Director of Special Projects

Job Title: Director of Special Projects

About: National Veterinary Associates is one of the largest and most respected communities of veterinary hospitals in the world, operating nearly 1,000 hospitals in North America, including in all 50 states, and caring for 8,000,000+ animals annually. NVA is backed by JAB Holding, a leading private equity firm. Each person who joins NVA is motivated by our mission to provide excellent, accessible care to improve the lives of animals and the people who love them. NVA has been extremely successful over its 25+ year history and we’re very excited about our next chapter as we work toward our shared vision of revolutionizing the pet care experience to provide more fulfilling lives for pets, their companions, and our team. 

National Veterinary Associates is seeking a Director of Special Projects to support key project initiatives for our General Practice. In this role, you will help us achieve our ambitious goals by serving as the lead person for scaling the rollout of our national refresh program and related construction projects, and branding rollouts. Using strong operational, analytical, and influencing skills, you will manage an array of capital projects and partner directly with leaders across the business and functions. We need a critical thinker with strong analytical and estimating skills who can dive deep into the details, while never losing site of the core focus on budget and schedule. The person in this role can be based anywhere in the western United States and will work remotely. The position will involve up to 30% travel across the United States and Canada.

Responsibilities: 

• Oversee the planning, execution, and delivery of 40-50+ small-to mid-scale, cosmetic refresh, or fast-track construction projects for veterinary hospitals. Manage high volume, high velocity construction projects at one time in multiple market.

• Coordinate and manage services provided by outside architects, contractors, and project management firms while working in partnership with internal design and construction management teams.

• Work with Operational and Hospital Leadership to secure scope of work alignment and identify revenue generating opportunities. Develop project scopes, schedules, budgets, and phasing plans.

• Develop project scopes, budgets, schedules and phasing plans in order to hone structure and processes to scale projects into a sustainable program.

• Track and report vendor performance, schedules, and budgets for individual projects as well as large programs using key metrics and evaluation performance indicators.

• Serve as primary point of contact for project stakeholders, including operational leadership teams, real estate managers, IT partners, finance and accounting members, and procurement specialists.

• Facilitate project meetings and provide regular progress updates to deliver projects on-time, at or under budget, and ensure completed work is of the highest quality all while minimizing disruption to the operating hospital.

• Ensure proper project documentation, including contracts and invoice review as well as manage turnover of project to operations, including warranties, manuals, and collection of as-built drawing documentation.

• Work to identify cost saving opportunities and process improvements and partner with the procurement team to streamline purchasing and logistics.

• At least 7-10 years of experience in construction or design, ideally in veterinary or medical projects (not required), including special projects, refreshes and renovations, or tenant improvements in open business environments.

• Experience managing and scaling a large volume of construction projects simultaneously.

• “Get it done” attitude. You will succeed in this role if you are a self-starter who is resourceful, collaborative, and solution oriented.

• Strong critical thinking, analytic reasoning, and creative problem-solving skills. You thrive when faced with a complex problem with no clear answer and enjoy breaking it down.

• Working knowledge of construction trade practices and safety requirements sufficient to manage all phases of project planning, construction and renovation

• Ability to work independently and to plan, to organize and achieve priorities when performing work. You have a strong attention to detail.

• Exceptional communication, project control and organization skills with sound judgment in resolving matters of high complexity across multiple departments.

• Skilled in long and short term planning. Analytical ability to resolve challenges with permanent and temporary solutions.

• Advanced Excel / PowerPoint skills, Microsoft Word, Outlook, Smartsheet, etc. as well as Project Management software such as Procore, Bluebeam, and Microsoft Project.

• Bachelor’s degree required

Compensation: The base salary range is between $165,000 to $180,000 with opportunity for short and long term incentives.