The San Francisco Estuary Institute (SFEI) is seeking a Program Manager for an applied science program working to protect water quality in San Francisco Bay (SFB).
The SFB Nutrient Management Strategy (NMS) is a regional applied science program focused on investigating water quality impacts from elevated nutrient inputs to SFB, and evaluating management options for protecting water quality now. SFEI partners with NMS stakeholders (regulators, dischargers, resource agencies, NGOs) to identify critical scientific uncertainties underlying key management questions, and in collaboration with regional partners, designs and carries out studies targeting those uncertainties using approaches including monitoring, targeted experiments, data analysis/interpretation, and numerical modeling.
The NMS Program Manager will play a leading role across a range of program management activities that are critical to accomplishing the NMS’ core science goals and to fulfilling the program’s broader mission of engaging stakeholders to translate improved understanding of nutrient dynamics and SFB’s change responses to nutrients into actionable information targeting upcoming nutrient management decisions. Core focus areas for the Program Manager will include: leading overall NMS financial management and budget tracking (~$4mill/year); Leading program-wide project management to support producing high-quality, on-time/on-budget work products; and playing a key role augmenting NMS stakeholder engagement, strategic planning, and program development.
If you are excited about this role, but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly with every qualification in the job description, we encourage you to apply anyway. You may be just the right candidate for this, or one of our other roles.
Qualifications
Required Skills and Experience
Master’s degree in environmental science, civil/environmental engineering, or a related field with 12-15+ years of relevant experience; or a B.S. in the same fields with 15-20+ years of relevant experience, including substantial experience (5+ years) in the program management areas below.
5+ years of work experience in relevant external project and program management areas, including stakeholder governance and communication; building and maintaining scientific collaborations; developing strategic programmatic goals and priorities; and holding teams accountable for deadlines and deliverables.
Work experience in relevant internal project and program management areas, including being responsible for implementing strategic programmatic goals, overseeing scientific teams on complex environmental projects, supervising staff, overseeing deliverables tracking, and work flow planning.
5+ years of work experience developing and managing budgets, and creating quarterly and annual expenditure summaries for projects showing amount and percent spent compared to percent complete of project
Excellent written and oral communication skills. Experience communicating complex scientific information to a broad range of audiences, ability to understand key messages, and translate those to others
Team player who inspires staff and is enthusiastic about SFEI’s mandate of providing science to inform decisions
Typical roles and duties will include
Develop and manage program-wide annual budgets, including working with project technical leads to develop budgets for individual projects; tracking revenue and project expenditures; and proactively working with project teams to align spending and work progress.
Financial reporting, including producing annual financial reports for distribution to the NMS-Steering Committee and other stakeholders, and developing and presenting quarterly budget updates to the NMS-Steering Committee meetings at quarterly.
Facilitate internal team meetings and external stakeholder meetings.
Leading program-wide project management:
Implement effective project tracking tools and processes
Collaborate with technical leads and project managers to identify and efficiently resolve workflow issues or technical challenges, and support project teams to achieve their goals of producing high-quality products and on-time/on-budget completion of projects.
Manage and mentor project teams and staff.
Stakeholder engagement and program development:
In collaboration with SFEI staff and key NMS-Steering Committee members, evaluate needs and options for strengthening NMS program governance and implementation of programmatic strategic goals and priorities.
Distilling complex science research into simplified verbal and written communication materials.
