Senior Program Manager, Consumer

Instacart•San Francisco, CA

8h•$139,000 - $176,000•Remote

About The Position

We're transforming the grocery industry At Instacart, we invite the world to share love through food because we believe everyone should have access to the food they love and more time to enjoy it together. Where others see a simple need for grocery delivery, we see exciting complexity and endless opportunity to serve the varied needs of our community. We work to deliver an essential service that customers rely on to get their groceries and household goods, while also offering safe and flexible earnings opportunities to Instacart Personal Shoppers. Instacart has become a lifeline for millions of people, and we’re building the team to help push our shopping cart forward. If you’re ready to do the best work of your life, come join our table. Instacart is a Flex First team There’s no one-size fits all approach to how we do our best work. Our employees have the flexibility to choose where they do their best work—whether it’s from home, an office, or your favorite coffee shop—while staying connected and building community through regular in-person events. Learn more about our flexible approach to where we work. Overview We're seeking an experienced Senior Program Manager, Creative Operations to provide holistic oversight and stewardship of our in-house creative agency’s ecosystem of resources: people, time, and budget. You'll serve as air traffic control for a portion of our creative portfolio, ensuring what we've sized, scoped, and allocated stays to plan, and reacting quickly with solutions when we need to deviate. When our most complex, cross-functional programs require dedicated leadership, you'll step in to provide hands-on program management, ensuring seamless execution across multiple workstreams and stakeholders. This role uniquely blends portfolio management (your primary focus) with strategic program management for high-stakes initiatives. You'll know when to zoom out to manage the ecosystem and when to zoom in to drive critical programs to successful completion. You'll apply broad expertise to lead and contribute to functional objectives that achieve company goals in innovative ways, working closely with the Head of Creative Operations, Executive Creative Director, and Head of Production.

Requirements

8-10 years of experience in Creative Operations, Production Management, or Studio Operations, with demonstrated expertise in both portfolio management and complex program management
Proven track record providing portfolio-level oversight in fast-paced creative environments—managing the ecosystem of people, time, and budget rather than individual project execution
Deep experience leading complex programs involving multiple creative disciplines, cross-functional teams, and external partners- with a focus on brand, product, and consumer
The ability to function in a highly
Strong background in capacity planning, resource forecasting, and portfolio optimization
Experience serving as 'air traffic control' for creative teams while also 'piloting' the most critical initiatives
Strong understanding of creative disciplines and how to coordinate them in complex programs
Ability to thrive in an extremely fast-paced environment, proactively identifying and implementing solutions while consistently demonstrating a high bar of excellence and polish in all deliverables
Deep hands-on experience with program management tools (e.g., Workfront, Asana, Monday.com, etc.)

Nice To Haves

At least 3-5 years in an agency environment (advertising agency, creative agency, or production company), with experience managing both creative capacity across portfolios and leading complex, multi-workstream programs
Strong analytical skills with ability to model scenarios, forecast capacity needs, identify risks, and evaluate complex tradeoffs between speed, quality, and cost across functions
Systems thinking—ability to design portfolio management frameworks that provide visibility and enable informed decision-making

Responsibilities

Provide holistic oversight of a portion of Local Produce's creative portfolio, managing the interconnected ecosystem of people, time, and budget across your assigned campaigns and initiatives—serving as 'air traffic control' to ensure optimal resource allocation and utilization
Monitor portfolio health and react quickly with solutions when projects deviate from plan, reallocating resources and adjusting scope to keep work on track while protecting team focus and preventing burnout
Lead end-to-end program management for the most complex, high-priority initiatives within your portfolio that span multiple creative disciplines, have cross-functional dependencies, involve external vendors, or are business-critical with high visibility
Develop comprehensive program plans with clear workstreams, milestones, and dependencies; coordinate across teams while managing risks, issues, and changes; and drive regular program reviews to ensure successful delivery
Provide portfolio-level and program-specific reporting that gives leadership clear visibility into creative capacity, utilization, and expenses; forecast future resource needs and evaluate tradeoffs between in-house talent, agency support, and contractors
Design and maintain portfolio management systems, dashboards, and reporting tools that enable real-time visibility into resource allocation, capacity, project status, and program health
Establish frameworks for intake, prioritization, and resource allocation that ensure your portfolio stays aligned with business goals, and determine when initiatives require dedicated program management vs. portfolio-level oversight
Partner with the Head of Creative Operations on capacity planning for Local Produce, owning capacity planning for your portfolio while maintaining a clear view of available bandwidth across all creative disciplines and proactively flagging capacity risks with recommended solutions
Translate company goals into operational objectives for your portfolio and build supportive relationships with stakeholders across Marketing, Creative, Production, and Finance
Partner with leadership to foster a positive, collaborative culture within Local Produce and encourage experimentation with new ways of working, including AI tools and emerging technologies