Panayiotis (Peter) Retsinas

Senior Agile Delivery Lead for Kaizen Gaming supporting growth markets in Greece and in Europe, with the Stoiximan brand in Greece and Cyprus and Betano in Germany, Romania, Bulgaria, Portugal, Brazil, and Chile. Working with cross-functional, remote teams, applying agile project management functions with the support of IT Development Teams functioning under and a Scrum or Kanban framework to ensure timely and accurate delivery of the roadmap items.

Guide three Scrum teams.

• Monitor the delivery flow of teams and ensure timely and accurate execution of the roadmap items, while maintaining inter-team alignment.
• Promote Scrum / Agile principles in the Scrum teams and stakeholders and drive process improvements.
• Coach Product Owners, team members and business leaders.
• Participate and share knowledge in the Chapter as well as promote best practices.
• Remove impediments and distractions to optimize teams’ performance.
• Support agile team transformation and encourage teams to adopt agile values and apply Scrum.
• Capture and report team performance metrics.

Senior Project Manager for SWORD Services supporting European Union and other worldwide Business Functions. Working with cross-functional, remote teams, applying traditional project management functions with the support of IT Development Teams functioning under and a Scrum/SAFe/DevOps framework.

• Developed comprehensive project plans, identifying risks and mitigation strategies for timely completion.
• Planned and manage new technical project implementations to enable modernization efforts for our customers worldwide.
• Coordinated internal and external stakeholders’ expectations.
• Oversaw the Demand/Change Management process, ranging from receiving the new project requirements to the technical proposal formulation and submission.
• Mobilize internal resources from various departments in support to new projects.
• Led cross-functional teams for successful project delivery within scope, schedule, and budget constraints.
• Produced the relevant KPIs and metrics based on contract requirements. Monitored project progress, identified risks and implemented corrective measures to acquire success.
• Lead the teams and projects utilizing Scrum and various agile practices.
• Spearheaded process improvement initiatives that resulted in increased productivity and streamlined workflows across departments.
• Partnered with internal and external project team members to identify and quickly address problems.

Scrum Master for Accenture Federal Services (AFS) supporting the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) Business Enterprise Services Technology (EGIS) Task Order for the U.S Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Working with cross-functional, remote teams, applying Scrum/SAFe/DevOps framework in a highly professional environment with cutting edge technologies.

• Lead day to day Scrum activities and implement SAFE practices for two teams. Both teams had 4 developers and a Product owner.
• Collaborated with Product Owners to develop clear product roadmaps and ensure timely release of high-quality deliverables.
• Supported high performing teams during modernization efforts, optimization/maintenance efforts, automation, risk management, SDLC, testing efforts, encouraged team demos, and deployment of new microservices in cloud environments.
• Got team to a high performing level by recognizing areas of strength and improvement and employing appropriate coaching.
• Assisted and Coached Teams to utilize Scrum and/or Kanban practices.
• Resolved team impediments with other Scrum Masters to increase the effectiveness of the application of Scrum in the organization.
• Worked with Team Managers, Team Leads, RTE, Product Owners to handle new requests, and timelines.
• Scheduling Agile best practices by facilitating and supporting all scrum events Sprint Planning, Daily Scrum, Sprint Review, Sprint Retrospective.
• Created, tracked, edited project timelines, backlogs, customized Epics, User Stories, and streamlined expectations and common procedures between various teams.
• Ensured deliverables were according to quality standards set at the end of each sprint and/or Program Increment (PI).
• Contributed to the advancement and improvement of Agile and DevOps practices within the organization.
• Mentored junior Scrum Masters and team members in Agile principles, promoting best practices within the organization.

Selected as Lead Project Manager for MetTel’s Federal Business Operations expansion. Duties are to ensure a smooth transition on the GSA GICS Task Order 1 and Task Order 2 EIS contract. Develop plan and manage the full lifecycle of activities for extremely highly complex projects for GSA.

• Serve as a project manager in assigned projects from inception to completion including, but not limited to the following: research, conceptualization, feasibility assessment, design, proposal, implementation planning, procurement, documentation, and transition to the operational environment.
• Work closely with various functional teams to ensure program and project status is tracked, monitored, and reported in accordance with the program plan and best practices.
• Help create and improve processes and procedures which will enhance outstanding customer experience.
• Facilitated stakeholder alignment by conducting regular meetings to discuss progress updates, address concerns, and set expectations.
• Interface with team members and vendors/suppliers to ensure, but not limited to the following: support, scheduling, milestone achievement, development processes and goals, assist in procurement of specialized equipment, equipment tracking, related services and agreements, purchase orders, and specific procedures support for implementation.
• Collaboratively adapted existing and developed new project plans, processes, and communication standards for the engineering teams
• Managed the formulation and ongoing tracking of each assigned project.
• Managed cross-functional teams to achieve project milestones, ensuring timely delivery of high-quality products.
• Identified changes in project scope and associated risk, develop contingency plans as needed.

Selected to oversee the Agile Transformation, strategic planning, establishment, execution, and evaluation of a multifaceted IT Development Team. Operate within the Delivery and Client Success function of CenturyLink’s IT Program Management.

• Assist team to continuous integration and either continuous delivery or continuous deployment.
• Documented the justification of proposed projects/programs in terms of their overall benefits, costs, strategic alignment, and risk.
• Maintained deep understanding of organization wide objectives, interactions, issues, and risks.
• Enable, motivate, direct, and continually develop a committed, motivated and high-performing team by setting clear goals and expectations, tracking progress, ensuring feedback and addressing performance problems and issues promptly.
• Supported the planning and implementation of enhancements/changes to a new application or infrastructure with minimal impact to the users.
• Collected and prioritize user requests for functional enhancements and bug fixes, together with expectations management.
• Tracked and report of program progress against a predefined work plan, ensuring program goals are met as defined by its business use cases.
• Providee support and guidance on program and project management processes, procedures, governance, tools and techniques to program project managers and their teams.

Selected to lead 3 Teams as Scrum Master. First team, Configuration Management Team (9 Developers and 1 Product Owner), and 2 Transport teams (7 Developers and 1 Product Owner) to establish iteration backlog, facilitate IT Development team organization, and ceremonies such as iteration planning, daily Scrums/stand-ups, sprint/iteration reviews/demos, and retrospectives.

• Facilitate the creation and adoption of working agreements and definitions of done, including use of appropriate tools, standards, and best practices.
• Organized business demos for sprint deliverables.
• Facilitated Scrum framework – sprint planning, backlog grooming, daily scrums, sprint reviews, and sprint retrospectives.
• Facilitate project progresses reports through the delivery life cycle.
• Improved team efficiency by implementing Agile and Scrum methodologies for project management.
• Advocate for continuous improvement in quality and the process.
• Assist team members in Agile estimation techniques.
• Assisted team to company’s Agile Transformation to Agile Framework. Coached team members on Agile principles, providing guidance on SAFe and Scrum framework.
• Facilitate discussion and conflict resolution to improve team productivity. Identify and remove any impediments/distractions that interfere with the team’s ability to deliver.
• Updated Agile tracking systems to provide transparency on product and sprint backlogs.
• Ensured that the development team members are practicing and engaged in the Agile processes.
• Collaborated with product owners, team members, technologists, and other scrum masters to define solutions and drive progress.

Selected as Lead Program Manager for CenturyLink’s Federal Network Operations project expansion. The Federal Network Operations Center supports services on over 40 products under the Networx contract nationwide. Responsible for the oversight of resources to achieve the cost, performance, and quality objectives. Provided oversight to ensure that Service Level Agreements (SLA) was achieved for government agencies under the Networx contract.

• Managed and directed with full authority, all phases of a project/program from inception to completion. Identify dependencies, risks, resources, and schedule deliverables.
• Improved the operational systems, processes and policies in support of organizations mission - specifically support better management reporting, information flow, business process and organizational planning.
• Oversee training material for Network Operations. Establish training sessions for Network Operations on new products and services.
• Worked across multi-functional director teams to implement new network products and services supporting the Networx contract and Operation’s initiatives.
• Played a significant role in long-term planning for the next generation federal contracts (EIS, and NS2020), including future initiatives geared toward operational excellence.
• Documented team processes to streamline communications and level of effort across impacted organizations.
• Oversee overall financial management, planning, systems and controls.
• Appointed escalations manager for the CenturyLink Networx Security Operations Center (SOC) and the Networx Federal Technical Assistance Center (TAC).
• Ensured all services were delivered per the contractual terms and conditions of the specific program/project.
• Ensured that troubleshooting resolution, maintenance, circuit availability, and reliability fall within contractual requirements.
• Initiated “After Action Reports” following all long duration outages or outages where process improvements can be readily identified and implemented.
• Established and tested Networx Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Plan (BC/DR).
• Initiated change management reviews and contract modifications and identify requirements for product and IT development.

Selected as Lead Project Manager for the Qwest Local Broadband expansion. Led on-site and off-site outsources resources to expand the network capabilities of Qwest Communications. The goal was to deliver rapid revenue growth with minimal expense and capital expenditures.

• 2000-2003, developed initial project plan for the Washington DC metro area. Grew monthly recurring revenue (MRR) from less than $100K to more than $2.3M in 18 months. Tripled the number of on net customer premises (CPs) buildings.
• Consistently exceeded client expectations by delivering high-quality projects ahead of schedule and under budget.
• Nearly doubled the reach of the network through innovative and inexpensive methods in Washington DC. This included ILEC/Collocation, DSL Deployment, Wireless, OSP, ISP and Hub facility build to include Qwest Local Broadband space and power requirements.
• Managed international projects by overlooking the sales engineering to meet specific customer needs.
• Continuously engaged with international vendors/partners on what can and cannot be done internationally in each region/country.
• Coordinated resolution of escalated inter-departmental problems. Provided neutral and unbiased decisions related to escalation of critical issues.
• Provided all support needed from the field to assure that the process accurately reflects changes and modifications to the project and associated plans. Institute process improvements in the field to shorten project cycle times.
• Supply Chain Management. Monitored City Acquisition Reports (CAR) and performance/spending to CAR budget.
• Managed relationships and coordinated information between various functional groups and their respective PM organizations.
• Developed reporting mechanisms to allow the communication with all stakeholders and senior management in a timely manner. Assured that reports are understandable and easily accessible.

Aggressively managed the AT&T Growth Markets interface with the AT&T customers, client vendors and AT&T customer care teams to yield on time products and services. The Growth Markets in Oakton, Virginia produced the highest monthly recurring revenue (MRR) in 1999.

• Responsible for the implementation and presentation of technical solutions. Created and produced proposals for the sales team describing the AT&T products, services and installation procedures.
• Addressed complex and non-complex voice and data services and solutions.
• Planned, designed, and scheduled phases for large projects.
• Briefed customers on capabilities and benefits of T1, ISDN, T3, SONET and other access technologies.
• Presented options of voice to data integration for total telecommunications network.
• Liaison with customer technical staff and AT&T product management for technical sales support.
• Expertise on order processes and negotiation for the external customer with AT&T Business Services.
• Tracked order-flow and provide status to customer and AE for all ordered services.
• Implemented in a timely, accurate manner adhering to project milestones.
• Project managed the installment/turn up of all AT&T services.
• Established effective communication among team members for enhanced collaboration and successful project completion.