Head of Development; Pre

Reporting to the Director of Growth, the Head of Development (Pre Contract)’s key responsibility is to lead the pre-contract Affordable Development programme and leadership of the pre-contract team. This role covers the delivery of new business for affordable tenures, with a focus on accountability and leadership to enable delivery of growth targets in line with the Group’s Development Strategy.

• Supporting the Director of Growth in the delivery of the Great Places Affordable Development Strategy pursuant to the targets and objectives in the Business Plan;
• Jointly leading the preparation and development of funding bids in conjunction with the Director of Growth and the Director of Programmes and Business Development;
• Providing clear leadership in the team, inspiring a culture of high performance, responsibility, accountability, challenge, efficiency and cross- organisational working;
• Ensuring skills, capacity, training and workloads are monitored within the pre-contract team and ensure appropriate delegation is maintained;
• Working alongside the Head of Development (Post Contract) to maintain the department team plan, training schedules and performance data monitoring, with focus on a learning environment;
• Leading, managing and being accountable for an effective strategy for generating and securing new business and partnership opportunities for the team;
• Taking a lead on stakeholder management engaging the wider team on the importance of networks, communication and partnerships;
• Developing and maintaining key stakeholder relationships with Local Authorities, Homes England and the private sector;
• Leading the development, delivery and continuous improvement of the approved pre-contract development programme against agreed targets; typically targeting 520 homes to commence each financial year;
• Actively leading and managing development risk, ensuring that data upon which investment decisions are to be made is comprehensive and robust and that appropriate risk mitigations are applied;
• Leading the pre-contract stages of all development projects, supporting the team to deliver high quality proposals, that are strategically aligned, viable, deliverable and fit funding parameters;
• Leading and supporting the preparation of bids strategic opportunities, large scale regeneration opportunities, partnership opportunities, land, new schemes and wider opportunities with agreed timescales and financial parameters;
• Managing the organisation’s preferred partner status and memberships on various panels / strategic projects;
• Ensuring that feasibility studies and financial appraisals of schemes are undertaken in line with agreed finance and development procedures and the Group’s financial parameters and risk management framework;
• Ensuring that all pre-contract schemes are assessed and processed in accordance with internal procedures, standards and financial delegations, and are in line with the Group Probity and Procurement policies;
• Preparing and presenting reports for Executive Directors, Growth Committee and Board as required;
• Seeking to ensure efficiency and value for money is achieved in procurement, supply chain, specification and use of materials;
• Ensuring that Social Value objectives are pursued and included within development contracts procured by the pre-contract team;
• Managing pre-contract scheme and programme cashflows and budgets. Including setting, monitoring and controlling budgets in accordance with the business plan and standing orders;
• Applying robust, audit compliant procedures which support maintenance of Homes England Investment Partner and Strategic Partner status, legislative compliance and funders requirements. Including being the named process owner for designated processes…