Description

Project Controls Manager

Requisition ID

5194

Country

United Arab Emirates

City

Abu Dhabi

Market

Real Estate/ Property Management

Job description

Project Control Manager

Al Jurf, Abu Dhabi (project-based)
15-20 years' experience | Civil engineering background | Luxury residential projects

Building the next chapter of luxury residential development

You will be joining the contracting arm of a luxury start-up subsidiary backed by a well-known villa and beachfront property developer in Abu Dhabi. While the business operates with the agility and pace of a young organization, it benefits from strong governance, financial discipline, and a long-term pipeline of high-end residential developments.

As delivery activities scale on flagship projects, strong project controls are essential to ensure time, cost, and performance discipline. This role sits at the heart of project delivery and plays a critical part in ensuring complex developments are delivered on time and on budget.

About the role

This is a senior, project-based Project Control Manager role responsible for establishing and leading planning, scheduling, cost control, and performance management on a large luxury residential development at Al Jurf. The role acts as the central point of control for schedule, cost, and progress, ensuring alignment across planning, procurement, commercial, engineering, and site teams.

The role is hands-on, highly visible, and critical in a build-from-scratch contracting environment where deadlines are tight and expectations are high. You may support a maximum of two projects, but the primary focus is on delivery excellence rather than portfolio oversight.

What you will own from day one

From day one, you will take ownership of project control systems and performance visibility, ensuring leadership has clear, accurate, and timely insights to support decision-making.

Your responsibilities will include:

• Establishing and maintaining baseline schedules and detailed project programmes
• Leading planning and scheduling activities using Primavera P6 and related tools
• Monitoring physical and financial progress against approved baselines
• Managing cost control, forecasting, and budget performance at project level
• Coordinating closely with QS, procurement, finance, and engineering teams
• Identifying schedule, cost, procurement, and resource risks early
• Preparing comprehensive project reports, dashboards, and performance analyses
• Recommending corrective actions to mitigate delays and overruns
• Supporting governance, documentation, and performance transparency

Your day-to-day reality

Your day typically starts with reviewing updated schedules, cost reports, and dashboards to assess progress against plan. You will work closely with planning teams to validate programme updates, challenge assumptions, and look ahead to upcoming risks. Throughout the day, you will coordinate with procurement on material approvals and delivery timelines, with QS and finance on cost performance, and with engineering teams to ensure submittals and approvals align with the project schedule. The role involves frequent meetings, detailed reporting, and continuous follow-up to ensure issues are addressed before they impact delivery.

What you bring

We are looking for a seasoned Project Control professional who combines strong technical capability with maturity, resilience, and sound judgement.

Key requirements

• Bachelor's degree in Civil Engineering or a related discipline
• Approximately 15-20 years of experience within contracting or construction environments
• Strong expertise in project planning, scheduling, cost control, and performance management
• Proven experience using Primavera P6 and project control systems
• Experience on large-scale residential developments (villa compounds of 80-90+ units or multiple high-rise buildings)
• Solid understanding of procurement processes, delay analysis, and risk management
• UAE experience is strongly preferred; KSA experience is also acceptable
• Strong analytical, communication, and reporting skills
• Professional working proficiency in English; Arabic is an advantage

Professional certifications such as PMP or CCP, experience with Earned Value Management, and strong dashboarding or data visualisation skills are considered advantages.

The environment you are joining

This is a high-pressure, project-driven environment with long working hours and clear delivery expectations. The organization is still building structure, so you will need to be comfortable operating with a degree of ambiguity while maintaining discipline and control. In return, you will have real ownership, visibility, and the opportunity to influence how project controls are embedded as the business grows.

What's in it for you

This role offers the chance to play a key role in delivering a flagship luxury residential project, with strong backing from an experienced developer and a growing project pipeline. You will have senior-level responsibility at project level, close interaction with leadership, and the opportunity to help shape how project control is done in a fast-growing contracting organization.

If you are motivated by challenge, ownership, and the opportunity to be part of a long-term success story, we would like to hear from you.