Senior Program Manager

The Senior Program Manager at By Light takes a hands-on approach to oversee the cost, schedule, and technical compliance of the company’s portfolio of programs, including both active customer-funded programs and internal research and development (IR&D) initiatives that support future growth and capture opportunities. They are responsible for actively managing customer relationships and communications on a day-to-day basis across multiple concurrent programs and projects. The ideal candidate for this role should have prior experience as a program manager, specifically in capture management, and should be familiar with working on complex programs in a fast-paced, product development, defense contractor environment, while also supporting strategic internal investments aligned to future business opportunities.

About By Light HQ

• By Light Professional IT Services LLC readies warfighters and federal agencies with technology and systems engineered to connect, protect, and prepare individuals and teams for whatever comes next.
• Headquartered in McLean, VA, By Light supports defense, civilian, and commercial IT customers worldwide.

Responsibilities

• Actively participate in proposal development and contract negotiations.
• Build pricing and work-breakdown strategies during the close-in capture process.
• Set up and activate project sites in accordance with By Light PM ISO Procedures.
• Develop project schedules, including costs, deliverables, risks, issues, and resource allocation, across multiple simultaneous programs and IR&D efforts.
• Establish budgets and cost controls, demonstrating a strong understanding of cost structure, pool rates, and ETC’s (Estimate to Complete).
• Collaborate with functional managers to define and allocate appropriate resources in a finite capacity environment supporting both contracted programs and IR&D projects.
• Participate in iteration planning meetings to ensure project milestones are met.
• Identify and manage issues and risks to ensure successful and timely project delivery across the entire program portfolio.
• Conduct requirements and design reviews to ensure products meet customer needs and corporate objectives.
• Work with stakeholders to ensure features comply with technical specifications.
• Continuously provide project gap analysis and proactively offer viable options, solutions, and corrective actions to maintain project success.
• Foster deep customer loyalty by actively managing expectations and proactively seeking favorable decisions and outcomes from customer partners.
• Proactively develop revenue growth opportunities.
• Manage and prioritize a portfolio of multiple customer-funded programs and internal IR&D projects, ensuring alignment with corporate strategy, technical roadmaps, and future capture objectives.
• IR&D project execution, including scope definition, cost tracking, schedule adherence, and technical maturity, to support emerging capabilities and future business opportunities.
• Manage and prioritize By Light’s portfolio of projects while collaborating with key internal stakeholders to deliver programmatic earnings and exceed customer expectations.
• Additional duties may be assigned as necessary.

Requirements

• Experience/Qualifications Bachelor’s degree in Project Management, Engineering (preferred), Business Management, or a related field.
• 10 plus years of proven program management success.
• Experience in constructing complex multi-discipline technology programs and managing key performance risks.
• Experience as a capture manager or systems engineer on one or more programs.
• Microsoft Project and Excel fluent.

Preferred

• Experience/Qualifications Ten or more years of experience managing multimillion-dollar projects or programs.
• VR/AR or Simulation or like technology experience.
• Exposure and experience with JIRA.
• Special Requirements/Security Clearance Ability to obtain a Secret Clearance.
• Must be willing to travel up to 50%.

Physical Demands

Must be capable of sitting for extended periods of time.