experience

I was fortunate over the years to be involved in a wide range of really interesting projects.  I was never a ‘day-rater’ and was always able to mix and match different types of work in different types of organisation.  Although I was seen in some quarters as a competence management specialist, I always tried to maintain a balance across research studies, real-world projects in organisations, facilitation of cross-sector groups, and the development of practice-based tools and techniques.

Along the way I established a reputation for honest, professional analysis of business, people-management, and learning issues, for the cost-effective design and delivery of practical, workable solutions – and for high-quality presentations and reports. Some highlights of my experience include:

Exploring change and skills needs

  • Research into how training policy is developed and skills issues are addressed in oil & gas
  • Pan-industry steering groups on attraction, recruitment, skills and training issues
  • People management and employment issues in the UK oil & gas industry
  • Benchmarking people-management systems in a regional cluster of 25 chemical companies
  • Comparisons of North Sea and Gulf of Mexico competence management and safety training
  • Evaluation of emergency response training for the offshore oil & gas industry

Linking HR strategies and business needs

  • Project-managing the design phase of industry technician apprentice training programme
  • Core-competence frameworks, entry routes and career pathways for a regional energy cluster
  • Research into the growth characteristics of companies and organisational metatypes
  • Research into the links between business performance and skills strategies in SMEs
  • Organisational re-design of the UK arm of a multi-billion pound company
  • Various organisational analysis, organisation design and job design projects
  • Critical roles and competencies for decommissioning nuclear power stations

Aligning personal and business goals

  • Simple competency frameworks for large and small organisations
  • Integrated competence and performance management systems for oil & gas operators, drilling and well services contractors, and SMEs
  • Job evaluation projects using a range of different scoring systems
  • Master Classes in people management for high-risk industries
  • Tools to assess the risks of human performance error
  • An e-learning strategy for a cluster of SMEs trying to penetrate non-core markets
  • Attitudes/values surveys across a wide range of organisations
  • Diverse projects on reward systems, executive selection and performance assessment

Embedding learning into HR routines

  • Complete suites of HR policies and processes for international blue-chip companies
  • A suite of web-based applications to help organisations manage intellectual capital
  • Applications to assess and monitor competence against standards
  • Database applications to help managers and teams prioritise business objectives and track KPIs
  • Qualifications framework for offshore design engineers
  • Web-based diagnostic tools to review progress against HR strategy

During my earlier working experience I also:

  • Pioneered risk-based approaches to competence management within safety-case/SMS regimes
  • Chaired an industry training committee and was deputy chair of 2 industry training associations
  • Re-structured and managed a division of 450 staff and trainees based at 10 locations across the UK
  • Won a National Training Award for integrated training programmes to support flexible skilling
  • Planned a multi-skilled resourcing and IR strategy for a new plant and ran a major recruitment campaign