From the army to construction: meet the members

Two reservists who mix construction and army life. Photographs: Cpl Gabriel Moreno RLC. 

Major Nigel Mockridge MCIOB, Project manager, Interserve Consulting

When you’re dealing with a different language and culture it helps to have a translator, and that’s one of the roles that reservist Major Nigel Mockridge MCIOB plays at Interserve Consulting. As a project manager guiding contracts won by Interserve’s PriDE joint venture with Southern Electric Contracting, under the south-east PRIME defence framework, it often falls to him to interpret the military mind and break it to colleagues that the critical path they think they’re on might not be what the client wants or needs. “Sometimes I have to say ‘that’s not how it works’,” he says.

Mockridge is a former Regular soldier, signing on in 1978 as a “sapper” and construction materials technician in the Royal Engineers and leaving in 2005. The intervening years demonstrated army meritocracy, with promotions through the NCO ranks to Captain commanding various Specialist Team Royal Engineers (STRE) in the 170 Engineer Group.

His last army role was to lead an STRE responsible for site investigation and geophysical surveys — a specialism that has never impinged on the public perception of the armed forces but is nevertheless critical to its ability to build bases, defences and infrastructure. “It was about gathering site information, drilling rigs, getting samples out of the ground, land contamination. And we had UCAS accreditation, I think that’s quite important to mention,” he says, highlighting the army’s construction credentials.

The transition to civilian life — working for student accommodation provider Liberty Living — was aided by the kind of informal contacts that have characterised army-to-construction traffic flow to date. He is still part of an informal network — Mockridge mentions a 40-strong group of former officers working in construction, property and FM who meet socially every few months. “We all seem to have made the transition well — we must be well trained,” he remarks.

During his next role, working for food services company 3663, Mockridge qualified as MCIOB after a year-long course at Aston University. Mainly, he needed more commercial awareness. “In the army, you don’t think about fee proposals and margins, you just get on and build.”

Since 2008 Mockridge has served as a reservist in the TA, where he’s Officer Commanding the 508 STRE general engineering works team. He’s hoping to build stronger links between the reservists and Interserve, starting with introducing a former colleague to the TA. “They’re trying to recruit 10,000 over the next four years — it’s a massive challenge and they need to get employers on board,” he says.

Major Dave Martin MCIOB, Managing director, DAMA

In Afghanistan today, and other theatres of operation tomorrow, civilian contractors are increasingly undertaking roles that were once the preserve of the Royal Engineers. That means the uniformed army needs good communication channels to its civilian force — facilitated by reservists such as Major Dave Martin MCIOB.

Martin, who runs specialist concrete and flooring contractor DAMA, was deployed to Afghanistan’s Camp Bastion for six months last year to introduce consulting engineer White Young Green “to theatre”. The firm has a two-year contract as a Civilian Engineering Support Team, and Martin’s role was to integrate its staff with personnel from the Royal Engineers’ UK Works Group, which manages and maintains infrastructure in Camp Bastion and other operating bases.

Reducing out-turn costs is the prime driver behind the move, a quest the army shares with the rest of the public sector. “The underlying reason is efficiency, and more value for money for the British taxpayer. It’s enabled the army to increase design and infrastructure output, allowing the Royal Engineers to concentrate on military engineering,” explains Martin. “And when you’re dealing with reconstruction, it’s probably a bit more palatable for [local] people to deal with civilian engineers.”

His posting in Afghanistan equated to almost a year away from DAMA, including pre-operation mobilisation and post-operation leave. The MOD paid his salary, but what about the effect on his business? “Turnover did go down, but I wasn’t too worried about that. Over the years, the army has put a lot of faith in my training, and I felt I wanted to do the job.”

Martin was a relatively late entrant to the TA, realising as a 28-year-old civil engineering graduate and site manager that he could pursue his construction career and simultaneously experience army life. He joined 73 Engineer Regiment as a direct entry officer cadet, training at weekends and longer camps over 18 months before being given a commission as a 2nd lieutenant.

In the industry, he became a senior project manager before helping an established aggregates business set up a contracting arm. He was then recruited as a director of another contracting business, before launching his own company at the age of 34. In the army, he has had spells in Germany, Cyprus and Ascension Island, commanding Specialist Team Royal Engineers (STREs) to design and deliver new military facilities.

So did his army experience  propel his construction career forward? “Oh yes, I’d say so. It doesn’t reshape you or remould you or change the way you think. But it does make you realise that your limitations are what you want them to be,” he concludes.