Processing Plant Supervisor

Job Introduction

NNL is where you’ll experiment to help solve global challenges. As part of our Waste Management & Decommissioning capability, your work will impact the lives of generations. By finding new ways to avoid, reduce, store and treat nuclear waste, and drive down the cost of decommissioning, you’ll help to deliver cleaner energy and influence our nation’s energy future. You’ll face new challenges every day, working in unique locations on ground-breaking projects. Whichever area you specialise in this is a place to do great science for a good cause.

This role is required to provide technical and operations support to NNL’s Waste & Residue Processing team based at the Preston Laboratory. The team have an established capability in developing and implementing bespoke processing solutions for a wide variety of uranic residues from both UK and overseas customers. We operate a unique facility, working across a flexible processing plant and several wet chemistry laboratories, utilising a wide range of processes and techniques.

This is an exciting development opportunity for an individual to train towards the role of Plant Supervisor.​  The role is critical to our operations and requires a level of knowledge and experience which will need to be gained on the job over the next 2-3 years.  The successful candidate will be provided with significant training and mentoring opportunities while working alongside the existing Plant Supervisor.

This is a development opportunity, therefore the advertised salary reflects the trainee role, this will be reviewed on a regular basis as the successful individual progresses towards full appointment of the Plant Supervisor role which is at a higher grade within our pay structure.

Role Responsibility

Main Responsibilities for Processing Plant Supervisor:

These accountabilities reflect the full Plant Supervisor role.  A training period of several years will be provided in order to build up the required experience to perform these duties in full.

• Train to a high level of competence in all plant operations
• Provide training to operators in plant operations
• Become competent in a range of laboratory techniques directly supporting plant operations
• Act in the capacity of Task Supervisor for the Processing Plant and associated areas, including management and supervision of day-to-day operations 
• Effectively line manage a team of plant operators
• Support effective planning and scheduling of operations and enabling activities as a member of the Plant Management Team
• Carry out enabling activities for plant operations, including the production of safety paperwork, procurement of chemicals, equipment and consumables, arranging radiological monitoring, submitting engineering requests and co-ordinating waste disposal
• Ensure accurate records are maintained for the plant chemical inventory
• Manage the plant housekeeping process and ensure timely action completion
• Facilitate safe delivery of work and provide additional technical capacity within the team by undergoing training to achieve various safety appointments;
  • Task Supervisor
  • Criticality Control Officer
  • Radiological Protection Supervisor (RPS)
  • Despatching Officer
• Liaise effectively with a range of internal contacts including compliance, procurement, laboratory, technical and craft teams as required to support plant operations
• Actively contribute to improvement initiatives and projects

The Ideal Candidate

Essential Criteria for Processing Plant Supervisor:

• Operations experience, preferably in a plant environment, or within a laboratory environment
• Willingness and aptitude to undertake training and become appointed to safety-responsible roles 
• Demonstrable positive attitude towards achieving high levels of safety and quality
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills
• Ability to build effective working relationships with a range of personnel at all levels
• Willingness and aptitude to develop into a line management role, with the ability to motivate others
• Demonstrable commitment to continued professional development
• Adaptability and responsiveness to manage a varied workload where priorities can change on a regular basis according to plant condition
• Highly competent in Microsoft IT programmes
• Excellent organisational skills and attention to detail
• Ability to work in a radioactive area
• Ability to view UK eyes only information

Desirable Criteria for Processing Plant Supervisor:

• Experience of supervising or managing a team
• Experience of operating on a nuclear or highly regulated site
• Qualified to Level 3 or above in a relevant scientific or engineering subject

About the Company

NNL is an incredible place to work A place where people do things that have never been done before A place where people push boundaries to further themselves, the business, and society as a whole.

This is a place where personal and professional opportunities are limitless. If you want to change the world, if you want to tackle climate change, if you want to help advance medical science, if you want to help put things in space, if you want to answer the big questions, if you want to work with extraordinary materials, if you want to meet great people, learn new skills, challenge yourself, work flexibly, and build a long successful career with the power to make a real impact… you can do it all here.

NNL has a vision for Equality, Diversity, and Inclusivity (ED&I) where NNL aims to be an inclusive workplace that attracts diverse talent through transparent and equal policies and procedures. We want you and the diverse mix of people that we employ, customers that we service, and stakeholders that we influence to feel valued. We encourage a workplace culture where everyone can thrive with a sense of belonging.

Recruitment Agency Notice

We operate a strict Preferred Supplier List (PSL) for the provision of recruitment services. Only agencies on our PSL may provide CVs and only when the role is released to them by our recruitment team. We will not accept unsolicited CVs from suppliers not currently on our PSL. We explicitly reserve the right to add candidate details from unsolicited CVs from non-PSL agencies into our own candidate database and to pursue/hire such candidate(s) without any obligation, financial or otherwise, to the agency concerned.

United Kingdom National Nuclear Laboratory