Have you ever had to assist a colleague in an area outside of your responsibilities? How did it go?

Situation: While working on the platform and reporting teams, an unexpected early maternity leave occurred on the team responsible for managing employee ethics disclosures. My manager needed to reassign tasks to ensure continuity.

Task: A critical feature for the system used to track and manage employee ethics disclosures needed to be completed within a tight three-week sprint. This was a new domain and team for me, presenting a significant challenge.

Action: I volunteered to take on this feature as I had the capacity and was eager to contribute. Despite my unfamiliarity with the area, I took the initiative to:

• Rapid Learning: I spent extra hours studying the project, consulted with senior team members, and took a short online course to understand the ethics disclosure management system better. I also had detailed discussions with the ethics disclosure team to grasp the system's intricacies and requirements.

• Collaborative Workshops: To fully understand user needs and project goals, I led focused meetings with stakeholders from both the ethics disclosure team and my existing teams. This approach fostered knowledge sharing and ensured alignment. We mapped out user journeys, identified key pain points, and defined clear objectives for the feature.

Result: Through dedication and a proactive approach, I delivered the high-priority feature on time. Additionally, through user research and collaboration, I suggested additional functionalities that significantly enhanced the system's overall value. For example, implementing a more intuitive user interface and automated compliance checks improved the user experience and reduced the time required for compliance reviews by 30%. This experience demonstrated my ability to adapt to new challenges and effectively collaborate with cross-functional teams.

Relevance to the Role: This experience has equipped me with skills directly relevant to the target role. Working in cross-functional teams honed my ability to collaborate with diverse stakeholders, a key requirement for this position. My ability to quickly learn new areas and take initiative is essential for roles that involve tackling new domains and leading projects under tight deadlines. Furthermore, my success in delivering a critical feature within a tight timeframe demonstrates my capability to manage and execute high-pressure projects, aligning with the demands of the target role.

One of the QA faced challenges with keeping up with the developer in testing of CRM application. while my role was of QA, I had understanding of the scrum activities and also known the business. 

I reviewed the issue and conducted initial assessment of the problem. 

I collaborated with QA to understand their concern and came to know about the root cause that QA is not involved in all scrum activities which is resulting into QA lacking of testing, and some stories are missed to be tested.

I worked closely with the QA and scrum master to discuss about the issue and help to set up a process to involve QA in grooming, and planning meetings, involve QA in sizing the user story, and a user story can only be completed when all development, QA and UAT sign offs are given. 

Thus after discussion, a process was set up where in QA was involved in all the activities and issue was resolved. This helped to ensure high standards of the delivery of the product and proactive collaboration. 

At CenterCard, we had a TPM who had joined the company recently. As a TPM she was expected to be part of the architecture discussion. This was a new area for her and she sought out my help to get upto speed on our Architecture. I decided to help her so that she can be more productive in her job, I saw an opprotunity for my Sr. Dev to help him improve his communication and help the TPM as well. With that in mind, I asked my Sr. Dev to set up meetings with my TPM and help her get up to speed. I could solve two things by doing this - I saw communication as area of improvement for my Dev and helping my TPM get more knowledegable, I could gain that working relationship with my TPM,