The Building Podcast
Mark Wakeford is Chairman of the National Federation of Builders, vice-chair at Constructing Excellence Midlands and a Governor at Construction College, Moulton College. He has run a large regional building contractor and now chairs Evoenergy, one of the UK's foremost renewable companies, bringing low carbon solutions to corporate Britain.
Mark talks to leading experts from across the construction sector to discuss issues facing the built environment. He explores various challenges with his guests, who offer solutions, information and ideas that listeners can apply to their own situations, be it in a company, on a project or studying at college.
The Building Podcast aims to provide CPD on the go. Supporting the sector with easily digestible ideas to support a rapidly changing industry!
Episodes
90 episodes
Mark talks to Tony Wehby
The United Kingdom’s largest project is HS2. A project to link London to Birmingham with a high speed train line that can provide significant increases in rail capacity in a highly congested area. There is 140 miles of new track, wi...
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Season 1
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Episode 72
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56:27
Mark talks to Danielle Parker
One of the larger challenges that the solar sector faces in trying to expand its installed generation capacity is winning the hearts and minds of the general public. It is true that the majority of people support their deployment, but it ...
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Season 2
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Episode 18
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36:12
Mark talks to Andy Laflin
Construction is a complicated and often challenging occupation, both on site and back in the office. Our smaller, regional main contractors have to deal with all the same legislation and pressures as their larger competitors, but with sub...
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Season 1
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Episode 71
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52:06
Mark talks to Professor Rosa Wells
The Institutes of Technology (IoT) were invented in 2019 to support businesses in England, in technical industries, to find the right new recruits, who were technology aware, capable and competent to join technical businesses. Technical b...
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Season 1
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Episode 70
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36:40
Mark talks to Dr Russell Hall
The role that carbon plays in construction design and delivery is large, accounting for over 40% of UK emissions that the industry is either directly responsible for or which it influences. Reducing it requires new techniques, different ways of...
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Season 1
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Episode 69
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59:59
Mark talks to Ian Heptonstall
Sustainability requires a culture change within construction. Ian Heptonstall set up the Supply Chain Sustainability School with a few main contractors who were looking to break the mould of training and skills acquisition in the UK on wh...
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Season 1
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Episode 68
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59:22
Mark talks to Professor Elaine Limond
Leaders are everywhere. All businesses have one, all organisations have them at various levels throughout their management. Within construction we can not lay a brick without an NVQ 2, yet there are no requirements for qualification...
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Season 1
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Episode 67
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55:12
Mark talks to Carla Toro
Mental Health remains a stain on the reputation of the construction industry with a suicide rate of four times the national average. The reasons why are varied and complex, but they only represent the tip of the iceberg in terms of stress...
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Season 1
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Episode 66
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48:25
Mark talks to Simon Carter
Improvements to construction productivity are the Holy Grail of many in our industry. Without these improvements we cannot offer our customers more for less, include additional services or even pay ourselves more, without charging our cus...
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Season 1
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Episode 65
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59:04
Mark talks to Wayne Connolly
There are two things that construction needs to learn from the retail sector. The first is that it is all about customer service. Fail at this and you fail at the first step in business. The second is that you must modernise a...
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Season 1
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Episode 64
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48:20
Mark talks to Rachel Owens
Environmental, Social and Governance standards are increasingly a mandatory requirement for investment into any sector. Solar is no different, indeed many would say that we are more prone to these issues with the bulk of our materials com...
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Season 2
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Episode 17
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28:03
Mark talks to Julie Bell-Barker
Construction prides itself on being a front-line meritocracy where every one has a crucial role to play in delivering successful projects. In any meritocracy there are bound to be those who are more equal than others and clients fulfil th...
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Season 1
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Episode 63
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47:39
Mark talks to Andrew Eldred
The green energy revolution relies on electricians and electrical companies to design and deliver the infrastructure needed to support generation and use of energy. Without them, the revolution dies and we will be unable to meet our statu...
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Season 2
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Episode 16
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53:23
Mark talks to Sara Barnes
One in four employees in the construction sector identify as neuro-divergent, meaning that they believe that they think differently, their memory works in a different way and they communicate differently to the norm. These people may be n...
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Season 1
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Episode 62
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45:47
Mark talks to Brad Pilgrim
Energy management and carbon reduction are becoming increasingly important to designers, operators and maintainers of buildings. The costs of operating a building are a significant part of the lifetime cost and the whole life carbon calcu...
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Season 1
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Episode 61
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54:19
Mark talks to Clive Dickin
Scaffolding is ubiquitous within the construction industry. A true temporary structure that is found on virtually all building sites that requires designing and erecting accurately and professionally. Clive Dickin is the Chief Execu...
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Season 1
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Episode 60
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44:45
Mark talks to Peter Wooders
The UK plans to have over 50GW of solar capacity installed by 2030. The global solar Council is projecting 8TW of solar capacity in the same timeframe. The UK accounts for just over half of one percent, yet we are part of a holistic...
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Season 2
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Episode 15
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58:18
Mark talks to Keith Blizzard
The complexity of construction projects, the changes that can happen during a project and the challenges of communication between the parties means that the sector is blighted with disputes. Many of these disputes are resolved between the...
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Season 1
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Episode 59
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56:06
Mark talks to Claire Gardner
The solar sector has two big people challenges to solve if it is to deliver on its opportunity to become a major generator of the UK’s energy mix and support a “Just Transition” to a low carbon, low cost energy grid. The first is the shee...
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Season 2
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Episode 14
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44:56
Mark talks to Dave Tattershall
This podcast is a solar podcast, exposing the opportunities and challenges associated with a significant roll-out of solar generation capacity across the UK. One of the key challenges in any rapid expansion of work is to ensure that the s...
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Season 2
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Episode 13
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46:49
Mark talks to Kamal Rajput
The solar sector is poised for significant growth to 2030, with a forecast £17Bn add to GDP and a compound annual growth rate in excess of 14%. This will only happen if the supply chain exists to deliver this work.Kamal Rajput lead...
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Season 2
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Episode 12
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45:55
Mark talks to Ross Grier
The Solar Taskforce, a joint UK Government and industry collaboration has just published it long awaited Solar Road Map. This charts how the UK will grow solar generation to over 50GW to meet the targets of clean power by 2030 and net-zer...
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Season 2
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Episode 11
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50:08
Mark talks to Ben Fawcett
The Solar Taskforce, an industry / Government collaboration has been in existence since May 2023, working with both Governments to see how solar generation can be rapidly deployed to support the de-carbonisation of the electrical grid and the U...
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Season 2
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Episode 10
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1:02:37
Mark talks to Simon Richards
Solar energy represents the most accessible form of renewable energy generation available to commercial customers across the UK. It is relatively easy to install, provides economic energy, reduces carbon footprints, improves energy resili...
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Season 1
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Episode 58
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30:51
Mark talks to Ian Rippin
The Solar Taskforce, an industry / Government collaboration has been in existence since May 2023, working with both Governments to see how solar generation can be rapidly deployed to support the de-carbonisation of the electrical grid and the U...
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Season 2
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Episode 9
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48:03
