Lead Design Program Manager (remote)

At Ford Motor Company, we believe freedom of movement drives human progress. We also believe in providing you with the freedom to define and realize your dreams. With our incredible plans for the future of mobility, we have a wide variety of opportunities for you to accelerate your career potential as you help us define tomorrow’s transportation.

We're in the midst of the biggest change the automotive industry has ever seen. Just as cars changed the world over the last century, new technologies such as self-driving cars, electric powertrains, and connected vehicles will radically reshape how we live, work, and play in the next hundred years.

We want to create digital products that gets better each day at scale. We want to do this while contributing to the sustainability of our planet. We are re-founding Ford from Ford 1.0 to Ford 2.0 where we evolve from appearance-based product development to experience based product development that embraces vehicle exterior/interior, software and service.

Our operations team looks at processes and logistics as a design challenge. We are constantly thinking of improving ways of working, all to keep the design community focused, creative, and in sync with its values. As the Lead Design Program Manager you amplify high-quality design, methods, processes and culture. You develop and implement the systems and processes around our design teams with the goal of making our creative teams successful. You provide program management and operational support throughout our team and across partner teams by increasing communication and connection points and streamlining processes. You’ll work cross-functionally and collaborate with managers, designers and engineering teams. You are an expert in project/program management and bring that expertise to leading a team of program managers, to ensure we are the as efficient and effective as possible.

As the Lead Design Program Manager you will…

• Manage overall project operational review processes: managing cadences, assessing how reviews are working, help teams get prepared, and maintain the clearest route forward.
• Build great relationships with project leads and senior leadership, with effective team communication, proactive problem solving, and information distribution.
• Work across multidisciplinary teams, understanding the necessary workflow to ensure excellent outcome delivery.
• Participate in scoping new project work opportunities, determining required design talent and budget to accomplish project objectives and evaluating strategic fit.
• Help define timelines, facilitate progress, manage adaptable budgets, and support Program Managers in assuring that all projects meet their deadlines with success.
• Develop, share, and provide best practices in program management across the team.
• Create and manage file structure for Program Management overall.
• Solve process problems proactively and creatively.
• Act as the point of contact when program management input is needed for other departments or corporate activities i.e. workshops and tours.
• Collaborate with and support team leads in delivering the highest level of trust-building and strategic counsel through all project interactions.
• Document and implement end-to-end repeatable processes through a team of program managers, that help the team plan, manage, and deliver on projects.
• Identify team needs and help source the best options with regards to process, tools, documentation, and asset management, and educate leadership in order to bring changes to ensure designers and developers are working efficiently.
• Act as a bridge across teams, connecting them and facilitating clear communication, ensuring interdependencies are understood and planned for.
• Work with management and across teams to understand, coordinate, and prioritize initiatives.
• Anticipate bottlenecks, provide escalation management, and articulate risks, trade-offs, and recommend prioritization based on a balance of business needs, constraints, and customer impact.
• Lead a team of program managers to guide projects from pitch to completion by facilitating team productivity, advising on deadlines, managing expectations, surfacing risks, resolving roadblocks, and providing a layer of communication between teams and stakeholders.
• Proactively assess risk and resolve issues before they become problems for the larger teams.
• Measure impact of programs and initiatives both qualitatively and quantitatively.