In The Beginning...
I am often asked what I did before becoming an independent consultant. Below is a brief history. There are aspects of the experience which continue to be useful today and some has become increasingly important.
For example, dealing with countless stakeholders, with no real authority over them, is a necessary managerial skill. For anyone engaged in major construction there may be local authorities, contractors, sub-contractors, architects, quantity surveyors, engineering and mining consultants, utility companies, railway companies, and suppliers. Naturally, they will not all have the same objectives or needs, so the job always requires understanding, negotiation, persuasion, discussion and agreement, all of which are necessary for management consultancy.
Secondly, environmental issues which have a high profile today were especially relevant in my early engineering career where we dealt with extensive “brownfield” sites. These sites had previously been in use over many years for mine working, brickworks, chemicals, machinery and textiles.
Thirdly, Change Management was never far away. What for one participant may be a construction project, or an IT project, for their ultimate client the work may be part of a dramatic change to their company’s capability requiring supplier changes, staff changes, staff relocation, process changes, training and extensive communications. All projects involve changing attitudes, processes, and possibly the way of life.
The following reflects some of the experience with
- Ernst & Young
- Specialist Contractor
- Saudi Aramco
- Scottish Development Agency
The following is a selection of assignments undertaken as a consultant with Ernst & Young
Business Modelling Programme
If you knew what the future held regarding your long term costs, what would you alter today? This was the key point behind the development of long term cost models for a client.Developed complex business control models for a waste reprocessing company to enable them to identify and respond to commercial issues affecting their long term business: Providing leadership and direction to client staff and colleagues in the production and application of business planning models; Ensuring that long term cost estimates were produced on a consistent basis and accurately identified critical risk issues to ensure management control; Producing a guidance manual for client staff and colleagues engaged in preparing, updating and using business planning models.
Marketing Management
Undertook line management responsibility for all aspects of a new marketing department in a division of the Home Office, subsequently privatised. This division provided telecommuncations services to police forces and fire brigades throughout England and Wales. Responsibility included:
- Undertaking line management responsibility for all aspects of a new marketing department;
- Advising on and preparing contract documents for installation, maintenance and repair of telecommunications equipment; setting up a suite of standard sales contracts;
- Producing a Marketing Manual setting out policies and procedures;
- Motivating staff to ensure that they understood the customers and met the organisation's needs;
- Organising, drafting and marketing competitive tenders; subsequently negotiating and agreeing contracts with customers.
Earlier Experience
A variety of roles in the UK and Saudi Arabia. While the term Change Management was not used much then – it was not part of the engineering lexicon at the time – change was never far away.
Saudi ARAMCO
Management of multi-million infrastructure projects in Saudi Arabia, with values of design services exceeding $5 million, and construction exceeding $30 million, with over 80 technical staff, from the Middle East, Far East, US and UK.
Scottish Development Agency
In 2010 I brought this experience up to date by providing a paper to an international geotechnical conference on this site's development, with the assistance of people I had worked with many years earlier.
Site development and renewal with the Scottish Development Agency, now Scottish Enterprise. The building pictured is on an industrial estate on the edge of Glasgow. The site was previously used variously for mining, brickworks and chemicals, as well as waste disposal. Converting it from derelict land into an industrial estate was part of the economic regeneration of the area. Environmental aspects were an important aspect even then, but it is fair to say that we never used the expressions ‘environmental issues’ or ‘change management’ although they were both at the heart of what we were doing.
Specialist Contractor
For about two years I was Technical Manager of a specialist contractor engaged in providing a variety of equipment, the most complex of which was for external maintenance – mainly window-cleaning and window replacement. As buildings are rarely duplicates every installation was bespoke.
For complexity, consider the vast glazed area in the building pictured. This required a permanent roof-mounted ‘crane’ weighing about 12 tonnes, with a telescopic jib extending to about 18m and a moving counterweight. For further excitement, it travels on rails and moves from one level to another on scissor lifts.
The moral of the story: there is a solution for every problem.