Planning Delivery Lead – AI Optimisation
Team: Strategic Programmes
Location: UK (London, Dartford, Manchester, Birmingham, Worksop – other locations considered)
Step into a role where your curiosity, client leadership, and problem‑solving mindset help shape how major infrastructure, mining and construction projects make decisions. We're building a supportive, forward‑thinking team that blends analytical thinking with real‑world delivery expertise — and we're looking for someone who thrives on guiding people through complex challenges.
If you enjoy turning ambiguity into clarity, bringing structure to big decisions, and helping teams deliver better, more confident outcomes, this could be your next step.
About the team
We provide digitally enabled decision‑intelligence services for large, complex programmes across construction, mining, energy, transport and infrastructure. As we scale, we're fostering a culture that values collaboration, open thinking, inclusion and continuous learning.
We believe that diverse experiences lead to stronger outcomes — and we welcome people who bring fresh perspectives, unconventional routes, or alternative career paths.
What You'll Do
In this role, you'll help clients navigate some of their most important delivery challenges — bringing structure, clarity and confidence to high‑stakes decisions. You'll:
- Act as a trusted advisor to senior executives, programme leaders and steering committees.
- Lead client engagements from discovery through to delivery, ensuring teams feel supported, informed and aligned.
- Run workshops, interviews and discussions that uncover insights, test assumptions and shape the direction of major projects.
- Bring together inputs from the AI optimisation, analytics and technical specialists to create clear, actionable recommendations.
- Translate complex technical analysis into simple, decision‑ready narratives and executive‑level presentations.
- Keep delivery on track — managing scope, priorities, risks, timelines and stakeholder expectations.
- Help shape the business in growing delivery frameworks, service models and best‑practice standards.
- Contribute to a small, high‑performing team where ideas are shared openly and every voice is valued.
If you enjoy solving ambiguous problems, bringing people together, and making a tangible impact on how major projects perform — you'll feel right at home here.
What You Bring
We're interested in people with backgrounds in project leadership, client engagement, consulting, engineering, delivery management or similar roles. You may have been a Project Manager, Engagement Manager, Delivery Manager, Technical Lead — or followed a different path that has equipped you to lead complex, multi‑stakeholder work.
What matters most is that you:
- Feel confident working directly with senior stakeholders and guiding conversations at an executive level.
- Can break down complex problems into clear steps, insights and recommendations.
- Have experience navigating multidisciplinary environments — ideally in construction, infrastructure or mining.
- Communicate with clarity, empathy and confidence, both in writing and in person.
- Are organised, disciplined and comfortable managing multiple priorities.
- Enjoy collaborating with technical specialists and translating analytical detail into business value.
- Thrive in environments with pace, autonomy and evolving ways of working.
- Bring a mindset that is inclusive, curious and motivated by continuous improvement.
If you're not sure you meet every point, we'd still love to hear from you — many of our strongest team members came to from unexpected backgrounds.
About Us
Laing O'Rourke are an international engineering and construction company delivering state-of-the-art infrastructure and buildings projects for clients in the UK, Middle East and Australia.
Certainty, reliability, quality – this is what our clients want. And at Laing O'Rourke, we have more than 150 years of experience delivering it. Laing O'Rourke's story is one of energy, passion, ambition, people and teamwork. We harness the power of our experience, stretching back over a century and a half to deliver certainty for our clients.
As part of the Disability Confident scheme, we would like to enable access to candidates with long term conditions and disabilities through the ‘Offer an interview scheme'. This supports applicants that meet the essential criteria by offering an interview for the advertised position. Please let us know if you would like to opt in to this scheme and let us know if you require any adjustments for the interview process.
We want to ensure our recruitment process is accessible to all. If you need the application form in an alternative format or you would like to know more about our recruitment process, please email resourcingteam@laingorourke.com
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