Mark Dutton, director at Summers-Inman’s Newcastle office, reports on an active 2023 and provides an insight into plans for 2024.
Looking back at 2023
2023 was a strange year with a lot of opportunities around, probably more so than previous years, however the uncertainty surrounding the economy seems to have delayed clients making decisions regarding projects proceeding or not.
Overcoming headwinds
I think the key headwinds we’ve suffered from are those afflicting many of our competitors, other consultant disciplines and much of the industry and that is in the recruitment of quality staff. The Universities are reporting a drop off in candidates in Surveying however the skills shortage suggests that there has never been a better time to go into surveying. This is a double whammy for consultants as the cost-of-living crisis and the skills shortage has led to some of the largest pay increases for staff I’ve known in my career. The greatest challenge is that we haven’t yet seen much movement in fee levels which concerns me for the economic sustainability of the industry and its ability to improve quality which must happen.
There is definitely a disconnect between the realities of the job market and careers advice that young people are getting – I believe the only way forward is for the Government to reintroduce grants for courses that lead to a vocational qualification where there is a skills shortage. Furthermore, those Universities who used to be Polytechnics, in my opinion, have watered down the technical content of their courses so much, that students aren’t seeing the value in their tuition fees anymore. Maybe there’s an opportunity for the colleges to step up and offer Polytechnic style technical/vocational degrees that actually train the students with the skills necessary for the vacancies available.
Demand in the North East
As ever, the North East economy is largely underpinned by public sector spending, so we are seeing particular demand in the health sector, which is great for us as we have a well-established specialism in that sector. Other sectors active in the North East for us is Education, both Schools and Higher Education, where we are working with all of the North East Universities. Another key specialism we have as a business which accounts for a significant amount of our fee income is in the Food Production Industry however, whilst much of our skill and experience is based in the North East, the centre of gravity for our projects is in the midlands.
2023 project wins to be proud of
One particular win we are proud of is the Digital Hub at the Health Innovation Neighbourhood which is the name of the redevelopment of the General Hospital Site on Westgate Road. This is the first project on an exciting scheme to place the site as a world centre of excellence for research to provide innovative solutions for living, leisure, learning and employment to improve lives at local, regional, and global levels. We have also been successful in winning the enabling works for Phase 1 of the masterplan.
Another is being successful in retendering for Severn Trent Water where we manage their building maintenance work. Our adoption and development of leading-edge technologies has allowed us to punch above our weight to win a contract across 8,500 sites and nearly 5,000 buildings. We’ve now been active on this contract for 13 years and winning it for another 5 is an endorsement of the ability of North East firms to innovate and develop.
Finally, one I have to mention is Greggs Midlands Campus, after many years of trying as a Gosforth based business (and personally as one of their most loyal customers), we are finally working with Greggs which is something we are delighted to be able to report.
Aims for 2024
The key aim for us at the minute is shaping our business for the future which has involved investment in technology but more importantly requires investment in our staff.
As a way of combatting the skills shortage, we are investing heavily in young talent which involves Apprenticeships, Higher (Degree) Apprenticeships, Placement Students and our Graduate Development Programme which turns our graduates into Chartered professionals. That will be continuing into 2024 and beyond.
We also need to shape our business to align with our clients’ Zero Carbon and Social Value objectives which I fundamentally agree with, however, the challenges around upskilling staff and introducing new processes to capture the data we need, adds a level of overhead to SME’s that is concerning but it also means that strategically we must target more local projects as we’ve come to realise that one of the cornerstones of sustainability in our industry has to come from reducing travel. We’ve often joked about consultants from outside the region winning local projects, whilst we win many outside the region; well finally, social value and zero carbon might just fix that!
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