Senior Project Manager

Posted:
9/29/2024, 7:03:11 PM

Location(s):
Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa ⋅ Gauteng, South Africa

Experience Level(s):
Senior

Field(s):
Business & Strategy

Workplace Type:
Hybrid

Who We Are:

At VML, we are a beacon of innovation and growth in an ever-evolving world. Our heritage is built upon a century of combined expertise, where creativity meets technology, and diverse perspectives ignite inspiration. With the merger of VMLY&R and Wunderman Thompson, we have forged a new path as a growth partner that is part creative agency, part consultancy, and part technology powerhouse. 

Our global family now encompasses over 30,000 employees across 150+ offices in 64 markets, each contributing to a culture that values connection, belonging, and the power of differences.  Our expertise spans the entire customer journey, offering deep insights in communications, commerce, consultancy, CRM, CX, data, production, and technology. We deliver end-to-end solutions that result in revolutionary work. 

What you’ll be doing:

  • Accountable for the Delivery Management of multiple projects from initiation, planning, monitoring to completion and closure
  • Ensure the Delivery Management Framework is adhered to. Also contributing to its development and refinement
  • Establishes governance, action management and communication routines and mitigate issues/risks.
  • Manage the core project areas of scope, time, cost and quality to ensure project outputs meet expectations:
    • Scope - Work closely with project sponsors to ensure that business requirements are met and the outputs of the project are fit for purpose.
    • Time – Maintain an up-to-date and accurate schedule to track project tasks and key milestones.
    • Cost - Manage the project cost – tracking costs based on budget, forecast and actuals/reconciliations.
    • Quality - Oversee the quality control and quality assurance aspects of the project including UAT and testing phase of the project.
  • Produce accurate and detailed documentation for the project (such as project kick off/briefing deck, SOW, workbook/estimation spreadsheet, meetings reports with clear actions and owners outlined, burn reports)
  • Accountable for project leadership and management of large multi-stream 18 month-plus projects ensuring client expectations, quality deliverables and profitability are met
  • Actively identify and manage risks and issues that may jeopardize the successful delivery of a project and take steps to mitigate these and manage these through to resolution.
  • Responsible for all projects entered into Projector (Project managementresourcing tool) and updated based on project and business requirement in timely manner
  • Responsible for accurate resourcing of your project team at any given time of the project lifecycle. Through Projector tool and by clear communication with resource manager
  • Manages resourcing constraints with the relevant internal stakeholders
  • Comfortable working with hybrid management tools and ways of working being part of a wider distributed EMEA team
  • Be the single point of contact, maintain customer satisfaction and regular status updates for all outstanding issues/risks regarding the project progress
  • Should be comfortable working with global clients, culture, languages
  • Establish and engage your project team to ensure the successful delivery of all outcomes/activities within the required timeframe.
  • Support Consultants when completing RFP’s or scoping projects by providing insight into resources, budget estimation and availability
  • Accountable for effective change management on:
    • People – any new roles or impacts on teams
    • Process – any new processes and procedures
    • Technology – any system, hardware or other technology changes required to support the business change
  • Expert in PM methodologies & tools: agile, hybrid, KANBAN, Smartsheet, JIRA, etc

What you’ll need:

TECHNICAL KNOWLEDGE REQUIREMENT

  1. Analytics
  • Briefing in and working closely with technical consultant, data analysts and dev team
  • Running analytics stand-ups  
  • Being reactive when client briefs come in. Prioritising, delivering within agreed SLA whilst managing client expectations reinforcing internal process
  • Technical understanding of how website analytics works
  • Experience delivering analytic based project, SEO, SEM.
  • Understanding of google analytics and Adobe Analytics platforms
  • Managing tickets on JIRA or similar platforms: creating tickets, assigning to resources, triaging, prioritising, closing tickets
  1. Business, Data, Operations and Marketing-Technology Consulting
  • Managing data projects for client portfolio in banking (for one of the top 3 banks in Africa)
  • Delivering a series of projects (costs, timings, risks, dependencies, admin) across analytics and business data opportunities
  • Briefing in and working closely with business, technical and data consultants
  • Outlining business opportunities when they arise and growing the account alongside the business director
  • Managing client relationship

OTHER REQUIREMENTS:

  • Tertiary business or technical qualification
  • Recognised Project Management certification
  • Experience within a PMO environment
  • At least 8 years’ experience responsible for project delivery within a technical or professional services environment (Our projects are technical and frequently involve technology vendors)
  • Knowledge of online marketing technologies (Messaging platforms, Social Media, Analytics, Data) and their integration into broader IT infrastructure highly advantageous
  • Ability to work effectively in a fast paced, entrepreneurial environment
  • Passionate about customer service
  • Excellent, concise written and verbal communication skills
  • Obsession with details and planning
  • Good working knowledge of the internet, Excel, PowerPoint, and Word
  • This is a senior position suiting an individual with eight year's work experience in a similar role

 

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At VML, we are committed to fostering an all-inclusive work environment that is both rewarding and career-forward. Our Inclusion, Equity & Belonging initiatives, alongside the VML Foundation, reflect our dedication to giving back and making a positive impact in our communities and beyond. Our people are the heartbeat of our organization—creators, doers, innovators, makers, and thinkers—who drive not just marketing, but meaningful experiences that resonate in every action and interaction. 

VML is a WPP Agency. For more information, please visit our website, and follow VML on our social channels via Instagram, LinkedIn, and X. 

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