Head of Strategy, Planning & Delivery

Strategic Planning & Delivery (SP&D) was established in 2019 as a Transformation office to accelerate progress towards MassMutual’s aspirations. These aspirations are rooted in the purpose we’ve long held and, in the vision, that we all share: To provide financial well-being for all Americans. 

SP&D’s current mission is to govern the budget, approval and benefit realization of strategic projects, aligned with MassMutual’s key strategic priorities. SP&D’s framework is designed to drive alignment and govern resolution of funding and resource constraints to facilitate effective execution. We remove barriers to allow for collaborative execution and generate value by fostering a culture of transparency, accountability, and ruthless prioritization to deliver on strategic projects.

The Head of SP&D is responsible for the end-to-end management and continued evolution of this critical function.

The Team

SP&D is one part of MassMutual’s Program Governance & Delivery (PG&D) organization. The other part is the Corporate Functions Program Management Office (CFPMO) responsible for overseeing the execution of projects across our 5 Corporate Functions and defining and owning project management standards across the company. Given the interdependencies between how we prioritize, execute and resource our projects, the partnership between SP&D and the CFPMO allows us to view and manage project execution holistically, bringing greater consistency and alignment across the company’s program governance and delivery.

The Head of SP&D and the Head of the CFPMO report to the Chief Risk Officer, who also leads a separate Enterprise Risk Management organization and is a member of the Executive Leadership Team. The SP&D team itself consists of workstream leads, operations and finance professionals.

The Impact

A successful Head of SP&D must be able to inclusively motivate employees to action at all levels in the organization; think strategically across the business; advise, engage with and influence senior business leaders and line employees; drive change across the organization; identify opportunities to add value to the business; demonstrate strong financial acumen and analytical skills; and successfully drive others to fully execute projects to completion and regularly report on progress and performance at all levels of the organization. 

Key Responsibilities

• Strategy – Own, oversee and evolve the SP&D framework for MassMutual. Ensure clarity of roles and responsibilities. Share the progress of this transformation effort with the broader organization.
• Alignment – Ensure the portfolio of projects are aligned with the corporate strategy and furthering the financial and market goals of the organization.
• Value Creation - Work across a matrixed organization to bridge ideas, resolve conflicts and pursue opportunities to increase profitability for the business. Aid in the assessment of the strategic value of projects and link them to business outcomes and company’s aspirations.    Ensure projects achieve their long-term value expectations and partner with project sponsors to implement corrective action when needed post-implementation.
• Resource contention – Ensure processes are in place and are effective in identifying and managing resource contentions (budget and headcount/SMEs) within and between projects.
• Risk Management – Identify risk of execution and proactively work with stakeholders to mitigate risk and avoid value slippage. 
• Governance - Evolve and ensure adoption of SP&D practices to maintain best-in-class governance controls and financial and data integrity of the overall SP&D effort. 
• Operations - Manage review of projects through stage gates. Provide analytics and reporting on financial health, project performance and key risks to value and execution to Steering Committee and executive leaders. Ensure benefits driven by the SP&D projects are realized in the company’s general ledger.
• Coaching - Provide senior leaders and workstream leads with coaching, insights and challenge on the tactics and pathways they need to adopt to meet their ambitious targets. Apply business and value focus, with a bias for action.
• Collaboration - Collaborate with team and stakeholders to ensure overall SP&D goals are met. Partner with corporate finance, business finance and pricing and actuarial functions to help develop efficient and effective financial management practices. 
• Leading Others – Lead both direct and indirect reports, focused on talent development, building a diverse and inclusive team and environment, and role modeling an agile mindset through change and ambiguity. Inspire others and drive culture of continuous improvement.

Minimum Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s Degree
• 10+ years’ experience in financial management, strategic planning or portfolio management within a matrixed organization
• Experience with holistic planning and prioritization cycles within a complex portfolio of high impact, cross-functional projects
• Strong financial and analytical acumen; experience in benefit realization and tracking; understand drivers of profitability within businesses
• Proven ability to guide decision-making, including where compromises may be necessary; tested ability to provide direct feedback Strong written and verbal communication (presentation) skills; can synthesize and explain complex topics and analyses to stakeholders and coach in a simplified manner

Ideal Qualifications:

• Advanced degree or designation preferred: MBA, MSF, CPA or FSA or equivalent preferred
• Familiarity with project management methodologies and financial governance and control processes

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