About the job

Job summary

The Submarine Delivery Agency (SDA) is a part of the Ministry of Defence responsible for the procurement, in-service support, and disposal of the UK’s nuclear submarines. Our work is of unparalleled strategic importance nationally and internationally, ensuring the security of the UK’s continuous at-sea nuclear deterrent, and delivering some of the most technically complex programmes in defence.

Here you’ll find a community to belong to – whether that’s alongside project teams with a shared vision or as part of an employee network of like-minded individuals. We believe that, by celebrating different backgrounds and perspectives, together we’ll achieve the extraordinary.

Discover more about our work:

We offer 25+ days’ holiday, flexible and hybrid working, enhanced parental leave schemes, shopping discounts, and an exceptional employer pension contribution of around 27%, to help work work for you.

Nationality, visas and vetting: For security reasons this role is open to sole UK nationals only. A ‘sole UK national’ refers to an individual who holds citizenship solely in the UK, without dual citizenship or nationality from another country. We’re unable to offer visa sponsorship.

This role requires you to have lived in the UK for the last 5 years and obtain Security Check (SC) security clearance. Clearance must be obtained without any caveats that prevent you from carrying out the role you have been recruited for. If it isn’t obtained, or is obtained but with caveats that prevent you from carrying out the role, any conditional offer made to you will be withdrawn. Obtaining SC security clearance can be a lengthy process, and we reserve the right to withdraw any conditional offer made if the necessary security clearance isn’t obtained within 12 months.

Job description

The Submarine Delivery Agency (SDA) are looking for Project Planners and Schedulers. The roles will be within the newly formed Schedule Management Group (SMG) which has been established to deliver standardised, coherent and cogent project baseline and P3M data outputs across the SDA. The SMG provides technical expertise and products to the SDA delivery and enabling teams, allowing us to strengthen how we deliver planning and scheduling analytics across the Agency, implement consistent ways of working, processes and technology, and enhance our Management Information to enable effective and efficient decision making. Through the SMG we are providing a functional home for all 55 of our planners and schedulers to collaborate, feel supported and thrive.

This is a varied, exciting, and challenging role, which will see you working with a technical team, engaging with a wide range of stakeholders and being responsible for the undertaking of planning and scheduling activity across a variety of projects, ranging in complexity and risk. Each senior support planner and scheduler will be tasked out to specific projects, across the directorates, on a business priority basis to enable growth and development of individuals, robust and credible delivery to our teams and increase resilience across the enterprise. You would be expected to develop and maintain plans and schedules and monitor activities to ensure customer and business outputs are delivered, communicating key project schedule performance data to principal schedulers / project controls managers to support decision making. This will include activities such as:

• Providing what if / new schedules to support change control/new scope for stakeholder review
• Running / providing support to planning meetings / schedule development workshops
• Developing new / what if schedules in P6 unsupervised
• Assisting Schedule Risk Analysis (SRA) on schedules in accordance with procedure, review the outputs and provide data as required to inform decision making and to support approvals
• Conducting analysis of performance data (EVM, KPIs and SRA) and deliver accurate monthly project data in a timely manner for input to the monthly drumbeat of Project and Portfolio reviews
• Providing regular update and insight to the principal planner and scheduler to support the SMG Governance and appropriate deployment of SQEP
• Primary delivery manager duties for junior members of the team

You will be based at Abbey Wood (ABW) Bristol and depending on tasks could have opportunities to travel to our Devonport, Clyde and Barrow-in-Furness sites.

At the SDA, we champion flexible ways of working. Regular in-person attendance is required to promote the benefits of face-to-face collaboration alongside flexibility of hours to support work-life balance. Initially, you may be expected to attend more frequently to familiarise yourselves with the site, the team, and your role.

What you’ll be doing

• Proactively engaging and challenging stakeholders to ensure robust schedules and accurate monthly updates and forecasts, inc. engagement with risk and cost
• Clearly communicating monthly progress and proactively reviewing forecast and highlighting areas for concern to OBI owners/CAM's/WPM's utilising P6 tools and reports
• Providing supervision and direction to support junior planners and schedulers; setting and assuring SDA standards are complied with, including supplier integration or integration of dependencies with other OBIs or Stakeholder schedules
• Supporting the delivery of technical advice on the integration of new baselines including running workshops and coordinating and managing efforts of others
• Ensuring alignment to Planning & Scheduling Procedures and Instructions as outlined on the Business Management System (BMS)
• Gathering key planning / scheduling artefacts to build robust baselines in accordance with internal policy processes and instructions
• Reviewing supplier schedules to understand monthly status / forecast for remaining work and reflect updates within internal schedules
• Ensuring baselines are maintained under change control as well as updating progress and remaining work to drive and control project(s)/portfolio
• Running or supporting planning workshops to define schedule assumptions and estimates
• Support the build and sustainment of the SMG capability, through active participation at events and training, and guiding / coaching of less experienced people

Person specification

To be successful with your application, you'll need to show that you meet the following essential criteria:

• Experience of planning projects and working with stakeholders to gather project information and implementation
• Running or supporting planning workshops to define schedule assumptions and estimates
• Experience of developing, managing and progressing schedules, preferably using Oracle Primavera P6 scheduling software, Microsoft Project or similar
• Generating and interpreting data and, under supervision, communicating clearly to stakeholders at different levels

In addition to the responsibilities above, the following technical competences and behaviours will be assessed at interview:

• Stakeholder Management
• Controlling a Project
• Working together
• Delivering at pace

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £34,800, Ministry of Defence contributes £9,396 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

Things you need to know

Selection process details

Your application will go through the following stages of assessment:

1. Pre-sift - We will check that you meet any essential or eligibility criteria that are listed in the Person Specification section of this advert. On your CV, please clearly show how you meet the essential criteria.
2. Sift - Your CV will be assessed against the following categories, using a simple numerical scoring system: Key Achievements; Relevant Experience; Applied Knowledge and Skills

Please follow our guidance on CV writing for best chance of success.

1. Interview - If you're invited to interview, you'll be assessed against the Sift categories listed above, as well as the Technical Competences and Behaviours listed in the Person Specification section of this advert.

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview.

Security

Successful candidates must meet the security requirements before they can be appointed. The level of security needed is security check (opens in a new window).

See our vetting charter (opens in a new window). People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

Open to UK nationals only.

Working for the Civil Service

The Civil Service Code (opens in a new window) sets out the standards of behaviour expected of civil servants.

We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window). The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria. The Civil Service also offers a Redeployment Interview Scheme to civil servants who are at risk of redundancy, and who meet the minimum requirements for the advertised vacancy.