Director, Project Management

BLUSA Defense Manufacturing is excited to announce an opportunity for an accomplished Director of Project Management to join our team and play a key role in driving the successful delivery of our most important initiatives. This is more than a project management position, it's an opportunity to build, lead, and elevate a high-performing project management function while partnering with talented teams across the Company.

Job Summary

The Director of Project Management provides strategic leadership for the company’s project management function, ensuring projects are consistently delivered on time, within budget, and in alignment with customer specifications, product requirements, quality standards, and profitability goals. This role oversees project managers and cross-functional project activity from order handoff through delivery, establishing disciplined processes, clear accountability, and effective communication across Sales, Engineering, Purchasing, Manufacturing, Quality, Customer Service, and Shipping/Receiving.

The ideal candidate is a hands-on leader who can balance customer satisfaction, operational capacity, cost control, and continuous improvement. The Director of Project Management is responsible for strengthening project execution, managing portfolio-level risks and priorities, developing the project management team, and providing leadership with accurate visibility into delivery performance, financial results, and resource requirements.

Key Responsibilities

To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily:

• Lead, mentor, and develop the Project Management team; establish performance expectations, provide coaching, and support professional development.
• Oversee the full project portfolio to ensure projects are executed according to approved schedules, budgets, customer commitments, quality requirements, and margin targets.
• Establish and maintain standardized project-management processes, tools, reporting methods, work instructions, and controls across the organization.
• Serve as the senior escalation point for significant schedule, cost, quality, scope, material availability, capacity, or customer-service issues.
• Partner with Sales, Engineering, Purchasing, Manufacturing, Quality, Customer Service, Finance, and Shipping/Receiving to ensure effective project handoffs, alignment on priorities, and timely issue resolution.
• Review project status, production constraints, material availability, customer commitments, and financial performance; prioritize resources and corrective actions as needed.
• Ensure Work Orders, project documentation, job packets, procurement requirements, outside-service requests, and customer-specific requirements are complete, accurate, and effectively managed within the ERP system.
• Monitor project costs, change orders, purchasing activity, outside processing, labor requirements, and job profitability; identify risks to margin and implement recovery plans.
• Lead regular project and production review meetings, providing concise updates on key milestones, risks, recovery actions, capacity needs, and customer-impacting concerns.
• Develop and maintain portfolio-level dashboards and key performance indicators, including on-time delivery, project margin, schedule adherence, backlog health, change-order performance, and customer satisfaction.
• Collaborate with senior leadership on forecasting, resource planning, staffing requirements, capital needs, and operational priorities.
• Drive continuous-improvement initiatives that reduce lead times, improve project visibility, strengthen cross-functional accountability, and enhance customer experience.
• Support customer communications for high-value, complex, or at-risk projects; help resolve escalated concerns while protecting long-term customer relationships.
• Ensure project-management practices comply with company policies, customer requirements, applicable quality systems, and regulatory requirements.

Qualifications

• Demonstrated leadership ability with strong interpersonal, coaching, customer-service, and conflict-resolution skills.
• Excellent written, verbal, and presentation communication skills, with the ability to communicate effectively with executives, customers, suppliers, and production teams.
• Strong financial and business acumen, including budgeting, cost tracking, project margin analysis, forecasting, and profitability improvement.
• Proven ability to manage multiple complex projects and competing priorities in a fast-paced manufacturing or production environment.
• Strong organizational, analytical, and problem-solving skills with exceptional attention to detail.
• Ability to make sound, timely decisions based on customer commitments, operational realities, financial impact, and company priorities.
• Experience developing project-management processes, performance metrics, and reporting tools.
• Proficiency with ERP systems, project-management software, and Microsoft Office applications; advanced Excel skills preferred.
• Ability to read and interpret technical engineering drawings, bills of materials, manufacturing routings, and customer specifications preferred.

Competencies

• Strategic Leadership: Aligns project-management priorities with company objectives, customer commitments, and financial goals.
• Project Execution: Creates accountability, maintains focus on critical milestones, and drives teams to deliver reliable results.
• Financial Acumen: Understands the cost and margin implications of project decisions and takes action to protect profitability.
• Problem Solving: Anticipates risks, identifies root causes, and implements practical, sustainable solutions.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Builds productive working relationships and resolves competing priorities across departments.
• Judgment: Makes informed decisions, escalates appropriately, and balances urgency with sound business judgment.
• Continuous Improvement: Challenges inefficient processes and leads measurable improvements in quality, delivery, cost, and communication.
• Adaptability: Responds effectively to changing customer requirements, production conditions, and organizational priorities.
• Accountability: Takes ownership of commitments, follows through on corrective actions, and holds team members accountable for results.

Education & Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Project Management, Engineering, Operations Management, or a related field preferred.
• Equivalent combination of education and directly related experience may be considered in place of a degree.
• Seven or more years of progressive project-management experience, preferably in a manufacturing, engineered-to-order, industrial, or production-based environment.
• Three or more years of supervisory or leadership experience managing project managers, coordinators, or cross-functional teams preferred.
• Proven record of delivering complex projects to schedule, cost, quality, and customer-satisfaction targets.
• Experience with production planning, scheduling, supply chain, procurement, ERP-based work-order management, and customer order fulfillment strongly preferred.
• Demonstrated experience with project budgeting, cost analysis, change management, risk mitigation, and profitability optimization.
• Project Management Professional (PMP), Program Management Professional (PgMP), Lean, Six Sigma, or comparable certification preferred.