Description

At VMLY&R, we create connected brands. We resist the usual ways of seeing, doing and thinking - harnessing creativity, technology and culture - to reimagine the entire connected consumer experience. Our goal? To create work that becomes part of people's lives, to drive value for our clients and, in the best of cases, to impact the world.

VMLY&R is looking for experienced Senior Project Manager who can quickly understand our clients' needs and objectives and has the ability to efficiently translate them into clear and concise user stories and acceptance criteria to be consumed by our teams. The senior manager will help client stakeholders, product owners, and agile teams communicate effectively throughout each stage of a project. VMLY&R needs individuals who are proactive problem solvers that can manage team dynamics, manage project financial performance, clearly communicate status, and drive progression towards dates.
Responsibilities

Business Analysis

• Client business practices and operations
• Problem statement
• Business key performance indicators (KPI) and Definition of Success
• Business, functional, and non-functional requirements (user stories). Non-functional requirements include, but not limited to: security, scalability, performance, SEO, and accessibility
• Work with client product owners and stakeholders to efficiently, clearly and concisely document
• Coordinate story mapping or other requirements gathering sessions
• Organize and lead product demonstrations regularly
• May function as a client proxy for agile teams
• Works with client product owner to set priority, build roadmaps, and facilitate working sessions

Requirements Analysis

• Work with agile teams to groom and refine user stories and acceptance criteria to meet the agile team's definition of ready.
• Annotate wireframes and/or creative to provide all needed detail for execution
• Decompose or combine stories to support effective execution
• Ability to communicate technical domain specific information to non-technical peers

Project Management

• Establishes dates required for completion of activities and evaluates impact of change to the overall timeline.
• Manages progress and identifies risks, issues and gaps that could impact timelines, and goals of services.
• Removes impediments from the working delivery team.
• Provides accurate and frequent status to internal teams on a regular basis.
• Manages resourcing based on project needs.
• Provides necessary external status reporting to clients as needed.

Team Leadership

• Facilitate understanding of clients' environment to properly set up project teams, identify needed documentation, and setup status reporting
• Collaborate with agile team and leadership to produce estimates and timelines for various possible solutions
• Work with agile teams and product owners to define release plans
• Create exceptional quality project setup documents detailing scope, assumptions, success criteria, risks, and communication strategy
• Proactively work with agile teams to eliminate blockers and impediments
• Facilitate team retrospectives, stand ups, and sprint planning sessions
• Proactively identifies dependencies and issues between teams and facilitates resolution
• Tracks project scope changes, delivery timing, and key project metrics
• Communicates project progress, changes, and risks internally and externally
• Quickly learn the basics of a given industry as needed to support client work
• Mentor and support Business Systems Analysts
• Adhere to and evangelize VMLY&R standard processes, tools and guidelines

Quality

• Perform desk checks and ad hoc testing before, during, and after quality assurance and user acceptance testing occurs
• Perform regular post-production deployment checks

As part of the WPP Group, VMLY&R offers one of the best overall compensation packages in the business.
Required Skills & Experience

• College degree or Business Systems Analyst experience
• Bachelor's degree in business administration, computer science, computer information systems, marketing, or equivalent experience, preferred
• 5+ years of analyst, project management, technical, and/or business experience
• Understanding of agile software development methodologies, specifically Scrum
• Experience in running or working with agile teams (preferably Scrum)
• Certified Scrum Master or Certified Scrum Product Owner, preferred
• Understanding of business requirements, user stories, and acceptance criteria
• Ability to break down and simplify complex problems and systems into smaller and more consumable components
• Ability to provide proactive and assertive servant leadership in problem solving, managing financial success of projects, maintaining timelines, and reducing waste
• Strong interpersonal skills and able to resolve conflict with productive outcomes
• Ability to be an effective and valuable part of a team
• Ability to effectively work across departments with diplomacy and a firm understanding of other's roles and perspectives
• Able to view problems in context at the system level and align solutions with the strategic direction of our clients and company.
• Proactive, adaptable, and flexible
• Life-long learner, demonstrated commitment to continuous improvement
• Strong attention to detail
• Demonstrable ability to operate under tight deadline with complex business/technical solutions
• Ability to work across multiple projects
• Ability to manage workload with minimal supervision
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Experience with at least one application lifecycle management solution
• Working knowledge of JIRA and Confluence, preferred

VMLY&R is an equal opportunity employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, race, color, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.