Technology is at the heart of Disney’s past, present, and future. Disney Entertainment and 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.  

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. 

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. 

Job Overview 

The Program Manager will be responsible for managing enterprise-level projects and initiatives within the Disney Entertainment and ESPN Product & Technology (DEEP&T) portfolio. This individual will work closely with various project owners to define the project team and assign responsibilities. The Program Manager will also be responsible for developing a consolidated view of the project, and for project deliverables including calendars, cross project dependencies, risk analysis, stakeholder coordination, and regular communication of status.  

Primary responsibilities include guiding process development at a project team level and managing high risk, high-impact, strategic projects across a multi-disciplinary, multi-function group of technologists and business professionals. This requires experience communicating across audiences, effectively defining and utilizing escalation paths, and updating technology or business leaders. 

The program manager reports into the Global Program Management organization and will be responsible for driving delivery across the DEEP&T. 

Responsibilities:

• Project Management Delivery

  • Accountable for driving execution and delivery of projects or support programs from start to finish

  • Demonstrates a clear understanding of the project/program’s vision, objectives, scale and scope of work, expected outcomes, business value and impact, timelines, roadmaps, resource level requirements

  • Establishes strong partnerships and engagement with project stakeholders

  • Create full-scale master project schedules and communication plans consisting of multiple teams or components

  • Supports governance practices and protocols to control and monitor the program/projects 

  • Ensure proactive scheduling of key deliverables, milestones, and deliverable tasks

  • Establish project financial forecasts including resource plans and other expense plans

  • Actively participates in process and practice improvements in the project management environment and serves as a catalyst for project management excellence

  • Establishes strong partnerships and engagement with project stakeholders

  • Provides oversight to ensure critical day-to-day program/project deliverables progress forward to deliver specified requirements, objectives, and value

  • Identifies gaps in the project team’s accountability and ownership of deliverables

  • Foster a team environment of self-organization, retrospect to learn and adapt with the goal of delivering the highest value to our guests and cast

• Financial Management

  • Responsible for finance/budget responsibilities for projects and budgets (<$1M).

  • Analyzes, measures and recognizes the financial impact of various project actions, participate in analyzing and using financial data to identify key project issues, and maintains budget tracking and monitors budget expenditures

• Status Reporting

  • Prepares program/project status reports to demonstrate project overall health, key performance indicator (KPI), risk, issues, accomplishments, next steps, and escalation requests

  • Identifies and facilitates resolution of issues and risks on projects to meet commitments

  • Maintains data visualization elements to provide a graphic demonstration of project analytics and metrics

• Communication 

  • Leads with a win/win attitude with competing priorities and adapts to diverse personalities. Operates as an independent and dynamic project leader. Demonstrates influencing without direct authority

  • Facilitates project team meetings effectively, ensuring the desired outcomes are achieved

  • Distributes timely and effective project meeting updates and call to action updates across project teams

  • Demonstrates effective communication skills to facilitate project-related conversations with technology senior leaders/managers/directors and service owners alike, and driving tasks and project dependencies to completion across multiple supporting teams

  • Escalates the need for guidance and support to direct manager effectively  

Basic Qualifications: 

• A minimum of 5-years of applicable project management experience in a technology environment, preferably for a large company. 

• Proven experience with at least 5 years of experience in leading technology, multidisciplinary efforts across a large-scale matrix organization 

• Experience in leading technology projects or multi-threaded efforts

• Able to lead project meetings and workshops driving commitments, accountability, and deliverables

• Demonstrated critical thinking, and planning skills  

• Demonstrated experience developing and managing software development project plans

• Exposure to software development lifecycle methodologies

• Demonstrated analytical and problem-solving skills to achieve business results

• Strong interpersonal, organizational, and communication skills and the ability to work effectively across a wide range of constituencies in a diverse corporate and client environment

• Proven ability to deliver projects on time and on budget while communicating with teams and leadership

• Ability to inspire, motivate and lead a team to produce quality work

• Ability to communicate effectively to technology and business leaders

• Excellent organizational, communication, and time management skills

• Exposure to modern software development and infrastructure tools, processes, and practices, including Jira/Confluence, Airtable, Smartsheets, etc.

• End-user experience in the use of modern program and project management tools, such as Smartsheet, Airtable, Jira/Confluence, etc. 

• Exposure to a wide range of productivity tools, including collaboration software (e.g., MS Teams), and standard MS Office tools (e.g., Outlook, PowerPoint, Excel, Word, OneDrive).

• BA/BS in business, computer science preferred or other technical field or appropriate work experience

Preferred Qualifications:

• Prior Disney experience is preferred.  

The hiring range for this position in Bristol, CT is $129,300 - $173,300 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.