Advanced Building Controls Feature in BSEE August Issue
The brains behind the building
By Tracey Rushton-Thorpe
The launch of the BCIA in May 2004 brought two organisations (BCG and CSSG) together to form one unified industry association which promised great things for the controls industry. One year on I spoke to BCIA President Doug Robins about what they have achieved and what we can look forward to seeing from them in the next 12 months.
While there are a lot of industry associations out there that don't necessarily do a lot to help the industry in which they operate, the BCIA is certainly not one of them. In fact since their launch they have been working hard to become a credible and recognised association within the building controls industry. Doug says: "The key message of the BCIA is professionalism, both of the organisation and the industry in which we operate. By joining the two groups together we were able to create a single voice which we can use to educate not just our own members but also the rest of the construction industry who need to be aware of the role that building controls play in the industry.
"The building controls industry is still fairly young (20-30 years) and in that time we have moved on considerably from simple controls to sophisticated pc based systems which are controlling a multitude of services within a building. This is great for the industry but it does mean that people who are outside of the industry will not necessarily understand what they are dealing with. It is therefore our job to educate people in the fact that controls do play an important role and that we are not simply an add-on at the end of the construction process.
"Everyone knows that they need heating, lighting and other essential services. What we want to do is to educate facilities managers into thinking about how they want their building to perform and how they want these services to interact with each other.
"Another important subject is that of energy efficiency and with the impending new legislation which will require a performance certificate for a building it is clear that this will impact our industry greatly. I can see a time in the not too distant future where controls will be just as important as any other service and we therefore need to ensure that we are promoting the benefits in all of the right places."
Looking back
The inaugural year of any association can be fairly hectic as members bed in and information is passed out, but for the 38 members of the BCIA their first year has been particularly hectic. One of the major highlights has been the recent conference which proved to be a huge success and set a platform for many more developments over the coming months. Doug says: "Our previous conferences have been very internally focussed and while they have still been successful we are limited in the people that we have access to. We therefore took the decision this year to open up the conference to a wider audience, a move which was reflected in the numbers, with attendance up by 15 percent on last year."
The variety of subjects on offer throughout the conference were testament to the fact that the industry is moving on at a great pace, and with technology constantly changing this would appear to be the place to get right up to date on what is happening. This begs the question that perhaps an annual conference may be the answer, but Doug is adamant that they will stick with the biennial formula which they are happy with: "The conference was a success because we had a lot of information and new developments to share with our members. If we moved to an annual event we may find ourselves with the problem of having a conference for the sake of it. I would prefer to hold one every two years and provide an event which is worth attending and of value to the delegates."
Training
Training has become something of a buzz word over the past few months with more and more companies and associations striving to provide a better service. The BCIA is one such Association but are they just paying lip service to a popular subject or do they actually believe in what they preach? Doug says: "I personally believe that training is an extremely important subject for any industry but for the controls industry where we have no formal qualification it is perhaps even more so. For this reason we need to be at the front leading by example.
"At one end of the scale we have introduced a series of CPD seminars. Although we already run a series of seminars every year we took the decision to have them CPD accredited as this gives credibility to the courses that we run. We feel that our courses could stand up in their own right but in a time when training is deemed to be so important we felt that CPD accreditation offered our delegates a little bit more."
But as we all know training is not just about CPD accreditation because there are still hundreds of people out there who are entering the controls industry without any formal qualification. This is fine if on the job training is readily available but should the BCIA (as the industry association) be looking to make some changes to this problem?
"Absolutely" agrees Doug. "And this is something that we are currently focussing our attention on.
"We want to use our technical training as a basis to form an NVQ. This will enable us to get government funding and then we can introduce new recruits into the industry and give them a career route. One of the problems within the controls industry is that there isn't a recognised career route or qualification and this is something that we need to work on if we are to offer this as an industry of choice for the next generation of school leavers. We hope that by achieving NVQ status we will be able to promote the industry to colleges and generate interest in the controls industry, but it will also enable people already in the industry to study for a professional qualification and further their career opportunities."
Looking forward
Having already achieved so much it is difficult to see what the natural progression is for the BCIA but according to Doug there is still a huge amount of work to do, and one of their main tasks will be the introduction of Associate membership.
"Associate membership is something that we want to introduce in the next year. It is a natural progression for the BCIA because not only have we had a lot of interest from consultants we can also see the benefits which this would have for our current members. At the moment we can discuss issues as an industry but without the input of outsiders we are almost acting within a vacuum. The introduction of Associate membership would enable an open dialogue with consultants and enable us to ultimately work together towards a common goal.
"Another area which we will be focussing on this year is the introduction of an industry award scheme. We already run a student award scheme and we would like to push this out across the industry, but we need to be careful what we introduce. One of the key factors about any awards scheme is that there has to be a value attached to the awards and they have to be truly representative of the work that is being done in the industry. We therefore have to ensure that the formula is right before we launch any scheme to the controls industry. "
And finally
The impression that you get from the BCIA is that they are an Association on a mission. The controls industry is something of a sleeping giant in some respects and because they have never really had one single voice they have been happy to remain that way. The launch of the BCIA has changed all that, and not only are they proving to be the industry voice which has been long needed - they are proving to be quite a loud voice at that. All that I think is left to say is watch this space because at the rate they are going I think we can expect to hear much more from them over the coming months.
Doug Robins is Technical Director of AES Control Systems and President of the BCIA.
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