Vice President of Program Excellence

Socket.dev; Fairfax (VA); On-site; USD 200,000 - 300,000; Full time

Job summary

Everforth ECS seeks a Vice President, Program Excellence to lead the enterprise program governance and delivery performance from its Fairfax, VA headquarters. You will shape the enterprise framework for program and contract management, oversee Health Review processes, and provide executive visibility into delivery, financial health, and customer outcomes.

The role partners with COO and BU leaders to identify systemic issues, lead high-risk program interventions, and scale best practices across

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Engineering, Information Technology, Management, or a related field.
• PMP certification required.
• 15+ years of progressively responsible experience in program management, operational excellence, quality management, delivery leadership, or portfolio operations within the Federal Contracting GovCon ecosystem.
• Executive Leadership Experience: Demonstrated success leading an enterprise program excellence, performance management, delivery assurance, quality, or program management function.
• Scale Experience: Proven track record managing performance excellence, program governance, or quality programs within a mid-to-large-tier federal contractor with at least $1Bn annual revenue and a complex portfolio of federal programs.
• Demonstrated experience leading and developing senior program management, operational excellence, or subject-matter-expert teams.
• Experience assessing and recovering complex or underperforming federal programs, including the ability to identify root causes, establish corrective actions, and influence executive and customer stakeholders.
• Strong understanding of federal program financial management, including forecasting, margin performance, earned value concepts, resource planning, and portfolio-level performance analysis.
• Demonstrated experience implementing and operationalizing enterprise delivery frameworks such as PMI, CMMI, ISO, Agile, ITIL, EVMS, or equivalent operational excellence models.
• Experience supporting program transitions, contract startups, recompetes, or other critical contract-lifecycle activities.
• Exceptional executive communication, facilitation, and organizational influence skills.
• Ability to synthesize complex program information into clear executive insights, decisions, and actions.
• Ability to translate compliance and quality requirements into scalable operational practices that improve execution without creating unnecessary bureaucracy.
• Ability to engage credibly with senior government customers, Business Unit executives, Program Managers, and corporate functional leaders.
• Ability to obtain and maintain a security clearance.

Responsibilities

• Enterprise Program Governance: Own the Program Health Review framework, enterprise program standards, governance processes, and corporate contract review cadence.
• Executive Performance Leadership: Advise the COO, BU Leaders, and executives on portfolio performance and risks.
• Proactive Enterprise Risk Management: Identify systemic risks and drive corrective actions with executive accountability.
• High-Risk Program Intervention: Lead independent assessments and deep dives for programs with critical challenges.
• Program Leadership and Organizational Capability: Build a high-performing team advising program leaders through contract lifecycles.
• Management Capability Development: Create playbooks, communities of practice, and training for program managers at scale.
• PgM and PM Maturity: Drive improvements to delivery predictability and efficiency across units.
• Financial and Operational Performance: Improve forecasting, margins, and resource planning with finance partners.
• Transitions and Contract Lifecycle Excellence: Standardize startup, transitions, recompetes, and closeouts.
• Growth and Recompete Enablement: Translate outcomes into recompete opportunities with Growth/Capture/Proposal teams.
• Performance Analytics and Automation: Expand dashboards and automated reporting for executives.

Job description

Everforth ECS is seeking a Vice President, Program Excellence to work at our headquarters in Fairfax, VA.

The Vice President of Program Excellence is the enterprise executive responsible for strengthening program execution, delivery governance, and operational performance across Everforth ECS. Reporting to the Chief Operating Officer, this role establishes and continuously improves the enterprise framework for program and contract management, leads the Program Health Review process, and provides executive visibility into delivery performance, financial health, customer outcomes, operational risk, and portfolio health.

The Vice President serves as a strategic advisor to the COO and Business Unit leadership, partnering with Account Portfolio Leaders and corporate functions to identify systemic performance issues, intervene on high-risk programs, strengthen program leadership, and improve execution across the enterprise.

This role builds and leads the Program Excellence function as an enterprise center of excellence. The Vice President establishes practical, scalable standards; equips program leaders with the tools and insights needed to execute successfully; and holds the organization accountable for measurable improvement.

The successful leader will make program execution a competitive advantage by improving customer confidence, financial performance, delivery predictability, transition execution, recompete readiness, and the company’s ability to expand within strategic accounts.

Primary Responsibilities

• Enterprise Program Governance: Own the Program Health Review framework, enterprise program standards, governance processes, and corporate contract review cadence. Establish common methodologies for assessing program financial health, delivery performance, customer health, risk, compliance, recompete readiness, and growth potential.

• Executive Performance Leadership: Advise the COO, Business Unit Leaders, and executive leadership on portfolio performance, systemic delivery risks, emerging trends, and actions required to protect customer relationships, financial outcomes, and strategic growth.

• Proactive Enterprise Risk Management: Identify systemic delivery risks, recurring delivery issues, staffing constraints, and opportunities for operational improvement. Lead or sponsor corrective and preventive actions, ensure executive accountability, and verify that improvements produce sustained results.

• High-Risk Program Intervention: Lead independent assessments and executive deep dives for programs experiencing significant delivery, financial, customer, contractual, or organizational challenges. Engage program teams, customers, subcontractors, and corporate leaders to identify root causes and develop actionable recovery plans.

• Program Leadership and Organizational Capability: Build a high-performing team of program management and operational excellence professionals who advise, mentor, and challenge program leaders throughout the contract lifecycle.

• Management Capability Development: Develop playbooks, communities of practice, and enterprise program management standards. Establish training, onboarding, coaching, and leadership-development programs that improve the effectiveness of Program Managers and delivery teams at scale.

• PgM and PM Maturity: Drive continuous improvement initiatives that improve delivery predictability, operational efficiency, and customer outcomes across Business Units. Ensure standards are appropriately scaled based on program size, complexity, lifecycle stage, and risk.

• Financial and Operational Performance: Partner with Finance and Business Unit leadership to improve forecasting accuracy, margin performance, cost management, resource planning, and the early identification of unfavorable program trends.

• Transitions and Contract Lifecycle Excellence: Establish enterprise approaches for program startup, incumbent transition, operational execution, recompete preparation, and contract closeout. Support strategic transitions and other critical program lifecycle events when executive oversight is required.

• Growth and Recompete Enablement: Translate delivery results, customer outcomes, innovations, and program accomplishments into evidence that supports recompetes, adjacent growth, and new-business pursuits. Partner with Growth, Capture, and Proposal leadership to incorporate execution insights and proven practices into competitive solutions.

• Performance Analytics and Automation: Advance the use of executive dashboards, automated reporting, leading indicators, and enterprise data to reduce administrative effort, improve transparency, and enable faster operational decisions.

Leadership Responsibilities

• Build and lead the Program Excellence organization within the Office of the COO, establishing it as the enterprise center of excellence for delivery governance, program leadership, and operational performance.

• Recruit, develop, and lead a team of experienced program management and performance excellence professionals capable of supporting a diverse portfolio of federal programs.

• Foster a culture of accountability, disciplined execution, and continuous improvement throughout the organization.

• Facilitate executive discussions on enterprise program performance, emerging risks, and strategic delivery priorities.

• Influence senior leaders across organizational boundaries and drive enterprise action without relying solely on direct reporting authority.

• Build communities of practice that elevate program management capability across Everforth ECS.

• Serve as an executive coach and trusted advisor to Program Managers, Account Portfolio Leaders, and Business Unit Leaders responsible for complex or strategically important programs.

Governance and Enterprise Oversight

• Own the Enterprise Program Health Review governance process, including program selection criteria, review cadence, health assessments, executive reporting, and action tracking.

• Establish and maintain enterprise delivery standards, program review templates, health scorecards, and governance artifacts. Work with the Governance, Risk and Compliance team to create and maintain an enterprise Process Asset Library.

• Establish performance indicators and escalation thresholds that provide early visibility into financial, contractual, delivery, customer, staffing, and compliance risks.

• Monitor enterprise delivery risks and coordinate executive escalation when program performance threatens financial results, customer relationships, compliance, or strategic growth.

• Provide executive leadership with portfolio-level insights, trends, and recommendations that improve operational decision-making.

• Ensure corrective actions from executive reviews are assigned, tracked, and closed. Evaluate whether corrective actions have produced sustainable improvement rather than administrative closure alone.

• Conduct independent customer and program reviews, including mid-course reviews, recovery assessments, and other executive engagements when execution or governance issues threaten customer confidence.

• Establish mechanisms to capture customer feedback, delivery outcomes, innovations, and measurable mission impact for use in executive decision-making, customer engagement, and growth activities.

• Work with the Governance, Risk and Compliance team to continuously improve enterprise program management standards, governance, and operational processes aligned with industry best practices and company quality, cybersecurity, and compliance frameworks, including PMI, CMMI, ISO, CMMC, and NIST.

• Ensure enterprise processes strengthen execution and compliance without imposing unnecessary administrative burden on program teams.

Success Measures

The Vice President of Program Excellence will be measured by enterprise outcomes, including:

• Improvement in CPARS ratings across strategic programs

• Increased Program Health Review compliance and corrective-action closure rates

• Reduction in enterprise delivery escalations and high-risk program incidents

• Improvement in Gross Margin After Fee across reviewed programs

• Improved forecast accuracy and delivery predictability

• Increased recompete win rate for programs participating in the Program Health Review process

• Growth in adjacent mission opportunities resulting from strong delivery performance

• Adoption of enterprise program management standards across Business Units

• Successful recovery and stabilization of high-risk programs

• Improved program transition, startup, and contract-lifecycle performance

• Demonstrated growth in Program Manager capability and organizational maturity

• Increased use of actionable performance data and automated executive reporting

Salary Range: $200,000-$300,000

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Engineering, Information Technology, Management, or a related field.

• PMP certification required.

• 15+ years of progressively responsible experience in program management, operational excellence, quality management, delivery leadership, or portfolio operations within the Federal Contracting GovCon ecosystem.

• Executive Leadership Experience: Demonstrated success leading an enterprise program excellence, performance management, delivery assurance, quality, or program management function.

• Scale Experience: Proven track record managing performance excellence, program governance, or quality programs within a mid-to-large-tier federal contractor with at least $1Bin annual revenue and a complex portfolio of federal programs.

• Demonstrated experience leading and developing senior program management, operational excellence, or subject-matter-expert teams.

• Experience assessing and recovering complex or underperforming federal programs, including the ability to identify root causes, establish corrective actions, and influence executive and customer stakeholders.

• Strong understanding of federal program financial management, including forecasting, margin performance, earned value concepts, resource planning, and portfolio-level performance analysis.

• Demonstrated experience implementing and operationalizing enterprise delivery frameworks such as PMI, CMMI, ISO, Agile, ITIL, EVMS, or equivalent operational excellence models.

• Experience supporting program transitions, contract startups, recompetes, or other critical contract-lifecycle activities.

• Exceptional executive communication, facilitation, and organizational influence skills.

• Ability to synthesize complex program information into clear executive insights, decisions, and actions.

• Ability to translate compliance and quality requirements into scalable operational practices that improve execution without creating unnecessary bureaucracy.

• Ability to engage credibly with senior government customers, Business Unit executives, Program Managers, and corporate functional leaders.

• Ability to obtain and maintain a security clearance.