Principal Project Manager Lead

Job DescriptionJob Description

JOB SUMMARY
Covalent Solutions (Covalent) is seeking a mission driven, highly motivated and collaborative Principal Project Manager Lead who is truly excited about building great products and user experiences to support the All of Us Research Program (AOU) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). AOU was established to accelerate health research and medical breakthroughs to enable an era of precision medicine for all. The program seeks to achieve this mission through building relationships with one million or more participant partners, delivering the largest, richest biomedical dataset ever, and catalyzing an ecosystem of communities, researchers, and funders who make All of Us an indispensable part of health research. It is the programs mission to accelerate health research and medical breakthroughs to enable individualized prevention, treatment, and care for all of us.

The Principal Project Manager Lead is a high-profile leadership position responsible for leading and developing a staff of project managers to ensure the success of AOUs strategic initiatives. Your primary mission will be to ensure organizational alignment and overall coordinated management of high-priority projects over their life cycle, focusing the team on increased predictability and achievement of intended project/program outcomes. Reporting to the AOU Director of Product, you will also develop definition, communication and training support for key project management processes used throughout the community of AOU project managers. Importantly, we are looking for a candidate who thrives on cross-team collaboration in a mission-driven organization.

This opportunity is full-time with Covalent and is on-site in Rockville, Maryland.

DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES include, but are not limited to:

• Leads and directs a team of project managers responsible for high-priority projects requiring high levels of cross functional integration.
• Responsible for overall coordinated management of high-priority projects over their life cycle (requirements gathering, project planning, development, launch and post-launch review).
• Monitors the scope, schedule and key performance indicators of high-priority projects in order to address risks and performance issues, and to increase the likelihood of achieving intended project/program outcomes.
• Facilitates project communications and documentation, communicating strategic project progress, decisions, status, issues and risks to senior leadership and stakeholders on a consistent cadence to ensure organizational alignment and optimum return on investment.
• Responsible for ensuring on-going examination and management of risks, and critical path analysis, to enable successful completion, fostering schedule predictability and adherence of high-priority projects.
• Ensure continuous improvement by encouraging and monitoring project and post-launch review retrospectives.
• Uses input from retrospectives, Senior Leadership and stakeholders to routinely refine and optimize project management processes and methodologies to improve organizational efficiency and effectiveness.
• Hires, trains, coaches, counsels, and evaluates performance of a team of project management direct reports.
• Proactively identifies and addresses strategic issues that may impair the teams ability to meet goals.
• Applies strong knowledge of project management software tools including scheduling, communication planning, risk plans, resource plans, and action item trackers.
• Develops definition around key Project Management processes used throughout the community of AOU project managers and representatives: Stage Gate Framework Phase Planning, Schedule Management, Risk Mitigation, Issue Management, Escalation.
• Defines intake and approval process for Project Management process exceptions.
• Defines Project Artifacts around key Project Management processes. Provides divisional training and knowledge transfer on Project Artifacts and processes.
• Communicates processes effectively to internal and external stakeholders.
• Works with AOU Senior Leadership and Product Managers to align project plans with portfolio vision and AOU Research Program objectives.
• Works closely with Technology, User Experience, Program Office, Product Managers, AOUawardees and other key stakeholders as part of Integrated Project Teams to define and execute project plans for high-priority projects.
• Completes other tasks and projects as assigned by the Director of Product.
  

QUALIFICATIONS
Education

• Bachelors or Masters in Computer Science, Biomedical Science or STEM discipline
• PMP Certification a plus
  

Work Experience

• 10+ years of end-to-end software project management experience
• 8+ years of directly managing and supervising 10+ person team of project managers
• Proven experience with the full software development life-cycle, from planning, gathering requirements, prioritization, execution, and iteration.
• Very strong release management, agile/scrum best practices.
• Proven experience managing cross-functional teams of designers, engineers, and other stakeholders.
• Experience must demonstrate increased independence and overall responsibility for more complex projects.
  

COMPETENCIES
Professionalism:

• Ability to apply judgment to manage conflicting priorities and resources, driving work and results that are the highest value for the organization.
• Ability to take in a lot of disparate information and find common themes, recommend clear paths forward and iterate.
• Sharp eye for detail. Keep meticulous notes and be able to manage multiple projects in different phases of work at the same time. Context-switching does not bother you.
• Ability to identify issues, analyze and participate in the resolution of issues/problems.
• Motivated by professional rather than personal concerns.
• Show persistence when faced with difficult problems or challenges.
• Ability to stay calm under stress and uncertainty, influencing the same in your team.
• Naturally curious about things you don't understand and actively look for opportunities to grow and learn from those around you.
  

Communication:

• Actively participate in meetings and be willing to advocate for what you believe in. Provide thoughtful, constructive review of others work, knowing that everyone is working towards the same objective.
• Superior written and verbal communication skills. You can always articulate the "why" behind your proposals.
• Listen to others, correctly interpret messages from others and respond appropriately.
• Ask questions to clarify, and exhibit interest in having two-way communication.
• Tailor language, tone, style and format to match the audience.
• Demonstrate openness in sharing information and keeping people informed.
• Speak intelligently about a wide variety of topics but know when to say "I don't know."
  

Teamwork:

• Ability to form trust-based relationships quickly and lead cross-functional teams through influence (without formal authority).
• Work collaboratively with colleagues to achieve organizational goals.
• Place team agenda before personal agenda.
• Support and act in accordance with the final group decision, even when such decisions may not entirely reflect one's own position.
• Share credit for team accomplishments and accept joint responsibility for team shortcomings.
  

Accountability:

• Take ownership of all responsibilities and honor commitments.
• Deliver outputs for which you have responsibility within prescribed time, cost and quality standards.
• Operate in compliance with organizational regulations and rules.
• Take personal responsibility for your own shortcomings, where applicable.
  

Company DescriptionCovalent Solutions is a team of highly skilled and motivated individuals helping our customers accomplish their mission.Company DescriptionCovalent Solutions is a team of highly skilled and motivated individuals helping our customers accomplish their mission.