Senior Manager, Program and Project Management

Job Summary

The Senior Manager, Program and Project Management is responsible for planning and managing the successful delivery of major programs.

The incumbent monitors program performance, manages risks of programs and related projects, ensuring plans are in place to support successful delivery and realization of business benefits.

Furthermore, the role builds and maintains working relationships with team members, vendors, and other departments involved in the projects.

For the purpose of the Enhanced Train Control (ETC) role, the incumbent actively participates in the deployment of projects governance, standards, and best practices.

The incumbent is also leading the program and project management practices of ETC, oversees the integration of multiple products, vendors and segments ensuring deliverables are met per agreed goals and timelines.

Main Responsibilities

Lead ETC Program 60%

• Ensure the delivery of the program’s benefits, paying attention to all details in all segments to ensure the dependencies between deliverables.
• Pay close attention to resourcing from all internal and external participants to maintain delivery cadence.
• Monitor and support resourcing plans, Work Force Plan, to enable the overall program success.
• Be responsible for program budget, ensure compliance to financial standards, monitor and seek corrections to budget variance clearly articulating any deviations following the defined change request management process.
• Manage the multi vendor ecosystem of the program with support from Procurement, Delivery Leads, and Project Managers involved in the vendor partnerships.
• Align strategic direction and steering with Operational Technologies and Project Management Officer (PMO)
• Establish and maintain a strong program governance and work diligently with business partners and stakeholders to ensure execution.
• Prepare and maintain, update, weekly the multi-year ETC integrated plan.
• Prepare and maintain communication presentations and material for consumption in weekly program reviews, frequent executive reviews, and steering committees.

Delivery Management Practices 20%

• Review the program or project definitions with Project Managers at the start of their project to ensure their project plans, tools and processes used conform and support the CN standards and best practices.
• Provide mentoring and consultation to program teams on standards, procedures, templates, etc.
• Work with the Project Managers to find alternate solutions not to compromise delivery.
• Perform program or project reviews on a regular basis.
• Ensure action plans to address gaps and timeline for corrective actions are documented and followed-up
• Facilitate communication of feedback and recommendations coming out of the review
• Participate in process improvement of Program Management and Project Management practice and assist with ongoing development of the standards.

People Management 20%

• Partner with Human Resources (HR) to bring new talent to the organization by determining which skills and roles will be required in the future and by making thoughtful hiring decisions.
• Provide a positive and welcoming onboarding experience to all new employees by ensuring they have access to the tools and resources needed to fulfill the requirements of their job.
• Recognize employee milestones as well as significant contributions and enhanced responsibilities.
• Focus on communications and foster collaboration by regularly providing updates to teams about ongoing initiatives and encouraging them to work together to accomplish common goals and learning.
• Manage employee performance by ensuring employees who are not meeting expectations are identified and supported through the performance improvement process.
• Create and enable a positive and engaging work environment by ensuring individual strengths are uncovered and leveraged through frequent and focused conversations.
• Participate in succession planning by contributing to the yearly talent review cycle and identifying employees with the potential to move up the management and expertise paths.
• Support employee development by having regular career conversations with all employees and supporting them in reaching their career goals.
• Ensure knowledge is preserved through cross-training for key skill sets in the team.

Working Conditions

The role has standard working conditions in an office environment with a regular workweek from Monday to Friday. The incumbent must be available to work night shifts and weekends when necessary.

Due to the nature of the role, the incumbent must be able to meet tight deadlines, handle pressure, and stress. The role requires minimal travel (20%) within Canada and the United States (

Requirements

Experience

Information and Technology Project Management

• Minimum 15 years of experience in I&T project and program management, preferably with experience in System Engineering practices and the deployment of Operational Technology and critical systems
• Minimum 10 years of experience demonstrating leadership qualities and overseeing deliverables.

Demonstrated experience delivering projects and programs on time and on budget that meet business objectives.

Demonstrated experience coordinating interdependencies with other projects and programs.

Experience working in the Transportation or Rail industry on I&T projects*

• Minimum 5 years of experience delivering or managing significant deliverables for programs exceeding $100MCAD.
• Any experience for these above would be considered as an asset

Education / Certification / Designation

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, Engineering, Commerce, or equivalent
• Project Management (PMP) Certification or equivalent
• Any designation for these above would be considered as an asset

Competencies

• Applies critical thinking.
• Communicates with impact.
• Collaborates with others and shares information.
• Sets direction and inspires others.
• Knows the business and stays current on industry needs.
• Identifies needs and finds solutions to create value for all stakeholders.
• Leads by example for the safety and security of all stakeholders.

Technical Skills / Knowledge

• Knowledge of System Engineering practices
• Highly familiar with agile methodologies (, Lean, Scrum), Development Operations (DevOps), Continuous Integration (CI) and Continuous Delivery (CD)
• Knowledge of Microsoft Project Professional Server (PPM)
• Knowledge of Microsoft Office (Excel, PowerPoint)
• Fluently bilingual, both written and verbal (English, French)*
• Any knowledge for any of the above would be considered as an asset

Organizational Impact

Decision Making & Impacts

The Senior Manager, Program and Project Management has a set level of authority to make significant fact-based decisions.

The role is required to present decisions that have a wider impact on the Steering Committee as well as influencing more than one project or program course of actions and progress.

The incumbent provides insights on how to maintain bottom line and expenditure under control to preserve projects and program business case viability.

Furthermore, the role is required to communicate any impacts to stakeholders.

Level of Interaction / Influence

The Senior Manager, Program and Project Management interacts with individuals internal and external to CN. Within the organization, the incumbent liaises with I&T as well as cross functionally.

Outside of CN, the role communicates with stakeholders and partners.

Employees Supervised / Organizational Structure

The Senior Manager, Program and Project Management reports to the Director Operations Solutions and may have dotted line reporting to ensure both the Project Office and the ETC Accountable leaders can assist to ensure success.

The role requires the direct supervision of 5 to 10 non-unionized management employees.

Thisposition is posted as a grade LEVEL 5. For internal candidates, note that thegrade level of the position may adjust based on the employee's experience.