Who We Are
American Farmland Trust (AFT) is the only national organization that takes a holistic approach to agriculture, focusing on the land itself, the agricultural practices used on that land, and the farmers and ranchers who do the work. Since our founding in 1980, AFT has helped permanently protect over 6.5 million acres of agricultural lands, advanced environmentally-sound farming practices on millions of additional acres and helped thousands of farm families make a go of it (primarily through programs that increase farm viability and/or enhance farmland access). Long a pioneering leader, AFT is now riding a new wave of growth, driven by agriculture’s most pressing needs and opportunities.
We believe diversity drives innovation. We are inclusive. We embrace differences. We recognize and respect the fundamental value and dignity of all our employees. We celebrate the unique traditions, heritages, and experiences our employees bring to the workplace. We are committed to creating and sustaining an inclusive culture that promotes and values diversity, and where everyone feels empowered to bring their authentic selves to work every day. Please see AFT’s statement on Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice.
Job purpose
AFT has experienced significant growth over the past five years in terms of volume of projects, number of awards and increased staff. AFT has prioritized the creation of a centralized Project Management Team (PMT) to support cross-functional staff, implement consistent project management methodologies, and ensure the successful achievement of current and future program objectives.
AFT currently has the exciting opportunity to hire a Project Manager to lead PSCP Beef Project and work across our Mid-Atlantic Regional Program. The successful candidate will have an interest in exploring the strategic alignment of project management best practices in relation to AFT’s efforts to catalyze a new conventional agriculture. Together, we will embrace regenerative systems to mitigate the climate change crisis, build healthy soils, improve operational resilience, equity, and farm viability.
Position summary
Reporting to the Project Management Director, the Project Manager leads assigned project(s) from award kickoff to close by developing project resources, monitoring progress, facilitating metrics/reporting, coordinating communications with the appropriate team members, and ensuring the successful execution of committed work on time, within scope and budget. Project Manager assignments are likely to be larger scale, multi-year projects with complex budgets ranging from $700K to $3M annually that involve numerous AFT Divisions and external partners.
In September of 2022, American Farmland Trust and its 15 partners were recipients of a $42 million (including Match commitment) Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities grant as part of the flagship USDA program to reduce emissions in the production of agricultural commodities and to create new markets for climate-smart agricultural products. Our project focuses on climate-smart beef production, with the goal of increasing the adoption of low-emissions grazing and land management practices, fine-tuning measurement, monitoring, reporting, and verification (MMRV) of these practices, and developing the market for climate-smart beef for producers. For this project, the successful candidate will have experience managing large federal awards, day-to-day project operations, and complex financials for an award of this scale. To diversify cross-functional experience, this position will also support an AFT Regional Program with a higher focus on portfolio management throughout the year.
Duties and responsibilities
Within assigned project(s), the Project Manager will:
- Attend Grant Award Kickoff meeting with Development to properly transition proposal resources, internal IDs, and funder requirements once award is secured.
- Advises Division Director(s) in scoping and evaluating impacts of new funding on existing timelines, staff workloads and other financial parameters to craft long term project strategies.
- Complete Project Charter and exercise full delegation of authority from Division Director to lead projects of high complexity.
- Develop annual work plan for project that establishes fiscal year deadlines, staff hour allocations and committed outcomes in accordance with award agreement.
- Develop annual budget for project that establishes fiscal year revenue projections, operating expenses, and associated labor costs in accordance with award agreement.
- Implement communication platform guidelines and SharePoint file structure to ensure effective team collaboration.
- Establish and maintain Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) that outlines tasks, schedules and team member assignments for identified components throughout lifecycle of award.
- Lead Project Kickoff meeting to introduce internal/external team members, present overview of committed outcomes, funder reporting requirements, and project resources.
- Lead monthly financial reviews to track YTD spenddown, identify coding discrepancies, and escalate >10% budget deviations to Finance.
- Co-Lead quarterly work plan and financial reviews to establish overall project status, deviations from budget, foreseeable delays and management actions required.
- Facilitate internal/external data collection, validation and submission with Development and Finance staff for interval funder reports – i.e., state or federal agencies, foundations, and/or individual donors.
- Support Division with collection of relevant project metrics for Executive Bullet, Board Book and/or other reporting purposes upon request.
- Support Division with contract/subaward development, invoice processing, and spenddown tracking for external entities with Coordinator as appropriate.
- Monitor and control scope creep, anticipated risks, lessons learned, and issues log to ensure timely escalation as required.
- Lead regular team meetings, with structured agendas, to evaluate progress, discuss requirements for upcoming tasks, and/or follow up on action items as appropriate.
- Lead Stakeholder and/or Advisory Committee identification efforts.
- Identify project tracking system to effectively manage internal/external timelines and responsibilities.
- Foster synergy across project component teams to further identify areas of opportunity and/or required support.
- Support Information Technology staff with Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system design, deployment, and continuous maintenance of information related to project.
- Design other comprehensive resources, as needed to aid in internal/external completion of assigned tasks on time, within scope and budget.
Within the PMT, the Project Manager will:
- Act as subject matter expert in project management field and provide related input on internal systems, tools, policies and procedures for managing AFT’s award lifecycle.
- Participate in weekly PMT meeting to discuss holistic award management approaches, upcoming deadlines, key constraints and/or shared initiatives.
- Participate in regularly scheduled meetings with Executive Leadership including AFT’s Chief of Staff, Chief Financial Officer, Vice Presidents of Programs, and others as identified to advise strategic planning across multiple levels of the organization.
- Initiate, develop, and improve project management methodologies and resources across the organization.
- Build cross-functional staff engagement and promote strategic collaboration to ensure consistent management practices of the award life cycle.
- Maintain an advanced level of proficiency with internal project and financial tracking systems, processes, and staff responsibilities.
- Support the Project Management Director with hiring and onboarding new PMT staff while fostering a high-performance culture.
- Embody a culture of AFT’s commitments to diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice through project assignments and/or engaging with internal affinity groups.
- Lead the annual Work Planning and Budgeting process with Finance.
