Lead Contract Manager | Inclusive Jobs

Contract type: Permanent
Hours: full or part-time. 37.5 hours per week (full-time)

Location: One of our satellite offices in key locations in the country, e.g., Leeds or Birmingham

WFH policy: At least two days a week in the office (and/or on site), and you’re welcome to come in more often

Flexible working: Variety of flexible work patterns, subject to line manager discretion, e.g., compressed nine-day fortnight

Reports to: Senior Head of CfD Account and Contract Management

Direct reports: Managers with varying degrees of experience

Role Summary:

Help protect the future

As a lead contract manager, you will lead and develop your own high-performing team. The aim of the team is to support a variety of counterparties to progress through their contractual milestones and start generating low-carbon energy.

You will be working towards something of national importance, and doing whatever it takes to make contracts succeed. By supporting your team to find solutions to counterparties’ problems, you will ultimately help generate the low-carbon energy that will make net zero happen.

Key Responsibilities

People management

Acting as a first-line leader and developing a high-performing team.
Leading and supporting the development and performance of contract managers and graduates.
Playing a proactive role in recruitment, including shortlisting, interviewing, and onboarding.
Maintaining a strong team, ensuring members have the capabilities and performance to meet expectations within portfolios.
Ensuring your team’s data is robust and accurate, first time, every time.

Stakeholder management

Getting out on site visits and to counterparties’ offices and meeting people face-to-face. This is one of the most important parts of the role.
Building trust through developing positive relationships with counterparties, and using the strength of these relationships to resolve all issues.
Taking full ownership of relationships at an account management level, while your team is responsible for relationships at a working project level.
Collaborating with and supporting stakeholders to meet all contractual requirements.
Ensuring counterparties are complying with the Contracts for Difference (CfD) agreement, by rigorously inspecting the details of the formal notices in contracts.
Using your knowledge and industry insight to collaborate with internal teams, such as policy, operations, and legal.
Preventing potential issues with stakeholders from becoming problematic, and knowing when to escalate to more senior colleagues.

Identifying and reacting to trends

Understanding and providing insights into the energy industry, landscape, and relevant technologies, such as onshore and offshore wind, solar, biomass, and advanced conversion technologies.
Translating complex information about trends into a simple style that communicates key facts.
Providing accurate information to senior heads of teams in a timely, helpful manner.
Keeping abreast of potential changes to government guidance, and working with colleagues across the business to interpret them.

Ownership of contractual process

Writing clearly and effectively. Succinctly articulating technical amendments, force majeure claims, etc. and summarising in papers for approval.
Acting as a trusted advisor and providing counterparties with pragmatic solutions within the parameters of the CfD.
Adopting an analytical approach to help get projects through their milestones. Providing a variety of solutions from multiple perspectives, including legal, financial, commercial, and holistic.
Implementing strategic detail at a lead level, including company policy, performance management, budget control, and talent development. You will be on the periphery of strategic decision-making and must be able to quickly grasp what is happening within the organisation and where we are headed.
Supporting and leading the development and improvement of company and directorate policies, procedures, and processes.

Skills Knowledge and Expertise

You are a pragmatic, creative problem solver who is curious about the world and naturally inclined to ask a lot of questions. You pay attention to detail and have a flexible, commercial mindset.

Personable and approachable, you have great emotional intelligence. You’re a fantastic communicator who knows how to influence and read others. People trust you; you have a very human perspective of the people you work with. We want you to be out and about, meeting as many people as possible, so if you’d rather sit behind a screen, this isn’t the job for you!

Our lead contract managers come from a variety of backgrounds, including private power organisations, water, commercial, and procurement. While a broad understanding of the energy industry would be helpful, it is not essential, although the ability and enthusiasm to learn about it are crucial.

We’d like you to have a STEM degree and a minimum of eight years’ experience of operational delivery and construction or energy contracts. If you don’t have a STEM degree, you’ll need at least 10 years’ relevant experience.

Training and development
We will work with you to develop a personal development plan, designed to support your career aspirations and fill certain skill or knowledge gaps.

Because each plan is bespoke, we cannot say what yours might include. But, for example, we’ve supported colleagues with chartered status with the World Commerce and Contracting Association and chartered status with the Chartered Institute of Mechanical Engineers. And in the past, we’ve provided lead contract managers with managerial education, such as first-line manager and employee relations training, alongside more general courses in the areas of emotional intelligence, communication, critical thinking, and problem solving.

When appropriate, we will also pay for and provide study leave for specific external training and qualifications relevant to your role. Internal mentorship schemes are also available.

We are keen to promote internally and will support you to progress to your next career step.

Employee Benefits

As if contributing to and supporting work that makes life better for millions wasn’t rewarding enough, we offer a full range of benefits too. Key benefits that may be available depending on the role include:

Annual performance based bonus, up to 10%
25 days annual leave, plus eight bank holidays
Up to 8% pension contribution
Financial support and time off for study relevant to your role, plus a professional membership subscription
Employee referral scheme (up to £1500), and colleague recognition scheme
Family friendly policies, including enhanced maternity leave and shared parental leave
Free, confidential employee assistance, including financial management, family care, mental health, and on-call GP service
Three paid volunteering days a year
Season ticket loan and cycle to work schemes
Family savings on days out and English Heritage, gym discounts, cash back and discounts at selected retailers
Employee resource groups

About Low Carbon Contracts Company

The Low Carbon Contracts Company (LCCC) exists to help decarbonise the generation of electricity and make it more affordable for the future. Our work is central to the delivery of the government’s objective to achieve the Net Zero target by 2050.

Discover more about LCCC and what it’s like to work with us by watching this video: https://vimeo.com/1046713265

Please take the time to answer the optional diversity questions
At LCCC, we are dedicated to fostering a diverse and inclusive workplace where everyone can be their authentic selves and contribute to our mission of advancing a flexible energy future. Our aim is to be reflective of the environments where we operate and truly benefit from a rich tapestry of backgrounds and experiences where everyone thrives, which of course makes us stronger together. Your diversity data is valuable to us; it helps us understand whether we are effectively connecting with under-represented groups and realising our diversity aims. Please note that your diversity data will remain anonymised to us as it only feeds into high-level reports not connected to the candidates.