Higgins Construction – Housing Forum Case Study
Story posted: 29/06/2010
Higgins Construction PLC – The Quadrant, Stockwell
Project team
Client: Presentation Social Investment Agency (SIA)
Main Contractor: Higgins Construction PLC
Architect: Hunters
Information
Presentation Social Investment is committed to community regeneration and together with their contractor partner Higgins Construction, the submission of The Quadrant as a Demonstration Project seeks to illustrate how that is being achieved. The Quadrant is a site of 271 housing and commercial units: a selection of 78 homes for shared ownership, 193 homes for rent and 9 commercial units where Adult trainees from the BME community are given the opportunity to receive customised training on a live site and at Higgins Construction’s Head Office as Management Trainees in professional disciplines in Construction.
Regeneration of existing homes and housing services is underpinned by Presentation's established programme of education, training and community building initiatives. Presentation established Olmec Solid Foundations in 2003; it is a community investment foundation that works with community organisations and individuals in disadvantaged neighbourhoods to design and deliver innovative projects that act as catalysts for change.
The Olmec initiative offers support from the contractor and the training provider/housing association. This apprentice training programme seeks to harvest, nurture and constructively channel the interests and skills found within the local community. This gives local community members first-hand experience of being involved on a 'live' project that they can relate to as well as contributing to a sense of community ownership.
The selection criteria requires applicants to be:
- A resident, relative or dependent/partner of a resident of Presentation Housing Trust;
- From a refugee background and living in London;
- Unemployed and from an ethnic minority group living in London.
The trainees are supported by Olmec and Higgins Construction PLC throughout the whole recruitment process, with access to one-to-one employment support and employability skills workshops. Trainees are given exposure to all elements of their profession /discipline and are assigned a 'Buddy' to learn their profession/discipline that they are either already experienced in or have demonstrated an interest in mastering.
Higgins’ project managers experienced in construction manage the trainees to ensure they get the best support and mentoring, guiding them to be successful construction professionals in the future.
Training courses are specifically in line with Higgins' requirements i.e. Engineering, First Aid SMETS (A 5-day Site Management Course), Fire Awareness, Foundation in Engineering, etc. This provides the trainees with a broad understanding and expands their skills set, so that they can aptly appreciate the full operational considerations involved in their profession. It is of great importance that the trainees receive this exposure to get first-hand experience of various forms of management and types of construction.
Each trainee placement is directly employed by Higgins Construction and not their sub-contractors, which is very different to most trainee schemes. The trainees become familiar with the way Higgins operate as a business, familiar with their style of work, and familiar and comfortable with how training will be delivered - hence ensuring continuity and reducing potential barriers of knowledge loss or unfamiliarity.
This investment has the potential of yielding great benefit to Higgins as the trainees on the programme all have the potential to become full employees within the business; this customised training almost acts as a long term probation period for both parties.
The commitment of the trainees (due to their age and maturity), combined with the desire to train the next generation of professionals, makes this project special. Rather than take the easy option of local labour or youth training the contract stipulated that 5 paid management trainees are to be employed for 12 months and in that time they receive support and guidance and receive full exposure to their chosen field. A sum of monies was agreed by all parties and a financial donation was made by the contractor to Olmec to fund wages and the training cost for the individuals.
Good communication is maintained with all trainees and managers and formal quarterly meetings are held on site to ensure all is operating according to expectations. In addition to these meetings, any ad-hoc site visit always involves a meeting with the trainees to ensure they have regular contact and opportunity to share how they are progressing.
The trainees were introduced to Higgins via the Olmec programme; they were carefully screened to ensure that the individual matched the criteria and person specification set out by the Contractor. However once they started on site they have been directly supervised by Higgins and therefore benefit from the same training as a permanent member of staff. The trainees are given a personal development plan, are appointed a mentor and are given regular appraisals.
This project is unique for a number of reasons:
- Monies are identified in the preliminaries for this project;
- Customised training is provided in a live project;
- Individual training plans are set for trainees;
- The trainees are from disadvantaged backgrounds, e.g. refugees, females;
- This project aims at adult management trainees rather than NVQ/youth training;
- Trainees may be refugees who are qualified in their country of birth, but whose qualifications are not compatible with those of the UK and so makes a real difference to their personal profile and community;
- The project demonstrates best practice between a housing association and contractor.
