Faye Jenkins Community & Regeneration Officer Laing O’Rourke North Project Liaison Manager - Trinity Leeds CSR in Building – “A Holistic Approach”

Presenter

Presentation Notes

2.) Generally I feel CSR is still often misunderstood. Some people may think its about doing a charity walk once a year, the odd workshop in a classroom, planting a tree. In some cases, I suppose it can be. In general, many seem to think it’s about doing “something” in the community and “being green”. A question of ethics. People say to me all the time they are vague about what CSR is really about. Through my roles, I want to tell you about what I have learned and talk about a different way of thinking. Approaching CSR in Building “Holistically” and genuinely getting people in the team involved so they feel a part of CSR. Its not some agenda devised by a faceless person within the company who sits in an Ivory tower somewhere! The reality is, it is a part of their everyday. It is integrated into the business.

Presenter

Presentation Notes

3.) Companies in the built environment sector tendering for work in a competitive marketplace are often being asked to deliver extremely ambitious CSR targets, which focus on numbers. Number of Apprenticeships, number of NVQ trained etc. (Especially in the wake of the Section 106 agreement in some cases making CR targets contractually binding). Once on site, is it achievable to deliver these targets? Is it quantity over quality? What is the real legacy long after the project has finished? Recent figures from CITB show there are over 2,500 displaced apprentices in the UK. Could we be contributing to the problem through a target based approach? I suppose the real question is “Does the responsibility of the Construction company finish once the tick is in the box?”

Presenter

Presentation Notes

4.) As a company (and as an individual), we have learned from past experience that promising to deliver unachievable figures is not sustainable. To really get into the fabric of the community to establish what the real needs are and set ambitious achievable targets based on these needs makes more sense on many levels. I feel that the “one size fits all” approach doesn’t work. What I mean by that is, a global CSR strategy applied across the whole of the UK. Can this have the effect of being patronising? Can this be seen as a large corporation who know nothing of the area coming into their town and trying to preach on what they need without really finding out first? Each LOR project delivers different CSR objectives based on the real needs of the community they are operating in. This is done by sitting down with local education, local community and local businesses early doors to find out what the frustrations / needs are. What do people really need from industry? LOR did this with Construction Leeds on Trinity, and this is what we heard when we listened to the community of Leeds. We have maintained that 2 way dialogue throughout, listening, reacting and delivering. There are 2 key areas that I will focus on today (we cant cover them all). One, is the simple principal of work experience delivered in a way which focuses on a quality experience linking in with future career options. The other, is something a little different – actually working to positively impact education delivery in the region.

Presenter

Presentation Notes

5.) First area of focus based on conversations with teachers. Young people in Leeds do not understand what careers are available to them. They cannot see the link between what they are learning in the classroom, and their future. It seems out of their reach, and they can become despondent. Not all young people in Leeds may have the role models to give them this information and help them make decisions on their careers. The HMRC reported nearly 30,000 young people living in “poverty” in Leeds in June 2011. Some of their own role models at home may be out of work, and some struggle with seeing the link between hard work in the classroom and real career opportunities. Teachers told us students are always asking questions like “what is the point of doing Trigonometry, maths equations? I’m never going to need them in the future”.

Presenter

Presentation Notes

6.) So, what did we do to try and address this? Case Study 1 – Work Experience With 46 Secondary Schools, and 7 Further Education Colleges, the community of Leeds has a real requirement for employer engagement activities such as Work Experience. Objective; to connect classroom learning with careers and develop skills for life. We deliver a quality, structured timetable of learning activities over the week placement, covering Commercial, Planning, Design, Site Management, Engineering, Logistics, Leadership, and support functions. All Work Experience students have a dedicated mentor. All students undertake the full Laing O’Rourke induction on their first day including a full tour of site and a one to one with their Project Leader (like everyone else would, no different treatment). Students are set a mini-project to be completed over the course of the week. They are tasked with “interviewing” each person in each department that they spend time with to discover aspects of their job such as career routes, daily challenges, responsibilities and accountabilities, and projects that they have worked on in the past. They present their findings to their mentor at the end of the week. The student and the mentor then agree how Laing O’Rourke can support them in the future. Ie.) access to information on types of construction methods for future school / college projects. Because the whole team are responsible, everyone is part of it, and a side benefit it that is has had a tangible positive effect on team morale.

Presenter

Presentation Notes

7.) Feedback The feedback from students and teachers alike has been fantastic: “The real strength of the Laing O’Rourke work experience placement is that they find this out at first hand from experienced people within an industry that they aspire to be part of, not from teaching staff or advisors and this makes it so much more relevant. The structure of the placement is geared around relevance to their current studies, and the career options available to them. The feedback from our students has been nothing short of outstanding. I have literally watched them grow before my eyes into focussed individuals within the space of a week. One student now has a real desire to succeed in this maths as he knows he will need this to be the Engineer he now aspires to be. He knows this for sure, because he used it when he was setting out and levelling on site only the week before”. Andrew Mangham, Engineering Diploma Teacher from Guiseley School, Leeds……

Presenter

Presentation Notes

8.) Second area of focus; Teachers and students feel frustrated that students are not qualifying with the basic skills and knowledge demanded by industry. Industry is also struggling to find Apprenticeships that deliver the NVQ criteria to suit their trade. There are thousands of students undertaking courses around the Built Environment in the Leeds area. 7,500 at Leeds College of Building alone! Businesses want to take apprentices on, indeed they need to, but the feedback from our supply chain partners has been that colleges don’t always deliver an apprenticeship that suits their trade, so they are put off going down that route. The NVQ criteria sometimes just does not entirely match the real life trade on site. Is there a gap between Education and Industry that needs to be bridged, should Industry should be leading from the front on this? Allow me to give you example of this, qualifications in what we call “wet trades” such as plastering and bricklaying when the industry is demanding more dry stud wall and partitions, and pre-cast concrete panels. We are not saying that plasterers and bricklayers are not required. But there is a skills gap emerging in the industry that could be exploited by some of these young people that they are not aware of. When we bring the students and teachers to site, and show them some of these methods and talk about the careers available, they’ve never heard of them. We listened to this feedback.

Presenter

Presentation Notes

9.) Case Study 2 – Supporting education to deliver relevant NVQ criteria in qualifications to match modern industry roles Laing O’Rourke in partnership with a local supply chain partner have engaged with the Leeds College of Building to help develop feasible delivery of NVQ criteria relevant to their trade. Their trade is Fire-stopping, a market with huge demand which involves basic joinery and paint spraying skills. However, there is no apprenticeship which covers these, amongst the other skills required to do the job. Therefore we have worked with both parties and found elements of the Shop-Fitting apprenticeship that fit, Paint Spraying apprenticeship that fit, and Bench Hand Joinery that fit, and “create”d an apprenticeship with the relevant NVQ criteria. Laing O’Rourke have committed to provide learning opportunities for the areas that cannot be covered on site by either using Laing O’Rourke’s own local projects, our Explore Manufacturing Facility, or working with our supply chain and local learning providers to provide the right environment for the learning opportunities. We went to the college to talk to the students about this company and the roles available, the feedback was fantastic and you could literally feel the excitement in the room. Here is a specialist sector in construction that is buoyant and successful and struggling to find people! One Apprentice starts his Fire Stopping Apprenticeship in 2 weeks, with another 2 currently being arranged with the employer through the college. This is robust, quality delivery of apprenticeships, with real commitment to life long partnerships.

Presenter

Presentation Notes

10.) Feedback: The first Apprentice who starts in the next couple of weeks didn’t come via the college as the other 2 will. He is an 18 year old local person, who fell into the NEET category for the last 2 years and has been on Job Seekers Allowance. He came to us via the Learning Partnerships programme run by Leeds City Council on an 8 week (site based) work experience programme working with all departments. He chose the role he preferred out of all the various trades he experienced while on his placement. He had a hand in his own destiny, and he has been very involved in the decisions made. The whole process has been extremely hands on for him. He chose Stroma and they were also really impressed with him, he was actually fixing fire boards within 3 weeks! We now have other local supply chain partners who are struggling with taking on apprentices approaching us to pursue this option. Companies, again with huge potential and healthy order books, in areas such as metal fabrication. One of the alternative ways of recruiting apprentices we tried, was to ring through a list of available students sitting on a spreadsheet put together by a government department, it didn’t work for us! Some are sat on this list for 6,9 even 12 months, most don’t even know they are on it! Most were not looking for an apprenticeship. Databases such as this are only as good as the amount of data cleansing that takes place. We found our supply chain felt more inclined to look at taking on an Apprentice when they could (for want of a better term) “try as you buy” through the 8 week work experience programme. Get to know the potential candidate first, and allow the candidate to see if this is the job for them. The element of risk is taken away. Both the candidate and the SCP work with LOR to deliver the learning outcomes that cannot be covered on the site. Again, a collaborative approach.

Presenter

Presentation Notes

11.) Summary Image – Nick Clegg came to see our apprentices to talk to them about their amazing experience! Our objectives of CSR: To really engage with people in the local community and listen, remain in an open 2 way dialogue with them Not to “greenwash” tenders To manage clients understanding / expectations of what good / effective CSR is To deliver ambitious, yet achievable and sustainable CSR commitments Quality over Quantity Get everyone in the team involved – if anything it has a boost on morale Doing the simple things well

"Young people who have 4 or more interactions with employers while at school are 5 times less likely to end up unemployed than young people who have not had these interactions with employers. They also go on to earn an average of 16% more." Dr Anthony Mann, Director of Research & Policy, Education and Employers Taskforce