Cost Specialist in Tavistock

At Babcock we're working to create a safe and secure world, together, and if you join us, you can play your part as a Cost Specialist at our Devonport Royal Dockyard site.

The role

As a Cost Specialist, you'll have a role that's out of the ordinary. You'll help keep complex submarine programmes on track across our Naval Nuclear Submarines business. You'll turn cost data into clear insight - strengthening project performance, enabling confident decision‐making and directly supporting the Royal Navy's mission. It's meaningful work with real world impact, and a platform to grow your skills in project controls, cost control and earned value management (EVM).

Day-to-day, you'll be involved with the collection, processing and analysis of actuals data; providing multi-layered reporting both internally and externally and providing justification, analysis and recommendations to the business based on data and supporting investigations.

• Manage actuals against cost performance baselines and control changes to those baselines.
• Produce clear monthly cost reports for senior leaders and external stakeholders.
• Analyse cost and performance data, providing insight, recommendations and actionable next steps.
• Coordinate accurate forecasts with activity owners and investigate variances to plan.
• Support deep-dive investigations to drive corrective action and continuous improvement.

This role is full time, 35 hours per week and provides hybrid working arrangements with 3-4 days in the office/onsite and 1-2 days working from home.

Essential experience of the Cost Specialist

• Experience in a cost control/management environment.
• Understanding of project controls - especially cost control, earned value and finance.
• Strong data analysis capability and attention to detail.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office (Excel, Word, PowerPoint).
• Confident stakeholder management and communication skills.

Qualifications for the Cost Specialist

• APM Project Fundamentals Qualification (PFQ) or APM Project Management Qualification (PMQ) - desirable.

Security Clearance

The successful candidate must be able to achieve and maintain Standard (BPSS) / Security Check (SC) security clearance for this role.

What we offer

• Matched contribution pension scheme, with life assurance.
• Access to a Digital GP, annual health check, and nutritional consultations through Aviva DigiCare+.
• Employee share scheme.
• Employee shopping savings portal.
• Payment of Professional Fees.
• Reservists in the armed forces receive 10-days special paid leave.
• Holiday Trading is a benefit that allows UK Babcock employees to buy additional leave or to sell up to one working week of annual leave from their annual entitlement.
• 'Be Kind Day' enables employees to take one working day's paid leave a year (or equivalent hours) to undertake volunteering work with their chosen organisation or registered charity.
• Excellent development opportunities and benefits package including an employee assistance programme supporting physical, mental and financial wellbeing.

We're Babcock — a global FTSE 100 organisation with over 26,000 people working together to make a difference. Here, you'll be part of something bigger. From initial design to final decommissioning, your work will contribute to products and services that are essential to national security and public infrastructure. Together, we're building a future that lasts — not just through the impact we make, but through meaningful careers that respect your work-life balance. We call that lifetime engineering.

Join us and see how far we can go, together.

We are a disability confident committed employer. If you have a disability or need any reasonable adjustments during the application and selection stages, please email careers@babcockinternational.com with the subject header 'Reasonable adjustments requirement'. We're committed to building an inclusive culture where everyone's free to thrive.

We are happy to talk about flexible working – please ask about alternative patterns of work at interview.