Open Doors: aspiring engineers visit HS2’s Old Oak Common Station

As young people enter the workforce, they may have a pivotal moment or event to thank that led them to their chosen career – perhaps a conversation with someone inspiring or a week of work experience at university. Last week, at Build UK’s Open Doors event, the students overlooking HS2’s Old Oak Common site under blue skies may well have experienced theirs.

As part of industry body’s scheme, which aims to attract new talent to the industry, level three engineering students from Slough and Langley College in Berkshire were invited to inspect the progress being made at the largest railway infrastructure project in Europe.

 

From the viewing platform

“Roughly 1,200 people will be working on-site today. It varies, but a large proportion of those are actually underground fixing steel, pouring concrete, preparing platforms, doing a whole range of jobs.”

Jamie Townsend, social value and legacy manager for the Balfour Beatty Vinci Systra Joint Venture (BBVSJV) at HS2 Old Oak Common Station, explains the processes that go into creating the station box, the first phase of the expansive project.

“Basically, the underground structure runs between those two points, so a kilometre long and at the very far end of the site,” he says, pointing out through the floor-to-ceiling panoramic windows of a viewing room four levels off the ground.

He answers the students’ questions about tunnelling, explaining how the boring machine (TBM) parts have been lifted in and how the tunnel is laid out underground.

The group of aspiring engineers are eager to learn about the complexity of delivering HS2’s largest station and the many different roles that a construction professional may take on at the project.

Townsend says: “There will then be a roof that spans everything you see out there. It’s a pretty impressive structure; it will harvest rainwater and it will control the temperature [of the station] with lots of steel and glass. This is more of a machine to be honest, it’s more mechanical than it is structural or civil.”

As the class stepped out onto the viewing platform to get a closer look at the action, the focal points were the enormous cranes set against a sky-blue backdrop that towered over all other on-site components across the vast development.

Attracting talent

Inviting young people and those looking for a change of career to exciting building projects during Open Doors Week is only one way to entice them into the sector. Around 5% of HS2’s project team is made up of apprentices, making it the only JV to have achieved more than the 4% industry target. But the BBVS JV senior leadership team is keen to continue growing this number.

“We know that 88% of our visitors say they’ll consider a career in construction after an Open Doors visit, and we need to recruit 250,000 of them each year. We need 200,000 to replace those leaving and 50,000 additional young people as new entrants,” points out Suzannah Nichol, Build UK’s passionate chief executive.

Daniello Aspeling, health, safety and environmental lead at the BBVSJV highlights what the industry and its young recruits can offer each other. “I think it’s important that what these major infrastructure projects offer is a sense of belonging and purpose, so when we travel on that train, it’s changing the perception of what construction and engineering is,” he says.

“People think we just go home with dirty hands, but there’s a lot more to it, and it involves understanding that we’re in the age now where we talk about how we’re going to use AI to enable us. So, we need these people that come through from different generations to bridge the gap.”

Mukta Hashmi, procurement lead at the BBVSJV, started her career as a business apprentice in the defence sector but found she had the transferable skills that would lend themselves to planning procurement. “I think there’s something so magical about construction,” she says.

“It really does entice you in with the impact you can make. I’ve gone across loads of different industries and come back to construction.”

Steve O’Sullivan, the JV’s project director, observes that teachers spend a significant amount of time with their students and can therefore influence their career choices. “I think the people we really need to [build relationships with] are the teachers,” he suggests.

“I think we should do more engagement with the teachers on the construction industry, the opportunities and salaries.”

Through partnerships with the Department for Work & Pensions, The Careers & Enterprise Company, Careers Wales, Construction Futures and Skills Development Scotland, Open Doors continues to reach more teachers and students with visit opportunities every year.

Amir Zakari, programme manager at Slough and Langley College, is also keen to “build up more collaboration” between the education system and the construction sector and make known to his students the variety of opportunities an engineering qualification can offer them. He also advocates for a greater focus on gender diversity at both a student and professional level.

Looking around the room, there are only a few female students in the class, but their teacher praises their “high quality” work and would like to see more balance in higher education.

“We need to see more girls in engineering and more diversity of skills,” he says. Despite the gender imbalance that is too often prevalent across STEM subjects, he calls for teachers to “give girls the support they need to make sure they enjoy the course”.

Inspiring the future workforce

Strong role models are a key part of inspiring the future workforce, and there is no shortage of those at HS2’s Old Oak Common Station. In a series of career presentations, speakers from across the project team shared their stories.

From using mobile robots for surveying and material handling and heavy-lift drones, to curating a sparkling CV with experience working across huge schemes like London’s Millennium Bridge and the Bull Ring shopping centre in Birmingham, the presenters emphasised that there is no one way to enter the industry.

Marvin Jones, electrical delivery manager at Anthro, took an unconventional route to work on what he describes as “the best project ever”. He completed a degree in advertising and marketing before retraining as an electrician. His advice to the workforce of tomorrow is: “Don’t be scared of change, don’t be scared to start again – it’s do-able.”

With the students eagerly asking questions and engaging in the team-building activities on the day, there is no reason to doubt that some of them may well be giving their own career presentations at a similar Open Doors event a few years down the line.