The Role

Tala is looking for a highly motivated Program Manager to Drive high performance of teams by building strong lines of communication across and our global offices. Tala is a world leader in providing direct loans and financial services in emerging markets. We are a global team with diverse backgrounds who are singularly focused on using technology, data, and a customer-centric approach to meet the financial needs of the 3+ billion people of the emerging global middle class.

The Program Manager will report to the Program Management Lead and will be responsible for Support the delivery of products and initiatives using Agile practices. Successful candidates will have a deep expertise in Agile methodologies and have a background managing technical programs.

What You’ll Do:

• Work to improve the performance and sprint predictability of squads based on sprint velocity and cycle time, and use those agile metrics to sanity check roadmap commitments, as needed. 
• Participate in bi-quarterly roadmapping for the Wallet and new product teams as well as continuous reporting and unblocking. 
• Ensure collisions and/or dependencies are identified and planned for across all assigned projects and work with program leads of cross-squad initiatives to ensure roadmap alignment.
• Support the delivery of products and initiatives using Agile practices and by serving as ScrumMaster for assigned teams. 
• Participate in quarterly OKR planning and monthly scoring for the team he/she supports as well as continuous reporting and unblocking. 
• Organize roadmaps, timelines and review meetings for broad consumption
• Support a culture of continuous learning through the establishment of consistent retros, post-mortems, and team health metrics
• Provide input into resource planning and allocation in coordination with the PMO lead. 
• Develop a strong understanding of context (across markets) of our internal tools to optimize for efficiency, productivity, and team morale.
• Be the team champion to ensure team alignment, advocate product and be the subject matter expert for our internal tools.

What You’ll Need:

• 3-5 years of Program Management experience with proven expertise in Agile methodologies, concepts, practices, and standards
• 2+ years experience leveraging software development and team collaboration tools such as JIRA, Confluence, Smartsheet, etc
• Experience managing technical programs and projects for distributed teams across multiple locations and countries
• Flexibility to respond to changing requirements and juggle multiple responsibilities
• Must be comfortable working both as part of a team and independently - includes ability to set priorities which accurately reflect the relative importance of job responsibilities and follow through on assignments with minimal direction
• Proven ability to coach and mentor others who are learning project management and Agile practices in a replicable, scalable way
• Checked ego, humble, empathetic, collaborative, service-oriented attitude of “customer first”.

• Global travel may be required

We strongly believe that inclusion fosters innovation and we’re proud to have a diverse team with a wide variety of backgrounds and experiences. We focus on hiring talented people regardless of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, veteran status, or disability status.

About Tala:

Tala is the leading mobile technology and data science company committed to financial inclusion globally. Millions of people have borrowed through Tala's smartphone app, which provides instant, personalized credit to underserved customers in East Africa, Southeast Asia, and Latin America. Tala is backed by leading venture and impact investors including PayPal, Revolution Growth, IVP, and Lowercase Capital. Tala is headquartered in Santa Monica with additional offices in Nairobi, Manila, Dar Es Salaam, Mexico City, and Bangalore.