Overview
Job type: Permanent, full-time (with flexible working options available)
Job location: Edinburgh (Hybrid)
Direct reports: None
We are seeking a Principal Consultant with significant Financial Services experience to lead the design and delivery of complex technology- and AI-enabled client engagements focused on improving processes and customer experiences.
This is not about incremental improvement or building faster horses - it's about helping our clients engage with the art of the possible, guiding them through the policy, process, business, and technology changes needed to realise genuine commercial impact.
This is a senior, client-facing role suited to someone with 8+ years' experience in consulting or impact-led transformation. You must be comfortable operating with senior stakeholders, shaping solutions, and taking accountability for both delivery and commercial outcomes.
As Principal Consultant, you will play a key role in bridging user and business needs with implementable technology capabilities (including data, automation, and AI), coordinating delivery across internal teams - including human-centred designers - and multiple external technology partners. The role combines advisory, delivery leadership, and commercial responsibility.
This role is based in our Edinburgh office, with an expectation of regular in-office presence to support collaboration with colleagues and clients.
Key responsibilities
Client & Stakeholder Management
Build and maintain trusted relationships with senior client stakeholders (Director / VP / C-suite level).
Act as primary point of contact for clients, owning day-to-day engagement management and senior-level escalations.
Lead workshops and stakeholder discussions to understand client challenges, strategic objectives, and regulatory constraints.
Help clients see beyond current-state limitations to engage with what's genuinely possible with available technology.
Provide clear, confident advice and challenge clients constructively to achieve better outcomes.
Lead the definition and design of the business target-state that reimagine how work gets done - not just optimise existing processes.
Help clients understand the art of the possible, translating existing and emerging technology capabilities into practical opportunities for their business.
Work closely with human-centred designers and client subject matter experts to fundamentally rethink customer and colleague experiences.
Navigate and shape end-to-end change across policy, process, organisation, and technology.
Build compelling business cases that articulate genuine commercial impact, including (but not limited to) efficiency savings.
Develop target operating models, roadmaps, and delivery plans that connect vision to value realisation.
Delivery Leadership
Plan, manage, and oversee end-to-end delivery, ensuring scope, time, cost, quality, and risk objectives are met.
Coordinate and integrate the work of multiple technology vendors alongside internal design and delivery teams.
Guide clients through the interconnected policy, process, and technology changes required to realise benefits.
Take accountability for delivery outcomes across multiple workstreams and delivery teams.
Establish and maintain effective delivery governance, reporting, and controls.
Proactively identify delivery risks and issues, driving mitigation and resolution.
Lead technology- and AI-enabled delivery teams, ensuring solutions are implemented responsibly and effectively whilst prioritising business outcomes.
Take commercial accountability for client engagements, including budget ownership, forecasting, and margin management.
Develop and manage engagement financial plans, ensuring delivery remains within agreed commercial parameters.
Monitor financial performance throughout the engagement lifecycle and proactively manage risks to revenue, cost, and margin.
Work closely with finance and leadership teams to provide accurate financial reporting and forward-looking forecasts.
Manage contract scope, change control, and commercial discussions with clients and delivery partners.
Lead, mentor, and manage teams of consultants, including both permanent staff and contractors.
Set clear objectives, expectations, and delivery standards for team members.
Support the development, coaching, and performance management of junior consultants
Foster a collaborative, inclusive, and high-performance team culture.
Manage and coordinate multiple third-party technology vendors across concurrent workstreams.
Ensure effective collaboration between internal human-centred design teams and external technology partners.
Hold partners accountable for delivery commitments, outcomes, and quality standards.
Manage commercial and delivery relationships to ensure successful project outcomes.
Business Development & Account Growth
Support and, where appropriate, lead proposal development, bids, and responses to client opportunities.
Identify and shape opportunities for follow-on work and account growth within existing clients.
Work with account leads and leadership to develop account strategies and long term growth plans.
Contribute to compelling value propositions, solution approaches, and pricing models.
Build and maintain strong internal and external networks to support business development.
Apply deep knowledge of Financial Services domains (e.g. banking, insurance, wealth, capital markets, payments, or regulatory change).
Understand FS regulatory environments, risk, compliance, and governance requirements.
Use industry knowledge to provide informed, pragmatic advice and shape credible delivery approaches.
Who we're looking for
8+ years' professional experience in consulting, advisory, or technology enabled organisations.
Prior consulting experience, ideally within a Big 4 consultancy.
Significant experience delivering projects within the Financial Services sector.
Proven ability to help clients think beyond incremental improvement to genuine transformation.
Experience designing and delivering systemic solutions that span policy, process, organisational, and technology change.
Demonstrated ability to coordinate multiple technology vendors and integrate their work with internal delivery teams.
Strong experience planning and managing project delivery across multi-disciplinary teams, including human-centred designers.
Proven experience managing senior stakeholders and executive level clients.
Experience leading and managing teams of consultants, including contractors.
Strong commercial acumen, including budget ownership, forecasting, and margin management.
Solid understanding of modern technology, data, automation, and AI as enablers of fundamental business change.
Excellent communication, facilitation, and presentation skills.
Experience delivering large scale transformation, digital, or regulatory programmes in Financial Services or with Private Equity.
Exposure to agile, waterfall, or hybrid delivery methodologies.
Experience working on AI, data, cloud, or automation led initiatives.
Experience contributing to sales, proposals, or account growth activities.
What we offer
Edinburgh based with flexible working
Office on Edinburgh's prettiest and most Instagrammed street
Company pension scheme
Death in service cover
Private medical insurance
Electric Vehicle scheme
Annual Team Trip
Loads of lovely snacks (both healthy and indulgent) when you're in the office
Be sure to tell us a little about yourself, why you want to work at Nile, and the type of challenges you're passionate about. Like a cover letter, but a little less formal.
We promise to get back to you. (P.S. No recruiters, please.)
We encourage applications from a variety of backgrounds, ethnicities, religions, ages, gender identities, sexual orientations and all abilities. Nile cares deeply about building a better business that supports equality and diversity; not just because it's the right thing to do, but because it makes us stronger.
A quick note on eligibility: we aren't able to provide visa sponsorship for this role, so you'll need to have the right to work in the UK to apply.
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