Director of Facilities and Estates

Shape the future of our estate and help create outstanding environments where students and staff can thrive.

Orbital South Colleges Group is seeking an experienced and forward-thinking Director of Facilities and Estates to provide strategic leadership across our estates, facilities, compliance, sustainability and capital investment activities.

Reporting directly to the Chief Operating Officer, you will be responsible for developing and delivering the College Estate Strategy, ensuring our estate is safe, compliant, financially sustainable and aligned to the College's educational and strategic ambitions.

This is a significant leadership role with responsibility for facilities and estates across both East Surrey College and John Ruskin College, leading a multi-disciplinary team and overseeing a diverse estate portfolio.

You will lead the strategic planning, development and management of the College estate, ensuring our buildings, infrastructure and facilities support high-quality teaching, learning and student experience. Working closely with senior leaders, governors and external partners, you will oversee statutory compliance, health and safety assurance, capital investment programmes, sustainability initiatives and estate risk management. You will also play a key role in securing external funding opportunities, improving estate performance, driving carbon reduction initiatives and ensuring effective governance, reporting and assurance arrangements are in place across the Group.

What we're looking for

We are looking for an experienced estates or facilities leader with a track record of success within a complex multi-site organisation. You will bring significant experience of strategic estate management, statutory compliance, capital project delivery, contract management and governance reporting. The successful candidate will be a collaborative and influential leader, capable of developing strong relationships with a wide range of stakeholders whilst leading teams through change and continuous improvement.

You will have:

• A facilities management qualification (IWFM/BIFM Level 4 or above, or equivalent)
• Experience leading estates or facilities functions within a complex multi-site organisation
• Experience developing estate strategies and asset management plans
• Experience managing statutory compliance frameworks and assurance activities
• Experience leading major capital projects and managing external contractors and suppliers
• Strong financial, commercial and risk management skills
• The ability to prepare reports and business cases for senior leadership and governance bodies

Experience within Further Education, Higher Education or the public sector would be advantageous, as would experience of securing capital grant funding and supporting sustainability or Net Zero programmes.

Interviews are expected to take place on Monday the 7th and Tuesday the 8th of September.

If this sounds like you and you will enjoy working in a forward thinking, friendly, fast paced, changing environment with state of the art facilities, we would love to hear from you.

• competitive salary
• choice of two excellent pension schemes
• life assurance
• free onsite parking
• access to our fully equipped gym along with discounted in house Spa and Salon treatments

Orbital South Colleges Group are committed to Equal Opportunities, encouraging applications from all sectors of the community to reflect our diverse student population. We are also committed to PREVENT and Safeguarding the welfare of children and vulnerable adults and expect all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. Both College Campus’ are smoke-free zones.

As part of our pre-employment checks, successful candidates will be required to complete an enhanced DBS, references will be taken and evidence of all qualifications and awards will also be required before commencement of employment. Failure to do so may lead to offers being withdrawn.

Applicants must be eligible to work in the UK as we do not sponsor work permits, and work permits from other organisations are unacceptable as proof of right to work in the UK.

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