Project Scheduler

ABP is the UK’s leading and largest ports group, providing essential gateways for trade and enabling green infrastructure essential for the UK’s energy transition. We are a major landlord and port operator with 21 port locations in the UK. We have 87km of Quay and 5000ha of port estate handling approximately 100 million tonnes of cargo every year.

ABP handles more than a quarter of all ports industry volumes, provides support for over half the UK’s offshore wind and catalyses investment, jobs and prosperity in coastal communities. We are also a vital enabler of the UK's transformation to net zero, with exciting plans to develop our port estate so that they play a leading role in supporting the energy transition through onshore and offshore wind, hydrogen and carbon capture and storage (CCUS).

To support our ambitious growth, it is key for ABP to have a strong delivery engine for transforming new opportunities into reality. The Major Projects team lead the development and delivery of our complex, multi-disciplinary port infrastructure projects with a high strategic importance for the business to deliver our twin missions of ‘Keeping Britain Trading’ and ‘Enabling the Energy Transition’. Individual project CAPEX values typically range from £20m to in excess of £200m.

The Role: Project Scheduler

Purpose:

To provide specialist planning and scheduling capability across ABP Major Projects, developing and maintaining integrated schedules, improving schedule visibility and support to Project Managers and Project Controls Managers. To support project initiation and baseline development, and help mature early-stage schedules into credible delivery programmes with clear logical interfaces, milestones and forecasts.

Accountabilities:

- Standardise and embed planning and scheduling practices across major projects, aligned to the Project Lifecycle Process (PLP) and portfolio reporting requirements.

- Develop and maintain scheduling standards including coding structures, calendars, milestone conventions, progress measurement approaches and schedule quality checks.

- Enable clearer schedule forecasting during early design by integrating design progress, key assumptions, interfaces and constraints into the project schedule

- Develop, maintain and update integrated project schedules at project and portfolio level, including baseline, forecast and progress updates.

- Review and validate consultant and contractor schedules, including logic, critical path, float, interfaces, progress, forecasting and alignment with ABP reporting requirements.

- Load, maintain, share and quality-check third-party programme outputs and XER files where required, supporting data integrity within scheduling tools and portfolio visibility processes.

- Identify schedule trends, early warnings, slippage drivers and recovery options, escalating issues where proactive intervention is required.

- Maintain alignment between schedule, risk, change, cost and project progress data to support a single source of truth for delivery performance.

- Support project reviews, schedule assurance sessions and lessons learned, providing practical recommendations to improve delivery confidence.

- Support AI and automation opportunities where recurring schedule reporting or data-to-narrative tasks can be standardised and made more efficient.

- Provide coaching and support to Project Controllers and project teams to improve planning literacy and confidence in schedule data.

About you:

You have the ability to cope with uncertainty, conflict and change. You are flexible, and persistent and have well-developed creative problem-solving skills.

You will be able to work independently with a strong bias to getting things done. Understand the true value to the business of meeting objectives and timely delivery.

You will possess a firm belief in the values of customer service and ABP’s core values of openness and honesty, teamwork and respect, along with the ambition to make a difference and exceed expectations.

Skills, Experience & Qualifications

Essential

- Demonstrable experience working as a planner/scheduler on complex infrastructure, construction, engineering or capital projects.

- Strong practical knowledge of schedule development, baseline management, progress updates, critical path analysis, milestone reporting and forecast management.

- Proficient in Primavera P6 and MS Project.

- Able to review and challenge consultant/contractor programmes, including logic, durations, float, interfaces, constraints and progress assumptions.

- Experience using schedule data to support early warning, trend analysis, change control and executive reporting.

- Full UK driving licence required

Desirable

- Experience supporting development and delivery of capital infrastructure projects above £20m.

- Professional qualification or membership in APM, PMI, ACostE, RICS or equivalent project controls/planning body.

Want to see what it’s like to work for the UK’s largest port operator? Our virtual work experience programme gives you an inside look at trade, sustainability, safety, and careers in one of the UK’s most vital indutries- https://www.talentxp.co.uk/track/e2e029cd

Additional Information:

When joining ABP you will find an environment that is both welcoming and challenging. We reward our employees well and offer a generous remuneration package, employer pension, private health insurance and a range of other benefits.

Please note that ABP undertake random screening for substance abuse and operate a zero-tolerance policy. A medical will be required before starting this position also.

We are an equal opportunities employer and we welcome applications from all suitably qualified persons regardless of their background, which helps us to provide a diverse and inclusive working environment.

As part of our recruitment process, all successful candidates will be subject to pre-employment screening to Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS). Please note your consent will be required and further information on this check can be found using the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/united-kingdom-security-vetting-clearance-levels/national-security-vetting-clearance-levels