Transportation Consultancy Director - North of England

Atkins Transportation is organised around: Practices responsible for winning and delivering work in technical capability areas; and Markets focusing on developing strategic client relationships and winning work across the local transport, strategic rail and strategic highways markets. This Director level role will sit in the Consultancy Practice - which comprises over 500 staff delivering planning and advisory consultancy services to predominantly UK clients.

Atkins has a strong existing presence in the North of England across many sectors. The role will provide strategic and technical leadership to a team of c100 transport professionals based in the North of England, primarily focused on the transport planning sector and will work with clients in each of the major city regions, as well as national bodies such as Highways England, Network Rail, HS2 Limited and Department for Transport. The role will also provide leadership and strategic direction to staff within other disciplines that have a presence in the North, such as rail consultancy, asset management and intelligent mobility. The role holder will also be part of the Consultancy Practice senior management team that is responsible for strategy and business performance, and will report to the Director responsible for the Consultancy Practice.

The successful candidate will be expected to quickly grow our existing project portfolio, local footprint and reputation across the region – strengthening and rebalancing our business to better help our clients deliver the outcomes the Northern Powerhouse agenda seeks to achieve. This will require ensuring that Atkins is at the heart of shaping our clients’ long-term infrastructure programmes and will entail working closely with other parts of Atkins to position for, win and deliver multi-disciplinary projects.
The role requires a blend of excellent client-facing transport consultancy work winning, project delivery skills and experience, coupled with strong technical and people leadership skills. It requires a highly collaborative individual, capable of maximising the value of networks within and outside Atkins – including working in tandem with the Atkins’ Client Director for Transport for the North.

The focus of the role is to:

• Provide technical and people leadership to the transport planning business based in the North of England
• To grow both staff capacity and new capability, to face the range of opportunities that are emerging across our North of England client portfolio
• To work with the Market teams and the Transport for the North Client Director to significantly increase Consultancy Practice revenue from North of England strategic clients by 200% within 2 years.
• To take responsibility for work winning – leading on strategic pursuits and taking the role of Bid Director on tenders.
• To take responsibility for project delivery for major commissions for strategic clients acting as Project Director.
• To work as part of the Consultancy Practice management team to ensure that collectively we deliver the practice’s overall performance in line with Transportation’s overall strategy.
• Work with the Market teams and the Transport for the North client director to establish Atkins’ with a bold and relevant voice across transport in the North of England and raise our profile and increase our influence with key decision-makers and stakeholders.
• Work with Atkins’ Transportation market directors in the local transport, strategic highways and strategic rail markets and with the Client Director for Transport for the North to position us for and secure significant design and delivery opportunities that are expected to emerge.

The role holder will be expected to work to challenging operational and revenue targets for consultancy revenue secured from target client organisations in the North. The role is expected to be based in either of our Manchester, Warrington or Leeds offices, though other Atkins offices in the North could also be considered as a contractual base.