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Growth with constrained resources means working harder but smarter

Matching infrastructure growth with available resources requires new thinking around collaboration, says Antony Oliver

Antony Oliver, Infrastructure Intelligence editor

Resources, I keep hearing at this week’s ACE European CEO conference, are the critical issue facing modern engineering and consultancy businesses. 

It is without question a recurring theme as we drive out of recession.

Last week the National Skills Academy for Rail Engineering annual get together heard that “the supply of skills is the greatest impediment to growth in the UK. Before that, the prime minister in his speech to the CBI annual conference highlighted the critical issue of “making sure we have the skills for the future”. 

"The reality is that doubling growth in a resource constrained environment will either mean everyone working twice as hard, falling over and failing or it will mean everyone working twice as hard to think, do things differently and succeed."

Where ever you go in the infrastructure sector, whoever you talk to, be they clients, consultants, contractors or suppliers the message if consistent – yes we need more efficiency; yes we need to reduce carbon and reduce cost; yes we need to boost value for every client pound spent.

But fundamentally unless we take responsibility and invest in creating and training the workforce, our growth ambitions are likely to remain unfulfilled.

As Sir John Armitt, former Olympics boss and current chair of City and Guilds put it this week “We can’t rely on government to fill our needs. That is the responsibility of the industry. It is our responsibility to pick people up and give them training”.

Few would disagree. Hence the absolute need to engage with the huge number of programmes designed to boost gender and ethnic diversity across the industry and need to get behind apprenticeship programmes to boost the range of young people entering the sector. 

And without doubt, as Engineering UK continuously reminds us, businesses must drive the careers  message into schools and support teachers and careers advisors as the critical points of reference for future employees.

Yet while all of this is vitally important it remains clear that, for all the effort, solving this resource shortage is not an overnight task. Thus, if UK infrastructure businesses are to effectively ride the on-going wave of investment enthusiasm and truly deliver national growth enhancing projects and programmes - be they HS2, Thames Tideway, new nuclear or solving the housing crisis etc – something different will be required in the short term at least.

That means better management of resources to promote business and technical agility – both across individual businesses but also across groups of businesses. 

We are already seeing this strategy being played out at Atkins as it announced last week the move to bring together its road and rail professionals under a single transportation group. 

And we will increasingly start to see it happening across consortia as they react to HS2’s procurement goals to break away from business as usual and truly collaborate in a meaningful, value adding way.

The reality is that doubling growth in a resource constrained environment will either mean everyone working twice as hard, falling over and failing or it will mean everyone working twice as hard to think, do things differently and succeed.

We should probably favour the latter option.

Antony Oliver is the editor of Infrastructure Intelligence

If you would like to contact Antony Oliver about this, or any other story, please email antony.oliver@infrastructure-intelligence.com.