That was the week that was….all about stakeholders, celebration & opportunity

The nature of my job means that some weeks I work away at home keeping in touch with everyone via email and whatsapp (a growing communication channel for business!) and hardly seeing a soul except hubby and my dog Chester. Last week was very different though as I attended three in person events and had lots of proper face to face conversations. 

First up was the NDA Stakeholder Summit in Manchester. This brings together a really interesting mix of people across the NDA itself; it’s Site Licence Companies comprising Sellafield Ltd, Nuclear Transport Solutions,Nuclear Waste Services and Nuclear Restoration Services; representatives of the Site Stakeholder Groups and relevant industry organisations such as ourselves at BECBC. 

This ensures a diverse set of views in the room and makes for some interesting conversations. I was honoured to be asked to sit on a panel discussing “A legacy for the future” asking if we were being ambitious enough in our thinking and actions around the legacy we are leaving in our nuclear communities. It was a really interesting panel to be part of alongside Jim Mowatt – TUSNE Chair, Phil Matthews – NULEAF Executive Director, Angharad Rayner – NRS EHSS&Q Director and Connor Deehan – PA Consulting Energy Consultant with each of us addressing the question from different perspectives. 

For me I was thinking of our community in West Cumbria, an area where many people are benefitting from the well paid, skilled jobs Sellafield Ltd and its supply chain offer but where we have pockets of deeply entrenched deprivation that haven’t moved in decades. This means that people born in those parishes face additional barriers to achieving their potential, which isn’t good for them but also isn’t good for our area & it’s economy. I was very honest that I don’t think we have been ambitious enough in the past but we still have the opportunity to leverage the long-term spend at Sellafield to eradicate those dots on the map and give people that opportunity. For me the key to doing that is the local supply chain who can provide those skilled, well paid jobs and developing projects like Pioneer Park. 

Themes often run through events don’t they? There was a real sense in the room that we don’t celebrate the work we do in the nuclear sector anywhere near enough but there’s a balance isn’t there? How do we celebrate it without sounding self-congratulatory-a point that was raised in the room by one of the Site Stakeholder Group representatives. To communities where not everyone benefits it can be easy for these celebrations to sound hollow. I always think that these celebrations are much better when someone else instigates them for you-when one of your stakeholders say “You’ve doing an amazing job-we should celebrate that” As an industry there’s a real challenge to us to reach the point where people in our communities who don’t work in the industry shout about us because of the benefit we’re bringing to the area. It’s quite a challenge. 

It was then onto our own BECBC Nuclear Group Showcase & what a showcase it was! The room was full of amazing companies doing amazing things to incredibly high standards and the room buzzed with conversations that I hope were driving business opportunities. In fact it was buzzing so much I was struggling to get people back into the auditorium for the presentations! It was worth them going back in though with millions of pounds worth of future opportunities shared by presenters-you can find out more about the event on our news page. 

 

The event was only possible through the hard work of the team and I want to give a big shout out to Marie, our Membership Secretary, and Connor, the Nuclear Lead on our Shadow Board, whose work made the event the success it was. All that hard work was definitely worthwhile when we got some feedback from Garry Smith, Sales Director at Thomas Graham: “This was one of the best events I have attended to date. I found the presentations extremely informative, with plenty of useful insights and ideas that I can take away and apply in my role. The quality of the speakers and the content delivered throughout the event were excellent, and there was a great balance between strategic thinking and practical takeaways.”

“The networking opportunities were on another level. I had the chance to meet and speak with a wide range of people from across the industry, and I made many valuable new contacts. The event created a great environment for building relationships and sharing experiences, which I found just as beneficial as the presentations themselves.”

Garry’s feedback was so special to us as a team because it aligns so much with BECBC’s mission which is to create an environment for members to do business together which benefits members and their communities. While our events are fun & enjoyable that isn’t enough-they have to deliver for our members and Garry’s feedback told us that this one did. 

By Friday it was onto the Armstrong Watson Bank of England update with Gareth Harrison. Apart from the (always interesting) update on the economy there was a good discussion in the room around the impact of AI with virtually every company reflecting that rather than causing redundancies AI was being used to backfill on natural churn with people not being replaced. The focus of doing more with the same people shows that AI is currently augmenting rather than replacing people but that does still impact on the labour market, particularly for entry level careers. With the impact of the NI and National Living Wage increases impacting most on our future generations we need to think seriously about what that means for our future companies. If you’re interested in the subject of AI it was the subject of our most recent White Paper which you may be interested in reading. 

Well that was the week that was for me last week-how was your week?