Operations Lead

Responsibilities

This position will function as the Advisory and Assistance Services (A&AS) Operations Lead for the DTRA Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR). CTR builds foreign partner capacity to prevent, detect, deter and interdict the illicit trafficking of WMD materials, components including delivery systems and support equipment, and dual use technologies that support WMD programs development, production and operation.

The Operations Lead is responsible for daily operations and logistics, ensuring all deliverables meet quality and schedule requirements. The successful applicant will be able to multi-task on a broad range of activities, including RFIs/RFPs, client engagement and support, financial management, quality assurance, knowledge management, project management reviews, market research, and country assessments. The Operations Lead is also responsible for the development and tailoring qualitative and quantitative metrics for the project lifecycle from initial stage to sustainment for partner nation’s capabilities and capacities performance.  

DUTIES  

• Functions as the Department Chief of Staff;
• Serves as daily point person to Department leadership;
• Manages and tracks all incoming RFIs/RFPs. Appropriately tasks them out to the applicable POCs and ensures deadlines are met;
• Manages Department-wide calendar and briefs upcoming trips to Department leadership;
• Develops, tracks, and maintains Department-wide processes and SOPs;
• Suggests ways to improve and streamline operations;
• Develops operational root cause analyses and after action reports;
• Continuously searches for ways to increase productivity and makes recommendations on how to improve processes;
• Reviews recurring activities to create standardized and streamlined processes;
• Proactively reaches out to Department leadership for action items to track that may not have formally come in via the tracking system;
• Manages and tracks all executive-level Department engagements;
• Reviews all documents before they are sent out externally;
• Ensures Department leadership is adequately tracking all upcoming tasks;
• Maintains and sends daily list of actions to the entire Department;
• Builds and maintains appropriate filing for all briefs, addressed RFIs/RFPs, and Policy or TRAC guidance to efficiently address future tasks;
• Ensures teams are always privy and working off of most recent authoritative guidance;
• Maintains overall planning and oversight of the Department calendar and the annual management cycle;
• Prepares the Department for upcoming actions and provides steps on how to address;
• Proactively schedules internal meetings in advance of major milestones to prep the Department;
• Meets with Ops Managers in different departments to sync on daily operations and upcoming events;
• Briefs Senior Leaders on statuses of actions for the Department;
• Proactively searches through incoming RFIs/RFPs to see if anything similar has been addressed before, and disseminates to relevant teams if it has;
• Serves as main point for all new incoming hires, including setting them up on relevant distros and access to required files;
• De-conflicts events in advance before it becomes an issue for Department leadership;
• Attends all relevant CTR-wide meetings and actively takes relevant notes to disseminate to the department;
• Prepares topics and high-level briefing content of all quarterly Department-wide All Hands;
• Proactively checks in with staff and ensures the team is aware of current priorities;
• Supports the planning, scheduling, and logistics of the quarterly Policy Working Groups;
• Supports onboarding of new personnel;
• Maintains Department SharePoint with all relevant and updated SOPs, files, user guides, etc
• Develops, updates, and tracks project performance metrics utilizing the Evaluation Metrics Tool (EMT).
• Meets with Metrics Leads in different departments to sync on upcoming events.
• Monitors and evaluates new guidance (Capabilities and Activities Manual, Director’s Intent, Planning Guidance, and any OSD Policies), to update leadership on new considerations for project and programs evaluation approach.
• Develops project management review (PMR) standards for all projects and collaborates with project teams to ensure all requirements are addressed in preparing for PMR briefings.
• Conducts various open-source and cross-department research to identify data and trends of current and potential inquires by the client.
• Tracks and updates staff on developmental training to ensure proficiency is maximized.
• Proactively checks in with staff and ensures the team is aware of current priorit