Head of Project Management Office at Mastercard Foundation

Mastercard Foundation is a global foundation based across four hubs in Kigali, Rwanda, Nairobi, Kenya, Accra, Ghana and Toronto, Canada. Our programs promote financial inclusion and advance education and learning in Africa, primarily for young people, and in Canada for Indigenous youth. The Foundation was established in 2006 through the generosity of Mastercard when it became a public company. From inception, the Foundation was designed to be a separate entity and independent from Mastercard. Our policies, operations, and funding decisions are made by our President and Board of Directors.

The Foundation believes that youth employment is key to unlocking prosperity, both for youth and their societies. Enabling young women and men from disadvantaged communities to secure dignified and fulfilling work will ensure inclusive development and economic growth in Africa.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job Title: Head of Project Management Office

Location: Nigeria

The Opportunity

• Reporting to the Head of Technology, the role will be responsible for delivering approved projects and initiatives to meet business needs, using recognized Project Management techniques and expertise.
• The successful candidate will be based in Canada or any of our listed offices in Africa (Rwanda, Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, Senegal, Ghana and Nigeria).

Ways You Can Contribute

• Contributes to the development and delivery of overall Technology strategy in collaboration with internal and external stakeholders.
• Builds, deploys and operates a PMO Office. Defines the approach for Continuous Improvement of the PMO Office including tools used, education requirements, management systems, metrics, review cycles, projects execution governance and value realization measurement
• Reviews project proposals to ensure they are complete and aligned with the overall foundation strategy.
• Manages the strategic aspects of large programs/engagements and mitigates projects execution risks.
• Establish projects governance structures adjusted to project size, complexity, risk level and priority. Run the project governance calls and address stakeholders concerns. Request support from the governance structure where needed. Document and share PMO Office. performance metrics and continuous improvement work.
• Establishes appropriate project standards, communicates to the cross-functional teams the standards and enforces them across the organization.
• Within the context of approved projects, review and oversee the delivery of business change management activities and business process improvements.
• Review and approve the project communication deliverables and advocacy for the delivered solution and supported business vision.
• Oversee evaluation of impact on the business and ensure business stakeholders are aware of required change management effort and tasks.
• Build project plan in alignment with project scope and priority. Ensure business quarterly and yearly activities are considered when planning projects key milestones.
• Validate project timelines with internal and external stakeholders including project sponsors, IT Operations Team, and vendors.
• Track project budget and ensure project costs are reported on with accuracy and diligence.
• Ensure risks and issues are tracked and reported. Mitigation plans are build and executed.
• Ensure project methodologies are properly selected (waterfall, agile) and take into consideration the project scope, nature, priority and stakeholders’ expectations.
• Manage project vendors contracts and deliverables.
• Coach and support project resources. Support them with capabilities development and workload management.
• Quality control deliverables: business process maps and documentation, systems configuration and development, technical testing, functional testing, users acceptance testing, data migration, interfaces building, reporting and analytics deliverables, training material creation and training execution, change management and communication activities, hand over to IT Support Team and cutover activities. Manage post go live stabilization activities and project closure.
• Perform post go live evaluation. Collect learning and feed them into PMO improvements.
• Mentor, develop and hire strong, service-oriented project teams.
• Develops and oversees the project management schedule goals and the team's capacity planning.
• Leads and maintains a strong team of project and program managers by providing training & skill development in addition to coaching and mentoring.
• Establish solid relationships with external vendors providing point resources for project execution.

Who You Are

• Bachelor's Degree or Diploma and/or certificate in IT related fields is required.
• Experience working as a Project Manager delivering large scale global programs in a complex organization.
• Experience delivering projects with various methodologies: waterfall or agile.
• Experience in project management delivery with a scope across several business processes, business applications, data & analytics applied for core business (Finance, HR, Logistics, Operations, Sales, etc.).
• Experience delivering projects in IT infrastructure space is a plus.
• Experience reviewing and examining business processes and systems, modeling data, organizing activities and developing business strategies leading to successful business projects execution.
• Strong experience with data analysis, management reporting and project management tools is an asset.
• Appropriate project management and/or business analysis training/qualifications are an asset (PMP/PMIBOK, BCS/ISEB diploma, IIBA or equivalent certifications).
• Ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously with a global scope.
• Effective leadership skills and ability to listen, communicate and motivate teams to achieve results. Can demonstrate the ability to manage demanding and challenging stakeholders.
• Demonstrates accountability and leadership.
• Competent ability to deliver under pressure and respond to a changing environment.
• Has worked in and feels comfortable with international, virtual, multi-cultural, multi-disciplined, and high-performance working teams.
• Possess excellent verbal, written, and presentation skills with the ability to articulate information to a variety of constituents across cultures.
• Flexible, adaptable, and able to execute a range of job duties and changing priorities.
• Possess excellent verbal, written, and presentation skills with the ability to articulate information to a variety of constituents across cultures.
• Possess professional maturity, sensitivity with different cultures, and impeccable integrity.
• Commitment to Mastercard Foundation’s values and vision.
• Ability to travel 20% of the time as required.

Application Closing Date
6th December, 2022.