About the Obama Foundation

At the Obama Foundation, we are guided by a core belief: that ordinary people working together can change history. Our mission is to inspire those people to take action, empower them to change their world for the better, and connect them so they can achieve more together than they can alone.

We were founded by community organizers, so when we seek change, we do it by bringing people together.

That approach begins at home, on the South Side of Chicago, where we are building the Obama Presidential Center. The Center represents a historic opportunity for Chicago: a chance to build a world-class museum and public gathering space that celebrates our nation's first African American President and First Lady, steps away from where he began his career, where she was raised, and where—together—they made their home.

But that approach extends to all our work, whether it's holding leadership training sessions in communities throughout the U.S., bringing local leaders together in countries around the world, working to support the global education of girls, or ensuring young men of color have pathways to opportunity.

As President Obama has said, "we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together." So join us.

For more information, please visit www.obama.org.

Purpose of the Role

The Program Manager, Product & Technology, is responsible for managing timelines, goals, and priorities across projects, digital products, and necessary infrastructure implementation to support the Obama Foundation in scaling its ambitious vision of catalyzing millions to action - through digital channels and the future Obama Presidential Center.

Working with colleagues across the Foundation and within the Product & Technology team, you will work to collect and synthesize information on evolving priorities and needs within the organization, track the Product & Technology team's efforts towards goals, report on the team's output, and strategize around plans and resourcing needs. You will strategically manage a portfolio of connected projects, finding creative ways to conceptualize, move forward, and iterate.

The Program Manager's work will emphasize planning and implementation of Product & Technology's work for the Obama Presidential Center, coordination of work across the Product & Technology team, and how that work is communicated and coordinated with relevant teams across the organization.

Core Job Responsibilities

• Develops and maintains program's structure, processes, documents, and tools, including schedules, budgets, and reporting mechanisms - particularly using existing platforms (Asana, Jira, Confluence, etc) - and optimizing for collaboration, visibility, and transparency. Prepares presentations and other materials that support sharing product plans, status updates, and needs from stakeholders. Supports iterating on the Product & Technology team's workflows and processes.
• Serves as project manager for designated projects or strategic initiatives, ensuring that team members, collaborators, and consultants are accountable to goals, deadlines, and project needs. Provides strategic and user-focused input as a member of project teams.
• Works with product managers to understand and iterate on product roadmaps to support integration across workstreams with an eye for resource management.
• Builds close working relationships across product management, design, and engineering disciplines, as well as with cross-functional stakeholders. Understands technical concepts and can translate between subject matter experts and user needs. Helps project teams identify and preemptively clear roadblocks to delivery. Effectively communicates and drives a free flow of information with and among colleagues on all matters.
• Participates in scheduling, planning for, and facilitating regular program status and review meetings - ensuring the right stakeholders and cross-functional team members are involved, setting agendas and taking notes, documenting decisions and actions items, and following up with owners on commitments. Organizes complicated information so that it is readily accessible to varying stakeholders and can be kept current with minimal overhead.
• Creates slide decks, memos, tracking and reporting mechanisms, and other materials for communicating with internal and external stakeholders.

Key Deliverables / Outcomes

• Drives interconnected projects forward via project management, communication, resource management, and understanding of needs and impacts
• Collaborates with the product management team to formalize and execute clear product schedules and roadmaps that clearly indicate cross-product dependencies and stakeholder dependencies
• Develops a format for tracking and sharing product and project status updates across the Product & Technology team
• Creates repeatable processes and practices for team-wide needs, with a focus for 2023 on planning for upcoming software licensing needs in coordination with partnerships

Required Qualifications

• Extensive demonstrated relevant program and/or project management experience, including for multi-year projects. Familiarity with technology projects — including with teams using agile software delivery methods and iterative software development — and/or non-profits and cultural institutions highly desirable
• Experience managing complex, multi-disciplinary projects, and comfortable with coordinating across multiple interconnected projects and associated stakeholders at one time
• Exceptional project management and organizational skills, coupled with enthusiasm about organizational excellence, attention to detail, and comfort with digital project management tools
• Experience in defining, implementing, and improving operational and strategic processes
• Comfortable in ambiguity and at a fast-paced, growing organization
• Capable of working autonomously in a very cross-functional role, with a highly distributed team
• Excellent conflict resolution and negotiation skills
• Strong bias for action, results-orientation, and sense of ownership
• Unflappable, mission-oriented commitment to bringing the Obama Presidential Center to life in an innovative, impact-minded, and transformative way — with an understanding of the long view

In the interest of employee health and safety during the pendency of the COVID-19 global pandemic, the Obama Foundation is requiring that all prospective employees present proof that they are fully-vaccinated against COVID-19, or seek a reasonable accommodation for religious or medical reasons, prior to their first day of employment.

Equal Opportunity Employer

The Foundation is committed to creating a diverse work environment and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. The Foundation does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, gender identity, religion, sexual orientation, age, disability, parental status, veteran status, or any other protected status under applicable laws. We encourage individuals of all backgrounds to apply. If you are a qualified candidate with a disability, please e-mail us at careers@obama.org if you require a reasonable accommodation to complete this application.