Project Manager- Agile Specialist

Position Overview

Orion Group is seeking an experienced Project Manager III / Agile Specialist to support complex software development and engineering initiatives within a global pharmaceutical organization.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead Agile/Scrum ceremonies across multiple engineering teams, including daily stand-ups, sprint planning, backlog refinement, sprint reviews, and retrospectives.
• Drive continuous planning and maintain visibility into rolling quarterly plans, priorities, milestones, and delivery expectations.
• Maintain engineering team schedules and support resource planning by translating estimates into key milestone and delivery dates.
• Track project milestones, dependencies, risks, deliverables, and timelines to ensure programs remain on track.
• Identify and remove roadblocks that may impact engineering team progress or delivery.
• Coordinate communication and alignment across Engineering, Product, PMO, and other business stakeholders.
• Partner with Product and Engineering teams to manage, prioritize, and refine product backlogs.
• Ensure engineering teams have the appropriate product requirements, UX designs, and supporting information needed to meet delivery timelines.
• Serve as a key liaison between software development teams and external/business stakeholders.
• Manage and maintain team workflows within Jira, Confluence, and related Atlassian tools.
• Develop and monitor Agile performance metrics, including burndown charts, velocity, sprint progress, and delivery metrics.
• Use project and Agile metrics to identify risks, capacity concerns, bottlenecks, and opportunities to improve team performance.
• Promote Agile best practices and help teams continuously improve processes, productivity, and delivery.
• Support technical projects involving data engineering, AI/ML engineering, and software development.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Business, Information Technology, or a related field.
• 5+ years of experience working in an Agile environment, utilizing methodologies such as Scrum and/or Kanban.
• Demonstrated experience facilitating Agile/Scrum ceremonies for multiple teams.
• Strong technical project management experience supporting mid- to large-scale software development or technology initiatives.
• Prior experience partnering with Data Engineering and/or AI/ML Engineering teams throughout software development and delivery.
• Advanced proficiency with Atlassian tools, particularly Jira and Confluence.
• Experience managing project plans, engineering schedules, milestones, dependencies, risks, and competing priorities.
• Experience with backlog management, sprint planning, resource planning, and Agile delivery metrics.
• Strong understanding of software development and technical delivery processes.
• Excellent organizational, communication, stakeholder-management, and interpersonal skills.
• Strong problem-solving skills with the ability to adapt within a fast-paced, cross-functional environment.
• Ability to work independently while coordinating across technical and business teams.
• Must be able to consistently work Pacific Time hours.

Preferred Qualifications

• Hands-on experience with AI development/productivity tools such as Claude Code and/or Microsoft Copilot.
• Experience supporting AI/ML initiatives or AI-enabled software products.
• Experience working across multiple Agile engineering teams simultaneously.
• Familiarity with software engineering dependencies, technical requirements, UX/design handoffs, and product development workflows.

What We're Looking For

This position is best suited for someone who is more technical than a traditional non-IT project manager. The team needs an Agile delivery professional who understands how software engineering teams operate and can confidently work with developers, data engineers, AI/ML engineers, Product, and PMO stakeholders.

Top priorities

Agile/Scrum leadership • Jira & Confluence • Technical Project Management • Software Development/Delivery • Data Engineering & AI/ML Team Experience • Cross-Functional Stakeholder Management