Head of Asset Management & Reliability Refinery & Petrochemicals (Saudi Arabia)

ABOUT THE ROLE

We are recruiting the Head of Asset Management for a large-scale integrated refining and petrochemical complex on the Red Sea coast of Saudi Arabia. The complex has recently completed a major operational and financial turnaround in which improved plant availability was the principal driver of the recovery which is precisely what this function owns.

This is a technical authority and governance position within Engineering and Support. It is not a maintenance execution role. The successful candidate will define how the complex is maintained, chair the governance forums for the discipline, and report reliability performance directly to executive management.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

- Own asset criticality assessment across the complex, and the risk basis on which maintenance effort and budget are allocated.

- Lead maintenance strategy development: RCM studies, FMEA and FMECA, and preventive maintenance programmes across rotating, static, electrical and instrumentation assets.

- Develop maintenance procedures, job plans and task lists, and govern their revision.

- Lead major root cause analysis investigations and own the RCA methodology applied on site.

- Maintain and close out the bad actor and single point of failure (SPOF) registers.

- Lead obsolescence management for control systems, instrumentation and long-lead equipment.

- Define reliability KPIs and build the reliability monitoring and reporting system behind them.

- Manage and implement reliability enhancement programmes at organisational level.

- Own the asset management platform: its data governance, its integrity and its adoption across the site.

- Act as Technical Authority for the discipline and as Governance Lead for its standards and deviations.

- Interface with Operations, Maintenance, Inspection, Engineering and Turnaround leadership, and with executive management.

MANDATORY REQUIREMENTS

- Bachelor's degree in Engineering: Mechanical, Electrical, Instrumentation, Automation, Systems or Civil.

- Minimum 20 years of experience in oil and gas downstream, refining or petrochemicals.

- Demonstrated leadership of a Reliability, Asset Integrity, Asset Management or Maintenance Engineering department or section, with direct reports.

- Reliability or asset management programmes led at organisational level, with measurable results.

- Root cause analysis led personally, using structured methodologies such as Fault Tree Analysis, 5-Why or equivalent.

- Working knowledge of RAM studies, asset criticality assessment, SPOF, bad actor management and FMEA/FMECA.

- Experience developing and implementing preventive maintenance programmes for at least one asset class.

- Professional working English. All interviews, governance forums and reporting are conducted in English.

- Availability to relocate to Saudi Arabia on a residential basis.

PREFERRED

- Meridium or an equivalent asset performance management (APM) platform, implemented rather than only operated.

- TapRooT certification or equivalent formal RCA credentials.

- Recognised expertise in one or more of RCM, RBI, RIS or RCA.

- Experience rebuilding a reliability function that had lost credibility with Operations.

- CMRP, CRE or ISO 55001 credentials.

LOCATION AND PACKAGE

Residential position at the plant site, approximately two hours from Jeddah on the Red Sea coast. Tax-free expatriate package including housing, family medical insurance, education support, annual flights, relocation assistance and end-of-service benefit. Full details are confirmed with shortlisted candidates.

SELECTION PROCESS

Applications are reviewed against the mandatory requirements above. Shortlisted candidates complete a 45-minute technical interview in English with our consultant before any profile is submitted to the client. Every candidate who completes the screening questions receives a response.