Director, IT Portfolio & PMO

Graco manufactures and markets premium equipment to move, measure, control, dispense and spray a wide variety of fluid and powder materials. What does that mean? Well, we pump peanut butter into your jar, and the oil in your car. We glue the soles of your shoes, the glass in your windows and the screen on your phone. We spray the finish on your vehicle, coatings on your pills, the paint on your house and texture on your walls. Graco is part of your daily life.

This role is currently based at our Minneapolis office and will transition to our new headquarters in Dayton, MN, in 2027.  

The Director, IT Portfolio position is accountable for connecting IT strategy to execution through effective portfolio and investment management. This position ensures that IT work is prioritized, funded and sequenced in alignment with enterprise strategy and priorities. The individual in this position provides visibility into the full portfolio of work, facilitates trade-offs and investment decisions, and drives cross-functional integration across initiatives. The focus of the position is to strengthen how IT operates as a portfolio—balancing demand, capacity and investment; managing dependencies across initiatives; and improving consistency and effectiveness of execution and change across the enterprise.

What You Will Do at Graco
 

Portfolio & Investment Management

• Own and actively manage the IT portfolio, ensuring work is aligned, prioritized, and funded in line with enterprise strategy

• Lead portfolio intake, prioritization, and trade-off decisions across initiatives

• Balance demand, capacity, and investment to optimize resource allocation and delivery outcomes

• Provide transparency into portfolio health, performance, risks, and investment effectiveness

Program Integration & Execution

• Drive integration across initiatives, ensuring alignment of roadmaps, dependencies, and sequencing

• Coordinate execution of enterprise programs, enabling clear ownership and delivery discipline

• Surface and manage cross-initiative risks, constraints and interdependencies to mitigate schedule and budget impacts

• Improve consistency and predictability of execution across the portfolio through repeatable delivery standards and tooling

Governance & Operating Discipline

• Establish and maintain enterprise standards for portfolio governance, execution and reporting cadence

• Design, improve and enable structured decision-making processes, including prioritization, funding and progress tracking

• Ensure clear visibility into work status, issues, and outcomes for the CIO and senior leadership on a regular basis

• Continuously improve the operating rhythm, processes and execution discipline across IT

• Partner with IT leadership and Finance to align portfolio investment plans with annual budgeting, forecasting and multi-year capital planning cycles

Change & Value Realization

• Ensure change impacts are understood, planned and integrated across initiatives to reduce organizational disruption and accelerate adoption

• Strengthen the alignment between delivery outcomes and measurable business value, working closely with business leaders

• Define and track measures of success tied to portfolio outcomes and strategic objectives, including benefits realization tracking post-implementation

• Drive disciplined follow-through on commitments to improve realization of intended benefits across the portfolio

Team Leadership and Financial Management

• Lead, mentor, manage and staff a team of project and program managers, ensuring alignment with organizational goals and promoting a culture of excellence

• Drive team performance by setting clear goals, providing ongoing feedback and facilitating professional growth opportunities.

• Establish, manage, and be accountable for the annual IT PMO budget, ensuring effective allocation of resources and alignment with organizational strategic objectives. 

What You Will Bring to Graco

• Bachelor’s degree with 10+ years of experience leading complex, cross-functional portfolios, programs or enterprise initiatives

• Proven experience establishing or leading an enterprise PMO, including portfolio and investment governance

•  Strong capability in portfolio and investment management, including prioritization, capacity planning, and trade-off decision-making

• Experience operating across business and IT, translating strategy into an executable body of work

• Demonstrated ability to drive alignment and integration across multiple functions and initiatives

• Strong financial acumen, with the ability to link investments to outcomes and value realization

• Strong stakeholder management skills, with the ability to influence senior leaders and navigate competing priorities

• Experience establishing governance, operating rhythms, and execution discipline at scale

• Comfort operating in ambiguity and driving structure where processes are not yet defined

• Proficiency with portfolio and delivery tools (e.g., Microsoft Project, Jira)

• PMP, SAFe or similar certifications preferred

Accelerators

• Experience operating in manufacturing or operations-driven environments

• Experience managing portfolios that include major enterprise platforms (e.g., Oracle, SAP, Salesforce)

Applicants must be legally authorized to work in the United States. This role is not eligible for immigration sponsorship now or in the future (e.g., H-1B, TN, F-1 OPT).

At Graco, you truly make a difference. Your unique talents contribute to our organizational growth and future. Not only do you make a difference, but Graco’s culture empowers employees to create their own career path. Whether you choose to advance within your current department or explore new opportunities in different divisions, you have the ability to build your future. Our managers are here to provide support and guidance as you continue to grow within your career.

Graco has excellent opportunities available to individuals who want to be part of a fast-moving, growing company that is committed to quality, innovation and solving fluid handling problems for our customers. Graco is proud to be named a Best Place to Work by Fortune Magazine in 2016, 2018, 2019, 2021 & 2022. Graco offers attractive compensation, benefits and career development opportunities. Graco’s comprehensive benefits include medical, dental, stock purchase plan, 401(k), tuition reimbursement and more.

Our company uses E-Verify to confirm the employment and eligibility of all newly hired employees. To learn more about E-Verify, including your rights and responsibilities, please visit www.dhs.gov/E-Verify.

The base pay range for this position is listed below, exclusive of fringe benefits or other compensation.  If you are hired, your final base hourly rate will be determined based on factors such as geographic location, skills, competencies, education, and/or experience.  In addition to those factors, we will also consider internal equity of our current employees.  Please keep in mind that the range provided is the full base salary range for the role.  Hiring at or near the maximum of the range would not be typical to allow for future and continued salary growth.