To apply, please submit a cover letter, resume, references, and samples or links to your portfolio site.

Cover letters are important to us.  You will be required to complete a cover letter that describes why you think you are qualified for this role and how your past experience makes you an outstanding candidate.  Applications without cover letters will not be considered. 

Also, please be patient.  Our screening process takes longer than most other employers’—but we’re worth the wait.  We want to be sure that anyone we hire is a perfect fit for both the agency and employee, so our process is thorough.  

Message Agency is seeking to recruit a junior project manager (Junior PM) to work and learn with our expert staff.  We develop highly interactive websites for nonprofit organizations, public agencies, and universities using Drupal, WordPress, and open source technologies.

We are seeking an organized, tech-savvy Junior PM to assist our teams and wrangle client projects.  Our project managers shepherd projects from discovery through production, collaborating with clients and internal teams to ensure project success.  This Junior PM would assist our current project managers in supporting their agile teams of developers and in running ceremonies such as sprint planning and grooming sessions to keep project work organized and on track. 

A Junior PM will help plan client-facing meetings and maintain client communications, while also ensuring our internal teams are well-informed about scope, budget, and timeline so we can make good decisions that benefit the project.  They will help project managers with tasks that are critical to project success, including ticket management, budget reporting, and other administrative duties.  They will help develop critical documentation that supports project goals, including writing project briefs and user stories, requirements gathering, and setting and maintaining schedules.  Finally, they have a role in quality assurance by assisting with product review and testing.  

We are looking for a sharp self-starter who understands how to manage client expectations, who can collaborate closely with our development team, and who can thrive in the fast pace of an agency environment that still respects our staff’s work/life balance.  We need someone whose attention to detail is impeccable but who also understands the importance of building meaningful relationships with staff and clients.  

Duties and Responsibilities

Liaising with clients throughout project lifecycle via regularly scheduled meetings
Helping maintain and update detailed project plans and schedules
Participating in discovery meetings and collaborating with design and development teams to resolve project challenges and ensure client satisfaction
Creating meeting agendae and writing meeting notes; translating meeting outcomes into project tasks or documentation
Helping to anticipate, analyze, and mitigate project risk
Monitoring changes to scope, communicating to internal teams and clients about scope management
Assisting with project budget reports
Assisting with requirements gathering and feature definition
Developing end-user documentation
Reviewing products and performing quality assurance testing
Assisting with grooming, sprint planning, and other agile ceremonies
Collaborating with principal and other project managers to improve practices, document process, and identify efficiencies
Other project management-based administrative duties as assigned.

Ideal Skills and Experience 

An ideal candidate would have:

A college degree, although it is not required for this role.
At least one year of experience in an agency or in an account management or project management position.
Understanding of content management systems, preferably open source CMSs.
Experience with digital project management tools such as JIRA / Confluence, BaseCamp, Trello, etc.
Experience with project scopes, budgets, and schedules.
Understanding of agile principles and experience managing agile ceremonies.
Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
Excellent interpersonal and analytical skills.
Excellent attention to detail and follow-through.
Demonstrated experience working or volunteering with nonprofits, universities, foundations, or government.
Knowledge of Google Analytics and/or SEO.

About Message Agency

Message Agency delivers digital impact for the greater good.  Founded in 2007, we are an established and growing web development company with a social mission.  We build sites in Drupal and WordPress—open source content management systems (CMS)—and work with both regional and national nonprofits, universities, foundations, and government agencies.  As a certified B Corporation that’s been awarded “Best for the World” status three times, we are a triple bottom line business that believes:

We must be the change we seek in the world.
All business ought to be conducted as if people and place mattered.
Through their products, practices, and profits, businesses should aspire to do no harm and benefit all.
To do so requires that we act with the understanding that we are each dependent upon another and thus responsible for each other and future generations.

Message Agency is committed to our staff’s professional growth, and as such encourages and offers employees professional development opportunities and invites them to join teams outside of their discipline, such as our marketing team, Happiness Committee, and other internal initiatives. We frequently hold employee-led lunch and learns, company-wide “class trips” and outings, and the occasional bowling league.

Compensation and Benefits

This is a full-time position, and salary and compensation are commensurate with experience.  The pay is competitive for this role.  We offer profit sharing, 100% paid health/dental/vision, 401(k) with employer contribution, generous paid vacation/holidays, professional development budget, commuter benefits, FSA plan, life insurance, short-term disability insurance, and a great working environment. We are located in Philadelphia, PA, and would prefer to hire talent from our region.  However, this is a remote role and open to anyone in the United States.