Senior Technical Program Manager - Contractor

Overview

About the Role & Team The Senior Technical Project Manager Contractor role is the cross-workstream coordinator who owns the integrated NEXUS program plan at the execution layer. You hold workstream leads to their deadlines, manage dependencies across processes, architecture, development, data, change, and training, and surface risks early enough that they can still be decided rather than absorbed.

This is a delivery role, not an oversight role. You are expected to run the plan, not report on it.

NEXUS is IDC’s AI-integrated research production operating model. It modernizes how IDC research is created across roughly 44 document types, spanning production planning and capacity, content and workflow execution, and downstream consumption and distribution. Delivery runs in sprints, with parallel pods working document types simultaneously against fixed publication commitments.

The program combines internal teams (process design, business rules, change and communications, training and enablement, data engineering) with an external development partner and a distributed delivery model across US, Europe, and APAC time zones.

What You’ll Do

Integrated program plan

• Own and maintain the integrated NEXUS plan across all workstreams
• Translate sprint scope into sequenced, owned, dated work with explicit entry and exit criteria.
• Maintain the dependency map between process design, workflow architecture, development, data provisioning, UI, testing, change, and training, and keep it current as scope evolves.
• Flag schedule conflicts and constraint collisions before they hit the critical path, with options and a recommendation.

Execution and cadence

• Run the operating rhythm: sprint planning, standups, working sessions, cross-pod syncs, and sprint close.
• Hold workstream leads accountable to committed dates and deliverables without relying on formal authority.
• Drive delivery through the external development partner - track commitments, escalate slippage, and keep build sequencing aligned to the plan.
• Coordinate handoffs between teams so no deliverable stalls waiting for an unassigned next step.

Risk, issue, and decision management

• Own the risk, issue, and dependency log end to end. Every open item has a named owner, a next step, and a date.
• Convert ambiguity into decision points: frame the choice, the options, the impact, and the recommended path for Program Office resolution.
• Maintain the decisions log so decisions stay made and are not relitigated.
• Escalate on evidence, early, and with a proposed resolution.

Reporting and stakeholder communication

• Produce executive-grade status reporting for program sponsors.
• Give the Program Office a reliable, current picture of program health so their time goes to governance and strategy, not status assembly.
• Keep pod leads, product owners, and functional leads aligned on scope, sequence, and what is expected of them next.

What You Bring

• Ability to work a 16-week contract position
• 8+ years in technical project or program management, including at least 3 years running multi-workstream software, platform, or workflow delivery programs.
• Demonstrated ownership of an integrated delivery plan across parallel workstreams with hard, externally visible deadlines.
• Strong dependency and critical-path management across mixed technical and business teams.
• Experience managing external development vendors or partners against delivery commitments, including escalation when capacity or velocity falls short.
• Ability to hold senior stakeholders to commitments through influence rather than authority.
• Enough technical fluency to interrogate estimates, understand data and integration dependencies, and distinguish real blockers from convenient ones. You do not need to build it, but you need to understand what is being built.
• Disciplined risk, issue, dependency, and decision log practice, with evidence of keeping logs decision-ready rather than decorative.
• Executive-grade written communication: short, direct, accurate, and traceable to source.
• Comfort operating with incomplete information in a program where the operating model is still being defined.

Preferred qualifications

• Experience in research, publishing, editorial, or content production operations.
• Experience delivering AI enablement, automation, or workflow modernization programs in a professional services or knowledge business.
• Hands-on use of workflow and program management platforms such as Coda, Smartsheet, Jira, or equivalent.
• Experience coordinating distributed and offshore delivery teams across multiple time zones.
• Familiarity with data platform concepts sufficient to coordinate data provisioning dependencies (for example, Snowflake-based sources).

Why This Role Stands Out At IDC, your work helps shape how the world understands technology and where it goes next. You collaborate with curious, high-caliber colleagues who value rigor, integrity, and shared success. As the premier global provider of trusted technology intelligence, IDC equips business and technology leaders with the evidence they need to make confident decisions. Our insights inform strategy, investment, and innovation across industries and regions.

Recognized by IIAR as Analyst Firm of the Year for five consecutive years, IDC sets the standard for credibility and impact. With more than 1,000 analysts worldwide and a truly global perspective, we combine deep expertise with practical relevance. Here, your ideas matter, your voice is heard, and your contributions provide the insights leaders rely on every day. It is meaningful work, backed by a culture that supports growth, collaboration, and long-term career development with a globally respected brand.

Compensation Transparency

At IDC, we are committed to fair and equitable pay practices. Employees are compensated equitably for their work, aligned with their skills and experience. Salary and incentive structures are determined through a rigorous process that considers experience, education, certifications, role-specific requirements, internal equity, and verified U.S. market data from an independent third-party partner.The expected total annual compensation, depending on location and experience, is between$90 - $120 per hour.

If this role relocates to a different country, the salary range will be updated to reflect that country's range, rather than a currency conversion of the original range.

Equal Opportunity Employer

IDC is committed to providing equal employment opportunities for all qualified persons. Employment eligibility verification required. We participate in E-Verify.

IDC is currently able to employ remote workers in the following states: Arizona (AZ), California (CA), Colorado (CO), Connecticut (CT), Washington D.C. (DC), Florida (FL), Georgia (GA), Illinois (IL), Indiana (IN), Kansas (KS), Massachusetts (MA), Maryland (MD), Maine (ME), Michigan (MI), Minnesota (MN), Missouri (MO), Mississippi (MS), North Carolina (NC), New Hampshire (NH), New Jersey (NJ), New York (NY), Ohio (OH), Oregon (OR), Pennsylvania (PA), Rhode Island (RI), South Carolina (SC), Tennessee (TN), Texas (TX), Utah (UT), Virginia (VA), Vermont (VT), Washington (WA), and Wisconsin (WI).