Senior Project Manager

IT Senior Project Manager

Portsmouth | Personal Contract

Full-time | Hybrid

REQ4836

The Senior Project Manager will have extensive experience in different project management methodologies and techniques, and strong competencies in project planning, budget and time management, scope, risk, and change management.

The Senior Project Manager is responsible for leading teams to deliver project(s) that span across one or more business workstreams or multiple applications or technology platforms. Senior Project Managers are expected to manage the highly complex, extended or high budget projects. This may include legislative change as dictated by Ofgem or taking on failing/in trouble projects that need to be bought back on track.

The senior PM is expected to manage resources, schedules, financials and adhere to stage gate quality and control guidelines throughout the full systems development life cycle. They will also contribute to process improvement initiatives related to improving project delivery. Depending on the size and complexity of the project, the senior PM may be expected to manage less experienced PMs.

The Senior Project Manager will run projects on a day-to-day basis, verify that they produce the required deliverables to an acceptable quality, within the specified constraints of time and cost and to achieve the benefits defined in the business case. The role includes reporting/presenting to senior management / Portfolio Leads if/when required.

The Senior PM will be expected to mentor and coach other Project Managers and may be expected provide line management to other permanent project team members.

I help to keep people safe and warm by…

Methodology & Processes

• Full life cycle ownership: successful project delivery will include full implementation from initiation to deployment for one major or several minor initiatives simultaneously.
• Manage all aspects of multiple related projects to ensure the overall program is aligned to and directly supports the achievement of strategic objectives and delivered the anticipated benefits.
• Work creatively and analytically in a problem-solving environment demonstrating teamwork, innovation and excellence.
• Management of projects in line with SGN’s project delivery methodology, processes and quality standards.
• Deliver projects outcomes to meet the defined success criteria within the limits of the business case.
  
  

Stakeholder & People Management

• Develop and foster relationships with key stakeholders within IT, the business and third-party suppliers to share information on project progress.
• Lead stakeholder consultation process throughout the lifecycle of the project(s).
• Resolve conflict, negotiate with stakeholders, and effectively interact and maintain working relationships with all levels of the organisation internally and externally.
• Provide Leadership to the Project Team and more junior Project Managers.
• Ensure all project team members understand their roles and responsibilities throughout all stages of the project.
• Work with Procurement to engage with third parties to deliver projects.
• Manage a regulated tender process where a project breaches the spend threshold, working with Legal and Procurement.
• Deliver appropriate and effective Senior Management and Portfolio level communication.
• Be part of the wider IT management team.
  
  

Financial Control

• Manage the approved project budget.
• Ensure project costs are accurately estimated, reported and reviewed with Portfolio Lead
• Escalation to Portfolio Lead if projects are forecasting over the pre-agreed contingency budget.
• Look for opportunities to reduce expenditure by assessing requirements/outcomes of other projects or programs.
  
  

Risk & Issue Management

• Monitor, track and control outcomes to resolve issues, conflicts, dependencies and critical path deliverables
• Review of Risks/Issues and Dependencies with a view on the impact to the higher strategic programme(s).
• Aim to minimise risks wherever possible.
  
  

Planning & Resources

• Develop and implement program and project plans in conjunction with clients, management, stakeholders and/or external consultants.
• Track, monitor, and communicate project progress against the project plan, requirements, quality measures, standards, processes, and milestones.
• Ensure business requirements are being met and the current project plan reflects any changes to scope, timelines etc.
• Ability to conform to shifting priorities, demands and timelines through analytical and problem-solving capabilities.
• Prepare estimates and detailed project plans for all phases of the project
• Procure adequate resources to achieve project objectives in planned timeframes
• Understand interdependencies between technology, operations and business needs.
  
  

Project Closure

• Capture ‘lessons learnt’ and feed into PMO initiatives for continual improvement
• Review and assess the Business Case and review benefits case with the Project Sponsor/Business.
• Complete Closure activities ensuring any follow up actions are clearly defined and have agree owner.
  
  

Continuous Improvement

• Participate in establishing practices, templates, policies, tools and partnerships to expand and mature these capabilities for SGN.
• Actively look out for improvements that could be made in processes or documentation which would benefit the efficiencies of SGN.
  
  

Line Management

• Mentor/Coach and Support Project Managers for escalations or advice.
• Review Team members to identify any skill gaps/training needs.
• Complete project review to act as an internal quality control check for the project.
• Monitor staff performance to complete Quarterly Performance reviews and all other line management responsibilities.
  
  

What You’ll Need

Education

• Degree in Computer Science, Information Systems, or other related field or equivalent work experience.
• PRINCE 2 Practitioner
• ITIL (Desirable)
• MSP (Managing Successful Programmes) (Desirable)
• Other Project Management certifications
  
  

Experience

• >10 years of IT Project or Change Management experience.
• Management of projects or programmes with a budget >£2m
• Successfully leading projects and programmes on-time, on-schedule and within budget.
• Management of Projects of high complexity across different business areas / applications and/or technology platforms.
• Conducting Project quality/assurance reviews.
• Software Development, Application and/or Infrastructure Implementation projects.
• Agile and Waterfall Project Methodologies.
• Working with third parties on- and off-shore.
• Experience leading, motivating and managing various project and programme team sizes including mentoring and line management responsibility of permanent staff.
• Strong experience presenting to executive sponsors and demonstrated communication skills, both written and oral with technical and non-technical staff, all levels of management.
  
  

Desired Experience

• Cloud computing experience (delivery and/or migration).
• Experience of Lean ways of working including Kanban.
• Experience/knowledge of the Utility sector.
• Required Key behaviours and style indicators:
• Good at developing people and managing for improved performance.
• Able to coach and motivate teams to deliver results under pressure or with conflicting demands
• Good at challenging and support their teams on self -development and keeping up to date with technology
• Attention to detail
• Good interpersonal and communication skills.
• Collaborative team player.
• Ability to lead and take control when required to do so
• Assertive and driven
• Good at building rapport and influencing at all levels
• High energy and a desire to succeed
  
  

About us | Benefits | Diversity and inclusion

Please note that this vacancy is only open to current SGN employees.