Adam Nicholson is group preconstruction director at McLaren Construction
As building safety regulation has crystalised, it has become clear that digitised upskilling is as important to the modernisation of the construction industry as digitised delivery.
It was clear two years ago that the emerging building safety legislation could boost skills in our industry as well as the pace of transformation.
“Companies that cannot track, measure, align and evidence competence will fall behind in the modernisation process”
It has been seven years since Mark Farmer’s Modernise or Die report rang alarm bells about outdated delivery methods in our sector. We can be sure that the Grenfell tragedy, the resulting Building Safety Act and related secondary legislation covering building regulations, building control and the management of higher-risk residential buildings have finally provided the spurs for construction to modernise.
Raising the bar in competency, as well as upskilling everyone involved in project delivery to comply with building safety legislation and regulations, is vital for all main contractors as they supervise and manage skilled tradespeople on sites.
Under chapters three and four of 2023’s amended Building Regulations, principal contractors must ensure that any designers and subcontractors have the required corporate capability, and that individuals have the required skills, knowledge, experience and behaviours to carry out any design or building works.
To do this, principal contractors will need to reinforce their existing pre-qualification and onsite skills validation processes to reference the skills, knowledge and experience required to deliver building safety alongside health and safety.
The work being carried out by organisations such as the Construction Industry Training Board and Construction Leadership Council to develop competence frameworks across occupations will aid this process.
The opportunity to overhaul the quality, safety and standards of delivery for our country’s buildings and infrastructure through better training and development cannot be overstated.
But are main contractors leading from the front in this skills revolution, and in how they assess the skills, knowledge and experience of their own colleagues?
Those in roles such as design managers, quantity surveyors and project managers must adapt to the Building Safety Act and secondary legislation, with particular focus on Section 2A of the building regulations covering dutyholders and competence requirements for all construction sectors, not just higher-risk residential buildings.
Those construction companies that cannot track, measure, align and evidence the right skills, competence and behaviours will fall behind in the modernisation process.
Digital competency measurement
Delivery starts with people. That’s why introducing digital competency measurement and training programmes can help contractors quantify the number and level of skills they have in place, identifying where the gaps are and where training or upskilling is needed.
To do this, you need an online database that creates ‘skills passports’ for all employees, and that lets everyone involved in a project understand the competencies you’re bringing as a construction manager.
Bringing your workforce on board and inspiring them with a common vision is key to success. To establish and rank the competency levels in your workforce, you first need their self-assessment and input. Requiring people to engage online, disclose information and fill in forms takes time and commitment. Digitising competency and training programmes and systems in this way requires investment.
Cultural change and embedding new ways of working are also part of the process. Best practice requires engaging, interactive content to outline the importance of change to colleagues. Their buy-in is essential to creating a positive culture and focusing on the governance required to deliver building safety, quality and sustainability for a building’s occupiers in the long term.
Once populated, these systems can be used to assign colleagues to projects, almost like building a team online, which gives clients confidence that they are procuring services in line with competence requirements set out within the regulations, ensuring compliant design and quality delivery.
To enact the change our industry needs and boost our skills in line with new regulations, all principal contractors must develop similar solutions. We are all working with the same supply chain in creating buildings that people live and work in, and we all have the same responsibility to transform the way we measure and improve our skills to deliver on the promise of safety and quality.
