Rabia Hashmi
Lead Scrum Master | IT Project Manager | Agile Delivery Leader
Rockwall,TX
Summary
- SAFe® Certified Lead Scrum Master and IT Project Manager with 10+ years of experience leading Agile transformations, enterprise project delivery, and cross-functional teams across Fortune 500 financial services, retail, and technology organizations.
- Proven expertise in SAFe, Scrum, and Kanban methodologies, successfully managing multiple Agile Release Trains (ARTs), large-scale programs, and distributed teams while delivering complex enterprise initiatives on time and within budget.
- Experienced in facilitating PI Planning, Sprint Planning, Daily Stand-ups, Backlog Refinement, Retrospectives, Scrum of Scrums, and Release Planning, driving continuous improvement and Agile maturity across organizations.
- Strong leadership background in stakeholder management, cross-team dependency resolution, risk mitigation, executive reporting, and delivery governance, ensuring alignment between business objectives and technology execution.
- Hands-on expertise with Jira, Jira Align, Confluence, Azure DevOps, Rally, ServiceNow, Power BI, Miro, and Microsoft Teams, enabling Agile planning, portfolio tracking, workflow optimization, and executive-level reporting.
- Demonstrated success in improving team velocity, backlog quality, sprint predictability, release efficiency, and Agile metrics through coaching, process optimization, and servant leadership.
- Extensive experience delivering enterprise solutions within Banking, Financial Services, Brokerage, Retail, and Digital Transformation environments, supporting cloud, web, mobile, Salesforce, and enterprise application initiatives.
- Recognized for fostering high-performing Agile teams, mentoring Scrum Masters and Product Owners, and driving a culture of collaboration, accountability, and continuous improvement through data-driven decision-making.
Overview
4
4
Certifications
10
10
years of professional experience
Work History
Lead Scrum Master
Fidelity Investments
06.2022 - 05.2026
- Led 50+ member monitoring and trading vertical (4 squads: 3 webs, 1 mobile), driving alignment, resolving cross-team dependencies, and standardizing Agile practices
- Drove quarterly planning execution for 4 teams, ensuring 100% readiness with clearly defined objectives and validated dependencies, reducing mid-quarter scope creep by 20%
- Directed Agile delivery for Angular-based applications, overseeing development, testing, and release coordination, successfully delivering 50+ enterprise releases on time and within budget
- Orchestrated a high-impact GraphQL to Keel migration, coordinating cross-team execution and proactively managing risks and dependencies
- Owned end-to-end delivery lifecycle, including backlog refinement, feature decomposition, and dependency mapping, improving execution efficiency.
- Built executive dashboards (Jira, Power BI) to provide visibility into delivery health, progress, and key risks for stakeholders.
- Facilitated stakeholder demos and product showcases, improving transparency, engagement, and alignment.
- Built and optimized Jira Scrum boards and workflows for multiple teams, reducing carryover work by 30% and improving cycle time from 11 to 7 days.
- Implemented Agile process improvements (backlog hygiene, Definition of Done, dependency tracking) to enhance team efficiency and delivery consistency
- Coached senior team members on Agile principles, establishing team working agreements to improve collaboration, accountability, and performance
- Guided leadership and Product Owners on proactive backlog planning by driving early Epic definition ahead of quarterly planning, reducing sprint scope changes by ~25% and increasing predictability from 70% to 90%
- Key Projects: Auto Investment (Trading) | Tax Document Monitoring | Fully Paid Lending | Options & Margin Agreements | Dividends & Capital Gains
Scrum Master / Project Manager
Synchrony Bank
03.2020 - 07.2022
- Managed Agile delivery for enterprise financial technology initiatives in a regulated banking environment, managing cross-functional teams and stakeholder communications.
- Ensured backlog readiness by maintaining a pipeline of high-priority, well-defined work for the next 2–3 sprints and managing dependencies through a dedicated board to enable uninterrupted delivery
- Partnered with Product Owners and SMEs to develop and execute feature roadmaps aligned to business priorities
- Coordinated work across globally distributed teams and stakeholders in a fast-paced, compliance-driven environment
- Strengthen team collaboration and communication by facilitating retrospectives, planning sessions, and leadership reviews to improve efficiency and outcomes each sprint
- Led Agile delivery for Salesforce initiatives across Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, and Experience Cloud, partnering with product and engineering teams to drive end-to-end execution.
Scrum Master
7-Eleven
01.2018 - 03.2020
- Supported customer-facing platform enhancements with CRM-like features, improving user experience and engagement.
- Led a cross-functional team of 10 through full Agile ceremonies including sprint planning, daily standups, retrospectives, and backlog grooming.
- Managed sprint execution, backlog readiness, and delivery transparency for website enhancement projects impacting customers
- Enforced Agile methodology and coached team members on best practices to improve delivery consistency and team accountability
- Oversee key delivery artifacts, including quarterly planning prep, team objectives, JIRA board management, and risk tracking to support planning and execution
Scrum Master
Meijer
03.2016 - 12.2017
- Facilitated Agile ceremonies and supported technology project delivery for cross-functional teams
- Managed sprint execution, backlog readiness, and stakeholder communication in a retail technology environment
- Drove continuous improvement through retrospectives and team health assessments
- Proactively identified and removed impediments per sprint, implementing a structured impediment log in Jira and confluence that decreased average impediment resolution time.
- Created and maintained Agile dashboards and sprint metrics in Jira and Confluence, providing stakeholders with real-time visibility into team progress, risks, and release readiness.
- Coordinated User Acceptance Testing (UAT) and defect triage activities with QA and business.
Education
Bachelor of Business Administration -
University of Karachi
Skills
- Agile Frameworks: SAFe Agile, Kanban, Scaled Agile
- ALM / Project Tools: Jira, Jira Align, Confluence, Rally, Azure DevOps, ServiceNow
- Collaboration Tools: Miro, Mural, Microsoft Teams, Zoom Whiteboard, Slack
- Agile Practices: PI Planning, Scrum of Scrums, Sprint Planning, Daily Stand-ups, Retrospectives, Backlog Refinement, Sprint Reviews, Servant Leadership
- Reporting & Metrics: Velocity Tracking, Burndown Charts, Flow Metrics, Agile KPIs
- Testing: UAT Coordination, Test Planning and Test case Review, Regression testing, Defect Triage and Root Cause Tracking
- Release Management Tools: PlanIt, Mario, DevOps Awareness, SDLC
Certification
Certified Scrum Master (CSM)
Timeline
Lead Scrum Master
Fidelity Investments
06.2022 - 05.2026
Scrum Master / Project Manager
Synchrony Bank
03.2020 - 07.2022
Scrum Master
7-Eleven
01.2018 - 03.2020
Scrum Master
Meijer
03.2016 - 12.2017
Bachelor of Business Administration -
University of Karachi