Program Manager

Albertsons Companies is one of the largest food and drug retailers with 2,300+ stores. The Albertsons Companies family of brands includes some of the most prominent brands in food retailing, with a growing base of loyal shoppers. Thanks to the professionalism, diversity, spirit, and friendliness of our people, we have locations across the U.S.

The Digital Technology Department has an opening for a Program Manager. This position is located in Pleasanton, California.

Position Purpose

The Digital Technology group's Shopper Experience Web CX team is utilizing the latest in technologies to build market-leading customer facing ecommerce shopping experience solutions. We are seeking a Program Manager that thrives in the Digital ecommerce landscape and desires to drive and contribute in a fast-paced environment. This role's major responsibilities are to define and drive the PPM Strategy to support Organizational Agility, Lean Portfolio Management, Enterprise Solution Delivery, Agile Product Delivery, Team and Technical Agility and promote Continuous Learning Culture.

Key Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

• Develop strategy to enhance visibility and streamline governance that enables informed decision on all Portfolio investment using standard PPM and new tools, as required
• Develop strategy and implement capabilities for all Portfolio and Investment Oversight & Governance as single source of truth for visibility within and across teams and with executives
• Develop strategy and implement capabilities for Portfolio Roadmaps, Solution Roadmaps and Flow based outcomes working with broader Program Management & PMO groups
• Develop strategy and implement capabilities for the business and technology teams to come together inside a single source of truth enabling Enterprise Business Agility and synergy
• Ability to work with large, matrix, geographically dispersed and virtual teams; successfully integrating agile approaches across various disciplines and stakeholder groups to develop and achieve Governance and Delivery objectives in an iterative and continuous fashion.
• Develop strategy and create visuals that enable capacity planning at all levels - Portfolio, Solution, Program and Team
• Develop strategy and create visuals for clear understanding of dependencies, risks, and impediment management
• Must be able to develop customer and roles-based dashboards, reports and metrics provide transparency and visibility leveraging PPM single source of truth.
• Partner with the Product Management Teams to develop PPM Roadmap to maintain seamless data flow between ServiceNow, HCM, Oracle, Fieldglass etc.
• A strong team player and collaborator. You will work with scrum, Kanban, and program teams by leveraging the data via dashboards and metrics to run agile practices autonomously and help them create high performing teams.
• Understand the data needed by Scrum Master, Release Train Engineer, Solution Train Engineer, Product Owners, Product Managers, Portfolio Leads and collaborate / assist to improve data transparency to drive Business agility
• Actively collaborate with Agile Coaches & RTEs in the roll-out of Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe), understand and help resolve the challenges, dependencies, impediments, program risks and opportunities that exist within PPM schema / data.
• Collaborate very closely within Enterprise Agile PMO, other lean agile coaches, program leaders and stakeholders during SAFe roll-out.
• Actively coordinate and collaborate with Agile Coaches in getting the community trained in PPM Governance and Data principles.
• Actively collaborate with LACE in conducting quarterly health-check to build continuous improvement backlogs.
• Communicate with stakeholders, escalate impediments, help manage risk, and drive relentless improvement.
• Solid grasp of how to scale Lean and Agile practices and understand the unique opportunities and challenges associated with facilitating and continuously aligning a large development program.
• Knowledge of well documented Lean/Agile patterns and techniques (Burndowns/Ups Retrospectives, Continuous Flow, Cycle Time, Cumulative Flow, Exploratory Testing)
• Overall play the role of a reflective observer, facilitator, enabler, partner, and hands-on expert as needed.

Competencies:

• Servant Leader - Must be able to garner respect from his/her team and be willing to be hands-on.
• Communicative - Must be able to communicate well with diverse teams and executive level stakeholders from the business in both verbal and written communications.
• Facilitative - Must be able to coordinate and lead Scrum meeting, team discussion, Scrum of Scrums.
• Attitude of transparency - Must desire to bring disclosure and transparency to the business and Program Management to grow business trust.
• Impediment & Conflict resolution - Must be able to facilitate discussion and facilitate alternatives or different approaches.
• Assertive - Must be able to ensure Agile/Scrum concepts and principles are adhered to, must be able to be a voice of reason and authority, make the tough calls.
• Continual improvement - Must continually be growing one's craft learning new tools and techniques to manage oneself and a team in a creative and collaborative way.
• Attitude of empowerment - Must be able to lead a self-organization team.
• Quick learner - Must be able to quickly gain a high-level understanding of Scrum Teams Vision/Scope
• Team Player - Must be able to work closely with cross-functional stakeholders in facilitating team and business discussions.
• Understanding Agile - backlog tracking, burndown/burnup metrics, velocity, cycle time and task definition

Qualifications:

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science or equivalent work experience in a scaled Enterprise PPM Environment
• 10+ years of project, program, or technology management experience with the last 5+ years focused on Agile or Scaled agile practices with an emphasis on continual improvement.
• 5+ yrs experience in leading across group of teams in program level capacity
• 5+ years managing, using and configuring JIRA, JIRA Align, Aha!, Planview and Kendis or similar SDLC tools including reporting.
• Proficient in PPM Tools that support SAFe Agile methodology and Waterfall SDLC
• Prior experience in Waterfall to Agile Transformation is required
• Previous experience with medium to large projects in Retail Companies is a plus
• Must possess superior problem-solving skills, be action-oriented and decisive.
• Deep familiarity and understanding of Agile practices, SCRUM, Test Driven Development, XP, & Kanban
• Ability to effectively articulate and present complex concepts, ideas and strategies for Portfolio Lean Governance and Data Compliance to senior leadership and end users.
• Excellent organizational skills and the ability to work under pressure to balance competing priorities in meeting business deadlines.
• Excellent verbal, written, presentation and interpersonal communications skills.
• Extensive creativity, drive, high energy level, and the ability to self-manage.

About us

Albertsons Companies is at the forefront of the revolution in retail. With a fixation on innovation and building culture, our team is rallying our company around a unique vision: forging a retail winner that is admired for national strength, deep roots in the communities we serve, and a team that has passion for food and delivering great service.

Albertsons Culture Principles

• Compassion: We always treat each other with kindness and respect
• Team: We always support and recognize each other
• Inclusive: We always value everyone's perspective
• Learning: We always strive to grow and develop ourselves and others
• Competitive: We always act with integrity to win over the customer
• Ownership: We always take actions to drive our success

Physical Environment:

• Work may be performed in a temperature-controlled environment.
• Must sit, stand, or walk for extended periods of time.
• May spend long periods of time at desk or computer terminal.
• Will use keyboards, telephone, and other office equipment during the course of normal workday.
• Stooping, bending, twisting, and reaching may be required in completion of job duties.
• Work day is fast paced; some evening and weekend work may be required.

How to Apply: Interested candidates are encouraged to submit a resume by visiting https://www.albertsonscompanies.com/careers/en/home.html

Diversity is fundamental at Albertsons Companies. We foster an inclusive working environment where the different strengths and perspectives of each employee is both recognized and valued. We believe that building successful relationships with our customers and our communities is only possible through the diversity of our people. A diverse workforce leads to better teamwork and creative thinking, as well as mutual understanding and respect.

The Albertsons Companies policy is to provide employment, training, compensation, promotion, and other conditions of employment without regard to race, color, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, sex, age, disability, veteran status, medical condition, marital status, or any other legally protected status.

We support a drug-free workplace - some positions require applicants offered a position to pass a pre-employment drug test before they are hired.

AN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY EMPLOYER