Christopher Sykes Email and Phone Number

I am so proud of my time as a Scrum Lead at Measures For Justice (MFJ). We were able to deliver three Commons, including one for my home county. We were also able to deliver on many smaller product initiatives that improved the experience for our users (implementing a mobile experience), as well as deliver some significant internal improvements that have made the Commons stack easier to maintain (converting UI elements to Material UI and simplifying the code base).My experience as a Scrum Lead at MFJ also includes the following:- Facilitated Agile ceremonies and retrospectives, working closely with the team and Product Owner to plan sprints, organize backlogs, and improve processes.- Planned and prioritized team work based on product roadmap. - Delivered multiple large efforts on time with full scope features. - Empowered the team through servant leadership. - Represented the team in external meetings, reporting on key metrics and elevating concerns to leadership for process improvement.- Resolved interpersonal conflicts and removed obstacles to ensure team success, while fostering a supportive and collaborative team environment.- Collaborated with people managers to provide individualized support for team members and celebrated achievements through demos to stakeholders.- Collaborated with development and UX teams to ensure feature updates and bug fixes met project standards and matched the final product vision.- Partnered with the Project Manager to enhance meeting facilitation skills, contributing to the successful delivery of products like MeasuresForJustice.org and Community Commons/Dashboards.

Measures for Justice (MFJ) is leading a movement to change the future of criminal justice by developing data tools and products that help communities, including the institutions that serve them, reshape how the system works. MFJ has partnered with agencies and communities, created products and dashboards, provided services, and led research to help create a criminal justice system that is fully transparent, accessible, and accountable.I was hired by MFJ as a Quality Assurance Engineer. Being part of a small, not for profit was a new and exhilarating experience for me. I was tasked with supporting the product engineering team. As we worked our focus was on not only creating a high quality experience, but also an accessible one. Commons was meant to be accessible to an average community member as well as a criminal justice practitioner, so that meant a lot of attention and care went into the user experience. It was a new and challenging opportunity, but I was able to work on a team of people that supported and allowed me to thrive.My time in QA included the following:- Work with UX team ensure finished product match their vision.- Carefully tested new features and collaborated with development to resolve defects.- Conducted thorough regression testing, identified and prioritized defects, and helped establish QA best practices and an organized artifact library.- Act as interim Scrum Lead running Agile ceremonies and organize and prepare work for the team.

L3Harris Technologies is the Trusted Disruptor in the defense industry. With customers’ mission-critical needs always in mind, our employees deliver end-to-end technology solutions connecting the space, air, land, sea and cyber domains in the interest of national security. My team was tasked with verifying updates to radio hardware as well as the system software and cryptographic software. I was able to gain Secure clearance and in order to do the final testing for NSA approval. At this time, L3Harris was working to implement Agile methodiligies into their development process. One of the reasons I was selected was to assist the team familiarize with the processes.My experience at L3Harris included:-Tested Linux-based platform software and 13 unique waveforms, writing and updating manual tests to meet new feature requirements.-Recreated customer test environments to identify and resolve defects, documenting failures and collaborating with development teams on fixes.-Provide the final testing to approve new Cryptographical Software for final NSA approvals.-Worked with automation developers to design and verify new automated tests. -Advocate for myself and my team to help prioritize defects with development teams.-Contributed to the implementation of Agile testing methodologies.-Managed testing equipment inventory, provided status updates to management, and advocated for defect prioritization across development teams.

My time at Paychex was critical for my development. I grew as test engineer with opportunities to work in web apps as well as native mobile apps. My team also brought Selenium as an automation tool to Paychex. But nothing was more impactful that my introduction to Agile development methodology. My team was the first to learn and implement Agile at Paychex. We were able to be trained and coached as we worked through the bumps of completely overhauling the way we work. But I can say that something clicked for me in Agile that make me excited to get back to work! I can say I have never lost this excitement and drive to examine and improve the way I work.My time at Paychex also included the following:-Work with analysts and product owner to be sure that the customer’s needs are accounted for and a high quality user experience is provided.-Represent test engineering in meetings with analysts to write requirements.-Translate requirements into test plans prior to development therefore avoiding unnecessary defects.-Worked as Test Lead for Time and Attendance project team.-Responsible for creating the automation strategy for Time and Attendance project team when new Selenium based application (TAF) was implemented.-Create and organize reusable automation artifact repositories.-Plan and write automated sanity and regression tests.-Coordinated local testers as well as testers in Arizona and India to fully test new features. This required being available at all hours of the day and clear, efficient communication.-Provide live demonstrations to stakeholders.-Represented test engineering for overnight production deploys. Worked hard to quickly diagnose and resolve any issues to prevent code from being rolled back.-Mentor new team members. -Stepped in as the test lead on a time box effort to create a data handling tool for our service center. Development and Test Engineering combined to deliver a far more robust tool than was initially thought possible.

Xerox is continuing its legacy of innovation to deliver client-centric and digitally-driventechnology solutions and meet the needs of today’s global, distributed workforce. From theoffice to industrial environments, our differentiated business and technology offerings andfinancial services are essential workplace technology solutions that drive success for our clients.Xerox was where I first learned that I have real energy for QA. Finding bugs and trying to figure out how to recreate and diagnose them was exciting to me, and I learned that I was good at it. I also learned how communicate with technical and non-technical leadership, how advocate for the work my team and I were doing, and how to operate within a product development lifecycle. I learned how to be meticulous with my documentation and how to organize and prioritize work based on the needs set my leadership. My time at Xerox really helped me take my first steps down twisting career path.Xerox experience included:-Managed test planning and execution for Xerox print software and hardware, ensuring thorough testing across various machine configurations and prioritizing over 100 test plans based on known issues and customer concerns.-Ran and maintained the software testing lab, troubleshooting hardware, conducting interviews, and mentoring new test engineers. Recognized by management for exceptional work on initial testing and documentation of new technology.-Collected and analyzed test data, collaborating with developers to prioritize defect fixes and feature enhancements, and meticulously documented problems and work-around procedures.-Selected to test a prototype Print Module, documenting findings and collaborating with developers, and contributed to writing the final product manual.-Worked with software developers to recommend features that would allow the software to be more efficient for the system and the user.