In this series of Meet the Buyer, we caught up with our newest partner Speller Metcalfe to talk about digitisation in the construction industry, and how this fits into building a comprehensive social value strategy.
Introduction to Speller Metcalfe
Could you introduce yourself with a brief bio of Speller Metcalfe?
“Hey there! I’m Kate Moore, the Social Value Lead at Speller Metcalfe. Speller Metcalfe is an award-winning, regional contractor working on projects across the Midlands and South West. Operating across a range of sectors including healthcare, education, leisure and more, our family-run business has a key focus on providing innovation and excellence in construction that aligns with our ethos and values.”
Digitisation in the Construction Industry
How important is the early adoption of new technologies?
“Over the past few years, we’ve seen the importance of adopting new technologies rapidly increase in the industry to ensure effective communication and collaboration across projects – particularly from the pre to post-construction stages.”
Speller Metcalfe’s Commitment to Social Value
“One of the biggest areas of growth from our perspective is the increased focus on social value delivery in bids and project reporting. It’s not enough to state at bid stage what you intend to deliver in social value add, you need to show you can evidence this to your clients throughout the project and demonstrate the real value you’re adding to the community.”
“This is why we chose to use Compliance Chain to support our business with the planning, monitoring, and reporting of social value activities across our projects. Compliance Chain has a reputation for providing a trusted and reliable social value calculator, with an expert team on hand to advise us.”
The Introduction to Compliance Chain and Seamless Integration
How were you first introduced to Compliance Chain, and how have your teams found the change in your digital processes?
“The introduction to Compliance Chain occurred through the Procure Partnerships Framework, as they use Compliance Chain to monitor their framework projects, ensuring each project delivers a minimum of 12% social value add. This paved the way for a seamless integration, making it easy for us to plan, monitor, and report social value activities across our projects, as we had already been using the platform through PPF and found it really easy to use.”
Speller Metcalfe’s experience working with Compliance Chain has been overwhelmingly positive. The Compliance Chain team has been supportive, providing extensive training sessions and regular catch-up meetings to ensure a smooth integration onto the platform.
The Importance of Social Value Reporting
What is the most beneficial function of Compliance Chain to Speller Metcalfe, and why?
“The most beneficial tool for us is the Social Value Management function. We use the social value calculator as a tender tool, to build a proposed programme of delivery that allows us to provide a target figure of social value return for clients.”
“We also use this function to monitor social value delivery throughout the project life cycle, updating any progress made against our targets. Once the project has completed, the software allows us to produce a final case study report to present the total amount of social value return. Across all our projects we aim to return between 10-12% of the project value in social value add, and we exceed this in many instances.”
“Compliance Chain has been a useful tool to report on all of our social value activities, with targets split into five different themes, options to report against programmed dates and the ability to upload supporting evidence documents.”
Partnering with Compliance Chain
“Speller Metcalfe’s experience working with Compliance Chain has been overwhelmingly positive. The Compliance Chain team has been supportive, providing extensive training sessions and regular catch-up meetings to ensure a smooth integration onto the platform. The team’s availability by phone or email has further enhanced the efficiency of issue resolution.”
Any closing thoughts you’d like to share?
“As a family-run business, social value is deeply embedded into our mission and values at Speller Metcalf. We believe this partnership will continue to enhance our ability to deliver projects that leave a lasting legacy on the communities we work in.”
“To find out more about us, head over to our website: spellermetcalfe.com”
As the Head of Operations at Compliance Chain, Adam’s role is integral to enhancing our operational efficiency and ensuring our software solutions meet the pinnacle of quality and effectiveness.
