PEOPLE


10 MINUTES WITH:MIKE WARD UK and Ireland Territory Director at Wavin


March includes International Women’s Day, so this month’s feature takes a slightly different angle.


How does Wavin support its female colleagues?


We believe to attract and retain the best talent you can’t ignore the challenges our female colleagues face at home and in the workplace. The demands of juggling childcare, caring for elderly relatives or just needing to be flexible at home all impact on employee retention. That’s why we’re adding a range of new benefits to further support our colleagues throughout their careers. For example, as well as offering six months fully paid parental leave, Wavin covers 50% of our colleagues’ childcare costs until the child reaches school age. Women unequally bear the weight of childcare, and it’s unacceptable that many have to take a break from their careers because of rising childcare costs. By providing this financial help, we want to show employees with young families that we really value them, and that doesn’t stop when they leave the office.


How else does the new package support women in the workplace?


There are a variety of initiatives that we have brought in. We have a menopause support group where a number of colleagues meet regularly to share their experiences, support one another, and make our workplace one where there’s no stigma around the menopause. The group’s work will in fact shape company policy and a training


Mike Tattam has been appointed Commercial Director of the Builders Merchants Federation with effect from 1 April 2023. He has spent 35 years working with leading


manufacturer brands in senior commercial roles. He brings a wealth of experience across heavyside and lightside sectors, and with national and independent merchants, specialist stockists and buying groups. Tattam joined the BMF in August 2022 in an interim capacity to recruit and develop a new Regional team.


Keyfix has appointed Kieran Coyle as general manager, and Connor Quinn as financial controller. Coyle has worked with Keystone


Group for nine years whilst Quinn has eight years accounting experience behind him.


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programme for managers, so they can better support women who are experiencing challenges related to the menopause. In this way, we’re not only providing support for our current colleagues, but building a culture that ensures we’re a good place to work long into the future.


How does the company support women looking to advance their careers? Part of our responsibility is recognising that the workplace isn’t a level playing field when it comes to career progression. To try and address the balance, we offer female-specific coaching and mentoring programmes to establish clear paths for women into senior positions. These sessions provide a safe space for people to raise any concerns they have, and for senior colleagues to pass on their knowledge, experience and advice for younger female colleagues making their way at the company.


Why has Wavin introduced these benefits? Women are under-represented in the sector, and we’re all worse off for it. But changing that means taking real steps to address the challenges women face in the workplace and putting structures in place to support them throughout their careers. We invest a huge amount of resources to attracting the best young talent into our business, and so we must work hard to retain and support that talent on their journey.


There will never be a silver bullet for improving representation in the industry, so these initiatives are just the start of an ongoing commitment to improving the workplace for women.


What are the benefits of schemes like this? It’s such a competitive market, so we’re always looking at how we can improve our offering to attract the best talent. A more diverse workforce is one that brings different ideas to the table and is ultimately more effective, which is why we’re so passionate about developing schemes that genuinely support all of our colleagues. Our internships and graduate programmes are a key example of how this attitude has an impact on people starting out in the industry. Launched in 2017, we have supported more than 25 people through the schemes and 50% of those have gone on to become permanent members of the Wavin team. Our new package of benefits demonstrates to young people entering our business that we’re committed to them for the long term, because we want to make it clear it’s not just a steppingstone. While we’re particularly keen to invite women from STEM backgrounds to join the company, we welcome anyone with enthusiasm for what we do. For the rest of the industry, we want to be a success story and demonstrate that this is not just the right way to look after people, but that it makes business sense as well. BMJ


ON THE MOVE


Specialist civil engineering products provider Wrekin has appointed Ricky Hasprey as sales director dedicated to supporting merchant partnerships and closer customer service collaboration. With more than 15 years of experience in sales within the engineering sector, he will be responsible for the strategic management of UK sales to help sustain and grow new and existing opportunities for the manufacturer


Knauf Insulation has appointed Ross Foreman as National Wood Wool Manager for UK & Ireland to meet increasing demand for its Heraklith® range of wood wool products. He will


work with Knauf Insulation’s regional sales, specification and technical support teams.


Keylite Roof Windows has appointed John Magee as its new Area Sales Manager for the Northwest of England and North- Mid Wales, to help increase sales for northern builders’ merchants


and contractors. He previously worked for electrical wholesaler, Rexel.


Industry colleagues came together recently to mark Andy Gamble’s retirement from the merchanting sector. Gamble started as a management trainee over 40 years ago for International Timber. He joined Bradfords where he moved through from sales representative, via branch management and purchasing director, to be operations director. Having joined RGB in 2015, he became managing director in 2021 after the acquisition of the business by Cairngorm Capital.


www.buildersmerchantsjournal.net March 2023


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