Program Manager

Why this role, why now

IHE is expanding from transactional, course‑level sales toward multi‑year institutional and government agreements. To deliver on these complex, multi‑stakeholder engagements, we are standing up a customer‑facing Program Management Office (PMO) to orchestrate deployments across universities and ministries and to drive predictable outcomes at scale.

As the founding Program Manager, you will define the end‑to‑end customer engagement process, pilot it with anchor customers, and create the blueprint for scaling the PMO alongside sales, Customer Support Account Managers (CSAMs), Product, Marketing, and Delivery.

What you'll do (first 6-12 months)

• Design a repeatable customer‑engagement process that covers expectation setting, multi‑semester roadmap planning, delivery coordination, governance, and internal team alignment. Deliver the process as a documented playbook and operating rhythm.

• Pilot, learn, refine. Run 2-4 guided pilots with priority institutional customers; capture lessons, risks, and adoption blockers; convert into SOPs and checklists for scale.

• Define the scaling plan. Recommend the mix of roles (e.g., project managers, schedulers/principal scheduler, CSAM pairing model), skill profiles, and sequencing required as PMO volume grows; propose an allocation blueprint relative to solution cost/complexity.

• Stand up tooling and dashboards. Establish a "point‑of‑truth" for program plans, milestones, risks, and stakeholder comms using our PM toolkit; publish executive‑ready status.

• Institutional GTM alignment. Map handoffs with Sales and CSAMs from contract signature through go‑live; integrate into the GTM "Collaboration Spaces".

Core responsibilities (ongoing)

• Program orchestration: Own end‑to‑end delivery of complex customer programs—charter, plan, RAID, change control, stakeholder mapping, decision logs, and executive updates.

• Customer leadership: Serve as a trusted program counterpart to institutional leaders; facilitate steering committees; drive transparent status and issue resolution.

• Internal alignment & governance: Run a predictable cadence across Sales, CSAMs, Product/Engineering, and Marketing; ensure roadmap dependencies and E2E readiness are surfaced and resolved ahead of key terms/semesters.

• Quality & risk management: Maintain standard PM artifacts (risk register, comms plan, cutover plan, acceptance criteria); champion continuous improvement and "lessons learned."

• Process stewardship: Keep the engagement playbook current; ensure templates/checklists (e.g., project charter, initiation, RACI) align with Pearson guidance.

Success metrics (illustrative)

• Documented and adopted customer‑engagement process (usage of templates, cadence adherence).

• Positive stakeholder feedback (internal CSAMs/Sales and customer sponsors); trend to green on delivery KPIs.

• Scalable org recommendations (role mix, hiring plan, and timing) accepted and in motion.

• Predictable execution: milestones hit across pilots; reduced escalations; improved forecast confidence for launches.

• Customer outcomes achieved on time and within scope, including adoption and usage targets agreed at contract signature.

Who you are

Required

• Strong project/program management experience standing up or maturing processes; adept at turning methodology into practical, scalable operating models.

• Customer‑facing communicator who can lead with clarity at executive level and translate detail for cross‑functional teams.

• Comfortable with ambiguity; able to design while delivering, bringing structure, prioritization, and risk discipline to fluid environments.

• Proficient with common PM tooling (e.g., Smartsheet/PMT, MS Project/Jira/Confluence) and executive reporting.

Preferred

• Experience in education technology, assessments, or large institutional deployments (multi‑semester programs, complex integrations).

• Familiarity with PMI/PMBOK practices; relevant certifications (PMP, PgMP) a plus.

• Exposure to matrixed GTM collaboration (Sales, Product, Marketing) and launch‑readiness rhythms.

• Experience working in global or matrixed environments.

• Attributes we value

• Systems thinker who sees end‑to‑end and designs for scale.

• Clear writer, crisp facilitator, diligent owner of decisions and follow‑through.

• Builder's mindset with bias to action and continuous improvement.

Ways of working

• Operating cadence: weekly program status; bi‑weekly risk/decision reviews; monthly steering for pilots; quarterly playbook refresh.

• Artifacts & templates: program charters, comms plans, RAID logs, cutover plans, acceptance/sign‑off criteria, and checklists aligned to Pearson guidance.

• Data & transparency: single source of truth via PMT dashboards; proactive stakeholder comms; integration with Salesforce/OneCRM milestones where relevant.

Equal opportunity

Pearson is an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to inclusive, equitable hiring and welcome candidates from all backgrounds to apply.

Pearson is an Equal Opportunity Employer and a member of E-Verify. Employment decisions are based on qualifications, merit and business need. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status or any other group protected by law. We actively seek qualified candidates who are protected veterans and individuals with disabilities as defined under VEVRAA and Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act.

If you are an individual with a disability and are unable or limited in your ability to use or access our career site as a result of your disability, you may request reasonable accommodations by emailing TalentExperienceGlobalTeam@grp.pearson.com.

Job:

Program Management

Job Family: ENTERPRISE

#LI-REMOTE