Work Winning Lead - Water

Start here. Grow here. We are seeking a Work Winning Lead for our Water business to shape and drive all work-winning activities. In this pivotal role you will be accountable for building a robust, business-critical pipeline and will lead a high-performing team of six professionals (from Bid Coordinators to Associate Bid Directors). You will provide strategic oversight and support for major pursuits, typically ranging from $5M to $35M+ in contract value. Reporting to the Strategy & Growth Director for Water and working closely with the Water leadership team, you will directly influence revenue growth, profitability, and long-term market positioning. This is a high-visibility role partnering with senior leaders, Client Account Managers, Capture Managers, Marketing, and Delivery Teams to challenge conventional thinking and deliver data-driven insights that inform business decisions. You will champion best practices, foster continuous improvement, and elevate work-winning standards across AECOM Water. Here's what you'll do: Team Leadership & Development - Lead and manage a high-performing team of work-winning professionals, ensuring accountability for team projects and outcomes. - Attract, retain, and nurture top talent through effective recruitment, onboarding, and succession planning, fostering a culture of continuous improvement and excellence. - Inspire and motivate the team to achieve ambitious goals, promoting a culture of inclusion, accountability, and innovation. Strategic Bid Pipeline - Own and shape a multi-year pipeline of strategically important opportunities. - Monitor budgets, ROI, capture rates and other metrics identifying areas for programme-level improvement. - Lead rigorous prioritisation of Enterprise Critical Pursuits, Tier 2, and Tier 3 bids, managing work winning resources and proactively resolving risks or blockers. - Drive CRM (Salesforce) discipline to enable executive decision making and performance reporting. Quality & Governance - Where required on our largest and most strategic pursuits, lead bid reviews, facilitate workshops and constructively challenge client value propositions. - Leverage professional experience and data-driven insights to influence critical bid/no-bid decisions, ensuring optimal win rates and safeguarding return on investment. - Oversee quality and governance, embedding best practice processes and tools to maintain excellence in bid delivery. - Anticipate and escalate material risks to secure swift decisions that maintain our competitive advantage. Senior Stakeholder Engagement & Reporting - Build trusted relationships with senior business leaders, aligning pursuit strategies with business priorities. - Constructively challenge and influence senior leaders, Client Account Managers, Capture Managers using experience and insight to advocate for work winning best practices. - Deliver compelling reports and actionable insights that inform business planning and strategy. - Lead cross-functional projects aligned with business growth and work winning transformation. Bidding Best Practice & Continuous Improvement - Embed best-practice methods, tools, and training across capture and bid delivery; standardise how we qualify, plan, and execute. - Own the quality of bid collateral, playbooks, and reusable assets; ensure every major pursuit is proposition-led and client-outcome focused. - Drive continuous improvement and innovation in bidding approaches, overseeing win/loss lessons learned outputs ensuring they are turned into measurable improvements. Ready to push the limits of what’s possible? Here’s what we’re looking for: - Accountable leadership: Proven track record leading a bid/work winning function in the infrastructure, engineering or built environment, with clear accountability for outcomes. - Team development: Demonstrated experience inspiring, developing, and line managing high-performing teams. - Strategic mindset: Experience translating high-level business goals into effective, actionable work-winning plans and ensuring team focus on strategic outcomes - Stakeholder influence: Exceptional people skills, with experience building trust and confidently challenging and influencing senior stakeholders to shape key decisions. - Bid expertise: Extensive understanding of work winning methodologies and experience leading and supporting major bids and proposals in a complex, multidisciplinary environment. - Analytical skills: Advanced analytical skills, adept at distilling complex multifaceted data into clear and concise business insights to shape work winning direction. - Resilience & organisation: Decisive, organised, and resilient - able to lead through complexity and deliver results. - Qualifications: Degree-level qualification (or equivalent); APMP Professional certification (desirable). Water sector knowledge and experience (desirable).