Vandhana Mutharaja

PMP * PMI-ACP * ITIL * TKP * ICP-ACC * Six Sigma (GB) * CSP * PSM-I * PSPO * SAFe Agilist * ISTQB * ACP-100(JIRA Administration)
www.linkedin.com/in/vandhana-scrum-master-jira-administrator-6381144b

VSMLSS

CAREER OVERVIEW
• Over 10 years of experience working with groups, teams and organizations that use Waterfall and Agile for delivering
full life-cycle projects.
• Proficient in the application of agile software development methodologies in the development of robust systems that
deliver true business value. Strong proponent of mentoring and lifelong learning.
• Hands on experience in delivering SDLC Documents (Design Spec, SDD, QAP, Requirements Spec, SIT, UAT etc)
• Equally proficient as an Agile or Waterfall Practitioner with 8+ years of Scrum Master experience working with
executive leadership, business stakeholders, product owners, product managers improving process, thinking
strategically and building teams with excellent measurable and valuable business results.
• Consolidate and centralizes risks, assumptions, issues and dependencies using RAID Log.
• Strong experience in creating Project plans, Project Timelines, Gantt charts as per PMBOK standards.
• Administered the role of Scrum Master and having expertise in conducting Backlog refinement, Sprint planning, Daily
Scrum, and Sprint Review Meetings when using Scrum Methodology. Successfully implemented changes to Business
Processes, Systems and Technology, Job Roles and Organizational Structure.
• Supervised 3 Scrum Teams at a time and ensuring that team's success and progress are highly visible to Product
Owner and Stakeholders. Managed Project Backlogs, release scheduling, project duration estimation and forecasting.
• Strong experience in working with agile lifecycle, and/or tracking, and process management tools like Rally and JIRA.
Extensively used JIRA/Rally for maintaining User Story Hierarchy, Backlog Grooming, Updating Tasks, Connecting Rally
with Jira and Planning Iterations and Releases.
• Closely working with Q-CSV and SQA teams to maintain adherence to regulatory and compliance in GxP env/Non-GXP
environments.
• Business Analysis experience includes conducting JAD sessions, requirement gathering, documentation (Project
Charter, BRD, and FRD), diagramming data, process mapping (Use Case and Activity Diagrams) compiled detailed
project plan (to include resources, deliverable, milestones) and developed test plans and test case scenarios.
• Ensured engineering practices like Continuous Integration, TDD (Test Driven Development), Automated testing and
Pair Programming. Also involved in creating and reviewing test plan and test cases; manual testing and conducting
User Acceptance Testing.
• Proven experience in effectively prioritizing workload to meet deadlines and work objectives
• Strong organizational Skills & client orientationResponsible for providing estimation for the project deliverables and
resource allocation
• Involvement in full project life cycle (Requirements through Implementation) with delivery responsibility/ ownership.
• Managed mid to large projects, starting from Requirements gathering to Implementation phases.
• Customer Oriented with self-directing and self-motivating, technically competent and keeping abreast of
technology/business changes to make sure that the formulated/implemented solutions are relevant to the Business.
• Superior team building abilities that help to unite, guide and lead team members towards individual and common
work goals.

KEY EXPERTISE AREA

• Proposal/Project/ Management
• Team Management
• Methodologies - Project Management
• Resource Management
• Agile Project Management
• MS Project, Lean kit, CA Clarity PPM, TFS 2015

SKILLS

• Operating System: UNIX, Linux, Windows

• Programming Languages: C, Shell Script, Basic Python, Basic Java, C++
• Database: SQL, Oracle
• Agile Tools: Scrum, Kanban, SAFe, Version one, TFS (Team foundation Server), Leankit, JIRA, Confluence, Rally
• CA Clarity PPM, Open work bench. Service now
• MS-Office, Visio, MS-Project
• Devops

PM/Sr. Scrum Master

Client: FedEx, TN
Feb 2020 – Till Date
Leading three teams in LSSI Train(ART) which develop plans for and facilitate the migration from current to selected
future state by providing leadership to multiple initiatives for the Product, Location, and Geopolitical EFS as well as the
LSSI work.

• Facilitating sprint planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, Dev validation/ Story estimation, defect prioritization,
retrospective as Scrum master 
• Work with stake holders / product owners to prioritize the user stories for sprint
• Allow the stories into the sprint based on team velocity and individual capacity
• Encouraging the team for self-organization to boost the efficiency and coordination 
• Encouraging the team to come up with reusable elements and use the TDD, test automation and Peer review
• Motivated the team to come up with quality shippable product and meet the product goals. 
• Working with Product owner on Artifacts Such as Product Backlog, Spring Backlog, Sprint burn up / Burn-down, and
Release Burn up / Burn-down. 
• Help the product owners to come up with set of stories for better understanding for estimate and development.
• Tracks and reports status and other metrics against goals on an ongoing basis 
• Manage offshore team members in different geographical places. 
• Managing the overall performance and delivery of cross-functional 
• Co-ordinate with release team to align the sprint stories with release schedule
• Conduct Story estimation meetings on epic level as well as story level
• Assisted in implementing the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) in our organization and continue facilitating quarterly
program increment planning events across the organization.
• Working closely with cross-functional teams and resources to achieve program and project milestones within
established timeframes.
• Set up the Agile Release Train Synchronization meeting for all teams to discuss the status of the Program Increment
initiatives and resolve any cross-team dependencies.
• Work in partnership other Scrum Teams, Agile Release Trains and Value Streams as needed for planning and release
management.
• Interact with business users for better understanding of individual subject areas and modified specifications to user
needs. 
• Devised and prioritized the Product Backlog by conducting requirement churning sessions with various
Business/Product Teams.
• Introduced, drive and continuously improved team delivery via technical best practices such as automated testing,
refactoring, pair programming, test driven development, and continuous integration. Participated proactively in
developing and maintaining team standards, tools, and best practices.

PM/Sr. Scrum Master

Client: ETrade, Jersey City, NJ
July 2018 – Jan 2020
A flexible, scalable end-to-end wealth management solution company, designed to manage evolving client needs,
operate seamlessly in global markets, and drive high growth with improving efficiencies. The project was aimed to
provide a system for allocation asset-based portfolio and management provides model portfolios, which are selected by
correlation to investor’s responses to a questionnaire concerning time frames and risk tolerance.

• Facilitate Scrum ceremonies: Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review & Sprint Retrospective
• Thorough understanding of the way project activities contribute to achieving strategic business goals and operational
objectives.
• Responsible for coaching 3 scrum teams consisting of geographically distributed team members to build better
software and achieve faster time to market using Agile methodologies.
• Assisted in implementing the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) in our organization and continue facilitating quarterly
program increment planning events across the organization.
• Facilitated the organization’s move to a new change control process.
• Working closely with cross-functional teams and resources to achieve program and project milestones within
established timeframes.
• Assist the Lean Agile change agents in providing guidance to the teams around developing value-driven culture and
adopting Lean Agile practices.
• Work with the Executives across various teams such as Portfolio Planning, Change Management, Legal, Risk and
others to ensure the project is progressing as planned.
• Work in partnership other Scrum Teams, Agile Release Trains and Value Streams as needed for planning and release
management.
• Interact with business users for better understanding of individual subject areas and modified specifications to user
needs. 
• Devised and prioritized the Product Backlog by conducting requirement churning sessions with various
Business/Product Teams.
• Created and explained the User Stories to the Scrum Team and helped them design the tasks.
• Introduced, drive and continuously improved team delivery via technical best practices such as automated testing,
refactoring, pair programming, test driven development, and continuous integration. Participated proactively in
developing and maintaining team standards, tools, and best practices.

• Coach Agile values and principles to the team and business

• Facilitated Sprint Planning and Sprint review meetings for finalizing the Sprint Backlogs and Verifying the sprint
outputs respectively
• Expedited good sprint planning, helping the team in making appropriate commitments through story sizing and task
definition. Worked with the Product Owner to maximize ROI and attainment of project objectives Sprint reviews and
planning knowledge.

• Created Release Tracking Document in order to track the necessary changes.

• Participated in Business Demonstrations and Decisions for the Release of the Sprint Output to production.

Sr. Scrum Master

Client: NeoStrata, Princeton, NJ
Oct 2016 – June 2018
Led a team which developed a platform is an open architecture that can customize and integrate customer data in a
single environment where the application involved Document, Specification, and Cross capabilities
• Acted as a Agile Sr. Scrum Master in driving three parallel scrum teams as part of a major initiative for the program in
a GxP environment
• Working closely with the Stakeholders to understand the business requirements, timelines & delivery.
• Work closely with Product Owners, coordinating product backlog grooming and story estimation.
• Monitor the project progress and radiated the information to stake holders.
• Identify and mitigate team risks and impediments (Blocking Issues, Critical Defects) on daily basis.
• Deliver thorough testing reports that determined product quality and release readiness.
• Build quality metrics using Jira dashboard for stakeholders indicating progress on each project.
• Exhibits the behaviors of Lean-Agile Leader with a Lean-Agile Mindset. Helps the team embrace SAFe Core Values,
adopt and apply SAFe Principles, and implement SAFe practices.
• Provide guidance to assist the teams in constantly improving the quality of their deliverables and meeting the
definition of Done (DoD).
• Assist the team in preparation of ART activities, including PI Planning, System Demos, and the Inspect and Adapt.
• Guide the team in establishing normalized estimates and helps the team understand how to estimate User stories.
• Facilitated the Daily Scrum Meeting, Sprint Planning, Sprint Review and Retrospective.Present and discuss the burn-
down chart and the release burn-down chart.
• Defining the project goals / objectives, critical success factors, milestones and estimated risks.
• Ensure the scrum/development teams are practicing the core Agile principles of collaboration, prioritization, team
accountability and visibility.
• Assisting team with making appropriate commitments through story selection and task definition.
• Lead the development and maintenance of team standards, tools and best practices.
• Assisting in the identification and removal of impediments for scrum teams.
• Facilitate discussion and conflict resolution.
• Empowered the scrum teams to self-organize.
• Track and communicate team velocity and sprint/release progress
•  Produce project reports to Sponsor, Steering Committee and Management team through specified communication
(Meetings, Dashboards).
• Project status conveyed on a weekly basis via Status reports to all stakeholders, and Issues list tracked on a weekly
basis to close open items or report new ones.
• Ensuring project compliance as per the defined process with respect to audit findings

Sr. Scrum Master

Client: Toyota North America
June 2014 – Aug 2016
Supported retail systems division responsible for order management, customer profile management, and order
fulfillment and provisioning.

• Successfully handled role of Scrum master and having expertise in conducting story estimation, Sprint planning,
Daily Scrum, Sprint review and Retrospective meetings when using Scrum Framework. 
• Moderate Agile retrospectives, making them most pleasant for team members and focused on results, to bring teams
to an even higher level of performance.
• Managed all aspects of end to end release process. 
• Successfully managed Project Backlogs, Release Scheduling, Project duration estimation and forecasting. 
• Worked closely with Agile teams to understand their needs and make sure that the Rally tool meets those needs.
Provided guidance to the Agile teams on the Rally tool so it is used to maximum their efficiency. 
• Coaches and mentors Agile team members and provides constructive performance feedback.
• Trained and coached multiple development teams of 6-8 and management team to utilize Agile Methodology with
Scrum.
• Assisting Product owner’s with various activities including communicating updates and impediments as well as with
backlog grooming and release plan maintenance.
• Passionate about Scrum and helping organizations realize their agile potential. Building effective Scrum teams.
• Responsible for all facets of Scrum adoption and transformation while driving ongoing aggressive Scrum software
development schedule
• Helped the product owners to come up with set of stories for better understanding for estimate and development.
• Communicate with other management, engineers, product managers and support specialists on product issues.

Scrum Master
Client: Charter Communications
Jan 2011 – May 2014
Assisted to develop comprehensive business management solution designed to keep the total cost of ownership low by
supporting multiple technologies, databases, and operating systems.

• Provide visibility to team impediments/risks and help eliminate them 

• Facilitating sprint planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, Dev validation/ Story estimation, defect prioritization,
retrospective as Scrum master 
• Work with stake holders / product owners to prioritize the user stories for sprint
• Allow the stories into the sprint based on team velocity and individual capacity
• Encouraging the team for self-organization to boost the efficiency and coordination 
• Encouraging the team to come up with reusable elements and use the TDD, test automation and Peer review
• Motivated the team to come up with quality shippable product and meet the product goals. 
• Working with Product owner On Artifacts Such as Product Backlog, Spring Backlog, Sprint burn up / Burn-down, and
Release Burn up / Burn-down. 
• Help the product owners to come up with set of stories for better understanding for estimate and development.
• Tracks and reports status and other metrics against goals on an ongoing basis 
• Manage offshore team members in different geographical places. 
• Managing the overall performance and delivery of cross-functional 
• Co-ordinate with release team to align the sprint stories with release schedule
• Conduct Story estimation meetings on epic level as well as story level

Scrum Master
Client: Lincoln Financial Group
Oct 2009 – Dec 2010
The project developed a database application for the management consultants to track and manage the diversified
investment portfolios of their clients.

• Facilitated Scrum of Scrums for all time.

• Facilitated the Daily Scrum Meeting, Sprint Planning, Sprint Review and Retrospective.
• Provide visibility to team impediments, risks and helped them in removing.
• Assisted team with making appropriate commitments through story selection, sizing and task definition.
• Participated proactively in developing and maintaining team standards, tools and best practices reducing
development time by 35%.
• Coaches and mentors team members and provide constructive feedback.
• Worked closely with Product Owner and Stakeholders to prioritize the requirements in a sprint.
• Drew strategy of Release plans for product backlogs, created sprint back logs according to the release cycles and
estimated hours of work for user stories, reviewed the Burn down chart to target the delivery dates for each sprint,
and facilitated daily stand up meetings.
• Designed Solutions as per Business needs that included Designing Site Architecture, Site Navigation, Reports,
Dashboards, Views etc.
• Motivate the team to come up with quality shippable product at the end of each sprint.
• Tracks and report team velocity, team capacity and software quality and other metrics against goal on ongoing basis.
• Performed requirement traceability to ensure all the planned requirements are developed and validated and
documented.
• Representing the team to report overall project status and upcoming risks and suggest solution about it.
Test Lead
Aug 2008 - Sep 2009

• Facilitating sprint planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, defect prioritization, retrospective as Tester/Scrum master.
• Conduct the agile ceremonies such as Sprint Planning, Daily stand up, Retrospective and Backlog grooming.
• Preparing functional and regression test cases and executing test cases.
• Prepared Test Plan and Test Cases based on Business Requirements Document Responsible for writing Test Summary
Report.
• Worked with Project Owners to review, triage, and prioritize all new Jira items into corresponding queues and
escalate issues and update stakeholders as appropriate. Own JIRA issue tracking tool, including workflow
customization and reporting. Produced and communicated Sprint and issue-related metrics.
• Managing teams toward implementation of two or more successful releases to production each month across
verticals.
• Timely reporting of the major impediments/blockers to Product owners and other scrum masters in SOS and
leadership meetings.
• Coach and guide Product Owner and team members through the agile ceremonies.
• Demonstrate expertise in Rally while measuring velocity and identifying achievable challenges for Scrum teams.
• Foster positive relationships with team members and managers within highly matrixed organization.
• Build project wiki pages using Confluence and provide training to managers and colleagues.
• Create Work Item for every release and update milestones with the planned and completed status of that cycle.
• Follow key metrics such as burn up, burn down, cumulative flow and velocity.
• Involved in system testing, Integration testing, Regression testing and provided UAT testing support.
• Generated defect reports, weekly status reports etc
• Ensure that the testing done is compliant to quality standards.
• Coordinated and prioritized outstanding defects and enhancement/system requests based on business requirements,
allowing sufficient time frame to ensure accuracy and consider deadlines.
• Ensure that the testing done is compliant to quality standards.
• Coordinated and prioritized outstanding defects and enhancement/system requests based on business requirements,
allowing sufficient time frame to ensure accuracy and consider deadlines.

Education:
Master of Business Administration -2007, Alagappa University, Tamilnadu, India

Bachelor of Science in Microbiology, 2005, University of Madras, Tamilnadu, India