Technical Leadership Director

This is a challenging and exciting opportunity to join HS2 Ltd as a Technical Leadership Director, responsible for providing technical leadership and consistency across civil engineering discipline.

• Ensure that the duties of the Principal Designer Representative as mandated within the CDM Regulations 2015 are being discharged appropriately within the Civils Delivery.
• Coordinate the Principal Designer Representatives across the Civils Delivery.
• Be the Prime Systems Integrator Lead across Civils Delivery Teams.
• Support and advise the Chief Engineer on technical matters in relation to strategic change, the resolution of technical issues escalated from Delivery Teams, technical representation at appropriate governance forums, and technical support and input into engagement with political and strategic stakeholders.
• Accountable for technical leadership across the Civils Engineering discipline to promote and drive the use of best practice and innovative engineering techniques, technologies, and processes, joint value for money initiatives, and knowledge sharing.
• Promote and apply consistent approaches towards technical assurance, system safety, configuration management, and supervision across the Civils Delivery Teams through compilation and review of evidence and supporting the presentation before appropriate internal HS2 panels.
• Have overall accountability for providing professional and functional leadership to Heads of Engineering and Environment, embedded within the Civils Delivery Teams, and the Heads of Discipline Engineering, in accordance with policies and standards set up by the appropriate HS2 functions.
• Lead a team of Civil Engineering Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) to ensure an integrated, consistent approach to delivering the range of activities associated with the advisory and client role of the Technical Authority invested in the Railway Directorate.
• Assure that the design and construction work completed by the Civil Works Contractors complies with the technical and sponsor requirements, applicable standards, specifications, and procedures by supporting planned Technical Assurance Reviews and "spot-checks" of Contractor's deliverables.
• Responsible for assuring that the HS2 Technical Governance arrangements are followed across the Civils Delivery Teams and make recommendations for improvements where necessary.
• Create a collaborative culture with the supply chain and across Delivery Teams that encourages and implements the use of best practice, innovative engineering, and environmental techniques, technologies, and processes, driving consistency and identifying opportunities for efficiencies and maximizing the benefits of knowledge sharing.
• Accountable for championing High Speed Rail and the HS2 programme and build and maintain productive relationships with stakeholders, relevant Government Departments, the public, and other interested parties to gain their buy-in and input required to develop technical specifications. Represent HS2 at international and national level as required.
• Accountable for contributing to the development of business strategy in the assigned business area and provide specialist guidance and advice to support business aims and control risks to the business in relation to its safety, reliability, operability, and maintainability.
• Responsible for managing budget and resource requirements over different stages of the HS2 project and carry out associated line management responsibilities for a diverse functional team.
• Actively promote and embed Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) and support and comply with all organisational initiatives, policies, and procedures on EDI.

We are looking for a highly skilled and experienced Technical Leadership Director to join our team. The ideal candidate will have:

• Stakeholder management - the ability to manage diverse stakeholder groups, including central government, local government, professional bodies, internal stakeholders, and JV board stakeholders.
• Complex problem-solving - identifying complex problems and reviewing related information to develop and evaluate options and implement solutions. This includes the management and planning of multiple workstreams and the competing demands of stakeholders.
• Clear direction - defining and prioritizing objectives, analyzing inputs, assessing and challenging data, defining strategies, and supporting rationales.
• Decision quality - gathering and synthesizing information, identifying options, and applying sound judgment based on logic and reason, making use of a variety of analytical approaches to provide relevant information to suppliers, stakeholders, and decision-makers using key facts and data.

The successful candidate will have:

• Understanding both the needs of pragmatic delivery cost and schedule targets as well as the need to deliver integrated engineering and environmental solutions that meet all the functional requirements and deliver the end-state railway.
• Strategic oversight and contextual technical support and leadership on innovative/sensitive/controversial multi-discipline technical and engineering principles.
• Can confidently communicate all discipline-specific technical ideas to any audience, citing a wide range of examples of application.
• Applies principles and methods that ensure effective information management, modeling, and data security; understands the approaches and consequences to data creation, transformation, and visualization and knowing when to seek guidance from Subject Matter Expert.

The ideal candidate will have:

• Best practice IPT management principles and matrix organizations.
• Applicable UK construction regulations, including CDM requirements.
• Knowledge of how supply chain sectors operate across various geographies and industries (incl. civil, construction, and rail).
• Specific knowledge of the UK context surrounding HS2, which includes having knowledge and understanding of the political and environmental implications that may/may have impacted HS2.
• Understanding of the Regulatory/Legislative Framework relevant to HS2.
• Commercial awareness, including understanding of cost delivery, schedule targets, and the need to deliver an integrated solution that meets all functional requirements.
• Chartered Engineer/Membership of an appropriate professional institution or the equivalent experience.

The successful candidate will have:

• Experience in leading on multi-disciplinary standards, safety, and environmental activity on large complex major projects/programs within a complex infrastructure delivery program.
• Management of multi-discipline project teams.
• Experience of managing competing demands, including engineering, technical, and environmental with cost and schedule implications.
• Experience of managing and/or influencing governance forums, including partnering boards, collaboration boards, local/regional political stakeholders, and JV partner boards with delegated decision-making powers of multi-millions of pounds.
• The post-holder is expected to behave at all times in a manner consistent with the HS2 values of Safety, Leadership, Integrity, and Respect. It is expected that you will actively promote and embed Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) in all your work and support and comply with all organisational initiatives, policies, and procedures on EDI.