Technology Project Manager (12 month FTC)

Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer is a world-leading global law firm, where our ambition is to help you achieve your goals.

Exceptional client service and the pursuit of excellence are at our core. We invest in and care about our client relationships, which is why so many are longstanding. We enjoy breaking new ground, as we have for over 170 years.

As a fully integrated transatlantic and transpacific firm, we are where you need us to be. Our footprint is extensive and committed across the world’s largest markets, key financial centres and major growth hubs.

At our best tackling complexity and navigating change, we work alongside you on demanding litigation, exacting regulatory work and complex public and private market transactions. We are recognised as leading in these areas.

We are immersed in the sectors and challenges that impact you. We are recognised as standing apart in energy, infrastructure and resources. And we’re focused on areas of growth that affect every business across the world.

All of this is achieved by supporting the growth of our people, who help us deliver on our ambition – which is to help you achieve yours.

Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer: Your goals. Our ambition

The Opportunity

Primary Objectives

- Lead the end-to-end delivery of technology projects and defined workstreams that support the firm’s strategic and operational objectives, ensuring that agreed outcomes are delivered safely, predictably and to the required quality.
- Translate business needs into realistic delivery plans, bringing together stakeholders, multidisciplinary technology teams and third parties across locations and time zones.
- Maintain effective control of scope, schedule, cost, resources, dependencies, risks, issues and quality, providing clear reporting and timely escalation where delivery is at risk.
- Ensure that solutions meet the firm’s architecture, information-security, data-protection, service-management and project-governance requirements.
- Plan and coordinate testing, implementation, cutover, operational readiness and transition into service so that solutions can be adopted successfully and supported effectively.
- Apply the most appropriate delivery approach for the work, including predictive, agile and hybrid methods, and contribute to the continued improvement and standardisation of delivery practices within the Technology Delivery Office.
- Use technology, data and AI-enabled tools thoughtfully to improve planning, analysis, reporting and delivery, while observing the firm’s requirements for security, confidentiality, responsible use and human oversight.

Key Responsibilities

Project initiation and planning

- Work with sponsors, service and product owners, architects and other stakeholders to clarify desired outcomes, scope, success measures, assumptions and constraints.
- Support the development and validation of business cases, delivery estimates and options, ensuring that proposed plans are proportionate, achievable and aligned with the firm’s technology strategy and roadmaps.
- Establish appropriate project governance, roles, decision rights, reporting arrangements and escalation routes.
- Develop and maintain an integrated delivery plan covering milestones, resources, costs, dependencies, procurement, testing, implementation, change activity and transition into service.
- Identify resource requirements and secure commitment from matrix-managed teams, taking account of competing priorities and specialist capacity.

Delivery management and control

- Lead projects and technical workstreams through the full delivery lifecycle, from initiation and discovery through design, build, testing, deployment, closure and transition to support.
- Coordinate delivery across infrastructure, applications, data, integration, cyber security, workplace technology and service-management teams as applicable to each project.
- Manage scope, schedule, budget, resources, quality, dependencies and change control, taking corrective action when performance varies from plan.
- Maintain accurate risks, assumptions, issues and dependencies, with clear owners, actions and target dates. Escalate material matters promptly, accompanied by evidence, options and recommendations.
- Prepare concise, audience-appropriate status reports and decision papers that provide a reliable view of progress, forecast, delivery confidence and matters requiring intervention.
- Facilitate project meetings, workshops, planning sessions, retrospectives and decision forums. Record and follow through actions and decisions.
- Ensure that project documentation and delivery records are complete, current and stored in the appropriate systems.

Stakeholder and supplier management

- Build credible working relationships with sponsors, senior stakeholders, service and product owners, subject-matter experts and delivery teams.
- Translate between business and technical audiences, ensuring that decisions, trade-offs and delivery implications are understood.
- Manage third-party suppliers and implementation partners against agreed plans, deliverables, quality measures and contractual commitments.
- Coordinate teams operating across regions, functions and time zones, creating shared ownership of outcomes and resolving delivery conflicts constructively.
- Set clear expectations and maintain transparent communication, including early escalation where decisions, resources or dependencies threaten delivery.

Solution governance, risk and assurance

- Ensure that projects follow the firm’s applicable delivery lifecycle, project governance, architecture, security, data-protection, risk and financial-control requirements.
- Coordinate required assessments, design reviews and approvals, and ensure that actions or conditions arising from assurance activity are addressed.
- Work with technical and security specialists to identify delivery and operational risks, including risks relating to resilience, data, integrations, access, supportability and third parties.
- Maintain traceability between approved requirements, solution design, testing evidence, readiness decisions and delivered outcomes.
- Support project audits, health checks and assurance reviews, addressing findings and sharing lessons with the wider delivery community.

Testing, implementation and transition

- Establish an appropriate test and acceptance approach with business and technical leads, covering relevant system, integration, performance, security, operational and user-acceptance testing.
- Ensure that testing scope, environments, data, resources, entry and exit criteria, defect management and reporting are planned and controlled.
- Develop and manage implementation and cutover plans, including dependencies, communications, technical activities, business readiness, validation, contingency and rollback arrangements.
- Coordinate go-live readiness assessments and ensure that outstanding risks are understood and accepted by the appropriate decision-makers.
- Work with Service Management, Technology Services and Operations, support teams, change and training colleagues and service or product owners to achieve a controlled transition into production.
- Ensure that support ownership, operational documentation, knowledge transfer, monitoring, service acceptance and any early-life-support arrangements are in place.
- Lead or coordinate post-implementation reviews, ensuring that lessons, residual actions and improvement opportunities are captured.

Benefits, closure and continuous improvement

- Define measurable project outcomes and benefits with the sponsor and relevant owners, and ensure that ownership for their realisation is clear.
- Keep delivery forecasts current and provide transparent information on progress, cost, risks and expected outcomes.
- Complete formal project closure, including acceptance, financial reconciliation, outstanding-action transfer, lessons learned and archiving.
- Contribute reusable plans, templates, lessons and practical improvements to the Technology Delivery Office.
- Support consistent delivery standards while exercising judgement about the level of governance and documentation appropriate to the scale and risk of each project.
- Stay informed about emerging technology and delivery practices, identifying responsible opportunities to improve project execution and stakeholder experience.

Qualifications, Skills and Experience

Essential

- An innovative mindset, curious about AI and emerging technologies.
- Demonstrable experience of managing technology projects or substantial technical workstreams through the complete delivery lifecycle.
- A record of delivering agreed outcomes while controlling scope, schedule, cost, resources, dependencies, risks, issues and quality.
- Experience of coordinating multidisciplinary teams in a matrix environment, including technical specialists, business stakeholders and third-party suppliers.
- Practical experience of project initiation, planning, governance, status reporting, financial control, risk and issue management, change control and project closure.
- Experience of implementing technology solutions and planning testing, cutover, go-live readiness, operational acceptance and transition into support.
- The ability to understand technical information, ask constructive questions and communicate implications clearly to both technical and non-technical audiences.
- Strong stakeholder-management, facilitation, negotiation, influencing and written-communication skills.
- Sound judgement and a proactive approach to identifying problems, evaluating options and obtaining timely decisions.
- Experience of applying predictive, agile or hybrid delivery approaches according to the nature, risk and context of the work.
- Familiarity with modern project and collaboration tools, such as Jira, Confluence, ServiceNow, Microsoft Project, Microsoft Planner, Microsoft Teams or comparable platforms.
- An understanding of the importance of architecture governance, cyber security, data protection, resilience and service management in technology delivery.
- An innovative mindset, curious about AI and emerging technologies, with the judgement to use them responsibly and securely.
- The ability to work effectively with geographically dispersed teams and manage several competing priorities in a complex professional-services environment.

Desirable

- A recognised project-management qualification or equivalent practical experience, for example PRINCE2 Practitioner, APM Project Management Qualification, PMP or an agile qualification.
- Experience within a global law firm, professional-services organisation or another regulated, security-conscious environment.
- Experience delivering one or more of the following: enterprise applications, cloud services, infrastructure or workplace technology, systems integration, data migration, cyber-security change, office technology or technology-enabled business transformation.
- Experience of supplier selection, commercial management or managing delivery against statements of work and contractual milestones.
- Familiarity with organisational change, communications, training and adoption activity associated with technology implementation.
- Familiarity with product, service-management or DevOps ways of working.
- Experience using data and automation to improve project planning, reporting, forecasting or decision-making.

Team
Information Technology

Working Pattern
Full time

Location
London

Contract type
Fixed Term Contract

Diversity & Inclusion

We are committed to attracting people from all backgrounds and creating a respectful and inclusive culture where everyone thrives. We see this as essential to our success, including our ability to innovate and achieve sustained high performance. This is a key part of our Values - Human, Bold, and Outstanding.