Richard Ramkissoon explains how the realisation that a desk job wasn’t good for his fitness, and a few chance conversations, altered his career path.
“Something that many people probably don’t know about me is that I won Gold in the WAKO British (67kg) Full Contact championship in my younger days. I was also part of the World Kobudo British Ju-Jitsu team and competed in the World Kubudo Ju-Jitsu Federation’s World Championship in the early 2000s in Canada and France.
“It was while I was in Canada that I had a wake-up call. I watched the other competitors and thought, ‘I need to be doing more.’ I realised many of them probably had physical jobs to help maintain their fitness levels, and I was sitting at my desk having a cup of tea or something. I thought I was fit, but I realised I needed to spend more time keeping fit! So, I decided to leave my desk job.”
From Desk to Site and a Chance Meeting
Richard’s first site job was with Laing O’Rourke working at Blackfriars, where he moved gear around and vetted people as they entered the site. One day a very smartly dressed man approached him and asked him to sweep the pavement.
“So I started sweeping…” continues Richard. “The man returned later and asked me if I’d considered working in scaffolding. It turned out he was a scaffolding director and he knew of a job about to be advertised in the Even Standard that evening. I called my recruitment manager during break time to ask her if I could apply and after work when I called up, was offered to start working the following Monday in the Head Office scaffolding yard.
This was the start of Richard’s introduction to scaffolding. As time went on, he undertook various jobs, including loading materials onto the lorries, sorting tubes into hire and off-hire bundles and setting up a small yard on a large construction site so that he could service the scaffolders on the site.
“I remember my first Saturday job as a scaffold labourer; I thought it was an absolute treat,” laughs Richard. “I finished at 12 o’clock but got a full day’s pay.”
A Proactive Approach to Site Safety and a New Direction
While working on a Mount Anvil site, Richard started to think about moving into health and safety.
“One of their safety guys came up to me and pointed out some unsafe working practices, so I went up to the scaffolders and said, ‘just to give you the heads up, the health & safety guy has spotted a few things.’ Of course, they took this really well and were very polite about his comments!”
“After that, I started to ask the safety people on sites what they wanted from us so that I could pre-empt any problems. I then decided to bolt health and safety onto my scaffolding training.”
Learning on the job gave Richard a good understanding of general safe practices on site, and when his company offered to pay for him to do a health and safety course, he jumped at the opportunity. As he didn’t yet have enough construction knowledge to do a NEBOSH course, Richard opted for an NVQ 5 Health and Safety. For this, he had to be able to demonstrate what he was doing within his existing role.
So, ever the resourceful person, Richard used all the companies and organisations he had dealings with to gain the required knowledge. Harness and lifting equipment suppliers trained him on their products while the National Construction College and the Health and Safety Executive provided advice and guidance. Even the fire brigade helped by carrying out a risk assessment which Richard then used as his template.
“The NVQ wasn’t easy; some of the questions were confusing, but I cracked it by looking at construction law. I was reading something online and had a light bulb moment, and suddenly it all became much clearer.”
From Joining the Team to Spearheading Safety Training
Richard joined Millcroft in April 2013 after being invited for an interview with the scaffolding director (now MD), Billy Jones, who introduced Richard to Millcroft’s contracts manager.
Continues Richard, “I was offered a job on the same day, and since then, I’ve been part of the Millcroft team working to ensure the health and safety of everyone within the business. I assist with work package plans, method statements, risk assessments, accreditations such as FORS, the health and safety sections for PQQs, as well as ensuring the safety and wellbeing of everyone both in the office and on-site.”
It is also worth noting that Richard has been instrumental in our successful achievement of receiving 10 consecutive RoSPA Gold Awards, culminating in being awarded the RoSPA President’s Award last year.
Richard was also pivotal in setting up our CITB-approved on-site training centre, where we deliver SMSTS (Site Safety Training Scheme) and SSSTS (Site Supervisors Safety Training Scheme), first aid training and bespoke scaffold awareness courses.
“One of our clients had multiple sites, which meant we needed to have site supervisors with SSSTS accreditation and competent operatives. Training our guys externally is expensive, and it means we lose people for three or four days at a time, so I suggested to the directors that we could become an approved training centre and coordinate the training ourselves.”
Moving forward, Richard is looking at ways to keep on top of training and personal development when operatives already have full shifts. Initial ideas include workshops, presentations and online courses.
A Strong Safety Culture Throughout the Industry
Richard has found that clients are more safety conscious nowadays. They understand the human costs of an injury but are also now aware of the cost to the economy through lost time and its impact on project completion. This is helping to drive a more client-led safety culture within the industry. Mental health, behavioural safety, injury prevention, first aid and rescue training are now becoming the norm and are part of every recruit’s induction and ongoing training at Millcroft.
“I’ve seen that clients are trying their very best to provide a comfortable, safe working environment. They’re taking on more responsibility for their subcontractors with many running workshops and toolbox talks that we must attend before going to site.”
Summing up the Past 10 Years with Millcroft
“No two days are the same here. As we have a civils division, I’ve broadened my health and safety knowledge and have experience in different aspects of construction and maintenance.”
Richard concludes, “If I were to sum up my time with Millcroft, I’d say - challenging, rewarding and satisfying.”
