Director of Marketing Operations and Project Management

Indiana Wesleyan University•Marion, IA

1d•Onsite

About The Position

The Director of Marketing Operations and Project Management is responsible for the successful execution of all marketing projects across Indiana Wesleyan University's Marketing team. This individual leads the department's project management function, ensuring every marketing request is properly scoped, entered into the project management system, prioritized, assigned, tracked, communicated, and delivered on time and with high-quality. This role oversees the Marketing brand manager team and establishes project management standards, monitors department workload and capacity, removes obstacles to execution, and ensures marketing projects move efficiently from intake through completion. This position also helps maintain university brand standards and provides guidance to internal clients.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Project Management, or related field
Bachelor's degree with project management certificate
Seven or more (7+) years of progressively responsible experience leading marketing operations, project management, or agency account management
Three or more (3+) years supervising employees
Demonstrated success managing a high-volume marketing project portfolio
Experience implementing or administering project management platforms such as Wrike, Asana, Monday.com, Jira, Workfront, or similar
Exceptional organizational and project management skills
Proven ability to manage dozens of concurrent projects with competing deadlines
Strong leadership and people management abilities
Excellent written and verbal communication skills
Ability to influence without direct authority across multiple teams
Skilled at identifying process improvements and implementing operational efficiencies
Strong analytical and reporting abilities
Experience developing workflows, SOPs, and project management standards
Ability to remain calm and decisive in a fast-paced, deadline-driven environment
High attention to detail and commitment to quality
Strong Christian commitment and adhere to the standards outlined in the IWU Community Lifestyle Statement.

Responsibilities

Serve as the operational owner of the marketing department's project portfolio, ensuring every marketing project has a clearly defined scope, complete project information, appropriate prioritization, assigned resources, documented timelines, and proactive follow-up through completion.
Hold project owners accountable for meeting deadlines, identify risks early, and ensure 100% of marketing projects are entered, managed, and delivered through the university's project management system
Lead the university's marketing project management function, ensuring consistent execution of all marketing initiatives
Oversee the intake, scoping, prioritization, scheduling, trafficking, and completion of every marketing project
Ensure all projects are entered into the project management system with complete, accurate, and actionable information before work begins
Establish project timelines, milestones, dependencies, and resource assignments
Monitor department workload and capacity to balance priorities across creative, communications, web, digital marketing, and video teams
Identify risks to deadlines early and proactively resolve scheduling conflicts
Develop operational processes that improve efficiency, accountability, transparency, and project throughput
Produce regular reports on project status, workload, turnaround times, bottlenecks, and team performance
Directly supervise two Marketing brand managers
Provide coaching, performance management, and professional development
Foster a culture of accountability, responsiveness, customer service, and continuous improvement
Serve as the primary operational liaison between university clients and the marketing department
Meet with clients to define objectives, gather complete project requirements, establish realistic timelines, and manage expectations
Communicate project status proactively throughout each engagement
Ensure clients receive exceptional service while balancing institutional priorities and available resources
Ensure projects align with university brand standards, messaging, and visual identity
Provide guidance to clients regarding appropriate marketing strategies and brand implementation
Coordinate with creative leadership to maintain consistency across marketing materials
Coordinate work with outside agencies, freelancers, printers, photographers, and other marketing vendors as assigned.
Monitor vendor timelines and deliverables to ensure projects remain on schedule