Summary:

Some program leaders manage what exists. Sarah builds what doesn't. From a competitive City of Austin civic tech fellowship to directing six concurrent VA enterprise initiatives, her career has been defined by creating delivery infrastructure where none existed, and making it stick. Public Trust cleared, 15+ years at the intersection of federal contracting, civic tech, and commercial business. Knows how government moves, how agile works at scale, and how to drive operational clarity. 

Experience:

Coforma  |  Remote, May 2022—present

Director, Project Management & Team Lead

Lead strategic oversight and delivery across six VA enterprise modernization initiatives totaling $40M+, coordinating engineering, product, HCD, and government stakeholders to improve health services for Veterans and clinicians.

• Deliver a VA application suite reaching 14M+ record views and 48K+ users (2023-2026), including a national release that eliminated 141K+ clicks and a Nov. 2025 launch that hit 8M views in three months, the highest usage across 18 applications in the suite.

• Contribute to 10+ bids as VA SME and orals presenter, securing $25M+ in contracts in 2024.

• Standardized onboarding across distributed teams and subcontractors, reducing ramp time and improving retention 10% year over year.

• Serve as primary VA client liaison, leading quarterly planning sessions, status reporting, and TRM/contract compliance across the portfolio.

• Standardize agile delivery practices across all initiatives, improving sprint consistency and translating modernization priorities into executable plans.

• Manage portfolio financials including budget tracking, forecasting, and risk escalation to keep initiatives within contract obligations.

• Partner with leadership to advance PMO operations and implement AI-powered tools that streamline delivery workflows.

ASAPP  |  Remote, June 2021—April 2022

Lead Technical Program Manager

Directed delivery across four multidisciplinary HCD and engineering teams supporting AI/ML product development in a high-velocity, research-driven environment.

• Translated complex AI/ML capabilities into structured SDLC milestones, enabling consistent release execution and reducing rework through a shared backlog, roadmap, and technical documentation, creating shared visibility and reducing rework across teams.

• Developed operational runbooks, delivery processes, and collaboration frameworks that reduced coordination overhead and supported scalable product launches.

Nava PBC  |  Remote, August 2020—June 2021

Technical Project Manager, Level 5 & Team Lead

Led a 15-person cross-functional team supporting cloud.cms.gov: the enterprise cloud infrastructure-as-a-service platform for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

• Managed planning, execution, and risk mitigation for team deliverables within a 100-person federal digital services program, consistently maintaining delivery cadence against CMS modernization milestones.

• Collaborated across program teams to define site features and customer content for government partners migrating to cloud infrastructure at scale.

Austin Tech Alliance  |  Austin, TX, November 2017—August 2020

Program Director

Drove tech-sector engagement in Austin's civic and policy landscape through day-to-day operational leadership of a civic tech nonprofit.

• Produced editorial and policy content, including member communications, press releases, legislative priorities, and annual recaps, establishing ATA as a credible voice in Austin's civic tech ecosystem.

• Planned and executed 50+ community events across 2019 and 2020, including 25+ voter registration drives reaching thousands of Travis County residents, expanding ATA's reach and community membership year-over-year.

City of Austin, Office of Innovation  |  Austin, TX, July 2016—September 2017

Design, Technology & Innovation Fellow

As a civic tech fellow, partnered with a multidisciplinary team to bring human-centered design and tech-sector practices into City of Austin government, redesigning digital and in-person standards.

• Reengineered Austin's permitting process end-to-end: conducted 100+ research interviews with residents, businesses, and stakeholders, redesigned public-facing workflows and service delivery, and launched permittingatx.com, reducing resident reliance on in-person support.

• Scoped projects, authored statements of work, and managed program strategy and day-to-day delivery for a multidisciplinary team.

Under Armour  |  Austin, TX, April 2014—July 2016

Program Manager, Engineering

Managed a 25+ person team of designers and engineers, directing cross-functional delivery from concept to launch across iOS, Android, and web.

• Delivered 100% of 2015 roadmap initiatives on time, launching 20 new products across platforms, contributing to $40M+ in revenue in 2015, then scaled the e-commerce program to $250M+ in revenue in 2016.

• Identified and resolved complex cross-team dependencies and delivery obstacles across high-volume, high-visibility launch conditions.

Tools:

• Program & Delivery Leadership: Federal program management, SDLC/Agile delivery (Scrum, Kanban, SAFe), risk mitigation, roadmap planning, sprint governance, stakeholder and subcontractor management, release management, budgeting and cost control, FedRAMP compliance, contractual oversight

• Leadership & People: Cross-functional team leadership, multi-team portfolio oversight, mentoring, distributed team operations, business development support

• Clearance & Compliance: Public Trust clearance, VA adjudication

• Tools: Jira, Confluence, Asana, GitHub, Mural, Monday, Airtable, SharePoint 

Certifications & Education:

SAFe Release Train Engineer (RTE), 2025

Scrum Alliance Agile Leader, 2025

Scrum Alliance Certified Product Owner (CSPO), 2021, 2025

Scrum Alliance Certified ScrumMaster (CSM), 2014, 2021, 2023—present

SAFe 5 Advanced Scrum Master, 2024

New Ways for Work, High Conflict Institute, 2024

Bachelor of Arts in Communications, New Mexico State University