Senior Development Manager – Octopus Australia

This is an opportunity to join the Octopus Australia team in our Melbourne or Sydney office. The successful applicant will be able to join the Octopus Investments Australia team on their mission to accelerate Australia's transition to a future powered by renewable energy.

About Octopus Group

Octopus Group is one of the largest owners of renewable energy projects in Europe and Australia. It owns some 260 assets, on behalf of wholesale and institutional investors. Domestically, Octopus Australia is responsible for managing over $1 billion of assets for local and international investors.

Octopus Australia

Established in 2018, Octopus Australia is a dynamic multi-disciplinary team of over 55 highly skilled people which spans the expertise required to realise and operate a renewable energy and storage portfolio.

With an existing multi-GW portfolio of operating and development assets, including solar, wind and battery storage across the country. We are continuing to grow to create a long-term business that can deliver a firmed energy product to meet the evolving needs of Australia’s energy future.

About the Role

You will be leading the development of renewable projects, including solar, wind, battery storage projects and hydrogen opportunities that will need your stewardship through the development life cycle to financial close.

The role is based in Melbourne or Sydney – with site visits required periodically to: our development sites, stakeholders and communities. Our current portfolio consists of a mixture of greenfield through to late-stage assets, and with your help, we’ll be growing the pipeline to feed more projects into the construction phase.

Just as important as what you achieve in this role, is how you perform the role. We’ll need you to be an engaged team member, who can cross pollenate your development expertise into an investment world. Be ready for a dynamic work environment, with a start-up mindset. You’ll be encouraged and supported to be bold in your thinking and leadership, whilst being a helpful colleague to those around you.

Responsibilities

• Project Development from land owner liaison, development approvals, grid connection, EPC procurement, PPAs etc. Treat the projects as if they are your own.
• Assist the wider Investment Team through asset growth opportunities as required, including bringing your contributions and knowledge into project evaluations, acquisition bids, transaction and negotiation processes, due diligence work and supporting Investment Directors through internal approval processes.
• Provide leadership in developing sound relationships with relevant stakeholders including: landholders, community, Traditional Owners, regulators and policy makers.
• Manage project teams of multidisciplinary internal and external experts, including technical, planning, legal, grid, environmental and engineering advisors.
• Selecting advisors, consultants, OEMs and construction contractors (including EPC contractors), running procurement process and contract negotiations through to financial close.
• Take the lead role for negotiation of high value contracts including project construction, equipment supply and transmission connection agreements.
• Manage the grid connection process, working closely with NSPs and grid consultants, to navigate the complexity of the technical, regulatory and commercial connection landscape.
• Manage the delivery of development works within allocated budgets in a timely, efficient and effective manner.
• Development of project execution plans including timelines, costs, risk assessments, communication of project financials and progress reports in a consistent manner across the assigned projects.
• Development of required inputs for management papers, board papers and commercial negotiations as required.
• Prepare and manage budgets for Capex and Opex, project schedules, and technical inputs into financial models, supporting overall project business case development.
• Support our fundraising efforts, including meeting with prospective investors, promoting the Octopus profile, and supporting our fund managers with development expertise as required.
• Support ongoing profile-raising activities – networking with industry participants and at times engaging with energy policymakers to influence energy policy.

Qualifications

Ideally, you will have some or all of the following qualifications, skills and experiences:

• A relevant tertiary qualification, preferably in both technical and business-related fields.
• Minimum 5 years’ experience in a similar position working in the renewable energy sector is preferred. Development experience within complex infrastructure projects including oil & gas or transmission will be well regarded.
• Exposure to development process from concept to final investment decision.
• Ability to engage at an executive level with superior written and verbal communication skills.
• Candidates with an existing network of contacts within the Australian renewable energy industry will be highly regarded.

Core skills required:

• Strong Project Management skills with a background with technical / engineering qualifications and experience. Demonstrated experience managing complex workloads in a fast paced and dynamic environment.
• Applicants are expected to demonstrate awareness of how an investment business and a renewable energy business would operate.
• Knowledge of Health, Safety and Environmental practices, legislation and requirements.  
• Contract and project management skills. The candidate must be highly organised, confident in negotiating large and complex contracts and able to handle relationships with external contracts effectively, sometimes in challenging circumstances.
• Candidates must demonstrate a commercial mindset, and in particular be able to consider technical challenges in a broader commercial and investment context.
• The role will not require detailed financial modelling skills but applicants are expected to have at least a basic understanding of key investment principles – rates of return, risk, IRR and NPV financial concepts and ideally some familiarity with financial

What we offer

• 💰 A competitive salary package including bonus and medical insurance benefits
• ✈️ Extra Annual Leave entitlement
• 🏡 Flexible working 
• Ongoing learning and career development opportunities

Octopus has built an exciting and inclusive high-performance culture where employees feel empowered. We also understand the value of diversity, and we are dedicated to creating an inclusive workplace environment. We would welcome people of all backgrounds to apply. 

Our Values 

At Octopus we don’t just focus on what we do but also how we do it. Everyone to shares our values of being straightforward, helpful, and bold. Our culture is critical to our success and is built around three principles that underpin how we pursue our goals:

• Be Bold – We like people who make decisions quickly and are OK changing their mind if it turns out there’s a better way of doing things.
• Be Helpful – We like People who behave like it always day one and who remember without our customers there is no business.
• Be Straightforward – We like people who have opinions and express them in a way that’s respectful and easy to understand.