Senior Project Manager - Substation and Transmission

Senior Project Manager - Major Projects

The Senior Project Manager - Major Projects is responsible for the full lifecycle delivery of complex electric transmission line and transmission substation capital projects. The role leads projects from initial development and conceptual engineering through detailed design, permitting, procurement, construction, commissioning, energization, turnover, and closeout. The Project Manager integrates engineering, project controls, safety, environmental, right-of-way, outage planning, operations, procurement, construction, and stakeholder functions to deliver safe, reliable, cost-effective projects that meet approved scope, schedule, budget, quality, and system performance objectives.

Locations - Valparaiso, IN - Time Type - Full Time

Principal Duties and Responsibilities

• Lead the initiation, planning, execution, monitoring, control, transition, and closeout of major transmission line and substation projects, including greenfield facilities, brownfield expansions, rebuilds, system upgrades, and interconnections.
• Manage projects involving transmission voltage facilities, including 69 kV, 138 kV, 161 kV, 230 kV, 345 kV, 500 kV, and other applicable high-voltage systems, based on the utility portfolio and assigned program.
• Direct transmission line projects involving route development, survey and geotechnical investigations, right-of-way and easement coordination, environmental permitting, structure and foundation design, conductor and shield wire or OPGW installation, access planning, material procurement, construction sequencing, testing, restoration, and closeout.
• Direct transmission substation projects involving greenfield and brownfield stations, ring-bus, breaker-and-a-half, and straight-bus configurations; transformer, breaker, switch, bus, protection and control, SCADA, telecom, grounding, station service, control enclosure, civil, structural, and physical-security improvements.
• Integrate project scope, schedule, cost, quality, safety, environmental, procurement, risk, communications, and stakeholder-management processes across the complete project lifecycle.
• Establish the project execution plan, responsibility matrix, contracting strategy, baseline schedule, cost estimate, cash flow, risk register, communications plan, quality plan, and change-control process.
• Coordinate multidisciplinary internal and external teams, including transmission line engineering, substation physical design, protection and control, civil, structural, geotechnical, survey, environmental, right-of-way, real estate, permitting, procurement, operations, system control, construction, commissioning, and asset management.
• Manage engineering consultants, EPC contractors, construction contractors, material suppliers, and specialty subcontractors. Establish clear deliverables, review performance, resolve execution issues, and verify compliance with contract requirements.
• Lead outage and cutover planning with system operations, construction, commissioning, and engineering personnel. Coordinate switching, clearance, testing, energization, temporary configurations, and restoration activities while protecting system reliability and customer service.
• Develop, maintain, and control integrated project schedules that address engineering, permitting, right-of-way, long-lead materials, outages, construction sequencing, commissioning, and final turnover milestones.
• Prepare and manage project estimates, budgets, forecasts, commitments, accruals, contingencies, invoices, cash flows, and cost-to-complete projections. Analyze variances and implement corrective actions when performance deviates from the approved plan.
• Identify, quantify, prioritize, and mitigate project risks associated with permitting, land acquisition, constructability, aging infrastructure, unknown field conditions, long-lead equipment, outages, labor availability, contractor performance, weather, environmental restrictions, and stakeholder commitments.
• Administer contracts and procurement activities, including scopes of work, bid evaluations, commercial alignment, change orders, claims avoidance, schedule recovery, contractor payment review, and documentation of decisions and commitments.
• Apply configuration and change management to control project scope, design criteria, drawings, specifications, equipment data, field changes, as-built records, and turnover documentation.
• Employ quality-management processes to verify that engineering deliverables, procured equipment, construction work, testing, commissioning, and closeout records satisfy utility standards and project requirements.
• Use effective leadership, communication, conflict resolution, negotiation, and situational-management practices to align project teams and stakeholders around safety, reliability, schedule, cost, quality, and customer objectives.
• Engage utilities, regulatory agencies, municipalities, landowners, customers, interconnecting entities, regional transmission organizations, and other stakeholders as required by the project.
• Ensure project execution complies with applicable company requirements, utility standards, OSHA requirements, environmental permits, NERC reliability obligations, and approved safety and environmental plans.
• Use the NIPSCO risk-management utility, organizational process assets, Project Management Guidelines and Standards, project governance requirements, and approved project-management information systems.
• Provide accurate and timely project reporting through dashboards, milestone reviews, cost and schedule forecasts, risk updates, executive summaries, decision logs, action registers, and governance presentations.
• Manage multiple concurrent projects and priorities under stringent deadlines, changing system conditions, and constrained outage windows while maintaining disciplined documentation and stakeholder communication.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in engineering, construction management, project management, or another technical discipline plus six years of relevant technical or project experience; nine years of project, architectural-engineering, construction, or technical experience may be considered in lieu of the degree; or Project Manager-level experience plus two additional years of progressively responsible project-management experience.
• Demonstrated project-management experience delivering electric transmission line and transmission substation projects at transmission voltage levels. Experience should include responsibility for scope, schedule, cost, risk, procurement, contractor performance, stakeholder coordination, and project closeout.
• Experience managing the complete lifecycle of transmission line projects, including development, engineering, right-of-way, environmental permitting, procurement, construction, testing, restoration, and turnover.
• Experience managing greenfield or brownfield transmission substation projects, including major equipment, protection and control, SCADA or telecom, grounding, civil, structural, physical design, outage coordination, commissioning, and energization.
• Working knowledge of transmission construction methods, substation configurations, utility design and construction interfaces, outage constraints, commissioning processes, and high-voltage safety considerations.
• Expanded knowledge of project-management methodologies, processes, tools, techniques, standards, guidelines, and job aids, consistent with Level 3 project-management maturity expectations.
• Proficiency with project-management information systems and integrated project controls, including scheduling, risk management, cost management, forecasting, performance metrics, and dashboards.
• Demonstrated capability to lead multidisciplinary teams and manage contractors using situational leadership, sound judgment, value-based decision-making, integrated communication, teamwork, negotiation, and conflict resolution.
• Ability to efficiently perform assigned duties under stringent deadlines, outage schedules, construction constraints, and changing field conditions.
• Ability to work a flexible schedule and travel up to 50 percent based on project needs.
• Ability to work in field environments that may include high noise, dust, extreme temperatures, confined spaces, uneven terrain, energized-facility hazards, and chemical hazards, subject to applicable training and safety requirements.
• Valid motor vehicle operator license.
• Ability to obtain the PMP certification within one year of hire or within one year after meeting PMI eligibility requirements.

Preferred Transmission Experience

• Project management experience on 69 kV through 345 kV or higher transmission line and substation projects.
• Experience delivering major capital projects in an owner-side, engineer-procure-construct, engineer-procure-construct-manage, or construction-management environment.
• Experience with greenfield transmission lines, line rebuilds, reconductoring, structure replacement, OPGW or shield wire installation, transmission interconnections, and remote-end modifications.
• Experience with ring-bus, breaker-and-a-half, straight-bus, air-insulated, or gas-insulated substation configurations; transformer and breaker replacement; relay modernization; bus expansion; shunt reactor or capacitor installations; and control-building additions.
• Experience coordinating planned outages, switching, protection and control cutovers, testing, commissioning, energization, and turnover with transmission operations and system control.
• Experience with Primavera P6, Microsoft Project, SAP, Procore, or comparable utility project-management and project-controls platforms.
• PMP certification and an engineering, construction-management, or utility-infrastructure background.

Benefits PEAK's benefit offerings available for our associates include medical, dental, vision, Flexible Spending Account (FSA), Dependent Care Savings Account (DCA), and 401K plan.