Job Description
Job title: Bid Manager
Location: Crawley, Reading or Bristol - hybrid working arrangement (3 days per week in the office vs. 2 days from home)
The Opportunity:
Are you an experienced Bid Manager who enjoys team collaboration and problem solving? Are you looking for your next opportunity with excellent learning and exposure prospects, working on a wide range of bids across the company? At Thales we offer a great opportunity to use your talents and experience to lead and deliver high value, varied bids within a high performing bid organisation.
What the role has to offer:
* The opportunity to work within one of Thales UK’s fastest growing and highest profile organisations, with excellent opportunities to raise your profile and broaden your network.
* The opportunity to work across multiple Thales National Entities, gain experience of a wide variety of product lines and their integration to support the capability development of Navies around the world.
* Full representation and accountability for leading large, complex bids
* An opportunity to develop and promote Thales bid competitiveness internally as well as externally (customers and consortia)
* Allows you to be instrumental in driving the transformational change that will lead Thales into an exciting future.
* Working with a high performing team who will support your learning and development
* Hybrid working (3 days in the office / 2 days from home)
Core Benefits:
On offer is a competitive salary and benefits package, which includes;
* Performance-related bonus
* Half day every Friday
* 28 days annual leave (plus bank holidays) plus opportunity to buy up to 40 hours/year (pro rata)
* 24 hours paid volunteering
* Private healthcare (grade dependent)
* Pension scheme
* Life cover
* 24/7 Employee Assistance Program and access to mental wellbeing app
* Employee discount shopping schemes on major brands and retailers
* Gym membership discounts
Key responsibilities:
* Embedding a strong sense of delivery accountability and a proactive risk and opportunity management culture (for both ‘winability’ and ‘deliverability’) at all levels of the Bid team
* Creating and controlling the Bid schedule and resource plan; leading and coordinating multi-disciplinary teams to achieve key milestones and on time proposal submissions while adhering to Thales processes.
* Coordination of proposal development, including the use of colour reviews as appropriate
* Establishing and controlling the requirements baseline (technical and non-technical), including compliance traceability, allocation to Work Packages and the end to end estimating process
* Ensuring the creation of robust Initial Project Baselines for delivery post-contract award
* Tailoring and application of Bid Governance, including Bid Stage Gates, Bid Reviews and Project Characterisation
* Coordination and control of the Master Assumptions, Dependencies and Exclusions List (MADEL),
* Ensuring appropriate focus on cash management and achieving a positive net cash profile associated with the Initial Project baseline
* Promoting and enabling left-shifting E.g. solutions options and selection, Make/Team/Buy decisions, Project execution strategies
* Leading and coordinating PQQ responses, including reviews, governance and final sign-off
About you:
* A proven track record of leading successful multi-entity high value and strategic bids
* Familiarity with best practice including Shipley process.
* Experience in leading, motivating and influencing multi-disciplinary and international teams
* Experience managing internal stakeholders and customer/supplier/partner relationships
* A proactive, can-do attitude to seek out solutions and maximise customer value
* Experience constructing compelling proposals and/or solutions that meet customer needs
* Efficiently applying formal bid gate reviews, ensuring that business risk is appropriately managed
* Experience working in a complex, multi-site and international organisation
* A willingness to travel to customer sites, both in the UK and abroad.