Director, Program Management

About the role

The Director of Program & Project Management leads the Marketing Program Management Office (PMO) and is accountable for delivering high-impact marketing programs and projects on time, on budget, and with measurable business outcomes. This role establishes governance, standards, and operating rhythms across marketing planning and execution—ensuring cross-functional alignment, risk management, resource optimization, and performance reporting.

Responsibilities

• Own the end-to-end lifecycle for strategic marketing programs (e.g., launches, integrated campaigns, lifecycle/nurture programs, brand initiatives, events).

• Translate marketing strategy into executable roadmaps, workstreams, milestones, dependencies, and deliverables.

• Drive execution rigor through best-fit delivery practices (e.g., agile, hybrid, waterfall) and proactive issue resolution.

• Ensure outcomes are measurable by partnering with Analytics to define success metrics, reporting cadence, and learnings.

• Establish and continuously improve marketing program/project governance, stage gates, change control, and stakeholder communications.

• Create and run operating rhythms (weekly execution reviews, monthly portfolio reviews, quarterly planning/OKR cadence).

• Manage the marketing portfolio across teams and channels, balancing capacity, throughput, and priority trade-offs.

• Partner with functional leaders to allocate resources (internal, agencies, freelancers) based on skills, urgency, and value.

• Identify bottlenecks and implement solutions (process redesign, staffing plans, vendor strategies, automation).

• Serve as a trusted partner to marketing leaders and enterprise stakeholders, providing clarity on timelines, scope, risks, and dependencies.

• Facilitate decision-making forums (steering committees, program councils, launch/campaign reviews).

• Directly lead the Change Management team responsible for organizational readiness and sustained adoption of new processes, tools, and operating models.

• Build change strategy for major marketing initiatives: stakeholder impact assessment, communication plans, training/enablement, reinforcement, and adoption measurement.

• Support budget planning and tracking for programs and vendors in partnership with Finance and Marketing leadership.

• Oversee agency/vendor performance for delivery: SOWs, SLAs, deliverables, timelines, and quality.

• Proactively manage risks, issues, and escalation paths; implement mitigation plans to protect delivery dates and outcomes.

• Ensure compliance with brand, legal, privacy, and operational standards.

• Lead the Marketing-led enterprise initiatives—programs with enterprise scope where Marketing is the accountable business owner.

• Stand up and run integrated program governance (executive steering, workstream cadences, RAID management, dependency tracking, decision logs).

• Career development and team building: build, lead, mentor, and develop a multi-disciplinary organization spanning Program & Project Management, MarTech, and Change Management with clear goals, operating rhythms, and career paths.

• Create a high-performance culture focused on accountability, transparency, and continuous improvement.

• Define a unified delivery and adoption operating model to ensure initiatives are delivered successfully and sustained over time.

Qualifications

• 8–12+ years in program/project management, marketing operations, or PMO leadership—preferably within a complex, cross-functional marketing environment.

• Proven track record delivering integrated marketing programs and managing portfolios across multiple channels and teams.

• Demonstrated people leadership experience leading multi-disciplinary teams, including direct oversight of program/project management and either MarTech and/or Change Management (both strongly preferred).

• Proven ability to lead Marketing-led enterprise programs with executive governance, complex dependencies, and cross-functional workstreams.

• Strong executive communication skills—able to present to leadership, drive alignment, and influence without authority.

• Demonstrated experience building governance, scalable operating models, and delivery standards.

• Expertise with work management practices and performance reporting; comfort using data to drive decisions.

Preferred Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Marketing, Operations, or related field; MBA or advanced degree a plus.

• PMP, PgMP, Agile/Scrum certification, Lean/Six Sigma, or comparable credentials.

• Change management certification or formal training (e.g., Prosci/ADKAR or equivalent).

• Experience leading marketing technology delivery programs, integrations, and measurement enablement in partnership with IT and Data/Analytics.

• Experience managing agencies, contractors, and vendor contracts/SOWs.