Program Manager

Program Manager

Abt Associates

London, United Kingdom

The Opportunity

The senior programme manager (SPM) will be responsible for the following key functions:

Programme Delivery: Day-to-day head office operational oversight of programme delivery, ensuring head contract compliance and adherence to Abt operational policies and procedures, financial and commercial management and reporting, proactive risk management, management of sub-contractors and consultants, staff performance and quality programme delivery.

Business Growth: Supporting Abt Britain to scale its work in the UK, including the development of systems, processes and contribution to opportunity capture and project tender preparation.

Core Responsibilities

Programme Delivery

Client Management

• Achieve a high level of client satisfaction with programme outcomes
• Act as the first point of contact on all operational (including contractual, financial and personnel-related) communications with the Client.
• Ensure that the programme has an executed head contract and monitor all aspects of the head contract to ensure compliance with the budget, scope of work and all terms and conditions
• Support all head contract negotiations and the preparation of contract amendments.

Contract Management

• Manage contract requirements as necessary, escalating with sound judgement to the Programme Director.
• Support the delivery of contractual deliverables within contracted time frames or per Client approved extensions.
• Review and manage all contracting of personnel and organisations, ensuring that scope of work, budget and terms and conditions comply with the head contract.
• Oversee and lead negotiations with project subaward partners; oversees and/or completes drafting and execution of subaward agreements/contracts; identifies and manages key subaward issues, payments, budgets, and invoicing; and reviews deliverables in coordination with project team to ensure they meet technical, contractual, and quality standards.
• Ensure compliance with client standards, e.g. Green Climate Fund, European Commission, Global Fund.

Financial Management

• Day-to-day financial and commercial oversight of the project/programme
• Managing Client and Abt financial reporting, including accurate programme forecasting.
• Set up and management of project-specific Contract Input Code (CIC) structure, routine cost tracking and management, including transaction recoding and ensuring correct time and expenses allocations to the project.
• May support or manage a variety of contract mechanisms (e.g. Cost Plus Fixed Fee, Time & Material).
• Budget modelling for any prospective change, including for head contract amendments, personnel hiring decisions and subcontractor organisations.
• Works closely with project and corporate accountants to monitor prompt payment compliance and leads efforts in reviewing and determining causes of variances in expenditures against forecasts and budgets and ensuring client is informed as appropriate; works with programme director to identify solutions for shortfalls and train other project staff to do the same
• Tracking and reporting on commercial performance on a monthly basis, including profit leakage, funds at risk, and reporting against programme life and annual budget targets
• Review and submission of Client sales invoices and quarterly reporting, including value for money reporting, and responding to Client questions
• Management and response to the audit, including preparation ahead of audit and coordinating Abt responses
• Approving expenditure and time where necessary

Communication

• Act as a point of coordination between Abt head office corporate services (Finance, ICT, HR, Legal and Risk, Security) and programme team
• Act as the first point of contact on all operational (including contractual, financial and personnel-related) communications with the Client
• Support Abt corporate staff to communicate project impact, across the Abt, as well as with external stakeholders and potential clients
• Identify and communicate risks and risk mitigation plans

Programme and Staff Management

• Developing and executing mobilisation and close down work plans for complex programmes and projects, including recruiting, contracting and onboarding staff/consultants/partner organisations and developing and utilising programme tools and documents
• Proactively identifies issues or potential risks, including project performance, financial, and legal, and other core business areas. Develops strategies and solutions to address those risks, communicating, when appropriate, with the director and/or executive team; strategically assesses and consults with relevant stakeholders to help make informed decisions
• Ensure operational compliance, including the development of operational procedures
• Supporting project planning, progress reporting and finalisation of documents and systems. For example annual work plan, quarterly reports, recruitment plan, procurement plan, VFM analysis, project deliverables and risk management strategies
• Supporting the Team Leader to manage any staff departures and transitions that may occur from time to time
• Leads recruits of long- and short-term project personnel in accordance with Abt policy and delegates to or mentors others in project recruiting where possible and appropriate
• Supervises, mentors, trains, develops, and evaluates assigned staff; provides regular performance feedback to supervisees, conducts performance reviews and responsible for preserving adequate time and opportunity to support supervisees to grow professionally
• Mentors and advises staff across the programme delivery team as appropriate on a range of topics, including career mapping, business development, technical work, and project management
• Identifies opportunities for knowledge- and solution-sharing across company and takes initiative to build staff and company capacity
• Conducts periodic project office visits to monitor and support project operations and implementation, including conducting training, conducting or responding to audits, providing input to work planning, adherence to project requirements, government regulations, and Abt policies
• Takes initiative to identify business opportunities, efficiencies, and cost savings for the program delivery team.
• Training on Abt systems, conducting technical research, serving in an acting leadership role, and performing other complex tasks
• Supporting regular updates and contributing as appropriate to written reports as requested by the client
• Performs other duties as required

Technical Backstopping

• Utilise technical knowledge in the areas of climate change, health systems strengthening, governance, adaptive management, gender or MERL to supervise and backstop programme delivery
• Quality assurance of key deliverables
• Technical work planning, development of TORs and management of technical assistance inputs.

Business Development

• Identify and track potential business opportunities, including client meetings and in-country capture trips
• Develop and maintain strong external working relationships with clients, strategic partners, and technical advisers
• Undertaking pre-tender capture planning and activities
• Managing all aspects of the proposal process:
• • Managing international proposal teams across different geographies and time zones
  • Managing the development of proposal content, applying knowledge of FCDO or other client tendering requirements, compliance and guidelines
  • Managing the recruitment of project staff
  • Identifying partners and managing partner relationships and proposal inputs
  • Writing technical sections
  • Formatting and reviewing proposals
• Contribute to the development and expansion of the centralised knowledge management repository
• Undertake market research to inform business growth strategy

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