Key Responsibilities and Required Skills for Wireless Program Director

🎯 Role Definition

The Wireless Program Director is a senior leader responsible for planning, executing, and delivering large-scale wireless network programs (including 5G, LTE, small cells, DAS, and transport), managing cross-functional teams and vendors, controlling program financials and risks, and ensuring quality, safety, and regulatory compliance. This role combines deep technical knowledge of wireless networks and RF with world-class program and stakeholder management to deliver network rollout and modernization initiatives on time and within budget.

Keywords: Wireless Program Director, 5G deployment, network rollout, RF planning, program management, vendor management, wireless program governance, OSS/BSS integration.

📈 Career Progression

Typical Career Path

Entry Point From:

Senior Program Manager — Wireless/Network Rollout
RF Engineering Manager or RF Program Manager
Director/Manager of Network Deployment or Construction

Advancement To:

Senior Director / Head of Network Programs
VP of Network Deployment or VP of Network Operations
Chief Technology Officer (CTO) for network strategy (in smaller operators)

Lateral Moves:

Director of Vendor Management and Strategic Sourcing
Director of Product/Service Delivery (wireless services)
Director, Network Planning & Architecture

Core Responsibilities

Primary Functions

Lead end-to-end delivery of large-scale wireless network programs (macro sites, small cells, DAS, fiber/transport, and virtualization) including program initiation, planning, execution, monitoring, and closeout to meet scope, schedule, budget, quality, and safety objectives.
Develop and maintain comprehensive program plans, integrated master schedules (IMS), and milestone tracking for multi-region or nationwide 5G/LTE rollouts; coordinate dependencies across RF, transport, core, OSS/BSS, and IT teams.
Create and manage multi-million-dollar program budgets, perform cost forecasting, variance analysis, implement cost controls, and produce monthly financial reporting and executive dashboards to inform senior leadership decisions.
Own vendor and contractor selection, negotiation, and management for design, construction, integration, and managed services; develop SOWs, SLAs, KPIs and manage vendor performance, payment milestones, and change orders.
Define program governance, RACI matrices, and escalation paths; chair program steering committees, lead cross-functional governance reviews, and facilitate executive decision-making to remove roadblocks and accelerate delivery.
Oversee RF planning and optimization activities with internal RF teams and external vendors: site acquisition coordination, propagation modeling, interference analysis, capacity planning, and acceptance criteria for performance testing.
Drive site acquisition and municipal permitting strategies including negotiation with landlords and tower companies, local authority permit coordination, municipal variance management, and ensuring on-time site readiness.
Manage construction and deployment activities on-site (build, install, power, grounding, fiber splicing, backhaul provisioning), ensuring compliance with technical designs, safety plans, and construction quality standards.
Lead integration and acceptance testing (I&T), coordinated lab and field test plans, drive test and KPI validation, defect management, and final network acceptance to ensure SLA compliance and production readiness.
Direct transport and backhaul planning and implementation (fiber, microwave, millimeter wave), coordinating with transport vendors and internal transport architects to ensure capacity and latency requirements are met.
Drive OSS/BSS and systems integration activities, including orchestration, inventory reconciliation, provisioning flows, and addressing cross-domain impacts during cutovers and service launches.
Establish and track program KPIs (schedule adherence, cost-to-complete, sites completed, mean time to repair, availability, post-deployment issues) and implement continuous improvement initiatives to optimize delivery velocity and quality.
Own risk and issue management for the program: identify risks, maintain risk registers, implement mitigation plans, run scenario analyses, and report impact and recovery options to stakeholders.
Lead large, geographically distributed teams (project managers, PMOs, RF engineers, construction managers, site acquisition specialists, test teams) and cultivate high-performance execution through coaching, clear objectives, and performance management.
Develop and present regular executive-level program updates, board-ready summaries, and stakeholder briefings that highlight status, critical path, financials, risks and mitigation strategies.
Manage change control processes for scope, schedule and budget changes; evaluate business impacts of change requests and secure necessary approvals while minimizing disruption to the critical path.
Ensure regulatory compliance across jurisdictions (FCC filings, RF emission regulations, local zoning and permitting, environmental and safety requirements) and coordinate with legal and regulatory teams on license and spectrum matters.
Drive health, safety and environmental (HSE) program compliance on all field activities; approve site-specific safety plans, ensure contractor adherence to safety standards, and lead incident investigation and remediation when necessary.
Build and manage the program-level resource plan and workforce forecasting including subcontractor utilization, field crews, and third-party integrators; run resource leveling and capacity planning to meet deployment targets.
Lead commercial negotiations for contracts, master services agreements, performance incentives and penalty clauses; partner with procurement and finance to ensure favorable commercial terms and program-level protections.
Coordinate site decommissioning and swap-out activities for network modernization programs (legacy equipment removal, asset tracking, environmental disposal) ensuring minimal customer impact and proper asset reconciliation.
Drive cross-functional readiness for service launches (operations handover, trouble ticketing, maintenance plans, run-books), and support transition to Network Operations Center (NOC) and field operations teams for long-term operations and support.
Champion data-driven decision-making by establishing program reporting, KPIs, dashboards and analytics for site productivity, vendor performance, and cost drivers to support continuous improvement.
Lead post-deployment optimization and remediation programs, managing continuous drive-test & KPI remediation programs, coordinating software updates, and refining configurations to reach desired performance outcomes.
Support RFP and RFQ processes by defining technical and commercial requirements, evaluating vendor proposals, scoring responses, and making award recommendations aligned to program objectives.
Ensure cybersecurity and physical security considerations are integrated into designs and vendor contracts, coordinating with network security teams to protect infrastructure and customer data during rollouts.
Maintain detailed documentation and program artifacts (designs, as-built records, site inventories, contract appendices) to ensure long-term maintainability and audit readiness.
Drive innovation initiatives and evaluation of new technologies (Open RAN, vRAN, network slicing, edge compute) to support strategic modernization while controlling program risk and vendor proliferation.
Facilitate cross-functional alignment with product, sales, marketing, and customer care teams to ensure network capabilities support commercial launches, SLAs, and customer experience commitments.

Secondary Functions

Support ad-hoc data requests and exploratory data analysis.
Contribute to the organization's data strategy and roadmap.
Collaborate with business units to translate data needs into engineering requirements.
Participate in sprint planning and agile ceremonies within the data engineering team.
Mentor and develop program managers and project leads to build program delivery capability and succession planning.
Participate in industry forums, vendor briefings, and standards bodies to stay current on wireless technology and regulatory developments.
Support corporate sustainability and asset lifecycle initiatives (re-use, recycling, energy efficiency) for network infrastructure.
Assist in development of business cases and ROI analyses for new deployments, upgrades and technology trials.

Required Skills & Competencies

Hard Skills (Technical)

Program and portfolio management at scale — proven experience delivering multi-region wireless network programs (macro, small cell, DAS, backhaul).
Deep wireless technology knowledge: 5G (including NSA/SA), LTE, UMTS, GSM fundamentals and network architecture (RAN, Core, Transport).
RF planning and optimization expertise: propagation modeling, link budget analysis, drive tests, and KPI remediation methodologies.
Vendor and contractor management including SOW creation, SLA/KPI design, performance management and dispute resolution.
Strong financial acumen: budget creation, forecasting, cost control, capital and operating expense management, and financial reporting.
Transport and backhaul understanding: fiber engineering, microwave planning, capacity planning and latency optimization.
OSS/BSS, orchestration and systems integration: experience coordinating integration, inventory reconciliation, and provisioning workflows.
Program tools and methodologies: MS Project, Primavera, JIRA, Confluence, Smartsheet, or similar program planning and tracking tools.
Contracting and procurement experience, including RFP creation, vendor selection, negotiation and master services agreements.
Risk management, change control processes and governance frameworks for large technical programs.
Regulatory and compliance knowledge: FCC rules, local zoning/permit processes, environmental and safety regulation.
Technical documentation and configuration management: design documents, as-built records, site inventories and asset databases.
Familiarity with virtualization and cloud-native network concepts: vRAN, Open RAN, NFV, edge compute and containerization (desirable).
Data analytics and dashboarding: Excel (advanced), Power BI/Tableau, SQL basics for reporting and performance analysis.

Soft Skills

Strategic leadership with the ability to translate business objectives into pragmatic program plans and measurable outcomes.
Exceptional stakeholder management and executive communication — able to influence at C-suite and municipal leadership levels.
Strong negotiation and conflict resolution skills for contracts, vendor disputes, and cross-functional trade-offs.
Problem solving and decisive decision-making under uncertainty and schedule pressure.
Excellent written and verbal communication; ability to present complex technical topics clearly to non-technical audiences.
Collaborative mindset with demonstrated ability to lead cross-functional virtual teams and remote workforces.
Coaching and talent development — building strong program management capability and motivating teams.
High attention to detail and process discipline combined with a bias for action to drive results.
Resilience and adaptability in fast-moving technology and regulatory environments.
Customer-centric focus to align network deployments with commercial objectives and service experience goals.

Education & Experience

Educational Background

Minimum Education:

Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering, Telecommunications, Computer Science, Business Administration, or related field.

Preferred Education:

Master’s degree in Engineering, Business Administration (MBA), or advanced technical degree preferred.
Professional certifications such as PMP, PgMP, Prince2, or equivalent are strongly preferred.

Relevant Fields of Study:

Electrical Engineering / Telecommunications Engineering
Computer Science / Network Engineering
Business Administration / Project Management
Civil Engineering (for site construction/permits)
Finance or Economics (for budgeting/forecasting)

Experience Requirements

Typical Experience Range:

10+ years of progressive experience in wireless network planning, deployment, or program management with at least 5 years leading large-scale wireless programs.

Preferred:

12+ years of experience including proven track record managing multi-site, multi-vendor 5G/LTE rollouts, and demonstrated experience with municipal permitting, vendor contracting, and executive stakeholder engagement.