Content

Purpose

The RTE is a servant leader and a coach for the ART.

They facilitate the ART events and processes. Assists the teams in delivering value by fostering their Agile best practices.
The RTE works in strong collaboration with Product Management, System Architect, as well as stakeholders, Scrum Masters and Product Owners. They are in charge of making the whole train evolve and improve continuously to deliver the best value in the most sustainable time frame.

Key accountabilities

  • Managing the steps to deliver the ART flow of value
  • Ensures the aligning of ART activities with the organization's strategic goals
  • Guide towards Agile Best Practices making sure the train adheres to its values and artifacts.
  • Ensure consistency for the deliverables across all scrum/virtual teams of the train
  • Enables and foster close cooperation across all roles.
  • Responsible to organise and schedule the program increments (PIs)
  • Responsible to organise and schedule the program increments (PIs) reviews
  • Guides the ART teams and the stakeholders in understanding  their role in the ART 
  • Helps manage ART risks and its mitigations often related with budgeting and productivity.
  • Monitor and report the train Progress and Commitment, produce dashboards to communicate progress during sprint and during the year to all stakeholders, produce and communicate release notes to all relevant stakeholders
  • Consolidate ART capacity planning
  • Guarantees that all ART members are dedicated according to the recommendation
  • Promote and encourages knowledge sharing within the ART. 
  • Encouraging teams within the ART to collaborate  to meet goals.
  • Organize ART Knowledge Corner sessions 
  • Promoting improvement through inspect and adapt (I&A) events after PI completions

Skills needed

  • Animation & Facilitation – Must be able to animate and facilitate discussion and alternatives or different approaches. Encourage the flow of information and creativity between individuals and through the train.

  • Assertiveness – Must be able to ensure Agile concepts and principles are respected, must be able to be a voice of reason and authority.

  • Feedback and continuous improvement attitude – Ability to foster feedback exchanges, break habits and foster experiments

  • Communication – Ability to express ideas / views and passes on information in an open and honest manner which is clear and which others understand. Receptive to others’ ideas / views. Able to promote Feedback Culture – Be able to talk as a train.

  • Working together – Understanding ourselves and moderating our responses – Talking effectively and empathizing accurately, - Building relationships of trust, respect and productive interactions – Promote balance team members participation/visibility

  • Attitude of empowerment – Must be able to encourage teams to self-organize and all contributors to empower the group

  • Situationally Aware – Must be aware to coordinate and anticipate potential issues as they arise, coordinating their solving with the teams [s] (even outside the train) and elevate them to management if needed

  • Attitude of transparency – Must desire to bring disclosure and transparency to the stakeholders [R&D and Business] about development and foster trust

  • Motivator/Perseverance – Ability to maintain effective motivation in the face of setbacks or difficult situations

  • Conflict and Change Management – Demonstrates capacities to handle conflicts within the train and to support the group in the agile journey

Who should hold the position?

The RTE should have a solid scrum background, a strong Agile experience and feedback culture.

The position requires very good soft skills, especially in: change management, communication, active listening, conflict management, problem identification and decision-making.

Scrum Master certification required and Product Owner certification recommended.

Typical profiles

  • Senior Scrum Master
  • Agile Coach
  • Program and Project Manager (with strong Agile experience)

Time dedicated to the position

100%

Training Curriculum

  • Agile Fundamentals & Scrum Basics
  • Professional Scrum Master
  • Professional Scrum Product Owner
  • Agile Scrum for new teams
  • Change management
  • SAFe for RTE or SAFe Program Consultant (SPC)

Common Anti-Patterns for RTE

  • Telling the teams how to organize and improve
  • Being too polite and shy: not courageous to challenge teams, other ART roles or stakeholders
  • Allowing external ART disruptions
  • Focus on content rather than process
  • Lack of commitment: not ensuring frequent and effective PI events