Specialist, Agile Lead - NF

If you’re passionate about innovation and love working in an environment where you can constantly improve and adopt new technologies to drive business results, then Nationwide’s Technology team could be the place for you! At Nationwide®, “on your side” goes beyond just words. Our customers are at the center of everything we do and we’re looking for associates who are passionate about delivering extraordinary care.

This will be an Agile Leader within NFT SES, serving the Partner Express agile line within NFT IDS. Partner Express is a strategic integration and data‑sharing platform that productizes and automates standardized feeds between Nationwide and external distribution partners, making complex life, annuity, and retirement data consumable and significantly reducing cycle time for standard data‑sharing requests.

This line is also part of the flagship AI-DLC initiative and will need to help manage AI tooling evaluations and reporting progress.

This role will be a hybrid role based out of our Columbus, OH office, as the team comes in two days a week on Mondays and Tuesdays.

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This role does not qualify for employer-sponsored work authorization.  Nationwide does not participate in the Stem OPT Extension program.

Job Description Summary

If you’re enthusiastic about delivering secure technology solutions to support a company providing extraordinary care to its customers, then Nationwide Technology is the place for you. Nationwide's industry-leading technology workforce embraces an agile work environment and a collaborative culture to deliver outstanding solutions and results. If that sounds like something you aspire to, we want to hear from you!

As an Agile Lead you will facilitate a robust, self-organized line responsible for building and/or enhancing software with high quality. You’ll collaborate to deliver objectives through structured planning, and use appropriate software delivery practices (e.g., scrum, iterative, Lean) to continuously improve software delivery efficiency and quality. You will be key in guiding delivery from story card creation to implementation and participate in user communities to learn and implement optimal practices.

Job Description

Key Responsibilities:

• Coaches and mentor team members on Agile practices and principles.

• Removes impediments to the team’s progress; escalate obstacles requiring outside resolution.Identifies risks and issues that might have an impact on delivery and facilitates a mitigation strategy.

• Applies secure software and systems engineering practices throughout the delivery lifecycle to ensure our data and technology solutions are protected from threats and vulnerabilities.

• Assists in the prioritization of work to maximize value towards business outcomes.

• Collaborates with the Agile Team(s) to provide guidance in the areas of analysis, design, development, testing, automation, and deployment while ensuring the best capability practices are used.

• Guides and enables DevOps, DataOps, AI/MLOps through the adoption and refinement of Agile practices.

• Monitors and reports on team progress and performance through enterprise and industry metrics while maintaining data quality supporting metric accuracy.

• Collaborates with team and leadership on demand and financials. Actively participates in variable staffing functions for the line.

• Facilitates team cadences (e.g., retrospective, daily standups, and show-and-tell meetings) to encourage collaboration, communication, and feedback within the team; promote a learning culture and challenge the team to be innovative.

May perform other responsibilities as assigned.

Reporting Relationships: Reports to Manager/Director.

Typical Skills and Experiences:

Education: Undergraduate studies in computer science, management information systems, mathematics or related field is preferred. Agile certification (Certified ScrumMaster – CSM, SAFe ScrumMaster Certification - SSM, Professional ScrumMaster Certification - PSM) is a plus.

Experience: Typically, three or more years of experience with ALM tools, Microsoft Office Suite and working on an Agile team.

Knowledge, Abilities and Skills: Strong candidates will have an understanding of Agile practices and frameworks, including Scrum, Kanban and Lean, Ability to coach team members and have team first mindset.  Effective communication, solid problem solving skills and a pr