Project Manager

Overview

Our company is at the forefront of driving impactful initiatives, constantly seeking to innovate and deliver excellence across our operations. We foster a dynamic and collaborative environment where every team member contributes to our collective success and growth. We are committed to pushing boundaries and achieving ambitious goals, creating significant value for our stakeholders and the communities we serve.

We are seeking a highly experienced and strategic Senior Project Manager to join our team at our Pretoria office, located at 194 Bancor Ave, Menlyn, Pretoria, 0010, South Africa. This critical role demands a proven leader who can expertly navigate complex projects from inception to successful completion, ensuring alignment with strategic objectives and delivering tangible results. The Senior Project Manager will be instrumental in driving project efficiency, mitigating risks, and fostering cross-functional collaboration, ultimately contributing significantly to our operational excellence and the realization of key organizational initiatives.

Duties & Responsibilities

• To take overall accountability for the effective project management of allocated high value client projects according to the agreed plan, timeline budget and best practice to ensure overall client satisfaction and profitability of each project.
• monitoring and enabling the flow of resources and tasks (within the team)
• leading the project traffic flow to ensure project deliverables are on time and within budget.
• monitoring and reporting on project milestones according to project plans
• proactively identifying red flags and address issues to mitigate risks. (e.g. budget and deadline etc.)
• end-to-end communication starting from briefing to final delivery.
• Identifying potential risks timeously to ensure project timelines are adhered to.
• To take overall responsibility for the successful management of all client projects resulting in overall client satisfaction and profitability for Ask Africa.
• Planning client projects across the department, taking into consideration the constraints of time, resources, costs and agreed quality standards
• Managing the project workload and expectations (internally & externally)
• Translating project expectations into assigned tasks, schedule, and milestones
• Monitoring milestones and requesting ongoing feedback
• Identifying potential risks timeously to ensure project times lines are adhered to.
• Manage expectations (internally & externally) timeously
• Closing off projects successfully (close off reports, evaluations etc.)
• Together with other executives effectively coordinate the internal and external client briefings, to ensure that the needs are well understood by the various functions within Ask Africa, to develop the project plans, deliverables and milestones that will result in minimal amendments, no scope creep, efficient project delivery and overall client satisfaction.
• Ensure each project is resourced appropriately to maximize operational efficiency, delivering on the client brief in line with the agreed plan and budget, while carefully balancing internal capacity and workload for optimal productivity and performance.
• Manage, allocate, and monitor billable hours across the business to ensure time spent aligns with or remains slightly under the original costed estimate.
• Any billable hours exceeding 5% of the original order must be recontracted and invoiced in collaboration with the commercial team or approved by a Director.
• Ensure all assigned projects are delivered to the required quality standards, within the agreed deadlines, to drive client satisfaction, supporting long-term account retention and growth.
• All systems are up-to-date and synchronized to ensure all project related milestones are 100% accurate at all times to enable finance to invoice and report accurately.
• Take overall responsibility for ensuring full alignment between client project activities and Workbook, maintaining 100% accuracy and up-to-date records to effectively manage deliverables, improve efficiency, and drive profitability for Ask Africa.
• To develop and implement a PMO framework that ensures good governance and control of all project documentation.
• This includes but is not limited to templates, reports, processes, and document control to improve standardization of the function and ensure that best practice is implemented successfully.
• Act as the central project lead (internally and externally) ensuring successful delivery of all projects within budget, on time, and to client expectations, while maintaining clear and ongoing communication with all stakeholders to support operational excellence, project profitability, and client growth.
• To ensure that all required project documentation, administrative tasks, and internal processes are completed before project initiation to minimize risks and delays.
• To manage each project according to the allocated budget by monitoring and evaluating expenditure to mitigate risk, minimize overspend and maximize profitability for the business.
• To provide weekly project status reports to monitor progress and mitigate risk.
• To build highly effective relationships with clients to ensure overall client satisfaction and delivery.
• Ensure that projects are delivered on time, within budget and according to client specifications to not only exceed client expectations but support the growth and retention of the client accounts on an ongoing basis.
• This includes driving all the CSM projects, across the business taking into consideration project end dates and legislative requirement.