Mark talks to Faye Allen

Construction companies are paid to deliver projects in tough conditions where significant risks exist.  These conditions and risks inform the culture that exists within our businesses and the wider industry.  One of the greater challenges that we face is raising productivity within the sector, to enable us to deliver more for less and to pay our workers more.  Having the right culture is fundamental to this process as our business need to enable the right people with the right skills to deliver and the resilience to cope with change.

Creating the right culture requires overt leadership and Faye Allen, Construction Director at consultancy JS Held and author, argues that everyone should be a culture leader, responsible for generating the best environment. Faye talks about the levers that are open to us all to help each other, pointing out that people who are not suffering from stress or other illness are more diligent, productive and accurate in their work.  She argues that if we can get this right then the industry will be more profitable, and we will attract the best and the brightest into our fantastic sector.   Faye calls for a grass roots movement to get the best from everyone, through awareness of the pressures on each other and the honesty to discuss acceptable behaviours and performance.

Faye brings thirty years’ experience, working as a quantity surveyor and an international dispute consultant to her campaigning.  Her personal experiences of good, bad and ugly practices make her an ideal person to engineer change, particularly when mixed with her perspective of money within the industry.