You took over leadership of the BBA in 2020, what were your key objectives and what progress has been made?

The BBA set itself two key objectives at the start of 2020: to be more market, sector and industry-focused and to become a systems-driven organisation. Much of our transformation since then has been focused on meeting these objectives, with significant investment in the business – especially our people. Our focus has been on changing the way we work through systemisation and digitisation, and consequently, the improvement of the client experience and the enhancement in clarity of process of certification for our clients and wider stakeholders.

My arrival at the BBA was in part as a response to the Grenfell Tower tragedy and ‘lessons learnt’ formed the basis of our transformation programme. As a data company, the output we produce through the certification process enables informed, data-driven decision-making in the sector, and as such digitisation is vital to ensuring reliable, robust quality and process optimisation – every time. Learning the lessons from Grenfell was core to all of this and will remain core to future developments as the BBA embeds a philosophy of continuous learning and improvements. Complementing the digitisation of our organisation is a programme of modernisation, fostering a culture of open sharing of challenges and exchange – one where we are always looking to improve what we do.

There were three key aspects to our transformation. Firstly, we require strong leadership in the organisation, with a clear vision that colleagues can buy into. We also required the right infrastructure in place – we are a data company and should therefore take and active lead on digitisation in our sector. Finally, the BBA has access to some phenomenal knowledge through our very skilful, talented, and experienced people- and our longstanding history. This knowledge needs to be captured and retained in a systemised, state-of-the-art provision and distributed in ways that enables effective decision-making in our industry.

2024 has been a challenging year for the construction sector, with the publication of the final Grenfell Tower Inquiry report, a new government, and continued scrutiny of quality and safety in the built environment, what are your reflections on the past 12 months?

The publication of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase 2 report in September 2024 was long-awaited and vital for us as an organisation. First and foremost, our thoughts have been with all affected by its findings and for us, whilst a difficult read – an important milestone for us to reflect on our progress to date and a look to the future on what else needs to be done. Our colleagues have dedicated their careers to contributing to the construction sector in a positive way. Whilst there has been no malicious intent or gain, the findings, of course, cut to the bone – as they have to. However, while the content of the report may have been new to some, the BBA has been closely involved since the fire in June 2017. Our learning forms the basis of everything we do, every change we make and every improvement in services that we target. It has formed the basis of our transformation plan and remains core to our business plan. It is mentioned at every monthly colleague briefing, every monthly newsletter and all other regular communications. The loss of 72 lives, and the impact on hundreds more, and the remedial action placed on the entire sector, is a mission for us, our motivation to do more, to think differently and to be bold in the changes we target. This applies to us, as well as ways in which we can help others to improve.

The impact of this work is showing in the use of product certification in the construction industry. Since Grenfell, demand for independent, 3rd party certification has more than trebled; a clear sign that the sector continues to embrace independent verification and oversight.

Apart from the publication of the Grenfell report, 2024 this year also saw more elements of our transformation programme come to fruition. When I started, the organisation lacked many basic requirements for an effective and productive operating environment. We have invested every penny of operating surplus – and then some – to change this. Not only have we targeted ‘catching up’ but we have set ourselves stretching targets to provide our stakeholders with robust, timely and state-of-the-art technical guidance, richer content and more-easily accessible information. Given the reliance of our data by so many in industry, we see this having a direct impact on improving safety and quality in our industry. We are driven by this impact. On a personal level, I find the level of commitment and participation by colleagues in the BBA inspirational.

All this investment comes at a cost, as our accounts for the financial year to June 2024 will show. However, I am pleased to share that since July, the business is operating on a healthy footing and we are seeing returns on the investments made.

The complex market landscape is characterised by new and evolving product regulations and initiative through the Building Safety Act and a focus on high quality building products, how does the BBA support manufacturers and specifiers trying to navigate it?

The BBA welcomes all and any changes being made to improve product testing and certification. Many of our people are involved in industry forums, committees and working group to influence, contribute and support these changes. It very much meets one of our original objectives, to be more stakeholder, market and industry focused. We have much to contribute and are pleased to be able to do so.

A market consultation in 2022 identified ways in which the BBA can further improve the performance of products in the built environment, combinations of products and systems. We have shared these with stakeholders and as changes to regulations, approved documents, standards and industry best-practice are considered, the BBA contributes actively. We actively share the sixty years of experience we have access to, and we contribute our knowledge, and our understanding of best practice and relevant standards.

The work we do can be complex and will always require a high level of competence to support the users of the information provided. We are trying to simplify this as much as possible to help decision-making across the industry, but equally competence on behalf of the user will always be a necessity. That is why we have recently launched a CPD (Continuous Professional Development) course for architects and specifiers. This has been very popular and more outreach is in the pipeline.

In the absence of a forum for bodies like us post-Brexit, the BBA has launched an Industry Working Group. The group is chaired by Mark Prisk, former Minister of State for Housing and Local Growth under the Coalition Government, who is supported by Hugh Taylor, formerly MD of BM TRADA and a director of UKAS.

We believe in independent oversight, so naturally BBA has is accredited by UKAS, the government-appointed accreditation body for the UK for over 20 years.

What moves have you made to enhance the operational efficiency, reliability and rigour of the BBA’s processes and procedures, and how will this continue into 2025 and beyond?

Our highly-skilled technical staff have extensive qualifications, experience and know-how. We are working hard to retain our skilled people, attract and build future talent and develop systems to underpin our knowledge base and improve the delivery process for our clients and our colleagues. Systemisation and digitisation have much to offer, and this is an area where much has improved in the BBA. It also helps us to deal with the significant increase in demand for product certification.

Much of the work done has focused on improving the process of capturing content. We are now also looking at ways in which we can improve the distribution of content, making it easier to access and use our information. We wish our content to have a positive impact on all relevant decision-making.

Employee welfare and professional growth are increasingly seen as vital to long-term business success. What are your plans to boost employee competence, engagement, and training?

Attracting, developing and retaining the best people is most critical to us; maybe more than many other organisations. There is no ready supply of skilled and trained certification professionals in the market – we have to develop these skills ourselves. That is why we invest heavily in developing our people – where most professional service firms commit four or five percent of fee earners’ time to training, we commit to 15%.

We have also invested in substantial changes to our leadership at board and senior leadership levels. We have developed our vision, mission & values with extensive input from our people; we believe in co-creating our vision and ambition for the business and exchange regularly on all key aspects of our plans and ambitions for the future. Many of our colleagues see their career with the BBA as a vocational choice – they want to make construction a safer industry. They believe in our contribution to the industry and want to be a part of it.

How is the BBA driving the development of new products and services?

We see the introduction of new and innovative certification offerings as critical to achieving the goal of 1.5m homes in the next 5 years. Our efforts are focused on two parts:

1. Innovative construction products are often brought to market by relatively new companies or SMEs, who may have little or no experience with certifying their products. They may not know, for example, the best time to engage with us, what the costs and risks are and the likely commercial benefit from doing so. We have changed the way we work and now identify start-ups, early-stage companies or SME with little certification experience at an early stage. Our processes are designed to support them and help them. Ultimately, all products have a number of performance expectations to meet – some regulated and some underpinning our fitness of purpose assessment, but we have listened to the market and made many improvements to help with the process itself.

2. Secondly, we need have a good, regularly-updated understanding of the requirements of our ‘demand generators’ – those who use the information and product certificate content that we generate. The BBA is now engaging more with demand generators, has launched a CPD course for users and through the launch of MyBBA Search, our web-based search facility, we gather information on user patterns and the type of information requested.
Looking to the future, there is a lot more to do. Much of our investment in developing digital infrastructure has been to improve the process of generating and capturing content – less time on process and more on the richness of content. This is important, but we also wish to be more creative when it comes to the effective distribution of content. Fortunately, much of the new infrastructure will support improved distribution of data, to the point where our information will influence effective decision-making at all levels across a wide spectrum of our industry. Watch this space for future announcements!

In what other ways will your new digitised processes and systems enhance transparency, consistency and stakeholder satisfaction?

Our focus on learning the lessons from Grenfell has always been:
– What can we do better and
– How can we help others to do better.

Future functionality of our MyBBA search will simplify access to information and we also have plans to extend our coverage of product performance criteria. For example, we are keen to include information linked to environmental performance, energy usage, renewable content, etcetera. Ideally, those seeking construction product performance information should see the BBA website as their destination of choice. We want the user experience to be simple and effective, using different media and search facilities to access our rich data source.

For example, the Grenfell Inquiry expressed concern about the quality and accuracy of information contained in some product marketing material. In response, a new organisation, the Code for Construction Product Information (CCPI), was set up by Amanda Long to raise standards in product information and marketing. We are very supportive of this and have already agreed to incorporate their needs in our future digitised client onboarding process.

What’s next for the BBA?

Validating construction product performance has always been our highest priority and will remain so. Since the Grenfell fire, many in the industry have recognised the benefit of product certification and demand for our services has substantially increased. Dame Judith Hackitt and the Building a Safer Future report, as well as Paul Morrell OBE and Anneliese Day KC with their Independent Review of the Construction Products Testing Regime, have and continue to, contribute to the wider industry learnings and future.

We are seeking engagement with these key initiatives and the wider sector to make construction safer. As the UK’s largest construction product certifier, we have a contribution to make, maybe considered small- but important role to play. In an industry that is often quoted as fragmented, we see our role as a congregator of key information, committed to safety and collaborative in our dealings with others. The content we generate is rich in detail and understanding. Users find it helpful and valuable – we are constantly seeking ways to have a bigger impact.