Project and Industry Engagement Manager

at  University of Glasgow

JOB PURPOSE

The University of Glasgow is co-leading a consortium of seven universities, supporting the formation of a new national research centred funded by a significant UKRI and stakeholder co-investment for a 5-year and £45M programme of challenge-led research into digital twinning for transport decarbonisation. Such an ambitious research programme demands a significant project management team, led by the Hub Manager, with support from two project and industrial engagement managers (PIEMs). The Research Hub is led by Heriot-Watt University, and the support team of seven roles is based principally in Heriot-Watt, with one PIEM based at the University of Glasgow. All support roles report directly to the Hub Manager, who sits on the Executive Team of the Research Hub. The PIEMs will manage research teams comprised of researchers from all of the institutional partners, working in close collaboration.
The research builds on highly successful consultation which explored transport decarbonisation and mode integration. This new national research hub will be responsible for delivering new knowledge, technical capabilities and policy advisement relating to UK transport decarbonisation priorities. This highly ambitious programme of research is supported by over 65 industrial, research and stakeholder organisations.
The PIEM will direct the delivery of work packages and demonstration models across the consortium (all academic and industry partners) and maximise the contribution of the significant industrial resource committed to this work. It requires strong experience in project management and industrial engagement. This is an exciting opportunity to deliver a complex and transformative research programme to rapidly advance the decarbonisation of transport, building strong industrial and policy networks.

MAIN DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

1. Responsible for the management and reporting of research work packages and demonstrators across all academic and industrial partners. This includes managing timelines, action logs, identifying key milestones and project work plans, maintenance of risk registers and ensuring that deadlines and deliverables are achieved.
2. Challenge Led Demonstrator projects (CLDs) will be jointly led by two academic leaders with the PIEM, using agile approaches to deliver transport mode focussed digital twins and inter-modal transport models.
3. Work Packages (WP) will have academic leadership, with PIEM support to manage the resourcing and delivery of research outputs over the programme.
4. PIEMs will be responsible for co-ordinating activity across WPs and CLDs to ensure that programme interdependencies are respected.
5. Responsible for maintaining risk registers for WPs and CLDs and managing the mitigation of risks, particularly those that impact the programme / other WPs or CLDs.
6. Responsible for maintenance of performance dashboards and KPI reporting.
7. Responsible for updating of project plans.
8. Resource and financial reporting.
9. Key industrial partners have committed in-kind resources to the development of CLDs, and the PIEM is responsible for ensuring timely and effective industrial engagement in the research activities and effective communications with all stakeholders including consultation and management of expectations. PIEM is also responsible for the maintenance of an engagement register for weekly reporting to PM team.
10. The programme outputs are expected to inform policy internationally, nationally and locally in diverse domains (transport modes, energy, digital security, etc.) The PIEMs will support engagement with policy communities through reporting to the TransiT Policy Advisory Board and through a range of bilateral engagements informing the research activity.
11. Proactively manage engagement with related research hubs to ensure cross-learning and complementarity of research messages.
12. Preparation of monthly operations reports (progress reports, risk registers, engagement logs) for all WPS and CLDs.
13. Preparation of reports for Transit Executive Team (quarterly) and Advisory Board (bi-annually).
14. Identify and resolve of a wide variety of complex issues using specialist knowledge and a high degree of initiative.
15. Assess critical situations accurately and use judgement to quickly make decisions.
16. Undertake other relevant duties commensurate with the role.