Regional Sustainable Design Lead

At SOM, we are a collective committed to shaping a better future for our clients, communities and planet. We aspire to create the most sustainable, impactful work through creative, interdisciplinary teams with all the resources and diversity of a global firm. We value those who are passionate about excellence, innovation, integrity, inclusivity, and collaboration. Together we can achieve great things.
 

 Success at SOM Means

• Ideas: We believe in a meritocracy of ideas. We look to everyone to actively contribute to the discourse in the firm.

• Knowledge: We believe that expertise is the result of lifelong learning. We are not expected to know everything, but rather to passionately pursue answers, develop new skills and deepen our knowledge.

• Product: We strive for excellence in the concept, quality, and delivery of our work.

• Individual: We value individuals who bring the highest standards of professionalism and personal integrity in the way they work. Each person can develop and contribute their wealth of attributes, skills and knowledge to support the overall health of the firm.

• Team: We value the power of interdisciplinary integration. A positive team culture in which everyone collaborates openly towards common goals is essential.

• Firm: We have a history of making transformative contributions to the profession and our communities. We are constantly innovating and attempting to bring new approaches, solutions and processes to our work.

Overview

The Regional Sustainable Design Lead is responsible for the overall leadership of SOM’s East Coast SES practice and contributes to global SES business strategies and goals in collaboration with firmwide SES leaders. The Sustainable Design Lead will provide sustainable consulting services on a variety of projects related to the built environment and will successfully position the SES practice in the pursuit and delivery of projects with SES scope of services.

The Regional Sustainable Lead must actively engage colleagues in the New York and DC offices to provide sustainable education within project teams, effectively communicate complex concepts and analysis to inform design decision making and ensure that an integrated design process is occurring on all projects within the region. Mentorship of SES staff, thought leadership and public outreach within the design and sustainable industry is required in order to implement the SOM’s roadmap to carbon neutral design in the NY and DC offices, and firmwide.

Position Responsibilities

• Manages the Regional SES group and effectively collaborates with internal and external project design teams.

• Leads Energy and Carbon scopes of work with respect to policy, research, calculation, and application. This includes

  • overall approach to whole life carbon and circular design

  • carbon tracking through design, construction, operation and decommissioning

  • cost/benefit analyses and managing the team to deliver life cycle cost and return on investment analyses appropriate to each phase of project design. 

• Communicates sustainable design and engineering ideas and solutions to clients and consultants through graphics, images and analyses, and is able to lead technical discussions.

• Contributes to the development and management of standards and procedures for analytical and conceptual graphics and visualizations in collaboration with global SES leaders.

• Challenges and peer-reviews the work of external consultants in relation to sustainability and low-carbon design.

• Directly use basic and detailed sustainability analysis tools, such as energy modeling, daylight modeling, embodied carbon, and whole building lifecycle analysis (WBLCA) programs.

• Research, evaluate, and report on new sustainable building systems, materials, products, and technologies coming to market. 

• Oversees quality control of SES technical, analytical and design materials and deliverables.

• Manages team resourcing, project scoping and budgets, and develops proposals.

• Liaises with internal and external stakeholders in a contributing role on projects, supports new business and explores ongoing opportunities for improvement.

• Responsible for the development and execution of the Regional SES business plan and integrates strategy into global SES business plan in collaboration with global SES Leaders.

Leadership Responsibilities

• Inspires, mentors and educates designers and engineering staff on sustainable design and the latest engineering technologies.

• Directly trains and supervises team members, and performs employee performance reviews.

• Contributes to firmwide