PMO Manager

The Firm

HFW is a sector focused global law firm.  We have over 500 lawyers working across the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Australia.  We take a progressive approach to our roles in commercial business – thinking creatively and pragmatically to support our clients.

Whether we are solving complex issues within the construction, aviation or shipping industries, or providing advice across insurance, commodities and energy we are specialist lawyers here to add value to our clients.  We think about the commercial solution first, and then underpin our advice with a solid foundation of legal expertise. 

The Role

Responsible for delivering the full range of PMO activities across a range of projects supporting business growth and operational efficiency.  This is a standalone role within Secretariat; there is designated project management resource within IT.

Key Responsibilities

The role will include but will not be limited to:

• Manage the project pipeline, assisting with the preparation of project proposals, business cases and post-project reviews;
• Maintain an up-to-date, accurate and complete view of all projects, enabling informed and timely decisions to be made on plan, budget, scope, issues, risks, interdependencies and quality;
• Assist project managers with the creation of  project plans for all projects and manage the portfolio of projects, ensuring that project interdependencies, resource contention and key project risks are sensibly addressed or mitigated;
• Monitor resource across the project portfolio to ensure that resources are available as required;
• Assist the project manager to maintain up-to-date Action, Risk & Issue logs and agree appropriate mitigating actions, seeing these through to completion, including, where necessary, escalation to appropriate decision-makers;
• Maintain and report on budget across the portfolio, flagging any anomalies to senior management;
• Assist the project manager to engage, report and present to senior stakeholders on progress of projects.

Key Skills & Experience Required

• Programme or portfolio management and project delivery experience, ideally within a law firm or other professional services environment.
• Knowledge and application of a formal project methodology, eg. Prince 2.
• Sound understanding of PMO processes, standards and governance.
• Proven experience in the creation, deployment and management of processes, tools and frameworks.
• Experience and knowledge of change management.
• Ability to collaborate across a broad range of stakeholders in a partnership environment.
• Problem-solving and root cause identification skills.
• Strong analytical and decision-making abilities.
• Exceptional communication skills – both written and verbal.
• Budgeting/cost management experience.
• Proficiency in drafting reports.
• Ability to prioritise multiple varied deliverables with demonstrable organisational and time management skills.
• Strong interpersonal skills appropriate at all levels of engagement within the firm's international environment - influencing, diplomacy, flexibility, tenacity.
• Mentoring and coaching skills in the practicalities of working in a PMO and delivering projects.
• Strong results-focused leadership skills, able to work collaboratively and influence.
• Personal authority, independence, robustness and resilience.
• Sharp business acumen, including the ability to assess risk.
• Strong IT skills, including MS Project, Open Workbench or similar.

Additional Information

Kindly note that this job description is not contractual.  It will be reviewed periodically and may be amended or altered to meet the needs of the firm.

Due to the volume of applications, only those candidates shortlisted for interview will be contacted.