Senior Planner - AMP8 Water

Arcadis; Greater London; On-site; GBP 60,000 - 80,000; Full time

Job summary

Arcadis is seeking a Senior Planning Engineer to lead planning capabilities for major AMP8 water programmes in Greater London. This role requires a strong background in project planning, scheduling, and the ability to manage resources effectively.

The ideal candidate will have experience in the water sector or complex infrastructure, proficiency in planning software, and excellent communication skills. Join Arcadis to contribute to impactful infrastructure projects aimed at improving quality of life.

Qualifications

• Sufficient years’ experience in project planning and scheduling, ideally within the water sector.
• Strong understanding of UK infrastructure delivery contexts.
• Proven ability to lead and develop teams in a fast-paced environment.

Responsibilities

• Lead planning capabilities for major AMP8 water programmes.
• Design and implement new planning processes to standardise delivery.
• Produce timely reports on schedule performance and resource utilisation.

Skills

Project planning and scheduling

Communication skills

Team leadership

Organisational skills

Planning software proficiency (Safran, Primavera P6, MS Project)

Education

Degree/HNC/HND in Engineering, Project Management, or related subject

Tools

Safran

Primavera P6

MS Project

Job description

Overview

Arcadis is the world's leading company delivering sustainable design, engineering, and consultancy solutions for natural and built assets. We are more than 34,000 people, in over 30 countries, dedicated to improving quality of life. Everyone has an important role to play. With the power of many curious minds, together we can solve the world’s most complex challenges and deliver more impact together.

The Arcadis Water Optimisation team delivers AMP8 Water projects across our clients’ portfolios within clean and wastewater schemes within infrastructure & non-infrastructure. This strategic role will develop and implement robust planning governance, processes, and systems; integrate programme schedules; and drive continuous improvement in delivery performance. Our Programme & Project Management team seeks an experienced Senior Planning Engineer to join as a leader who will build and mature our planning capability while providing hands-on planning leadership for major delivery across the Water sector. In this role, you will provide expert advice to project teams and senior leadership on earned value management, resource requirements, programme risks, performance reporting, and outturn cost forecasting. You will collaborate with portfolio leads, discipline leads, and business stakeholders to optimise resource forecasting, align plans with delivery capabilities, and strengthen financial and schedule control. You will also support tendering activities by delivering comprehensive programme inputs, resourcing strategies, and cost forecast data that improve bid accuracy and deliverability. Your leadership will be critical in maturing planning capability, enhancing predictability, and enabling the successful delivery of complex resilience infrastructure programmes.

Role responsibilities

• Leading on planning capabilities that support major AMP8 water programmes, defining roles, standards and capability uplift.
• Design, implement and embed new planning processes, procedures and tools to standardise delivery across tender, project and portfolio levels.
• Own integrated baseline programmes, WBS and schedule hierarchies, ensuring alignment with scope, milestones, regulatory requirements and client expectations.
• Oversee schedule health checks, earned value analysis and variance management; drive recovery, contingency and re-forecast actions as required.
• Produce and present timely reports on schedule performance, earned value, resource utilisation and outturn cost forecasts to inform senior leadership decisions.
• Provide strategic input to tender programmes, including programme assumptions, resource plans, risk assessments and cost forecast data to improve bid deliverability.
• Maintain portfolio-level resource forecasts and capacity plans to support business unit resourcing strategy and recruitment priorities.
• Embed planning governance, data integrity and configuration control in planning systems; assure compliance with standards and auditable baselines.
• Facilitate integrated planning and risk workshops to identify programme risks, opportunities and mitigation measures, escalating critical issues to leadership.
• Drive continuous improvement and digital adoption in planning and reporting to enhance predictability, efficiency and decision support across the business.

Qualifications & Experience

• Essential: Sufficient years’ experience in project planning and scheduling, ideally within the water sector but open to complex infrastructure sector.
• Degree/HNC/HND in Engineering, Project Management, or a related subject.
• Strong understanding of UK infrastructure delivery contexts, including governance, regulatory and stakeholder requirements across the environment sector and local authorities.
• Proven ability to lead and develop teams in a fast-paced environment.
• Proficient in planning software (e.g., Safran, Primavera P6, MS Project).
• Excellent organisational, commercial, and communication skills.
• Experience with project controls, cost engineering, and financial operations.
• Familiarity with different contracting environments and commercial models.