Design Partner Director

Brown and Caldwell (BC) is seeking a director to oversee the Southeast Area portfolio of Collaborative Delivery Enterprise (CDE) Design Partners Projects within our Municipal and Private Sector Markets. These projects encompass water treatment, wastewater treatment, water reuse systems, linear infrastructure, and heavy civil construction.

The primary objective for the Director Design Partner is to ensure that all projects within their portfolio achieve the established key performance indicators and metrics. In Design Partners Projects, BC serves as the design engineer of record or as a design consultant on collaborative delivery assignments.

Characteristics of the successful candidate include the proven ability to manage a portfolio of projects in multiple Municipal and Private Sector Markets, maintain, leverage and expand BC’s exceptional client relationships, align with local and national resources, and collaborate with both contractor partners and BC teams. In Design Partners Projects, client means both Contractor and Owner.

The Design Partner role is accountable for completion of higher level complex collaborative delivery (PDB, FPDB, CMAR, EPC) municipal and industrial projects with high revenue accountability. The role works to plan, support execution, and oversee complex projects to have them completed on time, within budget, while meeting all quality standards, health and safety requirements, and Contractor-Partners and Owners satisfaction. The role works closely with leaders and cross-functional teams to define project scope, set objectives, allocate resources, and develop detailed project plans. The role monitors progress, risks and change, resolves high-stakes challenges, and communicates with stakeholders to provide regular updates. The role leverages staff with a deep knowledge of industry, products, and services to identify and evaluate Contractors and Owners needs and leverage the project team to deliver the best technical solution within the schedule and budget constraints. This role is expected to operate independently while successfully mentoring project teams to deliver results on time and on budget for our clients, while progressively increasing revenue responsibility.

Responsibilities

Responsibilities include the following for delivering day-to-day operations for larger complex projects:

• Project team leadership expectations:
  • Set direction: Support defining objectives, decision-making processes, schedules, budgets and success factors. Assist team by providing clarity on what the objectives are for an assignment, how decisions will be made, development of schedules and budgets, and what critical success factors the client is trying to achieve.
  • Communicate: Help establish effective communication methods for team standups, technical/design decisions, and client interactions.
  • Support Team Motivation: Assist in empowering team members, resolving conflicts, providing feedback and celebrating success.
  • Establish Trust: Demonstrate integrity, competence, consistency, loyalty, and transparency
  • Create a safe environment: Support and assist in providing an atmosphere where ideas and creativity thrive.
  • Embrace thought and experience diversity: Support an environment where diverse backgrounds, geographies, and different perspectives are all heard, respected and considered.
  • Develop team members: Support team development by contributing to continuous learning, skills development and mentoring.
• Execution of BC’s project delivery requirements:
  • Scope: Collaborate and prepare detailed scopes of work to set clear expectations and prevent project overruns. Develop clear assumptions and limitations and set realistic expectations and a solid pathway to delivering quality work successfully.
  • Schedule: Collaborate on the development and maintenance of project schedules to provide for timely resource allocation and delivery. Recommend and assist implementation of schedule delay mitigation measures as needed.  
  • Budget: Develop and collaborate on work breakdown structures and project budgets aligned with scope and schedule. to set a project up for financial success of the project. Manage budget on project to meet financial plan.
  • Quality Management: Create, implement and monitor quality management plans and processes to enhance client trust, minimize deficiencies, incorporate our standards and quality review processes and collaborate with team members to contribute to quality.
  • Change Management: Identify and manage internal and external changes to mitigate risks. Identify and recommend change management, in collaboration with project team, prepare the scope and budget for the change, and gain client endorsement and approval for the change to minimize financial and execution risk to BC. 
  • Risk Management: Ability to identify risks, develop risk mitigation strategies and perform ongoing risk monitoring and mitigation throughout the project lifecycle. Identify and escalate risks, collaborate with teams to prepare mitigation strategies for each risk, monetization of each risk, and update the risk profile on the project throughout the lifecycle of a project.
  • Health & Safety: Lead by example and follow BC policy and client requirements for health and safety. Lead development and implementation of health and safety plans per the project specific requirements.
  • Manage external resources: including third parties/vendors to deliver successfully on their contracted scope, quality and budget
• Delivery of Project and Business Performance Metrics: Lead achievement of project goals related to scope, schedule, budget and quality. Monitor profitability through routine earned value analysis and compliance, business revenue forecasting and timely invoicing/collections. 
• Client Service and Sales/Marketing Support and Engagement: Ability to build successful relationships with Clients, while collaborating with client service managers and project teams to assess client satisfaction. Monitor and share clients’ critical success factors for project success and client satisfaction.
• Flexibility to adapt and execute various additional assignments based on evolving needs.

Mentorship

• Provide mentorship, guidance, support and knowledge-sharing to help less experienced team members develop their skills and grow in their roles.

Skills & Competencies

• In-depth knowledge of products/services and industry, as well as leading edge project management tools and techniques.
• Excellent project planning and management skills, including budget, risk, contract, change and quality management and safety leadership.
• Exceptional business acumen with the ability to make strategic decisions and manage complex projects and how individual projects fit into larger organizational goals.
• Excellent client service skills and ability to build and maintain strong client relationships.
• Excellent team/staff management skills to build and maintain strong project team and staff relationships.
• Proven ability to identify and cultivate opportunities with new or existing clients.

Experience

• Typically, a minimum of 15 years of relevant experience, including successfully managing higher- level complex projects with a record of high revenue responsibility. Specifically:
  • Strong competency in development and monitoring of moderate to complex project schedules
  • Strong competency in development and monitoring of moderate to complex project budgets
  • Strong competency in Risk Management
• Experience collaborating with business leaders and cross functional teams.
• Proven experience in detailed project planning, risk and change management, and contract management of higher-level complex projects.
• Previous experience applying specialized knowledge in project management to deliver solutions for clients.

Education

• A bachelor’s degree in project management, engineering, business administration, or equivalent relevant experience is required.
• Project management certification is required.

Preferred Experience

• Extensive project collaborative delivery experience to be able to assist in developing, implementing a successful collaborative delivery design project management plan, assess design project health, and assist in the development of a recovery plan.
• Excellent client service skills and ability to build and maintain strong client relationships with both Contractors and Owners
• Experience, ability, and eagerness to contribute to the use and continuous improvement of the CDE pricing tools
• DBIA certification or ability to get it within a year is required. DBIA certification is acceptable in lieu of project management certification
• PE is strongly preferred

Salary Range: The anticipated starting pay range for this position is based on the employee’s primary work location and may be more or less depending upon skills, experience, and education.  These ranges may be modified in the future.  

Location A: $144,000 - $196,000

Location B: $158,000 - $216,000

You can view which BC location applies to you here. If you have any questions, please speak with your Recruiter. 

Benefits and Other Compensation:  We provide a comprehensive benefits package that promotes employee health, performance, and success which includes medical, dental, vision, short and long-term disability, life insurance, an employee assistance program, paid time off and parental leave, paid holidays, 401(k) retirement savings plan with employer match, performance-based bonus eligibility, employee referral bonuses, tuition reimbursement, pet insurance and long-term care insurance. Click here to see our full list of benefits. 

About Brown and Caldwell  

Headquartered in Walnut Creek, California, Brown and Caldwell is a full-service environmental engineering and construction services firm with 50 offices and over 2,100 professionals across North America and the Pacific. For more than 75 years, we have created leading-edge environmental solutions for municipalities, private industry, and government agencies. We strive to be the company of choice—to our clients, who benefit from our passion for delivering exceptional quality, and to our employees, present and future, who share our commitment to client service, collaboration, and innovation. Join us, and you will find a home where you can do your best work, reach new levels of expertise, and enjoy exceptional development opportunities. For more information, visit www.brownandcaldwell.com 

This position is subject to a pre-employment background check and a pre-employment drug test.  

Notice to Third Party Agencies: Brown and Caldwell does not accept unsolicited resumes from recruiters or employment agencies. In the event a recruiter or agency submits a resume or candidate without a previously signed agreement and approved engagement request with Brown and Caldwell, Brown and Caldwell reserves the right to pursue and hire those candidate(s) without any financial obligation to the recruiter or agency.   

Brown and Caldwell is proud to be an EEO/AAP Employer. Brown and Caldwell encourages protected veterans, individuals with disabilities, and applicants from all backgrounds to apply. Brown and Caldwell ensures nondiscrimination in all programs and activities in accordance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act.

Equal Opportunity Employer/Protected Veterans/Individuals with Disabilities
This employer is required to notify all applicants of their rights pursuant to federal employment laws. For further information, please review the Know Your Rights notice from the Department of Labor.