Blog – Sharing knowledge about sustainability that Arcadis offers to its clients

23 Dezembro 2016

My Quest Experience

Andrew Waddelove went on a Quest experience from the UK to Hong Kong.

hkAfter a long week I flew overnight on Friday 11th November from London, UK to Hong Kong to start my Quest. The purpose of my Quest was to share knowledge of our sustainability offering and how this should be applied to our HSBC account. Also to escalate the scope of the services we could offer in the region beyond energy reduction strategies to address more strategic sustainability offerings. I arrived in the early evening of Saturday and set about exploring the city. Having a day to get over any jetlag gave me some time on Sunday to explore, taking in the view from the top of Victoria Peak. I then spent some time exploring the city and taking in as many sights as possible before the real work started.

Monday November 14, 2016 

I was up early on Monday and caught the MTR to the office in Kwun Tong. Here I met with a range of people from the office in Hong Kong, including some familiar faces from previous bids, including Andrew Macpherson. I met with Lisa Shi, global Assurance Lead, to discuss our sustainability offering and how this could be applied under her assurance team. In the evening I met with Carl Wilkinson from HSBC, a key client for Arcadis in Asia. Carl is Regional Engineering Lead for Asia for HSBC, the equivalent to a key contact within HSBC I have previously met in London so it was good to discuss our capabilities. The meeting was facilitated by Stephen Hilton, our Regional Head of Critical Facilities and Engineering. The meeting was in the fairly historic setting of The Royal HK Yacht Club.

Tuesday November 15, 2016 

On Tuesday I met with Jonathan Waite and Chau Nguyen of the Strategic Pursuits Team. We discussed our sustainability offering in the UK and how I felt this could be applied to clients across Asia. They seemed excited by our offering and how this could link into our wider offering. On Tuesday evening I went out for dinner with Graham Kean and the Strategic Pursuits Team.

Wednesday November 16, 2016

On Wednesday I met with the Regional Leader for CRE for HSBC in the once most expensive building in the world, the HSBC Main Building. Lisa was driven to know how Arcadis’ central sustainability capabilities could link to Asia. This included areas such as natural capital where she was looking to create a ‘brand’ for HSBC around their significant buildings and to provide a real differentiator for them. In the afternoon I met with Simon Goodley and Hamish McLennan of HSBC’s CRE Team. Their key driver was to see action on the ground and for Arcadis to be more responsive to local requirements. In the evening the team took me to what is a Hong Kong institution, the races in Happy Valley.

hk-2Thursday November 17, 2016 

On Thursday I presented at a knowledge share session to the regional CRE Team on our sustainability offering and central corporate memberships. I then met with Stephen Hilton’s team of engineers to discuss our sustainability offering. It was a fantastic conversation as the team identified how their view of sustainability is limited to energy but that there is a wealth of expertise within the organization that we could offer to our clients.

Friday November 18, 2016:

On Friday I met up with Andrew Macpherson and Dave Hallam. Dave is the Regional Business Advisory Lead and saw sustainability as something we had not really been selling to clients but that could be a differentiator for us in the market. Andrew Macpherson was interested in how sustainability linked to value management and cost saves for our CRE offering. It was then back to the airport for the midnight flight back to London!

 

Conclusions

It is clear that the team in Hong Kong work extremely hard and that there is a real team ethic. Spread out across multiple locations I was made welcome wherever I went with a real sense of desire to engage and learn more about what we can do for our clients. No more was this apparent than two potential opportunities for business development identified during my trip and the understanding that sustainability is a potential weakness in our offering in region but that could differentiate us.

Quest is an international transfer program which connects Arcadians from all over the world. Quest is sponsored by the Lovinklaan Foundation

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