Portfolio Manager

Location:

Remote 150 miles from Columbus, OH- will go onsite to Columbus as needed (4-5x/year) Duration: 1 year contract with extensions/conversion Rate: $75-$90/hr Role Summary

We are seeking an experienced Portfolio Manager to provide end-to-end visibility, foresight, and orchestration across a growing portfolio of emerging initiatives within the Enterprise Program Management Office (EPMO).

This role operates as a senior, independent portfolio partner to technology leadership. The primary purpose is not to own delivery, backlogs, or decisions, but to ensure leadership has continuous, accurate insight into what is in the pipeline, what is progressing, what is at risk, and what is coming next—so momentum toward value is maintained.

Although this role has no direct reports, it carries significant influence through executive partnership, cross-functional coordination, and portfolio-level insight. Success in this role comes from proactively using visibility to drive readiness, align stakeholders, surface risks early, and ensure initiatives are prepared for governance, executive review, and transition between stages (e.g., POC to pilot to enterprise delivery).

This is not an administrative or execution role. It requires strong judgment, anticipation, and the ability to operate confidently with senior leaders without formal authority.

This position reports into the EPMO and partners closely with technology leadership, delivery leads, business stakeholders, and enterprise governance forums.

• Maintain a central, structured view of the full initiative pipeline
  , including Emerging ideas, Intake and “parking lot” items, proofs of concept, Pilots, Initiatives preparing for enterprise-scale delivery
• Ensure new ideas are consistently captured, visible, and triaged rather than remaining informal or fragmented.
• Provide continuous awareness of What is new, What is moving forward, What is stalled and why, What is approaching key decision points

• Ensure initiatives are prepared and well-framed before entering governance or executive forums.
• Proactively identify what is needed to move initiatives forward (information, alignment, decisions, preparation).
• Help coordinate the right conversations and bring the right stakeholders together when action is required.
• Support smooth transitions between stages (e.g., POC to pilot) by surfacing readiness gaps and clarifying expectations.
• Actively help maintain momentum toward value realization without owning delivery execution.

• Partner with technology leadership to prepare clear, decision-ready narratives for Governance forums, Advisory boards, Executive Leadership Team (ELT) discussions
• Ensure initiatives are not brought to governance “raw,” with key questions answered and required checks completed.
• Provide portfolio-level, narrative-based updates focused on outcomes and foresight rather than task-level status.
• Represent the portfolio with confidence, clarity, and credibility in executive-facing settings.
• Maintain end-to-end visibility across the portfolio, including Pipeline health, Stage progression, Risks and dependencies, Emerging value signals,
• Track and synthesize portfolio-level insights such as Value identified vs. value progressing, Signals from POCs and pilots, Where leadership attention or intervention may be needed
• Enable leadership to walk into executive forums with confidence and a clear line of sight across the portfolio.

• Does not own delivery execution or pod-level backlogs
• Does not act as a Product Owner
• Does not make go/no-go or funding decisions
• Does not design core intake or governance frameworks (these remain with technology leadership)

• 8–12+ years of experience in portfolio, program, or senior project management roles within complex technology or digital environments.
• Demonstrated success operating independently in ambiguous, fast-evolving environments.
• Proven ability to maintain portfolio-level awareness while selectively diving deep when needed.
• Experience partnering with senior IT and…