A day in the life of Nick
Estates Manager
Career background:
I spent nearly twelve years in Wakefield Primary Care Trust as a Corporate Facilities and Estates Manager. In the last two years of that time, I worked in the newly formed NHS Property Services. I joined Spectrum in October 2014, on a three-month contract for some specific projects. This was extended to six months which saw the organisation open its first dedicated integrated sexual health clinic in Barnsley and move into its new headquarters at Wakefield. That was over seven years now and I’m still here!
What do you love about working at Spectrum?
Diversity. It is true that no two days of mine are the same. Colleagues may contact me with medical device issues, repairs or maintenance matters, clinical waste problems, health and safety concerns, especially after the last two years! Then there will be contractors to monitor and manage at our own sites, and investment programs to oversee as we improve and upgrade our own clinical and corporate facilities. Day to day, I will also deal with staff who need workstation assessments arranging, aids and adaptations to make their working day more comfortable in whatever setting. In our secure environments, something is always on the move, be it accommodation, expanding facilities, building new ones or supporting with annual site visits and health & safety matters.
Why do you recommend others work at Spectrum?
The people. What we do is unique, providing our range of healthcare services in places from Wakefield to Northumberland, Manchester to the Lake District. The places those people work in are as diverse as prisons, with all their many categories, community outreach services, shopping centres to help provide equitable access to services to schools and colleges. Unique people are needed for that, in a unique, collaborative environment that is Spectrum. It’s not for everyone but once in, it’s a great place to be with amazing people. I’ve seen people come, go and in quite a few cases, come back!
Top tips for working at Spectrum:
Eyes and ears open; Honesty; Integrity; Can do attitude, whatever you come to do; Own it, share it, collaborate on it; Get to know and understand the company, with all its facets, links, attachments. You don’t need to know everyone and everything, but keep in touch, keep up to date and it will keep you interested. If the last two years has taught us anything, it’s be NICE to each other. It’s hard work being unpleasant and grumpy.
Something you wish you’d known before starting at Spectrum:
That I should have joined sooner!
This is what a day in the life of an Estates Manager can look like:
At 6am, my alarm goes off. I only live three miles away from the office but I would rather have a steady, unhurried start to the day. My wife and I get up at the same time (she works in a similar role for the local Clinical Commissioning Group), feed the cat and have tea, lots of tea. I leave the house at 7:45 if the schools are on half term or summer holidays – 7:30 if not as the traffic builds quickly getting into the city.
Once I arrive, I fire up the laptop, unpack my bag and make a brew (coffee now for the rest of the day but all decaf). Check emails (delete the sales and cold call stuff) then pick up on any issues that have come in from colleagues or teams overnight. My meetings range from our Health, Safety & Environmental group, ISO supporting our 14001 environmental accreditation, finance meetings monitoring my budgets and expenditure, vaccine centre monthly updates (while we continue to run a mass vaccination centre from our HQ site, serving over 70,000 people in the last 14 months), new build update for our commissioners in Wigan, and then there’s our twice weekly Gold Command meetings for COVID-19. Added to that, my day and week may see one or two site visits to other locations we operate from, for a catch up, deliveries of PPE, or Health & Safety checks with colleagues in those locations.
Normally at some point around 1pm, I catch lunch, check the news for any updates on health matters (especially COVID-19) and any interesting articles relating to work/my areas of work.
At around 5pm as the office quietens down, I get through anything left on my tasks list for the day, move into tomorrow, prep for anything I need to for the following day (download meeting papers etc. as we are paper light) and catch up with the domestics before heading home with the radio on (5 Live in the afternoon, Radio 4 in the mornings). Stormzy is my favourite (along with Liam Gallagher) for the ride home.
In the evenings, I cook at least twice a week to share the chore (Antonio Carluccio’s Carbonara is a favourite – quick and simple) so we catch up on our days and put the world to rights. It’s a glass or three of wine with dinner and the latest series on Netflix or Apple TV (Chicago Fire is a favourite right now), then fuss the cat, and bed after the news at 10 to start all over again the next day!