Job Title: Associate Director

Location: York

Penguin Recruitment is delighted to be supporting a highly regarded Planning and Design Consultancy on the hire of an Associate Director to their office in York. This is a permanent and full-time position.

Our client specialising in town planning and urban design and has a growing reputation for achieving results and producing high-quality and deliverable schemes. The leaders of the business hold substantial experience across the private and public sectors.

My client has an exciting opportunity for an enthusiastic and commercially minded Associate Director to join our growing team, based at the office in central York. The successful candidate will report to the Directors, though also work independently with their own client base on a broad range of planning projects, to influence and deliver schemes throughout the UK of all types and scales, across residential, employment, retail and leisure sectors.

The successful candidate should have excellent technical skills and knowledge of the planning system and be able to demonstrate a successful track record of delivering planning permissions of varying scales across a broad range of development sectors. The successful candidate should also have the ability to forge strong relationships with clients and other professional contacts to drive the business forward.

Key responsibilities of the role include:

• Forging and developing client and professional relationships.
• Pro-active co-ordination of external project teams.
• Preparation, submission and negotiation of planning applications and appeals of all sizes/types, including presentation at planning committees and informal hearings.
• Promotion of medium to large-scale residential, mixed-use, employment and other developments through the local plan process.
• Devising planning strategies for the delivery of successful schemes.
• Management of project budgets and resourcing.
• Optimise new business and cross-selling opportunities.

Essential skills and experience for the role include:

• Chartered membership of the Royal Town Planning Institute.
• A strong track record in planning, with a minimum of seven years post-qualification experience, preferably in a consultancy or similar commercial environment.
• An excellent knowledge of the planning system including planning policy.
• An ability to undertake complex negotiations with stakeholders based on a coherent planning strategy.
• Strong and clear communication skills.
• Project management skills, including effective time/resource management.
• Enthusiasm, commitment and an eye for detail, with the ability to think laterally.
• An ability to work with minimal supervision and to work under own initiative.
• A strong team-working capability and keenness to mentor junior members of the team.
• Ideally holding a full UK driving licence.

Interested?

The hiring manager is looking to meet with suitable candidates ASAP so if you meet the above criteria, please contact Josh Jones on (phone number removed) or (url removed)