Senior Project Manager - Higher Education

Senior Project Manager with experience of managing strategic projects across the full project lifecycle, ideally within the Higher Education sector or similarly complex environment is required to work with our Higher Education client to realise their long term strategy.

The role represents an opportunity to work for an innovative and industry-focused Higher Education institution that is embarking on an ambitious period of strategic growth to deliver an exceptional student experience.

The Senior Project Manager will play a pivotal role in delivering ambitious projects that drive our client’s strategic growth. Initially focusing on estates and IT, you will ensure projects are managed from inception to completion on time, within budget, and achieving their intended impact. The Senior Project Manager will be responsible for leading a variety of projects across estates, technology, business change, and academic/student-based projects.

Senior Project Manager - Higher Education - Essential Experience

• Extensive experience as a project manager delivering projects across Higher Education or equivalent complex environments (Public sector, government, NHS, charity, or third sector).
• Broad project experience, it's not an IT Project Manager role, experience of supporting business change, strategy, academic, student engagement, and/or other projects.
• Full lifecycle project management experience including (business case development, approval, delivery, resource allocation, budget, and risk management).
• Experience of successfully delivering multiple high-profile projects simultaneously across a range of functional operations.
• Skills in identifying and managing risks, issues, and dependencies.
• Experience of managing projects through change controls and stage gate including business case approval, technical design authority, change advisory, service transition, and benefits realisation.
• Experience of managing high-value project budgets (Circa £2M +), defining KPIs, and evidence benefits realisation quantitatively.
• Ability to utilise data and other evidence to inform project scope and objectives.
• Project Management qualification or experience with Prince 2, MSP, APM, or similar.
• Experience of applying project management qualifications/methodologies to deliver complex projects.
• Excellent working knowledge of Microsoft applications (Ms Excel, PowerPoint, Word, Teams, SharePoint).
• Excellent stakeholder management skills with the abilities to work collaboratively with senior stakeholders across multiple business functions to ensure all inputs are incorporated.
• Strong communication skills to communicate project progress through concise reporting whilst maintaining effective relationships with academic, operational, and senior/executive management stakeholders.
• Broad project experience across all functional operations and services, not limited to digital or technology.