Program Manager, GCC Setup and Transition

Location: Pune, India

Work Mode: Full-time, on-site

Experience: 8–12 years

Joining: Immediate

NextFactor360 is hiring a Program Manager to lead the end-to-end setup and transition of a new Global Capability Centre (GCC) in Pune for a French energy multinational. The client's name will be shared with shortlisted candidates.

About the Role

The Program Manager will oversee the GCC setup from planning and governance to hiring, infrastructure readiness, process transitions and operational handover.

Working with global leadership, India teams and external partners, the role will bring multiple workstreams together under one integrated plan, manage dependencies and risks, and ensure timely execution.

This is a program leadership role focused on coordinating functional owners and partners rather than replacing them.

Key Responsibilities

• Program Governance: Establish governance structures, roles, decision rights and reporting mechanisms across global and India teams.
• Integrated Planning: Develop and maintain a master plan covering milestones, dependencies, resources, budgets and risks.
• Requirements Definition: Work with business, functional and IT stakeholders to define processes, headcount, systems and service requirements for the India GCC.
• Budget and Workforce Planning: Establish and track hiring plans, headcount ramp-up, capital expenditure (CAPEX) and operating expenditure (OPEX).
• Workstream Coordination: Align teams and partners across HR, IT, facilities, legal, procurement and other functions.
• Transition Execution: Manage global-to-India transitions, including knowledge transfer, shadowing, parallel runs, cutover and hypercare.
• Risk and Progress Tracking: Monitor milestones, costs, hiring and operational readiness. Identify delays early and drive corrective actions.
• Leadership and Governance Reviews: Lead PMO meetings and steering committees, manage escalations and drive decisions to closure.
• Operational Handover: Ensure processes, standard operating procedures (SOPs), service-level agreements (SLAs) and ownership structures are in place before the GCC moves to steady-state operations.

Required Experience and Skills

• GCC Setup: Hands-on experience setting up or scaling a GCC, captive centre or shared services operation in India.
• Transition Management: Proven experience delivering global-to-India process transitions while maintaining service continuity.
• Program Management: Strong capabilities in integrated planning, dependency management, milestone tracking, critical path analysis and risk mitigation.
• Financial and Workforce Planning: Experience managing budgets, hiring ramp-ups and actuals against approved plans.
• Stakeholder Management: Ability to coordinate senior global and India stakeholders, cross-functional teams and external partners.
• Vendor and Partner Management: Experience coordinating external partners across areas such as IT, recruitment, real estate, legal and procurement.
• Education: Graduate degree in engineering, commerce or a related field. An MBA or equivalent is preferred.

Good to Have

• Experience in energy, utilities or infrastructure.
• Exposure to French-headquartered companies or European global teams.
• Knowledge of Pune's talent market, commercial real estate and vendor ecosystem.
• Experience transitioning multiple functions, such as finance, HR, procurement, IT and engineering.
• PMP, PgMP, PRINCE2 or equivalent certification.
• Familiarity with MS Project, Smartsheet, Jira or Power BI.

What Success Looks Like

• First 90 Days: Governance established, requirements validated, integrated master plan agreed, and budget and workforce baselines approved.
• First 6 Months: Workstreams operational, hiring and site readiness progressing to plan, and initial transition waves completed without service disruption.
• First 12 Months: GCC operating at scale, service levels and costs tracked against plan, knowledge transfer completed, and operational ownership transferred.

About NextFactor360

• NextFactor360 is a Bengaluru-based consulting firm working across GCC strategy, digital and AI-led transformation, sourcing advisory and workplace enablement.