Our Purpose
Mastercard powers economies and empowers people in 200+ countries and territories worldwide. Together with our customers, weāre helping build aĀ sustainableĀ economy where everyone can prosper. We support a wide range of digital payments choices, making transactionsĀ secure, simple, smart and accessible. Our technology and innovation, partnerships and networks combine to deliver a unique set of products and services that help people, businesses and governments realize their greatest potential.
Title and Summary
Director, Product Management - Strategic Initiatives & Innovation
Who is Mastercard?
Mastercard is a global technology company in the payments industry. Our mission is to connect and power an inclusive, digital economy that benefits everyone, everywhere by making transactions safe, simple, smart, and accessible. Using secure data and networks, partnerships and passion, our innovations and solutions help individuals, financial institutions, governments, and businesses realize their greatest potential.
Our decency quotient, or DQ, drives our culture and everything we do inside and outside of our company. With connections across more than 210 countries and territories, we are building a sustainable world that unlocks priceless possibilities for all.
Overview
The Global Portfolio Optimization (GPO) team is seeking a Director, Product Management ā Strategic Initiatives & Innovation to drive portfolio performance and accelerate opportunity conversion at scale. This role will leverage advanced analytics, best practices, and strong program leadership to prioritize high impact initiatives and translate strategy into measurable business outcomes.
This role is central to championing strategic opportunities and solving complex challenges that require a coordinated, global response. With broad visibility across the organization and regular exposure to senior leadership, the role shapes global action plans, influences decision making, and drives execution across regions, functions, and product areas. The ideal candidate is a strategic thinker, structured problem solver, and disciplined program leader who thrives in fast paced, complex environments.
Role
In this role, you will:
ā¢ Identify, prioritize, and drive high impact strategic initiatives that improve portfolio performance and accelerate opportunity conversion.
ā¢ Partner with senior stakeholders to translate strategic priorities into actionable, executable roadmaps.
ā¢ Identify and coordinate key stakeholders across geographies and functions to ensure strong alignment and effective execution.
ā¢ Act as a connective leader across Product, Sales, Analytics, Finance, Marketing, and Regional teams.
ā¢ Size opportunities and quantify business impact using advanced analytics and data driven insights.
ā¢ Develop clear value cases, recommendations, and action plans to support leadership decision making.
ā¢ Drive end to end project management and delivery of prioritized initiatives, ensuring accountability, pace, and quality of execution.
ā¢ Lead complex, multi workstream programs with clear governance and escalation mechanisms.
ā¢ Define, implement, and monitor KPIs to track initiative progress, portfolio performance, and realized impact.
ā¢ Prepare executive level updates, business reviews, and performance readouts.
ā¢ Coordinate within the GPO team to ensure focus, alignment, and acceleration of strategic priorities.
ā¢ Support, lead, or champion workstreams sponsored by key stakeholders as needed.
All About You
ā¢ Proven experience in Payments, Banking, Financial Services, or adjacent industries.
ā¢ Strong strategic leadership skills with a high sense of ownership and accountability.
ā¢ Background in consulting, strategy development, product strategy, or strategic program management.
ā¢ Demonstrated ability to develop executive ready presentations, business cases, and leadership materials.
ā¢ Superior analytical skills, including comfort working with complex data sets and translating insights into action.
ā¢ Advanced stakeholder management skills with a collaborative, partnership oriented approach.
ā¢ Strong prioritization capabilities with the ability to adapt quickly as business needs evolve.
The ideal candidate for this position should have:
ā¢ Experience defining and managing KPIs and performance frameworks, is a plus
ā¢ High level of resilience, ambition, and passion for scaling impact through team and portfolio execution.
ā¢ Ability to hit the ground running, adapt quickly and take an action-oriented, roll-up-your-sleeves approach to execution that focuses on measurable results
ā¢ Advanced proficiency in PowerPoint (Think Cell preferred) and Excel.
ā¢ Comfort operating in global, matrixed organizations with multiple competing priorities.
Corporate Security Responsibility
All activities involving access to Mastercard assets, information, and networks comes with an inherent risk to the organization and, therefore, it is expected that every person working for, or on behalf of, Mastercard is responsible for information security and must:
Abide by Mastercardās security policies and practices;
Ensure the confidentiality and integrity of the information being accessed;
Report any suspected information security violation or breach, and
Complete all periodic mandatory security trainings in accordance with Mastercardās guidelines.