Overview Join the Digital Payments team as a Summer Associate, Program Manager/Experience Owner, and gain hands-on experience supporting meaningful initiatives across payment and money movement products. You will work alongside experienced team members to help solve business problems, improve processes and experiences, and support the delivery of solutions that help members move and manage their money.
This opportunity provides exposure to how ideas progress from initial discovery and analysis through planning, solution development, testing, implementation, and ongoing improvement within a complex financial services and technology environment.
About the TeamThe Digital Payments team supports the execution and advancement of strategic initiatives across a diverse portfolio of payment and money movement solutions.
Our work may involve platforms and services such as: ACH Payments, Debit and prepaid cards, Wire Transfers, Real-time payments and FedNow, Payments Hub, Zelle, Global Transfers, Treasury Management Services, Cashier's Checks, and other payment modernization initiatives. The team partners across business, technology, operations, fraud, compliance, risk, product management, experience management, vendor management, and support organizations. Together, these groups help define business needs, coordinate delivery, manage risks and dependencies, improve the member experience, and support successful implementation of payment capabilities
Why Spend your Summer with Digital PaymentsPayments are central to the member experience, giving our members secure, convenient access to move and manage their money when and where they need it. Our Digital Payments team connects people, businesses, financial institutions, technology platforms, and operational processes to delivery highly personalized, scalable, and secure money-movement experiences.
As a Digital Payments Summer Associate, you collaborate with team members to address and support critical payment services and modernization efforts. You will gain exposure to both strategic planning and detailed execution while learning how complex ideas are transformed into practical solutions that improve the member experience.
The Summer Associate Program is a 12-week internship program beginning in May 2027 and ending in August 2027. Students will work on impactful projects and meaningful work during their internship. To qualify for this position, applicants must be currently pursuing a degree from an accredited college or university and have an anticipated graduation date of December 2027 or later.
Responsibilities Potential ProjectsOur goal is for the Summer Associate to take ownership of meaningful work, solve a real problem, and complete the internship with a tangible result. Depending on business priorities, you may lead or support a defined initiative within the Digital Payments portfolio. The project will provide an opportunity to apply program management and experience-analysis skills while working with an experienced Program Manager, Experience Owner, Product Owner, System Analyst, or other subject matter experts.
A summer project could include:
- Mapping a Current and Future-State Process: Document how a payment process works today, identify pain points, risks, manual activities, and dependencies, and help develop a future-state process that supports a more efficient experience.
- Building a Product or Program Dashboard: Develop a dashboard or reporting approach that helps the team understand product performance, delivery progress, risks, operational trends, or other relevant program information.
- Supporting a Payment Modernization Initiative: Assist with requirements, planning, stakeholder coordination, risk management, testing readiness, implementation preparation, or another defined component of a payment modernization effort.
- Exploring an Emerging Technology Opportunity: Research how artificial intelligence, automation, real-time processing, or another emerging technology could improve a payment process, employee workflow, or member experience.
- Solving an Operational or Business Problem: Evaluate a process that is manual, complicated, time-consuming, or difficult to track. Develop practical recommendations that improve efficiency, transparency, controls, or stakeholder alignment.
- Designing or Enhancing a Payment Capability: Start with a member, employee, operational, or business need and help translate that need into requirements, experience considerations, process flows, and a potential solution.
ResponsibilitiesAs a Digital Payments Summer Associate, you will become an active member of the team. Your experience may include:
- Supporting the planning, coordination, and execution of a Digital Payments initiative or defined workstream
- Working with business, technology, operations, product, experience, risk, compliance, and vendor partners to understand needs and challenges
- Helping gather, analyze, and document business and functional requirement
- Analyzing business processes and identifying opportunities to make them simpler, faster, and more effective
- Mapping current-state and future-state processes, systems, or member experiences
- Assisting with the tracking of milestones, deliverables, risks, issues, dependencies, decisions, and action items
- Participating in Agile ceremonies, planning sessions, working sessions, brainstorming, and solution-design discussions
- Using data, research, and stakeholder feedback to develop insights and recommendations
- Supporting testing, implementation planning, operational readiness, and change activities
- Developing dashboards, presentations, process maps, status updates, and other materials used to communicate progress and recommendations
- Researching payment technologies, industry developments, emerging capabilities, or opportunities for process improvement
- Presenting findings and recommendations clearly to team members, stakeholders, and leaders
- Learning how a large organization manages payment programs, technology delivery, operations, risk, and organizational change
- Perform other related duties assigned
Qualifications- Are currently pursuing an undergraduate degree
- Enjoy understanding how products, systems, and processes work
- Are interested in how money moves through financial institutions
- Like solving problems and working through complex information
- Are naturally curious and comfortable asking thoughtful questions
- Can organize work, manage multiple priorities, and meet deadlines
- Communicate ideas clearly in writing and conversation
- Enjoy collaborating with people who bring different skills and perspectives
- Are comfortable learning new technologies and tools
- Can analyze information and develop practical recommendations
- Take ownership of your work and bring forward new ideas
- Want meaningful professional experience and the opportunity to contribute to real business outcomes
What You'll GainExperience in the following areas:
- Program and Project Management
- Business and Functional analysis
- Digital Payments and Financial Technology
- Product and Experience Management
- Process Mapping and Improvement
- Agile Delivery
- Data Analysis and Dashboard Development
- Requirements Gathering and Documentation
- Testing and Implementation Readiness
- Testing and Implementation Readiness
- Risk, Issue, and Dependency Management
- Stakeholder Engagement
- Research and Recommendation Development
- Cross Functional Collaboration
Additional InformationHours:- Monday - Friday, 8:00AM - 4:30 PM CT
Locations:- 820 Follin Lane, Vienna, VA 22180
- 5550 Heritage Oaks Dr Pensacola, FL 32526
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Equal Employment Opportunity: All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, race, sex, color, religion, national origin, disability, veteran status, pregnancy, sexual orientation, genetic information, gender identity or any other basis protected by applicable law.
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Disclaimers: Navy Federal reserves the right to fill this role at a higher/lower grade level based on business need. An assessment may be required to compete for this position. Job postings are subject to close early or extend out longer than the anticipated closing date at the hiring team's discretion based on qualified applicant volume. Navy Federal Credit Union assesses market data to establish salary ranges that enable us to remain competitive. You are paid within the salary range, based on your experience, location and market position. For additional details regarding compensation and benefits, review the Benefits page of the Navy Federal Career Site.
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