Manager, Customer Project Management

Continuum Solutions; Houston (TX); On-site; USD 85,000 - 135,000; Full time

Job summary

Continuum Solutions in Houston, TX, is seeking an experienced Manager, Project Management to lead the PM team. You will own customer relationship management after the sale, drive orders through internal execution, and strengthen status, priorities, escalations, and documentation across engineered-to-order projects.

This role emphasizes influence over authority. You will coach Project Managers and Coordinators, set standards for communication, handoffs, and change management, and partner with

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in PM, Business Administration, Engineering, Operations, or related field preferred.
• 8+ years in project management, customer order management, or related manufacturing coordination.
• 3+ years supervisory or cross-functional leadership experience.
• Experience in matrixed environments and driving outcomes across non-direct teams.

Responsibilities

• Lead the Project Management department, set priorities, KPIs, and communication standards.
• Coach Project Managers and coordinators; balance workload, training, and succession needs.
• Maintain active project portfolio visibility with status, risks, and next actions.
• Shape customer communication on order status, changes, approvals, and ship commitments.
• Collaborate with Sales, Estimating, Engineering, Planning, Production, Supply Chain, and Quality.

Skills

Project leadership

Customer order management

Cross-functional collaboration

Communication

Influence-based leadership

Process improvement

Team coaching

Escalation handling

Education

Bachelor's degree in PM/Business/Engineering/Operations

Tools

MS Project

Power BI

SharePoint

Excel

Teams

Smartsheet

Monday.com

Job description

Our client is a growing manufacturer of engineered-to-order electrical equipment, providing electrical systems integration and worldwide service to industrial customers. The company is known for its focus on quality and operational excellence, and for building a work environment that supports employee development, success, and fulfillment.

We are looking for an experienced, customer-focused Manager, Project Management to lead the Project Management department and strengthen the discipline around customer order management, project status, communication, priorities, escalations, change impacts, approvals, documentation, and project portfolio visibility.

This is not a traditional project-control role — you won't own budgets, vendors, or contracts end to end. Instead, you'll lead a team that owns the customer relationship after the sale, driving orders through internal execution by building trust and influence across departments you don't directly manage. The role calls for someone who leads through relationships and accountability, not authority.

If you're a leader who builds trust fast, drives results through influence rather than formal authority, and brings strong customer focus, clear communication, and the ability to develop a high-performing team, we'd love to hear from you.

• Build trust quickly as a new leader — coach, develop, and support the team through change, creating a culture where people feel comfortable raising issues and confident in your follow-through.
• Lead the Project Management department by setting priorities, KPIs, communication standards, project status routines, escalation rules, workload expectations, training requirements, and accountability standards.
• Coach and develop Project Managers, Project Coordinators, and project support personnel while managing workload balance, performance, training, hiring, and succession needs.
• Build a Project Management team known for customer confidence, responsiveness, ownership, professional communication, status discipline, and respect for internal process ownership.
• Own project portfolio visibility by ensuring active projects have current status, risk owner, next action, customer communication record, internal owner, escalation path, and required due date.
• Set standards for customer communication related to order status, schedule risk, change impacts, approvals, documentation needs, customer decisions, ship commitments, recovery plans, and escalations.
• Lead hard ship date and customer-critical escalation discipline so risks are identified early, documented clearly, assigned to owners, and elevated when decisions exceed Project Management authority.
• Lead order handoff and change-management discipline, including scope clarity, customer contacts, contract requirements, submittals, drawing approvals, revision changes, customer change requests, schedule impacts, and documentation updates.
• Shape the quality, consistency, and credibility of customer communication across complex engineered-to-order projects.

PM / Planning Alignment & Cross-Functional Partnership

• Ensure Project Management provides Planning with clear, actionable customer inputs including need dates, hard ship dates, priorities, holds, approvals, FAT or witness-test requirements, documentation needs, shipping constraints, and partial-ship approvals.
• Use confirmed Planning outputs factually, including production sequence, material readiness status, estimated completion, internal clear-to-ship determination, and recovery-plan information, without overriding Planning's schedule ownership.
• Lead Project Management alignment with weekly production planning and confirmation meetings by ensuring PM inputs are complete and current before Planning confirms internal status.
• Partner with Sales, Estimating, Engineering, Drafting, Planning, Production, Supply Chain, Purchasing, Warehouse, Quality, Testing, Shipping, Accounting, Field Services, Human Resources, Operations, and leadership to resolve customer-impacting issues while maintaining clear functional ownership.
• Partner across Planning, Manufacturing, Engineering, Supply Chain, Quality, Testing, Sales, Shipping, and other functions to keep customer commitments aligned with confirmed internal status.

Performance, Process & Continuous Improvement

• Monitor Project Management KPIs including project status currency, customer communication timeliness, PM input completeness, hard ship date risk escalation, change and documentation accuracy, project risk closure, and team performance.
• Establish and improve standard work, status definitions, dashboards, project trackers, risk registers, escalation logs, customer communication templates, handoff checklists, change-management procedures, and PM/Planning interface standards.
• Prepare clear Project Management updates for the Vice President covering portfolio health, customer exposure, hard ship date risk, escalations, open decisions, staffing needs, ownership gaps, and process improvement progress.
• Improve project visibility, PM/Planning handoffs, change control, escalation discipline, dashboards, and standard work in a rapidly growing manufacturing environment.

REQUIREMENTS

• Bachelor's degree in Project Management, Business Administration, Operations Management, Engineering, Supply Chain, Industrial Distribution, or a related field preferred.
• 8+ years of project management, customer order management, manufacturing project coordination, electrical equipment, or related experience.
• 3+ years of supervisory, management, lead project manager, team lead, or cross-functional project leadership experience.
• Proven success operating in a matrixed or influence-based environment — driving outcomes across departments you don't directly manage, and knowing when to resolve an issue yourself versus elevate it. Background in account management, client relationship management, or customer success within a manufacturing or engineered-to-order environment is a strong plus.
• Manufacturing experience required; UL-891 switchboards, switchgear, electrical equipment, engineered-to-order manufacturing, industrial power distribution, data center, or mission-critical project experience preferred.
• Experience managing customer commitments, project schedules, change impacts, submittals, approvals, documentation, FAT/witness-test coordination, shipment priorities, and project escalations.
• Advanced experience with ERP, project tracking, and collaboration systems such as, Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, Excel, Power BI, Smartsheet, MS Project, Monday.com, or similar systems preferred.
• Strong leadership, customer communication, project portfolio management, meeting facilitation, conflict resolution, problem-solving, data tracking, stakeholder management, and written communication skills.
• Certifications such as PMP, CAPM, or Lean Six Sigma Yellow/Green Belt are a plus, but not required — we're more interested in how you lead and influence than in what's on your certification list.