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Efficiency & Value for Money – Direct Works Live Seminar
March 5 @ 9:00 am - 3:30 pm
£80Our first live seminar of 2024 will take place on 5th March at the King’s House Conference Centre in Manchester.
Members get 2 free tickets that include lunch and refreshments. Additional tickets are available for purchase for members.
Agenda
9.15 – 9.45 Registration
9.45 – 10.00 Welcome & Agenda
From Russell Thompson, Chair of Direct Works
10.00 – 10.30 FLS (Fast Lean Smart): How dynamic scheduling can help deliver an efficient field force at less cost.
Session delivered by Chris Welsh from FLS to understand how the use of Field Service Technology and Dynamic Scheduling is helping to improve efficiency, reduce travel and ultimately, the carbon footprint of an organisation.
10.30 – 11.00 Existing Electric Storage Heaters – making them dynamic!
Kenny Cameron, Managing Director of Connected Response Ltd will lead this session exploring how making existing electric storage heaters more dynamic can reduce fuel poverty and make large asset savings
11.00 – 12.00 Disrupting the sector – background to Believe and changes to working practices and investment decisions.
This session will be led by Andrew Thompson from The Social Housing Consultancy, who will deliver a short presentation on reducing cost on planned works components in Voids and then open up the topic for a round table discussion. Andrew will be joined by Believe colleagues.
12.00 – 13.00 LUNCH & Networking
13.00 – 13.45 Current impacts of procurement pressures within the sector
Matt Jarratt from ProcurePlus will be presenting an overview of global market conditions and how they are impacting the housing sector.
13.45 – 14.15 Using Data to Create a Proactive Approach to Building Management.
Tony Cubitt from Vericon will be providing us with an insight on how data and connected technology can change your processes from reactive to proactive.
14.15 – 15.30 Yorkshire Housing – preparing for the proposed changes to the decent homes standard
Liz O’Connor, Yorkshire Housing and Direct Works Steering Group member will offer a short presentation on what can the sector expect from the re-launch of the Decent Homes Standard followed by a round table.
15.30 Seminar Ends
Keynote speakers
Chris Welsh, FLS
Chris Welsh is a business and software solutions specialist with more than 30 years’ experience of translating field service and mobile workforce management needs into software solutions that deliver authentic operational & environmental efficiency, increased customer satisfaction, and a significant reduction in costs.
As Sales Director of FLS – FAST LEAN SMART, Chris has introduced the award-winning FLS VISITOUR to field service organisations across Europe; across dozens of industries and tens of thousands of field resources. His enthusiasm matched with a deep sector knowledge ensures that partners, prospects, and customers not only invest in a solution that meets their individual needs, but most importantly, delivers continuing value.
Kenny Cameron, Managing Director, Connected Response Ltd
Kenny Cameron grew up in Glasgow and graduated from Stirling University in 1979. His career has spanned 40 years in the utilities sector in manufacturing, supply chain, asset ownership and contracting. Since 2012 he has held senior roles with leading energy market players including Energy Assets and VCharge/OVO Energy and Fusion Group. Previously he served as MD at Fusion Provida (now Wolseley) and McNicholas (now Kier). He Co-founded Connected Response in 2018, before in 2021, it became part of Warmworks, Managing Agent for Scottish Government’s Warmer Homes Scotland scheme for energy efficiency and fuel poverty. Kenny is passionate to change the unfairness of the storage heating experience, by improving comfort and reducing bills – and looks forward to doing this even better as part of Warmworks.
Andrew Thompson – TSHC (The Social Housing Consultancy)
Andrew Thompson has 35 years experience in Social Housing. In 2004 he established TSHC (The Social Housing Consultancy) with Janet Thompson. He has provided asset management consultancy and interim management services at Director level to a number of Registered Providers and Charities over the last 20 years, including Clarion (Affinity Sutton and Circle), Believe, LFHA, RNIB, F4S, Onward (Contour), Your Housing Group (Arena), H4W, DGHP, and many more.
He has delivered significant cost savings and improved efficiency in many organisations, and, alongside Russell Thompson, who joined TSHC in 2023, is currently promoting and implementing a “Disruptor” initiative within the social housing sector to reduce waste, and thus cost, as well as improve performance for inhouse contractors.
His recent work with the team at Believe highlights how in-house teams can deliver the improvements required in a period of mounting pressure in the sector to deliver more for less, and reduce our impact on the environment
Matt Jarratt, Assistant Director of Operations at Procure Plus
Matt is Assistant Director of Operations at Procure Plus leading the team responsible for the procurement and delivery of £200m of investment works and services per year across the housing and public sectors. His team of specialists utilise the collective volume and knowledge of their customers to understand the market and drive continuous improvement from their activity and exposure to it. Matt is a chartered building surveyor and prior to joining Procure Plus in April 2010, he worked in a range of construction and development roles across the public and private sectors.
Tony Cubitt, Vericon Systems
Tony has over 10 years’ experience within the social housing sector and has gained a deep understanding of some of the challenging issues RSL’s are experiencing, particularly around damp & mould. He is passionate about the idea of technology being used as an enabler for the greater good and has been working extensively to get this message across to his clients.
Liz O’Connor, Yorkshire Housing
Strategic lead on the management and development of the Repairs and Investment Delivery Directorate at Yorkshire Housing, Liz is ensuring we deliver a customer obsessed service that provides value for money and high customer satisfaction.
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