Mick Southerland – Agile Project Manager, Business Analyst

Mick Southerland has over 15 years of experience as a project manager for system/software engineering and Information Technology development and management. He has been a Project Manager, Sr. Project Manager, Scrum Master, Product Owner, and Program Manager.

Mick has managed Agile, Hybrid, and Waterfall projects for Nintendo, Golf Digest, Discovery Network, National Storage Associates, Mahindra USA, United Healthcare, Johnson Controls, Scott & White, University of Texas, Texas State University, Mattress Firm, Firehouse Agency, Maggiano’s Little Italy, HCB Health, Convio, Texas D.P.S., Chili’s, Thyssen Krupp, Brinker International, Texas A&M University Kingsville, Really Big Industries, McGarrah Jessee, Gatti’s Pizza, ESPN, Texas Mutual Insurance, My Fit Foods, Toshiba, Stepping Stone Schools, Austin Symphony, Cactus Cafe, FieldComm Group, Pioneer Surgical, Biomedical Solutions, Audiotoniq, Lammes Candies, Cielo Wind, GSD&M, Biomedical Solutions, SUN Microsystems, Austin Humane Society, State Farm, and McGraw Hill.

• Senior-level manager of cross-functional development teams
• Certified Scrum Master (CSM, SAFe SSM & PSM I & II Certified)
• Nexus Scaled Professional Scrum™ (SPS)
• Professional Scrum Product Owner (PSPO Certified)
• Contentful Certified Professional
• Skilled at project discovery and scope definition
• Experience managing small to enterprise-level projects
• Self-motivated
• Agile Practitioner
• Experience managing several concurrent projects
• Strong verbal and written communications skills
• Excellent Stakeholder status reporting
• Devout Earned Value Analysis believer
• Practices daily, honest interaction with team members and stakeholders

Recent Projects

Nintendo
Senior Project Manager

Primary project manager on a $2M Liferay redevelopment for a Nintendo using a custom Scrum and Earned Value Management hybrid. Responsible for stakeholder assessments, reporting presentations, risk assessments, earned value tracking, baselines, resource management, budget projections, and Scrum events for a team of ten cross-functional developers. The project required a large database upgrade and porting of 30+ Java portlets from Liferay 3.6 to Liferay Digital Experience Platform 7.4. A highly complex project that requires coordination with two additional program initiatives. Fully remote project with resources based in the US, Japan, and India.

Implemented Scrum framework in a Waterfall organization.
Built spreadsheet for EVM and resource tracking (EV, AC, PV, CPI, SPI, SV, EAC.)
Forecasts for resource usage through the end of the project.
Conducted project status presentations for 20 stakeholders in 3 separate weekly status meetings.

Golf Digest / Discovery Network
Senior Agile Project Manager

Implemented Agile project management methodology using Scrumban framework. Acted in the role of Scrum Master and Product Manager. Managed the “Hot List” project for manufacturers to present new golf equipment to high-profile professionals and media outlets for testing and reviews. We developed new applications in Laravel, MySQL, and React. I was responsible for scheduling, resource allocation, client meetings, Scrum events, reporting, and roadblock removal. Lead company-wide meetings for development teams, stakeholder updates, and long-term budget planning. Managed two development teams consisting of 5-8 developers and one developer lead per team, including one team based in Ukraine during a war.

Facilitated communication with offshore developers in a war zone.
Sponsored non-profit to raise money for Ukraine developers’ communities.
Brought a lagging project back on schedule with tight sprints.
Successfully managed an unusually high amount of risk to schedule, resources, and scope.

National Storage Solutions
Senior Agile Project Manager

Managed major initiative to redevelop the NSA reservation and booking systems for NSA’s over 1000 storage solution locations. The scope of the project was to replace an aging monolithic application with a fresh, headless architecture using microservices. The project severely needed reorganization to remedy significant, negative client sentiment from past broken promises. The project was quickly turned around with the implementation of Scrum (with one-week sprints to express urgency and show immediate results,) workflow reorganization, reallocation of development resources, and the addition of dedicated QA. Client relationships improved through consistent delivery of usable increments and a focus on built-in quality.

Increased overall development production while reducing costs.
Restructured project workflow to improve delivery times and productivity.
Improved quality of deliverables.
Reestablished client trust in development processes.

Mahindra USA, Inc.
Senior Project Manager

Managed a full Drupal site build for the world’s largest agricultural machinery seller with dealer locations all over North America. They needed a new look, commerce functionality, and new workflows.

Lead a five-person Scrum team through:

Technical rollout of company-wide rebranding and redesigns.
Migration from proprietary CMS to a robust and flexible platform in Drupal 8.
Integration with third-party customer relationship management applications.
Internationalization.
Efficient scalability.
Integration with sales team SAS.

Pixeldust Interactive
Senior Project Manager / Founder
2009 to 2021

Senior Project / Product Manager for a web and application development agency responsible for end-to-end development from discovery to launch; including discovery with SMEs, analysis of business requirements, technical specifications, estimates, bids/proposals, project planning/scheduling, time tracking, developer assessment, resource allocation, architecture, technology assessments, IT infrastructure, content auditing, content management, SEO, SEM, UI, UX, brand guidelines, compliance (HIPAA, PCI, ADA, Section 508), UAT, maintenance and service-level agreements. I have been directly involved in sales, advertising, marketing, and training. I am ideally a key point of contact for client support, updates, and reporting throughout project lifecycles.

Managed Agile, Hybrid, and Waterfall projects for United Healthcare, Johnson Controls, Scott & White, University of Texas, Texas State University, Mattress Firm, Firehouse Agency, Maggiano’s Little Italy, HCB Health, Convio, Texas D.P.S., Chili’s, Thyssen Krupp, Brinker International, Texas A&M University Kingsville, Really Big Industries, and more.

Nice Monster Agency
Digital Experience Architect
2006 to 2009

Nice Monster was a digital experience agency focused on supporting traditional advertising agencies with digital experience know-how. Projects typically included the design and development of interactive initiatives to support broad, multifaceted campaigns. For example, Nice Monster developed a tool for recording submissions and selections in a nationwide jingle writing contest. Our work on the project won three Addy advertising awards.

In my role at Nice Monster, I acted as a digital experience consultant in agency pitch meetings. I consulted on projects for State Farm’s Steve Harvey Campaign, Maggiano’s, Gattis Pizza, and Texas Department of
Public Safety. Agencies worked with included GSD&M, Firehouse Studios, McGarrah Jessee, Door Number 3, M Group, and Sherry Matthews Agency.

GSD&M Advertising Agency
Digital Experience Consultant
2004 to 2006

Worked directly with Creative Directors to produce design comps for pitches and advertising campaigns. Created original art for advertisements in Illustrator. Designed and developed banner ads in Flash/
ActionScript.

Managed branding, style guidelines, design and development of media assets, media buying, and placement workflows. I worked on projects for United Healthcare, Southwest Airlines, and Brinker International’s Chili’s restaurant chain.

Certifications and Licenses

Professional Agile Leadership (PAL I)
PAL I Certificate
PAL-EBM Certificate

Professional Scrum Master (PSM I & II)
April 2022 to Present
PSM I Certificate
PSM II Certificate

Certified Scrum Master (CSM)
April 2022 to Present
Scrum Alliance Scrum Master Certification

Professional Scrum Product Owner (PSPO)
April 2022 to Present
PSPO Certificate

Certified Kanban Expert (Kanban-EXP)
March 2022 to Present
Kanban-EXP Certificate

Certified SAFe 5 Scrum Master (SSM)
May 2022 to Present
SAFe 5 Certificate

Nexus Scaled Professional Scrum™ (SPS)
June 2022 to Present
SPS Certificate

Contentful Certified Professional
June 2022 to Present
Contentful Certificate