Head of Preconstruction

Due to significant growth in our water sector, a Head of Preconstruction role has become available to join our delivery team, working on the Northumbrian Water Framework (NWG).

Costain have won extensive work across the water sector this year to support the AMP 8 investment cycle. We have been appointed by Northumbrian Water to the Living Water Enterprise to help shape and deliver its strategic infrastructure upgrade programme over the next 15 years.

The Head of Preconstruction will be the dedicated focal point for all opportunities, drawing on input from the Project Delivery & Commercial teams, Supply Chain, estimating resource and wider Costain business.

Key elements of the role will be the formulation and co-ordination of the proposal team across each project opportunity, ensuring clear requirements and responsibilities are established, the necessary governance requirements are met, risks identified and communicated and delivering a robust compliant proposal to the client in line with agreed timescales.

Once secured you will support the design and preconstruction teams through the NWG gateway process in advance of on site delivery where you will handover to the Head of Delivery and relevant construction teams.
- Establish the initial tender strategy, liaising with both Project Managers and Commercial representatives
- Engagement with the Supply Chain, estimating team and wider Costain business to establish clear requirements and responsibilities and lead kick-off sessions
- Develop the Tender Programme, monitoring progress and ensuring milestones are met
- Prepare relevant governance documentation in conjunction with the Framework SLT and wider Costain business.
- Coordinate close-out of all governance actions on behalf of accountable parties.
- Population of Group/Sector Work winning information (Dynamics) associated with the Northumbrian Water Customer Account
- Coordinate efforts with the NWG framework delivery team and wider Costain business in ensuring the development of associated indirect estimates, including welfare requirements & scope, staffing organogram & Bottom-Up Estimate (BUE), Testing & Commissioning BUE, Design BUE
- Coordinate with the Estimating Team at each stage of the proposal phase to produce opportunity proposals in line with Customer mandated process and internal business governance rules (as amended from time to time)
- Ensure technical and commercial queries, both up and down the opportunity supply chain, are resolved to inform estimating and ensuring robust schedule of Technical and Contractual Clarifications are in place at time of Tender response to the Customer
- Facilitate flow of information between Client / design team / estimators / supply-chain / Delivery Team / NWG framework delivery team and wider Costain business
- Facilitate Technical Queries &/or Requests for Information to the Client (via the Client Contract portal), Suppliers and other internal/external Stakeholders
- Ensure Compliance, Risk and External Constraints elements are documented and factored into estimates
- Management of design partner scope creation and execution working with the Framework Commercial team
- Engagement & coordination with site operations to ensure the site-specific constraints / issues are known and mitigated for the tender and delivery phases of the opportunity
- Coordination with opportunity Delivery Team and Client/other Stakeholders to identify potential impacts and mitigations from the relevant 3rd Party, environmental and ecological constraints (such as protected species, vegetation and need for clearance, archaeology, UXO, etc...).
- Work with the opportunity delivery team to identify, plan and manage site surveys required in support of each tender (where appropriate)

Essential
- Degree level qualified or equivalent in an Engineering or Commercial related discipline
- Significant experience working in a similar level role
- Experience of pricing medium to large value contracts preferably in the water sector
- Customer Focused, Open and Honest, Safe and Environmentally aware, Team Player, Accountable
- Excellent communication skills and a good team player
- Able to manage administration support and other members of the team to ensure the successful delivery of the tender
- Commercially aware and a lateral thinker with a knowledge of various Forms of Contract, I.Chem.E.and NEC Terms and Conditions and Target Cost
- Ability to manage and prioritise a high volume of work that requires completion within tight timeframes to meet the demands of the contract and the timely completion of multiple concurrent tenders with a fast turnaround in a Framework Environment
- High level of competence using MS Word, Excel. PowerPoint and Teams

Desirable
- Significant experience of the water and / or utilities sector
- Experience of working within a multi-discipline engineering environment
- Knowledge and appreciation of sewage treatment processes, water treatment processes and pumping syste