Blog

RSS

2010 CPD diary

10 Dec 09

| 0 Comment

Our 2010 CPD schedule is attached here. It includes training on birds and windfarms, anabats and associated gadgets, public inquiries and contract management. Although this is mainly training offered free to our core team and associates, if you really fancy coming along, we might be able to squeeze you in!

Also, if there is a subject covered that you'd like us to provide training on, perhaps in your own business setting, get in touch and we'd be happy to arrange it. Sharing the knowledge is all part of what makes us tick.

Training, Susan White, Kelly Clark, Andrew Baker

The Environmentalist

17 Nov 09

| 0 Comment
The Environmentalist

Ecology is an environmental discipline in its own right and is enjoying heightened awareness but there is a shortage of specialist graduates. In the November issue, Alison Ebbage of The Environmentalist charts the career of one ecology consultant - our own Andrew (Fred) Baker.

You can get to the web site here, but need to be a member of the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment to look at the full articles. Download the pdf from the bottom of this page.

The big training question

02 Oct 09

| 3 Comments

Susan writes: Every ecologist I have spoken to regards training opportunities as important. In the after-hours discussions at conferences “What training do you get?” usually crops up more frequently than questions about bonus procedures. Finding good training is hard though.

There seem to be lots of introductory courses for people at the start of their careers but not much to move on to for those of us who are 5yrs+ in.

Because they are mainly practically based (and why not?), they are often in the spring and summer. Seriously, how valuable is it to spend your weekends in May and June on courses when you’re putting in 60hrs Monday to Friday?

Training

The world of public authority tenders

03 Sep 09

| 2 Comments

Does anyone out there have a fail-safe way of filling in pre-qualification forms? Of course not! We’re even sending Diana on a course to learn about them. I’d really like to get a group of Local Authority procurement people in a room to justify why they are all different and admit which bits are completely arbitrary.

The scoring system for example, it’s all in the weighting, and unless we understand it, we just don’t know if a job is worth pursuing. The forms are so long, it’s a serious investment devoting time to these things and if there’s a ‘killer question’ in there it’s an utter waste of time.

For example the trading for more than one year (or sometimes 3 years) clause that pops up a lot. We have tons of experience running particular types of projects but if we wont be considered until we have the right number of years accounts it seems pointless proceeding.

local authority