Program Manager

Key Responsibilities


Program and Project Management
• Lead planning, execution, and monitoring of the UI Inspire modernization project, ensuring alignment strategic modernization goals. Solve complex problems and drive action across the organization.
• Coordinate activities across Benefits, Tax, and Appeals modernization workstreams and associated vendor delivery teams.
• Develop and maintain integrated program schedules, milestone tracking, and risk mitigation strategies aligned with the planned September 2026 go-live timeline.
• Track delivery of critical implementation milestones including system testing, user acceptance testing, data migration validation, security testing, and production readiness.
• Manage dependencies between vendor deliverables, agency readiness activities, and federal certification requirements.
• Track and report on project budget.

Vendor Oversight and Delivery Coordination
• Serve as the primary coordination point between leadership, GTA, and the system implementation vendor.
• Monitor and drive vendor progress against project milestones and ensure timely resolution of development issues, defects, and delivery risks.
• Support implementation of accelerated delivery approaches including AI-assisted development and testing initiatives proposed for the project.
• Facilitate issue escalation, decision support, and cross-team coordination to maintain project momentum.

Federal Readiness and Compliance Management
• Coordinate readiness activities required under federal unemployment insurance modernization guidance, including UIPL 11-18 Change 2 readiness expectations.
• Ensure completion of key readiness artifacts including:


o End-to-end validation of critical UI business scenarios


o Data reconciliation accuracy validation


o External partner interface certification


o Load and performance testing results


o Operational readiness documentation and staff training validation.
• Support preparation of readiness documentation required for federal certification prior to go-live.

Governance and Stakeholder Engagement
• Present project status and issues to agency leadership.
• Support program governance structures including Steering Committee and executive leadership oversight groups.
• Facilitate regular project status meetings, steering committee updates, and executive briefings.
• Track action items and decisions related to scope, prioritization of functionality, and release readiness.
• Maintain transparent reporting on project progress, risks, escalation of key issues, and mitigation strategies.

Implementation Readiness and Deployment Planning
• Coordinate planning for implementation readiness activities including:


o Data migration verification and validation


o User acceptance testing cycles


o Security, accessibility, and performance testing


o Production environment readiness


o Go-live dry runs and rollback procedures.
• Support development of Go/No-Go decision criteria, cutover planning, and post-go-live stabilization activities.

Organizational Change and Operational Readiness
• Coordinate with business units to ensure readiness of agency staff and operational teams.
• Support training coordination including train-the-trainer programs and end-user training deployment.
• Ensure call center, adjudication, and operational workflows align with the new system design.
• Promote adoption of new processes and technology capabilities across business units.

Required Qualifications
• Bachelor's degree in information systems, public administration, business administration, computer science, or related field.
• 10+ years of experience managing large-scale IT modernization or enterprise system implementation projects.
• Demonstrated experience managing government technology modernization initiatives, preferably in unemployment insurance, workforce systems, or human services.
• 10+ years Experience working with multi-vendor delivery environments and state technology governance frameworks.
• Strong knowledge of Agile, hybrid, or iterative software delivery methodologies.
• 10+ years experience coordinating development, system testing, data migration, and implementation readiness activities.
• Experience supporting state unemployment insurance system modernization programs.
• Familiarity with federal certification processes and readiness expectations for UI systems.
• Experience managing cloud-based or enterprise platform implementations.
• Experience working with public sector program governance and executive oversight structures.
• PMP, PMI-ACP, or similar project management certification.
• PgMP certification.

Key Skills
• Large-scale IT modernization program management
• System Implementation vendor management
• Vendor and stakeholder coordination
• Risk and issue management
• Executive communication and reporting
• Implementation planning and operational readiness
• Cross-functional team leadership