Program Schedule Manager

Job description

WHO WE ARE Proxima Fusion is Europe’s fastest-growing fusion company and the continent’s best-funded fusion player, as well as the first spin-out from the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (IPP). Backed by over €650M and powered by a growing team across Munich, Zurich, and Oxford, we are developing the hardware and infrastructure needed to deliver the world’s first commercial stellarator fusion power plant. Our concept advances the most mature fusion technology out there, the Wendelstein 7-X stellarator, through two next-generation machines: Alpha and Stellaris. Our work combines stellarator optimization, advanced computation, machine learning, and high-temperature superconducting magnets to unlock higher-performance designs that were previously out of reach. Turning these designs into a functioning fusion power plant requires excellence and ownership across every discipline, from physics and engineering to software, manufacturing, law, and business functions. WHY JOIN PROXIMA FUSION - You will get to work on some of the most complex tech challenges to bring abundant, safe, clean energy to the world. - You'll get to join and learn from an exceptional selection of accomplished and driven individuals. - Do your life’s best work and enjoy the journey. - Get to show that big things are possible in Europe when you assemble the best talent. YOUR IMPACT - Own and build the Integrated Master Schedule (IMS) for Alpha, Proxima Fusion’s first fusion demonstrator. - Define the scheduling architecture, coding structure, baseline conventions, and reporting standards from the ground up. - Integrate sub-schedules across infrastructure, plant suppliers, manufacturing, and machine engineering into one coherent programme view. - Establish credible milestones, programme gates, dependencies, and schedule interfaces across all workstreams. - Identify, validate, and maintain the programme’s critical and near-critical paths. - Provide early warning of schedule risk, emerging delays, and downstream impacts. - Run schedule analysis to support recovery planning, mitigation actions, and informed trade-off decisions. - Maintain the IMS as a live, accurate, and trusted programme-management tool. - Support PMO governance, release-gate decisions, and executive programme reviews. - Provide clear schedule insights and recommendations to programme leadership as Alpha scales. - Drive schedule discipline and alignment across internal teams, suppliers, and delivery partners. - Ensure the programme has a defensible plan against which progress, performance, and readiness can be measured. WHAT YOU WILL DO - Build / advance the Alpha IMS architecture: WBS structure, activity coding, baseline conventions, and schedule governance rules that work across infrastructure, manufacturing, and machine disciplines - Consolidate sub-schedules from all workstreams - including facility and plant construction, specialist equipment suppliers, and machine engineering - into one integrated baseline; enforce scheduling standards with internal project owners and external delivery partners - Maintain a lean 6-week rolling lookahead as a live, actionable planning tool for the PMO and construction governance stream - Identify and continuously update the critical path; model schedule impacts from scope changes, design evolution, or supplier delays before they reach senior leadership as surprises - Own the schedule input to release gate decisions: prepare schedule status packs, flag float consumption, and present risk-adjusted scenarios to the management. - Define and enforce scheduling standards - including building and plant construction partners, and other specialist disciplines who provide delivery schedules as inputs to the IMS - Work in lockstep with the Cost Controller so that schedule baseline and cost forecast always reflect the same program assumptions; support integrated change impact assessments - Support the development of the PMO's broader project controls framework as the team builds out WHO YOU ARE - Experienced in integrated schedule management on major capital programs - energy, industrial, research infrastructure, or similarly complex multi-discipline projects; experience spanning both building construction and equipment/plant supply chains is strongly preferred - Capable of building an IMS architecture from scratch, not just maintaining an inherited baseline - you know what a good schedule looks like before it exists and can get there from incomplete inputs - Technically proficient in scheduling tools for large-scale complex projects; comfortable working with federated schedule inputs from parties using different tools and conventions - Able to hold the line on schedule discipline with internal engineers and external partners who have their own priorities - you combine analytical rigour with the communication skills to make schedule governance stick - Comfortable operating with high autonomy in an environment where program structure is still being built; define the working framework without waiting to be told how - Fluent in English; German is a strong advantage given the contractor and regulatory landscape - Familiar with AI tools and digital working methods; you adapt fast and are comfortable in a lean, high-pace environment INTERVIEW PROCESS - Recruiter Interview (30-60 min) - Technical Screening (30 min) - Technical Panel (3x60 min) - CEO call (30 min) *This role sits at "L3" of our framework, please inquire during the recruitment process for further information. At Proxima Fusion, our mission is bold: making limitless clean energy a reality. To get there, we need a high-performing, diverse team that brings different perspectives, challenges assumptions, and builds together with purpose. We know that diversity of thought and experience leads to better ideas, stronger execution, and a more resilient team. We don’t look at how you identify, what you look like, who you choose to worship or what ethnicity you are. We care about what you can bring to the table.