Bid Finance Manager - Cost Engineering

Location : Crawley, United KingdomIn fast changing markets, customers worldwide rely on Thales. Thales is a business where brilliant people from all over the world come together to share ideas and inspire each other.

In aerospace, transportation, defence, security and space, our architects design innovative solutions that make our tomorrow's possible.

Together we offer fantastic opportunities for committed employees to learn and develop their career with us. At Thales UK, we research, develop, and supply technology and services that impact the lives of millions of people each day to make life better, and keep us safer.

We innovate across five major industries; Aerospace, Defence, Ground Transportation, Security and Space. Your health and well-being matters to us and that’s why we offer you the flexibility to do what’s important to you;

whether that’s part time hours, job sharing, home working, or the ability to flex your start and finish times. Where possible, we support a working pattern that suits your lifestyle and helps you reach your ambitions.

Job title : Bid Finance Manager Cost Engineering

Location : This role can be based at any of the key Thales sites in the UK : Crawley, Reading, Glasgow, Belfast, Cheadle, Templecombe, with travel to other UK sites depending on business needs (20% of the time).

Hybrid working arrangement (3 days per week on site vs. working from home)

Are you ambitious with a passion for delivering robust and commercial solutions? Are you looking to help shape and influence the future prospects of our business?

Are you seeking a role that gives you a wide breadth and profile of exposure and excellent future career possibilities in a leading global organisation?

What the role has to offer :

Help shape and impact business opportunities and projects

Visibility across the whole of Thales on the service we provide

Excellent career development opportunities

Core Benefits :

On offer is a competitive salary and benefits package, which includes;

Performance-related bonus

Half day every Friday, usually finishing around 13 : 00pm

28 days annual leave (plus bank holidays) plus opportunity to buy up to 40 hours / year (pro rata)

24 hours volunteering paid for

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 :

This is a unique, dynamic role where you will use your engineering and business expertise to explore, support and influence major prospects, working with key stakeholders and Subject Matter Experts to help shape a business winning costed approach with the aim of continually improving the value of the output as it is used in our Project and Bid validation / governance.

Key responsibilities include :

Use parametric estimating to support the cost modelling of complex business opportunities.

Develop and use your sound commercial awareness and effective stakeholder management to deliver high quality, winning proposals.

Help to develop the capability for the Bid Finance function and support the development of an integrated estimating capability across Thales in the UK, including the establishment of processes and tools.

Work with projects / programmes and bid teams as they define their solutions, supporting those teams in generating robust and defendable costed solutions that deliver through the various phases of the development and manufacturing life cycles.

About you :

You will have a degree in a relevant discipline or equivalent qualification in Engineering or specifically experience in Cost Engineering and Parametric estimation together with the following : -

Track record in producing and managing estimates in complex bids / projects & / or a demonstrable record of engagement in delivery of complex projects

Business acumen demonstrated by a strong commercial and financial awareness

Proven experience and understanding of : -

Industry estimating techniques, methodologies and processes

Estimating Management

Developing engineering solutions that support project and service delivery

Financial and Performance Metrics

Experience of delivering the engineering content of system level programmes across domains

And additionally :

Risk and opportunity analysis, modelling and management

Effective communicator, able to articulate ideas and deliver information in a clear and persuasive manner

Ability to work in multi-stakeholder environment and create clear and achievable goals

Excellent organisation skills, delivering to agreed timescales with attention to detail

Proficient in Microsoft Office Suite, especially Excel

LI-DNI

In line with Thales' Baseline Security requirements, candidates will be asked to provide evidence of identity, eligibility to work in the UK and employment and / or education history for up to three years.

Some vacancies may require full Security Clearance which can require further evidence to be provided. For further details of the evidence required to apply for Baseline and Security Clearance please refer to the Defence Business Services National Security Vetting (DBS NSV) Agency.

At Thales we provide CAREERS and not only jobs. With Thales employing 80,000 employees in 68 countries our mobility policy enables thousands of employees each year to develop their careers at home and abroad, in their existing areas of expertise or by branching out into new fields.

Together we believe that embracing flexibility is a smarter way of working.

Thales UK is committed to providing an inclusive and barrier-free recruitment process. We will provide reasonable adjustments and support to ensure neuro-diverse applicants or those with a disability or long-term condition can be their best during the recruitment process.

To request an adjustment,if you need this job advert in an alternative format or if you have any questions about the recruitment process, please contact Resourcing Ops for mid to senior roles, or the Early Careers Team for graduate and apprentice roles.

Great journeys start here, apply now!