Program Manager

Spire is seeking an experienced, collaborative Program Manager to work in our St. Louis office. This role focuses on strategic alignment, optimizing value creation, cross-functional resource optimization, and project synergies.

About the role

This position is accountable for executing the PMO program and portfolio strategy, prioritizing projects, and ensuring project execution aligns with strategic objectives. A successful candidate will form strong partnerships with department leadership to elevate and optimize strategic project results, develop a strong team, and bring complex projects to successful completion, primarily focusing on quality, cost, synergies, and schedule. This role works with business sponsors to ensure initiatives and potential projects are defined as part of the annual business planning cycle.

Responsibilities

• Plan, forecast, and manage a portfolio of projects through the program and project lifecycles, including those with the highest level of complexity, risk, and strategic impact.
• Conduct and lead the annual business planning process for allocated domains, focusing on defining initiatives to support strategies and lead initiatives through lean business cases.
• Manage program and project plan integration with a focus on company strategy, cross-project, and cross-functional impacts.
• Set and apply program and project management governance and standards in collaboration with department leadership; monitor performance across project teams to support a consistent approach.
• Apply Lean Portfolio Management concepts to the assigned portfolio, managing programs and maximizing results at the portfolio level.
• Support the development and maintenance of the project portfolio management tool to drive consistency across projects and provide analytics for reporting and improvement.
• Use judgment in flexible application of various project methodologies (waterfall, agile, hybrid) to best fit specific project needs; recommend innovative solutions to business challenges.
• Drive project engagements as a technical, facilitative, and analytical expert; consult with project teams, coach project management personnel, and implement data-driven and quality improvements.
• Ensure successful program and project results through clear ownership and roles, inclusion of change management elements, and a strong business handoff process.
• Identify program and project risks early, with a focus on higher-level and cross-project dependencies; develop mitigation strategies and elevate to leadership as appropriate.
• Create transparency through proactive reporting and program/portfolio tracking to meet cost, quality, and time constraints, and optimize strategic goal achievement.
• Develop and report standard program status update materials for key stakeholders, including Leadership Council and Board of Directors.
• Analyze the project portfolio for strategic goal achievement, prioritization, resource optimization, connections across projects, and change management themes.
• Measure project portfolio success and enable data-driven decision-making through identification, implementation, and ongoing measurement of KPIs.
• Coordinate with Innovation, Continuous Improvement, and other Project Management leadership on the continuous and annual process of collecting, evaluating, and prioritizing project proposals, ensuring alignment with budget and forecast processes.
• All other duties as assigned.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree from an accredited university in an analytical field (e.g., Engineering, Science, Business, IT) required; Master’s degree preferred.
• Project Management Professional (PMP) or other recognized project management certification required; Change management certification preferred.
• Other accreditations, such as PMI-PgMP, PMI-PBA, PMI-ACP, SAFe Program Consultant, or Lean Six Sigma, are valued.
• Minimum ten years of related experience, including leading large-scale cross-functional projects; prior experience driving technology solutions is preferred.
• 5-7 years of experience managing project managers and coordinators required.
• Knowledge and skills described in the foundational principles of Project Management (PMBOK) required.
• Experience with Agile development and project management techniques required.
• Lean portfolio management and program management experience required.
• Demonstrated experience leveraging existing and new technologies to support new processes and ways of working.
• Skilled in budget preparation, work scheduling, management applications, meeting management, technical reporting, and contract management.
• Ability to lead by example, define roles/responsibilities, motivate, and set strategy.
• Extensive knowledge of Microsoft Office applications.

Schedule

• Typically, 8 hours a day, Monday through Friday.
• Eligible for Hybrid work arrangement (3 days/week onsite, 2 days/week remote).
• May require work during nonstandard business hours.
• Some travel required.

About Spire

We are committed to understanding the needs of the homes and businesses we serve. We believe offering the best service means bringing together the best people. We hire those who share our values of safety, inclusion, and integrity, and demonstrate competencies that bring the Spire vision, mission, and culture to life:

• Adaptability: We embrace change, continuously seeking opportunities for improvement while remaining open-minded and flexible.
• Collaboration: We achieve more together through respect, embracing healthy conflict, and fostering an environment where everyone’s input is welcomed.
• Ownership: We see things through, demonstrate accountability, honor commitments, and take responsibility for outcomes.

By living our values and competencies, we strive to create an environment where employees feel welcome, respected, and valued.