Lead Technical Program Mgr

Disney Entertainment & ESPN Product & Technology

Technology is at the heart of Disney’s past, present, and future. Disney Entertainment & ESPN Product & Technology is a global organization of engineers, product developers, designers, technologists, data scientists, and more – all working to build and advance the technological backbone for Disney’s media business globally.

The team marries technology with creativity to build world-class products, enhance storytelling, and drive velocity, innovation, and scalability for our businesses. We are Storytellers and Innovators. Creators and Builders. Entertainers and Engineers. We work with every part of The Walt Disney Company’s media portfolio to advance the technological foundation and consumer media touch points serving millions of people around the world. 

The Business Operations team helps guide and articulate technology strategy and research, and is responsible for driving the day-to-day operation of the Product & Technology organization, including: project and portfolio management and tracking; organization-level capital, space, and resource management and allocation; process management; technical incident management; and our administrative and workplace experience support team.

The Global Program Management team for Ad Platforms is focused on facilitating the design and engineering behind DEEP&T’s ad platforms for our linear and non-linear distribution channels. Ad Platforms develops the products, technology, systems, and tools that extend and accelerate Disney’s advertising business and drive advertising innovation and performance. The department supports a diverse set of Disney brands including: Hulu, Disney+, ABC, ESPN, Freeform, FX, Lucasfilm, Marvel, Pixar, and National Geographic.

Here are a few reasons why we think you’d love working here:

Building the future of Disney’s media: Our Technologists are designing and building the products and platforms that will power our media, advertising, and distribution businesses for years to come. Reach, Scale & Impact: More than ever, Disney’s technology and products serve as a signature doorway for fans' connections with the company’s brands and stories. Disney+. Hulu. ESPN. ABC. ABC News…and many more. These products and brands – and the unmatched stories, storytellers, and events they carry – matter to millions of people globally.  Innovation: We develop and implement groundbreaking products and techniques that shape industry norms, and solve complex and distinctive technical problems.

Job Summary:

This is a staff position within DEEP&T’s: Business Operations - Global Program Management organization. The Lead Technical Program Manager will focus on the planning and execution of complex programs that may span several areas of Ad Platforms, or may cut across the department and other DEEP&T groups. They may also assist with the triage of other programs to help form recommendations to senior leadership.

This position requires proven experience in program management. Ideal candidates must be highly proactive, detail-oriented, and able to autonomously work on multiple assignments. They must be capable of attaining a strong understanding of technical details and clearly communicating schedules, risks, status, and processes to a variety of business and technical audiences. They must be able to partner with closely with project managers and technical leads to coordinate schedules and deliverables.

Responsibilities and Duties of the Role:

• Drive activities for large, strategic, technically complex, high-priority programs
• Develop plans and timelines, accounting for all dependencies
• Ensure transparency of progress and issues/risks. Proactively drive risk mitigation and contingency planning, along with issue resolution
• Communicate status, updates, and program summaries via presentations, email, and direct communication with key stakeholders and executive leadership
• Ensure that all involved parties understand and accept their roles and responsibilities and are held accountable to their deliverables
• Facilitate all build activities (including QA), as per plan
• Proactively drive, track, and report on budgets
• Perform capacity planning for teams
• Collaborate with other program management colleagues to coordinate activities across multiple technology teams
• Strong understanding of most program domain technical components, including architecture, tools and deployment practices that development team is employing, including cross-system interactions and dependencies
• Track and report key program metrics, informing stakeholders as appropriate
• Partner with Product to facilitate advancement of intake pipeline, sometimes helping to triage programs to make recommendations to senior leadership
• Independently manage activities and resolve conflict within associated teams, with minimal influence from management
• Effortlessly sift through “noise” and facilitate discussions and activities with a laser focus towards results
• Navigate the TWDC to effectively drive progress, even when the scope of responsibilities may be unclear
• Exemplify leadership characteristics through collaboration, work ethic, and creative thinking. Strive to inspire others and deliver the best possible outputs
• Coordinate with external vendors, where applicable
• May manage smaller teams of professional employees related to area of focus or expertise
• Define, optimize, and manage Agile ceremonies and processes at the team-of-teams level

Required Education, Experience/Skills/Training:

Basic Qualifications

• 7+ years of experience managing large-scale, strategic, software development programs in a well-established global technology organization
• Proven ability to facilitate effective communication across disparate teams
• Expertise in Agile or Waterfall program management methods that may include Scrum, Kanban, and/or Scaled Agile
• Evidence of strong planning, delivery, and problem-solving skills
• Superb written and verbal communications, presentation skills, and meeting facilitation skills (especially when working with senior leadership)

Experience with:

• Experience working in a media technology environment
• Ad tech domain knowledge, or demonstrated aptitude for learning a technology-based engineering domain 

Required Education  

• BA/BS or equivalent experience required 
• Formal project management certifications preferred

Job Posting Statement The hiring range for this position in New York, NY is $163,100 to $218,700 per year and in Glendale, CA and Santa Monica, CA is $155,700 to $208,700 per year. The base pay actually offered will take into account internal equity and also may vary depending on the candidate’s geographic region, job-related knowledge, skills, and experience among other factors. A bonus and/or long-term incentive units may be provided as part of the compensation package, in addition to the full range of medical, financial, and/or other benefits, dependent on the level and position offered.