Kathy K
Edinburgh,UK
Summary
Security Cleared (SC) Delivery Manager with 18+ years of experience delivering complex digital, business and policy change across UK Government, Financial Services and Retail sectors. Experienced in leading multidisciplinary teams through Discovery, Alpha and Live Service delivery, working collaboratively across policy, business, user-centred design and technical communities.
Proven ability to coordinate cross-functional teams, manage dependencies, risks and governance, and deliver business-critical outcomes in complex, regulated environments. Successfully led the transition of three live HMRC services to Accenture with zero service disruption and currently driving delivery activities for a major DWP Policy Reform programme.
Recognised for building trusted stakeholder relationships, fostering collaborative team cultures and enabling the successful delivery of complex change through Agile ways of working and continuous improvement.
Overview
2027
2027
years of professional experience
1
1
Certification
Work history
Delivery Manager – DWP Policy Reform Programme
DWP
2025.06 - Current
- Leading delivery activities for a major Policy Reform programme through Discovery and Alpha phases.
- Coordinating delivery across a multidisciplinary team of approximately 15 professionals including Business Analysts and UCD specialists.
- Establishing impact assessment approaches to identify cross-service impacts, integration dependencies and operational hand-offs.
- Facilitating stakeholder workshops, walkthroughs and design reviews.
- Managing risks, assumptions, dependencies and planning activities across multiple workstreams.
- Supporting roadmap development, estimation and prioritisation activities.
Delivery Manager – HMRC
HMRC
2023.03 - 2025.05
- Led supplier transition of three live HMRC services to Accenture, achieving a seamless migration with zero business disruption.
- Led delivery across three service workstreams supporting services generating approximately £5.8M annually.
- Line managed and supported approximately 40 professionals including engineers, testers, UCD specialists and delivery practitioners.
- Managed workforce planning, onboarding, forecasting and resource allocation.
- Coordinated sprint planning, governance, release management and delivery assurance.
- Delivered security improvements, change requests and technical debt initiatives while maintaining live service performance.
Scrum Master
Specsavers
- Facilitated Agile delivery across multiple product teams, driving sprint planning, reviews, retrospectives and backlog refinement.
- Partnered with three Product Owners to balance competing priorities and align sprint goals with business objectives.
- Managed delivery progress using Jira, providing transparency of risks, dependencies and delivery commitments.
- Coached teams on Agile principles and continuous improvement, promoting effective collaboration and self-organisation.
- Worked with development teams to strengthen Definition of Done and improve quality standards.
- Proactively managed delivery risks and impediments, escalating where appropriate to maintain delivery momentum.
- Fostered a collaborative environment to enhance team performance.
- Resolved conflicts for improved team dynamics.
- Liaised between business and technical teams, bridged communication gap.
- Led sprint planning sessions, ensured alignment with business objectives.
Scrum Master
Macy's Transportation
- Supported Agile delivery across transportation technology initiatives, facilitating Scrum ceremonies and release activities.
- Collaborated with Product Owners to maintain prioritised backlogs and deliver incremental business value.
- Coached delivery teams on Agile principles and best practices to improve team effectiveness.
- Identified and removed delivery impediments to maintain sprint objectives.
- Produced delivery reporting and supported release planning activities.
- Fostered collaboration between business and technical stakeholders.
Test Lead
Royal London
- Led quality assurance activities within Agile delivery teams, supporting sprint planning and estimation.
- Collaborated with Business Analysts and developers through Three Amigos sessions to improve requirements quality.
- Delivered functional, API and automation testing across multiple environments.
- Established data-driven API testing approaches and supported automation framework development.
- Managed defect lifecycles and communicated delivery risks through Agile ceremonies.
- Supported sprint reviews and environment readiness activities to improve delivery quality.
Education
Bachelor of Technology - Biotechnology
Vellore Institute Of Technology
Vellore, IndiaSkills
Agile Delivery
- Delivery Planning
- Dependency Management
- Risk & Issue Management
- Resource Planning
- Continuous Improvement
GOVERNMENT SERVICE DELIVERY
- Discovery
- Alpha
- Policy Reform
- Governance & Assurance
- Stakeholder Engagement
- Service Transformation
DELIVERY MANAGEMENT
- Service Transition
- Supplier Management
- Live Services
METHODS & TOOLS
- Scrum
- Kanban
- Jira
- Confluence
- Azure DevOps
Certification
- Professional Scrum Master (PSM)
- ISTQB Advanced Test Manager
- IBM Certified Database Associate – DB2 11
- AINS 21 Property and Liability Insurance Principles
Key Acheivements
· Leading delivery activities for a major DWP Policy Reform programme through Discovery and Alpha phases.
· Coordinating delivery across a multidisciplinary team of approximately 15 Business Analysts and User-Centred Design specialists.
· Led supplier transition of three live HMRC services to Accenture with zero impact to service health, service availability or business continuity.
· Led delivery across three HMRC workstreams supporting services generating approximately £5.8M annually.
· Line managed and supported approximately 40 professionals across multidisciplinary teams.
· Extensive UK Government experience across DWP, HMRC and Social Security Scotland.
CORE COMPETENCIES
Agile Delivery | Discovery | Alpha | Policy Reform | Stakeholder Engagement | Governance & Assurance | Dependency Management | Risk & Issue Management | Service Transition | Supplier Management | Release Management | Operational Readiness
Technical Skills
Jira, Confluence, Azure DevOps, Jenkins, GitHub, Selenium, Cucumber, Java, SQL Server, Oracle, DB2
Timeline
Delivery Manager – DWP Policy Reform Programme
DWP
2025.06 - Current
Delivery Manager – HMRC
HMRC
2023.03 - 2025.05
Scrum Master
Specsavers
Scrum Master
Macy's Transportation
Test Lead
Royal London
Bachelor of Technology - Biotechnology
Vellore Institute Of Technology