Project Manager in Dallas, Texas at Learfield IMG College

Learfield is the leading media and technology company powering college athletics. Through its digital and physical platforms, Learfield owns and leverages a deep data set and relationships in the industry to drive revenue, growth, brand awareness, and fan engagement for brands, sports, and entertainment properties. With ties to over 1,200 collegiate institutions and over 12,000 local and national brand partners, Learfield’s presence in college sports and live events delivers influence and maximizes reach to target audiences. With data-based solutions for a 365-day, 24/7 fan experience, Learfield enables schools and brands to connect with fans through licensed merchandise, game ticketing, donor identification for athletic programs, exclusive custom content, innovative marketing initiatives, NIL solutions, and advanced digital platforms. Since 2008, it has served as title sponsor for the acclaimed Learfield Directors’ Cup, supporting athletic departments across all divisions.

Our people-first culture is the foundation of our business and is reflective of our approach to building meaningful relationships with our employees, partners, and fans. The company strives each day to deliver the mission statement and embody the core values that make Learfield an exciting place to work.

Our Mission

Powering the connection of fans to the brands and experiences they love.

Our Core Values

Build Trust | Be Fans of One Another | Power Tomorrow | Create & Connect Communities | Have Fun

As a Project Manager on Learfield’s Data Strategy & Analytics team, you will serve as the operational backbone of a high-performing team building Fanbase — our proprietary data and analytics platform that delivers strategic fan insights across the enterprise. Fanbase aggregates data spanning ticketing, sponsorship, digital and social channels, commerce, and beyond, enabling our organization and school partners to more deeply understand fan engagement with college athletics — and to translate that understanding into stronger marketing efficiency, expanded commercial opportunities, and more meaningful fan relationships.

In this role, you will own the discipline and rigor that keeps sprint execution on track, maintain a healthy product backlog, facilitate agile ceremonies, and ensure that day-to-day delivery work remains clearly connected to broader product roadmaps and business outcomes. You will partner closely with colleagues across engineering, analytics, and product, serving as a steady force for clarity, accountability, and forward momentum. This role reports to the Vice President, Data & Analytics.

Essential Duties & Responsibilities:

Sprint Execution & Backlog Management

• Own the day-to-day health of the Data Products sprint board in Azure DevOps, ensuring tickets are current, clearly described, and accurately pointed
• Facilitate biweekly sprint planning, backlog grooming, end-of-sprint reporting, and retrospective sessions
• Maintain a well-structured, prioritized backlog in close collaboration with Product Managers, ensuring the team always has a clear and ready queue of work
• Track sprint velocity, burndown, and scope changes — surfacing issues and blockers proactively rather than at the finish line
• Partner with Product Managers and engineering to enforce consistent story pointing standards

Planning & Roadmap Coordination

• Collaborate with Product Managers to ensure initiatives and epics are translated into well-defined, actionable stories at the appropriate time
• Maintain forward visibility into upcoming work, flagging when stories are not sprint-ready or when dependencies remain unresolved
• Participate in initiative-level planning conversations alongside Product Managers and leadership, helping to document outcomes, owners, and timelines
• Prepare biweekly leadership status updates and sprint reviews that clearly connect completed work to measurable business impact

Cross-Team and 3rd Party Coordination

• Collaborate with other Project Managers to align on process standards, share best practices, and coordinate cross-team dependencies
• Support leadership in tracking the work of external engineering partners within Azure DevOps, ensuring their contributions are story pointed, sprint-tracked, and visible across the team
• Assist in facilitating vendor-related status updates in coordination with the Director of Engineering and other team leaders
• Cultivate effective working relationships across engineering, analytics, and product functions to keep work moving and communication clear

Accountability and Continuous Improvement

• Maintain a retrospective log each sprint in coordination with Product Managers, documenting what slipped, root causes, and corrective actions
• Help reinforce a team culture in which deadlines are treated as commitments and blockers are surfaced early — with proposed paths forward
• Identify opportunities to streamline processes, reduce friction, and continuously improve team effectiveness
• Stay current on evolving project management tools and methodologies, including AI-powered workflow solutions, and bring innovative ideas to the team

Minimum Qualifications:

• 1+ years of experience in a project coordination, project management, or operations role
• Strong organizational acumen with the ability to manage multiple workstreams simultaneously without losing detail
• Clear, confident communicator — written and verbal — comfortable engaging both technical and non-technical stakeholders
• Solid grounding in agile and scrum methodologies, including sprint planning, backlog grooming, story pointing, and retrospectives
• Experience with project management or work tracking platforms such as Azure DevOps, Jira, Asana, or equivalent
• Exposure to product road mapping tools such as Aha or similar platforms is a plus
• Genuine interest in AI tools and their potential to improve team efficiency and workflow
• A solution-oriented mindset — someone who asks "how do we make this happen?" and works constructively through obstacles
• High attention to detail, strong follow-through, and a collaborative working style
• Genuine curiosity about data, analytics, or technology
• Background in sports or collegiate athletics is a plus, though not required

Physical Requirements:

• Ability to sit or stand at a desk for majority of day.
• Ability to use hands and fingers to operate a computer, telephone, keyboard and mouse.
• Ability to talk, hear and communicate clearly in person and via phone/video conferencing.

Learfield offers a full spectrum of benefits for eligible employees including Medical, Dental, Vision, Health Savings Account, Life Insurance and Other Insurance Plans, Flexible Paid Time Off (minimum 10+ days annually), including Parental Leave, 20 Paid Holidays, 401(k) + Match, and Short/Long Term Disability. Leave benefits are consistent with state and local laws, including the Colorado Health Families and Workplaces Act.

Learfield is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We provide equal employment opportunities to applicants and employees without regard to race; color; sex; gender identity; sexual orientation; religious practices and observances; national origin; pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions; status as a protected veteran or spouse/family member of a protected veteran; or disability.