On why we’re all going to be very busy next year

This industry is cooking up a storm for next year.

Quite frankly we’ve been run off our feet trying to keep up. And it’s only speeding up.

Partly it’s the momentum that’s now unstoppable for sustainability, climate action, net zero goals – call it what you will. You know what we mean.

Partly it’s the incredible motivation that comes from this industry – chock full of smart creative people who work hard to get stuff done and care about others. And never hesitate to pull apart old shibboleths or innovations once grand but now past their use by date.

Those critical analytical skills are possibly the most valuable that the industry has to offer in the race to keep this planet beautiful.

So yes, it’s valid to critique star ratings and construction codes, yes we should all have net zero homes and net zero buildings. Or loads of solar but if there’s loads of solar does everyone have access to it and if not how do we provide it equitably and fairly to others? But what is the building fabric like? If it’s as flimsy as a tent then how comfortable or safe will people be inside if they have to constantly keep the aircon or heating blasting full pelt?

After the fundamentals are taken care of you can move to the cornucopia of ways that the built environment can improve lives, reverse loneliness, or enhance a nature inspired circularity.

Design for instance

Kellie Payne, a director of Bates Smart is always an inspiration. And often a surprise. As a leading architect she’s one of the people that decision makers go to for solutions capable of kicking off new trajectories in thinking and can be scaled up.

In just a snippet of insight into what we hope to delve into next year Payne told us she’d been thinking about how to improve the lives and outcomes of high performing women.

You know how it goes, she says. If you’re a high performing woman, you work hard and then harder – the Taylor Swift effect. Perhaps placing you in danger of working yourself to death (so to speak – or maybe not).

Payne says bad habits start early, so in her work in student accommodation – she’s trying to design into the fabric of the building opportunities for more balanced lifestyles.

For women’s colleges in particular. “You can embed design of the spaces that provide a routine and rhythm in life to incorporate selfcare into their lifestyles,” she says.

“For instance breakfast overlooking the sunrise.” Or communal cooking and eating in pleasant spaces that promote social engagement.

International students are particularly vulnerable, she says, landing in a new country perhaps from a home environment where everything was provided for them and suddenly they have to manage a strange new country.

“Suddenly they land in Canberra or Sydney and they have to make friends and navigate all these challenges.”

Her fellow director Philip Vivian is incorporating a kind of “We Live” style facilities at a built to rent project at Barangaroo. More social spaces are a must and can mean smaller private spaces and therefore “tackle a bit of the rental crisis.”

The same applies even more critically to social housing, where welfare issues need to be built into the infrastructure right at the start of a project in collaboration with the housing providers.

Recycling is good

In the commercial sector the thinking is also swinging to retrofit and recycling. At one project Payne’s working on at 111 Bourke Street in Melbourne, Australia Post moved into new headquarters two years before Covid hit, “went home and never came back,” she says.

The result was 10,000 square metres of “ghost furniture” lying around. Payne took a look, thought about the new premises for the Commonwealth Bank she was also working on, just a few blocks away, and realised reusing the furniture would not only save a huge amount of carbon but also “a truckload of cash”.

She now has to figure out how to use it to best effect in order to meet the client expectations but even though some parts might need to be replaced the high carbon material parts like steel can likely be retained.

Business expansion and ESG prospects

On the pure business front things are looking good according to RSK, a UK based company that has a rather unique business model. It snaps up controlling interests in businesses that are leaders in their fields, do a deal that keeps the founder and/or leadership team in place and goes on to enjoy the benefits of the existing brand, existing client relationships, and the synergies of the businesses working together.

It’s a variation on the “swallow them whole” business model of mergers and acquisition of some megalith companies, often resulting in a loss of the best and brightest talent.

RSK’s latest acquisition in Australia is Edge Impact.

We had a lively chat with the RSK’s divisional director Australia Mark Haydock this week who said the deal brings  number of companies to 175 now under the company’s global umbrella and 15,000 staff.

The company’s founder Alan Ryder he said, started an environmental business, which he grew to around 500 people before he decided to raise finance and bolt on complementary services for clients.

“That escalated particularly in the past five years and was refinanced along the way.”

Five years ago the business raised $A2 billion, which Haydock says was the biggest raise at the time for a sustainability linked loan.

Another refinance happened earlier this year.

So what underpins the confidence behind this strategy?

Haydock says the ESG market momentum is building fast.

“For a long time the market maturity has not been there from an ESG point of view.”

But mandatory reporting will now “push the market forward”.

The Edge Impact purchase is ideal, Haydock says.  “We’re at the bottom of a wave and it’s beginning to build. It’s been driven by our clients, consumers, community and whatever it takes to decarbonise and build a circular economy.

“We’re at the forefront of that.”

Renewable energy is a particularly powerful wave about to take off in his view.

So far Australia is lagging, “quite significantly” especially compared to the UK and other parts of the world.

RSK he says has been a key player in the UK’s renewable build – whether wind or solar – and connecting to the grid transmission lines.

Some of the skills will come from the slowing transport sector as they will be transferrable, and some may come from the UK.

“It’s easy to attract good talent to Australia”.

On the threat of political backlash to the green transition both in the US and Australia, Haydock says, “you just need to roll” with the political wind at the time and realise that “one door closes and another one opens”.