Principal Consultant - Green Transition

Ecorys UK; Rotterdam; Hybrid; EUR 150,000 - 210,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Hybrid working policy

Flexible pension scheme

Employee ownership

30 annual leave days

Buy/sell leave days

Opportunity to buy company shares

Job summary

Ecorys seeks a Principal Consultant to lead Green Transition initiatives within the Resilient Economies team in Rotterdam. You will drive acquisitions, manage complex EU contracts, and oversee delivery teams to ensure profitability. The role focuses on energy transition, circular economy, and advisory services for EU clients.

You will collaborate with international partners, develop methodologies, mentor staff, and uphold quality in reporting across initiatives that span EU markets and beyond.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Economics, Energy, Environment, European studies.
• Minimum 10 years of experience leading acquisitions and winning work.
• Experience leading and managing projects in Energy Transition or Circular Economy.
• Experience managing EU contracts and at least 5 MS in the last 10 years.
• Proven track record delivering and winning contracts with EU institutional clients.
• Strong writing, analytical capacity and cross-cutting methodologies.

Responsibilities

• Lead strategic projects in Green Transition (Energy, Circular Economy, advisory services).
• Drive acquisitions, client development and market expansion for the portfolio.
• Manage project delivery teams and ensure profitability targets are met.
• Oversee consortium formation and partner engagement; ensure quality assurance.
• Develop methodologies and budgets; ensure high-quality reporting.

Skills

Project management

Acquisition & bids

Leadership

Energy transition

Circular economy

Stakeholder engagement

English communication

Education

Bachelor's degree in Economics, Energy, Environment or European studies

Job description

Principal Consultant - Green Transition

Department: Resilient Economies

Employment Type: Permanent

Location: Rotterdam, Netherlands

Description

We are looking for a Principal Consultant – Green Transition to join our Resilient Economies team based in our Rotterdam office.

As a key leader within Ecorys, you will play a key role in contributing to sustainable growth of NL business. This role aims to expand the capabilities of Ecorys Netherlands in research and consulting, monitoring and evaluation, and integrated services that address the needs of our clients across the EU market and beyond.

You will play an instrumental role in supporting our Resilient Economies team in winning and delivery of projects aimed primarily at the European Market and cut across International and new client segments. This includes playing a leadership role in acquisition, managing our large-scale contracts, overseeing the project delivery team, lead consortium and partner formation and ensure quality assurance of our reports – specifically methodology development, and budget design. Our proposals are largely focused on Industry, markets, energy transition, circular economy.

You will be responsible for managing our project delivery team and jointly meeting the target of profitability of the portfolio. You will part of the principal team supporting the Sector Leader.

Key Responsibilities

• Project management – Leading key strategic projects in the field of Green Transition (Energy, Circular Economy, Advisory services). Projects span across evaluations, studies, impact assessment or technical assistance. Approximately 50% of your role is delivering projects and overseeing project delivery teams) and 50% of your time will be dedicated to supporting acquisitions and winning work.
• Acquisition and account management – Development and maintenance of existing market (area) and / or products as well as opening / developing new markets and / or products (PMCs) for the portfolio and across the company.
• Networking – You will support the portfolio in strengthening its strategic partnerships and further develop our pool of associates. You will support the Director to strengthen inter-office relationships and work together with them. In particular you will be responsible for: Strategic partnership development, Support network facilitation teams to expand our pool of associates and engage with key partners, universities and offices to build stronger working relationship.
• Expertise and capacity development – You will support the Director to build capacity, expertise both internally and externally.
• Financial Responsibility – You will be responsible for the delivery of the projects and meeting the profitability target for the Resilient Economies team. You will regularly review the projects and ensure projects are implemented efficiently and in line with our commercial guidance.

What you will bring

What we will need from you:

Essential:

• A Bachelor’s degree in a subject relevant to the work areas (Economics, Energy, Environment, European studies) of the Resilient Economies Team
• Minimum 10 years of experience in leading acquisitions and winning work (EU commission, EC services amongst others)
• Experience in leading and managing projects in the field of Energy Transition, Circular Economy, or Sustainability transition within industries with a value of at least EUR 1.5 million.
• Experience in managing projects (contracts of minimum EUR 200k) in the EU and at least 5 MS in the last 10 years
• Successfully led and developed diverse teams
• Built a successful track record of delivering and work-winning (contracts of minimum EUR 800k) from EU institutional clients
• Successfully directed and managed projects including the co-ordination of inputs under matrix management approaches
• Experience in leading teams/line management
• Led the delivery of consultancy and research services to support public sector clients in thematic fields (particularly Greening sectors and the Energy Transition) relevant to Ecorys
• Strong writing and analytical capacity
• Strategic thinking and problem solving
• High level cross cutting expertise in various methodologies research, evaluations and TA
• High levels of Project management experience
• Client and contractor management, negotiation and stakeholder management and networking and stakeholder engagement
• Excellent written and verbal communication in English
• Financial management and accounting particularly commercial know-how in reducing project slippage

Please note that you will not be short-listed if you don’t have 10 years’ experience and project management experience in the EU market with EU DGs. In order to get short-listed please outline in your cover letter how you comply with the requirements.

What we offer

• An international organisation with highly motivated staff
• An organisation motivated to work on key societal challenges
• A large degree of freedom and flexibility
• An organisation that welcomes new ideas
• A salary based on your background and experience
• An excellent and flexible pension scheme
• We are employee owned and offer the opportunity to buy company shares
• 30 annual leave days and possibility to buy and sell leave days
• A hybrid working policy with flexibility to work from home and from elsewhere