Location
Central London

Hours
Full Time

Salary
Competitive, commensurate with experience

About the Role
We’re looking for a Principal Ecologist or Associate Director to help lead our Peterborough ecology team - a pivotal role within our UK ecology business. You’ll combine strategic leadership, technical excellence and people development, working across an exciting portfolio of projects spanning water, transport and energy infrastructure. In this role, you will: Help steer the strategic direction for the Peterborough ecology team and contribute to UK-wide leadership; act as the go-to expert providing high-quality advice to clients, stakeholders and regulators; build strong relationships through extensive client and stakeholder engagement; lead and inspire colleagues through empathetic, high-impact leadership and mentoring; apply your technical expertise across EIA, Habitat Regulations Assessment and Biodiversity Net Gain; design and oversee ecological monitoring and survey programmes; collaborate across disciplines to deliver integrated, innovative solutions; play a central role in identifying, bidding and winning new work; promote the ecology team’s capability across the wider business and externally; and oversee resource planning for the Peterborough ecology teams to ensure balanced workloads and proper project support. This is your opportunity to shape not just projects, but people, performance and the future direction of the team.

Experience
- Strong background in terrestrial ecology with significant industry experience
- Proven experience leading ecological input on large-scale projects
- Experience in line management, mentoring and team development
- Experience in innovative scoping of ecological inputs, protected species licensing, Biodiversity Net Gain, project consenting and construction environments
- Experience in stakeholder and regulator engagement, planning inquiries and examinations

About you
You’re a confident, forward-thinking leader ready to take the next step. You have a strategic mindset with the ability to influence wider business decisions. You demonstrate a proactive, hands-on approach with strong self-awareness and the ability to adapt across diverse and complex projects. Most importantly, you bring the ability to think differently, challenge the norm and continually improve how we deliver for our clients.

Qualifications
Chartered status (or on track to achieve it) in ecology or a related discipline.