Consulting Services Manager

Job Title: Consulting Services Manager
Reports to: Chief Technology Officer
Function: Consulting Services Management
Location: San José, Costa Rica

Purpose Statement.

To effectively deliver migration projects, increase our understanding about client’s needs, improve our working methodologies, increase efficiency through our practice, derive improvements to our current products and help visualizing other potential new tools and products, and share this expertise with our partners amongst others, is that the Consulting Services Manager role is defined.

 

The Consulting Services Manager is responsible of managing the assigned team and the processes that will support the execution of Consulting Services projects, from their envisioning to their closure, and that will aim at delivering quality results within the profit standards and clients expectations. The Consulting Services Manager will support Pre-sales and Sales activities to provide prospects with better value propositions.

 

Dimensions

Finance

Responsible for gross margin, execution, deadlines and invoicing of all the Consulting Services Projects. And internal and external customer relationships.

Other

Headcount: 25 persons approximately. US$: N/A.

Principal Accountabilities.

i. Management

a. To manage the migration projects (which include coordinating the planning, organizing, directing, controlling, reporting, retro-feeding and closing) assigned to Consulting Services according to best practices, aiming at delivering them within the agreed budget, expected gross margins, invoicing dates, number of hours and resources, schedule and quality.

b. To assess projects risks on a regular basis together with the corresponding Project Manager and Technical Lead as part of the normal project execution process, and take the corresponding preventive and/or corrective actions to protect the budget, expected gross margins, invoicing dates, number of hours and resources, schedule and/or quality.

c. To manage and lead the resource allocation within existing projects and other areas of the company to maximize capabilities. This may include the management of outsourcing, time-bound contracting and/or partnering opportunities.

d. To create, collect and maintain performance indicators for projects to assess and adjust execution accordingly.

e. Act as a liaison of the Finance Department, providing the required Project monthly information, aiming at delivering the projects within the agreed budget, expected gross margins, invoicing dates, number of hours and resources, schedule and quality.

ii. Operations/Business

a. To be the escalation path for team members to support decisions during a project execution time that may affect the quality of the project deliverables and/or the project schedule, invoicing or budget parameters.

b. To generate and communicate timely Consulting Services accounting data, performance information and timesheets.

c. To communicate status, progress, achievements, contingencies and results of projects under execution.

d. To assess variations in the execution of projects against their respective planning to adjust projection accordingly and improve future estimates and planning phases.

e. To maintain, promote the use and improve the Consulting Services tools that support best practices in the tracking and delivery of projects.v

iii. Leadership

a. To support and guide team members to use the Artinsoft migration methodology and best practices to produce project deliverables according to each project scope, budget and schedule.

b. To evaluate team members based on annual balance scorecards and performance evaluation sessions.

c. To give team members proper and timely feedback on their execution performance, carrier path, succession planning and training opportunities.

d. To clearly communicate team members their individual roles and organizational expectations.

e. To recruit, retain and grow talent.

f. To guide Technical Leaders and Consultants to effectively discriminate indisputable manual changes from potentially automated changes during a migration project, and recognize their potential value for the project and the product.

iv. Relationship

a. To create and develop a communication channel with sponsors, vendors and key contacts of projects under execution with which new business opportunities can be explored.

b. To serve as escalation path for projects under execution.

c. To conduct formal project revisions with project sponsors in a timely manner to ensure project acceptance and client satisfaction.

d. To give the Product team feedback on the technical opportunities and challenges migration projects face and discuss support alternatives.

e. To promote product improvements through migration projects.

f. To promote and coordinate technical training activities on areas of interest for the projects and Consulting Services in general.

v. Innovation

a. To lead and promote the tuning of existing methodologies, procedures and controls, or the creation of new ones, that will improve our services practice.

b. To lead and promote research on new technologies, products, tools, techniques and others that can improve and better support migration projects.

c. To contribute to the definition, specification and evaluation among others, of new tools and products that the Product team will be working on.

vi. Knowledge Dissemination

a. To determine the training requirements the Consulting Services team may require in preparation of new technical opportunities and challenges and carry out the agreed trainings. Once defined, work together with the Human Resources Department to plan and execute as needed.

b. To promote mentoring and training to Architects, Project Managers, Technical Leaders and Migration Consultants on decision making, migration methodology, best practices and tools.

c. To maintain and improve the Consulting Services Project Management Office (PMO) to support team members to standardize project execution processes according to the PMI guidelines when appropriate.

d. To create awareness and common shared knowledge amongst team members on strategies, best practices and techniques to appropriately handle migration projects.

e. To ensure knowledge-based technical information is created and validated throughout migration projects such that consultants, partners and other technical personnel can effectively use it in other migrating efforts.

vii. Support

a. To review, evaluate, provide feedback and support new migration proposals, estimates and contracts the Pre-Sales team creates.

Additional Information.

i) Context/Environment:

The Consulting Services Manager leads and coordinates a team of highly skilled engineers and project managers to successfully execute migration projects. Through the continuous improvement of the existing migration processes and the creation of new ones, the Consulting Services Manager will help escalating the company’s capacity to deliver effectively migration solutions to our clients and creating new migration tools and products.

ii) Knowledge, Skills & Experience:

Knowledge and Experience

  1. Bachelor degree in Software Engineering with graduate studies in Business Administration.
  2. At least five years in a similar management position.
  3. Fully Bilingual (English/Spanish).

Skills

  1. PMI certification.
  2. Broad understanding of the business and the technology.
  3. Interpersonal and negotiation skills.
  4. Impact and Influence ability.
  5. Analytical and conceptual knowledge.
  6. Experience leading people and teams over 50 persons.
  7. Fluent verbal and written communication skills in Spanish and English are necessary.
  8. Excellent interaction with Clients and Consultants is essential.
  9. Knowledge dissemination capabilities area expected.

iii) Key Success Factors:

  • Projects executed on track from a technical, financial and client satisfaction perspective.
  • Up to date and proper implementation of policies and methodology (PMO).
  • To recruit, retain and grow talent.
  • Significant contribution to the definition and specification of potential new tools and products.

iv) Working Relationships:

Internal

  • Product team, by contributing to the improvement of existing tools and products and the envisioning of new ones.
  • Pre sales, by providing support for project estimates and to develop new project proposals.
  • Finance, by acting as a liaison providing timely and quality information for budgeting, invoicing, consolidated financial statements, between others.
  • Human Resources, by acting as a liaison providing timely and quality information for retention, training and development, career path planning, succession plan, between others.
  • IT, by coordinating all hardware and software requirements and any others involved on the projects execution.
  • CM, by coordinating all configuration management activities required.

External

  • Clients, by maintaining a close relationship with sponsors, vendors and key contacts of projects.