Senior Manager/ Associate Energy Transition

About the organisation

Amberside Advisors Ltd (‘AAL’) specialise in providing project finance consultancy and advisory services to public and private sector organisations. AAL combines market-leading financial modelling capability with experienced project finance expertise, and our services include advisory, refinancing, due diligence, model development, model audit and training. We have worked on more than 1,500 projects to date across a wide range of sectors and global locations, and our clients are well-known companies with billions of pounds of investments.

Part of the Steer Group since July 2022, we serve a global client base through 22 offices across four continents and take great pride in providing high quality advisory, customer service and insight into our clients’ projects. Our core industry sectors are low carbon, transport, decentralised energy, large scale energy and infrastructure, and we regularly advise on major projects ranging across heat networks, wind, solar and biomass, road and rail, schools, and hospitals, as well as public service delivery contracts in sectors such as local authorities, healthcare, education, and justice.

AAL are an equal opportunities employer. We are committed to eliminating discrimination and encouraging diversity across our employees. In addition, staff wellbeing is a key focus for AAL, and annual events are dedicated to reconnecting with colleagues, welcoming new joiners and having fun together as a team. Furthermore, weekly social events provide an easy and enjoyable way to get to know your peers.

About the role

This role will report to Amberside’s Head of Commercial Advisory, who leads on our energy transition investment mandates, advising the public and private sector on all the commercial (including contractual, financial and policy-related) aspects of decentralised energy sectors like Heat Networks, CHP, EfW, and Smart (Integrated) Local Energy Systems.

This is a key growth area for Amberside from its existing clean energy platform, and a key collaboration sector across the Steer Group globally, together with other Net Zero and Decarbonisation workstreams such as e-mobility, with executive oversight from our Head of Sustainability, globally.

Whilst the role will be involved across a number of mandates, it will be expected to lead on the origination and delivery of public sector (including central government) mandates particularly. This will include existing mandates supporting the GHNF fund and BHIVE platform, with a keen focus to grow the Steer/Amberside offering to Local Authorities (as well as healthcare and education), especially in the context of Heat Network Zoning policy.

The candidate will utilise resources across teams, and as growth is realised, be expected to recruit and line manage a team in order to lead concurrent advisory mandates, driving the value-add to clients, managing relationships and programmes, and producing (and or reviewing for) high quality client outputs as well as continuing delivery of advisory mandates, working on tenders, presentations, and reports, directly.

This will include supporting Steer and Amberside initiatives that may apply internationally,

Specific responsibilities include but are not limited to:

• Managing several complex client engagements or components independently – consulting with colleagues where appropriate.
• Managing commercial aspects of an individual engagement to achieve desired levels of quality and profitability.
• Executing projects and maintaining a review process to ensure projects are completed to a level that meets the high-quality standards of Amberside Advisors.
• Providing commercial/technical knowledge on projects specifics to junior staff and feeding back any perceived knowledge gaps to senior management to deal with.
• Specialise and contribute to the practice area - developing and maintaining industry knowledge and demonstrating sound knowledge of economic, political and market trends.
• Contributing towards creating innovative and repeatable solutions which strengthen business performance.
• Passing on pertinent market/client knowledge to senior management and colleagues/ teams to aid the development of knowledge.
• Managing scope and delivering timely and quality outputs.
• Communicating risk and issue early to appropriate colleagues.
• Holding/attending reviews on completion of projects to identify lessons learned and enhance future quality of performance.
• Working on CPD to maintain any relevant professional status/ accreditation.
• Meeting deadlines throughout the AAL Performance Development Cycle for self, including seeking good quality feedback goal setting, providing input into engagement/ project reviews.
• Ensuring relevant project team members are accurately charging time to engagement codes as part of assessing profitability of individual projects.
• Taking action to ensure employee wellbeing is being actively managed in the office.
• Exhibiting role model behaviour in line with Amberside Advisors values.
• Building constructive working relationships across different teams.
• Participate in team meetings to support with resource allocation.
• Takes ownership of complex projects.
• Being able to step back, see the bigger picture and “make the numbers” talk when reviewing datasets and models, including financial models where relevant to project
• Ensure projects are “closed down” will all potential marketing opportunities exploited.
• Ensures where applicable, that team meets client expectations, budget and profit requirements.
• Uses resources effectively and efficiently on project/task.
• Effectively manages director expectations of project outcomes.
• You will drive growth in new sectors, clients and markets.
• Developing the team through “on the job” mentoring.
• Comfortable with “working in the grey”.

Work-life balance 

At Steer, we believe that a healthy work-life balance is paramount to long term success, which is why all employees seeking a full-time opportunity are encouraged to spend 60% of their time either in office or on-site with clients and why we aim to keep our employee’s typical work week to 37.5 hours, reflective of client needs. Hours, expectations, and exemption status will be determined for any applicant seeking a part-time opportunity.  

Compensation 

Steer is committed to ensuring that all its employees are compensated a fairly and at a competitive rate. All initial compensation, regardless of location, may be subject to change as skills, abilities, internal equity and geographic location are taken into account. 

In addition to base salary, all employees will be eligible for an annual discretionary performance bonus. Please review the benefits section for more information on total reward. 

Steer reserves the right to ultimately pay more or less than the posted range and offer additional compensation. 

Requirements

Qualifications:

• A first level university degree, 2:1 (or equivalent) or above in business administration or relevant field such as economics, law, finance, sciences, engineering
• ACA/CIMA/CFA/IA
• Must be legally authorized to work in the United Kingdom without the need for employer sponsorship, now or at any time in the future

Person Specification

You must be self-motivated, team player and with a passion for working on large projects that make a difference to our world. The role requires working to deadlines, prioritising workload, and always providing a high level of service.

Values and skills we look for in an Amberside employee:

• Driving curiosity to solve client problems and respond to a challenge.
• Belief that solving the world’s energy and climate challenges is something to which we should all respond.
• Passion for understanding the financial drivers for each project, combined with the intellectual and communication skills to help clients understand the impact of those drivers.
• Confidence in using you own initiative and making decisions at pace.
• Exceptional attention to detail and an ability to translate this to an Excel model.
• Practiced at communicating complex information in a clear and concise manner – verbally or in written form.
• Exhibits role model behaviour in line with Amberside Advisors values
• Able to apply research skills to solve new issues and make improvements.

Benefits

We offer a competitive package of benefits including private medical insurance and health screening, life assurance, group income protection, company pension scheme, EAP, ability to buy and sell annual leave days, Season Ticket Loan, a group Share Incentive Plan, up to 5 days for volunteering activities and a discretionary bonus scheme based on annual compensation (dependent upon individual and company performance).

Additionally, we offer 25 days annual leave, plus the 8 bank holidays and the ability to buy and sell leave in the year to give extra flexibility.

Steer is an equal opportunity employer and welcomes all candidates regardless of race, color, ancestry, gender identity or expression, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, Veteran status, or any other legally protected status. Any other human expressions and experiences not mentioned here are equally welcome. If you require an accommodation, now or throughout your employment, please let us know.

In our commitment to inclusivity in the workplace, Steer has welcomed the creation of various Employee Resource Groups, dedicated to ensuring the support, progression, and well-being of all employees. For more information, check out our social responsibility page Our social responsibility | Steer (steergroup.com).

We understand that some may be dissuaded to apply based off their compatibility with the job description. That being said, we understand that not everyone is a perfect match on paper and encourage anyone to apply regardless of how much their work experience directly relates to the job description.

Part-time and flexible working applications will be considered.