What is a … strategic relations manager?

Strategic relations? Sounds like a nightmare family reunion.
A strategic relations manager works for a building contractor and deals with housing associations and councils as partners.

"We have a relationship with clients who agree to give us a certain amount of work a year, as long as we perform and improve," says Paul Nicholls, strategic relations manager at contractor United House. "I set those relationships up and establish the roles and responsibilities within them."

Awfully modern, then?
Indeed. The job of strategic relations manager grew out of Sir John Egan's 1998 report Rethinking Construction. Relationships between clients and contractors used to be much more adversarial.

The new culture is one of the best things about the job, says Nicholls. "I enjoy not having to work in the traditionally confrontational environment with contractor and client at each other's throat."

Nicholls worked at the Housing Forum in the early days of the Egan revolution. He oversaw some of the first projects to adopt the new way of working. "It was about doing things differently," he says, "and I wanted to see if I could do that myself, rather than tell other people how to do it."

So, everyone loves this new way of working, do they?
Not quite. "One of the major challenges," says Nicholls, "is dealing with the culture change needed to work in these relationships. It's an entirely new approach and there are people in all organisations who find it hard to adapt."

What kind of things do you do?
There's a lot of paperwork to get through, as well as meetings inside and outside the company.

"No two days are the same," says Nicholls. "A few days ago, I went to London for a meeting with Anglia Housing Group. We sat down with them, with another contractor and with four consultants to look at their development programme and see what opportunities there were to work in partnership."

So what do you get paid?
A senior manager's salary.

I enjoy not having to work in the traditionally confrontational environment with contractor and client at each other’s throat

Paul Nicholls, United House

And what are the hours like?
"Long – and never nine to five," according to Nicholls.

Any good stories from your time on the front line?
"There was the occasion last year when I spent 20 pleasant minutes talking to a gentlemen in a flat we had just refurbished. Believing him to be the tenant, we discussed the finer points of his new kitchen and bathroom and why we had chosen that particular boiler.