Area Operations Manager London, England
Job description
Who are we?
Thames Water is the UK’s largest water and wastewater company. We make a daily difference to our 15 million customers by supplying 2.6 billion litres of water through 32,000 km of pipes, keeping taps flowing and toilets flushing.
At Thames Water, every one of our actions, big and small, matters every day. Water is essential to life, so our business is always open.
About the role:
This is a high-profile operational role, responsible for leading a team of wastewater network operations and planning specialists, as well as the front-line field engineers, to ensure the delivery of wastewater services to our customers, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
This is an exciting opportunity for an individual to lead a dynamic operational team with a direct impact on Thames Water’s performance in several key areas. Accordingly, the role encompasses a wide-ranging remit, making each day different from the last and posing a unique challenge.
What will this role involve?
- Manage a team of experienced operations and planning specialists, who are responsible for the day-to-day operation of the wastewater network services for one of the most diverse operational regions within Thames Water’s catchment area.
- Delivery of stretching area performance targets, each with a direct link to top-level company performance, such as pollutions, sewer flooding and customer service.
- Driving an industry leading Health and Safety performance culture. Keeping the front-line workforce safe through the elimination of lagging indicators (incidents, near misses, etc) and championing health and safety behaviour and policies through site audits, inspections and safety observations.
- Control of a multi-£million TOTEX budget: ensuring efficient delivery of regional services by keeping OPEX spend within budgets and the correct prioritisation of risk to direct CAPEX spend to areas of most need.
- Working collaboratively with the WNS contract holder’s regional representatives to ensure a positive working environment that prioritises the customer. Drive high productivity, and the effective delivery of Thames Water’s ODI metrics at a local level.
- Dynamic working environment. Responding to high profile operational events that have the potential to significantly impact our customers, or the natural environment.
What skills are we looking for?
- You will possess excellent leadership experience, engagement, capability and vision.
- Experience in leading a team through a significant period of change.
- Previous experience in managing contractor relationships.
- Proven track record of delivering and driving a culture change, and in developing a high performance and customer focussed culture.
- Experience of working within a regulated environment.
- A NEBOSH qualification is desirable, as is knowledge of the New Roads and Streetworks act.
- A full clean driving licence is essential.
What’s in it for you:
Our competitive salary package includes an excellent contributory pension, 26 days holiday per year increasing to 30 with length of service and a wider benefits scheme. This includes an annual pay review, season ticket loans, voucher scheme giving you money off in major retail outlets, loyalty awards for continuous service plus much more, including our referral scheme, where you can receive £750 for helping someone get a permanent position within the company.
We’re also proud to be here for our local community, offering everyone two days paid volunteer leave a year, as well as proudly supporting a lot of local events and charities.
Click here to find out more about working at Thames Water
Why Thames Water?
Thames Water is the UK's biggest water and sewerage company. We provide the essential service at the heart of daily life, health, and enjoyment to 14 million customers across London and the Thames Valley.
On a typical day, we supply 2.6 billion litres of top-quality drinking water, and our 350 sewage treatment works treat more than 4.2bn litres of wastewater. Our 85,000 miles of water mains and sewers would wrap around the world three-and-a-half times.
We have an amazing history but are equally excited by the future. We already self-generate enough electricity to power a city the size of Oxford, but by 2020 we expect 20 percent of our power will come from sewage. We also built the UK's first sewage recycling plant on the Olympic Park and understand the importance of speaking to our youngest customers by visiting them at school.
We will not compromise on standards which is why we carry out more than 400,000 tests per year on our drinking water. We continue to invest, and this year will be spending more than £1 billion to improve our network and infrastructure - our pipes, sewage treatment and clean water treatment plants, which are some of the biggest and most advanced in Europe.
Above all this, Thames Water values its staff as number one. The enormous scale of our work means we must recruit and develop only the most talented candidates. Are you up to the challenge?
Disclaimer: due to the high volume of applications we receive, we may close a vacancy earlier than the advertised date. This is so we can manage all the applications properly and give candidates a positive experience. Once closed, we can’t consider any further applications, so please submit your application as soon as possible to avoid disappointment.
