Senior Cost Manager in Birmingham

Salary Base salary: c£61,622 pa to £77,028 pa depending on skills and experience. In addition, we offer a flexible benefits fund of 20% which is paid on top of the base salary and is fully pensionable, as well as a range of competitive benefits.

HS2 Ltd endeavours to ensure everyone working for us and with us feels included, thrives, and achieves their full potential. In practice, this means we are positive and inclusive about making adjustments, providing flexible working, encouraging our staff networks to flourish, and providing personal and professional development opportunities.

Job Purpose

This role is responsible for working with the Head of Cost and Estimating at a Programme and Contract level. This includes supporting the management of budgets, actual costs, forecasts, and Earned Value Management (EVM) to support the successful delivery of HS2.

About the role:

• To be accountable for leading on the analysis and verification of programme and contract phase level cost performance and ensuring the data accurately reflects the current programme performance for onwards reporting.
• To be accountable for leading on the validation of cost performance data submitted by delivery teams as part of communicating overall programme performance to Project Controls and Programme Management Office.
• To be responsible for assisting with the development of overall programme and contract performance reports to communicate current performance to the Head of Project Controls and Project Controls Director, including Earned Value Management (EVM), forecasted costs and EAC pressures.
• To be responsible for supporting the Head of Cost and Estimating in the management of the cost performance team, setting key time and quality targets, and providing specialist advice where required.
• To be responsible for ensuring adherence with cost performance processes and procedures across the respective programme and for storing and maintaining data and documents accurately within the corporate systems.
• To be accountable for communicating key updates to the cost performance team and ensuring they are aligned to current business process and ways of working.
• Assist the Head of Cost and Estimating in leading the cost performance team and by setting individual objectives, reviewing performance/appraisals, and providing ongoing feedback on a formal and informal basis so that direct reports are aware of what they are required to achieve and how they are performing against their objectives.
• To be responsible for working closely with the Areas to develop a series of defined work-streams to progressively enhance cost performance capabilities within the Phase.
• To have accountability for leading on the continuous improvement of the Cost Performance function within the Phase One programme and ensure that lessons learnt are captured and presented back to the team and to implement governance processes and review policies in order to ensure they are in line with strategic business objectives.
• 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.

About You:

Skills:

• Stakeholder management - ability to manage multiple stakeholders within a matrix environment, including the facilitation of stakeholder meetings and information flow.
• Able to solve problems with attention to detail.
• Able to provide clarity, direction, and motivation to a team.
• Communication skills – clear communicator with the ability to deliver clear presentations which engage and influence colleagues and external stakeholders at all levels.
• Able to use Microsoft applications (e.g. Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint).

Knowledge:

• Knowledge of Project Controls, Commercial and Finance processes and how these operate within complex organisations.
• Knowledge and commercial awareness of multiple construction contract types (including NEC contracts, amendments, early warning notices, and the workflows of communications between contractor and client) and their respective benefits to client organisations.
• Knowledge of the core Project Controls disciplines, including Schedule Management, Change Management and Risk Management.
• Knowledge of baseline development and maintenance of baselines on a major programme.

Types of Experience:

• Experience in the management of Cost and Performance and project controls within a major project.
• Experience in the core project controls functions, including baseline maintenance, schedule management, cost performance, change management, risk management, performance reporting, and document control.
• Experience in managing and producing performance reports that summarise cost performance, including Budgets, Earned Value Management (EVM), and forecasts on major projects.
• Experience in the management and control of cost management systems (e.g. Prism, Ecosys, etc.).

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.

As HS2 Ltd do not hold a sponsorship license from the Home Office, we are not able to provide sponsorship to any applicant. Applicants must already have the Right to Work in the UK at the time of application and our process involves a Right to Work validation prior to the interview stage. Note, there are certain types of time-bound visas that we cannot accept.

Any offers made to applicants will be subject to satisfactory completion of pre-employment checks which include Nationality & Immigration Status, employment references, DBS, Financial and Education checks.

We ask for a variety of detail in your online application; however, we perform the first assessment of suitability for a role based solely on the information in your CV. In a further development of our efforts to create a more diverse workforce, your CV will be anonymised, and personal information will be removed during the first stage of the application review. This removes bias from the process and makes it even more important that you attach an updated word version of your CV for each new application ensuring you include evidence directly related to the criteria in the job advert.

Any applications received after the closing date will not be considered.

About Us

High Speed 2 (HS2 Ltd) will be the UK’s new high speed rail network. As well as improving capacity, the new scheme will shorten journey times between a number of Britain’s major population centres, boost the economy and create thousands of jobs.

HS2 Ltd will create a skills legacy and develop a diverse range of talent. We aim to be a leader in EDI practice by creating a safe & inclusive working environment for all our staff - living our values of Safety, Respect, Integrity and Leadership.

In practice, this means we are positive and inclusive about making adjustments, providing flexible working, encouraging our staff networks to flourish and providing personal and professional development opportunities.

HS2 Ltd is also a safety-critical organisation. Employees are required to ensure reasonable care of their own and others’ health and safety by taking personal responsibility for working to our ‘Safe at Heart’ programme principles and following safe working procedures at all times.