Portfolio Lead

Position: Change Portfolio Lead
The Change Portfolio Leader will provide leadership, structure and governance across Markel UK’s change portfolio, ensuring initiatives are clearly defined, prioritised, sequenced and delivered in line with UK strategic objectives, business value and available capacity. This role will lead the team responsible for UK portfolio planning, intake, prioritisation, governance, reporting and benefits tracking. Working with UK senior leaders, business stakeholders and delivery teams, the role will provide reliable portfolio insight, support investment decisions, strengthen delivery rigor and embed consistent ways of working across UK change activity.

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Who we are:

Business Unit overview:

The Change and Continuous Improvement team supports the delivery of strategic change across Markel UK by providing portfolio governance, delivery oversight, reporting and continuous improvement capability. The team works closely with UK senior leaders, business stakeholders, technology, finance, risk and delivery teams to ensure change activity is prioritised, controlled and aligned to business value. This role will lead the UK portfolio management capability and provide clear insight to support effective decision-making across the UK change portfolio.

Part of Markel Group (NYSE – MKL) a Fortune 500 company with over 60 offices in 20+ countries, is a holding company for insurance, reinsurance, specialist advisory, and investment operations around the world.

What you’ll be doing :

Lead, coach and develop a team responsible for portfolio management, governance, reporting and delivery oversight, creating a culture of teamwork, collaboration and continuous  responsible for the end-to-end change portfolio process, from initial idea and intake through to prioritisation, delivery oversight, adoption and benefits realisation.

Lead portfolio prioritisation, sequencing and capacity planning to ensure activity is aligned to strategic objectives, business value, risk and available resources.

Ensure consistent application of the relevant change framework and governance standards for UK change activity, including lifecycle gates, decision points and required evidence.

Provide clear UK portfolio reporting, insight and recommendations to senior leadership and governance forums, highlighting progress, risks, issues, dependencies and decisions required.

Support case review, investment prioritisation and value-based decision making by constructively challenging assumptions and evidence.

Track portfolio outcomes, adoption measures and benefits realisation, driving accountability for delivery of agreed value.

Build strong working relationships across business leaders, change delivery teams, technology, finance, risk and other colleagues to support coordinated and controlled delivery.

Find opportunities to improve portfolio governance, reporting, data quality, standards and ways of working across the change function.

Key

Skills:

Experience leading change portfolios, enterprise programmes, portfolio management offices or comparable transformation governance functions.

Experience managing, coaching or developing direct reports, with the ability to set direction, prioritise work and build team capability.

Strong understanding of structured change, project or programme delivery life cycles, including governance, controls, dependency management and benefits tracking.

Experience building, embedding or improving portfolio governance, reporting, management information or decision-making processes.

Ability to handle opposing priorities, capacity constraints and delivery risks across multiple initiatives.

Strong influencing skills, including the…