PROJECT COORDINATOR (I)

Department Description

The Office of the Registrar provides a number of services to both prospective and current students and is the primary information source on enrolment, convocation ceremonies and important student dates and events throughout the year. The Office of the Registrar comprises 7 departments: Student Services, Student Financial Aid & Scholarships, Student Recruitment, Undergraduate Admissions, Student Records & Systems, Scheduling & Examinations, and Central RO Administration and has a staff compliment of approximately 70. This dynamic team works together to provide assistance to students from the beginning of their time at McMaster University until they graduate. We are currently looking to hire a Project Coordinator in our Student Records & Systems department that will use a variety of specialized skills to promote and support the overall strategic plan of the Office of the Registrar.

General Description

The Project Coordinator (I) manages multiple concurrent projects to meet quality, budget and time objectives. Delivers high quality outputs in compliance with agreed time and budget constraints and to the satisfaction of clients and stakeholders. Assist and, where necessary, lead stakeholders in defining business processes, developing realistic goals and ensuring implementation is done with a smooth transition to the ongoing business operations.

Representative Duties & Responsibilities

• Manage multiple concurrent projects.
• Develop and maintain project plans, prepare project status reports and keep management, clients and other project stakeholders informed of the status.
• Organize and conduct start-up sessions to communicate requirements and project plans, and to initiate team building.
• Accountable for leading and managing all aspects of the project from inception to analysis and development, to production acceptance and post implementation reviews including related infrastructure requirements such as security and hardware.
• Work with stakeholders and department staff to define project components that must be completed to ensure the overall project goal is achieved.
• Work with all project stakeholders to obtain buy in and sign off to deliverables, time lines and implementation methods.
• Develop and manage project budget, time lines and milestones for presentation to senior management.
• Track and report on project progress between milestones.
• Identify and select development strategies to maximize the efficiency and effectiveness of project work while maximizing negative impacts on stakeholders such as managing project and task dependencies so they work together for both the business and technology strategic plans.
• Ensure proper setting of priorities, problem resolution and incorporation of changing events and conditions into the project from business, technical and political perspectives.
• Ensure that project work occurs within established budgets and time lines and communicate all issues or problems to management and all stakeholders.
• Manage change and its effects on project resources.
• Manage problems that arise in the course of projects.
• Receive and respond to time critical issues.
• Plan, coordinate, and schedule meetings for effective user groups, focus groups, and advisory boards.
• Ensure that all project work is effectively integrated into current systems and, where possible, any current production problems are addressed.
• Investigate, evaluate, and recommend improvements that may be required to business practices, their applications systems, and supporting computing technology.
• Create and manage budgets and schedules.
• Ensure that projects meet specified functionality requirements.
• Manage all phases of testing including, but not limited to, system, integration, acceptance, regression, and performance.
• Develop and maintain information technology process flow, methodology, and control documentation.
• Assist with the development of project proposals and estimates.Facilitate effective dialog between the user community and technical staff.
• Take ownership of functional issues by identifying underlying problems, analyzing potential solutions and implementing system resolutions, including workarounds.
• Work with the development team to determine technical approaches and technical risks for project testing.
• Work closely with testing team members to ensure that requirements are testable.
• Prepare and assist other testers with the creation of test cases.
• Identify and manage defects identified during all phases of a project.
• Review test cases created by the testing team members to ensure that the test cases adequately define the business processes.
• Resolve problems in the test, production implementation, and post-implementation phases in coordination with other technical and business groups.
• Develop simple queries using basic Business Intelligence tools.
• Review systems, processes, and information and provide recommendations to others.
• Liaise between the technology and support teams.
• Communicate testing results to other stakeholders.
• Facilitate effective dialog between technical staff.
• Interact with and exchange information with colleagues.
• Follow a test script and document defects.
• Prepare and review recommendations and other project initiation documents.
• Prepare and review end user and operations documentation, training materials, and timelines.
• Maintain information technology process flow, methodology, and control documentation.
• Plan, schedule, and monitor own work within short time horizons.
• Organize individual time, work and resources to accomplish objectives in the most effective and efficient way.
• Understand and use appropriate methods, tools, and applications to complete work tasks.
• Demonstrate a rational and organized approach to work and identify development opportunities.
• Absorb technical information when it is presented systematically and apply it effectively.
• Use measurement methods to monitor progress toward goal attainment, tenaciously working to meet or exceed those goals, while deriving satisfaction from the process of goal achievement and continuous improvement.
• Ensure that the internal and external customer perspective is a driving force behind decisions and activities.
• Follow service practices that meet customers’ and University needs.
• Interact with others in a way that gives them confidence in one’s intentions and those of the University.
• Work collaboratively with others to achieve departmental and institutional goals. Actively participate as a member of a team to move the team toward the completion of goals.
• Perform a range of varied work activities in a variety of structured environments.
• Engage in multiple initiatives simultaneously.
• Apply and enforce department change control policies and procedures.
• Acquire and maintain a basic understanding of Business Intelligence and Data Warehousing principles.
• Read and understand complex Business Process Diagrams and develop basic (Level II) models.
• Remain current with relevant development and project methodologies.
• Remain current with security policies and procedures and work with System Administrators to implement security changes.
• Remain current with the different levels of testing and develop simple use cases and test scripts.

Supervision

Provide direction to others in how to carry out work tasks