In this role, I have oversight over the fantastic Denis Goldberg Scholarship, which is funded by Herriot Watt University, as well as a wider range of International focused programmes within the Challenges Group portfolio. On each of these, my responsibilities include project management, internal and external reporting, financial management supporting the growth of Challenges work in across the Group, engaging current and new partners, developing strong working relationships and ensuring new and continued sources of income.

In this role, I was focused on spreading the Agile mindset throughout the organisation, as well as guiding and coaching three diverse teams on how to maximise Agile/Scrum practices and values to become self-organized, cross-functional and to deliver value to the customers.The different contexts, requirements and agile maturity of each team required me to adapt a proactive and flexible approach, and transition swiftly between different roles (servant leader, coach, facilitator, teacher, mentor, manager and janitor) depending on the circumstances.Overall, I am most proud of my work in helping to build a trusting and safe environment within each team which allowed us to tackle challenges head on without fear of blame or judgement.

In this freelance role, I collaborated with the Education Team to analyse, streamline and develop internal processes to improve efficiency and transparency. I also delivered Agile workshops and support to Full Stack Development students during their bootcamps, and assisted internally with the incorporation of Agile practices to enhance productivity and cross-team collaboration.

In this role, I coached multiple remote international development teams transitioning into Scrum and Kanban and led on promoting and facilitating a greater alignment with Agile values and principles across the organisation.This involved leading productive daily standup meetings, planning and facilitating engaging retrospectives, backlog refinement meetings, sprint reviews and planning sessions, supporting Product Owners in user story writing and task prioritisation and providing regular progress reports to Business Teams.I also took it as my responsibility to build greater community among the teams and supporting the personal and professional development of all team members, through introducing fortnightly coaching and reflection sessions, group activities and fostering a safe space for discussion and dialogue.

Over the course of 18 months, I taught myself to code using Object-Oriented Principles and created a number of websites and single-page applications for a range of clients. In each of these projects I aimed to create a product that was fast, intuitive, dynamic, simple, striking and, crucially, designed for the requirements of its key users. While I eventually decided to move away from frontend development to follow the passion I discovered for Agile Coaching, I greatly value this experience for the technical knowledge I gained in HTML, CSS, SASS, React, Bootstrap, Javascript, jQuery and Git, the wider understanding I developed about the daily challenges of developers, as well as the resilience, creativity and determination to overcome roadblocks great and small that I discovered in myself every day,To see my completed and ongoing projects, you can visit https://github.com/stekaye.

I was responsible for marking Swahili examinations on a seasonal basis within tight deadlines. I also had the responsibility of checking future examination papers and providing recommendations before publication. Both roles require excellent attention to detail, organisation and time management.

Beara Beara is a vintage leather bag brand based in London and working sustainably with skilful craftsmen in Bolivia.I was contracted to lead on the sourcing of a new venue capable of hosting all elements of the business, including a new hospitality venture. I was then responsible for developing the hospitality section from conception to opening, which included developing the menu concept, recruiting and training staff, sourcing suppliers, marketing locally and renovating the space.

In partnership with the Mastercard Foundation, the University of Edinburgh provides full scholarships and transformative leadership training to support students from Sub-Saharan Africa with great leadership potential but few educational opportunities. The $27 million 7-year Scholars Program will provide 200 undergraduate, postgraduate and online postgraduate degrees with an emphasis on returning back on graduation.As Student Development Coordinator, I led on the design and delivery of comprehensive and holistic transformative leadership programming for undergraduate and postgraduate scholars. This included the creation of two groundbreaking summer schools, a comprehensive orientation week, a wide range of workshops, a leadership retreat and an innovative staff-student reflection scheme. I also provided personal pastoral care, sourced and developed long-lasting partnerships and created in-depth documentation.The Mastercard Foundation Team was nominated for the Outstanding Student Services category at the 2018 Times Higher Education Leadership and Management Awards (THELMAs).

After having successfully made the case for a four-week Tanzania based Summer School course, I was then employed to design, market and deliver the programme. Within a short timescale, I developed the curriculum, visited Tanzania to source and risk assess accommodation and transport suppliers, provided high quality photos and videos to the marketing team, recruited and trained local teachers, planned extra-curricular activities and ensured all was within budget. In country, I provided round-the-clock pastoral care to the international group of students, delivered lessons, facilitated and coordinated all logistics and activities, invigilated examinations and led reflection and team-building activities.

I was responsible for the creation, development and delivery of the first ever accredited Swahili courses as the University of Edinburgh. I took this project from the proposal stage and expanded the portfolio over time to include two undergraduate courses, two postgraduate courses, two summer school courses and two evening adult learning courses. Alongside this, I developed innovative and original lesson materials, two textbooks and fostered links with societies, local community organisations and East Africans living in Edinburgh. This led to a number of collaborative side projects, including Swahili interview skills training, an East African cooking day and the popular African Food Battle event.

World Challenge builds the life skills young people need to live a life of courage, kindness and adventure. The organisation sends over 8,000 students to over 40 destinations every year and is a market leader in in safety, quality, ethical community engagement and learning outcomes.I planned and developed a range of expeditions to Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. This involved comprehensive risk assessment, extensive collaboration with in-country agents and partners, a wealth of knowledge about the region, excellent attention to detail and a willingness to listen and engage with a wide range of feedback. In this role, I improved feedback drastically while also nurturing more impactful community engagement and reducing costs. Many of the expedition documents and innovations that that I initiated, such as a Kilimanjaro tree planting project, are still being used to this day.