Sam Ervin

About Sam Ervin

Nurturing organizational and working cultures that are efficient, healthy, and sustainable - advancing high performing teams.I am an expert at building teams and fostering cultures of collaboration and growth where people can do their best thinking. I design collaborative systems and ask the smart questions that enable groups to overcome bias, avoid thinking traps, and experience breakthroughs. I am skilled at focusing a team to collectively understand their problem — leading to effective solutions. Collaboration can be harnessed, but it can’t be controlled. As a collaborative leader, I enable teams to solve complex problems by granting them the freedom to decide how to solve problems. In my work to date, I have: Led a team of scrum masters and agile practitioners to nurture a culture of problem-solving, transparency, and trust. Led the process management for the successful release of dynamic new products. Wowed the crowd as the Master of Ceremonies at the SAFe Summit attendees!) Facilitated steady alignment between development teams to manage cross functional dependencies. Facilitated company-wide quarterly planning, embracing fun and energy to help teams collaborate, correct misalignment, manage risk, and make commitments.I am a firm believer that failure—in an open and collaborative feedback loop—leads to innovation and growth. At one point, it was clear that our product demos were not hitting the mark. Feedback wasn’t being exchanged early in the development process, and customer expectations were left unmet. Something had to change. Working with product management, I curated more intentional agendas, instituted more flexible timeboxes, and experimented with methods to increase engagement. This provided opportunities to receive feedback, identify markers of failure, and course correct at an earlier stage, ultimately leading to increased efficiency and a better product—noted by the customer and Chief Executive. Continuous improvement is also a priority in my personal life: I enjoy learning new skills in CrossFit, patiently chasing weightlifting PRs, and learning new languages (currently: Japanese). I’m currently working on expanding my culinary skills; at the nightly “product demos” around the dinner table, I do my best to receive feedback humbly so that I can delight my “customer” (husband). I’m still learning. If any of the above interests you, send me a DM! I would genuinely love connecting with you over shared interests.

Experience

1. Program Manager Safe Release Train Engineer

   Safe By Scaled Agile, Inc

   Jun 2023 — Present · Kailua, HI, US

   After proving myself as a highly focused and energetic scrum master, I was promoted to Release Train Engineer. As the RTE, I guided two Agile Release Trains building new adult learning products (instructor-led training, eLearning, guided workshops) and developing platforms for purchasing and accessing training materials. —Led a team of agile practitioners to nurture a culture of problem-solving, transparency, and trust increasing employee engagement, reliable predictability, accelerated value delivery—Led the process management for the successful release of dynamic new products accelerating the rate of innovation, validating learnings earlier, increasing customer delight—Facilitated steady alignment between development teams to manage cross-functional dependencies creating reliable development timelines, increasing speed to market—Facilitated company-wide quarterly planning, embracing fun and energy to help teams collaborate, correct misalignment, manage risk, and make commitments building a greater sense of employee purpose, and healthy relationships between teams and senior executives.

Education

• Furman University

  Bachelor of Arts (B.A.), French Language and Literature

• Darla Moore School of Business at the University of South Carolina

  International MBA, German Track

• University of Mannheim

  German Language