Senior Project Manager (Prosperity Partnership) - School of Metallurgy and Materials - 103041 -[...]

University of Birmingham; Coventry; On-site; GBP 47,000 - 57,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading university in the UK seeks a Senior Project Manager to oversee a large EPSRC funded project at the High Temperature Research Centre. Responsibilities include strategic direction, day-to-day operational management, and financial oversight of the project. The ideal candidate will have significant project management experience, a relevant degree, and strong engagement skills. The role offers a full time, fixed term contract with competitive salary and benefits, promoting a diverse and inclusive workplace.

Benefits

40 days paid holiday

Occupational sick pay

Pension scheme

Development opportunities

Qualifications

• Significant experience in programme/project management for large and complex projects.
• Substantial experience managing large financial budgets.
• Proven ability to meet targets with minimal supervision.

Responsibilities

• Manage a large EPSRC funded project within HTRC.
• Ensure project delivers in line with its objectives.
• Coordinate financial monitoring and reporting.

Skills

Project management

Budget management

Stakeholder engagement

Analytical skills

Communication skills

Education

Relevant degree or equivalent qualification

Formal Project Management qualifications (APMP, Prince2, MSP)

Tools

MS Office Suite

Job description

Position Details

School of Metallurgy and Materials, College of Engineering and Physical Sciences

Location: High Temperature Research Centre, Coventry, UK

Full time starting salary is normally in the range £47,389 to £56,535 with potential progression once in post to £63,606

Grade: 8

Part Time (18.75 hours per week)

Fixed Term contract up to May 2028

Closing date: 4th January 2026

Our offer to you

People are at the heart of what we are and do.

The University of Birmingham is proud to have been a part of the City of Birmingham and the wider region for over 100 years, andweare equally proud to be recognised as a leading global university.We want to attract talented people from across the city and beyond, support them to succeed, and celebrate their success.

We are committed to helping the people who work here todevelopthrough our sector-leading Birmingham Professional programmewhichprovides allprofessionalservices staff with development opportunities and the encouragement to reach their full potential.With almost 5,000professionalservices jobs in a wide-range of functionsin Edgbaston andin our campus inDubai, there are plenty of opportunities foryou to be able to develop yourcareer at the University.

We believe there is no such thing as a typical member of staff and that diversity is a source of strength that underpins the exchange of ideas, innovation, and debate.We warmly welcome people from all backgrounds and are committed to fostering an inclusive environment where diversity is at the heart of who and what we are,and how we work.

Supporting our people to achieve a healthy work/life balance is important both to our employees andtothe success of the University and, depending on the role, we offer avarietyof flexible working arrangements. We therefore welcome discussions on all forms of flexible working.In addition, you will receive a generous package of benefits including 40 dayspaid holidaya year, one paid day a year for volunteering, occupational sick pay, and a pension scheme. We also have three high quality subsidised day nurseries.

The University is situated in leafy Edgbaston and there are excellent transport links to our beautiful campus, including main bus routes and a train station on site.On campus we have a state-of-the- art sports centre with pool, shops,places to eat and drink,our own art gallery, museum and botanical gardens.

Find out more about the benefits of working for the Universityof Birmingham

Background

The High Temperature Research Centre (HTRC) is a research partnership between the University of Birmingham and Rolls-Royce plc.Funded in 2012 and operational in 2016 the Centre is at the forefront of research in to manufacturing of nickel superalloy single crystals and related enabling technologies. Research projects span early stage discovery through development and maturing of technology and manufacturing capability and direct impact within Rolls-Royce’s manufacturing facilities.The Centre trains the manufacturing and technical specialists and leaders of the future.The excellence of the research partnership between the University and Rolls-Royce plc was recognised by the Royal Academy of Engineering’s recent presentation of the Bhattacharyya Award (2022) and Queen’s Anniversary Prize (2023).

HTRC is a dual site facility; laboratories focusing on low technology readiness level research are located in the School of Metallurgy and Materials at the Edgbaston campus and large scale research facilities at Ansty Park, Coventry.

The HTRC recently secured an EPSRC Prosperity Partnership grant on Advanced Research in to Crystal Anisotropy and Nucleation effects in nickel superalloys (ARCANE).This large 5 year, £11M, Birmingham led project with Rolls-Royce plc, University of Oxford and University of Greenwich has five research work packages alongside an overarching data science and artificial intelligence strand.

We are seeking to appoint Senior Project Manager to support the Principal Investigator with management and delivery of the ARCANE project.

Role Summary

The Arcane Senior Project Manager will have the remit of managing the EPSRC funded project within HTRC based at the University of Birmingham’s facility at Ansty. Within this capacity the job will provide strategic direction and management to ensure the project delivers in line with its objectives. The Senior Project Manager will work directly with the HTRC Director for delivery of all aspects of this project and be line managed by the Deputy Director of Operations for EPS College at UoB.Through collaboration, the aim is to manage and support the delivery of five work packages and data science workstreams.

As Manager for the project, the post holder will be responsible for day to day operational management of the project, robust financial monitoring and the successful delivery of contracted outputs. The task will necessitate co-ordinating and managing the efforts of staff involved in all aspects of project delivery.

The Senior Project Manager will be responsible for ensuring that all funder requirements for reporting and auditing are met for the duration of the project and will also be responsible to the Project Director for reporting progress on the projects, and for alerting senior management to any major potential threats to project delivery. The Senior Project Manager will be required to ensure that all aspects of project delivery are completed in line with University policies. The Senior Project Manager will also have responsibility of submitting final reports/claims to the funder and Project Closure for the contractual obligations which will conclude in May 2028.

Main Duties

Project Delivery

Responsible for managing a large project.This will include the following:

• Leading on the management of the project, including influencing and developing complex project plans.
• Creating and maintaining an overall project management plan for the whole project using project management principles.
• Identifying objectives and indicators of success and delivering contractual obligations.
• Planning, organising and maintaining a regular schedule of project meetings and ensuring sufficient engagement by all relevant stakeholders to the project.
• Establish effective networking relationships with all stakeholders.
• Setting up, managing and monitoring a granular budget for the project.
• Co-ordinate and collate output evidence.
• Delivering project outputs on time, to budget and to the agreed quality standard.

Budget management, monitoring and reporting

• Ensure records are maintained of expenditure, planned expenditure profiles, and cash flow to ensure that the full project value can be recovered from funders.
• Ensure that suitable records of all allowable costs are maintained by the University of Birmingham.
• Provide leadership and expertise to colleagues regarding the maintenance of accurate records of expenditure and allowable costs.
• Communicate and where appropriate determine and delegate budgets to key task managers.
• Ensure appropriate monitoring, control and audit of all project expenditure within the University.
• Approve expenditure in line with delegations and the project budget, escalating decisions on any novel contentious issues to the Project Director.
• Grants – ensure all grant reimbursement to beneficiaries / recipients of funding from the university is set up and processed in line with university policy and grant award.
• Provide financial reports to the project funder and to the Project Management Board at least quarterly, and more frequently if expenditure materially deviates from the plan in the proposal.

Monitoring, evaluation and communication

• Develop and implement a comprehensive evaluation strategy for the project.
• Establish and implement reporting procedures which meet requirements, and ensure all necessary data is gathered in a timely and efficient manner.
• Analyse data to determine if it is fit for purpose, and take appropriate action to ensure data quality.
• Develop reporting mechanisms for the project then report on project progress to the ARCANE Management Group and highlight any risks.
• Maintain a risk register and communicate risks in a timely manner, proactively proposing solutions.
• Engage and communicate with a variety of stakeholders to ensure progress but also to disseminate outputs of the project.
• Coordinates and organises strategic governance meetings including ARCANE Steering Board and Advisory Board meetings, producing progress reports for key stakeholders including EPSRC.
• Supports the PI in oversight of project delivery through attending short term meetings (task reporting and tracking, finance and contracts, staff and student recruitment, IP register and risk register updates, updating project plan), medium term (capturing impacts, coordination with Steering Board and Advisory Board, annual conference planning, finance planning and forecasting, third party opportunities, research funding opportunities, technical reports) and long term (reports to EPSRC, Advisory Board, mid‑term review).

People management and Research Culture

• Line manage (where appropriate), ensuring relevant targets and goals are achieved within resource constraints.
• Create a motivating and collaborative ARCANE project environment where staff are encouraged and supported to achieve outstanding research outputs and impacts.
• Identify appropriate opportunities for development and change and encourage other team members to do the same.
• Maintain the ARCANE website as an external portal for communication of research.
• Supports day to day needs of ARCANE research students.

General

• Actively manages equality, diversity and inclusion through monitoring and evaluation and actively challenging unacceptable behaviour.
• Supports the University’s sustainability agenda through resource efficient working.
• Any other duties commensurate with the grade.

Required Knowledge, Skills, Qualifications, Experience

• Relevant degree or relevant equivalent professional qualification, plus significant programme/project management experience (in increasingly large and/or complex projects) or substantial relevant experience evidencing the experience required in this role.
• Formal Project Management qualifications such as APMP, Prince2 or MSP preferred.
• Substantial experience of managing large financial budgets along with experience of budget planning, forecasting and monitoring.
• Technical reporting.
• Substantial experience of financial policies and processes.
• Authoritative knowledge of the work practices, processes and procedures relevant to the role, including broader sector/commercial awareness.
• Evidence of literacy and numeracy, with the ability to write clearly for a variety of audiences, and to produce and analyse source material, information and data.
• Proven ability to meet targets, with minimal supervision to deadlines.
• Substantial experience of engaging, and collaborating, with internal and external stakeholders.
• Proven analytical and problem solving skills that will help to identify and implement improvements and efficiencies across the project or projects you work on.
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills, with the ability to influence and negotiate effectively with a range of stakeholders.
• Highly proficient IT skills, including the MS Office suite. You should be confident and able to quickly learn new IT skills and software packages as required.
• Excellent people management skills, with proven experience of leading, motivating and managing teams.
• High level of self‑motivation and personal accountability with ability to plan and deliver goals to deadlines under pressure.
• Ability to monitor and evaluate the extent to which equality and diversity legislation, policies, procedures are applied.
• Ability to identify issues with the potential to impact on protected groups and take appropriate action.
• Experience of championing Equality, Diversity and Inclusion in own work area.
• Ability to monitor and evaluate the extent to which equality and diversity legislation, policies, procedures are applied.
• Ability to identify issues with the potential to impact on protected groups and take appropriate action.

DBS required

The University is committed to safeguarding and we promote safe recruitment practice, therefore all associated pre‑employment checks will be undertaken before any appointment is confirmed.Due to the nature of the work undertaken in this role all successful applicants will be subject to a satisfactory DBS clearance prior to appointment.

BPSS Required

Due to the nature of the work undertaken in this role, all successful applicants will be subject to a BPSS check prior to appointment.

Informal enquiries to Gareth Pugh, email: [e-mail]

View our staff values and behaviours here

Use of AI in applications

We want to understand your genuine interest in the role and for the written elements of your application to accurately reflect your own communication style. Applications that rely too heavily on AI tools can appear generic and lack the detail we need to assess your skills and experience. Such applications will unlikely be progressed to interview.

We believe there is no such thing as a 'typical' member of University of Birmingham staff and that diversity in its many forms is a strength that underpins the exchange of ideas, innovation and debate at the heart of University life. We are committed to proactively addressing the barriers experienced by some groups in our community and are proud to hold Athena SWAN, Race Equality Charter and Disability Confident accreditations. We have an Equality Diversity and Inclusion Centre that focuses on continuously improving the University as a fair and inclusive place to work where everyone has the opportunity to succeed. We are also committed to sustainability, which is a key part of our strategy. You can find out more about our work to create a fairer university for everyone on our website.