Director, Strategic Projects

The Strategic Projects team at Riipen is responsible for bringing Riipen’s biggest partnerships to life; taking a partnership concept and operationalizing it into a fully fledged program, that runs on Riipen.

Project partnerships include ICT Ignite, a partnership with Lighthouse Labs,  Level UP,  the Royal Bank of Canada’s Future Launch program, EPIC, a partnership with the US Chamber of Commerce and Calgary Economic Development’s EDGE UP program. 

Building on these incredible projects and  this team’s success, we are looking for a seasoned, operationally minded Director who will be responsible for leading and directing all aspects of Riipen’s Strategic Project Management function.

This role would be ideal for someone who can bring a project management mindset, who is highly skilled when it comes to fostering strategic and collaborative relationships, to make dreams come to life.  This role leads a team of six individuals and reports directly to the VP, Operations. 

Riipen is a remote first company and this role can be located anywhere in the US or Canada.

Please note that the salary listed is inclusive of base & variable compensation.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead and manage the Strategic Projects function; holding accountability in successfully delivering on a portfolio of high-profile projects 

• Ensure that every project under the portfolio is effectively resourced, has a robust and attainable project plan from concept, ongoing delivery to expansion / renewal 

• Lead the team to effectively iterate on Project Management standards; driving program efficacy and efficiency this role focuses on enhancing our ability to be able to scale the team as we acquire new partnerships 

• Develop key success metrics that can be applied across the portfolio to ensure that projects are delivered on time and driving impact 

• Working hand in hand with the Strategic Partnerships to support the acquisition of new projects and working with academic sales/account management to leverage strategic projects to increase academic sales and expansion

• Work closely with x-functional teams such as marketing, lead generation, employer partnerships, product and customer success to effectively ensure that project deliverables are met, stay on track, and meet all key metrics 

• Partner with Riipen’s product team to provide ongoing platform feedback and product suggestions

• Provide oversight of all project reporting across the portfolio ensuring that all reporting meets data quality and accuracy standards 

• Work closely with marketing to design impact reporting standards, and produce quarterly impact reports for each project, including case studies, press releases and other media as required. 

• Work closely with Riipen’s finance team on operational costs, budgeting and reporting 

• Work closely with the Strategic Partnerships team on potential and pipeline opportunities to ensure operational oversight in terms of project delivery standards, pricing and project offerings

• Manage the performance of the  overall project team, fostering team norms such as collaboration, innovation, ownership and unwavering customer championship

• Coach, mentor and develop Riipen’s future leaders 

Skills, Knowledge and Expertise

• 10+ years of experience in project management or highly operational roles, either as an individual contributor or project manager/lead, including

  • Managing multiple projects and project collaborators simultaneously

  • Managing projects with large enterprise partners/funders (government, large corporations, consortiums, etc.)

  • Leveraging data to forecast and report on complex project delivery 

• At least 10 years experience in managing teams, specifically experience in managing individuals who have direct reports 

• Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to lead and inspire a team to drive project and portfolio success

• A minimum of a Bachelor’s degree in relevant fields 

Bonus Points

• Portfolio management experience 

• Experience in the tech/SaaS space 

• Experience in the higher-education/government grant space 

We ask that if you feel like you don’t check all the boxes but have the potential to learn what you don’t know, that you still apply! We believe that diverse teams are high performing teams and we strive to employ individuals with a diversity of backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives. 

If this role excites you, we look forward to receiving your application!

Benefits

🌐 Remote/travel working opportunities (when appropriate)

🏖️ 4 weeks of annual vacation 

🤕 Paid sick leave

🏥 Extended Health and Dental benefits from your first day 

💻 We will ensure you have a great work-from-home setup 

📚 Learning & Development Stipend after 6 months of employment

We appreciate your interest and application. Only those applicants under consideration will be contacted. 

Riipen is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer. Employment decisions are based on merit and business needs, and not on race, colour, creed, age, sex, gender, sexual orientation, national origin, religion, marital status, medical condition, physical or mental disability, military service, pregnancy, childbirth and related medical conditions or any other classification protected by federal, state or provincial and local laws and ordinances. 

Reasonable accommodation is available for qualified individuals with disabilities, upon request.

About Riipen

Conceptualized by Dana Stephenson and Dave Savory for their capstone entrepreneurship project at the University of Victoria, Riipen addressed an issue that they faced personally as learners — the challenge of gaining relevant work experience, building a network of possible employers, and then demonstrating their skills to that network in order to find work that would help them start their careers. They were facing the graduation conundrum — You can’t get a job without experience, but you can’t get experience without a job. 

Since inception in 2013, Riipen has expanded its reach internationally and has developed a state of the art technology platform that caters and provides significant competitive advantages for organizations and academic institutions while staying true to their original goal of supporting student development. Riipen has enabled 193,000+ students at 590+ post-secondary institutions and training providers to partake in applied learning with 31,000+ companies. All of this leads us to our mission: Eliminate Underemployment.