Senior Manager, Strategy & Implementation Management

The Foundation

We are the largest nonprofit fighting poverty, disease, and inequity around the world. Founded on a simple premise: people everywhere, regardless of identity or circumstances, should have the chance to live healthy, productive lives. We believe our employees should reflect the rich diversity of the global populations we aim to serve. We provide an exceptional benefits package to employees and their families which include comprehensive medical, dental, and vision coverage with no premiums, generous paid time off, paid family leave, foundation-paid retirement contribution, regional holidays, and opportunities to engage in several employee communities. As a workplace, we’re committed to creating an environment for you to thrive both personally and professionally.

The Team

Division Summary: Global Growth and Opportunity
The Global Growth & Opportunity (GGO) division works to catalyze sustainable and transformative socio-economic change. In the face of inequities and market failures, GGO seeks to realize the potential of untapped markets, and ensure that economic and social benefits reach everyone. We focus on the areas of agricultural development; digital public Infrastructure; inclusive financial services; global education, nutrition, and water, sanitation & hygiene. We seek solutions that are sustainable, transformative, and inclusive with an eye toward applying technology innovations, as well as data evidence, to drive change in developing countries.
Team Summary: Inclusive Financial Systems
The Inclusive Financial Systems (IFS) team believes that valuable, low-cost financial products have the potential to offer a pathway out of poverty, and that digital financial systems can enable the private sector’s delivery of such products to the poor sustainably and at scale. IFS supports the buildout of inclusive digital financial services (DFS) systems in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) by (i) enabling the right policy and regulatory environment, (ii) supporting the implementation of inclusive digital payments systems, (iii) driving scale and economic sustainability by promoting pro-poor use cases; and (iv) closing the gender gap in the usage of formal financial products.

Your Role

As Senior Manager, Strategy & Implementation Management you will play a pivotal role in supporting the IFS team to implement its ambitious agenda. We are looking for a teammate with a great attitude! Specifically, you will be responsible for supporting the strategic and operational aspects of the team, including oversight of our investment pipeline and initiative portfolios, managing the IFS program coordinator team, leading engagement with business partners and the onboarding of new team members. You will also support the team’s efforts to continue improving our culture and collaboration and improve team processes and communication to ensure that the initiatives within IFS’s strategy are aligned.

This position reports to the Deputy Director, Strategy Planning & Management (DDSPM).

You will work in a hybrid virtual arrangement from our Seattle, Washington office, with an expectation of working in-person at least 50% time. This role is ineligible for remote work or work from a foundation office in another locale. We will be reviewing qualified, Seattle-based applicants or those with a desire to relocate to Seattle, Washington.

What You’ll Do

Strategic Program Management & Implementation:

• Support the development and play a key implementing role of IFS’s new strategy, goals and priorities, translating goals to execution plans, tracking follow-ups and progress, and working as a catalyst for improvement across the division.

• Authoritatively facilitate process definition and improvement efforts in support of staff productivity; work with staff to identify process gaps and inefficiencies that impede effectiveness.

• Promote efficiency and productivity on the team by providing leadership and support in process development and improvement, implementation and improvement of tools, analysis, reporting, and change management.

• Collaborate with DDSPM and initiative Deputy Directors to coordinate work across teams and see opportunities for alignment between initiatives, improving team communications and clarity.

• Partner with DDSPM and Senior Program Assistant to plan for and facilitate team retreats and regular meeting cadence.

Annual Planning & Portfolio Management:

• Lead processes to develop and coordinate annual planning and strategy review, investment, and financial and operational processes, including IFS’s investment development process, annual planning, strategic Rhythm of Business cycle, and progress tracking.

• Support the leadership team with analytics and thought partnership to enable integrated portfolio management, ensuring alignment across efforts within the team, and with the team’s goals and breakthroughs.

• Identify resource trade-off decisions and recommend options for leadership decision-making, including assessing large, long-term investments for efficiencies (in partnership with Financial Planning & Analysis)

• Monitor progress, identify critical outputs and outcomes, and optimize resource allocation / trade-offs to drive efficient and impactful investments.

• Develop long-term roadmaps, define critical outputs and outcomes, identify interdependencies and handle risks for integrated planning along key initiatives or key geographies.

People Management, Business Team Leadership, and Process Optimization:

• Lead, manage, empower, and influence people, direct reports, broader team, and matrix partners, using adaptive strategies depending on situation and people involved.

• Lead a team of Program Coordinators facilitating grant-making and management with Program Officers.

• Provide guidance, mentorship, and support to ensure effective coordination and execution of grant coordination activities.

• Drive business process optimization to increase efficiency of grants and contracts management.

Ad-Hoc Initiative Deep Engagement Support:

• Advise on highly complex, strategically important investments that need additional support or guidance.

• Manage reporting and tracking of infrastructure initiative project pipeline & progress including development of communications materials and briefings.

• Advise and liaise with Deputy Directors and Program Officers on key strategic investments and partnerships.

Your Experience

We are looking for individuals who enjoy the opportunity of working on complex problems and collaboratively creating solutions that have the potential for transformative change. You must be prepared to work with flexibility, efficiency and diplomacy in an exciting and challenging environment.

• MBA (or similar advanced degree) with 7+ years of experience or equivalent strategy and operations experience

• Strong portfolio and people/team management skills. Demonstrated complex project management skills, particularly for strategy development, execution planning, and business process redesign projects, and a successful track record of leading or managing multiple projects simultaneously.

• Strong consultative and advisory skills. Demonstrated excellence in influence and leadership, ability to build trust, be a team leader and player who motivates and educates other team members and understands the value of interpersonal relationship building.

• Outstanding relational and collaboration skills – comfortable working within a diverse team

• Ability to act independently to determine methods and processes on assignments, to prioritize in a dynamic and complex environment, and to alternate between thinking strategically and performing at high quality.

• Ability to effectively facilitate, manage and summarize divergent points of view to advance the thinking of the group, synthesize and extract meaning from complex bodies of work and effectively communicate key takeaways for diverse audiences.

• Experience creating analytical models/tools and ability to communicate results to inform sound strategic and tactical decisions.

• Technically proficient and creative; successful in both collaboration and as an independent problem solver.

• Financial savvy plus budget development, financial analysis, and operational management skills.

• Excellent written and verbal communications skills with the ability to effectively synthesize information to reach a diverse audience.

*Applicants for this role will only be considered if they are able to legally work in the country where this position is located without visa sponsorship.

The salary range for this role is $199,000 to $308,400 USD. As a mission-driven organization, we strive to balance competitive pay with our mission and new hires are typically brought into the organization at a salary between the range minimum and the salary range midpoint. Actual placement in the range will depend on a candidate’s job-related skills, experience, and expertise, as evaluated during the interview process.

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Hiring Requirements

As part of our standard hiring process for new employees, employment will be contingent upon successful completion of a background check.

Candidate Accommodations

If you require assistance due to a disability in the application or recruitment process, please submit a request here.

Inclusion Statement

We are dedicated to the belief that all lives have equal value. We strive for a global and cultural workplace that supports ever greater diversity, equity, and inclusion — of voices, ideas, and approaches — and we support this diversity through all our employment practices.

All applicants and employees who are drawn to serve our mission will enjoy equality of opportunity and fair treatment without regard to race, color, age, religion, pregnancy, sex, sexual orientation, disability, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, genetic information, veteran status, marital status, and prior protected activity.