The biggest single industry in New Zealand for waste is building and construction. So with commercial construction at record levels, residential building consents peaking at 1970’s levels, massive housing shortages combined with anticipated additional demand from Kiwibuild – we must find a better way. The solution is adopting circular economy thinking. Not only does this…
What do you ACTUALLY do? Your answer can help our industry better promote itself. There is no doubt that heavy engineering has an image problem. We’re consistently hearing how hard it is to attract and retain quality staff. Students are not choosing it as a study focus. Apprentices are hard to find. Women are not…
If you think you’re safe from disruption, then think again. Because by the time a disruptive change has overtaken us, we won’t have time to react. If recent history is anything to go by, our future will be full of change. Innovations in the digital space have already transformed us, and the rate of change…
It’s not often you’d expect a heavy engineering research association to talk homelessness to their membership. But, having recently discovered that three homeless people were sleeping in the undercover area at the back of HERA House – here we are. The discovery led to some really challenging discussions amongst HERA House tenants on how to…
Sitting for long periods is thought to slow the metabolism, which affects the body’s ability to regulate blood sugar, blood pressure and break down body fat. This makes it a serious health and safety consideration with emerging awareness of its impacts. A range of studies show growing evidence for the serious consequences of pro-longed sitting.…
New Zealand’s R&D and innovation performance – can we do better? The answer is yes! NZ’s expenditure on R&D is benchmarking alarmingly low. This is the key takeaway from MBIE’s recently released 2018 Research, Science and Innovation System Performance Report. But why does this matter? According to the OECD and Treasury, low R&D investment…
That’s a good question and one we have been asking ourselves. So much so, that we’ve been working with our team to define them. Initially, by getting our lead team to propose what we think are the really important values we want to live by, and then having discussions with our full team to see…
In today’s digital age, traditional manufacturing companies must harness disruption before it engulfs them. If you aren’t prepared – your company infrastructure is a natural disaster waiting to happen through digital disruption. That’s because natural disasters aren’t just restricted to events of nature. Nature of events can run their course in businesses and markets as…
Property infrastructure is on our radar for the month of October. And, not surprisingly it got us to thinking about what infrastructure needs to be developed to create a better organisational leadership culture. To answer this, we took inspiration from the Founder of Doblin Larry Keely who said “Innovation is the elegant integration of many…
We hope a lot, and that you’re willing to do anything! Because growth is a critical key metric for any organisation to survive. Yet, time and time again, we see our members not giving the ‘time’ needed to focus on this in their day to day work. A likely reason being that growth and survival are…
Shaping the Future of Construction: Insights to Redesign the Industry is a white paper released by the World Economic Forum in 2017. This paper identified six challenges to the future of construction: Project Delivery – creating certainty to deliver on time and on budget, and improving the productivity, quality and safety of the construction sector.…
What are the big five megatrends in construction risk? And how do they relate to our members? Last week, I attended the launch of the Willis Towers Watson Construction Risk Index (CRI). The results reiterate what our members are already telling us. They also reiterate what we are asking our members to consider. That is,…