Project Manager · PMP · Chicago

On time. Within budget. No surprises.

I'm Daniel Okafor. For nine years I've run technology and infrastructure programs for companies that can't afford a missed date: payments platforms, office build-outs, and the PMO that keeps them honest.

PMPPMI-ACPHybrid deliveryEarned valueJira · MS Project
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$48MTotal program value delivered
27Projects closed, 2017–2026
94%Delivered on or ahead of schedule
−4.2%Average variance against budget

About

The person who owns the plan

Good project management is mostly unglamorous: a clear scope, an honest schedule, a risk list someone actually maintains, and a weekly status that tells leadership the truth early enough to act on it. That's the job, and I like it.

Technology programs

Platform migrations, integrations, and cutovers where downtime has a dollar figure attached. Comfortable between engineers and executives.

Infrastructure & facilities

Multi-site build-outs and relocations with contractors, landlords, IT, and security all on one critical path.

PMO & governance

Stage gates, portfolio reporting, and estimation practices that make the next twenty projects easier than the last.

Selected projects

Three programs, start to finish

Scope, budget, timeline, and what actually happened. Figures are rounded; the lessons are exact.

01 · Technology

Payments platform migration

Harbor Point Technologies · 14 months · $6.5M · 38 people

Moved a payments platform processing 1.8M transactions a day from a legacy data center to a cloud provider, with a hard regulatory deadline and a requirement of zero customer-facing downtime.

Ran it as a hybrid: fixed milestones for the regulator, two-week sprints inside. Built the cutover runbook with engineering six months early and rehearsed it four times. The real cutover took 41 minutes against a 4-hour window.

Outcome
0 min customer downtime
Budget
−3% under plan
Schedule
On time for regulator
Risks closed
63 of 63 logged
MILESTONES · 14 MONTHS Charter Architecture Parallel run 4 rehearsals Cutover CUTOVER WINDOW VS ACTUAL 41 min actual 4 h window OPEN RISKS AT CUTOVER: 0
Illustrative schedule view. Rehearsals were the difference.

02 · Infrastructure

Regional office build-out program

Harbor Point Technologies · 11 sites · 20 months · $18M

Delivered eleven new offices across the Midwest, each with its own landlord, general contractor, network install, and move date, on a single program plan with shared vendors and one weekly steering review.

Standardized the site playbook after the second office so every later site started with a proven checklist and a known cost baseline. Negotiated a volume agreement with the furniture and AV vendors that funded the contingency.

Outcome
11 / 11 sites opened
Schedule
3 wks ahead overall
Budget
−6% under plan
Change orders
14 all approved pre-work
SITE OPENINGS · PLAN VS ACTUAL (WEEKS) Site 1 Site 2 Site 3 Site 4 Site 5 Sites 6–11 Planned durationActual, after playbookActual, first site EACH SITE FASTER THAN THE LAST
The playbook paid for itself by site three.

03 · PMO

Standing up the project management office

Harbor Point Technologies · 9 months · 6 project managers · 40+ active projects

Projects were approved in hallway conversations and reported in six different formats. I designed a stage-gate process, a single portfolio dashboard, and a lightweight estimation practice, then coached six PMs through adopting it.

The rule that mattered most: no project enters delivery without a one-page charter signed by the sponsor and the person who will maintain the result.

Cycle time
−31% idea to delivery
Cancelled late
0 after gates (was 4/yr)
Reporting
1 dashboard, weekly
Estimation
±12% accuracy (was ±40%)
STAGE GATES Idea1 page Chartersponsor signs Plan±12% estimate Deliverweekly status ESTIMATE ACCURACY Before±40% After±12% LATE CANCELLATIONS AFTER GATES: 0
Governance that people actually followed, because it was short.

Methods

How I run a project

Right-sized method

Agile where requirements will change, predictive where the date is fixed by a regulator or a lease, hybrid in between. The method serves the project, not the reverse.

Risks before status

Every weekly review opens with the top five risks and what changed. A status report without risks is a press release.

Rehearse the hard part

Cutovers, moves, go-lives: if it happens once and it has to go right, we practise it until it's boring.

Experience

Nine years, twenty-seven projects

2021 — Present

Senior Project Manager

Harbor Point Technologies · Chicago, IL
  • Lead the company's largest technology and facilities programs; current portfolio $21M across six workstreams.
  • Designed and run the PMO: stage gates, portfolio dashboard, estimation standards, coaching six PMs.
  • Delivered the payments platform migration with zero customer downtime.
2018 — 2021

Project Manager

Northfield Construction Group · Chicago, IL
  • Managed commercial interior projects from $400K to $4M for corporate tenants, including nine office relocations.
  • Introduced weekly earned-value reporting that caught two projects drifting over budget early enough to recover.
2017 — 2018

Project Coordinator

Northfield Construction Group · Chicago, IL
  • Owned schedules, submittals, and change-order logs for a 14-person project team.
PMP — Project Management ProfessionalProject Management Institute · 2020
PMI-ACP — Agile Certified PractitionerProject Management Institute · 2022
B.S., Civil EngineeringUniversity of Illinois Chicago · 2017

Skills & tools

Toolkit

Delivery

  • Hybrid, Agile & predictive
  • Scope & change control
  • Critical path scheduling
  • Earned value management
  • Cutover & go-live planning

Governance

  • Stage-gate design
  • Portfolio reporting
  • Risk & issue management
  • Vendor & contract management
  • Steering committee facilitation

Tools

  • Jira & Confluence
  • Microsoft Project
  • Smartsheet
  • Procore
  • Power BI

People

  • Teams of 10–42
  • Coaching project managers
  • Executive communication
  • Cross-functional alignment
  • Contractor coordination

Contact

Have a project with a hard date?

I'm open to senior project and program management roles, and to short engagements for cutovers, relocations, and PMO setup. Tell me the date you can't miss.

LOCChicago, Illinois · on-site, hybrid, or remote
INlinkedin.com/in/danielokafor-pmp
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