Engineering Project Management Group Leader/Director, Design & Construction

Roche•South San Francisco, CA

About The Position

Lead Strategic Excellence and Build the Future as Engineering Project Management Group Leader/Director Are you ready to take on a dynamic leadership role that drives impactful change across our cutting-edge biotech campuses? Genentech is seeking an experienced Engineering Project Management Group Leader/Director to strategically manage and deliver a diverse portfolio of construction projects that support the critical needs of our Pharma Tech (PT) organization. With oversight of projects ranging from $50K to $30M and an annual portfolio value of up to $80M, this role offers a unique opportunity to transform spaces and ensure the success of mission-critical operations across our South San Francisco and Dixon campuses. As the single point of accountability for project execution and customer success, you will lead a diverse team of project managers, foster relationships across functional and external partners, deliver portfolio excellence, and shape the future of our campus infrastructure through your leadership and vision. If you thrive in resource-sensitive environments and have a passion for innovation, customer collaboration, and operational improvements, this role is your next big move!

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Engineering with a preference for mechanical, electrical, chemical, environmental, architecture or related field.
15 years minimum experience in Engineering, Project Management, Facilities, Planning or related field.
Good working knowledge of project design, construction and management.
Excellent interpersonal, leadership, collaboration and conflict resolution skills, as the role works frequently in a resource challenged and schedule sensitive environment.
Confidence in leading a team of project professionals, positive attitude, and a good temperament for customer interaction is a must.
Excellent communication and presentation skills, and must deliver effective presentations to senior management
Must embrace approachability and true relationship building with customer and third party partner groups.
Excellent organization and planning skills.
Advanced Microsoft Office and Google Suite skills along with growth mindset towards learning and embracing AI in the workplace.
Exceptional teamwork and collaboration skills are essential to facilitate the work of cross-functional and interdepartmental teams.
Must be dependable, attention to details, and proficient in coordination tasks.
Self-starter and ability to work with minimum or no supervision.

Nice To Haves

Certification in project management (i.e. PMI certification), Six Sigma, Lean or Operational Excellence or additional relevant management training is desirable.

Responsibilities

This Director level position has overall leadership and strategic accountability for a team of Genentech project managers in the execution of construction projects supporting a specific internal Genentech client group’s small project portfolio, PT (Pharma Tech – Manufacturing, Quality and Development) as well as cross site work projects.
The small project portfolio will consist of projects ranging in dollar value between ~$50K and $10M for each project and will be located at the Genentech South San Francisco or Dixon campuses. Such a portfolio consists of ~30 – 60 active projects at any given time, have a total portfolio project value of $30M - $70M, and expected annual cash flow of $25M - $50M.
The Director may also be responsible for several medium sized projects ($10M - $30M) in addition to managing the portfolio work. Overall value of projects overseen by this role will typically be in the range of $40M to $80 Million per year, with an annual cash flow of $30M - $70M
The Director will be the key point of contact/liaison between Design & Construction and the representatives of their respective customer group, managing the relationships between the groups and resource planning to support the customer, and resolving escalated issues.
Manage the relationships and alignment between Genentech and the alliance architectural\engineering firms and general contractors executing work on their portfolio.
Leadership expectations of this position include ensuring that the group has the appropriate forward looking strategies to meet the business needs of the site.
Responsible for managing the finances around the portfolio of customer projects, to support the customer in staying on budget targets for the year.
A portion of the Director’s time will be spent on leading or supporting process improvements within Design & Construction.
This role will have major interfaces with representatives of key customer groups (frequent ~PL7 to PL9 interactions, with periodic meetings with customer vice presidents, or VP \ Sr. VP levels in Site Services) and will carry full responsibility for the results of their organization to Genentech.
Make decisions on how to best address customer project requests, the timing around project starts to meet customer needs and annual spend\cash flow targets, the approaches for efficient project delivery, staffing assignments, and issue resolution.
This role is expected to be an effective communicator of ideas, project goals and results. With minimal supervision, is expected to make effective presentations and updates to senior management and in broader forums.
Responsible for creating an environment for the team to learn, develop and grow – both from a leadership and technical perspective.
This role will also frequently interact with senior leadership (Operations managers, Directors and Project Executives) of the key alliance design and construction firms hired to support the project work.
A key role of the position is to manage ambiguous business situations, resolve conflicts or disagreements between different project stakeholders, and manage the customer relationships.
This role’s direct reports are between four (4) and eight (8) Project Managers (level SE6 to SE7). This team will consist of some (3 - 5) blue badges, but may include some contingent workers (green badges).
Successful completion of Genentech specific site training and continual training compliance.
Establish and maintain positive working relationships with others, both internally and externally, to achieve the goals of the organization.
Demonstrate professional conduct when communicating with peers, customers and managers.
Positively influence others to achieve results that are in the best interest of the organization.
Direct & Lead Staff: This role shall hire, develop and lead a staff of Genentech project managers, varying in level from SE6 to SE7, who will each execute approximately 5-12 construction & engineering projects at a time (typically between $50K and $20M in value per project, although occasionally several medium sized projects as well).
Identify upcoming project starts, manage the resourcing of his\her team, and provide project assignments to their project managers.
Responsible for supporting their staff’s work and will hold weekly or bi-monthly one on one meetings with each project manager on their team to provide direction and coaching on how best to execute the work, help with escalated issues, and to guide them in career development.
Customer Relationship Management: The Director of this team is the direct interface between Design & Construction and the key representative(s) of a major Genentech functional group, in this case Pharma Technology.
This role will be highly engaged with the customer in understanding their business needs, and working to translate those needs into individual engineering projects.
The Director will have a significant impact to ensuring the built environment supports the ability of a major functional group at Genentech (PT here) to operate efficiently in their occupied facilities.
Assist in developing new project scopes, providing input on initial costs and schedules for that customer’s portfolio of work (cLRP level estimates), and assist the customer in making decisions about when to start new projects.
To support this work in the Planning/Project Initiation stage, the Director will engage resources as appropriate for constructability reviews, alternative analysis, scheduling, estimating, etc., to assist the development of the scope. Once ready, assign a project manager from their team to execute the defined project scope.
Portfolio Management for the Supported Customer Group: The Director will be responsible for the portfolio of projects executed for their customer group, and is responsible for the cash flow and budget & resource management of the functional area’s portfolio.
On a monthly basis, will meet with the leadership of that functional area (typically a director, senior director or executive director) to review the portfolio and assist the customer in prioritizing their portfolio to meet available project resources.
A key deliverable for the director in this role will be the creation of a portfolio financial report, detailing the budget and cash flow status of the portfolio on a monthly basis. Decisions on which projects to start \ stop \ hold are made based on this reporting.
Manage Relationships with Key Suppliers: The design, engineering and construction of the projects executed for each customer group will be done by a number of alliance design and construction firms, who will partner on a portfolio basis with the project managers to execute the work in an efficient, well coordinated manner.
The Director will be responsible for managing the relationships between Genentech customers and their project managers with these firms, to ensure positive interactions, and a collaborative and efficient approach to the work.
Continuous Improvement: A subset of the Director’s time will be dedicated to leading or supporting continuous improvement initiatives within Design & Construction to enhance customer relations and workflow efficiency. The initiatives will typically require team building, cross functional leadership & wider business understanding.
Project Approvals: The Director in this role can independently approve projects up to $1M. This role will also be a rotating chair of the Project Review Committee (PRC), along with the other two Directors (Group Leaders), with responsibilities to review and approve projects up to $2M and authorize projects with higher value to be presented to CGC (higher level body) for approval.