Current role: I’m the Dean of The Bartlett Faculty of the Built Environment. I have held this role since summer 2024, and before that I spent five years as Vice Dean Research.
I joined The Bartlett School of Sustainable Construction at UCL in summer 2018 as Professor of Construction Management.
Being a Dean at UCL means I am responsible for the overall strategy and operation of the faculty, working in close collaboration with our Director of Operations, the faculty’s leadership teams and finance and HR business partners. I’m also a Line Manager to our nine Heads of Department.
Our faculty is home to about 1,000 staff and 4,000 students, based in 18 different spaces across Bloomsbury and Stratford. I am a member of the University Management Committee and liaise with other Deans and the VPs daily – all the Deans play an active part in the wider leadership of UCL, beyond their own faculties.
Please could you describe your career journey
Having gained my degree and postgrad in architecture, I was awarded an EPSRC PhD studentship and graduated from Oxford Brookes University in 1998. My industrial sponsor then co-sponsored a lecturer post at Oxford Brookes for five years, enabling me to build up my teaching and industry experience by working 50% in each area. Looking back, working in this balanced way turned out to be an important platform for my later career, albeit it was quite tough at times to balance the two roles.
Seeing an opportunity to move to a more research-active university and a more secure job, I applied for a full-time academic post at Loughborough University in 2003 in the Department of Civil and Building Engineering. I stayed there for 15 years and got experience of different leadership roles, having been promoted to professor in 2012. My prior experience helped me to lead industry-sponsored programmes graduating construction managers and civil engineers, and I was later appointed as Associate Dean Enterprise to build collaborative partnerships with major firms.
In 2017 I started to realise that I had reached my limit at Loughborough, so when a Professor of Construction Management job came up at UCL I applied and was successful. I was nervous about applying to UCL, and particularly The Bartlett, due to their global reputation. I wasn’t confident I would be appointed, but as chances like that don’t come up very often, I had to try and was delighted to be offered the job.
As you moved through your career journey, please describe your experience(s) in how you progressed to your current role?
I have always wanted to be at The Bartlett, but it’s not been a smooth journey to be here. I’d applied for the BSc Architecture programme at UCL when I was 17, was made an offer, but I didn’t work hard enough at my A levels, so didn’t get in. I enjoyed and made the most of my years at Oxford Brookes thereafter, but when that fixed-term lecturer contract was ending, the job opening at Loughborough couldn’t have come at a better time.
I stayed at Loughborough for 15 years because it was a campus-based, medium size university where most students and many staff lived close by – it had a family feel to it. I was able to thrive, make a difference, and gained leadership experience. I enjoyed good working relationships with senior academic and professional service leaders which was invaluable. However, I realised I would have to leave to progress. It wasn’t easy to do after such a long time – I wasn’t confident about my ‘value’ in the market, so I applied for several roles to build confidence in my ‘ability to apply’.
I arrived at UCL feeling excited, if a little overwhelmed by the sheer scale of the place, but soon felt welcomed and valued. Within a few weeks I’d been asked to lead a major research proposal, and was getting involved with all sorts of groups, conversations and activities. It was so inspiring.
In my six years at UCL, I have felt encouraged and well supported – faculty colleagues have been incredibly helpful, and I have used all the leadership development tools available – including 360-degree feedback. I have also had executive coaching, which was invaluable in reflecting on my leadership practice. Being a Vice Dean gave me a wealth of experience and understanding of UCL and our community and coupled with a three-month stint as Director of The Bartlett School of Architecture in 2022, I felt well prepared to apply to be Dean, this year.
What lessons have you learnt on your career journey?
It’s been 30 years since I started my PhD – it was then that I realised that a university career might be something I would quite enjoy, but it took some years to convince me that I had the capacity to shape a career in academia that would suit me. Active learning along the way has helped me move into a role which spans everything that goes on in a faculty – which is brilliant, stimulating and tough at the same time. It makes me think of three key things I have learnt:
- Be ready to take a chance. You never know when, where or how an opening or chance to develop will come along, so don’t stay in your shell. Make sure you keep your eyes and ears open to what’s going on around you, and not just in your own department or group. That way you’ll understand more about the university as well as getting access to opportunities.
- Actively promote close working between academics, professional services and technical staff. I have learnt so much from professional services and technical colleagues – our wonderful in-house experts who, put simply, make everything possible. Academics can dream it – but others help make it happen. Everything we do as a joint venture, so if you are an academic take time to build these relationships and become a strong, respectful ally for all staff groups.
- Be observant and engaged. Wherever you are, and whatever your role, be engaged in what’s going on and take time to watch local and senior leaders in action. Think carefully about how they make things happen – what do they do to make change come to life, and what works in bringing people along on the journey – and ask them how they do it.
What working achievement or initiative are you most proud of?
I am proud of a research project which I led at UCL, called the Transforming Construction Network Plus. It was an incredible joint venture of academics, professional services colleagues, and industry stakeholders. A network plus is like a mini research council because it gives out funding to others – and so can be catalytic in terms of developing people’s research ideas and creating impact. But it can also be rather complicated, in terms of governance and accountability.
Working together for just over two years in our network plus, we created new spaces for university-industry dialogue around the challenges that the construction industry is facing. We tested out different ways to support early career staff in their journeys, and we produced some novel research publications and attractive animations.
Overall, it was a challenging project – not least due to its timing during the pandemic – but we came together around a common purpose and had a wonderful time together. I am still asked how it worked, and I’m happy to share my experience with academics who are working out how to deliver this complex type of grant.
What advice would you offer to others?
My advice is to read the work of Brene Brown, as part of your own learning and development.
She talks about the importance of care for others, exercising kindness, having courage, and setting boundaries. This is all fundamental to life-work wellness in universities.
UCL is a people business at our heart – relying on safe, productive and collaborative relationships, bravely facing the challenges around us, and (this is particularly important for academics) managing ourselves to resist the almost limitless opportunities to over-work.
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