Our Organization: 

Rabo Diversified Services LLC ("RDS") is part of Rabobank, a global financial services leader providing wholesale, rural and retail banking services in more than 40 countries worldwide. Founded by Dutch farmers over a century ago, Rabobank remains true to our core mission: to create value for our customers, our employees, and the local communities where we do business. Rabobank today is one of the world’s largest banks with over $650 billion in assets. In North America, Rabobank is a premier financial institution providing services across the food and agriculture value chain. RDS’s support functions champion over 1,300 employees throughout Rabo AgriFinance and Rabobank North America Wholesale, companion Rabobank subsidiaries.  

Job and Context:

The Enterprise Program Management Office (EPMO) is a corporate function within the Chief Operating Officer domain. It provides a range of project and program management and assurance services to support the North America Executive Team’s (NAET)  decision making and oversight for the combined portfolio of the combined entities’ (Regional, Rural and Wholesale) critical projects, and the effective and efficient coordination and delivery for those initiatives. The EPMO serves as a trusted advisor, employing strategic insights, sound governance and leading best practices to support Executive decision-making and enable delivery excellence.

The Portfolio Management is an arm of the EPMO. Its core function is to oversee, align, track and provide consistency to important bank-wide initiatives, assuring that objectives and efforts are prioritized in sync with the Bank’s strategy and requirements.

The Enterprise Program Management Officer will:

• Support the mandate of the EPMO function by adopting core facets of Rabobank’s global PMO framework, and will assure fit-for-purpose and best practices for project/program management in North America.

• Independently assess project management planning and execution progress across the Bank’s portfolio.

• Provide regular, clear communication on important deadlines, progress and issues to senior management, work stream leads, project leaders, and stakeholders.

• Maintain a central administration framework to track the Bank’s project portfolio/program that includes resource and cost tracking and play a major role in the regular convening of NA’s Project Portfolio Committee (PPC), a subset of the NAET.

The Manager will ensure projects/programs adhere to project management & corporate frameworks as well as the corporate governance standards and processes of Rabobank. For certain major initiatives, the Officer will work closely with and support 3rd-parties providing independent assurance

Job Overview/Purpose:

• Helps lead the continuing development of the team’s directive to enhance execution of best practice project management standards across the combined entities, reducing risk and improving confidence in the overall design and delivery of projects and major change initiatives.

• Be a leading contributor to the production of high-quality, action-orientated reporting and analytics for the North America Executive Team (NAET) and key internal and external stakeholders (regulators), including the development of key themes and insights to aid Executive decision making.

• Takes on “diplomatic” role, securing the buy-in of key stakeholders for the development and adoption of the overall EPMO plan and approach and will provide guidance and leadership to the wider project management community.

• Takes a leading role in the development and implementation of common project, program and portfolio management standards, associated tools and documentation such as governance, benefits-led project portfolio planning/budgeting process and portfolio reporting.

• For key projects/programs, maintain NA project/program tracking and dashboard reporting frameworks and ensure periodic reports and other information is accurate and truthful with a consistent project management methodology

• Liaise regularly with relevant project/program boards to understand planning/execution issues.

• Provide a second line of review for project/program assessment, including follow-up of benefits, embedded project assurance framework, and third-party assessment, when needed, of high-value projects/programs

• Maintain a central administration framework to track the Bank’s project portfolio that includes resource and cost tracking and play a lead role with respect to the regular convening of NA’s Project Portfolio Committee (PPC).

• Adopt global PMO guidelines and frameworks for application to enterprise programs. Identify opportunities for broader training and instilment of fit-for-purpose PM approaches across NA, as appropriate.

Key Responsibilities and Accountabilities:

• Develop good knowledge of Global Value Chains, NA business strategy and functions (IT&Ops, Finance, Risk, Compliance, etc.) in order to support critical governance discussions and drive decisions/requirements

• Partner with key stakeholders across departments/entities to establish a foundation for successful projects/programs, including intervention where initiatives are running into difficulties

• Develop good relationships with functional teams and project managers across NA entities

• Interact with PMO colleagues, work stream leaders and external resource providers (consultants) in order to ensure timely reporting cadence within program governance bodies

• Undertake project assurance activities during project lifecycles that align with accepted Rabobank’s project guidelines - including templates, registers and capture of lessons-learned

• Support project and quality assurance functions (external to PMO) in promoting quality in the delivery of projects

• Maintain central view of major projects/programs across the enterprise

• Play central role in submissions and agenda of NA Project Portfolio Committee (PPC)

• Develop and automate efficient, streamlined PMO reports/dashboards where needed

• Develop and maintain high quality project management approaches for the portfolio of key bank initiatives, adopting core facets of Rabobank’s global PMO framework, and will introduce fit-for-purpose best practices for project management within the North America Region..

• Independently assess project management planning and execution progress across the Bank’s portfolio and provide regular, clear communication on important deadlines, progress and issues to senior management, work stream leads, project leaders, and stakeholders.

• Coach/train, project practitioners and promote learning & development of PM and EPMO skill-sets

• Oversee assignments/ quality of PMPA Officer’s work and develop/coach PMPA Officer to attain peak levels of performance

Risk

• Complete all mandatory training within a timely basis, as instructed.

• Comply with code of conduct and Bank policies/ procedures.

• Actively identify incidents outside of established policies and procedures and report to management immediately.

• Must be familiar with and comply with laws, regulations and internal policies and procedures that are applicable to required job duties.

• Understands and complies with all RAF and Rabobank anti-money laundering (AML), compliance, and all other applicable laws, including, but not limited to, the completion of all required AML and Sanctions training.

Culture and Values

• Actively and consistently demonstrate the  Our 7 Cultural Commitments.

Job Skills and Knowledge: 

• Demonstrated excellent track record in program and project delivery gained by leading large, complex projects or change programs across multiple disciplines and will offer expertise in business change and transformation techniques.

• Ability to quickly assimilate sufficient business and technical content to form understanding of project/program scopes, objectives, and success criteria

• Ability to play an effective ‘challenger’ role

• Experience working with Audit and 3rd party independent assessors

• High comfort level with project plans and critical assessment thereof, including critical path and dependencies

Ability to assist with scoping and planning any remedial efforts as may be required over the course of the program (including program contingency planning)

Job Requirements:

• Bachelor’s degree plus 5-7 years of relevant work experience, including project and risk management related to IT, operations, infrastructure and data quality projects

• 2+ years cross-functional PMO and project/program assurance experience

• Experience working in a commercial/wholesale banking environment

• Desirable – Agile Dev Ops, Six Sigma and Prince2 practitioner-certified, PMP or other equivalent accreditation

We Offer: 

With healthcare and insurance costs on the rise, Rabo Diversified Services employees enjoy a first-class benefits package, featuring a selection of medical coverage and investment options to meet your personal needs. Our benefits program includes:  

• Medical 

• Dental 

• Vision 

• Health care spending account 

• Dependent care spending account 

• Basic life insurance plus AD&D insurance 

• Optional life insurance 

• Short-term disability 

• Long-term disability 

• 401(k) program 

• Health and wellness seminars 

• Tuition reimbursement  

Rabo provides equal opportunity in employment to all employees and applicants and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, creed, religion, national origin, ancestry, alienage or citizenship status, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, marital status, genetic information, medical condition, physical or mental disability, pregnancy, childbirth or related medical condition, military service or veteran status, victims of domestic violence, or any other basis protected by applicable law.  Rabo also prohibits harassment of any individuals on any of the bases listed above.

Consistent with this policy, Rabo embraces diversity and welcomes employees and applicants of all backgrounds.  Our goal is to create an environment that is inclusive, drawing upon the strengths of the diversity of our workforce to exceed the expectations of our clients and customers.