Agile Project Manager Resume Skills: What to Include and How to Write Them

Use a simple, clean format that highlights your skills and experiences. Focus on readability by using bullet points and short phrases to present your skills. Properly organize your resume into education, experience, and skills sections.

“Adding a skills section to your resume is a great way to draw the recruiter’s attention to your most relevant strengths and competencies.”

– Ashley Watkins, NCRW, NCOPE, Job Search Coach

For example, Agile project manager resume bullet points might look like this:

• Led a cross-functional team of 12 using Scrum methodology, completing 95% of sprint goals on time.
• Developed and maintained Jira dashboards to track sprint progress, improving project visibility by 40%.
• Facilitated sprint planning, daily stand-ups, and retrospectives, increasing team productivity by 30%.
• Transitioned a $2M project from Waterfall to Agile development, reducing time-to-market by 20%.
• Collaborated with technical leads to ensure Agile best practices during software development cycles.

Hitting all the top job requirements with your skills list will help you rank highly for a keyword search within an applicant tracking system. But don’t stop there. Add context for every skill elsewhere in your work experience.

If a recruiter is excited by your customer service skills, for example, the first thing they’ll do is skim your work experience to figure out when, how, and how much you used that skill.

As you list your responsibilities, it’s also important to highlight your specific achievements wherever you can.

“For soft skills, it’s often more effective to demonstrate them in the context of your past work experience. Instead of merely stating “excellent team player”, you are better off saying “collaborated with a cross-functional team of 6 on a new product launch that boosted sales by 30% in one year”. Examples of specific accomplishments or business outcomes speak louder than buzzwords.”

– Ana Lokotkova, Career Coach and Advisor

Instead of saying:

• Managed Agile projects and teams.

You could say:

• Led Agile teams through successful sprint cycles, achieving 90% sprint completion rates and increasing project delivery speed by 25%.

This demonstrates your level of expertise with the skills you listed. It gives the recruiter more reason to be interested in you as a result.

If you’re applying for a role requiring a broad skillset, categorize your skills.

“If you opt to include a designated skills section on your resume, include up to 10 of your core competencies. Excessive skills lists are overwhelming and sometimes confusing to the reader.”

– Kelli Hrivnak, Marketing and Tech Recruiter

Agile Methodologies

• Agile
• Scrum
• Kanban
• Agile Development
• Waterfall

Project Management Tools

• Jira
• Sprint Planning

Core Management and Communication

• Management
• Technical
• Written Communication

Use numbers to quantify your accomplishments wherever possible. This helps potential employers understand your abilities and the impact you can have on their organization.

“Recruiters and hiring managers are looking for relevancy of how and when you applied those skills, so provide examples of this in your experience section. Bonus tip: Don’t just insert the skill like a task–include results.”

– Kelli Hrivnak, Marketing and Tech Recruiter

Instead of saying:

• Oversaw sprint planning and task assignments.

You could say:

• Directed sprint planning sessions for a team of 10 engineers, achieving 95% task completion rates and reducing backlog by 30% over six months.

By using numbers, you give hiring managers a better sense of your value.

Read the description carefully and emphasize the relevant skills and experiences. Highlight the skills that the employer seeks and provide examples of how you’ve used those skills in your previous roles. Doing so can demonstrate that you’re a strong fit for the position and increase your chances of being invited to an interview.

“The ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach doesn’t work when it comes to your resume. For every job application, tailor your skill set to match the job description. Most companies use Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) that filter candidates based on keywords and skills listed in the job description. So, research the role you’re applying for and distill the skills required.”

– Ana Lokotkova, Career Coach and Advisor

In order to do this, “you must first understand what skills are most important for the target role,” says Ashley Watkins.

Sample Job Description for Agile Project Manager:
We are seeking an Agile Project Manager to lead software development initiatives, drive Agile adoption, and manage project lifecycles from sprint planning to delivery. Responsibilities include facilitating Scrum ceremonies, collaborating with stakeholders, using Jira for task management, and ensuring timely delivery of high-quality products.

Tailored Resume Bullet Points:

• Facilitated Agile ceremonies, including sprint planning, stand-ups, and retrospectives, enhancing team collaboration and project visibility.
• Used Jira to manage project backlogs, sprint progress, and cross-team dependencies, increasing on-time delivery by 20%.
• Partnered with stakeholders to define project requirements and ensured alignment with Agile best practices.

“Focus on the sought-after and in demand skills. A great way to figure out what is currently in demand is by researching current job openings from your preferred companies and reading through the posting. Pay close attention to the preferred requirements section and build your skills section based on this list.”

– Chelsea Jay, Career & Leadership Development Coach – Seasoned and Growing

Start each bullet point with an action verb. An action verb expresses an action, such as “create,” “build,” “manage,” “lead,” or “implement.”

Action verbs grab the reader’s attention and paint a vivid picture of what you accomplished at work.

Action verbs make your resume more interesting to read. They also show the kind of can-do attitude that employers are looking for.