Fire Safety Matters Podcast - Episode 17

The Fire Safety Matters (FSM) Podcast is hosted by the magazine’s Editor Brian Sims and Western Business Media’s CEO Mark Sennett, with new editions available each month. The FSM Podcast is kindly sponsored by The Fire Safety Event, which takes place at the NEC in Birmingham from 7-9 September 2021.

Episode 17 features Fire Safety Matters’ Editor Brian Sims interviewing Brett Ennals, founder and managing director of Cento, the nationwide recruitment company with a keen focus on the fire and security markets in addition to the Health and Safety sector.

A graduate in business and finance at the South Nottingham College, Brett began his career in the commercial world back in 1989 after a four-year spell with the RAF Special Signals Unit.

Across seven years, he worked as an engineer for both Abel Alarms and Gent before becoming a regional manager for Notifier in May 1999 and then moving into a similar role at Defensor Fire Detection Systems two years later.

Just shy of four years in the role of sales manager for Honeywell followed before Brett established Cento in 2007. Today, the business provides a tailored range of recruitment solutions for the supply of both contract and permanent staff.

Looking back at the economic downturn of 2008, sadly the nation now finds itself in a similarly gloomy period given the ongoing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Set against that backdrop, what’s the recruitment market looking like at present? Brett offers his considered views on the matter.

Of late, there has been a great deal of talk focused on the skills shortage across the fire and security business sectors. There are several initiatives that have been kick-started to address the situation, of course, but does Brett believe it’s the case that someone needs to take ownership of this issue and really drive positive change here? Listen to Episode 17 of the FSM Podcast and find out.

When it comes to salaries, are they appearing to hold firm in the recruitment market just now or are fluctuations the order of the day? Brett assesses what’s always an area of great interest for today’s practitioners. In addition, industry discussion has realised something of a debate about the perceived reliance on sub-contractors. In view of this, Brett puts forward his opinions on the matter.

As one of the sector’s foremost recruitment businesses, Cento is necessarily keen on delivering salient Best Practice advice for candidates and those companies who are currently recruiting as we move further into the New Year. In parallel with offering his thoughts here, Brett also outlines the detail underpinning a free service that’s currently being offered by the business.

Fire Safety Bill online conference

When it comes to ‘all matters legal’ in relation to the fire safety world, we believe that there’s no better expert to turn to for advice than our regular FSM Podcast contributor Warren Spencer (managing director at Blackhurst Budd Solicitors).

For those readers of Fire Safety Matters who are perhaps not aware of this fact, Warren has actually prosecuted more cases under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 than anyone else.

Due to work commitments, Warren was unfortunately unable to serve as a guest on Episode 16 of the FSM Podcast. This time around, in tandem with Mark he reflects on the content delivered during the digital conference focused on the Fire Safety Bill that was run as a joint venture between Blackhurst Budd Solicitors and Fire Safety Matters just prior to Christmas.

Mark expertly chaired the online event, which took place between 10.00 am and 1.00 pm on Thursday 3 December and featured comprehensive input from Warren himself in addition to the views of Joseph Hart (a barrister at the Deans Court Chambers in Manchester) and James Aird (also a member of the fire safety law team at Blackhurst Budd Solicitors).

Passive fire protection

Our final guest on this edition of the FSM Podcast is Adam Turk, CEO at the Siderise Group. Adam joined the Siderise family of British manufacturing businesses last May. The Group includes Siderise Insulation, the specialist in passive fire protection solutions for building envelopes.

The proud holder of an MBA from the University of Warwick’s Business School, Adam became national sales manager for housing at British Gypsum in 1998 before moving on to join Artex Blue Hawk two years later and becoming sales director.

A spell as marketing director for Artex Rawlplug followed ahead of Adam assuming the role of UK sales and marketing director at Jeld-Wen.

Adam then served as commercial director for the Polypipe Group across the next eleven years. He subsequently joined Baxi Heating in June 2016, spending three years in the role of managing director for the commercial division.

During his FSM Podcast interview with Mark, Adam talks in general about the business and why he firmly believes it’s one of the passive fire protection market’s best kept secrets.

Importantly, Adam goes on to reference Siderise Insulation’s current ‘By Your Side’ campaign (which featured on the Front Cover and also in some detail on pp20-21 of our December 2020 print edition).

As always, the FSM editorial team delivers and analyses the latest major news impacting the fire sector here in the UK.

Listen to the FSM Podcast

You can listen to the FSM Podcast for free on iTunes, Spotify or Google Play. To download the FSM Podcast on iTunes or Spotify, all you need to do is enter the term ‘Fire Safety Matters’ into the search box of your chosen platform.

Alternatively, you can listen to the FSM Podcast online at fsmpodcast.podbean.com or via our YouTube channel by clicking here.

*If there are any specific subjects you would like to see featured in an upcoming Fire Safety Matters Podcast please do contact us. You can do so on Twitter by using the hashtag #FSMPodcast. Alternatively, send an e-mail direct to bsims@westernbusiness.media