Transport Planning Service Lead Scotland

Mott MacDonald

Position location: Glasgow or Edinburgh
Recruiter contact: David McFall

We’re a global engineering, management, and development consultancy.Our purpose is to improve society by considering social outcomes in everything we do, relentlessly focusing on excellence and digital innovation, transforming our clients’ businesses, our communities and employee opportunities.

A fundamental part of this is respecting each person’s differences and striving to meet their needs.

Our values: Progress, Respect, Integrity, Drive, Excellence.

This senior role of Project Director provides oversight, independent of the project team, for single or multiple projects, ensuring that the project is delivered successfully for the client and for Mott MacDonald.You will also focus on growth of our transport planning capability to support the transport planning business. You will be part of the senior team responsible for business development and customer liaison across the Scottish Region. You will also support team development and management and providing technical and project directorship. The role will require close working with other parts of the Transport Planning business specifically and across the wider UK and Ireland business overall.

As Project Director within the Transport Planning team within Scotland you will provide successful technical delivery and maintenance of trust between Client and the company, which is key to commercial and financial success for Mott MacDonald.  The Project Director oversees one or several Project Managers, challenging PMs and Mott MacDonald management as well as mentoring and coaching as necessary with the prime aim of ensuring projects are able to deliver a successful outcome.

We are looking for an enthusiastic transport planning professional with a passion for the promotion and development of transport planning throughout the UK. This includes active travel, travel choice and behaviour, public transport, decarbonising transport, strategic transport connectivity, transport studies and development planning.The second Strategic Transport Project Review was published in late 2022 by Transport Scotland and contained 45 recommendations for investment in transport over the next 20 years. This provides a platform for future transport projects to be delivered, which are likely to be brought forward by Local Authorities.

In your role you will assess the scale and nature of the market and plan a strategy (alongside our Account Leads and Technical Service Leads) to allow The Transport and Mobility Solutions (TMS) Division to maximise its activity in this core market. You will also assess the skills required to meet this market and identify any skill gaps in our offering. An essential part of this role will be the engagement with clients across the country, identifying opportunities and delivering successful projects. As such you will be the focal point to ensure our technical delivery supports our clients’ needs in the best way.

As a leader of our team, you will be expected to support our projects in a variety of capacities, including in planning and designer capacities as project principal, project manager or technical lead and provide support to research studies and innovation projects, including Net Zero and digital delivery.We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate and take positive steps to create an inclusive culture.Following our continued growth and wider success in winning major projects across the UK and overseas, we are looking for a Transport Planning Lead for Scotland to join our team.

This role will be based out of our Edinburgh or Glasgow office, but leading teams in both locations.

This is an exciting opportunity to not only take a major role in developing and growing our transport planning team but to shape our offering and strategy, contributing to achieving a high performing shared enterprise with our partners. You will work with the team to fulfil the needs of our clients across a wide range of opportunities, including developing new and innovative technical solutions in the Transport Planning field. You will promote our health, safety and well-being policies and ensure these are incorporated in any design as well as ensuring design outputs meet our quality obligations and requirements set out in our Business Management System (BMS).

Your responsibilities will also include:

• Meeting clients to understand their needs and pipeline of future works
• Development of our Transport Planning Win strategy/pipeline and skills development strategy;
• Delivery of active projects from initial strategy to concept and planning, design and construction - to UK and potentially international design standards;
• Develop your own and the teams technical knowledge in the sector
• Coordination with key Win and Resource management teams in the Division, and with other Units and Divisions;
• Assessment and prioritisation of opportunities with Principal/Account Leads;
• Supporting members of the team with their technical and professional development;
• Implementing digital technology to increase delivery efficiency or enhance project outcomes; and,
• Supporting the development of bids to increase the pipeline of work.
• You can be expected to lead your discipline and a team in delivery, plus take a client-facing role in technical discussion.

The successful candidate will be proactive, enthusiastic and passionate about client engagement, customer experience, work winning and delivering great transport solutions that drive robust social outcomes.

Essential academic, professional qualifications and experience:

• Demonstrable technical knowledge in transport planning ideally with business case, active travel, travel choice and behaviour, public transport, decarbonising transport, strategic transport connectivity, transport studies and development planning experience (or a combination of) for projects with national and / or local government clients, agencies, and private sector.
• You will have demonstrable experience winning and delivering Transport Planning projects, leading teams and engaging with Clients.
• An established network of industry relationships in the region.
• Transport Planning or Civil Engineering degree or equivalent.

Essential competencies / skills:

• High standard of verbal and written communications and willingness to engage and communicate with clients and colleagues - a collaborative approach is essential;
• Ability to see the bigger picture and strategies and to see delivery through to successful project completion;
• Strong interpersonal / people skills; and
• Ability to travel throughout UK & Ireland.

Desirable academic, qualifications, experience, competencies and skills:

• Broader competencies that could add value to your role, such as a commercial understanding of pricing in the market and an understanding of the public sector frameworks.
• Good understanding of Net Zero, sustainability and carbon.
• Chartered status or equivalent.

If you feel you can demonstrate strong evidence in most but not all of the competencies, we would still be interested to hear from you.

Equality, diversity, and inclusion 

We put equality, diversity, and inclusion at the heart of our business, seeking to promote fair employment procedures and practices to ensure equal opportunities for all. We encourage individual expression in our workplace and are committed to creating an inclusive environment where everyone feels they can contribute.

Accessibility

We want you to perform your best at every stage in the recruitment process. If you are disabled or need any support to enable you to apply or attend an interview, please contact us at reasonable.adjustments@mottmac.com and we will talk to you about how we can support you.

Agile working 

Happy to talk Flexible Working and how we can support your responsibilities beyond the workplace.

We offer some fantastic benefits including:

• Pension matched up to 7%   
• Life insurance 
• An annual professional institution subscription   
• Continuous development opportunities – because we want you to thrive  
• Agile/flexible working – because life isn’t 9-5  
• Enhanced parental leave; shared parental leave policies – for parents and care givers  
• Annual bonus scheme  
• Flexible benefits that suit you, including ability to buy/sell annual leave entitlement, cycle to work & interest free season ticket loans 
• Wellbeing support including access to an independent Employer Assistance Scheme, wellbeing champions and access to learning and support resources 
• Access to our Advanced Employee Networks which support our LGBTQ+, gender, race and ethnicity, disability and parents/carers communities 
• The opportunity to make a difference; learn more about our social outcomes

Apply now, or for more information about our application process, click here.