Constructing Excellence in Wales

When North Wales developer and building contractor Watkin Jones decided it needed to revitalise its business, it took the brave step of actually looking within its own organisation for methods to improve quality of workmanship, productivity and staff retention.

All too often it is easiest to look elsewhere for answers. Soon after his appointment as Managing Director, Mark Watkin Jones had a clear vision on how to drive the Group forward; it needed a total overhaul.

The existing structure was too reliant on middle managers and needed stronger direction from higher up the management structure so assistant directors for each sector of the business were introduced to help drive those aims forward. The brave decision to slash company turnover and become more selective with contracts has ensured that the Group can deliver a high quality product at better margins throughout its core businesses.

This has helped direct and improve staff expertise alongside the growth of the company.

“What we wanted to do was have more control over the business, improve the quality of our workmanship and encourage the training and development of our loyal staff to do this. The people development side is vital for us to meet those goals,” explains Training and Development Manager Leah Watkins.

But to achieve this wish list the company had to strip the structure back to basics and assess each employee’s strengths and weaknesses. Only by doing this could a plan meet the key objectives, of defining employee roles and responsibilities, identifying skills gaps to increase the level of training and development to plug the gaps while developing a training hierarchy that would run alongside career progression, be ultimately successful.

The training and development programme is focussed around a company wide statutory minimum training requirement for each staff member. This is currently set at four days each year but the company has introduced some innovative methods to help ensure this requirement is easily met.

Training courses are offered over half days if required, to help take advantage of the morning hours where the brain is more able to cope with new information and employees get to choose the training course they go on through direct meetings with their line manager. This helps ensure that not only are the employees pushing the development of their core skills in the right direction for the business but also for themselves.

“We wanted to get away from the idea that going on a course was a burden that had to be endured,” says Mrs Watkins, “Allowing staff input over which courses they attended enabled them to develop their career and increases staff buy-in, which is vital for the success of this scheme.”

Ensuring the training hierarchy filters through the management ladder from the top down has been important to delivering the programme. Without senior management showing the way then it is difficult to expect others in the Group to adopt the training ethos. 

Neither has the Group been slow to recognise the skills and experience it already has within its staff numbers. Wherever possible the group organises a series of ‘Learn at Lunch’ sessions where experienced staff will pass on the expertise they have gained over the years to those members whose own level of knowledge is not as complete. These have developed alongside regular staff forums which are held off site and allow employees to meet and exchange useful training or business information informally. This ensures that each individual has a greater say in how the company is managed as well as their own career development

This increased focus on individuals to help move the business forward as a whole seems to be paying off. Absenteeism figures have plummeted and the level of repeat business from clients has increased dramatically. Staff turnover has also improved significantly in an industry that is well known for its high levels of turnover or ‘churn’.

“Repeat business is very important to us and is recognised as a vital part to our future success. Building relationships based on trust within and outside the Group is helping to achieve this and is demonstrated by the fact that 75 per cent of work for our construction division is repeat business. Staff turnover levels have also been halved and we believe this shows that investing in our staff is undoubtedly a worthwhile investment,” says Mrs Watkins.

Being proud of its Welsh heritage, the Company has implemented a long-term plan for its staff members to embrace the Welsh language..  Support will be offered so that those struggling with the language are able to at least get to grips with it at some level.

This highlights the view taken by the management at Watkin Jones that the main component of a successful business is its people and it has an obligation to continuously improve all aspects of an employee’s working life and personal development.

“It is important that we look after our staff and are able to instil or values and ethos throughout the company. The leadership and people development programme helps us do that,” say Mrs Watkins.