Regeneration needs you!

If your skills are right, regeneration is your oyster. Companies will dangle top salaries to tempt you and you will have no problem moving on and up in a sector where headhunting is rife. In the pressurised and under-resourced world of regeneration, good people are treasured pearls.

The findings of the PSD Group/Regenerate 2006 Working in Regeneration survey – which examined recruitment patterns at developers, housing associations, quangos and local authorities – are good news for the ambitious individual, but make grim reading for the sector as a whole. People with the right blend of private and public sector experience are in worryingly short supply and the industry is struggling to attract graduates. Urban regeneration corporations and their quango variants are the hardest hit, with some only managing to retain people for about 12 months. Even in the private sector, where remuneration is typically 20% higher, two years’ employment at any level is seen as a decent stint.

“There is a shortage of good people right across the sector,” says Tony O’Neill, head of residential development and regeneration at recruitment consultant PSD Group, which carried out the survey. “But although the private sector can often trump with its financial incentives, the inability of some agencies to recruit directly affects their ability to deliver projects, making them an even less attractive employment prospect. Their future is simply too uncertain.”

Just how uncertain will be revealed this autumn when the government publishes its delayed consultation paper on the future of under-performing agencies set up to deliver the sustainable communities plan. Duncan Sutherland is managing director of Inpartnership, a small private company that works with local authorities to deliver 10 to 15-year projects, including the £1.8bn North Solihull estates regeneration. He is looking forward to reading the review: he thinks it will push the agencies into some much-needed restructuring. “The focus of these organisations can change overnight from economic development to housing,” he says. “People at all levels are confused about what they’re doing, which is why the organisations under-perform.

I have recruited middle managers from URCs and RDAs who were just desperate to leave them. People want clear aims and values.”

But even when organisations do have clear aims and values, good staff can still be hard to find, says Bob Lane. The chief executive of quango North Northants Development Company recently took six months to recruit an investment and marketing manager. “We were very clear about what we wanted for our £75,000 salary, but in the end we had to use a recruitment agency,” he says. “There just aren’t enough people in the market who combine commercial acumen with the experience of local authority bureaucracy.”

Anu Vedi, chief executive of registered social landlord Genesis Housing Group, seconds that. “Recruitment has become even tougher over the past year,” he says. “Housing associations generally offer better remuneration than quangos and local authorities but, because we are delivery vehicles, we are expected to have private sector skills in abundance and they are in very short supply.” Our survey shows salaries range from £44,000 at project manager level to £130,000 for a chief executive in the South-east.

The 2012 Olympics might help increase the skills supply. Although there is some concern that regeneration’s finest will be seconded to work on the massive infrastructure required for the Games – as has already happened with some of English Partnerships’ top players – there is also widespread optimism that the Olympics will be an opportunity to sell the sector to the workforce (see recruitment charts, overleaf). “I think it will prove a long-term investment for the sector and that in as little as four years’ time we will see considerably more expertise in the marketplace,” says Sutherland.

His words are backed by, among others, Alan Cherry, chairman of housebuilder Countryside Properties. “The Olympics will speed up infrastructure delivery and that can only benefit the sector in the long term,” he says. “There might be a short-term soaking up of resources, as there was with Bluewater [the 330-store shopping centre in Greenhithe, Kent] and the Channel Tunnel, but overall the Olympics will be a tremendous learning vehicle that will attract new talent.”

Cherry is also unruffled by the industry’s skills shortage. “Regeneration has grown massively in size and complexity over the past six years, so it is unsurprising that we have an ill-equipped workforce. People are adjusting.”

The private sector remains regeneration’s top payer. Salaries range from £55,000 for project managers to £145,000 for a chief executive in the South-east. This is roughly on a par with the public sector, but pay at developers is boosted by bonuses of up to £90,000.

Cherry does, however, think some organisations could be more proactive in encouraging career development. “All companies need to properly engage in training,” says Cherry. “We have been breeding our own regeneration specialists through a training academy we sponsor through a university and we also run a management training programme. Headhunting is a fact of life, but by offering staff good training you can control it. English Partnerships is doing its share in this area and it has a good retention rate.”

The newly formed Academy for Sustainable Communities is also doing its bit. Set up by the government to address the skills shortage, the Leeds-based centre has prepared training packs for children as young as 12 in an attempt to encourage them into sustainable community careers. “We want the next generation to know they can earn their living in regeneration,” says ASC chair Professor Peter Roberts.

Meanwhile, BURA thinks there are plenty of existing regenerators who could turn their community work into paid employment. Its regenerator workforce campaign launched in July will host informal roadshow-style recruitment and career development events for people at all levels in regeneration. “We want ambitious graduates, rising stars and the ordinary people who do the neighbourhood watch scheme to all network under one roof,” says Sean Fleetwood, regenerator workforce campaign project manager with BURA.

The group does not have a figure for how many people it hopes to recruit. But it is clear that regeneration needs all the people it can get and that it has a lot to offer. To find out how much they – and of course you – could be earning, download the .PDF below - The pounds in your pocket. …