Lead Design Manager

Short Description

Mission:
We are seeking an agile Engineering Location Lead for the UK to support our Delivery Team at Colt DCS, to deliver technical excellence and leadership across the UK projects to ensure on time and on budget delivery. You will lead and manage a multi-disciplinary technical and design management team in the UK delivering multiple Hyperscale data centre projects. You will be responsible for ensuring the technical delivery of these projects and be accountable for consistency and adherence with employer’s requirements and specific customers’ solutions on multiple projects in the UK. This shall be achieved in a combination of either dedicated project design managers reporting directly into you or in the role as design manager yourself for projects.

You will report to the Regional Engineering Manager (UK / EUR) of the Major Builds Delivery Team in Colt DCS and be based in the UK with a focus on our London portfolio.  
You will play a leading role in the delivery of a multi-disciplinary design, managing external engineering consultants and contractors to meet programme, design and budget for the successful delivery of our projects and to achieve cost effective and resilient infrastructures in line with Colt’s Global design standards. 
 

Job Summary

The successful candidate must take an agile approach to design, cost and programme & project management, providing solutions to potential issues and having a direct input to the business performance, ensuring that we, as a team, deliver on time and on budget, every time.

The role requires excellent people management skills:
•    To enable efficient communication, provide motivation, build trust amongst participants and stakeholders and demonstrate a willingness to see others succeed.
•    Lead, mentor, and manage a team of engineers working on data center construction projects, ensuring alignment with project goals and objectives.
•    Foster a positive team environment, encouraging collaboration, innovation, and professional development.
•    Set clear performance expectations, conduct regular performance reviews, and provide constructive feedback to team members.
  

Outcomes:  
Responsibility to ensure the outputs from the UK engineering team meet the business requirements at a technical level and provide ways of efficient delivery. Alignment and cross collaboration with other functions to input into a “one team” mentality from development to operations. The role will require continuous support of Colt’s Design Managers and Engineers to ensure objectives’ alignment with agreed programme and costs and ensuring fast and responsive communication lines between engineering and project management, for faster and effective decisions.

At project level, you should manage the Design Programme to ensure on time creation and review of Employers Requirements (ER’s), tender information and design documentation issued for planning and Construction.  
  
You will be required to steer and guide and challenge the external Design Consultants and Contractors when required taking a ‘Trust but Verify’ approach, to ensure they deliver a design to meet the requirements of the Design Brief, periodically assessing and evaluating all project related design decisions presented by consultants and contractors with support if required from Senior DCS staff.   
  
You will apply a commercial approach in all aspects of the work including design, engineering and construction, working with other engineering functions, Procurement and Delivery to ensure that the procurement of all items is conducted on the most cost-effective basis to drive reduction in costs, maximise our speed to Market, while obtaining the lowest PUE values that meet Colt’s sustainability and environmental targets.  
  
You will be required to analyse, review and comment on design proposals, specifications, manuals, and other data submitted for Colt DCS review on BIM 360 Platform and to evaluate the feasibility, cost, and maintenance requirements of designs or applications; you will also actively participate to the team workload to ensure that all project documentation internal governance approvals are completed in a detailed and timely fashion.  
  
You will support the Project managers to drive project programmes/delivery while working closely with the other design engineers and construction teams to ensure milestones and completion dates are met with successful handover to the client on time.  
You will also work on Sales requests and liaise with customers to develop specific project design requirements, together with senior staff, delivery managers, to deliver first class projects to our customers.   
 

Job Description

The Team 
The Delivery Team, reporting to the VP of Real Estate, is formed by in Regional groups of Project Managers, Design Managers/Engineers, Specialists (namely BMS, Security and Commissioning), Cost Managers and Procurement Managers reporting to the Regional Head of Delivery.  
The Design Managers are managed by a Regional Engineering Manager, who will assign a Design Manager and a supporting engineer (of opposite discipline) to each project.  
The Design Managers will interface daily with their peers of the Delivery team, but also with the Development Team, who is responsible for site acquisition, power and connectivity searches, authorities' approval, preparation of the project’s Design Brief and Business Plan.  
  
The Global Engineering Team, reporting to the Global Director of Design & Construction, is instead responsible and owner of the GRD and technically responsible for the OFCI equipment procurement and vendors management, ensuring at each stage that the projects are compliant with our standardised design. 
 
Our core values are:  
•    Agility of a Start-Up  
•    Collaborate to perform  
•    Value Creation  
•    Step Up to Challenges  
  
The skills and Expertise Required: 
•    Excellent people management skills to enable efficient communication, provide motivation, build trust amongst participants and stakeholders and demonstrate a willingness to see others succeed.
•    Strong understanding of design consultants appointments and processes.
•    In depth knowledge and experience in delivery of mission critical engineering, built environment design processes, MEP strategies and technologies, CSA disciplines and their dependencies, construction works.
•    Substantial experience of working in the built environment engineering industry.
•    Experience performing commissioning, qualification & change control activities related but not limited to electrical systems, life safety and fire protection, HVAC, chiller plants, domestic and process water systems, building automation systems, etc.
•    Experience in working within the UK including planning and development processes with experience in the RIBA stage gate delivery process.
•    Deep understanding of the digital environment including BIM, levels of development in design and technology that can assist in the engineering and construction process.
•    A thorough understanding of site planning and interdependent disciplines, such as civils, structures and architecture, demolition, site enabling works and project delivery processes needed to support our growing fleet of Data Centres, is strongly desired.  
•    This person shall be detail-oriented, possess strong organizational skills, and be a self-starter that can excel with little direction.  
 

Skills

Education