Portfolio Risk Manager

Job Description

At Transgrid, we play a crucial role in delivering safe, reliable, and sustainable energy to millions of Australians. Operating over 13,000 km of high-voltage transmission lines and 128 substations across NSW and the ACT, we connect electricity generators to the distribution network powering homes, businesses, and communities. As Australia accelerates its energy transition, the work we do has never been more significant.

The Opportunity

Transgrid is looking for a Portfolio Risk Manager who has actually delivered projects, not just managed risk frameworks around them. This is a senior role leading the risk management function across a portfolio of electricity transmission construction projects - transmission lines, substations, synchronous condensers and data centre connections - and it requires someone who understands how cost, schedule and risk connect in practice.

You will lead a team of three, report to the Project Controls Manager and work alongside cost controllers, schedulers and project managers to make sure risk is integrated into how projects are run, not treated as a separate function that produces reports on the side. The expectation is that you will build something the project team actually uses. That means being practical, being present and being willing to work through real problems with the people delivering the work.

If you have 12 or more years of risk management experience grounded in major capital project delivery, know how to use quantitative tools without being captured by them, and can translate complex risk data into clear guidance for senior decision-makers, we want to hear from you.

A Day in the Life

The work spans the portfolio rather than sitting inside a single project. Here is how it generally flows.

• Risk Framework and Governance: Setting and maintaining the portfolio-level risk management standards and making sure they are actually used consistently across all projects, not just ticked off at the start and forgotten. You run risk governance forums, provide reporting to senior leadership and build in lessons learned so the framework improves over time.
• Risk Identification and Assessment: Leading risk workshops across the portfolio and making sure risk data is captured in a structure that allows project-level risks to roll up into a meaningful portfolio view. You use quantitative analysis, Monte Carlo, scenario planning, to model cost and schedule impacts but your focus is always on what the numbers mean for the project, not on the methodology itself.
• Working with Project Managers and Cost Controllers: This is where the role earns its value. You sit alongside project controls, cost controllers and schedulers and translate risk into something the project team can actually use. You help develop mitigation strategies and contingency plans that are grounded in what is actually happening on the ground, not just in a model.
• Risk Reporting and Insights: Preparing regular portfolio risk reports for the executive, flagging trends, emerging risks and recommended actions. The goal is always to give leadership clear information to make decisions with, not to present a complex risk matrix and leave them to work it out.
• Contract Risk: Supporting the review of tender and contract programs, identifying risk and liability positions in contracts and helping project teams understand and manage what they have signed up to. You work with the commercial and contracts teams to improve how risk is handled contractually across the portfolio.
• Training and Capability: Coaching project teams on risk tools and techniques in a practical way. You are the subject matter expert people come to when they need help, and you make risk management approachable rather than theoretical.

Why This Role Matters

Transgrid's delivery portfolio spans transmission line construction, substation upgrades, synchronous condenser installations and data centre connections. These are complex, high-value projects where cost and schedule risks can materialise quickly if they are not identified and managed early. A risk function that works on the ground alongside project controls makes a real difference to outcomes. One that sits separately and produces theoretical models does not.

This role leads a team of three and reports into the Project Controls Manager. It is a senior position with real scope and the expectation is that you will build a risk function that project managers and delivery leaders actually use and trust. That requires someone who understands how projects are run, not just how risk frameworks are structured.

About You

This is not a role for someone who has spent their career building risk models in isolation from project delivery. We need someone who has worked on major capital projects, understands the relationship between cost, schedule and risk in practice, and can sit alongside a project controls team and add real value, not just produce reports.

• Degree in Engineering, Project Management, Risk Management or a related discipline.
• Minimum 12 years of experience in risk management across major capital projects or portfolio environments, with clear grounding in project delivery rather than just risk advisory.
• Practical understanding of how cost and schedule integrate with risk, including the ability to interrogate a program, identify where risks are sitting in the baseline and translate that into something the project team can act on.
• Experience using quantitative risk analysis tools such as Acumen Risk, Safran Risk or Palisade @Risk, with the judgment to know when the output is useful and when it is adding noise.
• Proficiency in risk analysis software, Primavera Risk Analysis or similar, and working knowledge of risk management systems such as CAMMS or ARM.
• Strong knowledge of risk frameworks including ISO 31000 and PMI, applied in a way that supports delivery rather than generates compliance documentation.
• Experience reviewing tender and contract programs for risk and identifying liability positions in contracts.
• Ability to lead risk workshops, facilitate governance forums and communicate risk clearly to senior leadership and project teams.
• Experience leading and developing a small team.
• Comfortable working across Sydney and Newcastle with travel to project locations as required.

Good to have

• Professional certification such as PMI-RMP or APM Risk Certificate.
• Familiarity with electricity transmission industry standards and the Australian Energy Regulatory framework or comparable regulated environments.
• Experience working within a project controls function alongside cost controllers and schedulers on infrastructure programs.
• Prior experience on energy transmission, substation or large civil infrastructure projects in Australia.

Our Leadership Principles and Values

Courage, Care, Clarity and Connection. These are the principles we lead by at Transgrid. Courage is doing the right thing even when it is not easy. Care is genuinely looking out for the people around you. Clarity means your team knows what good looks like and why it matters. Connection links people to the bigger picture and to each other.

Our Values - Safety, Achievement, Integrity and Service - shape how we show up every day for the customers and communities that depend on us.

Benefits and Perks

At Transgrid, we empower our people with a well-rounded benefits package designed to support their personal, professional and social wellbeing, helping them deliver their best work every day. Employees have access to a range of corporate discounts across retail, utilities, travel, health and wellbeing, as well as novated leasing options, workplace flexibility, 20 weeks paid parental leave and more.

Beyond benefits, we believe in real development and progression. Here, you will have access to regular and ongoing training, tertiary education support, and career mentoring, enabling you to build a career that evolves with you.

Applications close on 8th of September 2026 however will be assessed on a rolling basis and may close earlier. Apply today and play a crucial role in driving the transition to a cleaner, more sustainable energy future!