Senior Project Manager

Location: London, Dordrecht

Business Area and Mission

The goal of the Publishing Performance and Intelligence Group (PP&I) is to help deliver next generation digital publishing at Springer Nature and, as a result, grow the number of published articles, especially in Open Access (OA). Working closely with the Journals Group, Production, Technology, Marketing and Customer Services, we contribute to a wide variety of support work. This includes increasing the number of transfers of articles between journals, the commissioning of new collections and strengthening editor engagement, as well as supporting and enhancing the end-to-end publishing process.

The Centre of Excellence (CoE) Team aims to create and drive continuous improvement with PP&I teams and their respective stakeholders including Operations, Technology, Customer Services, Research Sales & Marketing, Finance and others. We align, agree, plan and drive the implementation of new/improved workflows, processes, systems, and tools within the end-to-end publishing process.

Purpose of the Role

The Senior Project Manager will, as part of the Centre of Excellence Team, provide project management expertise across the Springer Nature Journals Portfolio, to ensure strategically important workflow initiatives can be delivered in a timely and efficient way. They will ensure key SN journals stakeholders are well informed of project progress and workflow changes and will coordinate engagement as needed.

Responsibilities

• Lead a variety of initiatives across the Springer Nature journals publishing pipeline.
• Project management and contribution to key publishing business projects, including but not limited to implementing policies and workflows and digital transformation (platforms/tooling).
• Act as a central point of knowledge regarding these business areas, providing information and insights to support the work of colleagues in the Publishing Team and wider company.
• Start-up and deliver business projects within agreed timeframes.
• Develop project plans with milestones and governance structure which are clearly visible and understandable by key stakeholders e.g. Editorial, Product & Platform Group, Technology, Marketing and Sales.
• Develop a solid understanding of Springer Nature processes and systems, as well as their relationship with and potential impact on projects.
• Work with implementation teams as needed to ensure the delivery of solutions which support the business needs.
• Monitor the impact of initiatives, ensuring appropriate reporting and analysis is in place to measure success and identifying areas for further improvement.
• Communicate with stakeholders to ensure that they have the information required for decision-making and are kept well informed of progress and of any risks and/or issues.
• Secure and maintain buy-in from stakeholders throughout the project lifecycle, developing and maintaining excellent relationships, for successful delivery.
• Stay aware of and adapt to any changes (organisational or other) which may impact the delivery of projects.
• Provide project level reporting across all initiatives.
• Build close working relationships with key stakeholders in other internal divisions that control and/or develop the processes and systems we rely on.
• Contribute to an overall project status tracker for all CoE activities.

Experience, Skills & Qualifications

Essential

• Experience of managing and developing complex and interconnected business projects.
• Experience of working with a wide range of stakeholders at various levels and on a global scale.

Desirable

• A good understanding of the research publishing landscape and how journals and journal publishers serve the research community.
• A good understanding of the workflows and processes that underpin the submission-to-publication journey.
• Experience in the successful transition and implementation of new technologies and workflows in a commercial environment.
• Experience of negotiation; experience of successfully integrating customer and operational requirements.

Skills

• Understanding of publishing workflows.
• Excellent organisation skills to manage multiple concurrent projects and competing priorities.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills; able to communicate with individuals at all levels and on a global scale.
• Excellent numeracy skills with proven attention to detail.
• Excel and PowerPoint proficiency.
• Good problem solving/logic/analytical skills with the ability to capture and document requirements and processes.
• Proactive and able to lead projects alone as well as part of a large group.
• Prince 2 or an equivalent professional project management qualification.
• Lean, Six Sigma Certified.

In return, we offer a competitive salary range and great employee benefits.

Please submit a CV and covering letter outlining your experience and interest for the role.

We are an ambitious and dynamic organisation, and home to some of the best-known names in research, educational and professional publishing. Working at the heart of a changing industry, we are always looking for great people who care about delivering quality to our customers and the communities we work alongside. In return, you will find that we open the doors to discovery for all our employees – offering opportunities to learn from some of the best in the business, with a culture that encourages curiosity and empowers people to find solutions and act on their instincts. Whether you are at the beginning of your career or are an experienced professional, we invite you to find out more about the roles we offer and explore our current vacancies.

We are a global and progressive business, founded on a heritage of trusted and respected brands – including Springer, founded in 1842, Macmillan, founded in 1843 and Nature, first published in 1869. Nearly two centuries of progress and advancement in science and education have helped shape the business we are today. Research and learning continues to be the cornerstone of progress, and we will continue to open doors to discovery through trusted brands and innovative products and services. Springer Nature Group was created in May 2015 through the combination of Nature Publishing Group, Macmillan Education and Springer Science+Business Media.