Partner – Organisation and Talent — Water And Utilities Business

The mandate

A water-and-utilities client portfolio requires organisation advice tied to the work that must move. Its leaders seek insight into how accountability, capability, incentives and leadership behaviour affect delivery. The regional partnership seeks a Partner who can diagnose these dimensions, then remain through implementation until the new system works.

The client-value perimeter is approximately S$21,850 million in project and operating assets, supported by 1,050 employees and material partners. The Partner will lead organisation strategy, operating-model design, workforce and capability analysis, senior-team effectiveness, succession, change delivery and client stewardship. Client executives retain employment and project decisions. The Partner owns the quality of organisational evidence, the implementability of recommendations and the growth of the advisory team.

Water programmes combine process engineering, networks, civil delivery, controls, commercial management, regulation and operations. A chart can appear clear while decisions still wait for unavailable specialists or cross-company consent. The work must trace real decisions, information and consequences across project stages before titles or spans are altered.

Delivery recovery also creates emotional pressure. Leaders may seek a redesign to signal action, protect a function or remove an individual. The Partner will distinguish structural cause, capability shortage, performance failure and relationship conflict. Advice must be fair to people and useful to the project.

Why this seat is open

This is a planned replacement with a four-to-six-month transition. The incumbent will transfer priority clients, team responsibilities and current engagements while the council completes referencing and conflict review. Confidentiality permits a deliberate announcement to clients and colleagues. The change is not associated with a quality or conduct finding.

What you will own

• Diagnose decision flow, work interfaces and capability constraints.
• Design structures, governance and roles around delivery outcomes.
• Connect workforce plans with project stage and technical demand.
• Facilitate senior-team choices without assuming client authority.
• Measure adoption through decisions and project performance.
• Build organisation-advisory leaders and transferable client relationships.

Diagnosis will use observed work. The team will follow decisions such as design acceptance, change control, supplier approval, commissioning readiness and operational handover. It will record who provides evidence, who recommends, who decides and where rework returns. Interviews and surveys remain useful, but perceptions will be checked against meeting records, queues, schedule variance and actual escalation behaviour.

Operating-model choices will show consequence. Central technical authority may improve consistency but create delay; project autonomy may accelerate work but duplicate capability and weaken standards. The Partner will offer explicit alternatives with capacity, cost, risk and transition implications. Decision rights will include thresholds and escalation, not merely boxes labelled accountable or consulted.

Workforce planning will be dynamic by project stage. Hydraulic, process, environmental, controls, commercial and commissioning needs rise at different moments. The Partner will map critical demand, internal proficiency, partner reliance and location constraints, then recommend redeployment, development, hiring or contracted capability. Headcount reduction will not be presented as productivity when it transfers work to already scarce experts.

Leadership work will address behaviour in the operating system. The senior team must practise making disputed resource and standard decisions using the new governance before launch. Individual assessment will focus on role requirements and observable evidence. Sensitive conclusions will be protected, yet the Partner will not allow confidentiality to make accountability ambiguous.

Implementation measures will connect organisation change to delivery. Decision time, rework, interface failure, technical-authority load, critical-role coverage and milestone reliability will be baselined. The team will identify external factors so it does not claim every improvement. Client capability will be built into the assignment from the beginning, with ownership transferred through coached cycles rather than a final training session.

The first 12 months

In the first 90 days, the Partner will review the eight largest engagements, observe critical client decisions and assess the 1,050-person delivery perimeter. The council will receive a client-value map, quality risks and choices on pursuits that lack sufficient implementation access.

By month eight, three project teams should operate revised decision rights, two technical-capability bottlenecks should have costed supply plans and at least two client leaders should independently run the new governance. The practice will have one evidence-based recovery proposition used across unrelated accounts without copying an organisation design.

At year-end, targeted decision cycle time should fall 25%, interface rework improve 15% and 80% of pivotal client roles have verified capability or a dated intervention. At least 75% of organisation outcomes should remain in use after two reporting cycles, while engagement contribution and quality remain within council-approved tolerances.

What the board will measure

• Organisation advice grounded in actual project decisions.
• Faster delivery without weakened technical or public-service control.
• Workforce capacity aligned with changing project-stage demand.
• Client leaders able to sustain the operating model themselves.
• A strong advisory bench and orderly relationship succession.

The person

You are an organisation-and-talent Partner, operating-model leader or senior people adviser with 22–28 years of experience. You have carried client-value scope above S$12,650 million and led at least 725 people. You understand project delivery sufficiently to connect organisation choices with engineering, commissioning, regulatory and service consequences.

The council will examine a redesign you refused because diagnosis was weak, a workforce intervention that removed a delivery constraint and a client relationship successfully transferred. You must show outcomes beyond chart approval and explain what evidence separated structure from individual performance. Pure executive-search or workshop experience will not meet the bar.

The appointment is onsite in Singapore with extensive regional client and project travel. The incoming Partner will complete client, independence and personal conflict diligence.

Compensation and terms

Base compensation is S$360,000–480,000 plus annual incentive. Evaluation includes client outcomes, adoption, contribution, quality, talent development and succession. Final terms follow the confirmed practice role and regional partnership governance.

Confidentiality

The advisory practice, clients, projects, leaders and organisation findings remain confidential. Additional detail follows reciprocal interest and an undertaking. The brief combines non-identifying characteristics rather than describing a named client.