regional manager (hard fm).

Regional Manager – Defence Hard FM

Location: Home-based, with responsibility for a portfolio of Defence sites across Cambridgeshire and the surrounding region

Salary: £85,000–£95,000 + Bonus + Car/Car Allowance + Private Medical + Benefits

Contract: Permanent, Full Time

The Opportunity

An excellent opportunity has arisen for an experienced Regional Manager to take operational and commercial ownership of a significant portfolio within one of the UK's major Defence estate contracts.

Operating within a large-scale Hard FM contract with an annual turnover of approximately £330m, you will take responsibility for regional service delivery and a budget of circa £26m, leading multi-site operations across a complex and highly regulated estate.

This is a senior operational leadership position with responsibility for the performance of Hard FM services including planned and reactive maintenance, engineering, asset and property maintenance, compliance and additional works.

You'll lead through a regional management structure, ensuring operational teams and supply chain partners consistently deliver against demanding contractual, financial, safety and customer performance measures.

The position combines operational leadership, financial ownership, customer management and people leadership, making it particularly suited to somebody who has previously managed a sizeable region, business unit or portfolio within Hard FM, engineering or technical services.

Key Responsibilities

• Take overall responsibility for Hard FM operational performance across a multi-site Defence estate, ensuring services are delivered safely, compliantly and in accordance with contractual requirements.
• Manage a regional budget of approximately £26m, maintaining strong financial control across labour, supply chain, maintenance activity and additional works.
• Lead the delivery of planned and reactive maintenance, statutory compliance, engineering services and associated property maintenance activities.
• Provide leadership to regional operational teams, creating clear accountability for service delivery, customer satisfaction, safety and commercial performance.
• Monitor performance against contractual KPIs and SLAs, identifying underperformance and implementing effective recovery and improvement plans.
• Maintain strong relationships with senior Defence customers and key stakeholders, acting as a senior point of escalation for operational and service delivery matters.
• Work closely with commercial and finance teams to manage budgets, forecasts, cost control, risk and overall regional profitability.
• Lead and challenge supply chain partners, ensuring contractor performance delivers the required standards of safety, quality, value and responsiveness.
• Ensure compliance with statutory legislation, contractual requirements, Health & Safety standards and relevant Defence estate procedures.
• Drive continuous improvement across operational processes, productivity, asset performance and customer experience.
• Support the delivery of additional works and infrastructure activity alongside core Hard FM services.
• Identify operational and commercial risks early and ensure appropriate mitigation and escalation.
• Develop regional leadership capability through coaching, succession planning and performance management.
• Contribute to wider contract strategy as part of the senior operational leadership structure.

About You

You'll be an established senior operational leader with experience managing large-scale Hard FM, engineering, technical services or property maintenance operations.

You'll be comfortable operating across multiple sites and leading through other managers rather than being directly involved in day-to-day engineering activity.

We're particularly interested in candidates who can demonstrate:

• Significant leadership experience within Hard FM / technical facilities management.
• Responsibility for a sizeable regional or operational P&L/budget, ideally running into the multi-millions.
• Experience managing complex, geographically dispersed, multi-site service delivery.
• Leadership of substantial operational and engineering teams, including management through regional or site-based managers.
• Strong understanding of planned and reactive maintenance, statutory compliance and engineering service delivery.
• Proven delivery against demanding contractual KPIs and SLAs.
• Strong commercial awareness, including budgeting, forecasting, cost control and supply chain management.
• Experience managing senior customer and stakeholder relationships.
• A strong understanding of Health & Safety and compliance within operational environments.
• The ability to lead change, improve performance and create accountability across large teams.

Experience within Defence, MOD or another highly regulated environment would be advantageous but isn't essential. Candidates from other complex Hard FM environments such as healthcare, justice, government estates, utilities, critical infrastructure or large corporate estates are also encouraged to apply.

An HND or equivalent qualification within Building, Mechanical, Electrical, Civil Engineering or a related discipline would be beneficial, alongside a management-level Health & Safety qualification such as NEBOSH or SMSTS.

Knowledge of CDM Regulations and CAFM / asset management systems would also be advantageous.

Why Consider This Opportunity?

This is an opportunity to take genuine ownership of a substantial regional operation within a c.£330m Defence Hard FM contract, with responsibility for approximately £26m of regional spend.

You'll be joining at a senior level with significant autonomy, visibility and influence over operational and commercial performance. The scale of the contract also provides strong longer-term opportunities for progression into broader operational and contract leadership positions.

Package

• £85,000–£95,000 basic salary
• Annual bonus
• Company car or car allowance
• 6% matched pension contribution
• 25 days annual leave
• Private medical cover for you and your partner
• Life assurance at 2x annual salary
• Home-based working with regular travel across the Cambridgeshire region