Project Director

What is the Opportunity?

Aecon is seeking a Project Director to join the Urban Transportation Solutions group to support dynamic transit projects in Canada. We are proud to support projects that are committed to faster and more convenient travel, ultimately improving transportation experiences. This starts with bringing aboard the best possible team!

As the Project Director, you will carry overall accountability for project performance across safety, scope, schedule, cost, quality, and stakeholder outcomes. You will operate within multi-party delivery environments with shared decision-making contractual and governance structures. This role demands equal parts technical leadership, commercial judgment, organizational management, and relationship stewardship. You will set the culture, pace, and standards for the entire project team.

This opportunity is part of Aecon UTS’ proactive talent pipelining as the business continues to expand across major transit projects. We are engaging passive, high-calibre leaders in the market to build relationships ahead of upcoming project awards.

What You Will Do Here:

• Lead delivery across the full project lifecycle (pursuit through design, construction, systems integration, commissioning, and closeout), ensuring alignment to contract model principles, contractual obligations, and commercial outcomes.
• Act as the primary, senior interface with the Owner and Partners, setting the tone for collaboration, trust, and “best-for-project” decision-making in an open-book environment.
• Establish and lead the governance framework, including executive leadership alignment, decision-making protocols, escalation pathways, and integrated team performance across all partners.
• Define and maintain the overall delivery strategy, ensuring alignment between scope, schedule, cost, risk, and stakeholder commitments, while adapting to evolving project conditions.
• Provide executive oversight of cost, schedule, risk, safety, and quality performance, ensuring disciplines are integrated and collectively accountable to target outcomes and KPIs.
• Champion Target Value Delivery, ensuring target cost integrity, gainshare/painshare optimization, value engineering, and disciplined trend management.
• Lead client, stakeholder, and external engagement at the highest level, including transit agencies, municipalities, regulators, Indigenous partners, and community stakeholders.
• Oversee the commercial and contractual framework, including approvals, change strategy, reporting, and alignment to “no disputes / no surprises” principles.
• Ensure effective integration of design, construction, and systems, with early resolution of interfaces and strategic oversight of civil-to-systems integration risks.
• Set the tone for project culture, driving transparency, collaboration, inclusion, and high performance across the integrated team.
• Ensure executive-level reporting, assurance, and governance provide an accurate view of project health, enabling proactive intervention and confidence from the Owner.

What You Bring to The Team:

• 20+ years of progressive project leadership experience on major infrastructure projects, including at least 5 years in a Project Director, Alliance Director, or equivalent senior leadership role on transit, rail, or heavy civil programs of significant scale and complexity, ideally exceeding $1B.
• Demonstrated experience leading projects across a range of collaborative and contractor-led delivery models, including Alliance, Progressive Design-Build, Design-Build, Construction Management, CMGC, or similar frameworks involving integrated governance and shared decision-making.
• Proven success leading projects through the full lifecycle from pursuit, development, and early design through construction, systems integration, testing and commissioning, and handover to operations.
• Extensive client-facing leadership experience, including serving as the senior interface with owners, transit agencies, municipal authorities, regulatory bodies, utilities, Indigenous communities, and other key stakeholders in complex, high-profile environments.
• Strong commercial and contractual acumen, including direct experience with target cost models, gainshare/painshare mechanisms, change management, commercial negotiations, risk allocation, dispute avoidance/resolution, and close-out of major infrastructure contracts.
• Proven ability to establish, lead, and align large, multi-discipline project organizations, including teams of 200+ personnel across engineering, construction, systems, quality, project controls, commercial, and stakeholder functions.
• Direct experience managing joint venture, consortium, or partner relationships, including governance, integrated resourcing, risk sharing, issue resolution, and maintaining commercial alignment across partner organizations.
• Strong understanding of how design, construction, civil works, utilities, track, structures, systems, and commissioning interact on major transit and rail programs, including key interface risks, sequencing dependencies, and integrated planning requirements.
• Experience with a variety of project conditions and scopes, including underground, elevated, and at-grade construction in dense, operational, and urban environments.
• Recognized for building high-performing, inclusive project cultures grounded in collaboration, accountability, transparency, and trust, with references that speak to both leadership character and delivery performance.
• Post‑secondary education in Engineering, Construction Management, or a related discipline, or an equivalent combination of education and experience. P.Eng, PMP, or similar designation considered a strong asset.
• Strong executive communication, judgment, and stakeholder leadership skills, with the ability to lead through ambiguity, make timely decisions, and represent the project credibly at the most senior levels.
• Committed to advancing inclusion, diversity, and belonging, and to creating project environments where different perspectives are welcomed and teams can perform at their best.