Project Operations Manager

Job Description

Role Overview

Caribou is seeking a Project Operations Manager to act as the connective tissue across our programs, business development, and internal leadership. This role blends project coordination, business development support, knowledge management, and process improvement to ensure Caribou delivers high-quality work and scales smoothly as a global, fully remote organisation.

The ideal candidate is a digital-first operator who thrives on coordination, process execution, and problem-solving, while being comfortable rolling up their sleeves to provide hands-on support. Highly organised and detail-oriented, they excel at managing multiple priorities, combining structured delivery with practical execution to ensure outcomes are consistently achieved to a high standard.

Key Responsibilities Business Development

• Systematise opportunity scanning: Identify the RFP boards, platforms, and channels Caribou should consistently monitor. Develop and manage a structured process, and oversee development of digital tools (including AI systems currently in build) to automate this work.
• Maintain and update the BD toolkit: Keep CVs, skills inventories, templates, and compliance documentation up to date, ensuring a searchable staff/associate database for bids.
• Coordinate proposal processes: Coordinate inputs from the technical team and draft generic sections by tailoring pre-existing content. Take full ownership of all non-technical requirements, including the organisational due diligence and compliance documentation. Ensure all administrative details are completed accurately, and assemble polished, compliant final submissions.
• Maintain the BD database: in Notion, ensuring all opportunities and bids are tracked.
• Manage the BD events calendar: including researching and tracking relevant conferences, securing speaking opportunities, and supporting staff with preparation and follow-up (e.g. speaking notes, LinkedIn posts, trip debriefs, contact capture).
• Maintain the client outreach tracker: monitor engagement and conduct bi-annual reviews.

Programs Coordination

• Coordinate a portfolio of short-term, expert-led projects: track timelines, deliverables, and budgets; support operational needs (e.g. vendor SOWs, contracting, invoicing); and report on performance to the COP.
• Support resource planning: use timesheet data, pipeline inputs, and program lead feedback to maintain an up-to-date view of utilisation, capacity gaps, and bottlenecks.
• Maintain programs data: keep the central programs database in Notion current and share updates across teams.
• Facilitate programs reporting: prepare monthly BD/program update decks and facilitate quarterly program calls, working with Finance and program leads to ensure timely completion.
• Streamline delivery: build and maintain repositories of templates, tools, and best practices to reduce duplication and improve consistency.
• Oversee vendor management: support program teams to recruit, contract, onboard, and offboard vendors and suppliers.

Internal Communications & Knowledge Management

• Coordinate the cadence of internal comms touchpoints and schedule central Caribou meetings (ELT, SLT, all-staff updates, retreats, Brown Bags).
• Support ELT with OKRs and annual planning processes, coordinating team inputs into pre-defined processes.
• Own and maintain Caribou’s internal knowledge management system (Notion), ensuring it is user-centric and intuitive, and that staff can easily access up-to-date information on core processes and policies.

Continuous Improvement

Continuously improve BD, program, and knowledge management systems by identifying opportunities for greater efficiency and effectiveness. Ideally this would include embedding digital tools and workflows.

• Improve Caribou’s opportunity-scanning systems, for instance by working with external partners to develop and refine an AI scraper that aggregates RFPs into one repository. Ensure these systems remain current, reliable, and efficient.
• Develop automation: Work with the IT Manager and external partners to implement automation (e.g. AI-based RFP scanning, Notion workflows).
• Support tool selection: Coordinate requirements gathering, demos, evaluation, and contracting for new digital tools (e.g. for data collection, AP management, expenses).
• Drive adoption: Act as an advocate for smarter, more automated ways of working, ensuring teams are trained and supported in new systems.

Candidate Profile Essential Skills & Experience

• 7+ years of experience in program management, operations, or business development support, ideally in a consulting or client-oriented environment.
• Proven ability to support complex, multi-stakeholder projects from end-to-end.
• Strong writing and synthesis skills.
• Demonstrated ability to design and improve processes in growing organisations.
• Confident communicator, comfortable working across diverse geographies and cultures.
• Highly organised, with the ability to manage multiple priorities simultaneously.
• Experience managing or improving digital knowledge management systems (e.g. Notion, Confluence, SharePoint).

Desirable Skills & Experience

• Experience championing digital-first processes
• Experience in business development pipelines and proposal coordination.
• Ability to introduce and embed new digital tools across teams, ideally in a remote-first or globally distributed setting.

Personal Attributes

• Confident operator able to execute details with precision.
• Proactive, solutions-oriented, and able to anticipate needs.
• Collaborative and empathetic, skilled at bringing people together.
• Commitment to Caribou’s mission of building inclusive and sustainable digital economies.

About the Organization

About Caribou

Caribou is an impact consulting company on a mission to create more inclusive economies and societies in an increasingly digital world. We support clients to use their funds and resources more effectively to maximize their social and environmental impact. Our partners are leading corporations, government agencies, international financial institutions, and private foundations worldwide. We provide end-to-end fund management, advisory services, research, measurement, and impact services to enable organizations to tackle some of the world’s most complex challenges.

Caribou has existed for a decade and is in the midst of a period of rapid change and growth, which necessitates greater structure and efficiency in its central functions. This Management Accountant role will report into the Finance Manager and be a full-time position.

What it’s like working with us

We have always been a remote-first company. We have no physical office and use digital tools for collaboration. We have over 50 staff in 20 countries across 5 continents. We trust and empower everyone to work in a way that achieves successful outcomes, while providing flexibility to manage all aspects of their life. We hire people because they are the best at what they do, so we’re pretty sure that our team is some of the smartest and most interesting people you’ll meet. Join us!