Assurance Lead

Are you looking for a role that will challenge you to influence the successful delivery of complex, high-impact projects? Can you see yourself leading assurance activities, evaluating project readiness, and providing independent, risk-based insights that support informed decision-making? Do you enjoy working with project teams and subject matter experts to identify risks, strengthen governance, and improve project outcomes? If you answered yes, this may be the job for you as our Chalk River location is looking for an
Assurance Lead
to coordinate and execute project assurance activities, support governance and readiness reviews, and help ensure projects are positioned for success through objective assessment, continuous improvement, and expert collaboration.
What you will be doing!
Supporting and guiding Project Delivery Office's (PDO) subject matter experts (SMEs), project teams, mission organizations, and other stakeholders in understanding and applying CNL Gating and Sanctioning and Project Assurance processes to ensure requirements are understood, planned for, and met.
Coordinating and monitoring PDO assurance activities, including SME assignments, assurance schedules, evidence reviews, reporting requirements, action tracking, and escalation of issues where assurance deliverables or project readiness are at risk. Supporting the preparation, review, and quality of assurance reports, findings, recommendations, and decision-support materials used for project assurance activities, ensuring outputs are clear, evidence-based, and suitable for senior and executive stakeholders.
Applying practical project management judgement to identify gaps in project readiness, execution planning, assumptions, interfaces, and decision evidence before formal gate or sanctioning reviews.
Coordinating project maturity and readiness assessments, including fit-for-purpose tools such as construction readiness reviews, project definition reviews, technical readiness reviews, benchmarking, schedule recovery reviews, and other delivery confidence assessments.
Supporting SME project support activities by coordinating the right internal, reach-back, or external expertise to help projects prepare for gates, annual planning, phase transitions, recovery activities, or major project reviews.
Establishing, maintaining, and coordinating an active SME bench to support PDO assurance and project support activities, using internal CNL resources first where suitable expertise exists.
Identifying and coordinating internal SMEs, reach-back support from functional organizations, external specialists, and MSA-based resources required to support assurance reviews, targeted deep dives, project readiness reviews, and governance-related assessments.
Tracking SME assignments, availability, conflicts, independence considerations, and completion of assigned assurance inputs, ensuring SME contributions are integrated into overall assurance findings and recommendations.
Providing input into the development, maintenance, and improvement of PDO MCPs, tools, templates, forms, and assurance-related documentation.
Supporting SMEs and contributors with ATOM and document workflows required for creation, revision, review, approval, and release of documents, ensuring compliance with information management and records management expectations.
Maintaining PDO assurance records, SharePoint content, approved document listings, ATOM links, and assurance-related packages to ensure information is properly filed, current, accessible, and controlled.
Identifying recurring assurance findings, project readiness issues, process gaps, or documentation weaknesses and recommending improvements to PDO assurance, governance, and project delivery processes.
Supporting implementation of improvements to Gating and Sanctioning, Project Assurance, and PDO operating processes based on assurance findings, project feedback, ImpActs, lessons learned, and delivery experience.
Collaborating with Assurance Leads, Portfolio Integration and Governance, PM Qualification, missions, and functional groups to ensure lessons from assurance are reflected in standards, guidance, training, templates, and continuous improvement activities.
Identifying and communicating risks, issues, or deficiencies that may affect assurance quality, project readiness, SME availability, or timely completion of assurance deliverables.
Supporting mitigation of short-term assurance and project readiness risks in accordance with established processes, procedures, and direction from PDO leadership.
Escalating highly complex or unresolved assurance, SME resourcing, governance, or project readiness issues to PDO leadership with clear analysis, options, and recommended actions.
Other duties as assigned by your manager.
What we are looking for:
Education
Bachelor’s degree in engineering, business, project management, or related discipline.
Advanced degrees or professional certifications (PMP, PgMP, IPMA, APM, etc.) considered an asset.
Experience
10+ years in project management, project controls, project assurance, audit/oversight, or delivery of complex capital or nuclear projects.
Experience leading independent reviews, readiness assessments, or assurance activities. Experience working with SMEs, external reviewers, or multi-disciplinary review teams. Experience in regulated or high-hazard industries preferred.
Knowledge, Skills & Abilities
Strong analytical skills in evaluating project maturity, evidence quality, risk exposure, and baseline realism. Ability to exercise independence, objectivity, and sound professional judgment.
Strong facilitation, communication, and influencing skills with senior stakeholders. Ability to coordinate complex assurance activities across Missions and functions.
Demonstrated ability to assess whether an integrated project package is complete, coherent, credible, and decision-ready.
Ability to apply broad project management judgement and determine when specialist input is required, particularly in estimating, scheduling, risk, commercial strategy, and construction readiness.
Ability to synthesize input from multiple SMEs into an overall assurance conclusion regarding project readiness and delivery confidence.
Strong understanding of gating, lifecycle governance, sanctioning, and Earned Value Management Systems. Knowledge of project assurance models, audit/oversight practices, and risk-based assessment methodologies. Familiarity with nuclear project delivery expectations, regulatory environments, and safety culture principles.
Security Clearance Eligibility Required
Reliability Status with Site Access Security Clearance (SASC), which has a minimum requirement of 3-5 years of verifiable history in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the United States and/or the United Kingdom. CNL implements security screening in accordance with the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat's “Standard on Security Screening” and the “Policy on Government Security.”
Working Conditions:
Working schedule: Five (5) days per week, seven and a half (7.5) hours per day for a thirty-seven and a half (37.5) hour work week.
Why CNL?Does the idea of working with a dynamic team across Canada to advance nuclear science and technology for a clean and secure world excite you? At CNL, we’re reinventing ourselves to be industry leaders—pioneering solutions to the problems that matter most.
From building the next generation of clean nuclear and hydrogen energy technologies, to developing targeted cancer treatments, to continuing our global leadership in environmental remediation—we are driven by impact, innovation, and purpose.
What We Offer: A Total Rewards PackageWe believe in taking care of our people. Here’s what you can expect as part of our team:
Paid time off:
vacation, sick, personal, and floater days
Benefits effective Day One
– no waiting period
Tuition support
to help you keep learning and growing
A
defined-benefit pension
plan or a
defined-contribution pension plan, depending on your employee group, to support your long‑term financial security
Do Our Priorities Resonate with You?
Delivering
clean energy
for today and tomorrow
Restoring and protecting
the environment
Contributing to the
health of Canadians
If so, you’ll feel right at home at CNL!
Location: HybridLocated in the heart of the Ottawa Valley, our Chalk River site offers a beautiful natural setting with forests, lakes, and wildlife right at your doorstep. Surrounding communities such as Deep River, Petawawa, and Pembroke provide access to excellent recreation and a great quality of life.
Please note:
This is a hybrid position, with a combination of remote work and onsite presence at our Chalk River Laboratory, Ontario.
Our Commitment to Equity, Diversity & InclusionAt CNL, we are committed to fostering an environment that promotes equity, diversity, and inclusion. We celebrate and welcome employees, stakeholders, and partners of all backgrounds and identities.
We are proud to uphold a workplace culture grounded in our
Core Values :
Respect
Teamwork
Accountability
Safety
Integrity
Excellence
CNL is an equal opportunity employer. If you require accommodation during any phase of the hiring process, please let us know via View email address on ca.hrm.tc. All requests will be handled with confidentiality.
CNL operates on sites located on the traditional lands, waterways and ceded and unceded territories of Indigenous peoples. CNL recognizes and affirms all First Nations, Métis communities and Inuit in this land we now know as Canada. We acknowledge, respect and seek to better understand Indigenous history, rights and title on the lands where we work and develop projects.
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