Project Lead and Design Manager
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James is a Project and design manager with ten years of experience working for Council and tier one main contractors in the north of England and Wales. Having seven years on-site engineering experience he has progressed into design management and preconstruction. James has outstanding interpersonal and teamwork skills which have been applied to effectively negotiate and coordinate clients, subcontractors and supply chains.
James has experience in producing and managing contracts in line with the NEC3 and NEC4 form of contracts and has a proven track record of delivering projects and work packages on time and within budget, thus ensuring that value for money is achieved for clients. James has a Civil Engineering Masters degree at the University of Manchester and is in the final stages of becoming a Chartered Civil Engineer in 2025. This demonstrates that James has enthusiasm for design management with a broad industry experience.
Project Manager at Denbighshire County Council (2026-01 – Present)
James is a Project Manager for Denbighshire County Council leading the annual project delivery for bridge and structural projects across the county. He manages the full project lifecycle from feasibility and design through to procurement and construction, ensuring schemes are delivered safely, on programme, and within budget. James coordinates multidisciplinary teams, including consultants, contractors, and stakeholders, driving design development and resolving issues proactively to maintain progress.
He leads technical and progress meetings, ensuring efficient delivery of design outputs and construction activities. He is responsible for budget management and funding, applying his technical and site experience to develop practical, value-driven solutions in complex environments. James ensures compliance with CDM and health and safety requirements while promoting a strong safety culture.
He maintains effective stakeholder engagement, including with elected members and the public, ensuring clear communication and high levels of client satisfaction.
Design Manager and Project Lead at Balfour Beatty (2020-01 – 2025-12)
James is the design manager and project lead for Balfour Beatty on the £10m Pont Llanerch Bridge Replacement project in Denbighshire, North Wales which covers the design and build of a bridge replacement project. James is managing the design subcontract package leading the coordination of design information, tracking design deliverables and hosting collaborative meeting with 3rd parties to resolve design issues. James hosts technical design meetings to which efficiently identifies design issues proactively, maintaining project momentum.
As project lead James manages a preconstruction team to provide progress updates to the client in addition to supporting the client with funding applications, land negotiations and utility coordination. James has used his site and technical experience to overcome budget constraints to the project by providing value for money alternatives to balance the project budget. James has successfully managed to develop a design solution in a very environmentally sensitive area though collaboration with stakeholders and the design team.
James has guided the client though the project achieving excellent customer satisfaction scores.
Design Manager at Balfour Beatty (2023-01 – 2024-12)
James is working closely with Halton Borough Council and Mott MacDonald to finalise Runcorn Busway. The project budget is £18m James has worked on the project from outline design stage he has tracked the design change during detailed design. Whilst tracking the design creep on the project James provided budget updates' supported by subcontractor quotations in result of the change of scope.
To mitigate the budget uplift James has successfully hosted weekly value for money workshops with the client and designer to influence and encourage design changes to realign the construction budget cost. In addition to mitigating the project budget cost. The design workshops have also provide the opportunity to improve the safety by design.
James has lead the utility coordination by highlighting the need for trail holes during preconstruction to reduce the risk during construction. The identification of stats has enabled design changes to be implemented during preconstruction reducing the risk during construction. In addition James has supported the client with the liaison of the utility providers.
James has championed BIM-360 enabling clear and efficient communication of design information between all parties and the supply chain for pricing.
Senior Engineer at Balfour Beatty (2020-01 – 2022-12)
James was the senior engineer for Balfour Beatty on the £27m project. James managed and trained a team of five engineers providing, technical support improving safety quality and commercial awareness. James managed the coordination of design information and technical queries providing the liaison between the client, designer and contractors.
James identified a number of design issues and proposed suitable solutions in keeping with the project programme and budget. The design solutions aided constructability and improved safety during installation. James hosted daily briefing and instructions to the subcontractors collaboration the teams activities to improve efficiency and safety which included collating the health and safety file for handover to the client.
Project Engineer at AMCO GIFFEN (2018-01 – 2019-12)
James successfully lead the engineering team on the £20m project delivering 137 platform updates in twelve months. with managing six site engineers. Working on the project from contract award James assisted the planning and mobilisation of 137 sites and provided technical support and training to the site agents and engineers.
Graduate Engineer at Carillion (2015-01 – 2017-12)
James was the site engineer for 4km of highway and structures on the greenfield site. James joined the project at site clearance stage working with multiple contractors to install the section of highway to handover completing all site engineering activities, health and safety and quality management duties of his role.
Masters in Civil Engineering – University of Manchester
