B&ES, CIBSE and RIBA discuss collaborations

UK: The presidents of CIBSE, B&ES and RIBA have joined forces to call for more collaboration between members of the construction supply chain.

Andy Sneyd of B&ES joined with Nick Mead of CIBSE and Stephen Hodder of RIBA at Westminster Central Hall last week, in an event organised by the CIBSE Patrons, to urge professional institutions and trade associations to lead a campaign for better communication and integration in project teams.

Discussing cross-sector collaborations and how their respective associations could work more closely together, Andy Sneyd said: “We need to have a broader voice for building services and the only way we can do that is if we start to collaborate more within the institutions and associations.”

CIBSE’s Nick Mead said that the industry needed “genuine collaboration to achieve energy reduction in the built environment”. He said it was not possible for CIBSE members to deliver better building performance on their own. “We need to work with others…and the building needs to work as a complete system not a collection of products.”

Andy Sneyd said that if the industry did not start to collaborate more successfully, then others would come in “to take our place”.

He called for the industry to embrace the digital revolution to help deliver more collaborative working, but not to lose its “gut instinct” for making good engineering decisions.