Sector: Housing association

Analysis

Registered social landlords have changed dramatically over the past five years, freeing themselves from the constraints of regulation and grant to become social enterprises, with development programmes across the tenure scale. The sector is also being changed by merger and acquisition, and that consolidation may help to ease some of the recruitment problems the sector has suffered, Tony O'Neill believes.

Change within the sector has made it a more attractive career proposition, says O'Neill. “Good people are enthused at the prospect of being part of a growth industry. The main attraction for candidates is that they believe that they can retain their private sector commerciality, but will also have the opportunity to play a more active part in sustainable development.”

The survey shows housing associations to be reasonably competitive on salary, falling between the private sector and local authorities. Some of the bigger RSLs in the South-east are now seriously competing with the private sector, particularly in the key areas of land and top management. But our survey found that high private sector pay levels were still an issue of concern for housing associations, specifically in relation to employee turnover and inability to make counter-offers to retain staff.

Phil Richards chief executive, Twin Valley Homes

Present role Phil Richards has found himself at the heart of housing regeneration, operating in the territory of housing market renewal pathfinder Elevate East Lancashire. Richards runs the housing association formed in the large-scale voluntary transfer of Blackburn with Darwen council’s stock of 9600 homes in March 2001. Since the transfer, the housing association has outperformed its targets in upgrading stock, won praise for its business performance and assembled a £12m development programme. As if that’s not enough, it is now putting in a bid for £2m to develop 500 homes in the Housing Corporation’s next bidding round.

I’ve been on site, spotted an overflow leak and fixed it myself. It’s good to go back to your roots

Career path There aren’t many housing association chief execs that are fellows of the Chartered Institute of Building. Richards’ first job was as a trainee site engineer with George Wimpey. After five years in the job, Richards moved into local government, working in building surveying and land reclamation for Wirral council. A role comparing private contractors and direct service organisations in housing estate repair and maintenance marked a change of direction into housing. Richards went on to become director of housing at Blackburn council, running the stock transfer and then landing top job at the transfer RSL. He has now removed all of his technical qualifications from his business card, apart from that FCIOB.

Past versus present “The good part about my technical background is that if I’m on sites I’ll spot problems. I’ve been on site and spotted an overflow leak, knocked on the house door and fixed it myself. It’s good to go back to your roots. The hardest part for a technical person moving into management is releasing the finisher role and dealing with the bigger picture. I changed from a technocrat to a manager following a consultant’s report that said I would make a good director, but that I needed to be an assistant director first. At the time I was hurt because I already was an assistant director, but I found out that I was still number crunching. It helps that I’ve come from the council in terms of some relationships, and I know what the housing strategy is aiming to achieve because I took a part in writing it. It is important we continue working with the council’s housing and regeneration strategy.”

Likes about the job “It’s satisfying seeing customers’ lives change.”

Biggest personal regeneration challenge “Working with partners, the council and Elevate East Lancashire, to maximise funding opportunities to create more mixed estates. Some of that is about the council’s cohesion strategy – where estate residents have been predominantly white or predominantly black, we’re trying to integrate.”

Is regeneration getting tougher or easier? “Here it’s getting easier, because we are working in partnership with the council. As a transfer organisation we’re a key player in the council’s regeneration and housing strategy.”