Senior Program Manager

With more than $1B in revenue, Tennant Company is a globally recognized leader in the cleaning equipment industry. For the past 150 years, we have been passionate about developing and manufacturing innovative and sustainable solutions for our customers. At Tennant Company, we are committed to stewardship and creating a cleaner, safer and healthier world. With manufacturing, operations and sales, service, and support functions across the globe, your journey at Tennant can take you places you never expected.

Posted Job Title:

Sr. Program Manager

Job Description:

As a Sr. Program Manager, you will lead product development programs from strategy through post-launch, following Tennant's product development process. The role will include management of the program scope, execution, validation, product introduction, and post product delivery support. You will be accountable for the overall schedule, cost, quality and ROI performance of your program.

Being a highly motivated cross-functional team leader will be essential for success. You will have broad responsibilities in leading team members from all disciplines. The role involves engaging with cross-functional team members, executive staff members, partners and suppliers, sales account teams and customers. You must possess the ability to promote collaborative decision-making, provide direction and establish a sense of urgency within the program team. You must be able to objectively evaluate risks to program objectives and be comfortable making difficult program decisions. The ability to effectively lead through ambiguity is critical for success in the role.

Primary Objectives:

• Lead cross-functional product development teams to deliver products to market for Tennant Company
• Successfully plan and execute new product development programs from product strategy to post launch
• Manage stakeholder needs and expectations by effectively facilitating tradeoff decisions and clearly communicating program status
• Create, document, and implement new product development processes and improvements as required

Accountable for:

• The overall leadership and success of the program.
• Program performance as measured by cost, quality, ROI and schedule metrics.
• Building and leading cross-functional product development teams using resources from all functional areas of the company.
• Coordinating and managing all program documentation as required by the product development process including gate review materials and presentations.
• Developing comprehensive product development plans that align with product and departmental strategies and appropriately balance organizational capability/capacity, business/technical risk and financial return.
• Communicating all aspects of program status including identification and resolution of risks/issues threatening program deliverables.
• Ensuring quality in execution of all aspects of product development programs.

Required Skills:

• Exceptional leadership and team building skills.
• Exceptional communication skills at all levels of the organization.
• Leading cross-functional teams through phase-gate development processes.
• Ability to reach out across functions during the "fuzzy front end" and lead the creation of concepts while evaluating feasibility and market fit.
• Exceptional planning and management skills using industry standard tools and methods.
• Exceptional cross-functional perspective including engineering, marketing, procurement, sales, and service.
• Knowledge of engineering fundamentals.
• Knowledge of complex mechanical, electrical, and software systems.
• Capability to leverage basic financial tools in making project decisions based on return on investment and other financial metrics (NPV, IRR, Break-Even, Gross Margin, etc).
• Creating and supporting innovative approaches to product development activities.
• Strong process orientation with flexibility to function effectively where processes do not exist.
• Ability to manage multiple complex projects simultaneously.

Required Experience:

• Bachelor's of Science degree in a technical field.
• Advanced degree preferred (MBA strongly preferred).
• 3+ years experience leading cross-functional teams including engineering, product/program management, and/or procurement preferred.
• 10+ years experience in product development environment.
• Advanced project training/certification, such as PMI, preferred.
• Six Sigma Black Belt or LEAN certification preferred

Begin your journey with us. Let's reinvent how the world cleans.

Equal Opportunity Employer

Tennant Company is an equal opportunity employer. Employment decisions are made on the basis of individual skill, ability, reliability, productivity, and other factors important to performance. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, creed, religion, sex, national origin, physical or mental disability, age, veteran status, pregnancy, sexual orientation, genetic information, gender identity, or any other basis protected by state or federal law or local ordinance.