In profile: Bruce McGill, Chief Executive, Society of Operations Engineers

It’s an interest that has sustained him through 12 years working for engineering bodies, beginning with a nine-year stint as the Head of Marketing for the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. He later moved on to CIBSE as a Director of Membership, before taking up his current role as Chief Executive of the Society of Operations Engineers a little over two years ago.

“Engineers are what keep things moving, keep things operating, and engineers working along with scientists solve some of the big, big challenges that we face,” McGill explained. “I really enjoy working with organisations that are supporting that.”

ENGINEERING CHANGE

McGill joined  the Society in September 2018, during the government’s year-long Year of Engineering campaign. He describes the government campaign as a great opportunity to “really put engineering on the map”, and continues to work with government, the Royal Academy and Engineering UK to continue promoting engineering as a career of choice, as well as advise and inform government on engineering matters.

McGill’s passion for engineering is also shared by his colleagues, who he said have shown tremendous resilience during the recent COVID-19 crisis. “My staff are very committed to the organisation and helping the Society and our members achieve our charitable objectives,” he said.

It also depends on the work of 100 plus volunteers, who work the length and breadth of the country, as well as in Hong Kong where the Society has a strong membership base.

“Without them, we simply couldn’t run the Society,” he said. “You get to work with people who feel very passionately about what they do, and I enjoy that and we’re all working towards a common set of goals and objectives. A lot of what we do is about improving public safety and making society safer for the public. That motivates me and I think it motivates our volunteers and our staff as well.” 

LENDING INDUSTRY A VOICE

The Society of Operations Engineers  was formed 20 years ago by the merger of the Institute of Road Transport Engineers and the Institution of Plant Engineers.

“They felt that there was a lot of benefits in doing that in terms of having a combined voice, a combined effort to support operations engineers across plant maintenance and road transport,” McGill said.

A third body, the Bureau of Engineer Surveyors, a former sub-group of the Institution of Plant Engineers, quickly joined the new Society.

Last year,  it also welcomed former members of the Society of Environment Engineers, which had effectively closed.

“The sustainability agenda was already very much on our radar,” McGill said, “and SEE members coming across, joining us and forming a new sector, it just seemed like a very natural progression. We’re very excited about that development.”

MEMBERSHIP MATTERS

The Society currently has around 16,000 members, of whom around 9,500 (six out of ten) work in road transport. “Road transport is a significant sector for us, no question,” McGill said.

It has more than 1,000 members in the armed forces, including those working in the RAF and the Corps of Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (REME), who are responsible for maintaining military vehicles and equipment.

“Basically, where there is operating equipment to be maintained, you’ll find our members,” said McGill, “whether that’s industry or retail or road transport or armed forces or nuclear.”

RAISING THE STANDARD 

When members join the Society they have to meet certain standards, including an ongoing commitment to Continuing Professional Development (CPD). As many of its members are professionally registered with the Engineering Council or the Society for the Environment, this is a mandatory requirement.

It helps its members to meet their CPD obligations through a range of activities, including hosting webinars and publishing technical guides and a trade magazine. Before lockdown the Society hosted regional meetings where speakers would come and brief on best practice. It also holds the IRTEC and workshop accreditations, to ensure technicians are reaching a certain level in terms of their competency, and workshops are operating to the appropriate standard in terms of their systems and processes.

“With the accreditation standards, professional registration, and all our CPD activities, we’re trying to make sure that our members are as well equipped as they possibly can be for the roles they are operating in,” McGill said, “A lot of what they do has a very direct impact on public safety so that’s so important.”

BATTLE FOR TALENT

Just as there are skills shortages in the logistics sector, the engineering profession often struggles to attract applicants with the right skill sets.

McGill believes that the industry needs to do more to attract people with the right skills and a real interest in engineering as a career at each entry point into the profession, whether that’s an academic route by studying engineering at university or through a vocational route via an apprenticeship.

While he thinks government has done a great job in terms of improving the availability of apprenticeships, he also thinks more needs to be done to make engineering attractive as a career.

“A career in engineering is a great opportunity to be creative, to be innovative, to solve problems, to make things work,” he said. “There are certain types of people who love doing that. But there’s no question that there are other career opportunities elsewhere which can be more lucrative, can be more attractive. So we have to work hard to make sure at those entry points that we are attracting people with the right skills and we’re retaining them as well within the industry.”

McGill is particularly concerned by a ‘brain drain’ to other high-paying sectors of the economy. “Engineering graduates are very numerate and have a skill set which investment banks would quite like to get hold of,” he said, “We’ve got to make sure that ‘brain drain’ to other more lucrative career options isn’t taking away the best talent from engineering.”

There is also the challenge of developing the skills of technicians to work on electric vehicles. “As you look at the move to net zero,” McGill said, “the demand for skills of that nature is just going to go up and up and up.”

PANDEMIC CHALLENGE

While the COVID-19 pandemic has rocked industry across the board, the picture for operations engineers has been more mixed, with some sectors like the bus and coach industry badly hit, while others like road haulage are holding up reasonably well.

“On the whole it’s not been too bad,” McGill said. “The demand for competent engineers to maintain and operate equipment, that hasn’t gone away. But in some sectors, it is tricky, bus and coach being an obvious example.”

BEYOND BREXIT

With the end of the Brexit transition period now less than two months away, McGill says the outlook for his sector very much depends on the detail of a trade deal between the UK and EU, assuming one is agreed in time. While he expects increased costs and short-term disruption to supply chains, particularly given how many manufacturers now work on a ‘just-in-time’ basis, he remains hopeful that they will not translate into a long-term issue.

“There will also be an opportunity to come up with innovative solutions for these kinds of challenges,” he said, “that will give you a competitive advantage. So, there’s going to be opportunities for some organisations, no question.”

THE ROAD AHEAD

While he concedes that his sector is almost certainly looking at some short-term disruption, McGill believes that a good trade deal and a vaccine early next year will help dramatically reduce the disruption and difficulties it will face in the coming months. Given the essential role that his members perform, he is also broadly optimistic that the demand for their services will remain high.

“The challenges that are solved by engineering, the challenges that our members are dealing with on a daily basis in terms of keeping the country moving and operating, keeping the road haulage industry up and running, maintaining plant equipment. Those challenges are not going to go away in a hurry,” he said.

“So yes some short-term disruption, but society still needs engineers to maintain, operate, come up with solutions through some of the big challenges that we face as a society and that’s not going away, whatever short-term disruption we might face in 2021.”

*https://www.soe.org.uk/ 

Published On: 12/11/2020 16:00:43

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