Assistant Commercial Manager

Sage Homes is an innovative Blackstone and Regis business addressing the housing crisis in England by making good homes affordable for people across the country who need them.

Since 2017 we have delivered around 10,000 new homes across affordable rent, shared ownership and social rent for individuals and families. In 2021 Sage Homes became the largest provider of new affordable housing in England, and by 2030 we have committed to deliver 30,000 high-quality affordable homes across the country.

We have invested more than £3 billion into high-quality affordable housing. Our entrepreneurial spirit combined with our technical expertise has got us to where we are today and will enable future sustainable growth.

The Sage Development Management (DM) team is responsible for overseeing the completion of a substantial pipeline of between 3,500 and 4,500 homes annually and managing the process by which these homes are passed to the downstream Sage operational teams including Sales, Lettings, and Asset Management. This annual programme of work is delivered through a large number of Development Agreements, with many Developer partners, across a large number of geographically dispersed individual projects.

As Assistant Commercial Manager, you will be allocated to a Development Portfolio and will perform a key role, responsible for supporting the Commercial Governance Lead in the commercial and contractual management of the entire annual project delivery programme. You will support the engagement with external Employer’s Agent (EA) and Clerk of Works (CoW) teams to ensure that commercial activities are completed in accordance with Sage’s contractual obligations.

You will support the Development Managers and liaise with the Programme Management Office function over matters including payments, cost reporting, progress, risks, issues, and opportunities; and will be responsible for the collation of all supporting data and documentation that is created through the Commercial Governance workstreams.

You will play a key supporting role in the transformation of the DM team that it may provide more consistent programme information to satisfy other downstream Sage stakeholder teams, in particular Sales and Lettings.

Key duties include:

• Identification of commercial and contractual risk, opportunity, and remedy available to Sage
• First point of contact and screening with EA and CoW teams to ensure that commercial deliverables are produced to suit Sage’s governance programme.
• Under the guidance of the Commercial Governance Lead, analyse and provide initial commentary on the accuracy and adequacy of project deliverables
• Assisting other Project Managers with collating information to inform other workstreams and the PMO
• Tracking site progress against contract sum analyses
• Ensuring that development invoices are contractually due and adequately supported by accurate documentation to enable timely settlement
• Be a point of liaison for Project Managers and other key stakeholders for payment queries
• Be a point of liaison for other Sage operational teams
• Respond to ad-hoc tasks and requests for support across all workstreams

The postholder will be strategically, technically and contractually aware, able to build effective working relationships, a self-starter and a team player. Experience of the following at a senior level would be advantageous:

• Commercial background and experience of managing contracts
• Proactive and able to prioritise effectively and manage a busy workload
• Able to build effective working relationships, a self-starter and a team player.
• Welcome and embrace continuous improvement and change
• Possess excellent attention to detail
• A high level of organisation skills and the ability to assess the criticality of tasks in response to changing business priorities
• Possess strong communication skills
• Possess proficient IT skills including Microsoft office and specialist database applications
• Embrace working in a dynamic, fast-paced, and challenging development client team environment
• Able to plan and manage own workload to achieve deadlines
• A technical qualification in Quantity Surveying, Commercial Management or a related subject preferred. In the absence of a suitable qualification, relevant experience - i.e. commercial contracts/quantity surveying will also be considered

We are committed to ensuring you have the best career here at Sage. As well as regular support and guidance from your manager you can expect to receive a variety of learning and development opportunities to support you as you grow within our business. This includes internally and externally delivered development programmes and opportunities to study for professional accreditations and qualifications.

We truly care about the outcomes we deliver; creating safe and environmentally friendly places for people to flourish. And we’re curious, passionate and inventive in the way we create social change.

Sage is a fast-paced and supportive environment where ambitious and proactive employees thrive. People are empowered to use their pioneering efforts to grow themselves and our business.

We are proudly committed to creating an inclusive workplace, where the diversity of our people and their ideas are truly valued and we love to see applicants from diverse backgrounds and different walks of life.