MPA - Associate Director (Data & Insights)

Job description

Role Purpose

Capital projects consistently underperform in terms of budget, schedule, and value.  Stakeholders often lack confidence over the performance of their projects and programmes, and the transition to business-as-usual operation often fails to take advantage of the data and insight generated during the project implementation phase.  Data can enable and drive improvement as it has in many facets of our lives, with automation, digitalisation and AI now becoming the norm. 

It has quickly become a cheap commodity, easily created, and accessed.  However, capturing good quality, meaningful data to drive a completive edge, enable intelligence-led decision-making, helping to track and improve performance is today’s challenge for many organisations.  How do stakeholders obtain insights when served with an overwhelming volume of disorganised, poorly considered, badly constructed data?

Our Major Projects Advisory (MPA) team specialises in providing clarity to Boards, Executives and SRO’s and senior leaders across major public and private sector organisations, on the delivery of their complex projects and programmes. We work on some of the UK’s most strategically important programmes, and across all sectors including Utilities, Power, Energy, Transport, Natural Resources, Oil & Gas, Defence, Health and Education.

MPA comprises a multidisciplinary, diverse, outcome-focused team of 100+ industry experts who are driven by purposeful work to achieve positive change for our local communities and make a lasting global difference. ​ We enable greater transparency, efficiency, predictability and confidence, whilst helping navigate uncertainty. ​

We are a market leader in partnering with clients to maximise value through significant capital investments and complex transformations, working across projects, programmes and portfolios.  As trusted advisors, we support our clients across a broad range of areas in project and programme management, portfolio management, commercial and procurement, construction, ESG and technology.

We are strengthening our digital, data and insights capability to grow our client service offering.

This role is for an ambitious, innovative, and professional Associate Director, who can work alongside our existing team to enhance the way we deliver services to our clients using data, intelligent insights from analytics and visualisation to improve project delivery confidence.

Within your career you will have attained an exquisite balance of understanding data and data system architecture with a flexible, creative approach in its application to create value for your clients.  You will be able to breakdown and translate complex problems into smaller components that are easily described throughout the client’s organisation.  This will require a passionate and highly motivated individual who enjoys problem solving and learning in general.    

You will join the MPA business at an exciting period of significant growth and will be a significant contributor to how it is shaped.  You will interface with our leadership team, client organisations and other KPMG teams to develop our offerings and value propositions.

Description of Role

• Take a lead in developing our data and insights value propositions, to improve project delivery confidence through intelligence data led insights, analytics and visualisation.
• Manage and work as part of teams to deploy digital capabilities in the delivery of engagements and take a lead in identifying further opportunities in collaboration with MPA colleagues and more broadly across the firm.
• Work with KPMG’s global networks to identify, develop and deploy appropriate tools and methodologies.
• Work with KPMG’s technology and data analytics teams to develop and deploy proof of concepts and solutions.
• Develop partnerships with third party providers to develop an ecosystem of solutions for client issues.
• Interpret and challenge systems and systems architecture.
• Develop value-led information management structures and transparent decision making.

Role Dimensions

Leadership and Management

• Engagement Management of project teams to deliver client engagements.
• Identify, lead and support business development opportunities.
• Management of quality and risk on engagements to meet KPMG standards.
• Financial management of engagements including budgeting, reporting, and invoicing processes.
• Performance Management and mentoring of junior employees.

Stakeholder Interaction & challenges

• Client facing role for both business development and delivery, including stakeholder management and workshop facilitation.
• Liaise with technical teams on the client side to support productionising of proof of concepts.
• Change management of client teams to embed solutions and supporting processes.
• Develop internal networks with other data, analytics, and technology teams in KPMG.
• Ability to easily translate technical areas to senior leadership and non-technical teams.

Impact, Accountability & Governance

• The role will have a material impact on the success of the ambitious MPA growth strategy.
• The role will be client facing and have direct impact on the reputation and perception of KPMG.
• The role has financial responsibilities through Engagement Management.

Experience, Skills, and Qualifications

Essential

• Experience in managing consultancy or client facing assignments.
• Experience working with data, analytics, and intelligent insights in an infrastructure / capital project environment to deliver business benefits.
• Experience advising clients plan, develop and deploying meaningful information management strategies, including Common Data Environments.
• Enough understanding of the infrastructure environment to be able to relevantly apply digital insights and capabilities.
• Experience of working with complex information management and security requirements
• Demonstrable experience of innovative thinking.

Desirable

• Experience of working with enterprise data management platforms.
• Experience working on complex change programmes.
• Experience outside of construction/infrastructure – particularly digital and manufacturing sectors.
• Experience building business cases for funding.

Expertise / Technical Role Requirements

• Experience (or foundation level understanding) of conceptual Data Modelling and Solution Architecture.
• Knowledge of complex project / programme delivery ideally in a capital / infrastructure context.
• Advance Microsoft Office (Azure, Office365, etc.)
• Power BI.

Skills

• Excellent facilitation and communication (written and oral) skills.
• Ability to bring complex concepts to life for non-specialist audience.
• Ability to quickly assimilate and apply new techniques and knowledge.
• Ability to manage multiple projects for multiple stakeholders and balance time across these appropriately.
• Proactive and able to work with minimal supervision.