R&D Project Manager

The R&D Project Manager is responsible for day-to-day management including but not limited to managing projects through the NPD Stage Gate process – Initiate, Plan, Execute, and Close.
The R&D Project Manager will implement project management tools, dashboards, and metrics to successfully facilitate and deliver on the NPD project portfolio within Fluid Solutions South (FSS) of Watts Water Technologies, Inc.

RESPONSIBILITIES AND DUTIES:

Project Management:

• Lead new product development efforts utilizing the Stage Gate process from concept to post-launch
• Ensure key stakeholders/team members follow a structured and repeatable process from ideation, business case/commercial specification, engineering/production validation, to market launch and post-launch close out
• Facilitate creation of project plan with required budget, resources, detailed project schedule, defining critical milestones, aligned with Stage Gate deliverables
• Ensure project scope, schedule, and required resources are clearly defined and aligned across all stakeholders
• Develop resource plan to meet project timeline, work closely with functional managers to allocate required resources to achieve milestones on time
• Work well with others, highly organized and detail-oriented, meet deadlines and strive to stay within budget
• Identify project risks/issues and develop contingency plans to mitigate impact on schedule or scope throughout project lifecycle
• Schedule and lead all required project gate review meetings with gatekeepers
• Facilitate and share lessons learned to ensure proliferation of knowledge and best practices implementation across the organization
• Performs other duties and responsibilities as assigned or needed

NPD Process Management:

• Develop and maintain project KPIs for schedules, budget and resource allocation. Provide periodic updates to drive common understanding of status and to expose improvement opportunities
• Develop and maintain resource management capability to support Marketing, Engineering, and Operations organizations in balancing project priority and workload constraints
• Assist in improving organization’s ability to manage multiple projects on schedule and under budget
• Facilitate periodic NPD/VAVE project and gate reviews
• Assist in the Idea Generation process including facilitating periodic core team reviews
• Performs other duties and responsibilities as assigned or needed

EDUCATION:

• Bachelor’s degree in Engineering or Business or equivalent experience

QUALIFICATIONS:

• 5+ years of experience and at least 2 years of progressive Program/Project Management experience or equivalent combination of education and experience –Mechanical, Energetic and Electrical engineering preferred
• Proven track record in managing new product development, introduction and product life cycle
• Proficient with Project Management Office tools – WBS, Logic Network, Gantt Chart, Agile methodology
• Computer efficiency – Intermediate level in MS office, Project, Visio, Adobe Acrobat
• Project Management Professional (PMP) certification is a plus
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills; ability to effectively discuss both commercial and technical aspects of a project to all stakeholders, including executive level communication
• Excellent facilitation, problem solving, and conflict resolution skills
• Excellent planning, organization, time management, and structured thinking skills
• Ability to perform on a strategic and tactical level
• Knowledge of both theoretical and practical aspects of product development, project management and ability to lead teams in execution of these methodologies
• Broad professional experience in product development, operations, sales, engineering and marketing areas are a plus
• Ability to Inspire, mentor/coach and build a high performance cross-functional teams in a matrix organization
• Portfolio, Schedule and Resource Management tools experience