Senior Water Resources Engineer

Employer description

Your Opportunity We are seeking a senior Professional Engineer who has built the majority of their career around hydraulic and hydrologic modelling and is motivated by developing both high-quality models and capable modellers. This is a hands-on technical leadership role for someone who wants to remain actively involved in complex modelling while establishing sound approaches, reviewing technical work, sharing practical knowledge, and mentoring junior and intermediate staff. The successful candidate will bring deep experience in wastewater and stormwater collection systems, potable water distribution systems, or a combination of these areas. Our team collaborates on projects across Canada and North America for municipal, regional, and other public- and private-sector clients. As part of the Urban Water Resources Water Delivery Team, you will serve as a senior technical resource for sanitary, stormwater, combined sewer, drainage, and water distribution modelling. You will work alongside project managers and discipline leads, but your primary focus will be technical excellence: solving difficult modelling problems, strengthening modelling practices, reviewing work, teaching others, and helping teams apply models with sound engineering judgement. You will also provide senior technical input to proposals, scopes, work plans, level-of-effort estimates, and client discussions. Your Key Responsibilities • Serve as a senior technical lead for hydraulic and hydrologic modelling assignments involving wastewater, stormwater, combined sewer, drainage, and potable water systems. • Remain actively involved in developing, calibrating, validating, troubleshooting, maintaining, and applying complex hydraulic models. • Establish fit-for-purpose modelling approaches, assumptions, workflows, documentation standards, and quality expectations. • Provide senior technical review and quality assurance of model inputs, calibration, validation, scenarios, outputs, limitations, and conclusions. • Guide the use of monitoring, GIS, SCADA, rainfall, operational, and other system data to build, calibrate, and validate models. • Lead the technical assessment of system capacity, performance, level of service, wet-weather response, flood risk, servicing constraints, and operational issues. • Develop and evaluate future growth, climate, operational, infrastructure, and remedial scenarios to support master planning, servicing studies, capital planning, and system optimization. • Interpret model results, identify uncertainty and limitations, and translate complex findings into practical recommendations for clients and project teams. • Mentor junior and intermediate modellers through hands-on coaching, technical review, structured feedback, and shared problem solving. • Develop and deliver modelling guidance, examples, training materials, workshops, and lessons learned that strengthen consistent practices across the team. • Help staff develop sound engineering judgement, including understanding model purpose, data quality, calibration, sensitivity, uncertainty, and appropriate interpretation rather than relying only on software outputs. • Review and contribute senior technical input to proposals, scopes, work plans, methodologies, assumptions, level-of-effort estimates, schedules, and fee estimates for modelling assignments. • Participate in client discussions, technical presentations, and project workshops as a trusted modelling specialist. • Collaborate with project managers, discipline leads, GIS and data specialists, and delivery teams to support high-quality work while maintaining a primary focus on technical leadership rather than overall project management. Your Capabilities and Credentials • Advanced understanding of hydraulic and hydrologic principles as they apply to urban drainage, collection, and/or water distribution systems. • Extensive hands-on experience developing, calibrating, validating, troubleshooting, reviewing, and applying hydraulic models to complex infrastructure questions. • Advanced experience with at least one major modelling platform, such as InfoWorks ICM, PCSWMM, InfoSWMM, WaterGEMS, or WaterCAD. Experience with MIKE+, InfoWater, or comparable platforms is also valued. • Demonstrated ability to independently define modelling approaches, assess fitness for purpose, identify technical risks, and resolve complex model development and application issues. • Strong experience managing, analyzing, and interpreting large datasets, including flow, level, rainfall, SCADA, operational, and spatial data. • Experience using GIS to support model development, results interpretation, mapping, and communication. AutoCAD experience is an asset. • Demonstrated experience reviewing the technical work of others and providing clear, constructive, and actionable feedback. • Demonstrated ability and interest in mentoring, teaching, and developing junior and intermediate modellers. • Ability to explain modelling concepts, limitations, and results clearly to staff, clients, and technical and non-technical audiences. • Experience preparing and reviewing technical reports, memoranda, model documentation, presentations, and recommendations. • Experience providing senior technical contributions to proposals, scopes, methodologies, work plans, level-of-effort estimates, budgets, and schedules. • Strong interpersonal, facilitation, verbal, and written communication skills, with a collaborative and practical approach to technical leadership. • Proficiency with common Microsoft 365 applications, including Excel, Word, PowerPoint, and Teams. • Complementary skill sets in applying optimization routines, scripting, automation tools, or AI agents to improve individual productivity and project efficiency, as well as climate change, asset management, river or coastal engineering, data visualization, or database management, are assets. Education and Experience • Bachelor’s degree in civil, water resources, environmental, or a related engineering discipline. • Registered as a Professional Engineer (P.Eng.) in a Canadian province, or eligible for registration through interprovincial mobility. • Minimum of 10 years of relevant consulting, municipal, or utility experience, with the majority of that experience focused on hydraulic and hydrologic modelling. • A record of progressively responsible technical work that includes leading complex modelling assignments, reviewing the work of others, mentoring staff, and contributing to technical scopes and proposals. Typical office environment working with computers and remaining seated for long periods of time. Hybrid work arrangement available. This description is not a comprehensive listing of activities, duties or responsibilities that may be required of the employee and other duties, responsibilities and activities may be assigned or may be changed at any time with or without notice. Stantec is a place where the best and brightest come to build on each other's talents, do exciting work, and make an impact on the world around us. At Stantec, we live our corporate values every day.