Work

Donna Lee
From Manila, Philippines.
Now in Japan.
Former software engineer turned change agent.

lee.donnamarie[at]gmail.com

Agile Coach. Former Engineer / Manager. Human Being.

I like understanding how things work, how a person’s mind works and how systems and organisations work. The world we live in is a complex, independent and yet an interconnected structure. By looking at everything and anything with curiosity and empathy, I get to have the most interesting and profound experiences. I enjoy using my skills to bring people together to achieve all that they can be.

Skills

Programming Python, C/C++, Ruby on Rails

Methodologies Scrum, XP (TDD, Pair/Mob Programming, ATDD, CI), Kanban, Design Sprints, User Story Mapping, Planning and Estimation, Kaizen

Soft Training, Coaching, Mentoring, Facilitation, Leadership, Mindfulness

Languages English, Filipino, Pre-intermediate Japanese, Basic Chinese

Experiences

Senior Agile Coach at Woven Planet Holdings – Tokyo, Japan

(Oct 2020 ~ Present)
Working with other agile coaches at different levels of the Arene organisation to support and create conditions for better teams, streamlined processes, and delivering and developing products.

Agile Coach at AXA Life Japan – Tokyo, Japan

(Sept 2019 – Sept 2020)
Working as an Agile Coach to promote improvements through agile mindset and values from organisation to individual level.


Scrum Master at Fundbook Inc. – Tokyo, Japan

(Feb 2018 – Jul 2019)

  • Responsible for creating structure and alignment to the technology team with the use of Scrum which led to the release of a Minimum Viable Product in 3 months and consistent and incremental product development every sprint
  • Coached the development team in best practices like Mob Programming, and help create their own core values and ways of working
  • Coached the CTO/Product Owner about Vision Mapping, Product Backlog prioritisation, creation of user stories and user story mapping
  • Responsible for conducting workshops and facilitation of meetings outside of Scrum ceremonies like Design Sprints and User Story Mapping
  • Other roles in the team include testing, which led to the creation of automated testing that runs on local and staging environments that can be run on IE or Chrome browsers using Robot Framework, Python and Selenium

Scrum Master & Team Lead at Rakuten Inc. – Tokyo, Japan

(Aug 2015 – Jan 2018)

  • Led a development team responsible for Rakuten Global Market.
  • Helped aligned team’s development plan with the business direction
  • Updated JIRA tickets and Kanban boards for transparency and shared metrics of overall success and improvement points.
  • Coordinated with Operation, INFRA, QA, and Design teams to increase synergy and reduce dependency concerns.
  • Facilitated Scrum ceremonies and meetings and and drived process improvement to teams who are not using Scrum.
  • Conducted a variety of Agile framework and development training and tech talks across departments.
  • Provided mentoring and coaching to team and team members about career growth
  • Developed and maintained Rakuten Global Market’s automated smoke testing framework

R&D Manager at Nokia Networks – Manila, Philippines

(Feb 2013 – Jul 2015)

  • Was responsible for managing teams in two different business lines.
  • Improved team efficiency by training, facilitation, coaching and mentoring best practices.
  • Provided regular 1-on-1s with each engineer to help them improve and grow in their careers.
  • Guided individuals in the creation of their personal development plan and team/individual goals.
  • Coached teams with agile software methodologies and the Scrum framework
  • Taught agile planning and estimation to university students as part of an elective course

Scrum Master and Software Engineer at
Nokia Networks – Manila, Philippines

(Sep 2011 – Jan 2013)

  • Was responsible for managing teams in two different business lines.
  • Ensured Scrum practices and values are followed by Team and Product Owner.
  • Assisted in setting up the continuous integration server for the team.
  • Part of a feature team that developed a test library to validate alarms management of MCRNC, and maintained and enhanced an Eclipse plugin that enables users to code and develop a telecom-specific language in Eclipse.