Senior/Deputy Director, Office of Strategy Management

About Us

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.

Job Description

• Strategic Planning and Implementation

• Facilitating the University's strategic planning framework, encompassing both short and long-term planning cycles undertaken by departments, and ensuring alignment between departmental plans and the University's overarching strategic objectives and priorities.

• Overseeing the team in supporting senior leadership meetings and executive retreats focused on strategy formulation. This includes agenda planning, stakeholder engagement, preparation of materials, documentation of key discussions, and synthesis of insights to inform long-range goals and strategic frameworks. Also responsible for coordinating the effective communication of strategic outcomes across the University.
• Overseeing the operationalisation of systems to monitor and evaluate strategic performance, ensuring the efficient tracking and assessment of the University's Strategic Plan and initiatives. This includes regular updates, performance reviews, and analysis to measure alignment with institutional goals and to inform the refinement of future strategies.
• Leading the strategic planning business partner team, including advising initiative owners on potential challenges, tracking progress, offering actionable recommendations, and facilitating access to required resources to drive successful implementation of strategic initiatives.

• Co-leading strategic reporting, including the compilation and presentation of reports on strategic initiatives, plan reviews, and other critical areas to support institutional decision-making and long-term planning.

• Corporate Planning and Performance Management

• Overseeing the University's performance management frameworks, including the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) and the Dean's Discretionary Fund-BSC (DDF-BSC) performance-based incentive framework, to drive continuous improvement and strategic alignment.

• Leading performance review facilitation for BSC and DDF-BSC, between University management and select business units. This includes engaging with Schools and relevant Offices to analyse performance drivers, identifying key achievements and improvement areas, following up post-review to confirm or revise targets, ensure alignment of work plans and annual budgets with desired outcomes.
• Managing performance reporting and analysis for BSC and DDF-BSC, including the compilation, analysis, and reporting of performance metrics, to support data-driven decision-making and institutional planning. This also include overseeing the development and maintenance of the Executive Management Dashboard.

• Co-leading the annual planning process to ensure alignment of workplans with prevailing strategic plan, supporting departments in conceptualising and implementing business-level strategies that align with the University's strategic goals. This includes advising departments on aligning annual budgets and work plans with institutional performance objectives and long-term aspirations.

• Overseeing the provision of strategic inputs and information for key reports, including MOE Quality Assurance Framework for Universities (QAFU) external validation exercise.

• Strengthening departmental planning capabilities by identifying and organising relevant resources, streamlining planning processes, and providing advisory support to OSM colleagues involved in planning activities.
• Leading or contributing to cross-university taskforces and working groups to support institutional priorities and collaborative initiatives, as assigned.
• Undertaking other related duties as assigned.

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in any field; postgraduate degree would be an advantage.
• At least 12 to 15 years of work experience within at least 10 years in strategic planning, preferably in higher education and/or consulting.
• Experienced in strategic/corporate planning and review, secretariat functions for strategic/ corporate planning processes and organisation/leading of strategic/corporate planning events.
• Experience in managing a team and leading projects.
• 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.

Other Information

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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.