Core Program Director

The Core Program Director will be responsible for the end-to-end delivery of the project, leading the organisation through the change and ensuring impacts to customers are minimized and well-managed.

Key Result Areas:

• Deliver the program on budget and with an absolute focus on minimizing Customer impacts
• Project delivery outcomes are aligned with the company targets and strategy
• Positive engagement with technology and non-technology stakeholders, at all levels, to drive outcomes
• Exhibit strong leadership skills and management capability to ensure program success

Key Responsibilities and Accountabilities:

As Core Program Director you will be responsible for the overall end-to-end project delivery of the Core replacement program, more specifically:

• Project Initiation and approach - including a clear definition of project lifecycle phases, entry/exit criteria, RASCI, Roles & Responsibilities
• Detailed Requirements gathering and project objectives working with stakeholders, users, and technology teams to formulate a tight achievable scope
• Development and testing - ensure the software partner is developing a quality solution, traced to our requirements, and is validated through comprehensive and thorough testing, including non-functional and functional testing with users
• Architecture and Integration - close management of development teams to ensure they produce an integrated solution as prescribed in the architectural roadmap
• Migration and implementation - the role will have a responsibility to ensure that the migration of data is accurate and effective, the go-live event (and dress rehearsals) are extremely well planned and coordinated, and that customer impacts are minimized and very well managed. This includes deep knowledge and understanding of the Data Reconciliation process and reporting
• Where appropriate, seek External parties to review and validate key checkpoints
• Business impact and change management - the role will work with key teams within the organization to understand the impact and changes to processes, procedures, roles, and forms, manage the documentation of those changes and ensure that appropriate training is conducted
• Warranty and ongoing support for the successful closure of the warranty period, closure of the project and the transition to BAU
• Financial Management, Ensure that the project costs are tracked, reported and maintained within budget

The delivery of the program will require strong discipline and management throughout, with a particular focus on:

• Vendor management - as the partners in the project, and the software providers are critical to the successful delivery of the project. This role will be responsible for ensuring the Vendor delivers within time and cost boundaries, with the welfare of our customers at the forefront of the delivery approach. The Core Vendor contract needs to be fully understood with all deliverables tracked and linked to payment outcomes
• Project control - ensures that the project maintains the key project disciplines of the required standard for decisions, risks/issues, RASCI, financial tracking, requirements traceability, Reporting, timelines, change management and adhering to the governance protocols through the Steering Committee and other management forums
• Stakeholder engagement - as the face of the program, the Program Director will interface with stakeholders, understand their needs and requirements, update them on progress, escalate issues, ensuring that delivery activities within their teams are planned and executed
• Project Team - the role will be required to manage the dedicated resources within the program, and the resources leveraged from supporting teams. This will extend from building a resource plan to maintaining the resource plan, clear Roles and Responsibilities, RASCI and task allocation

Experience, Functional Skills and Knowledge Areas:

• Minimum 12 years of experience in Program/Project Management with at least 7 years in a bank or financial institution (MFS)
• Previous end-to-end project accountability for a Core System replacement is a MUST
• Deep knowledge of SDLC (Software Development Life Cycle) in Waterfall
• Proven Track record of delivery, particularly involving customer/data migration
• Detail-oriented with strong organizational skills and the ability to meet deadlines consistently
• Ability to work with all levels of an organisation, including providing strategic direction to Executives
• Held leadership positions managing large teams, with a mixture of direct reports and support resources
• Self-motivated with a proactive approach to problem-solving
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Expert in MS Project, Jira, Quality Centre and other related tools