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TACE Team Spotlight: Nick Thomas

For our first Team Spotlight Interview, we caught up Nick Thomas about his journey from apprentice engineer to Associate Director.

What would you say has contributed to your success at TACE?

TACE have provided me with fantastic opportunities to gain experience throughout my career. I have been given the opportunity to attend meetings and experience all aspects of the role of a building services engineer, from design team meetings, witness testing roles and social events.

All of these opportunities provided me with a solid basis of experience and confidence in performing all of the various roles I have had in the team over the years.  

Can you tell us more about your progression to Associate Director?

Throughout my 13 years within TACE I have been given responsibility to perform the different roles independently and that experience has been essential in learning how to manage projects, hit deadlines and work well with colleagues. Because I have been given that autonomy, I have been able to develop quickly and take on more responsibility within the company.

I have also been very fortunate to gain my academic qualifications quickly since TACE invested in my education right up to master’s level. And even after I finished my masters, TACE sponsored me to achieve CIBSE CEng status.

The help and support I have been given throughout my career to date has been essential to achieving both my academic and career progression. And because of that support, I’ve gone from Apprentice Engineer to Associate Director in less than 15 years.

If you would like to know more about working at TACE you can contact us via info@tace.co.uk

Changing the face of our industry, one breakfast at a time

When someone says to you, “There’s no such thing as a good M&E consultant”, it’s tempting to immediately push back against that opinion, especially when you are an M&E consultant, and a proud one! But over my many years in private practice I’ve heard that comment numerous times and began to question why such a perception persisted and how it might be changed?

This is a journey we’ve been on at TACE for the last 15 years and I believe we’ve made significant progress. We recognised that negative perception was out of step with reality (after all, there were many M&E consultants doing first rate work) but as an industry we clearly haven’t portrayed our brand in an effective way.

In our opinion that’s largely down to the way we (the M&E sector) communicate with other construction professionals. We’ve been narrowly focused on our technical sphere and haven’t always made it easy for other sectors to appreciate what we do and how it helps them achieve their goals. That requires a Big Picture approach and a wider skill set.

To address this, we made some initial changes at TACE which affected our people. We:

  • Sponsored our engineers through a BSc and many to Masters degree level
  • Shared profit to all members of staff
  • Retained staff through above-market level salaries
  • Provided a share purchase scheme.

This helped us build a team of highly qualified, motivated and loyal engineers, but we wanted to do more. We decided to develop our future leaders, the people who would drive this industry forward into the 21st century.

Part of the answer was to bring external trainers into the company but we felt we wanted to share those learnings with others – hence the launch of our Leadership Breakfast Club.

“The Breakfast Club (sponsored by TACE) has been set up as a leadership programme to assist you in your career development. We offer to share our experiences with you with opportunities to attend private seminars with business and industry experts, as well as develop your business relationships. The aim is to provide you with the extra skills and knowledge that will assist you in your career progression.”

At our inaugural event in June we were delighted to welcome networking guru Will Kintish as our first speaker. Our next session (on 27th September) will feature communications expert Andrew Thorp, who will explain how we can tell a powerful and unique story about our business.

For more information on the Breakfast Club and for details of upcoming events please email Jo Mageean .

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0161 486 0429

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Stanley Green Business Park,
Portland House, Earl Rd,
Handforth, Cheadle Hulme
SK8 6QL

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GM Social Value Award

Three of our engineers recently attended a couple of Careers Awareness events at local high schools to engage with pupils and get them interested in careers within the STEM industries.

Damian Rafferty, Alex Lord and Jack Dixon gave a great presentation illustrating what a career in mechanical and electrical engineering involves, giving quick demonstrations on some of the technology we use on a day to day basis including CAD and Revit. The presentation was part of a ‘Careers Connect’ event. These events can have significant affects on the careers decisions taken by young people at key points in their school lives.

As a result of their hard work at these events we are thrilled to have been awarded a Bronze Social Value Award from the Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce. The award recognises the time and effort donated by companies to help inspire the region’s future workforce.

We hope to continue being involved in great events like this.

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0161 486 0429

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Stanley Green Business Park,
Portland House, Earl Rd,
Handforth, Cheadle Hulme
SK8 6QL

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LABC Building Excellence Awards 2017

We recently attended the LABC Building Excellence Awards 2017 where we were thrilled to see three of our schemes amongst the nominees.

Bolton Town Hall and Alderley Edge Festival Hall were both nominated for Best Public Service Building, a category that was won by Crewe Lifestyle Centre.

It was a great evening and a fantastic achievement to have Crewe Lifestyle Centre take home the award.

Congratulations to all involved.

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0161 486 0429

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Stanley Green Business Park,
Portland House, Earl Rd,
Handforth, Cheadle Hulme
SK8 6QL

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Changes to BB101

Rules on school ventilation are changing under BB101 Guidelines on ventilation, thermal comfort and indoor air quality. The revised version of Building Bulletin is due to be published in late Spring or early Summer this year. The government is getting tough on air quality in classrooms with maximum CO2 limits being reduced significantly and minimum flow rates being established for science labs, halls and gyms.

 

To help prepare for the new revision we have put together a summary of the changes;

Minimum Flow Rates

  • Classrooms should be capable of 8 l/s/p or 2 ACH for the design occupancy when occupied, whichever is greater;
  • Halls and gyms should be capable of a minimum of 8 l/s/p or 2.5 ACH, whichever is greater;
  • Corridors need a minimum of 2.5 l/s/p +0.3 l/s/m2  of floor area, or – if number of people is unkownn – 1.2 l/s/m2
  • For science labs with an area >70m2, the minimum is 4 l/s/m2

Maximum CO2 Limits

Natural Ventilation

  • CO2 can’t be greater than 2,000ppm for 20 consecutive minutes or more during occupied day;
  • Average CO2 during occupied day must be less than 1,500ppm

Mechanical Ventilation

  • CO2 can’t be greater than 1,500ppm for 20 consecutive minutes or more during occupied day;
  • Average CO2 during occupied day must be less than 1,000ppm;
  • In science labs, an alarm goes off when CO2 reaches 2,800ppm

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0161 486 0429

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Stanley Green Business Park,
Portland House, Earl Rd,
Handforth, Cheadle Hulme
SK8 6QL

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1000 Jobs and counting

TACE recently won our 1000th job, which alone is a cause for celebration, but pair that with the company's 15th anniversary and it's quite the occasion!

As you’d expect these two huge milestones have incited a fair bit of reflection so we have put together a bit of a retrospective of some of the stand-out schemes that have made up the last 15 years here in the TACE office.

Download our PA1000 brochure below and take a look…

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0161 486 0429

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Stanley Green Business Park,
Portland House, Earl Rd,
Handforth, Cheadle Hulme
SK8 6QL

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