Associate Project Leader Jobs in Ohio (NOW HIRING)

About Us:  

LayerZero Power Systems LLC. is a globally recognized leader in providing state-of-the-art power distribution solutions for critical industries. With a strong focus on reliability, innovation, and customer satisfaction, we deliver advanced power systems products that ensure uninterrupted and dependable power supply in mission-critical environments. Our customer base is comprised of companies in the data center (our main focus), financial, computer service provision, and semiconductor manufacturing sectors. LayerZero Power Systems is on a trajectory of sustained growth, with a loyal customer base of existing Fortune 100 customers and an expanding portfolio of new customers.

Position Summary

The Associate Program Manager is a developing member of the Program Management Office (PMO) who provides day-to-day project coordination, schedule monitoring, milestone tracking, action management, and program status visibility across the organization.

Initially, the role will provide significant support to Engineering-focused programs and activities, working with the Senior Program Manager and functional Engineering managers responsible for Customer Jobs, New Product Development (NPD), and Advanced Design.

A significant initial focus will be supporting Engineering activities associated with customer jobs and monitoring production schedule requirements that affect Engineering priorities. As experience and organizational knowledge develop, the role may expand to support NPD, Advanced Design, STEP and STEP-Lite programs, Engineering Change initiatives, and other programs within the PMO portfolio.

Functional managers retain responsibility for their teams, technical or functional execution, resource priorities, and departmental deliverables. The Associate Program Manager complements functional leadership by providing consistent project-management structure, schedule and milestone visibility, action tracking, risk identification, reporting, and follow-up.

A key responsibility of the role is maintaining accurate, timely, and consistent project information within the organization's program-management tools so that functional leaders, program stakeholders, and senior leadership have appropriate visibility to project status, milestones, risks, dependencies, and upcoming requirements.

This is an entry- to mid-level position with a structured development path toward independent program management. As knowledge of the company's products, processes, systems, and organization develops, the Associate Program Manager will progressively assume responsibility for independently managing increasingly complex programs.

 Primary ResponsibilitiesProject & Program Support

• Provide day-to-day program-management support for assigned programs and projects.
• Maintain schedules, milestones, deliverables, dependencies, owners, and critical dates.
• Track project activities and follow up on upcoming and overdue deliverables.
• Maintain action, issue, risk, and milestone tracking.
• Identify schedule conflicts, dependencies, and emerging execution risks.
• Escalate significant risks or unresolved issues to the appropriate functional manager and Senior Program Manager.
• Prepare concise project status information for routine program reviews.
• Maintain accurate and timely project information within established systems.

Customer Job Engineering Support

• Support the Engineering Manager responsible for Customer Jobs in maintaining visibility to Engineering activities associated with active jobs.
• Track Engineering deliverables, milestones, dependencies, owners, and required completion dates by job.
• Monitor Engineering activities against job requirements and production-driven dates.
• Identify upcoming requirements, overdue activities, schedule conflicts, and emerging risks.
• Follow up on required Engineering actions and deliverables.
• Prepare Engineering status information for customer-job and production schedule reviews.
• Customer relationship and commercial ownership remain with the appropriate Sales and Application Engineering functions.

Production Schedule Monitoring & Engineering Alignment

• Routinely monitor the production schedule to identify changes affecting Engineering priorities and deliverables.
• Track key dates driving Engineering work, including production need-by dates, BOM requirements, Engineering release dates, first production starts, testing requirements, and other applicable milestones.
• Identify schedule changes that may create risk to Engineering commitments.
• Assess and communicate potential Engineering impacts resulting from changing production requirements.
• Provide functional managers and the Senior Program Manager with visibility to significant schedule changes, risks, and required escalations.
• Production schedule monitoring within this role is intended to ensure Engineering alignment with production requirements. Ownership of the production schedule and production execution remains with the appropriate Operations functions.

NPD & Advanced Design Support

• Support NPD and Advanced Design managers with schedules, milestone tracking, action management, risk visibility, and project coordination.
• Maintain visibility to major deliverables and dependencies.
• Identify schedule risks, unresolved dependencies, and upcoming decisions requiring management attention.
• Support project and gate-readiness reviews as applicable.
• Maintain project status and supporting program information.
• As knowledge and experience develop, these responsibilities may expand. Functional managers retain responsibility for their teams, technical decisions, priorities, resource assignments, and functional execution.

STEP & STEP-Lite Execution Support

• Support programs operating within the STEP and STEP-Lite governance framework.
• Track activities, milestones, deliverables, dependencies, and gate readiness.
• Assist with preparation of information required for program and gate reviews.
• Monitor completion of actions resulting from gate reviews.
• Maintain program records in accordance with established governance standards.
• Identify recurring execution challenges and communicate observations to the Senior Program Manager.
• Support implementation of program-management process improvements.
• The Senior Program Manager – Product Development & Governance retains ownership of STEP and STEP-Lite governance, process introduction, training, organizational adoption, standards, gate methodology, and continuous improvement.

Process & Tool Adoption Support

• Support implementation and adoption of new PMO processes and program-management tools.
• Assist with transition of existing Excel-based project tracking into standardized Smartsheet workflows.
• Maintain accurate project information within Smartsheet and applicable business systems.
• Support testing and piloting of new templates, workflows, reports, dashboards, and automations.
• Identify data-quality issues, workflow challenges, and opportunities to simplify routine project tracking.
• Provide user feedback as new processes and tools are implemented.
• Support documentation, training, and adoption activities associated with new program-management processes.

Program Status Visibility & Reporting

• Maintain accurate program information within established project-management tools.
• Support dashboards, reports, and management views providing program status visibility across the organization.
• Maintain data supporting program-management KPIs.
• Prepare routine project and program status reporting.
• Track milestones, risks, dependencies, actions, and upcoming requirements.
• Ensure project information is timely, consistent, and accurate.
• Support portfolio reporting as experience develops.