Group Program Director - Project Management

The Edelman Project Management team is passionate about finding smart ways to deliver great work. We sit at the center of our business, collaborating with best-in-class teams to ensure Edelman ideas make an impact in our clients’ real worlds. From cars to consumer goods, fashion and retail, financial service, food and beverage, luxury, technology or healthcare – we are fanatics about integrated project management and enable our creative, strategy and account teams to deliver smart and brilliant programming for our clients.

This is an exciting opportunity for a process-oriented, go-getter who wants to become a key part of a forward-thinking, integrated team. We want passion and excitement. We want someone who is unafraid to ask questions, is willing to challenge the norm and is eager to be the best in the business. At Edelman, our team have deep experience in integrated project management. They are the leaders who oversee the project management operation, the definition of assignments and the flawless delivery of work for multiple large portfolios of clients that span geography. They are recognized as the go-to's for our most senior leaders to activate exciting and high-profile integrated work - and to ensure a calm, solutions orientated, one team approach in everything we do.

Project Management team are responsible for providing operational structure and overall delivery oversight on integrated projects. Serving as the overall program management lead across multiple portfolios of accounts, they oversee a teams of project managers and project leaders who lead schedules, deliverables, priorities and teams towards flawless execution. They are a strategic core team leader and counselor to Account and Specialty leads in program management, project delivery best practices and financial health. They are also leaders within the Project Management team, reporting to the Global Head of Project Management. As such, they are responsible for guiding career development and fostering an inclusive, growth-minded team culture.

Key Responsibilities

• Business planning with geo leadership and client portfolio leadership to ensure a clear actionable strategy to facilitate growth and diversification.
• Own the intake of new work and the evaluation of new briefs within their portfolios, devising delivery approaches for each assignment drawing on PM best practices, and ensuring clear direction for more junior members of the team who will execute the day to day.
• Partner with global PM leadership and regional operational leadership to implement a vision for project management and contribute to the future evolution of the discipline within Edelman.
• Own and manage project definition in scopes and staff plans with account leads and specialty teams within their portfolios, producing / overseeing indicative pricing and detailed budgets that match a description of deliverables and actual work effort.
• Champion approved project management tools and best practices that standardize how to author and maintain project schedules, project briefs, cost estimates, financial management (OOP & fee), and other relevant project documentation. Also, stay connected to innovations (tools and processes) within the field of project management so that they can be considered for future implementation.
• Independently own the delivery of multiple large, complex programs independently and with support from PM leaders and more junior project managers.
• Serve as an escalation point to manage risks and provide solutions-oriented consultation to integrated team leads, proactively looking around corners, controlling project scope and the change control process, and collaborating with leads to strategically identify and implement win-win solutions.
• Partner with Finance and Account teams to ensure clients are profitable, fees are appropriate, forecasts are accurate, and SOWs are approved.
• Drive client discussions related to delivery strategy, financial health, Edelman capabilities, and scope negotiation.
• Partner with Resource Management to forecast current and future staffing requirements on assigned portfolios to identify the best talent for the work.
• Establish workflow and best practices on integrated businesses that enable teams to efficiently deliver against program goals.
• Ensure quality checks and consistency of all outputs across all project deliverables.
• Ensure flexibility in approaches to fit client, creative, and business needs, while managing change and exploring various budget / time scenarios to elevate work.
• Contribute to project operations and "the work behind the work" - prioritizing new project opportunities, establishing flexible frameworks and best practices with new teams, and providing input on PM team assignments.
• Manage and mentor Project Management team members, including resolving project escalations, setting and managing performance goals, coaching individual career growth paths, and balancing workloads.
• Balance a sense of urgency with calm and confident leadership at all times.

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