Permissions manager

About the company

Utopia is an ultra-luxury hospitality and lifestyle brand creating a global ecosystem of properties and experiences.

We develop private villa retreats in beautiful locations around the world, each with high-end service. Utopia also offers a wider ecosystem of leisure experiences and services available both to those staying on property and to external visitors.

Utopia designs and builds its properties in-house. Our projects span the full journey: from concept and architecture to construction, interiors, landscape, guest experience, and long-term operation. For architects and designers, this means contributing on properties from the ground up, with the ability to influence how each place is planned, built, and experienced. For hospitality professionals, it means collaborating with a brand where service is personal, attentive, and built around each guest’s stay.

We’re a young, ambitious team with high standards and a hands-on approach. We value strong ideas, practical thinking, attention to detail, and people who are ready to take ownership of their part of each project. If you’re interested in architecture, design, hospitality, or guest experience, we invite you to explore opportunities with Utopia.

About the role

We're looking for a Permissions Manager to build a unified permitting process from the ground up: a standard template adapted to the regulatory realities of each market, with the clear goal of reducing the time from application to approval. You'll collaborate closely with development, architecture, construction, and legal teams, as well as local consultants and authorities in every location.

• Design and implement a unified permitting process across all Utopia projects, from pre-application through final approval.
• Build a master permitting template and adapt it to local regulations in Brazil, Costa Rica, Spain, the Dominican Republic, Dubai, and Cape Town.
• Reduce permit approval timelines by identifying bottlenecks, sequencing submissions in parallel, and anticipating authority requirements early.
• Map the regulatory landscape for each market, covering zoning, building, environmental, and hospitality licensing, and keep it current.
• Coordinate local architects, lawyers, expeditors, and consultants to ensure complete, high-quality submissions.
• Track the status of every permit across the portfolio and provide leadership with clear timelines, risks, and mitigation plans.
• Integrate permitting milestones into project schedules together with development and construction teams.
• Document lessons learned from each market and continuously refine the process and templates.

Requirements

• Proven experience in permitting, entitlements, or regulatory approvals for real estate, construction, or hospitality developments.
• Hands-on experience securing permits in multiple jurisdictions, ideally across different countries.
• A track record of building standardized processes or templates that measurably shortened approval timelines.
• Solid understanding of zoning, building codes, environmental approvals, and land-use regulations.
• Experience managing external consultants, local counsel, and interactions with public authorities.
• Strong project management skills: you can run dozens of parallel applications without losing sight of the details.
• Fluent English.

Nice to Have

• Spanish and/or Portuguese.
• Hands-on permitting experience in Spain, Brazil, Latin America, the UAE, or South Africa.
• Background in luxury residential or hospitality development.
• Experience with permit-tracking systems or project management tools such as Jira or Confluence.

Benefits

• Fully remote with business trips. You'll collaborate from anywhere within GMT-3 to GMT+3.
• All the tools you need. A laptop and access to our project and documentation tools from day one.
• Properties across three continents. You'll take projects through approval in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Latin America, so you won't be limited to one market, one regulator, or one type of permit.
• A team that spans 30+ countries. Developers, architects, engineers, and legal specialists from every corner of the world, held to the same standards and the same bar for quality.

By submitting this application, I agree that my personal data will be collected, processed, and retained by the company solely for the purposes of managing and assessing my candidacy.