Change Managers (Utilities)

Initial 3‑6 month contract; up to 3 days working on client site in the South of England; may involve extensive travel to other sites.

Summary

You’ll join North Highland’s Energy & Utilities (E & U) practice, working with our UK water utility clients across the South of England, leading change across their multi‑year transformation and change portfolios delivered under managed service and consulting frameworks. The sector is delivering the biggest upgrades seen in a century – modernising assets, systems and ways of working to ensure essential water and waste services are provided. These portfolios span all core business units of water utilities and enabling functions such as HR, Finance, Commercial and Procurement.

You’ll lead the people‑centric side of the transformation – shaping change strategy, managing readiness and adoption, and delivering clear, compelling communications that take stakeholders on the journey. You’ll typically operate as a change or communications lead within the client’s delivery model, owning change artefacts and interventions and ensuring readiness and adoption.

Responsibilities

• Lead change impact assessments across field operations, control rooms, and asset planning & engineering; define change strategy aligned to programme goals and delivery approach.
• Produce stakeholder impact maps and readiness assessments, and design, deploy and manage key change deliverables – change plans, communications plans and training needs assessments.
• Develop stakeholder engagement strategies for operational leaders, frontline teams and union/workforce representatives, facilitating genuine two‑way engagement that feeds operational insight back into solution design.
• Develop a compelling change narrative and deliver multi‑channel communications tailored to transformation, field teams, office‑based teams and senior leadership.
• Define and track adoption metrics; monitor and measure communications effectiveness and adapt messaging based on feedback and adoption signals.
• Coordinate with programme and workstream leads to manage dependencies between technical delivery and business readiness, escalating adoption risks and concerns.
• Shape and manage training rollout, support transition activities (UAT and go‑live readiness), and provide reinforcement and embedding support, including benefits reporting, to embed new ways of working post‑implementation.

Qualifications and Experience

• Strong experience leading change and communications on complex transformation programmes (multiple workstreams, dependency‑heavy delivery), ideally in regulated or operational environments such as utilities/water, power, telecoms, life sciences and infrastructure.
• Demonstrable experience working with frontline field staff, engineering communities and unionised environments, where clear governance, assurance and adoption discipline matter.
• Confident creating change narratives, communications strategies and leadership messaging/talking points, and translating technical information into engaging, compelling narratives.
• Experience designing and deploying change interventions across agile, product, hybrid and waterfall deliveries; comfortable shaping training and embedding reinforcement.
• Excellent stakeholder management and facilitation, with the ability to translate complexity into clarity and build trust at all levels.

Applicants must be authorized to work in the United Kingdom, without the need for visa sponsorship by North Highland. Work visa sponsorship will not be provided, either now or in the future, for this position. This is a temporary employee (PAYE) opportunity working via an Umbrella company.

North Highland is an equal opportunity employer, and we adhere to all applicable laws and regulations to ensure a fair and equitable workplace. All qualified applicants will receive fair and impartial consideration without regard to race, color, sex, gender identity, religion, national origin, age, sexual orientation, disability, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. We handle all information in accordance with local privacy standards and maintain strict confidentiality.