Programme / Project Controls Manager

AWE plc; United States; Remote; USD 67,000 - 105,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

9-day fortnight

270 hours annual leave

Pension scheme 9-13%

Maternity/Paternity leave

Job summary

AWE is seeking a senior Project Controls Manager to lead cost, budget, planning and estimating within the Future Material Campus programme. You will head multi-functional controls teams, collaborate with project managers and procurement to secure delivery, and influence stakeholders to ensure effective controls and timely progress.

This role supports national infrastructure and defence programmes, with a focus on schedule predictability, risk management and change control.

Qualifications

• Professionally qualified with chartered or equivalent status.
• Experience in project controls on major construction/defence projects.
• Proven ability to mentor a multi-functional controls team.

Responsibilities

• Manage risk, schedule, cost, and change control for complex projects.
• Lead multi-functional project controls teams and coordinate with PMs and procurement.
• Influence and negotiate with stakeholders to ensure baseline sign-off and progress visibility.

Skills

Project Controls

Cost management

Planning

Estimating

Stakeholder influence

Education

Chartered status or equivalent

Tools

Primavera (P6)

Power BI

Excel

Job description

Location: RG7 4PR, located between Reading and Basingstoke.

Some of our corporate functions will be moving to Reading Green Park towards the end of 2026, this will be discussed with you during your recruitment journey.

Salary range starts at: £49,830 up to £78,770.

Working pattern: AWE operates a 9-day working fortnight. You will be required to attend site up to 3 days per week.

Closing Date: 30th November 2026

Ready to play your part?

At AWE, it’s not just a job, it’s far more than that. Our shared purpose is to help keep the nation safe.

Why This Role is Exciting:

As a Project Controls Manager at the Future Material Campus, you'll be part of a team working on one of the UK's most complex infrastructure programmes. This role is crucial to national security, and you'll be joining at a pivotal moment as the UK government invests significantly in improving our infrastructure.

Who are we looking for?

We are looking for someone with a high level of experience of Project Controls including cost, budget, planning and estimating to join our Project Controls team at AWE Nuclear Security Technologies. In this role, you'll lead multi-functional Project Controls teams. You'll collaborate with Project Managers and Supply Chain to ensure the delivery of our projects and programmes. Your ability to engage, negotiate, and influence people across the business will be key to ensuring effective controls are in place to monitor progress, manage issues, and mitigate slippage.

A typical day could look like this:

• Managing risk, including ownership of qualitative and quantitative assessments to schedule predictability and cost.
• Influencing and supporting project managers and procurement to ensure schedule momentum and cash flow KPIs.
• Role modelling best practice in conceptual estimating, funding stage gates, basic contingency principles and procurement principles.
• Coordinating and facilitating planning sessions and workshops to compile the master project/programme schedule baseline, ensuring an achievable duration.
• Utilising your expertise in procurement schedules to create achievable lead times within the schedule.
• Prioritising materials and equipment orders to meet scheduled install dates.
• Influencing key stakeholders to facilitate sign-off of baseline and encouraging visibility of regular progress updates.
• Introducing robust change processes, ensuring schedules, interfaces, cost, risk, and changes are managed appropriately.
• Owning the change management process and workflow.
• Highlighting trends and root causes of deviations against the baseline using lead and lag indicators and reporting effective remedial actions.

We do need you to have the following:

• Professionally qualified with chartered or equivalent status
• Success in a Project Controls environment on a major construction project
• Delivering Controls in a major project/ programme environment, ideally within Defence, Life Sciences, Pharma, R&D facilities, Industrial, Manufacturing, Distribution & Logistics sectors
• Mentoring and developing a multi-functional controls team
• Meeting project deadlines
• Adept with controls/ general software applications such as Primavera (P6), Power BI, Excel
• Insight into engineering, procurement, contracts, construction processes
• Knowledge of engineering and construction management
• Development of project controls processes

Work hard, be rewarded:

• 9-day working fortnight – meaning you get every other Friday off work, in addition to 270 hours of annual leave.
• Market leading contributory pension scheme (we will pay between 9% and 13% of your pensionable pay depending on your contributions).
• Family friendly policies: Maternity Leave - 39 Weeks Full Pay and Paternity Leave - 4 Weeks Full Pay.
• Opportunities for Professional Career Development including funding for annual membership of a relevant professional body.
• Life Assurance (4 x annual salary).

The 'Working at AWE' page on our website is where you can find full details in the 'AWE Benefits Guide'.

#LI-SW

We are at the start of a once in a generation – possibly two generations – programme to design and produce a replacement warhead for the UK’s continuous at sea deterrent. We will do this while continuing to deliver the Trident programme as well as managing ambitious state‑of‑the‑art capital and construction projects – some of which have never been done before. Find out more on our website.