Agile Technical Project Manager/Scrum Master-Focus

IBSS is seeking highly qualified candidates to potentially provide Agile program and project management services for NOAA’s Modeling Moonshot Initiative. The work supports multi-organization scientific R&D programs with substantial software components and is distinct from IT program management.

The multi-year NOAA Modeling Moonshot Initiative advances U.S. leadership in Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) through GPU-accelerated modeling, continuous data assimilation (DA), AI-augmented ensemble prediction, and NOAA’s transition to the Model for Prediction Across Scales (MPAS) dynamical core.

Its Research-to-Operations (R2O) focus prioritizes moving advanced capabilities into NOAA’s operational forecast suite through coordination among NOAA offices, federal laboratories, and scientific partners.

The Moonshot encompasses four interconnected technical focus areas:

• MPAS integration into the Unified Forecast System (UFS) for the next-generation Global Forecast System (GFS).
• Continuous DA using a global km-scale Joint Effort for Data Assimilation Integration (JEDI)-MPAS system.
• GPU acceleration and UFS refactoring for advanced hardware, cloud, and high-performance computing.
• AI for NWP (AI4NWP), including emulation, hybrid physics/AI models, and training datasets.

The services will operate across all four areas, providing WPO with program visibility, dependency and risk management, R2O tracking, deliverable coordination, and stakeholder engagement. Although not performing scientific or software development, personnel must understand NWP, scientific computing, and Agile development to engage technical staff and coordinate effectively., Provides Agile facilitation for GPU acceleration and UFS code-modernization teams. Helps teams balance portability, correctness, maintainability, throughput, reproducibility, and technical debt while coordinating dependencies on target platforms, data, environments, and tests.

Roles and responsibilities

• Serve as Scrum Master/facilitator for assigned GPU/UFS modernization teams; facilitate planning, refinement, reviews, retrospectives, and technical syncs.
• Maintain backlog records for target platform, code baseline/path, performance hypothesis, profiling evidence, numerical tolerance, portability impact, maintainability, and technical debt.
• Help teams decompose modernization goals into testable increments with explicit correctness, regression, performance, and reproducibility evidence.
• Track CPU/GPU capacity, storage, data movement, queues, software environments, specialized skills, shared baselines, and operational windows as program dependencies.
• Maintain impediments, actions, risks, and decisions; escalate items that threaten cross-area integration, readiness gates, capacity, or schedule.
• Prepare iteration summaries and progress inputs that report end-to-end outcomes, not isolated kernel speedup, and distinguish forecast from accepted evidence.
• Coordinate interfaces with MPAS-UFS, continuous DA, AI4NWP, platform providers, and external modernization partners without directing Government personnel.
• Coach teams in version control, peer review, automated regression tests, configuration management, CI practices, and reproducible performance measurement.
• Provide surge support to other focus areas and contribute to shared facilitation standards, metrics, retrospectives, and process improvements.

• BA/BS degree (or accepted equivalent).
• 5-7 years of experience in the technical area being managed and 5+ years of IT management experience.
• Demonstrated ability to manage day-to-day engineering-team activities and organize, direct, and coordinate assigned project work.
• Strong Agile facilitation, backlog/dependency management, risk escalation, reporting, coaching, and stakeholder-communication skills.
• Technical literacy sufficient to facilitate software-modernization, HPC/GPU, performance, regression, and portability discussions., * Experience managing GPU acceleration, HPC modernization, heterogeneous computing, scientific-code refactoring, or performance-portability initiatives.
• Familiarity with UFS/MPAS or comparable large scientific codes, profiling, numerical reproducibility, regression testing, and CI/CD.
• CSM, PSM, SAFe Scrum Master, PMI-ACP, or comparable certification.
• Prior NOAA/OAR, NWS, Federal laboratory, cloud-HPC, or community scientific-software experience.
• Advanced Smartsheet, Google Workspace, issue-tracking, dashboard, and technical-reporting skills.

IBSS offers a competitive benefits package that includes medical, dental, vision, and prescription drug coverage with a company-paid deductible, paid time off, federal holidays, a matching 401K plan, tuition/professional development reimbursement, and Flex-Spending (FSA)/Dependent Care Account (DCA) options.

Since 1992, IBSS, a woman-owned small business, has provided transformational consulting services to the Federal defense, civilian, and commercial sectors. Our services include cybersecurity and enterprise information technology, environmental science and engineering (including oceans, coasts, climate, and weather), and professional management services.

Our approach is to serve our employees by investing in their growth and development. As a result, our employees bring greater capabilities and provide exceptional service to our clients. In addition to creating career development opportunities for our employees, IBSS is passionate about giving back to the community and serving the environment. We strive to leave something better behind for the next generation.

We measure our success by the positive impact we have on our employees, clients, partners, and the communities we serve. Our tagline, Powered by Excellence, is a recognition of the employees that make up IBSS and ensures we deliver results with quality, applying industry best practices and certifications.