Senior Agilist

Role Overview

Aptive is seeking a Senior Agilist to provide expert SAFe, Lean-Agile, and enterprise Agile implementation support for VA health informatics teams within the IHT 2.0 Field Informatics Service Health Practice program.

You will advise and coach teams in the IHP Agile Release Train (ART), strengthen Agile cadence and governance, and help teams deliver clinical informatics solutions that improve workflow efficiency and care quality.

Responsibilities

• Provide senior-level Agile and SAFe coaching, consulting, and implementation support across interdisciplinary VA health informatics teams.
• Support consistent adoption of SAFe and Lean-Agile practices, including:
  • PI Planning support
  • Team ceremonies
  • ART-level coordination
  • Dependency management
  • Continuous improvement
• Guide creation and refinement of Lean-Agile artifacts, including:
  • Lean business cases
  • Feature canvases, feature specifications
  • User stories and acceptance criteria
  • MVP definitions
  • Non-functional requirements
• Coach Agile roles and stakeholders (e.g., Scrum Masters, Product Owners, analysts, clinical informaticists, SMEs) on responsibilities, artifacts, and ceremonies.
• Help teams define and communicate:
  • Value delivery and performance metrics
  • Sprint outcomes
  • Risks and impediments
  • Retrospective actions
• Facilitate collaboration across VA stakeholders, product management, ART leadership, clinical SMEs, and technical resources.
• Support reporting and transparency using Jira and Jira Align (and related dashboards/reporting tools).
• Recommend Agile process improvements that enable operational excellence and sustainable organizational change.

Requirements (Minimum Qualifications)

• SAFe Practice Consultant (SPC) certification.
• 7+ years leading Agile and SAFe implementations in medium-to-large organizations.
• Proven enterprise experience adopting Agile.
• Experience consulting on large-scale Agile/Safe implementations.
• Experience coaching teams on SAFe Lean-Agile principles, ceremonies, backlog management, value delivery, and continuous improvement.
• Experience with Jira, Jira Align, or comparable Agile planning/reporting tools.
• Strong skills in executive communication, facilitation, change management, and stakeholder engagement.
• Ability to obtain and maintain a public trust clearance.
• Legal authorization to work in the U.S.

Nice to Have (Desired Qualifications)

• Experience supporting VA/VHA and/or Field Informatics / IHP ART / EHR modernization / clinical informatics and federal healthcare product teams.
• Experience with clinical informatics artifacts (e.g., lean business cases, feature canvases/specifications, performance dashboards, clinical workflow improvements).
• Healthcare technology experience (e.g., VistA/CPRS, Oracle Health/ Cerner, clinical decision support, terminology/standards, interoperability).
• Additional certifications such as SPCT, Release Train Engineer, SAFe Advanced Scrum Master, Product Owner/Product Manager, PMP, Prosci, CSM/PSM.
• Experience building Agile operating models, metrics/community of practice, playbooks/SOPs, or Agile maturity roadmaps.