// Role Summary
Join Leonardo UK as a Senior Bid Manager on a 12-month fixed-term contract, leading the formulation of bid strategies and the development of competitive proposals for Electronic Warfare opportunities.
// Key Responsibilities
- Lead competitive and non-competitive bids from inception to conclusion.
- Develop customer win themes and value propositions.
- Coordinate multi-functional teams and manage bid lifecycles.
- Analyze customer requirements and formulate bid strategies.
- Accountable for the quality of bid submissions and internal governance.
// Role Specification
About the Role
Leonardo UK is seeking a Senior Bid Manager to join the Electronic Warfare Bids and Proposal team. This is a 12-month fixed-term contract role, covering maternity leave, with potential for permanent opportunities within the team thereafter. You will be instrumental in delivering competitive proposals by leading the proposal generation process, developing customer win themes, and formulating bid strategies.
Your Impact
As a Senior Bid Manager, you will be responsible for building and leading bid teams to develop winning solutions for our customers. This involves coordinating inputs from various functional areas across multiple sectors, working closely with Sector VPs, the EW Head of Bids and Proposals, Capture Leads, Integrated Project Team Leads, Engineering, and Capability Managers to define the bid strategy and implement win themes. You will have accountability for the overall quality of bid submissions, guiding the capture team through internal governance and approval gates, and ensuring crucial business-winning information is presented effectively to the EW leadership team. This requires excellent planning and stakeholder management skills.
Key Responsibilities
- Lead both competitive and non-competitive bids to a successful conclusion, from tactical follow-on business to multi-million-pound strategic initiatives.
- Collaborate within capture teams to develop win themes, storyboards, graphics, and compelling narratives for bid submissions.
- Coordinate and manage bids of varying complexities throughout the capture and bid phases.
- Analyze and break down customer requirements (PQQs, RFIs, RFPs, RFQs, ITTs etc.) into manageable work packages for the capture team.
- Work collaboratively with customers and partners, applying best practices, to formulate bid strategies and drive bid teams towards winning solutions.
- Support the capture team during contract negotiations, managing and implementing necessary changes to bid submissions.
- Schedule, plan, and drive bid activities, including Win Strategy, Bid Kick-off, Answer Planning, WBS development, Bid Progress Reviews, Proposal production, Proposal content collation, Proposal reviews (e.g. colour reviews), and Tender Approvals.
- Plan, lead, and challenge cost build-up and pricing activities involving business functions.
- Lead bid teams in identifying and analyzing risks and opportunities, developing mitigation/realisation plans.
- Forecast functional resource and budget requirements for bids, proactively managing approved bid budgets.
- Manage and contribute to writing compelling proposals, leveraging the skills of capture team members and subject matter experts.
What We're Looking For
- At least 3 years of experience managing complex bids and proposals.
- Proven track record in winning business (preferably leading bids over £20m) through competitive processes.
- Strong commercial, project, and risk management skills.
- Experience managing multi-functional teams, ideally within a Bid Management or Business Winning discipline.
- Ability to assess requirements and communicate effectively with stakeholders at all levels.
- Excels in bids and proposals coaching, mentoring, team management, and team building.
- Interpersonal skills to develop strong relationships with internal/external stakeholders, senior management, and government/military customers.
- Effective communication skills across all business levels and with external consortia.
- Excellent planning, organization, and time management skills.
- Working understanding of best practice bid processes and tools (e.g., bid planning, Black Hat, Red Team, Price to Win).
- Experience in writing proposals and proposal content is desirable.
- Meets entry requirements for APMP Practitioner certification; holding the certification is desirable.
Security Clearance
This role is subject to pre-employment screening in line with the UK Government’s Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS). Additional Personnel Security Controls, referred to as National Security Vetting (NSV), may apply, potentially including eligibility for Security Check (SC) or Developed Vetting (DV).
Location and Working Arrangements
This role is based at our Luton site, with potential for occasional UK travel. We operate a hybrid working model with flexible working options, expecting you to work from the Luton office two to three times per week on average, with flexibility based on business needs and your schedule.
Benefits
Join Leonardo and benefit from a comprehensive, company-funded benefits package:
- Generous leave, with up to 12 additional flexi-days per year.
- Award-winning pension scheme with up to 15% employer contribution.
- Free access to mental health support, financial advice, and employee-led inclusion networks.
- Bonus scheme eligibility for management level and below.
- Free access to 4,000+ online courses via Coursera and LinkedIn Learning.
- Refer a friend programme for financial rewards.
- Tailored perks, up to £500 annually, including private healthcare, dental, family cover, tech & lifestyle discounts, and gym memberships.
- Flexible hours with hybrid working options.