Month: September 2018

Advance TRS’s latest charity fundraising activity was somewhat less strenuous than our usual extreme challenges for good causes. The team competed in a company ‘Bake Off’ to raise money for Macmillian Cancer Support.

Everyone made a fantastic effort to support the team Bake Off, bringing in impressive home bakes, donating or just eating! Our judges ate their way through 10 different bakes before judging Chantal’s Advance TRS inspired cake and Steve’s surprisingly tasty New Zealand apple cake the very worthy winners!

The main controversy of the morning still remains – did Mick bake the cake or is Mrs Schruyers to thank…?

Macmillian Cancer Support

Macmillian takes the time to understand the support people need to live their lives as fully as they can. From the moment of diagnosis and whenever they’re most needed, Macmillian here to help people find their best way through. Their help is totally focused on each individual person, so everyone receives the support that’s best for them.

  • Every day around 1,000 people across the UK will find out that they have cancer
  • It’s now estimated that half of all people will receive a cancer diagnosis at some point in their lives.
  • Breast cancer is the most common cancer in the UK, with an average of around 150 cases diagnosed every day
  • Prostate cancer is the most common cancer in men, with 330,000 men living with prostate cancer in the UK.

People living with Cancer in the workforce:

  • In 2015, there were an estimated 890,000 people of working age living with cancer in the UK. This is set to increase to 1,150,000 by 2030.
  • An estimated 1 in 3 people living with cancer are of working age.
  • 85% of people with cancer who were employed when diagnosed say it was important for them to continue work after diagnosis.

Follow our fundraising activities on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn for the latest news.

The Advance TRS Property team attended the Institute of Residential Property Management (IRPM) Regional Seminar in Brighton on Thursday 13th September.

Director of Property Services, Alan, and Recruitment Consultant Kirsty, represented the team as sponsors of the Regional Seminar events.

The speakers and presentations were really informative and the team listened in on the various topics that were discussed. Some of the information that the team took away were:

  • It was announced on the 1st April this year that it will be mandatory for Leasehold Property Managers to be qualified and do ongoing CPD
  • Reforms to Leasehold and Commonhold will be on their way
  • There are approximately 4 million leaseholders in the UK
  • New build houses are no longer allowed to be leasehold
  • Working Group 8 are looking at having Building Safety Managers for each block/estate who will be legally accountable for its safety and will more than likely need professional indemnity insurance
  • The IRPM qualification will be made up of 4 key elements – Technical, Safety, Customer Focus and Ethics & Behavior

There was also a talk from Gudrun Burnet who was giving insights on the topic of domestic abuse. She is involved in a number of organisations, including Against Violence & Abuse (AVA) and Domestic Abuse Housing Alliance – DAHA.

AVA is focused around those areas where they can make the best contribution to ending violence and abuse. They are doing this by providing innovative training, developing a range of toolkits, e-learning and other material that supports professionals to provide effective and appropriate support to survivors of violence and abuse and much more.

DAHA has a mission to improve the housing sector’s response to domestic abuse through the introduction and adoption of an established set of standards and an accreditation process. DAHA is a partnership between three agencies who are leaders in innovation to address domestic abuse within housing; Standing Together Against Domestic Violence (STADV), Peabody and Gentoo.

We will be at the next 4 IRPM regional seminars. The next one is on the 2nd October in Birmingham. Please contact us if you would like to arrange a meeting!

To view our latest jobs click here.

To register an account with us click here. Don’t have time to register an account? Click here for our quick send CV function.

Welcome to our new weekly roundup of the latest industry news.

Check out the biggest headlines of the week below:

PM pledges extra £2bn for housing associations over 10 years

The Prime Minister today pledged to release an extra £2bn for housing associations over the next decade to help them lead developments. Read more…

Morgan Sindall trials mixed reality headsets on school site

Morgan Sindall has completed successful trials of the Microsoft HoloLens mixed reality headset to perform installation checks on site. Read more…

Willmott Dixon clinches £38m Winchester sports centre

Winchester City Council has chosen Willmott Dixon to build its £38m sport and leisure Centre at Bar End. Read more…

£1.9bn fund open for housing site infrastructure

The Government has set up a £1.9bn funding pot to help unlock uneconomic sites for housing development. Read more…

Morgan Sindall bags £384m London scheme first phase

Morgan Sindall has sealed a pre-construction service agreement for the first phase of Hackney Council’s ambitious £384m mixed-use community development, near the London city fringe. Read more…

Browse our latest Construction jobs here.

Register for job alerts here.

Welcome to our new weekly roundup of the latest industry news.

Check out the biggest headlines of the week below:

Crossrail West wins top industry award

Crossrail West – part of Europe’s biggest civil construction project – has been named major project of the year at The National Rail Awards. The awards, held by RAIL magazine on 13 September, recognise achievements by organisations in the rail industry in areas including safety, civil engineering and railway stations. Read more…

TfL helps people with learning disabilities launch new careers

Hundreds of thousands of passengers pass through King’s Cross St Pancras Underground station every day. It was the busiest station on the network last year and can be a stressful place for even the most seasoned traveller. Read more…

Innovation through people and technology

Ian Prosser, HM chief inspector of railways and director of railway safety at the ORR, picks out the key industry challenges to focus on based on the regulator’s most recent annual health and safety report. Read more…

Major 2019 rail review led by BA boss will ‘leave no stone unturned’

In response to the May timetable disruptions and longstanding concerns over what has been repeatedly branded a “broken” franchising system, the government has decided to formally launch a comprehensive review of the rail industry in the country – with reforms planned to be implemented from 2020. Read more…

RailSport 2018: Speed, stamina and passion at the 25th annual games

Between 8-9 September, the long-running industry sports event welcomed hundreds of competitors back to Loughborough to challenge rivals old and new for a RailSport medal. Read more…

Browse our latest Rail jobs here.

Register for job alerts here.

Welcome to our new weekly roundup of the latest industry news.

Check out the biggest headlines of the week below:

Waitrose & Partners Commits To Removing 134m Plastic Bags 

Waitrose & Partners has announced that it has committed to removing loose fruit and vegetable plastic bags by spring 2019 and 5p single-use plastic carrier bags by March next year in all shops. The move will save 134 million plastic bags, the equivalent of 500 tonnes of plastic a year. Read more…

Barhale awarded Thames Tideway Tunnel contract 

Civil engineering and infrastructure specialist Barhale has been awarded the main civils package at Barn Elms Sports Centre work site in Richmond by the BAM Nuttall-Morgan Sindall-Balfour Beatty joint venture that is delivering the west section of the 25km Thames Tideway Tunnel. Read more…

Atkins appoints new head of UK water 

Atkins, a member of the SNC-Lavalin Group, has appointed Daressa Frodsham as its head of UK water, responsible for increasing the company’s footprint in the UK water market. Read more…

Demonstration plant achieves two-hour nitrogen removal from wastewater 

An innovative technology that can achieve the removal of nitrogen from wastewater in less than two hours has shown its effectiveness at a large-scale demonstration plant in the US. Read more…

Young Stars Recognised At 2018 Scottish Resources Awards 

To celebrate the Year of Young People 2018, the Scottish Resource Awards has teamed up with The Vibes Scottish Environment Business Awards to present the 2018 Young People Award. Read more…

Browse our latest Water & Utilities jobs here.

Register for job alerts here.

Welcome to our new weekly roundup of the latest industry news.

Check out the biggest headlines of the week below:

RICS backs stamp duty cut to ‘reignite’ house market

In order to rebalance and reignite the UK housing market, respondents to the RICS Residential Market Survey suggested overhauling current housing tax and scrapping stamp duty on certain properties, could potentially help thousands more young people own their own home. Read more…

Are you ready for the new HMO legislation?

New HMO legislation due to come into effect on 1st October could apply to around 177,000 properties according to the Residential Landlords Association. Read more…

New HTB range launches at NatWest

NatWest Intermediary Solutions has announced that from today a range of Help to Buy Shared Equity remortgage products will become available. Read more…

Phase two of Community Housing fund now open

Phase two of the £163m Community Housing Fund launched on 17 September for community-led groups to drive forward their ambitions for delivering new affordable housing schemes across England up to 31 March 2020. Read more…

You can no longer buy a property in London for less than £100k

The latest research from Housesimple has revealed that despite a highly publicised slump in London property prices over the past few months, £100k properties in the capital are now a thing of the past – in fact, there are only four at around £125,000. Read more…

Browse our latest Property jobs here.

Register for job alerts here.

Welcome to our new weekly roundup of the latest industry news.

Check out the biggest headlines of the week below:

You can no longer buy a property in London for less than £100k

The latest research from Housesimple has revealed that despite a highly publicised slump in London property prices over the past few months, £100k properties in the capital are now a thing of the past – in fact, there are only four at around £125,000. Read more…

Waitrose & Partners Commits To Removing 134m Plastic Bags 

Waitrose & Partners has announced that it has committed to removing loose fruit and vegetable plastic bags by spring 2019 and 5p single-use plastic carrier bags by March next year in all shops. The move will save 134 million plastic bags, the equivalent of 500 tonnes of plastic a year. Read more…

Shortlisted bidders revealed for £360m Tyne and Wear rolling stock deal

Nexus, which runs the Tyne and Wear Metro, has announced a shortlist of bidders in the running for the £360m contract to build and maintain the network’s new rolling stock. Read more…

PM pledges extra £2bn for housing associations over 10 years

The Prime Minister today pledged to release an extra £2bn for housing associations over the next decade to help them lead developments. Read more…

TfL helps people with learning disabilities launch new careers

Hundreds of thousands of passengers pass through King’s Cross St Pancras Underground station every day. It was the busiest station on the network last year and can be a stressful place for even the most seasoned traveller. Read more…

Browse our latest jobs here.

Register for job alerts here.

With just 16% of jobs in rail filled by women, we need to understand how we can encourage others to join the industry and not just attract women to the railway, but also to keep, develop and promote them.

This was the key message shared at the launch of the Women in Rail South division, held in September at the Bath Function Rooms.

Set in the particularly fitting re-purposed old Green Park Railway Station in Bath, a mix of men and women from across the industry met to celebrate the launch of Women in Rail South.

Attendees heard from inspiring women working in a varied range of roles across the region, including Anna Delvecchio – Commercial Account Director for Amey, Joanna Whittington – Chief Executive Office of Rail and Road, Rajinder Pryor – Network Rail and Estelle Whittaker – CCO Achilles to name but a few.

In total, eight women shared their personal experience of working within the industry and told stories of why they love working in the rail sector.

From being part of an essential network underpinning the economic activity of the country to inspiring changes in attitudes and enjoying flexible working opportunities and the fantastic opportunity for promotion and personal development, each speaker shared their own reasons for loving being women in rail.

Inspiring speeches sparked interesting debate around what Women in Rail and the industry in general can do to close thegender gap in the railway sector, including;

  • Raising the profile of rail as a sector and engineering to school children
  • Boosting the profile of the rail industry to attract women to the sector
  • The need for male champions to further women in the industry
  • Flexible working/job shares and shared paternity leave
  • Celebrating the success / raising the profile of successful women as champions of the sector

But it wasn’t all serious talk, with networking drinks following the inspiring speeches, which provided a great opportunity to make new connections with people from all across the sector disciplines.

The evening proved to be a fantastic opportunity for members to meet others who live and work in the area, develop their professional network and engage with key industry leaders.

Are you looking for your next move in the rail sector? For our latest rail jobs, to register for job alerts straight to your inbox or view our live jobs here.

To find out more about Women in Rail and become a member, please visit: https://lnkd.in/eW6ApbG  

Your CV represents you to your future employer. Your employer wants to know why they should hire you and not any of the other applicants. So, how do you make your CV and experience stand out on a word document? Here are some top tips from our team that you need to think about when writing your CV.

Presentation

When structuring your CV, remember employers see lots of applications for each role, so if yours doesn’t make the right information easily accessible it will go straight to the bottom of the pile. The simpler it looks, the easier it is to read.

  • Invest time to tailor your personal summary specifically for the job you are applying for. This is your primary opportunity to highlight your strengths and previous successes
  • Follow on from this with your qualifications
  • Keep the font to one standard type and size
  • Don’t begin each sentence with ‘I’. Unfortunately, it is not the way to create a compelling CV
  • Keep your education and job history in chronological order. It makes sense to put the most recent achievement or job at the top of the list as this is what the employer is interested in

Be truthful

Noting down truthful experience is essential. If you feel that you have to add in an experience you haven’t completed, this job is not for you! Note down all experience you think is related to the job you are wanting to apply for and you will find the perfect employer who wants to invest in you.

Employment history

Keep this short and sweet. Employers don’t need to know every job you’ve had throughout your life. If you think, on average, 50 people apply for every job on the market. If those 50 people all have 8 paged CVs, the employer will quickly become disinterested in reading through all of that information. Save the long explanations of your employment for your interview. Just note the job role, the company and the dates you worked there and add a little bit more information on what you’ve done in your most recent roles.

Check, check and check again – no typos!

Checking your spelling and grammar is essential. You might want to ask someone to look over your work as well as using spell check and looking up any words you’re unsure of!

Make your CV role specific

Make sure you tailor your CV to suit the job you’re applying for. It’s very tempting to try to cut corners with a generic ‘one size fits all’ CV, but it is unlikely you’ll get away with it. Always read the role’s exact requirements and re-word your CV accordingly. This will involve you doing your research so you know exactly what the employer is looking for, it may take a bit of effort, but if it puts you one step closer to your dream job so it’s well worth it!

Once you are convinced that your CV meets all the job criteria and portrays you in the best possible way you are ready to search and apply!

So why is Training and Development in the workplace important?

Investment in training and development for staff is proven, not only to improve employee  performance within their job, but also helps increase confidence, employee satisfaction and increase morale and consistency within themselves.

Studies have shown that investing in employee development  increases productivity and aids business, ultimately leading to better client relationships, increased sales and increased profit.

The U.K. L&D Report: 2018 – Benchmark Your Workplace Learning  outlines learning and development statistics in the UK. It states that top-performing organisations are five times more likely to have learning cultures, suggesting a culture of learning is a key component of business success.

Key Statistics:

  • 63% of companies with increased turnover in the last year, rated leadership and management development as their top priority.
  • 31% of companies who had grown in the last year used external coaching for senior leadership. That’s twice the average.
  • Companies with decreased turnover were 2x more likely to say their staff does not prioritise learning.

An article by The Independent this year, states that two out of three UK workers have changed jobs because of a lack of training and development opportunities, two out of three employees say training is more important today than it was just two years ago, and four out of five employers believe training has a positive impact on their workers.

Research by Towards Maturity, a research company who are supported by CIPD, reveals that high performing learning organisations, on average, are seeing a 24% increase in productivity and performance as a result of learning done well.  40% of employees who don’t receive the necessary job training to become effective will leave their positions within the first year.

What does it mean to us?

You spend most of your week with your colleagues. At Advance TRS , we are dedicated to ensuring we give our staff the best possible start in their careers with the business. As such, our Training and Development Director, Neil, oversees a comprehensive programme of induction, mentoring, training, ongoing personal development planning and guidance to all staff in the business.

We are committed to giving every employee the best opportunity to grow and advance within their role in the company. To help our team become the best they can be, we provide invaluable mentoring from our experienced recruitment experts.

A happy workforce is key to a successful business. Giving employees a good reason to stay at a company by providing them with training and development opportunities to carry on improving and succeeding is a real must.

If you are looking for your next career move and are interested in joining Surrey’s Employer of the Year, contact Neil for a confidential conversation on 07432 356750. We are always on the lookout for the industry’s next top talent.

Check out our latest internal vacancies here.

An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.”―Benjamin Franklin