Principal Commercial Capability & Enablement Manager

Principal Commercial Capability & Enablement Manager Package: £63,270 to £85k (depending on experience) Location: Reading, with free onsite parking. Working pattern: AWE operates a 9-day working fortnight, with every other Friday as a non-working day. This role is eligible for hybrid working, meaning employees typically spend three days on site in a long week and two days on site in a short week. We support flexible working where possible, including part-time and varied working hours, so please let us know if you would like us to consider an alternative working arrangement when you apply. At AWE, it’s not just a job, it’s far more than that. Our shared purpose is to help keep the nation safe.

As the Principal Commercial Capability & Enablement Manager, you will be part of the Commercial Enablement Senior Leadership team and accountable for leading the strategic development and execution of Commercial capability, workforce planning and functional enablement, ensuring the function has the skills, capacity and operating frameworks required to deliver current and future business objectives. Working closely with the Chief Commercial Officer, Commercial Senior Leadership Team, HR and wider stakeholders, the role is responsible for capability strategy, talent and career development, strategic workforce planning, functional governance, performance management, communications and change delivery. Through strong leadership, cross-functional collaboration and data-driven insight, the role drives commercial excellence, functional transformation and organisational readiness, while leading a high-performing team to deliver sustainable capability and resource outcomes across the Commercial function. The role ensures the Commercial Function has the skills, capacity, leadership and operating framework required to meet current and future organisational objectives.

Key Accountabilities

• Drive implementation of the Commercial Functional Strategy by translating strategic priorities into coordinated delivery plans across Commercial delivery teams and leadership teams, ensuring effective flow down of Commercial objectives.
• Develop and maintain the Commercial Capability Strategy, aligning capability priorities with organisational objectives, workforce plans, and future capability requirements.
• Own and continuously evolve the Commercial Competency Framework, defining the critical skills, knowledge, behaviours, and capabilities required across all commercial disciplines and career levels, in partnership with AWE HR and GCF.
• Lead strategic workforce planning, resourcing strategies, and resource demand management (RDM) for the Commercial Function, ensuring capability and capacity requirements are met through workforce optimisation and informing the AWE People Board process.
• Lead and manage Commercial resource and recruitment processes, including workforce planning, onboarding, induction, and deployment of resources across the function.
• Drive Commercial functional change initiatives and the embedding of wider AWE organisational change, acting as the central coordination point for transformation activities to ensure successful adoption and sustainable outcomes.
• Own the Commercial communications strategy, ensuring consistent engagement, visibility of priorities, alignment across the function, and effective communication of strategic objectives and change initiatives.
• Provide strategic oversight and leadership of Commercial learning, development, talent management, career pathways, succession planning, and knowledge management, designing and delivering a best-practice learning and development strategy in collaboration with AWE L&D teams and leadership.
• Lead the development of the cadence for leadership and performance reporting, coordinating the development of effective commercial board reports, coordinating all inputs and providing strategic narrative.
• Lead Commercial participation in Integrated Business Planning (IBP), ensuring workforce, financial, and capability requirements are effectively represented and managed, overseeing the Commercial budget.

The role ensures the Commercial Function has the skills, capacity, leadership and operating framework required to meet current and future organisational objectives.

In return we offer balance, with award winning benefits including:

• 9-day working fortnight – meaning you get every other Friday off work, in addition to 270 hours of annual leave.
• Market leading contributory pension scheme (we will pay between 9% and 13% of your pensionable pay depending on your contributions).
• Family friendly policies: Maternity Leave - 39 Weeks Full Pay and Paternity Leave - 4 Weeks Full Pay.
• Opportunities for Professional Career Development including funding for annual membership of a relevant professional body.
• Employee Assistance Programme and Occupational Health Services.
• Life Assurance (4 x annual salary).
• Discounts – access to savings on a wide range of everyday spending.
• Special Leave Policy including paid time off for volunteering, public service (including reserve forces) and caring.

Experience and qualifications

• Compliance with relevant legislation and regulations.
• Must have proven professional experience.
• Strong background in organisational planning, business operations and change management.
• Experience in preparing exec level communications.
• A strong grasp of business, financial, and operational metrics to support decision making.
• Adept at handling sensitive or confidential matters with discretion, sound judgement and professionalism.
• Experience in leading teams and driving cross-team working, and working with senior business leaders.
• Experience of working collaboratively with and influencing business stakeholders.
• Significant experience in working with Senior leaders on developing and implementing functional strategy.
• A strategic thinker with ability to align business priorities to commercial outcomes.
• Capable of working collaboratively in cross-functional teams.
• Skilled communicator with the ability to influence at all levels.
• Highly developed organisational and analytical skills and effectiveness to manage conflicting priorities in a multi-task role delivering to challenging timescales.
• Ability to work effectively in a complex and ambiguous environment.
• Role model for innovation and continuous improvement.

Important things you need to know

You will need to obtain and maintain the necessary security clearance for the role. This will be funded by AWE. The nature of our work does mean you need to be a British Citizen who has been resident in the UK for the past 5 years in order to apply for SC clearance and 10 years for DV. We want you to feel comfortable and able to shine during our recruitment process. Please let us know on your application form if you need any adjustments/accommodations during the process. Our interviews typically take place over Teams and for most roles are a 1 stage process. Our ambition is to create workplaces where we recognise and celebrate differences, encourage diverse contributions and our employees feel able to be themselves at work. We strive to create a genuine culture of openness and inclusion and encourage diverse applicants. Any inclusion information you provide will be stored in accordance with GDPR and kept separate from your application form and CV, and the information will not be shared with anyone involved in interviewing or making hiring decisions. Please note that you must be a British Citizen to apply for a role with us. If you’re looking for a role with excitement, intrigue and something that really makes a difference then now is the time to join AWE. We are at the start of a once in a generation – possibly two generations – programme to design and produce a replacement warhead for the UK’s continuous at sea deterrent. We will do this while continuing to deliver the Trident programme as well as managing ambitious state-of-the-art capital and construction projects – some of which have never been done before. Find out more on our website.

Next steps

Everyone who works at AWE brings unique skills and perspectives to the table. We recognise that great people don’t always 'tick every box'. That’s why we focus on your potential, your fit with our values, your transferable skills as well as your experience.

Service Leavers, Veterans and Reservists

We are an Armed Forces Covenant Gold Award Employer. Visit the Service Leavers page to find out more.

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