Director, Programs & Project Delivery

The Canada Life Assurance Company•Toronto, ON

4d•CA$128,200 - CA$178,200•Hybrid

About The Position

As Canada Life continues to advance its strategic priorities, the Business Project Management Office (BPMO) within COBE plays a critical role in enabling successful business transformation. The Director, Project Management is a senior delivery leader responsible for mobilizing and executing complex initiatives that span multiple business areas, systems, and stakeholder groups. Working in partnership with executive sponsors and cross-functional leaders, this role establishes governance, drives alignment, manages risks and dependencies, and ensures initiatives remain focused on delivering measurable business outcomes. The Director brings disciplined project delivery practices, strong business acumen, and enterprise-wide influence to support strategic change across the organization.

Requirements

15+ years of experience in program/project management, and/or business transformation (financial services/operations experience is an asset).
Post-secondary degree or equivalent combination of education and experience; PMP, PgMP, PRINCE2, Lean/Six Sigma, or Agile certification(s) are assets.
Demonstrated ability to lead through influence as a senior individual contributor, facilitating alignment and decisions across diverse stakeholders.
Strong governance and delivery discipline: scope, schedule, dependency, risk/issue, and change management.
Excellent communication skills with experience creating executive-ready updates, presentations, and concise written recommendations.
Analytical and metrics-oriented; able to define outcomes, establish baselines, and track benefits/OKRs/KPIs.
Agile mindset with a demonstrated ability to work through ambiguity and manage multiple time-sensitive concurrent deliverables.
Strong planning, organization, and attention to detail with a bias for action and follow-through.
Credibility to build trusted relationships across businesses and functions, provide sound advice, and challenge constructively.
Understanding of technology-enabled change and the impacts to operations, customers, and advisors.
Advanced proficiency with Office 365 applications (e.g., PowerPoint, Excel, Teams, SharePoint); experience with reporting/dashboard tools is an asset.

Nice To Haves

financial services/operations experience is an asset
PMP, PgMP, PRINCE2, Lean/Six Sigma, or Agile certification(s) are assets
experience with reporting/dashboard tools is an asset

Responsibilities

Oversee the planning and delivery of assigned strategic initiatives; navigate ambiguity, identify risks and issues, and drive mitigation across multiple domains.
Lead integrated project management practices including schedule management, RAID management, dependency management, change control, and release/readiness planning.
Develop and maintain executive-level status reporting, dashboards, and materials that provide an integrated view of progress, decisions, risks, and outcomes.
Partner with stakeholders across the organization to refine the project charter, define the problem-to-solve, and translate objectives into a clear delivery approach and high-level requirements.
Define milestones, dependencies, assumptions, and resource needs; proactively surface trade-offs and options.
Establish fit-for-purpose governance and operating cadence (forums, decision logs, escalation paths), ensuring timely decisions and transparent progress.
Coordinate with leaders to engage the right subject matter experts and maintain role clarity and accountability across workstreams.
Build strong cross-functional relationships and influence outcomes through facilitation, structured problem solving, and executive-ready communication.
Support development of initiative-level business cases, including value drivers, costs/effort estimates, and key assumptions - tracks deployment of project budgets across multiple projects, including forecasting, variance analysis, and financial reporting.
Assess impacts to people, processes, and systems; ensure appropriate consideration of controls, audit practices, risk, and compliance requirements.
Act as a change leader by supporting stakeholder engagement, communication planning, and adoption/sustainment activities across the delivery lifecycle.
Contribute to annual planning by consolidating roadmaps, estimates, capacity/resource needs, and key risks across the initiative portfolio.
Partner with senior stakeholders to shape strategic and operational plans, ensuring initiatives remain aligned to business value and organizational strategy.
Drive benefits realization practices: define expected outcomes, establish baseline metrics, track delivery against targets, and support post-implementation reviews.
Promote continuous improvement by identifying opportunities to simplify governance, improve delivery discipline, and leverage automation and best practices.
Advises and coaches PMs on practical implementation of PMO practices and standards.

Benefits

Opportunities for career advancement
access to industry-leading learning programs
up to $2,000 annually towards education reimbursement
Flexible health and dental benefits
$5,000 mental health benefit
In addition to regular vacation and personal days, we support community involvement with a volunteer day.
Company-matching pension plan
share ownership program
additional investment options
Employee recognition programs
service milestone celebrations
employee discounts
Employee Resource Groups (ERGs)
mentorship programs
social clubs and events