This is a senior role leading delivery across Freemans Event Partners (FEP) Strategic Projects: seasonal and large-scale food and beverage partnerships across a varied portfolio of venues and events.
This is a senior role leading delivery across Freemans Event Partners (FEP) Strategic Projects: seasonal and large-scale food and beverage partnerships across a varied portfolio of venues and events.
The Project Delivery Director brings operational leadership to a growing team, leading the Event Managers and Venue Manager on operations on site. The role works closely with FEP’s Core F&B team so that every project is delivered to the same high standards as the wider business.
Essential
Job Requirements
- Proven senior operational leadership at director or head-of-operations level in events, hospitality or leisure.
- A demonstrable record of strategic and operational accountability for high-volume events or seasonal operations, delivered to a consistently high standard across multiple sites.
- Experience of leading and developing managers, including line managers, across several sites or events at once, setting clear standards and holding them to account for performance.
- Full accountability for operational budgets and delivery costs, with a record of delivering to budget and working with finance to build cost into planning from the outset.
- The ability to lead a varied portfolio concurrently (live seasons, new partnerships in development and new teams being built) and to prioritise resource and effort across competing demands.
- Calm, decisive leadership under pressure, including leading the operational response to major incidents, backed by rigorous forward planning.
- Credibility and influence at senior level, building strong partnerships with the Operations function, internal teams, partners and clients’ senior stakeholders.
- Commercial and analytical judgement: confident using plans, budgets and operational data to make decisions and shape the operational plan.
- Experience of setting, embedding and auditing operational standards, SOPs and systems across a portfolio.
- A track record of building people capability, including contributing to appraisals and building new delivery teams.
- Confident working with clients’ site teams, alongside the account manager.
- Full driving licence and able to travel to sites.
Desirable
- Multi-site and seasonal food and beverage experience.
Job Responsibilities
Strategic Leadership of Portfolio Delivery
- Hold overall accountability for operational delivery across a varied portfolio of projects, directing event plans, capacity, staffing and site set-up.
- Lead delivery on the day alongside the venue managers on site, and own the operational response to any incident or issue that arises.
- Jointly approve event and site plans with each account manager at the planning stage, ensuring operational viability before commitment.
Operational Standards and Partnership with Operations
- Set, embed and assure FEP’s group standards, SOPs and systems across every project, and lead the audit programme.
- Act as the principal operational link with the Operations team, chairing regular operations meetings and the fortnightly resourcing session.
- Plan shared resource, such as the trader network, in partnership with Operations ahead of each season.
Leadership and Development of Teams
- Lead the Event/Venue Managers on operations, setting clear expectations and holding them to account for delivery.
- Direct Event/Venue Managers on operational matters, including standards, systems and incidents, in partnership with each account manager.
- Provide formal input to appraisals on operational competence, and build their capability and succession.
- Build and develop new delivery teams with a strong operational focus.
Financial Accountability, Planning and Readiness
- Partner with finance to ensure delivery costs are built into every budget, and own delivery performance against budget.
- Lead readiness reviews before each season, starting with the 2027 season from March, and provide assurance on readiness to the Project Director.
- Lead post-event debriefs and embed the lessons into the following season’s plans.
Growth and New Partnerships
- Provide operational input to new partnerships from their earliest phases, shaping deliverability, cost and resourcing.
- Support events that need a lighter touch while retaining oversight of the detail, ensuring consistent delivery from the largest season to the smallest event.
Job Benefits
- Competitive salary, commensurate with experience.
- Bonus scheme
- 25 days’ annual leave plus bank holidays.
- Pension scheme.
- Access to FEP’s wider employee benefits programme.
- A dynamic, fast-paced environment where you can make a genuine impact at some of the UK’s most exciting venues.
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