Executive Affairs Program Manager

NielsenIQ•Chicago, IL

2d•$83,700 - $125,000

About The Position

The Office of the President, North America is seeking an Executive Affairs Program Manager, combining senior executive support with program management. The role operates the executive office, exercises judgment about what requires the President’s attention, resolves routine matters on her behalf, prepares information for key engagements, and coordinates across teams to turn decisions into completed actions. The position requires autonomy, discretion, strong stakeholder skills, and comfort working through ambiguity in a high-stakes, externally visible environment. The role manages the President’s calendar, travel, expenses, inbox, meeting preparation, operating rhythm, stakeholder engagements, and discrete projects. It maintains decision and commitment tracking, drives follow-through, improves office processes, and represents the Office of the President with polish and discretion. The position is based in Chicago.

Requirements

At least 8 years supporting senior executives in an executive assistant, business operations, chief-of-staff, executive affairs, or program management capacity.
Proven ability to operate autonomously, make judgment calls on an executive’s behalf, and earn trust in doing so.
Strong program and project management skills, including planning, governance, tracking, and driving cross-functional work to completion.
Exceptional written communication, including the ability to write credibly in an executive’s voice.
Executive presence and polish to represent the office with board members, senior clients, and external partners.
Comfort with ambiguity and a strong bias to action; able to work from direction rather than instruction.
Absolute discretion with highly confidential and sensitive information.
Advanced proficiency with Outlook, Teams, SharePoint, PowerPoint, and Excel.
Based in Chicago.

Nice To Haves

Fluency with AI-assisted ways of working.
Experience in legal, banking, professional services, or a similarly rigorous executive environment.

Responsibilities

Manage a complex executive calendar in line with strategic priorities set by the President and the VP of Commercial Operations & Strategic Programs.
Serve as the single point of entry for scheduling requests and coordinate with Executive Assistants, external executive offices, and event organizers.
Protect calendar time, resolve conflicts early, maintain calendar accuracy, and provide a rolling two-to-three-week forward look with proposed solutions.
Own domestic and international travel arrangements, including bookings, itineraries, visas, ground transport, and on-the-ground logistics.
Manage expense reporting and reimbursement, including receipt capture, coding, submission, and approval tracking.
Handle invoices, purchase requests, vendor coordination, and budget tracking for events, offsites, and travel; proactively flag variances.
Read and triage the executive inbox daily, surfacing important items, redirecting matters to the appropriate people, and closing items that do not require the President.
Draft correspondence in the President’s voice, initiate necessary preparation and follow-up, and exercise delegated approval authority for agreed categories of routine decisions.
Maintain a live view of open commitments, decisions, and follow-ups.
Set meeting-preparation standards by tiering engagements, assigning owners, and ensuring materials arrive in advance.
Prepare briefings for board, client executive, partner, and leadership engagements, covering objectives, attendees, context, key issues, desired outcomes, and team needs.
Refresh briefings when engagements are rescheduled or circumstances change, and arrange advance preparation or calendar review time for executive engagements.
Support the leadership operating rhythm by preparing agendas, pre-reads, materials, and run-of-show plans for recurring forums, leadership reviews, and in-person sessions.
Capture meeting decisions and commitments, assign owners and due dates, drive completion, and surface risks early.
Maintain shared trackers, decision logs, and document repositories as a single source of truth.
Identify and resolve operational friction, improving the office’s operating model.
Coordinate executive engagement with customers, strategic partners, industry organizations, and other external stakeholders.
Close the loop on external commitments, including confirmations, attendance, and follow-ups, and maintain stakeholder context and relationship history.
Represent the Office of the President externally with polish and discretion.
Manage projects for the President, including offsites, leadership events, cross-functional working sessions, and special initiatives, from planning through delivery.
Partner with the Commercial Initiatives PMO where executive commitments intersect with the initiative portfolio.
Translate complex inputs into concise, decision-ready summaries for the President and her leadership team.