Project Manager – Higher Education

Overview

In this role you lead construction delivery on Higher Education, laboratory, and museum projects, coordinating trades on live, occupied sites. You will oversee safety, quality, and compliance while keeping programmes and budgets on track. You’ll work with estates teams, academic staff, and curators to navigate sensitive environments and adapt to complex access constraints. Your expertise shapes safe, efficient projects that protect specialist spaces and collections. This is an impact-driven opportunity to deliver sustainable, high-quality outcomes in collaboration with multidisciplinary teams.

Responsibilities

• Manage construction delivery on Higher Education, laboratory, and museum projects on live, occupied sites
• Oversee scopes of work, contractor engagement, site supervision, and quality control to ensure compliance with technical specifications and safety standards
• Lead site coordination meetings, manage programme schedules, and track budgets to stay on time and within financial targets
• Collaborate with estates teams, academic staff, curators, and stakeholders to navigate sensitive environments
• Identify and manage risks early, escalating to senior management as needed to maintain momentum and compliance
• Monitor site progress and resource allocation to anticipate delays or cost impacts and adjust plans
• Advise on construction best practices and continuous improvement based on sector experience

Key requirements

• Hands-on experience managing construction or refurbishment projects within Higher Education, laboratories, or museums
• Ability to work with multiple trades on live sites with complex access and operational constraints
• Experience with specialist environments such as labs or museum spaces (environmental controls, collections protection) is highly desirable
• Familiarity with CDM regulations, risk management, permits
• Confident communicator with clients, tradespeople, and internal teams
• Commercial awareness with time and cost management on multi-stakeholder projects
• Project management qualification (MAPM or equivalent) preferred; CIOB, RICS, HNC/HND welcomed

• confident communicator
• stakeholder management
• commercial awareness
• construction on live sites
• multitrade coordination
• risk management

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