Program Manager

About the company

Side (formerly PTW) is a global video game development and services provider, offering technical and creative solutions to many of the largest developers and studios around the world. 

Founded in Japan in 1994, Side has grown to become a global force in the video games industry, with over 40 studios in 15 countries worldwide and offices across North America, Europe, South America, and Asia. 

Our industry-leading services include codev, art production, localization, audio production, quality assurance, localization QA, player support, community management, and datasets. For more information, visit www.side.inc

About the role 

This a key role that supports our Localization and LQA delivery teams with a range of tasks, projects, and initiatives with primary initial focus on LQA. As the Program Manager, you will be responsible for the management and delivery of complex projects and process improvement initiatives involving multiple lines of business and/or regions. You will own and manage the global projects portfolio, delivering improvements in client onboarding, operations, technology, processes, and procedures. You will help drive consistency and best practices that will benefit our clients, working with internal resources, stakeholders, and external partners. You will also work closely with clients and internal teams to ensure client satisfaction and retention. 

Key Responsibilities: 

• Leads key projects and initiatives for delivery operations.
• Establish and implement best practices for process organization, reporting and support of key delivery processes.
• Define global projects scope, goals, budget and timeline in collaboration with Sales, internal teams and clients.
• Manage on-boarding process for global clients and projects, coordinating with all supporting and regional teams.
• Create and maintain high level plans which span multiple lines of business.
• Oversee the overall project schedule, ensuring the individual line of business plans are maintained and the interdependencies between are tracked and managed.
• Lead and guide the respective Project Managers of each line of business, ensuring their individual project needs to deliver are met.
• Effectively communicate project expectations to PMs across involved LOBs in a timely and clear manner.
• Capture and communicate program-related business, functional and creative information to project stakeholders and senior management.
• Conduct high-level reporting to the client and internal stakeholders, working with them and our internal teams to recognize and address any potential challenges.
• Helps prepare business cases and other documents in support of key initiatives.
• Effectively manages issues, risks, and dependencies.
• Conduct postmortems and make recommendations in order to identify successful and unsuccessful project elements.
• Define ‘best practice’ methodologies with other Program Managers for future projects which span multiple lines of business.

General Responsibilities:

• Work flexibly and reactively to a high volume of workflow by managing your own workload & time
• Be proactive in client and internal stakeholders relations
• Promote the Safety and Comfort of colleagues, freelancers, talent, clients, and vendors
• Adhere to company Security, Confidentiality and Health and Safety procedures and ensure the compliance of the team
• Adhere to the company IT and HR procedures and ensure the compliance of the team
• Understand ethical behavior and business practices and ensure that own behavior and the behavior of others is consistent with these standards and aligns with the values of the organisation.

What You will Need

• Effective relationship builder and collaborator both with clients and internal stakeholders.
• Proven ability to manage multiple projects, resources and deliverables across different functions and locations globally.
• Experience managing LQA or Localization projects at PM or above level.
• Excellent English communication skills, written and verbal.
• Ability to deal with ambiguity and work under pressure.
• Ability to deal with competing priorities.
• Resourceful, with a proactive and problem-solving nature
• Project management and PMO experience.
• Ability to operate in the time zone required for a specific client or project.

• Excellent understanding of full software localization cycle including development, translation, LQA and audio is a plus 
• Project management certification, i.e., PMP, ACP, etc. is a plus