Vice President, Project Controls & Cost

5C Data Centers USA, Inc.•Springfield, OH

6d•Remote

About The Position

The Vice President, Project Controls & Cost leads portfolio-wide schedule and cost governance from early development and pre-construction through construction, commissioning, customer handover, and closeout. Reporting to the Chief Development Officer and leading the Senior Directors of Project Controls and Cost Control, this role builds a scalable controls organization to protect capital and customer commitments through credible schedules, reliable forecasts, and early warning. The position is remote in the USA and requires 25–50% travel.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in a relevant discipline, or equivalent senior-level experience.
15+ years in project controls, cost engineering, construction, or capital-program leadership, including leading managers or functional heads across complex portfolios.
Experience on multi-hundred-million-dollar projects or major multi-project programs in data centers, mission-critical facilities, or comparable infrastructure.
Strong command of CPM scheduling, baselines, progress measurement, ETC/EAC, cash flow, change, contingency, risk, and earned value.
Proven ability to build functions and develop leaders in a scaling organization, challenge assumptions constructively, and align peer functions.
Ability to clearly explain technical, commercial, and capital tradeoffs to executive audiences.

Nice To Haves

Hands-on experience with Primavera P6 and Procore.
Power BI and database management experience.

Responsibilities

Define the controls operating model, including charter, functional boundaries, decision rights, stage-gate requirements, approval pathways, reporting cadence, escalation thresholds, and aligned work and cost breakdown structures, baseline rules, and risk/change methods.
Lead, coach, and hold the Senior Directors of Project Controls and Cost Control accountable for performance, forecast credibility, and succession; scale project controls, scheduling, cost management, and specialist support according to workload, complexity, and risk.
Oversee integrated L1–L5 schedules covering power, permits, design, procurement, construction, energization, commissioning, integrated systems testing, and turnover; govern baseline approvals, rebaselines, recovery reviews, and schedule assumptions.
Oversee budgets, commitments, actuals, accruals, ETC/EAC, change exposure, contingency, and final-account forecasts across contractor and owner-direct scope; require evidence-based variance explanations and review funding gaps, escalation, claims, and commissioning exposure.
Establish assurance reviews that reconcile reported progress and forecasts with field conditions, procurement status, quantities, productivity, and system completion; apply consistent measurement rules, earned value, and scenario analysis where practical.
Lead joint schedule and cost assessments of changes, risks, and recovery options; document assumptions, prevent double counting, assign owners and deadlines for material exposures, and escalate unresolved issues to the CDO.
Partner with Planning & Development and Pre-Construction to validate scope, power availability, permits, design readiness, procurement timing, and funding before commitments; set controls readiness criteria for funding, procurement release, mobilization, commissioning, and customer handover.
Partner with Procurement, Commercial, and Construction to embed schedule, cost, progress, change, and reporting requirements in delivery contracts; maintain integrated visibility of contractor and trade work, owner-furnished equipment, manufacturing, factory testing, logistics, and utility delivery.
Oversee schedule-linked cash-flow forecasts and funding inputs; ensure payment positions are validated against contracts and verified progress, and reconcile commitments, actuals, and accruals with Finance.
Own integrated controls reporting on commitment health, critical paths, EAC, variance, contingency, change, risk, and required decisions; present analysis, options, and tradeoffs to the CDO, executives, customers, and board, investor, or lender audiences.
Set the scheduling, cost, project-management information system, and reporting roadmap; establish ownership, common definitions, and audit trails; improve data quality, version control, and reporting automation, and train teams to reduce duplicate administration.
Ensure final schedules, costs, changes, and contingency are reconciled at project closeout; build benchmarks and incorporate lessons about utilities, vendors, procurement, productivity, and commissioning into future estimates, schedules, contracts, and delivery standards.