Head of Estimating

Overview

Head of Estimating —
Location: Homebased – Remote, with UK travel;
Contract: Full-time, Permanent;
Hours: 40 per week, Monday to Friday;
Salary: Competitive, plus £6,900 car allowance.

Mears Group is seeking an exceptional Head of Estimating to lead our commercial estimating and tendering function at a strategic level. This is a pivotal senior leadership role, shaping how we price, win and mobilise major contracts across the organisation. If you are commercially astute, influential at senior levels, and passionate about driving excellence in tendering, this is an opportunity to make a significant impact on the future growth of our business.

As Head of Estimating, you will take ownership of developing robust, compliant and commercially competitive bids across a wide range of work streams, including Repairs & Maintenance (such as M&E and Planned Works), Central Government housing and support services, Decarbonisation and Net Zero programmes, and DLO support. You will shape the commercial strategy behind each opportunity, building cost models from first principles, driving value engineering, and ensuring risks and assumptions are clearly understood.

Working closely with Business Development, Operations and Legal teams, you will influence strategic bid decisions and ensure our proposals support sustainable growth and margin protection. Your leadership will set the standard for commercial governance, pricing excellence and the continuous improvement of our estimating function.

Commercial Leadership

• Lead the creation of high-quality commercial proposals tailored to individual opportunities
• Develop cost models from first principles and drive pricing strategy and value engineering
• Provide senior leadership with clear commercial analysis, risk positions and recommendations
• Partner with internal teams to shape strategic bid decisions and contract risk assessments

Tender Governance & Risk Management

• Ensure all submissions are compliant, well-documented and commercially sound
• Lead competitive dialogue, clarifications, RFIs and post-tender negotiations
• Oversee commercial review of contracts and legal documentation
• Enhance estimating methodologies, tools, templates and documentation standards

Stakeholder Engagement

• Present commercial proposals to Directors and the Senior Management Team
• Embed tender assumptions and methodologies into mobilisation and operational teams
• Engage with supply chain partners to secure competitive and deliverable pricing

Mobilisation & Continuous Improvement

• Play a key role in mobilisation of successful tenders, challenging assumptions to drive profitability
• Translate estimating assumptions into operational cost monitoring
• Analyse outturn performance to inform future bids and build a commercial knowledge base

People Leadership

• Lead, mentor and develop the Estimating Team, fostering technical excellence and collaboration.
• Identify capability gaps and champion learning, systems improvement and performance management

• Extensive experience in social housing estimating, including expert knowledge of NHF Schedule of Rates.
• Proven ability to develop pricing strategies and deliver value engineering solutions.
• Strong track record in post-tender negotiations and contract award processes.
• End-to-end tender lifecycle experience, from pricing to mobilisation.
• Strong working knowledge of standard forms of contract
• Experience presenting commercial proposals at senior leadership level.
• Ability to manage multiple bids under demanding deadlines.
• Demonstrable leadership experience in building high-performing teams.

• Experience at Head of / Senior Manager level within a large contracting or housing services organisation
• Familiarity with sector-standard estimating systems and analytical tools
• Professional qualification in Quantity Surveying or Construction Management

• Strategic commercial thinker with strong influencing capability
• Excellent communicator, able to simplify complex commercial reasoning
• High numerical accuracy and attention to detail
• Proactive problem solver committed to continuous improvement
• Collaborative leader with a passion for…