New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA)
Joey Wu, MBA '06
Issue date: 9/14/05 Section: Careers
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At the beginning of June, I had to choose between doing project management for the City of New York at the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) or working with army generals and social sector organizations at the Leader to Leader Institute, formerly the Peter F. Drucker Foundation for Nonprofit Management. Preoccupied during the spring semester, I found myself without an internship by the start of the summer. Bit of a scary proposition for anyone. However, after some of much overdue diligence, I managed to receive two interesting offers. I found the NYCHA opportunity through the CMC's correspondence opportunities and the Leader to Leader Institute opportunity through an independent job search. Basically, I e-mailed half of the people on their contact lists saying I have heard great things about their organization on the Leadership Trek and was wondering if they need a summer intern. In the end, I chose to intern at the NYCHA because I felt the project and change management work there would better match my professional interests.
At NYCHA's office of the CIO/PMO, we were entrusted with overseeing billions of dollars of technology infrastructure investments: everything from acquiring printers for the Housing Authority to installing elevator sensors that notify maintenance of a malfunction. With funding from the Department of Housing and Urban Development being halved and the City of New York also cutting back, the strategic imperative for the next five years would be to centralize, cut costs, and squeeze as much benefit (pubic and financial) as possible from every investment.
At NYCHA, I drafted and reviewed project management documents that the project management managers were required to submit to the PMO or the Board of Directors. This included project concepts to initiate a project, business cases to obtain approvals and funds, bid solicitations to engage consultants and vendors, and change management/training plans to prepare the organization for the impact of these projects.
At NYCHA's office of the CIO/PMO, we were entrusted with overseeing billions of dollars of technology infrastructure investments: everything from acquiring printers for the Housing Authority to installing elevator sensors that notify maintenance of a malfunction. With funding from the Department of Housing and Urban Development being halved and the City of New York also cutting back, the strategic imperative for the next five years would be to centralize, cut costs, and squeeze as much benefit (pubic and financial) as possible from every investment.
At NYCHA, I drafted and reviewed project management documents that the project management managers were required to submit to the PMO or the Board of Directors. This included project concepts to initiate a project, business cases to obtain approvals and funds, bid solicitations to engage consultants and vendors, and change management/training plans to prepare the organization for the impact of these projects.