Senior Design Manager

Senior Design Manager

Overview

The Senior Project Design Manager will proactively and collaboratively lead integrated teams, made up of both internal and external design and construction professionals, through llluminate's optimized, end-to-end design build management process from design inception to building completion. The ideal candidate will be committed to meaningfully enhancing the efficiency, accuracy, completeness, and speed of the design, documentation, and construction process, and will enthusiastically leverage innovative procedures, tools, and technologies to exceed our client's expectations.

Core Design Management

• Responsible for the successful realization of client's project vision, including performance, programming, cost, and schedule objectives.
• Lead the interface between design teams, Suffolk Operations, industry professionals, trade partners, regulatory agencies, and other project stakeholders to achieve project goals, all the while embracing culture of authentic collaboration and technical competence.
• Maintain and support client relationships during all project phases, ensuring a client-first mentality that encourages both active engagement in and ownership of all design decisions.
• Lead project team meetings, workshops, and other collaborative communications throughout a project's life cycle.
• Hold self, and teams, accountable for meeting deadlines; trouble‑shoot challenges by leveraging the full capacity of interdisciplinary project teams.

Design Phase Responsibilities

• Lead the development and management of optimized design processes for each project, supporting the efficient, linear delivery of fully coordinated and buildable drawings prior to the start of construction.
• Build upon Suffolk's world‑class construction planning and execution capabilities by strategically aligning design and documentation development with construction sequencing, supporting streamlined workflows.
• In association with Illuminate VDC and Suffolk preconstruction experts, lead the execution of rigorous, 'real‑time', project constructability reviews during the design process, ensuring that all documentation is complete, coordinated, and buildable prior to the start of construction.
• De‑risk project construction by identifying design gaps early in the design process and enable active remediation before construction workflows are disrupted.
• At key project design milestones, liaise with preconstruction teams to evaluate and validate cost and schedule alignment with project objectives.

Construction Phase Responsibilities

• With Suffolk field operations team, prioritize design issue resolution in alignment with optimal construction sequencing. Expedite responses to maintain pace of construction.
• Collaborate with key project stakeholders to ensure design decisions are made in step with project schedule and lead‑time requirements.
• Establish effective working relationships with the project design team to collaboratively identify, resolve, and complete design issues. Serve as the liaison between the Architect of Record and the project team.
• Bring Suffolk and llluminate's full technical expertise to bear on project design challenges to rapidly produce solutions for review with architect and project team.

Illuminate Operations Management

• Track and report progress towards project milestone completion, staffing allocations, and project financial health.
• In collaboration with Illuminate leadership and the project team, analyze, refine, and test design construction workflow assumptions in real-time to optimize llluminate's process moving forward.
• Leverage and grow Suffolk's proprietary constructability knowledge database, which serves as a critical input to a proactive QA/QC process throughout design.
• Support llluminate's design technology staff in the introduction of automated design and documentation processes and workflows.

• Certification as licensed architect or professional engineer is preferred.
• Professional degree in Architecture or Engineering is advanced degree preferred.
• Significant experience in the professional design services industry, with relevant design project management years and specific…