Project Management Lead (466001)

Project Management Lead | 466001
DETAILS
Location: Allen, TX 75013 (onsite 1-2 days per week)
Position Type: Direct-Hire
Hourly / Salary: $130K-$150K (based on experience level)

JOB SUMMARY
Vaco is currently seeking a Project Management Lead for a Direct-Hire opportunity located in Allen, TX 75013 (onsite 1-2 days per week).  The Project Management Lead will lead an established PMO under new executive oversight.  The Project Management Lead will direct, govern, and execute enterprise-wide projects across the organization. The Project Management Lead will directly manage a team of 5 (1 BA / 4 PMs), ensuring high-quality project delivery, and driving continuous improvement of PMO processes and methodologies in a collaborative, empowering environment that values team input, justified innovation, and results over rigid tradition.

• Directly supervise and develop a team of 5 project professionals (1 Business Analyst / 4 Project Managers, including one fully remote/out-of-state member), providing coaching, feedback, encouragement, and career guidance while fostering a strong team environment.
• Oversee the planning, coordination, implementation, and successful delivery of all enterprise-wide projects, including software implementations, product launches, program rollouts, and other strategic initiatives.
• Provide weekly status updates to senior management, the CIO, and key project stakeholders on project progress, risks, issues, and overall performance.
• Lead and actively participate in assigned projects while balancing hands-on project management with overall PMO leadership responsibilities.
• Host and facilitate at least weekly project meetings for each assigned initiative, ensuring alignment, accountability, and timely resolution of action items.
• Develop, refine, and implement project management processes, procedures, and governance standards, generally aligned with PMI best practices, while having significant latitude to propose and execute improvements, including potential shifts to Agile or hybrid methodologies, when justified as the optimal approach for organizational success.
• Train and mentor PMO staff on processes, tools, and Waterfall / Agile methodologies to ensure consistent, high-quality project execution.
• Define project scope, boundaries, objectives, and success criteria in collaboration with business owners and stakeholders.
• Oversee Quality Assurance activities and responsibilities within the PMO.
• Ensure all projects meet defined timelines, scope, budgets, and quality expectations and track and report variances, as needed.
• Collaborate with department leaders and business units to secure the necessary human resources and other resources, schedule team members for project tasks, and resolve priority conflicts.
• Work with project teams and business owners to establish and maintain clear project priorities.
• Lead the development and documentation of business requirements and validate that proposed solutions fully meet requirements within approved scope and budget.
• Create, maintain, and update essential project deliverables in alignment with PMI standards, including Project scope statements, Communications plans, Status reports to stakeholders, Change requests and variance reports, Detailed project schedules with key milestones, Risk logs and mitigation plans, Action item logs, Standardized test plans and test cases, and Lessons learned documentation.
• Document, track, and drive timely closure of action items across all projects.
• Develop and execute test plans and facilitate testing activities and ensure successful validation of deliverables.
• Coordinate efforts among internal team members, vendors, and third-party consultants to achieve project objectives on time and within plan.

About the Project: This isn’t a high-level, hands-off program director role. You’ll be in the mix, including actively leading projects, ensuring deadlines, budgets, and scope stay on track, delivering weekly executive updates, and producing all the core PMI deliverables that keep everything transparent and moving forward.  What makes this stand out? The new leadership is deliberately opening the door for real change. You’ll have genuine autonomy to evaluate what’s working, propose meaningful improvements, and even shift toward more Agile practices, if the data and rationale support it. “We’ve always done it this way” mentality won’t work within this environment.  You must be able to work within a collaborative, empowering culture that genuinely values your input, team ideas, and results over rigid tradition.

JOB REQUIREMENTS

• Project Management Lead – Leading / Managing Teams of 5+ | Proven Track Record of Successfully Coordinating / Leading Complex Projects and Project Teams in an Enterprise Environment
• Agile / Waterfall Methodologies (thorough understanding) – Demonstrated Ability to Manage Projects Utilizing Either Approach | Train / Mentor Teams in Effective Application
• Project Management Tools – MS Project / JIRA / Zoho, etc.
• Lead / Manage High-Performing Teams – Build / Maintain Collaborative and High-Performing Team Environments Across Hybrid / Remote Settings

PREFERRED (not required)

• Financial Institution / Credit Union Environment (strongly preferred)
• PMP – Project Management Professional (strongly preferred)

Determining compensation for this role (and others) at Vaco/Highspring depends upon a wide array of factors including but not limited to the individual’s skill sets, experience and training, licensure and certifications, office location and other geographic considerations, as well as other business and organizational needs. With that said, as required by local law in geographies that require salary range disclosure, Vaco/Highspring notes the salary range for the role is noted in this job posting. The individual may also be eligible for discretionary bonuses, and can participate in medical, dental, and vision benefits as well as the company’s 401(k) retirement plan. Additional disclaimer: Unless otherwise noted in the job description, the position Vaco/Highspring is filing for is occupied. Please note, however, that Vaco/Highspring is regularly asked to provide talent to other organizations. By submitting to this position, you are agreeing to be included in our talent pool for future hiring for similarly qualified positions. Submissions to this position are subject to the use of AI to perform preliminary candidate screenings, focused on ensuring minimum job requirements noted in the position are satisfied. Further assessment of candidates beyond this initial phase within Vaco/Highspring will be otherwise assessed by recruiters and hiring managers. Vaco/Highspring does not have knowledge of the tools used by its clients in making final hiring decisions and cannot opine on their use of AI products.