About the position

The Vanguard 2025 program has an opening for a Technical Project Manager to support the Network Design and Engineering Division at the Department of State (DoS). The Technical Project Manager is a highly motivated leader, focused on disciplined processes that guide mission-critical project initiatives from concept to deployment into production environments. This is a critical role requiring a highly dedicated individual who can take ownership and provide procedural and project management support to internal/external customer stakeholders. Technical background in network engineering required. Supporting disciplined Information Technology (IT) service delivery best practices; this role has leadership responsibilities for managing project tasks, business and process analytics, documentation, scheduling, forecasting, and reporting. The Project Manager role will require frequent interaction and coordination with a variety of stakeholders to include (but not limited to) senior Government personnel, Contractor leadership, engineering staff, communications and training, security specialists, and organizations across the enterprise. The ideal candidate will possess leadership qualities enabling them to work effectively in a high-pressure, fast-paced environment that demands excellent communications skills, technical/business acumen and the ability to assimilate information quickly and take decisive actions. This position hybrid and located in Springfield, VA. It is primarily (but not exclusively) for normal business hours, Monday through Friday.

Responsibilities

• Works directly with and takes assignments from the Service Line Lead/Manager who provides project assignment from the Project Pipeline process.
• Reviews initial stakeholder requirements and coordinates activities.
• Engages frequently with stakeholders (internal and external) to ensure project milestones are met.
• Monitors, updates, and reports on project status and schedule using project management information system(s) and other project management tools.
• Escalates internal/external issues/concerns/risks promptly to Service Line Lead/Manager and/or Government lead to ensure matters are addressed timely as to not impact schedule.
• Accountable for scope, cost/budget, and schedule/milestones for all assigned projects.
• Manages development and quality delivery of all Project documents and deliverables.
• Creates, updates, and maintains detailed Project Schedules (using MS Project) for all assigned projects.
• Works closely with internal teams/managers to schedule and assign project/task related activities and responsibilities.
• Creates reports for weekly and monthly deliverables related to project status and operational metrics.
• Leads, coordinates, and facilitates recurring meetings with all stakeholders (e.g., customers, project resources/engineers, vendors) to ensure project status (schedule, issues, risks, or concerns) is effectively communicated throughout the project.
• Follows all Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) / Policies and provides recommendations to update/improve/change SOPs, as needed/required.
• Conducts project closeout procedures to include, but not limited to customer closeout meeting, final walk-throughs/surveys, and performs quality review of all agreed upon deliverables.
• Creates/Documents project closeout artifacts to include lessons Learned, Root Cause Analysis and After Action Reports, as required.
• Responsible for identifying, coordinating, and implementing initiatives, projects and activities that create efficiencies and optimize technical processing. Evaluates risks and solutions before action to ensure plans are timely, realistic and positive.
• Support the problem management process providing inputs to root cause analyses and suggests workarounds and/or solutions for recurring issues.
• Develop and maintains relationships with other support organizations including development and implementation teams.
• Promote a collaborative team environment that fosters creativity, innovation and high performance.

Requirements

• Bachelor's degree and 15+ years of experience managing components of large technical projects including significant experience in the network and telecommunication arenas; Masters and 13 years; may accept additional experience in lieu of degree.
• Proven people management skills with customer-facing experience
• Significant knowledge of network design and engineering disciplines.
• Significant experience leading teams of network engineers.
• Significant experience with cloud to on-prem project management and/or design
• Knowledge of circuit integration with customer networks
• Proficient with scheduling (using Microsoft Project) and project forecasting/estimating
• Strong presentation skills and ability to adapt to various customers to include government and/or contractors.
• Ability to resolve complex issues.
• Strong organizational skills.
• Exceptional oral and written communication skills with experience working directly with customers including VIP’s.
• Strong organizational skills; ability to manage multiple tasks in a fast-paced environment with competing priorities and quick turnaround deliverables.
• Possess an inclination for critical thinking and analytical approaches to solving problems dealing with issues that are not readily defined and/or conflict with available information with the ability to reach sound decisions quickly employing systematic, multi-step approach.
• Significant experience collaborating with and organizing staff across organizational lines to bring projects to successful conclusion.
• US Citizenship.
• Active secret clearance with the ability to obtain a top secret clearance.

Nice-to-haves

• Competency in Microsoft SharePoint and Microsoft Office products, including Visio.
• Experience with ServiceNow for incident and change request tracking.
• Hands-on experience as a network engineer
• Significant knowledge of Department of State organizations and processes.