Specialist Development - DevOps Release Manager

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Job Description:

Release Manager

Role:

The Global Release Management team is looking to add an experienced Release Manager (RM) to our growing team exclusively focused on DevOps best practices. To be successful in this role, you will need to understand how the role of a Release Manager has changed in organizations that are actively going through DevOps transformations.

The Release Manager will be responsible for release planning, scheduling, forecasting and execution of software development project(s). The role requires tight collaboration with different groups such as Development, Project Management, QA, DevOps and Operations Support.

The Release Manager will work closely with the Lead Developers, DevOps Engineers, and Release Managers from different portfolios across lines of business to manage release inter-dependencies, conflicts, risks and release integration.

Main Accountabilities:

Be accountable of the team’s coordination on implementation day, ensuring diligent and efficient resolution of possible last minutes issues

Develop common strategies for release governance across multiple departments and vendors to ensure there's a proper structure in place to allow different project teams to coordinate releases efficiently

Identify gaps including any DevOps tools insufficiencies

Track an enterprise-wide release calendar in partnership with change management

Measure release cadence and effectiveness

Create common standards and formats for release playbooks and work with operations to standardize release decision-making

Define common mechanisms for rollback and standards for capturing release-related performance indicators

Communicate with delivery leaders, test managers, development managers, and IT operations project and Agile Teams.

The RM must have the confidence to manage up and provide reporting as well as meeting updates to senior IT management and line of business.

Development of the Release Management Policy, Standards and processes as well as the integrated release schedules and plans.

Produce Deployment, Run Books, Implementation Plans and Weekly Release Reporting

Manage risks and resolves issues that affect release scope, schedule and quality

Conduct Release Readiness reviews, Milestone Reviews, and Business Go/No-Go reviews

Govern and help coordinate integrated releases, the number of releases to production will increase with the introduction of Agile and DevOps

Measure and monitor progress to ensure application releases are delivered on time, within budget and quality

Work with DevOps Specialist to understand impacts of branches and code merges

Continually work towards making improvements in the release process

Develops scripts and automation tools used to build, integrate, and deploy software releases to various platforms

Assist development team to resolve the build and release issues.

Coaching teams in effective use in ongoing adoption of build and deployment best practices.

Assisting with prioritization and resolution of defects/bugs.

Lead efforts to increase Release automation management.

Create and manage build and deployment implementation/release plan and schedule.

Support the application release from end to end to ensure releases are implemented on time and on budget.

Assume overall responsibility for release package artifacts and delivery.

Prepare status reports for management and stakeholders

Core Competencies:

Excellent verbal and written communication skills

Ability to liaise with internal and external stakeholders and adapt approach when dealing with technical and non-technical audiences

Ability to work both independently and as part of a strong, collaborative multi-site team

Excellent in organizing, planning and time management skills

Self-directed and proactive; thinking beyond the immediate problem with ability to analyze situations/problems systematically and deliver effective right-sized solutions in a timely manner

Possess an inherent passion for continuous improvement and innovation

Customer and results focused

Flexible and adaptable with the ability to align to changing priorities

Qualifications / Skills:

University Degree or College Diploma in a related discipline

7+ years of experience as release manager in both waterfall and Agile/DevOps project lifecycles.

Experience with automation tools and solutions for the release management function.

Experience with Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) best practices

Excellent organizational skills and ability to balance potentially conflicting priorities, and to track and monitor numerous commitments and activities.

Strong facilitation skills with experience in undertaking liaison and consultations with multiple stakeholders and interest groups.

Experience in liaising with clients/stakeholders where client service was a key focus to responding to queries, issues & risk management.

Has knowledge of product development and project life-cycle management

Knowledge of ITIL standards and best practices

Advanced written and verbal communication skills are a must

Assets:

Knowledge of the financial and insurance industries

Agile experience

Knowledge in scripting languages and tools such as Maven, Groovy, Jenkins, Bitbucket, Git, ANT, Docker, Ansible, WebLogic, Shell and Python

Knowledge of web technologies (e.g. JavaScript, AJAX, HTML5 and CSS), related protocols and standards (e.g. HTTP, SSL, SQL, XML)

Job Category:

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