Business Operations Manager Jobs in Colorado

Department Information

Mines is pleased to announce the opening of a new position leading project management efforts across campus business functions.

The Project Manager for Campus Business Operations is a member of the Finance, Administration and Operations team at Colorado School of Mines. Reporting to the Deputy Chief Financial Officer, the person in this role manages cross-functional technology and business process improvement projects. The role integrates with Finance, Business Services, Human Resources, IT, Compliance, and Operations, academic units, and administrative teams to create operational excellence across Mines. The PM applies a consistent, repeatable project delivery approach and contributes to practical improvements in project management, business process redesign, organizational change management, and continuous improvement practices.

The person in this role manages prioritized projects from needs assessment /discovery through implementation, operational transition, and closure. You’ll establish clear scope, goals, project plans, resource needs, status reporting, and evaluation procedures; ensure current-state workflows are mapped; identifies inefficiencies and policy constraints; ensures business requirements are translated into future-state processes and technical configuration needs; and coordinates testing, readiness, training, communications, and adoption.

This position is eligible for hybrid work with an expectation of at least three days per week on campus in Golden, Colorado, based on business needs and in accordance with Mines Flexible Work Arrangements policy.

Description of Job

• Manage the full lifecycle of assigned FA&O business process improvement projects from scope definition and chartering through planning, execution, testing, implementation, stabilization, operational transition, post-implementation review, and tracking improvement metrics across projects.
• Develop and maintain project plans with measurable goals and objectives, schedules, milestones, resource needs, budgets as applicable, risks, issues, dependencies, decisions, scope and change-control records, evaluation methods, and required deliverables.
• Guide and manage project execution across functional owners, product and technical teams, vendors, and campus stakeholders; clarify roles and decision rights, coordinate resources and capacity, resolve roadblocks, and escalate conflicts or delivery risks when necessary.
• Facilitate discovery workshops to map current-state processes, identify bottlenecks, manual effort, policy or control constraints, and customer pain points. Independently research solutions form other universities or organizations to aid in the discovery phase. Partner with functional sponsor and IT partners to assess technical needs and system capabilities on campus.
• Monitor dependencies, integration points, competing priorities, and impacts to shared resources or campus operations, and escalate alignment concerns through appropriate FA&O leaders and IT Project Management Office. Provide current and future state process maps to facilitate documentation and clarity.
• Provide timely, audience-appropriate project reports and dashboards to sponsors, project teams, and governance bodies.

• Develop and support stakeholder engagement and organizational change activities that build sponsorship, prepare impacted users and operational teams, address adoption risks, and support sustained use of redesigned business processes.
• Partner with FA&O Content Manager to deliver audience-specific communications, training, standard operating procedures, job aids, and other adoption resources.
• Build and maintain effective relationships across FA&O, academic units, administrative teams, vendors, and campus leadership; facilitate consultation, advocacy, decision-making, and issue resolution throughout the transformation journey.

• Document business needs, expected outcomes, customer impact, risk, effort, resource needs, dependencies, and expected value.
• Confirm the business need, expected outcomes, accountable sponsor, process owner, decision authority, resource commitment, and approval to proceed.
• Work with sponsors, project teams, and governance bodies to identify priority or resource conflicts, confirm continued sponsorship, and recommend whether assigned initiatives should proceed, pause, or be reprioritized as institutional needs and capacity change.

• Define measurable success criteria and baseline metrics such as cycle time, error rates, manual effort, service levels, user experience, and cost; compare them with post-implementation results and report outcomes to sponsors and campus partners.
• Use standard benefit-realization methods, dashboards, and reporting templates, and partner with operational owners to monitor sustained performance, identify corrective actions, and document improvement opportunities.

• Contribute to a consistent business process improvement practice with the IT Project Management Office by using and helping refine delivery methods, playbooks, reusable templates, process-mapping approaches, quality standards, project management tools, and measures for improving the practice over time.
• Promote project, change management, and process improvement best practices across assigned project teams, Information Technology, and campus partners; share practical guidance and lessons learned with peers and partners.
• Stay current with emerging practices and technologies in enterprise systems, business process re-engineering, continuous improvement, project management, and organizational change management.

Minimum Qualifications, Substitutions, Conditions of Employment & Appeal Rights

• Bachelor’s degree in business administration, finance, project management, or a related field. Individuals without a related degree may be considered if they demonstrate substantially equivalent knowledge through a combination of education, training, and relevant professional experience.
• 5+ years of professional experience managing process reengineering or enterprise-system projects through the project lifecycle.
• Project Management Professional (PMP) certification. Individuals may be considered if they demonstrate substantially equivalent knowledge through a combination of education, training, and relevant professional experience.
• Demonstrated experience managing cross-functional projects using project management, organizational change management, and communication best practices.
• Experience managing business process redesign projects that involve mapping workflows, identifying inefficiencies, and the design and implementation of future-state processes within a complex organization.
• Experience applying organizational change management principles to stakeholder engagement, communications, training, readiness, adoption, and resistance management.
• Excellent written, oral, interpersonal, presentation, and listening skills, including the ability to explain complex technical or process concepts in clear, accessible terms.
• Demonstrated relationship building skills across all levels of organizational contribution.
• Strong analytical, research, prioritization, problem-solving, cost-management, and risk-management skills, with the ability to make sound decisions under pressure.
• Proficiency with Microsoft 365 applications, process-mapping software such as Visio or Lucidchart, and project or portfolio management tools such as Microsoft Project or TeamDynamix PPM.
• Ability to learn and apply new technologies, adapt to shifting priorities and timelines, and work effectively both independently and as part of a collaborative team.

• Advanced degree in business administration, finance, organizational design, project management, or a related field.
• Experience redesigning and implementing business processes across multiple enterprise-wide systems, including coordination among functional, technical, integration, reporting, security, and data teams.
• Experience working in higher education.
• Experience using Workday or Ellucian/Banner enterprise-wide systems. Experience working with TeamDynamix or another service and project portfolio management platform, and OnBase or other document storage and custom workflow systems. Experience working with CRS or other procurement databases.
• Experience using journey mapping or related methods to understand current-state customer experiences and future-state needs.
• Prosci Certified Change Practitioner or Certified Change Management Professional (CCMP).
• Lean Six Sigma Green Belt or Black Belt.
• Agile, Scrum, or comparable project delivery certification.

• Flexible health and dental care options
• Generous sick/vacation time: 11 paid holidays per year – including a week-long winter break for entire campus.
• Fully vested retirement plan on first day of employment, with generous employer contribution
• Tuition benefits (6 credits per year for employees, 50 percent discount for dependents)
• Free RTD Ecopass

• Complete an online application (personal information, demographic information, veteran status)
• Upload a resume or CV
• Upload a cover letter: In your cover letter, please address this prompt: Please describe a business process improvement that you led from initiation to completion. In your answer, please share what process was re-engineered, who the stakeholders were, and what the outcome was, as well as your role in each step.

Supplemental Information

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