Head of Maintenance Repairs (Contracts) - 7973 in London

Contract Type: Permanent, Full-Time

Salary: £78,544 to £93,000 per annum dependant on experience, plus essential car user allowance of £1,300 per annum

Grade: 12

Reporting Office: London, Stratford

Persona: Agile Worker: 20% - 40% of contractual hours to be worked from reporting office/working location (hybrid working)

Closing Date: Friday 17th July at 11pm

Interview Dates: First stage will be held over MS Teams on Wednesday 29th July. If successful there will be a 2nd stage interview at our Stratford office on Wednesday 5th August, 2026.

Benefits: Excellent pension plan (up to 6% double contribution), 28 days Annual Leave rising to 31 days with length of service + Bank Holidays, Westfield Health Cash Plan, non-contributory life assurance, up to 21 hours volunteering paid days, lifestyle benefits, Employee Assistance Programme and many more.

Early applications are encouraged as we reserve the right to close the advertisement and interview earlier than stated. L&Q reserve the right not to progress applications from candidates with 3 or more unsuccessful applications/interview processes with L&Q in the previous 24 months.

L&Q is embarking on a major transformation of its maintenance services. A key part of this change is the way outsourced delivery is managed, with an ambition to move away from fragmented, short-term contracting arrangements towards long-term partnerships that deliver greater consistency, accountability, and value for money.

You will oversee a large operation, managing the outsourced delivery of repairs to c.70,000 homes. You will report to the Director of Maintenance Contracts and will have a team of Contracts Managers reporting into you. Working across a large geographical region with direct responsibility for the operational leadership for maintenance services under your control, you will ensure that there is a focus on achieving KPIs and controlling expenditure through robust contract management.

This role has direct influence over improving customer satisfaction, making sure our residents have seamless client-driven experiences. Placing focus on a right first-time approach you will work closely with the Procurement and Commercial Teams to improve efficient and effective service that removes complexity, delivers the best possible outcomes for customers whilst achieving satisfactory value for money.

Your impact in the role:

• Leading the contracted-out repairs’ contracts management function, providing leadership to up to six Contracts Managers – currently 40 contractors delivering circa 50,000 repairs per annum.
• Provide advice, support and contract management services to internal clients conducting minor works, disrepair works and damp and mould related works & services.
• Steer a long-term procurement project for all outsourced repair services, manage the resulting mobilisations and service delivery.
• Foster high level relationships with contractors adopting a partnering philosophy with contractors.
• Work closely with the Commercial, Transformation and Strategy teams to align outsourced delivery with corporate priorities.
• Manage budgets, ensuring compliance with procurement policy and financial frameworks.
• Lead on process development, design, and documentation for the outsourced repair’s function.
• Drive continuous improvement across external delivery, using performance data to hold contractors to account and raise standards.
• Engage directly with residents and communities, ensuring their experience of contracted services is consistent and positive.

What you will bring:

This post requires a leader with a strong commercial background and experience of managing large-scale maintenance contracts, preferably responsive repairs being delivered at scale across a large portfolio. Candidates will need demonstrable experience of procurement, contract mobilisation and contract management within housing, property services, or a related sector. They should bring resilience, credibility, and the ability to drive cultural change both internally and with external partners.

Candidates should be competent in:

• Workflow design (and/or process mapping), specifying process outputs for system implementation.
• Analysing and working with large data sets, design of insightful KPIs.
• Managing property related contracts using JCT (or similar) form of term contract.

This is an opportunity to redefine outsourced service delivery for one of the largest housing associations in the UK, ensuring residents benefit from consistent, dependable, and high-quality services.

A Recruitment Advocate will join this recruitment process as a panel member. This is part of an internal scheme supporting our recruitment process to be fair, transparent, and consistent, particularly at senior levels.

If you require any reasonable adjustments at any stage during this process, including application stage, please email lqcareers@lqgroup.org.uk.

About L&Q: We’re one of the UK’s leading housing associations and developers. We were founded on a simple belief: high-quality housing is vital for people’s health, happiness and security. Our purpose is simple – to provide social homes and landlord services that everyone can be proud of.

250,000 people call our properties ‘home’, and we’re proud to serve diverse communities across London, the Southeast and Northwest of England.

People are at the heart of our business, and our success depends on employing the best people and getting the best from them. The foundation of everything that we are is built on our corporate values, which outline our core expectations and should be demonstrated at all times, and all levels, when representing L&Q.

At L&Q, we know that diversity and inclusion make us stronger – and they’re at the heart of everything we do. When we recruit, we look at what really matters: your skills, experience, and potential. We’re proud to be recognised for creating an inclusive workplace. We’re a Disability Confident Leader (Level 3) and we’ve introduced our own Recruitment Advocate scheme to make sure every step of our hiring process is fair, transparent, and consistent. It’s all part of our commitment to ending discrimination and making L&Q a place where everyone feels welcome.

Sustainability is also at the heart of what we do. We recognise the responsibility we hold as one of the UK’s largest housing associations.

We value diversity in all its facets, including gender, disability, age, ethnicity, sexual orientation and identity. When it comes to finding a diverse balance for our senior positions, we have decided to address gender and ethnicity first. As such we are committed to offering an interview to at least one ethnic minority candidate and one female candidate for all senior leadership positions if they fulfil the role criteria.