Battling the issues of incursions, worker abuse, and recruitment

Re-flow’s philosophy of providing high-quality software is enabled by investing in talent, and by nurturing an atmosphere where our ever-expanding team engages directly with the industry – whether that’s highways, civils, commercial landscaping, utilities, rail, construction, or installation and maintenance.  

The networking, educational, and growth opportunities of trade shows are significant on this count. We enjoyed our February visit to the Road Safety Markings Association Annual Conference in Kenilworth, even if some of the stories we heard about the state of the industry were concerning.  

While the RSMA is focussed on highways, the hot topic was one familiar across the whole spread of Re-flow-associated industries: issues with recruitment and retention.  

The concerning news was that only 10% of workers are in the 16-25-year-old bracket and that 225,000 new workers will be needed by 2027. Key skills are being lost with the retirement of experienced workers, and not enough of the younger generation are interested in joining the industry. Jobs in tech, the statistics suggest, are more appealing. Our show report covered a few ideas to counteract this problem.  

A week later, we headed back to the midlands. Our visit to the UK Infrastructure Show became most interesting when we heard some further recruitment arguments from Jon Loveday, Director of Infrastructure, Enterprise, and Growth at the Infrastructure and Projects Authority. Jon’s keynote address focussed on ways to make the industry more attractive to those working in it by offering more training. This would make the sector more appealing to those looking for a career path with growth opportunities.  

Making sure workplaces are safe is a huge part of the appeal of our Re-flow software. Streamlined, more efficient risk assessments and enforced, easy-to-address health and safety forms found in Re-flow help operatives become more compliant. In this way, Re-flow can help battle incursions, as we wrote about later in the month, but combating worker abuse is a more difficult problem to address: we were proud to put our name behind the Stamp It Out campaign. And, continuing the theme of supporting good causes, we were also proud to support MV Kelly’s Three Peaks Challenge team in their efforts to raise money for the Birmingham Women's and Children's NHS Foundation Trust, ROSY, Crohn's & Colitis UK, Women's Aid, and the Garden House Hospice Care. 

The end of the month saw our industry analysis take on a national scale, when our CEO, Mike Saunders, discussed his thoughts on the Government’s recent spring budget. Mike’s engagement with the way the budget directly affected the lives of everyone working in big industry was a fascinating take on a pretty-much damp squib of a political moment.  

Finally, from a dubiously successful budget to genuine blooming growth: at the end of March, our collective hearts were warmed by two internal promotions. Rob Turland and Matthew Lake took on new roles – head of support, and head of client services respectively. The significance of these new roles is no less than a foundation stone for all the good work we have ahead of us this year.