Position Title: Program Manager
Location: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Employment Type: Full-Time
- Key Responsibilities
- Program Leadership & Governance
- Lead a multi-project program consisting of several concurrent IT projects within insurance, or financial technology domains.
- Provide direction, support, and performance management to assigned Project Managers.
- Establish program governance frameworks, reporting structures, and delivery standards.
- Ensure compliance with financial services regulatory requirements (e.g., AML, PCI-DSS, MAS/BNM guidelines depending on region).
- Planning & Delivery Management
- Develop and maintain integrated program plans covering timelines, dependencies, resources, risks, and budgets.
- Monitor project progress and drive corrective actions to address issues, delays, or deviations.
- Coordinate cross-functional delivery teams including business analysts, developers, QA, infrastructure, security, and vendor partners.
- Facilitate decision-making across stakeholders and escalate critical issues as needed.
- Serve as the primary point of contact for senior leadership and business sponsors.
- Present program status, dashboards, financial updates, and risk assessments.
- Build strong relationships with business units, operations, compliance, technology leads, and external vendors.
- Risk, Compliance & Quality Assurance
- Identify, assess, and manage program-level risks, dependencies, and constraints.
- Ensure project deliverables adhere to internal policies, cybersecurity standards, and regulatory expectations.
- Conduct program reviews, retrospectives, and continuous improvement initiatives.
- Financial & Resource Management
- Own program budget planning, forecasting, and cost control.
- Optimize resource allocation across multiple projects.
- Support procurement and vendor management activities, including contract negotiation and performance evaluation.
- Qualifications & Requirements
- Education & Experience
- Bachelor’s degree in Information Technology, Computer Science, Business, or related field; Master’s degree is a plus.
- 15+ years of experience in IT project/program management, 5 years in General and/or Motor Insurance domains with at least 3 years managing Project Managers.
- Experience in the financial services industry (banking, insurance, fintech, payments) is required.
- Technical & Domain Skills
- Strong understanding of SDLC methodologies (Agile, Scrum, Waterfall, Hybrid).
- Knowledge of financial systems such as core banking, digital channels, risk management systems, or payment platforms.
- Familiarity with regulatory frameworks and cybersecurity standards in financial services.
- Certifications (Preferred)
- PMP, PgMP, or PRINCE2
- Agile certifications (CSM, SAFe, PMI-ACP)
- ITIL Foundation
- Soft Skills
- Excellent leadership and people management skills.
- Strong communication and stakeholder engagement abilities.
- High level of analytical, problem-solving, and decision-making capability.
- Ability to thrive in a demanding, fast-paced environment.
- Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
- Program delivery on time, within budget, and aligned to scope.
- Stakeholder satisfaction and business value realization.
- Regulatory and audit compliance metrics.
- Team performance and engagement.
- Effective risk mitigation and issue resolution.
Added Advantage
Modern Architecture & Engineering Concepts
- Understanding of microservices architecture, APIs, and integration patterns.
- Familiarity with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP), including migration strategies (rehost, refactor, replatform).
- Knowledge of containerization & orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes, OpenShift).
- Awareness of DevOps practices, CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure-as-code (IaC).
- Knowledge of application performance, scalability, and resilience concepts.
- Experience with modern programming frameworks and legacy stacks (Java, .NET, COBOL, mainframe, etc., depending on environment).
Legacy Systems & Transformation Challenges
- Understanding of monolithic architectures and technical debt.
- Experience with data migration, schema changes, and modernization of integration layers.
- Ability to work with SMEs to define modernization paths, carve-outs, and phased migrations.
Strategic Planning for Modernization
- Ability to define multi-year modernization roadmaps. Experience leading large-scale application modernization or digital transformation programs involving multiple application teams and parallel release streams.
- Skills in managing dependencies, sequencing workloads, and planning phased rollouts.
- Risk management around legacy instability, cutover planning, and downtime avoidance.
- Facilitate cross-squad coordination through Scrum-of-Scrums ceremonies, dependency mapping, and synchronized sprint planning across application, QA, DevOps, and architecture teams.