Assistant Director, Office of Strategy Management

COMPANY DESCRIPTION

Singapore Management University is a place where high-level professionalism blends together with a healthy informality. The 'family-like' atmosphere among the SMU community fosters a culture where employees work, plan, organise and play together - building a strong collegiality and morale within the university.

Our commitment to attract and retain talent is ongoing. We offer attractive benefits and welfare, competitive compensation packages, and generous professional development opportunities - all to meet the work-life needs of our staff. No wonder, then, that SMU continues to be given numerous awards and recognition for its human resource excellence.

RESPONSIBILITIES

• Strategic Planning and Implementation
• Facilitate the University's strategic planning framework, including the coordination of both short-term and long-term planning cycles across departments. This involves aligning departmental plans with the University's overarching strategic objectives and priorities.
• Support Senior Leadership in strategy formulation, through the planning and facilitation of executive meetings and retreats, including agenda development, preparation of materials, documentation of key discussions, and synthesis of insights to inform long-term strategic goals and frameworks. Coordinate and support the communication of strategic directions across the University.
• Lead and implement robust monitoring and evaluation mechanisms to track the progress and performance of the University's Strategic Plan and associated initiatives. This includes conducting regular reviews, providing progress updates, and generating insights to inform continuous improvement and future strategy development.
• Lead the preparation and presentation of strategic reports, including progress updates, initiative reviews, and other key performance insights to support evidence-based decision-making and institutional planning.
• Provide business partnering to assigned Schools, Offices, Centres, Institutes (SOCIs) to support the implementation of their strategic initiatives, ensuring alignment with overall strategic objectives and performance targets, understand the key issues and challenges that SOCIs face when implementing strategic initiatives and escalate the issues requiring the Executive Committee's (ExCo) guidance and/or additional support/resources.
• Corporate Planning and Performance Management
• As a planning business partner, lead performance review sessions between the University management and key business units. Engage the key business units to understand the drivers and causes of performance and highlight areas of achievement and opportunities for enhancement.
• As a planning business partner, lead post-performance reviews, engage with the key business units for target revisions/confirmation and align proposed new work plans and annual budgets to desired performance and outcomes.
• As a planning business partner, lead and advise assigned departments on conceptualising and implementing their business-level strategies and initiatives to align their plans with the University's strategic aspirations and performance objectives
• Lead and facilitate the compilation, analysis, and reporting of performance data, budgeting information, and business initiatives to support evidence-based decision-making and effective institutional planning.
• Lead monitoring of university-wide strategic initiatives, including performance outcomes, under the SMU2030 Strategic Plan.
• Other tasks
• Oversee the monitoring of higher education business climate, trends and developments, and government policies and activities, and analysing how these might impact the University's plans and progress.
• Identify and organise resources and processes to strengthen the planning capacities of departments; providing planning mentoring and advice to colleagues.
• Contribute to cross-university taskforces and working groups to support institutional priorities and collaborative initiatives, as assigned.
• Perform other related duties as assigned.

• Bachelor's degree in any field; postgraduate degree would be an advantage.
• 10 to 15 years of work experience within at least 8 years in strategic planning, preferably in higher education and/or consulting and/or public service.
• Experienced in strategic/corporate planning and review, secretariat functions for strategic/ corporate planning processes and organisation/leading of strategic/corporate planning events.
• Experience in coordinating organisation-wide data collection, consolidation, and reporting tools, workflows and processes.
• Background in supporting the development of education and research policies; experienced in managing higher education institutes, preferably in strategic/corporate planning, preparing major strategic planning and/or organisational reporting documents, and overseeing enterprise performance.
• Demonstrated strong analytical and critical thinking, problem-solving, ability to assess and evaluate issues and data, and present options and their corresponding pros and cons.
• Strong communicator, both written and spoken.
• Demonstrated ability to influence and engage with colleagues of all seniority levels to achieve objectives. Excellent interpersonal and negotiation skills.
• Strong supervisory and leadership skills.
• Excellent organisational skills and attention to detail.
• Proficient with Microsoft Office Suite or related software.

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Candidates who do not possess the stipulated qualifications but have relevant work experience may still apply. Remuneration and appointment terms shall commensurate with qualifications and experience. SMU reserves the right to modify the appointment terms where necessary.