Cohabs – Senior Development Manager
Cohabs, a rapidly scaling global co-living brand backed by CDPQ, sought to appoint a Senior Development Manager to strengthen its UK team during a pivotal phase of expansion. With operations growing at pace, new buildings acquired monthly and launches across London and potential new markets including Dublin and Manchester, the need for a technically strong, delivery-focused leader became critical.
The existing team excelled in communication and motivation but lacked the technical depth required to oversee complex renovation and conversion projects. The new hire needed to bring structure, judgement, and hands-on expertise to manage multiple live projects, deliver on time and within budget, and elevate the quality and efficiency of delivery across the portfolio.
This appointment was essential to support Cohabs’ rapid growth trajectory, ensuring renovation quality, pace, and budget control while enabling leadership to focus on broader strategic initiatives.
We mapped and engaged over 100 professionals across London, prioritising individuals with hands-on experience in real estate development, refurbishment, and asset turnaround. The focus was on candidates from developers, family offices, and investors with exposure to small-to-mid-scale renovation projects rather than consultancy-heavy backgrounds.
We targeted individuals with proven ability to manage multiple concurrent projects, demonstrating strong judgement, energy, and accountability. Key technical capabilities included budgeting, tendering, value engineering, and a practical understanding of construction and MEP systems.
Through a structured and transparent process, we qualified and assessed each candidate, presenting a shortlist of high-calibre professionals aligned with Cohabs’ entrepreneurial and fast-paced culture.
A particular challenge was communicating the opportunity’s intensity and hands-on nature demanding autonomy, adaptability, and resilience, while maintaining engagement. We positioned the role around its high impact, ownership, and the ability to shape the company’s expansion across new markets.
Key steps in our process included:
- Partnered with Cohabs to create a branded campaign microsite, featuring a 20-minute recorded discussion with senior leadership to build candidate engagement and trust.
- Conducted technical and behavioural pre-interview assessments, giving Cohabs a complete view of each candidate’s strengths and suitability before first-stage interviews.
Managed a structured three-stage interview process - Oversaw offer and transition management, supporting negotiation and acceptance to ensure a seamless conclusion to the search.
Cohabs successfully appointed a new Senior Development Manager.
133 candidates mapped · 8 candidates shortlisted · 8 interviews · 1 hire
The Rockbourne team did an incredible job of finding us the right candidate in a hard search. They brought structure to the process and encouraged me to think about different profiles from those I might have initially envisaged, but all the candidates still fitted our unique company culture (this is where other recruiters had failed in the past, as Rockbourne really took the time to understand our company culture and working style before the search began). communication was good throughout and we ended up with a couple of strong candidates to choose from.
