Our client company is a multi-faceted and rapidly growing A/E firm with 20+ office locations in ten states and over 500 employees throughout the Midwest, Mid-Atlantic, Southeast, and Northeast. This family office-backed company is growing quickly and should double to triple in size in next 3 to 4 years. The firm has partnered with an investment holding company to drive the three-to-five-year strategy of gross revenue and EBITDA growth goals through organic and aggressive acquisitive growth. The strategic plan focuses on developing the four core business lines with Water growing to >$30 to 50M and expanding services, through acquisition, into Texas, Florida, and the Southeastern United States to balance the current Northern geographic footprint of the firm.
The water business line offers a full suite of Linear, Facility, Water Resources and Environmental to help communities, connecting people and places safely and cost-effectively.
Opportunity
We are seeking an exceptional leader to serve as the Senior Vice President | National Water Business Leader focused on improving performance, streamlining processes, and driving growth. The National Water Business Line Leader is responsible for profit and loss with the responsibility to hire and fire across the Water business.
The right leader will be someone who can envision the future, stay up to date on the latest technologies, and set internal engineering and project standards that ensure seamless project delivery. They have grown both organically and through acquisition. The Water business is currently about 30+ people and $10M revenue, covering Albany upstate NY, Hartford, CT to Maryland/Virginia to Ohio and Kentucky with capabilities everywhere.
The National Water Leader will be responsible for developing and executing a long-term strategy for growth, including developing the Water one- three- and five-year strategic plans inclusive of markets, clients, and geographies.
By providing oversight and leadership for the water business, this person will lead the group's expansion from strategy to execution, ensuring that the right people are on the bus and the right clients and projects are pursued. The responsibility includes client satisfaction and performance evaluation. The expectation for the position will be to grow the business by 10% year over year organically.
We seek a leader who will recruit and retain excellent talent, collaborate with other leaders, and ensure that up-and-coming talent is hired and given challenging developmental assignments. The leader we seek will understand that cultural norms drive outstanding performance, project delivery, and client satisfaction.
Specific Duties include:
- Provide oversight and leadership for the existing Water Business Line, including offices in Connecticut, New York, Maryland, Ohio and Kentucky.
- Project oversight. The water leader will have complete control of internal resources, marketing budget, and full support from the CEO.
- Lead the group's expansion by pursuing water-related projects in existing territories, by extensive client outreach initiatives, and through the new leader's network and participation in key industry organizations.
- Develop a strategic plan for longer-term growth, including developing the water one- three- and five-year strategic plan inclusive of markets, clients, and geographies with coordination of regional operations managers.
- Provide direction on significant water pursuits and industry expertise to clients.
- Responsible for maintaining and enhancing relationships with current clients to ensure high-quality and compliant design services, projects, and all other deliverables are delivered.
- Establish and maintain standards, processes, and procedures that ensure a high level of project quality and targeted profitability is maintained on water projects.
- Play a significant role in maintaining staffing and other resources necessary to ensure projects are executed with a high level of efficiency and technical excellence.
- Plan, recruit, and develop the talent needed to support the technical, managerial, and supervisory skills necessary for the growth of the Water Business Unit.
- Identify employee core competencies and career opportunities to drive technical expertise and succession planning.
- Lead the water operations and provide project managers with business planning, hours/revenue planning, and forecasting, workshare, and staff balancing training needed for success.
- Serve as the overall QA/QC leader and oversee the Water Quality Assurance Plan, ensuring its application and consistency across the Water Group.
- In partnership with the Executive staff, champion the continued Project Excellence Improvement initiative program to improve overall project management training and execution across all aspects of the project life cycle.
Specific Skills | Experience | Education
- Strong interpersonal skills and ability to lead, and grow, teams.
- Professional approach appropriate to represent the company in all settings.
- 20+ years of water experience in a leadership role.
- MS in Water Resources Engineering or equivalent water engineering related discipline.
- PE is required
- Solid professional relationships with key area clients and teaming partners.
- Demonstrated success with strategic planning for long-term business plans, including setting/measuring goals and leadership of strategic pursuits.
- Solid understating of Financials including but not limited to KPI's; Revenue, Net contribution, Estimate to Complete on projects.
- Successful experience growing revenues in water markets.
- Demonstrated ability to recruit, retain, and develop high-end talent for an organization.
- Demonstrated experience with quality management, including implementation and enforcement of QA/QC standards.
- Client development experience related to direct meetings, strategy projects, and industry associations.
- Active in professional organizations, preferably having served on committees or held positions of responsibility.
- Ability and willingness to travel as needed and manage the diverse geographic portfolio and drive organic and acquisitive growth.
- M&A experience in identifying, assisting in due diligence as part of the Executive DD team, and supporting integration post-acquisition.
- Demonstrated ability to deliver results on challenging projects.
- Excellent written and verbal communication skills including the ability to author proposals and work with the Marketing Dept to author proposals.
