Senior Contracts Manager

Location: Manor Royal Crawley, United Kingdom – Crawley (hybrid working arrangement – 3 days per week in the office pro rata)

Company: Thales is a global technology leader with more than 83,000 employees on five continents. With over 7,500 people in the UK, operating across defence, space, aerospace, and digital security, we help build a future we can all trust. Thales supports the security and stability of our nation by providing extraordinary technology to our customers, as well as delivering social value to the UK with our products and services.

Hours: Full time or part time (32+ hours per week)

What the role has to offer: This role offers an exciting opportunity to join the growing business and be part of a highly professional Commercial team within the Underwater Systems (UWS) business based in Crawley. The UWS business is growing at a rapid pace, with plenty of opportunities for challenge and professional growth working in a part of the business where what we do matters and protects the Royal Navy and our allies at sea. Our customer base is the UK Ministry of Defence and well-known prime contractors. The Senior Contracts Manager will be a key part of the project and bid organisations and will represent the function in an integrated manner within the respective teams within this role.

Key tasks/Responsibilities

• Strategic: Responsible for providing support to the Head of Contracts ASW in the definition and implementation of the Commercial strategy in the area of responsibility; Responsible for ensuring commercial considerations are within the Thales DNA across Capture, Bid and Delivery for area of responsibility; Establishes and owns customer commercial relationship with applicable customers; Responsible for defining the level of acceptable commercial risk for opportunities, providing robust justification.
• Tactical: Responsible for formal communication with the Customer and will be the commercial point of contact for area of responsibility; Responsible for ensuring adherence to Contracts and providing effective Contract Management; Reviewer of key artefacts as part of bid, capture and delivery teams; Manage all contractual aspects within an assigned sector with due regard to Compliance, Governance, Group-wide actions, Agreements (cooperation and strategic), Contracts; Provides customer perspective and commercial environment understanding to internal stakeholders; Proposes contract negotiation strategy and delivers contract negotiation; Support and participate in the business strategy, liaise with customers for all communication following ITT, RFP, ITN, review and provide proactive business support in the winning of bids and thus prepare winning commercial proposals/quotations, including but not limited to: draft contract commentary, input to bid risk assessments and commercial and pricing strategy; Ensure a robust contractual baseline is established and maintained including the active management of contractual change and contract amendments; Provide guidance on compliance with terms and conditions identifying flow down terms and risk by supporting the negotiation of major subcontracts; Identifying potential liabilities and disputes and support the development of appropriate mitigation plans.

About you: Proven experience working as a Contracts Manager with commercial SQEP skillset, behaviours that will ensure commercial robustness throughout all contract life cycle phases, and the ability to identify, plan and deliver tactical commercial elements. Experience managing Contracts and Bids over the contract life cycle from prospects, bidding to negotiation, contract award and contract closure. Experience managing challenging customers, working as a team player within integrated bid and project teams, with accountability for performance. Experience managing high-value bids that require a strong commercial presence.

Benefits: At Thales, we ensure equal opportunities, pay and working conditions for all. The benefits we offer include private medical insurance, buying or selling annual leave, cycle to work schemes, employee discounts, paid volunteering day, stocks and shares, annual bonus and much more depending on the role.