Senior Project Manager

Summary:

The Senior Project Manager at National Heritage Academies (NHA) is responsible for leading teams to deliver project(s) that span across one or more business units. Manage resources, schedules, financials and adhere to stage gate quality and SDLC control guidelines throughout the full systems development life cycle. This also includes management of issues, risks and project change requests to ensure successful and on-time project delivery. Contribute to process improvement initiatives as it relates to improving project delivery.

The Senior Project Manager has the authority to run the project on a day-to-day basis. Verify that the project produces the required deliverables of quality, within the specified constraints of time and cost and to achieve the potential benefits defined in the business case.

Company Information:

National Heritage Academies (NHA) partners with communities to build and operate public charter schools. Founded in 1995, today NHA serves over 100 schools in nine states, with more than 65,000 students in kindergarten through 12th grade. Our schools are designed to eliminate the achievement gap and provide school choice to families so their children are prepared for success in college, career, and life.

A majority of our schools consistently outperform their local district on the state test. According to the Center for Research on Education Outcomes at Stanford University, NHA is a leading performer among charter schools and management organizations, outperforming both conventional district schools and other charter school operators. In addition, according to our employee survey, over 90% of respondents agree that the work they do is meaningful to them. Join our team.

Duties and Responsibilities:

• Manage a portfolio of complex initiatives that span one or multiple lines of business.
• Provide on-site leadership for project team by building and motivating team members to meet project goals, adhering to their responsibilities and project milestones.
• Full project life cycle ownership: successful project delivery will include full implementation from initiation to deployment for one major or several minor initiatives simultaneously.
• Develop and manage all aspects of project and program engagement from planning, external vendor relationships, communications, resources, budget, change, risks and issues.
• Delegate tasks and responsibilities to appropriate personnel.
• Report on project success criteria results, metrics, test and deployment management activities.
• Work creatively and analytically in a problem-solving environment demonstrating teamwork, innovation and excellence.
• Participate in establishing practices, templates, policies, tools and partnerships to expand and mature these capabilities for the organization.
• Manage the day-to-day project activities and resources.
• Provide status reporting regarding project milestones, deliverables, dependencies, and risks and issues.
• Understand the interdependencies between technology, operations, and business needs.
• Manage project scope and changes.
• Participate and/or drive feasibility studies, vendor selections, and proposals for evaluation by appropriate key stakeholders.
• Manage issues log and participate in quality issue resolution.
• Assist in dispute, negotiation, arbitration or litigation, as needed.
• Define the Statement of Work and specifications for the requested goods and services.
• Set and continually manage project and program expectations while delegating and managing deliverable with team members and stakeholders.
• Monitor, track and control outcomes to resolve issues, conflicts, dependencies and critical path deliverables.
• Develop and deliver progress reports, proposals, requirements documentation and presentations to various audiences, including project team, sponsors, CIO and key stakeholders.
• Define success criteria and disseminate them to involved parties throughout project and program life cycle.
• Identify and develop trusted adviser relationship with project and program stakeholders, sponsors and university stakeholders.
• Deliver appropriate and effective executive level communication.
• Ensure that projects and programs are proceeding according to scope, schedule, budget and quality standards.
• Continue professional development to keep abreast of emerging technologies, methods and best practices.
• Extensive understanding of project and program management principles, methods and techniques.
• Proven success in providing on-site leadership for project team by building and motivating team members to meet project goals, adhering to their responsibilities and project milestones.
• Pair with Change Management Office on executing change management best practices on projects.
• Create, own, and execute change adoption, communication and training plans.
• Work alongside business owners to ensure user adoption and hand off process is set up for success.
• May travel 1-3 times a year.

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s Degree in appropriate field of study or equivalent work experience.
• 5+ years of project management experience, including tracking and planning projects.
• 5+ years of experience working with business stakeholders within a cross-functional matrix environment.
• 1+ years of previous experience with gathering requirements from the client / business and documentation.
• 3+ years of experience with full product lifecycle with understanding of development lifecycle and various technology methodologies that support that lifecycle.
• Excellent experience in SDLC Methodologies, Agile, SCRUM, SDLC / Waterfall.
• Strong leadership, diplomatic and motivational skills including the ability to lead up, across and down multiple business and technology organizations.
• Proven ability to work creatively and analytically in a problem-solving environment demonstrating teamwork, innovation and excellence.
• Build and maintain relationships by engaging business leaders to establish credibility, solve problems, build consensus and achieve objectives.
• Excellent leadership, communication (written, verbal and presentation) and interpersonal skills.
• Tools: MS Project, Excel, Word and PowerPoint; Workfront or another PPM tool.
• Experience negotiating vendor contracts.
• Experience drafting and submitting budget proposals and recommending subsequent budget changes where necessary.
• Strong experience presenting to executive sponsors and demonstrated communication skills; both written and oral with technical and non-technical staff, all levels of management.
• Experience influencing and gaining buy-in from executive sponsors, team members, stakeholders and peers.
• Team-building skills with technical and non-technical staff.
• Experience working both independently and in a team-oriented, collaborative environment.
• Flexible with proven ability to conform to shifting priorities, demands and timelines through analytical and problem-solving capabilities.
• Technically competent with various software programs, including but not limited to Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Visio) and Microsoft Project.
• Adept at conducting research into project-related issues and products.
• Must be able to learn, understand and apply new technologies.
• Support diverse and inclusive work environment.

This is an in-person position at our NHA Service Center located at 3850 Broadmoor Ave., Grand Rapids, MI.

Please to find out more about our core values.

National Heritage Academies is an equal-opportunity employer.