StARS Programme Scrum Master - Academic Services - 98596 - Grade 8

Position Details

Academic Services

Location: University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham UK

Full time salary is normally in the range of £42,149 to £50,296. With potential progression once in post to £56,587

Grade 8

Full Time, Fixed term up to July 2024

Closing date: 10 April 2022

Our Offer To You

People are at the heart of what we are and do.   

The University of Birmingham is proud to have been a part of the City of Birmingham and the wider region for over 100 years, and we are equally proud to be recognised as a leading global university.  We want to attract talented people from across the city and beyond, support them to succeed, and celebrate their success. 

We are committed to helping the people who work here to develop through our sector-leading Birmingham Professional programme which provides all professional services staff with development opportunities and the encouragement to reach their full potential.  With almost 5,000 professional services jobs in a wide-range of functions in Edgbaston and in our campus in Dubai, there are plenty of opportunities for you to be able to develop your career at the University. 

We believe there is no such thing as a typical member of staff and that diversity is a source of strength that underpins the exchange of ideas, innovation, and debate.  We warmly welcome people from all backgrounds and are committed to fostering an inclusive environment where diversity is at the heart of who and what we are, and how we work. 

Supporting our people to achieve a healthy work/life balance is important both to our employees and to the success of the University and, depending on the role, we offer a variety of flexible working arrangements. We therefore welcome discussions on all forms of flexible working.  In addition, you will receive a generous package of benefits including 40 days paid holiday a year, one paid day a year for volunteering, occupational sick pay, and a pension scheme. We also have three high quality subsidised day nurseries. 

The University is situated in leafy Edgbaston and there are excellent transport links to our beautiful campus, including main bus routes and a train station on site.  On campus we have a state-of-the-art sports centre with pool, shops, places to eat and drink, our own art gallery, museum and botanical gardens. 

Find out more about the benefits of working for the University of Birmingham   

Role Summary

StARS+ (Student Administration Refresh and Simplification) is a University-wide programme to simplify, standardise and improve our student administration services, enabled by a replacement and upgrade of our student record system. Its vision is to deliver a better experience for students, academics and Professional Services staff; and enables a fundamental shift towards a more flexible set of capabilities and services that are fit for the future.

Reporting to the Programme Manager the StARS+ programme is looking to recruit a Scrum Manager (Reporting & Data Project) to join the Programme’s Team. The post holder will lead, develop and manage the sprint planning for the development of the reporting needs of the University in relation to the student data. In conjunction with senior colleagues, the Scrum Manager will also play a role in engagement, development, and implementation of the project as a whole. The post holder will be fully conversant with the institutional priorities and understand the technical nature associated with managing data across a complex institution. They will also ensure that the reporting and data approaches used in the StARS+ transformation programme are consistent with those being developed more broadly across the University.

This new post will focus on the Reporting and Data project within the programme ensuring the delivery of the reporting capability to support the University reporting needs in relation to its student administration and associated statutory reporting requirements. The role will need to work closely with IT Services and Strategic Planning so that the changes are aligned with the University reporting and governance arrangements and with the other Project Managers and Leads so that the individual operational reports arising from their projects are coordinated and delivered through a consistent framework and reporting capability. 

Main Duties

• Facilitate the daily stand-ups

• Facilitate a scaled SCRUM approach that co-ordinates multiple workstreams

• Organising and running sprint planning and retros

• Ensuring the backlog is ready for planning

• Aligning dependencies and resources across all sprint teams

• Creating and promoting Agile practise around the company

• Manage the scope and timeline for each sprint

• Coordinate sprints, retrospectives and daily stand-ups.

• Reporting and update to the Reporting and Data Project Manager on delivery and progress in line with the project plan

Consulting Others

• Facilitate internal communication and effective collaboration.

• Work with product owners to handle backlogs (in R and D case, this is likely to be a combination of the BA and others.)

• Help teams to implement changes effectively.

• To provide expert advice and guidance to all colleagues on implementation and related issues;

• To raise awareness of, and increase engagement with, activity to implement the StARS+ reporting and data project across the institution; 

• Any other duties as specified by the Programme Manager.

• Consultation as required with the Programme IT Architect’.

Decision Making/Problem Solving 

• Ensure deliverables are up to quality standards at the end of each sprint.

• Guide the development teams to higher scrum maturity.

• Resolve conflicts and remove obstacles that occur

• Help build an environment where team members 'own' the product 

• Be confident in supporting multiple scrum teams

Person Specification

•    A degree or demonstrable equivalent experience; 

•    Considerable technical project management experience, with a successful track record of managing projects within timescale and budget; 

•    Training and experience of Agile methodologies is highly essential, an Agile coach is desirable; 

•    Membership of a professional project management body is high desirable. 

•    Significant experience of either working in Higher Education and/or reporting and data related issues with an understanding of data governance mechanisms and data reporting concepts.

•    Significant Scrum Master Experience and a consequent understanding of deliverables, deadlines, and risk management; 

•    Significant experience in engaging, and collaborating, with external stakeholders; 

•    Significant experience of working in complex organisations and successfully working across matrix management structures; 

•    Knowledge and significant expertise in strategic planning and translating data into operational and strategic reporting frameworks and business intelligence; 

•    Ability to be responsive and adapt to rapidly changing circumstances, whilst maintaining delivery of core goals and priorities; 

•    Ability to manage multiple, concurrent, complex streams of work; 

•    Excellent interpersonal skills and the ability to achieve buy-in across a spectrum of stakeholders, adapting approaches to meet the different needs of Academic Services Divisions and Colleges; 

•    Credibility and gravitas to influence a range of colleagues across the University;

•    Ability to persuade and negotiate effectively with all stakeholders; 

•    Experience of working with academic colleagues in a Higher Education setting or similar;
 
•    Self-starting ability to research and master quickly the activity of a service or academic function and, with appropriate consultation and reflection, identify challenges and offer solutions;
 
•    High level of self-motivation and personal accountability with ability to plan and deliver goals to deadlines under pressure;

Informal enquiries can be made to Anna Best - [email protected]

Valuing excellence, sustaining investment 

We value diversity and inclusion at the University of Birmingham and welcome applications from all sections of the community and are open to discussions around all forms of flexible working.