Job Description

Job Title: Programme Support Officer

Department/Division/Faculty: Chief Operating Officer – Strategic Programme and Change Team
Campus/Location: South Kensington and White City Campuses and Hybrid working
Job Family/Level: Professional Services Level 3b (Salary Scale)
Responsible to: Senior Project Manager
Line Management for: N/A
Key Working Relationships Director of Strategic Programmes and Change, Strategic Programmes
(Internal): and Portfolio Team, Strategic Change Team, Strategic Service Design
Team, Professional Services Directors and their teams, Programme
Directors of major programmes, Project Sponsors, and Faculty
Operating Officers, Departmental Managers, and their staff.
Key Working Relationships Consultants, Suppliers, Stakeholder Organisations and Third-party
(External): Partners. External suppliers, Project, and Change practitioners in HE
community.
Contract type: Full time, open contract
Background information
Imperial is recognised worldwide for being at the forefront of education and research and, at the foundations
of our academic excellence, our professional support services play an essential role. The Operations and
Infrastructure Committee is a key governance mechanism for the College’s transformational change
portfolio. The activities within the portfolio aim to support the delivery of programmes and projects that will
help the College deliver a world leading digital and physical infrastructure and operational services to
colleagues, students, and other stakeholders.

The Strategic Programmes and Change Team exists to ensure successful delivery, implementation, and
benefits realisation of the strategic operational elements of the College’s Strategy as a world changing
global powerhouse. The Strategic Programmes and Change Team is organised across three capability
areas of Portfolio, Service Design and Change. The teams operate a matrix model of working providing
resource as determined by the strategic priorities agreed upon by the Operations and Infrastructure
Committee and will be expected to work as a blended team working with colleagues in faculties and
professional services.

This role is within the Strategic Portfolio Team whose focus is on enabling a planning and prioritisation
cycle and deliver a strategic roadmap so that programmes and projects are aligned to strategic objectives
and deliver the intended benefits. The team will:
• Provide a complete picture of the College’s investment in strategic programmes so that:
o activity can be prioritised across professional services ensuring strategic objectives are
met
o programmes can be scrutinised and monitored to make sure they remain aligned with
strategic objectives and deliver the intended benefits enabling effective decision making
o the overall complement of programme or project resources and the business end-user
availability are aligned as effectively as possible
o the impact of programmes and projects on business-as-usual work can be prioritised and
managed

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 • Delivering a project management office (PMO) resource across the whole programme lifecycle
from initial business case to implementation working as a blended team with faculties and
professional services
• Retaining a rapid response capability to support programmes (not identified as a strategic
programme).

Purpose of the Post

The Programme Support Officer is responsible for providing day-to-day support to the delivery of projects
associated with the Strategic Programme and Change team and will be expected to work across different
projects and programmes. The post provides support to Project/Programme Sponsors, Programme/Project
Managers as an integral part of the teams. They are responsible for assisting the delivery of projects and
continuous improvement of project management disciplines in line with the agreed project management
standards. The post holder is responsible for supporting the monitoring and reporting of the overall status
of programmes/projects into the relevant governance Board(s).
This post is based in the Strategic Portfolio team and will be expected to work across different projects and
programmes.

Key Responsibilities

• Supports the project streams and their interfaces, ensuring an integrated and cohesive overall
project solution/delivery in line with chosen project methodology and standards.

• Ensures that all project documentation has been completed at the relevant stages of the project
lifecycle. Implements relevant project templates to achieve best practice and assists/influences
project teams to utilise project documentation to safeguard delivery.

• Gathers and analyses data to support monitoring.

• Support the project team to ensure there is a smooth handover to support transition to ‘business as
usual’ at the end of a project.

• Support the project team and Change Manager(s) to develop and implement plans such as the
change and communication plan(, benefits realisation plan.

• Monitors project stages and produces regular project reports; organises and minutes project review
meetings.

• Routinely monitors all activities and reviews project risks, issues, and progress, taking such action
as necessary to ensure minimum impact on project deadlines.

• Helps to identify and supports the project team to resolve where a change in project scope would
be beneficial. Administers the project change control process.

• Communicates project information and status to all relevant parties, providing early warning and
escalation of potential / serious problems to project teams/Boards

• Contributes to the wider community of Project Management within the College, sharing knowledge
and use of common methodologies, helps deliver the implementation of agreed programme and
project management standards.

• Influences others to seek continuous improvement in the programme/project environment.

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 • Assists in the development of a creative, informative, and engaging project/programme website.

• Monitors monthly project financial processes, co-ordinating issues with Project Managers.

• Provides project administration support, including tasks for meetings, documentation, and general
administration.

• Organises project workshops, quality/benefit realisation reviews and lessons learned activities.

• Creates SharePoint project areas (or other repositories) in line with agreed standards within the
PMO. Co-ordinates programme/project files in a control environment (as outlined in best
practice/industry standard).

• Provides guidance to project team members on project procedures.

• Proactively contributes to the Strategic Programme and Change Team and wider programme team
environment.

• Champion a culture of collaboration and continuous improvement.

• Observes and complies with all College policies and regulations, for example Health and Safety,
Data protections etc.

Person Specification

Requirements Essential (E)/

Candidates/post holders will be expected to demonstrate the following: Desirable (D)
Education
Project Management methodologies / techniques, such as PRINCE 2 or Agile D
practitioner
Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, MS Project, and SharePoint skills E
Visio or Nimbus skills D
Experience
A working knowledge of project administration and project lifecycles E
Experience of working with and in project teams E
Commitment to best practice, project management practices and continuous E
improvement
Ability to manage small projects under the guidance of a Project Manager D
Experience of producing and managing events associated with projects for example: D
launch events, world cafes, process mapping workshops etc
Knowledge
Ability to share knowledge and use common Operational Improvement D
methodologies and tools.
Ability to ensure that the project is managed to business requirements, specification, D
time, and budget
Ability to manage project change control D
Skills & Abilities
Good interpersonal and organisational skills. Ability to communicate effectively and E
clearly with all stakeholders

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 Ability to share knowledge and use common methodologies, helping with the E
development of programme and project management standards
Good data analytical skills with a structured and methodical approach E
Ability to simultaneously manage multiple varied activities with the ability to multi-task E
and prioritise. Highly organised
Ability to identify the work required and either organise, facilitate, or perform the E
work.
Ability to be a team player who can balance need, risk and pragmatism when E
developing solutions.

Further Information
Please note that job descriptions cannot be exhaustive, and the post-holder may be required to undertake
other duties, which are broadly in line with the above key responsibilities.
Imperial College is committed to equality of opportunity and to eliminating discrimination. All employees are
expected to follow the Imperial Values & Behaviours framework. Our values are:
• Respect
• Collaboration
• Excellence
• Integrity
• Innovation

Employees are also required to comply with all College policies and regulations paying special attention to:
Confidentiality, Conflict of Interest, Data Protection, Equal Opportunities, Financial Regulations, Health and
Safety, Information Technology, Smoking, Private Engagements and Register of Interests. They must also
undertake specific training and assume responsibility for safety relevant to specific roles, as set out on the
College Website Health and Safety Structure and Responsibilities page.

The College is a proud signatory to the San-Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA), which
means that in hiring and promotion decisions, we evaluate applicants on the quality of their work, not the
journal impact factor where it is published. For more information, see https://www.imperial.ac.uk/research-
and-innovation/about-imperial-research/research-evaluation/

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welfare. Animals may only be used in research programmes which are ultimately aimed towards finding new
treatments and making scientific and medical advances, and where there are no satisfactory or reasonably
practical alternatives to their use. Imperial is committed to ensuring that, in cases where this research is
deemed essential, all animals in the College’s care are treated with full respect, and that all staff involved with
this work show due consideration at every level. Find out more about animal research at Imperial.

We are committed to equality of opportunity, to eliminating discrimination and to creating an inclusive working
environment for all. We therefore encourage candidates to apply irrespective of age, disability, marriage or
civil partnership status, pregnancy or maternity, race, religion and belief, gender reassignment, sex, or sexual
orientation. We are an Athena SWAN Silver Award winner, a Disability Confident Leader and a Stonewall
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