Operations Manager

About this role

Role: Operations Manager – (Heat Networks/Utilities)

The Client

My client is a prominent and forward-thinking energy infrastructure provider in the United Kingdom, specializing in the design, delivery, and long-term operation of large-scale decentralized low-carbon utility networks.

The company focuses heavily on urban district heating, cooling, and power solutions, managing critical assets that supply sustainable energy to thousands of residential and commercial properties. Renowned for its engineering excellence and commitment to the green transition, the business integrates cutting-edge technologies like industrial heat pumps and waste-heat recovery systems to drive urban centres toward a zero-carbon future.

The Role

The Operations and Maintenance Manager is accountable for the day-to-day operation and maintenance of a number of Energy centre’s across Birmingham. The role translates the Head of Operations' regional strategy into consistent site delivery, leading people, contractors, maintenance performance, operational readiness and incident response so that customer services are maintained safely, compliantly and efficiently.

The postholder provides the regional management link between site teams and the Regional Head of Operations, balances priorities and resources across the appointed schemes, and acts as the operational deputy within formally delegated authority.

The role works closely with SHEQ, Technical and Asset Assurance, Commercial, Finance, Procurement and Project teams, while preserving the responsibilities of formally appointed Technical Authorities and contract owners.

Key Accountabilities

Operational leadership

• Lead the safe and effective day-to-day operation our energy centres, networks and customer interfaces, ensuring that agreed service conditions and operational priorities are met.
• Set clear site priorities and balance people, specialist support and contractor resources across schemes.
• Maintain effective management oversight through site visits, structured reviews, clear escalation routes and visible leadership in the field.
• Ensure operating strategies, plant status, setpoints, temporary configurations, isolations and return-to-service decisions are controlled, recorded and authorised at the appropriate level.

Safety, environmental and statutory compliance

• Provide visible SHEQ leadership, exercise stop-work authority where conditions are unsafe, and ensure work is planned and delivered under the clients safe systems, permit arrangements and applicable legal requirements.
• Ensure statutory and mandatory inspections, maintenance and remedial actions are identified, scheduled, evidenced and completed by their required dates; escalate any risk to compliance before it becomes overdue.
• Verify that employees and contractors are competent, appropriately authorised and working to suitable RAMS, isolations, lifting plans, confined-space controls and other task-specific arrangements.
• Lead or support incident investigations, assurance visits and audits, ensuring corrective actions are proportionate, allocated, tracked and closed with evidence.

Maintenance and asset reliability

• Accountable for delivery of statutory, mandatory, planned and reactive maintenance through the approved CMMS, including schedule quality, work-order control, close-out evidence, defect prioritisation and backlog risk management.
• With Engineers, coordinate planned outages, intrusive inspections, OEM interventions and major repairs, ensuring robust work scopes, contingency arrangements, communications.
• Participate in the review of condition, failure and performance data to drive root-cause analysis, reliability improvement and risk-based recommendations for lifecycle, overhaul and capital plans.
• Ensure critical spares, specialist tools and consumables are identified, compatible, serviceable, securely stored, periodically verified and replenished.

Incident response and business continuity

• Act as an incident lead, or support the nominated Incident Manager, for significant plant, network or customer-service events within the applicable response and escalation arrangements.
• Coordinate stabilisation, fault diagnosis, temporary operation, specialist attendance, stakeholder updates and recovery, ensuring that safety and customer impact remain the primary operational considerations.
• Maintain and exercise site disaster-recovery and business-continuity arrangements, including emergency contacts, temporary plant strategies, critical spares.

People leadership and competence

• Line manage and develop allocated personnel, setting clear objectives and completing regular one-to-ones, performance reviews and development conversations.
• Help build a collaborative team that shares learning, standardises good practice and provides effective cross-site support without weakening local asset ownership.
• Promote a culture of accountability, openness and early escalation in which defects, risks and mistakes are reported and managed constructively.

Financial, procurement and contractor management

• Manage delegated regional OPEX, forecasts, accruals and purchase requirements, maintaining cost control while protecting safety, compliance, reliability and contractual performance.
• Prepare clear scopes, review quotations, support tendering and appoint or instruct contractors only within the approved procurement process and delegated authority.
• Manage contractor performance against safety, quality, programme, cost and close-out requirements, escalating recurring underperformance and maintaining suitable alternatives for critical services.
• Develop evidence-based maintenance, overhaul and improvement proposals, including operational risk, customer impact, cost, programme and consequence of deferral, for approval by the Regional Head of Operations.

Customer, contract and stakeholder delivery

• Serve as the senior day-to-day operational escalation point for key stakeholders, coordinating closely with the Regional Head of Operations and Commercial team on sensitive or contractual matters.
• Ensure planned and unplanned outage notifications, operational updates, incident reports and service-performance information are accurate, timely and consistent with contractual and company requirements.
• Understand the operational obligations, service boundaries, demarcation conditions and approval requirements applicable to each scheme, and ensure they are reflected in work planning and site decision-making.
• Build constructive working relationships with customers, local authorities, statutory bodies, framework partners, OEMs and specialist contractors while protecting the clients contractual position.

Performance, reporting and continuous improvement

• Help maintain a concise regional performance view covering safety, compliance, plant and network availability, maintenance delivery, defects, customer impacts, energy performance, costs and improvement actions.
• Support operational readiness, management of change, commissioning and handover for new connections, plant upgrades and lifecycle projects.

Person Specification

Technical and operational

• Strong understanding of operating and maintaining district-energy or comparable critical infrastructure, including thermal plant, distribution networks, electrical systems, controls and customer interfaces.
• Working knowledge of CHP engines, boilers, heat exchangers, pumps, thermal stores, water treatment, BMS (Trend / Tridium) and associated gas and electrical systems; able to recognise when specialist support is required.
• Sound knowledge of maintenance planning
• Practical understanding of UK health, safety and environmental duties, safe systems of work, contractor control and statutory inspection regimes relevant to energy operations.