Director, Strategy & Performance Management

Welcome to the City of Charlotte

Charlotte is America’s Queen City, opening her arms to a diverse and inclusive community of residents, businesses and visitors alike. Here you will find a safe, family-oriented city where people work together to help everyone thrive. The mission of the City of Charlotte is to deliver quality public services and promote the safety, health, and quality of life for all residents.

Department: Charlotte Area Transit System Department

Salary: $122,936 – $153,669 (commensurate with experience)

Our Guiding Principles Include

• Attracting and retaining a skilled and diverse workforce
• Valuing teamwork, openness, accountability, productivity, and employee development
• Providing all customers with courteous, responsive, accessible, and seamless quality services
• Taking initiative to identify, analyze, and solve problems
• Collaborating with stakeholders to make informed decisions

Summary

The Director of Strategy and Performance Management serves as a strategic though partner leading the development and implementation of enterprise wide planning and performance management initiatives across the Charlotte Area Transit System (CATS). This role is not data-analyst focused but rather oversees performance systems and guides the team to ensure leadership can understand and act on the insights telling the story behind the numbers.

This position ensures alignment between agency goals, operational performance, and decision-making. It defines KPI’s, ensures accurate and relevant data collection processes, and helps trans-lates performance trends into actionable strategies. The manager leads the development of performance tools, reporting standards, and strategic initiatives that support organizational improvement and accountability. This role is responsible for developing, organizing, and overseeing performance measurement systems and reporting tools that support data-driven decision-making and continuous improvement throughout the agency.

Reporting directly to the Chief Administrative Officer, the Strategy & Performance Manager will collaborate with senior leaders and division heads to embed performance management practices across all levels of the organization.

Major Duties And Responsibilities

• Lead strategic planning and performance initiatives, working closely with department heads and senior leadership.
• Design and oversee KPI framework, ensuring alignment with organizational goals and compliance with regulatory compliance.
• Partner with data owners across departments to streamline and standardize data processes for effective reporting
• Interpret and validate performance data to ensure accuracy, consistency, and usefulness for decision-makers.
• Guide strategic discussions using data-driven insights, not by analyzing data directly but by advising on its use and helping leaders make informed decisions.
• Develop and maintain visual standards for performance reporting and dashboards.
• Support and train staff on using performance tools and understanding agency goals.
• Coordinate cross functional projection and deep dives into business processes to identify operational improvements.
• Provide industry bench-marking and comparative performance analysis to inform planning and target setting.
• Supervise direct reports, ensure accountability, and connect individual performance to organizational goals.

The duties and responsibilities outlined are intended to describe the general nature and level of work performed. They are not to be construed as an exhaustive list of all responsibilities, duties, and skills required. Management reserves the right to assign or reassign duties and responsibilities to this position at any time, as needed, to meet organizational objectives.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Best practices in performance management, including how to develop and evaluate Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), set performance targets, and use benchmarking to compare against peers.
• How to assess and improve organizational performance using structured methods to evaluate operational effectiveness.
• Business systems and operations, including how data flows through systems and how to evaluate operational effectiveness.
• Core concepts in quantitative and investigative analysis, including techniques like sampling, trend analysis, enough to oversee their use and guide interpretation.
• Standard office systems, software tools, and documentation practices used to support reporting, communication, and analysis.
• Basics of professional writing and reporting, sufficient to review and guide the preparation of clear, actionable documents and summaries.

Skills

• Developing performance measures and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), determining performance targets, evaluating results, and conducting benchmarking and comparative studies of progressive and innovative organizations.
• Data analytics; designing and maintaining data associated with the delivery of regular reports and visualizations, including the design, maintenance, and updates to dashboards and other forms of communication.
• Recommending and leading implementation of goals and objectives for performance management.
• Defining timelines and project plans, coordinating stakeholder participation, supervising analytical and technical staff; managing vendors, contractors and other parties.
• Partnering and collaborating with a broad range of peers and stakeholders for joint initiatives, coordinating participation and buy-in.
• Performing complex statistical and other mathematical analyses.
• Making prudent, defensible and timely decisions.
• Exercising judgment in determining materiality of evaluation/ assessment results; understanding the environment, demands, and consequences of evaluation/ assessment results and the impact of associated findings and reports.
• Communicating clearly and concisely, both orally and in writing; ability to identify stakeholder sensitivities and adapt communications as necessary.
• Ability to organize, structure and frame ideas, issues, and strategies in a clear, focused, and persuasive manner.
• Ability to organize, combine, and tabulate large amounts of data into clear reports, charts, and dashboards that are understandable to stakeholders.
• Establishing and maintaining effective working relationships with those contacted in the course of the work.
• Planning, supervising and designing research and evaluation projects.
• Writing clear and concise reports.
• Supervising, organizing and reviewing the work of lower-level staff.
• Coordinating and administering budget processes for assigned departments or divisions.
• Interpreting, explaining and enforcing division/department policies and procedures.
• Operating office equipment and supporting software, including word processing and spreadsheet applications.

Core Competencies

• Strategic Planning: Translating policy direction and public input into actionable strategies
• Organizational Performance Management & Decision Support: Ability to use data to drive continuous improvement and accountability along with synthesizing complex data into actionable insights for leadership.
• Leadership and Motivation: Provides clear direction and purpose, inspiring and mobilizing others towards common goals. Encourages excellence, drives significant contributions, and fosters business growth.
• Communication Skills: Communicates effectively across various platforms, including speaking, writing, and listening, to share information and ideas clearly and effectively.
• Independent Execution: Performs assignments independently, providing valuable support and resources to the department, customers, and the organization.
• Influence and Persuasion: Effectively persuades and influences others to gain their support and encourage action, while also actively listening to and considering their opinions and feedback.
• Innovation & Problem-Solving: Thinks creatively to resolve challenges and improve service delivery and comfortable navigating ambiguity in dynamic political environments.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration, Analytics, Economics, Finance, Planning Project Management or a related field
• Five (5) years of experience in project management, performance measurement, public administration, transit operations and/or strategic communication that includes three (3) years supervisory, management, or project management experience involving coordinating and organizing the work of others.

Benefits

The City of Charlotte provides a comprehensive benefits package to eligible employees.

The City of Charlotte is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not unlawfully discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, sex, national origin, marital status, age, disability, sexual orientation, political affiliation or on the basis of actual or perceived gender as expressed through dress, appearance, or behavior.

Our culture is to serve the community honorably.

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