Property Focus: The Interview – David Bucknall

PROPERTY Focus chats to David Bucknall, chairman of Birmingham-based property and construction consultants Rider Levett Bucknall.

Mr Bucknall is also chairman of the Birmingham Community Foundation, the West Midlands Centre for Constructing Excellence and national chair of the RICS UK’s quantity surveyor and construction professional group board.

If you are interested in taking part in ‘The Interview’, please email tamlyn.jones@thebusinessdesk.com and click through to see all our previous Property Focus Interviews.

1. What are your views on the current state of the commercial property and property development markets?

It is a very difficult place to be. It has been a bad two years and we have low demand and almost non-existent finance. However, there is an unrivalled enthusiasm and commitment in the West Midlands property sector and the innovators and early adopters in this marketplace are adapting well to find solutions. People are beginning to turn the corner.

2. What are the key challenges and pieces of legislation you think will most affect your sector over the coming months?

It will be the removal of the RDAs and many other quangos while the LEPs have still to come to life. There will be a gap between the two that we all have to watch. Rider Levett Bucknall has some ideas as to how it can help the Birmingham LEP make an impact and start some activity in the redevelopment of the city so there are exciting times ahead too.

3. Why do you think the West Midlands is a good place to do business?

We are home to a high proportion of those people that make things happen. We are also a young demographic region situated in a prime central UK position which has never faltered in its attraction for those doing business. Many national and international firms hold their meetings in Birmingham as it is so central.

4. What is your favourite building/development in the West Midlands and why?

It has to be the International Convention Centre. Not just because Rider Levett Bucknall worked on this landmark scheme but also because I believe it kick started the regeneration of the whole of that side of the city. It has made a great economic impact on Birmingham and is still as good inside today as it was when it first opened.

5. If you could improve anything in the region, what would it be?

That the public and private sector could work together more cohesively and collaboratively for the better of the region. This is starting to happen and it will be interesting to see how this develops when the LEP is fully operational.

6. What barriers have you had to overcome during your career and how have you overcome them?

I’ve survived four recessions and learned lessons from each of them that have been ploughed back into Rider Levett Bucknall to make it the forward thinking operation it is today. I also believe that class barriers between professionals, contractors and the supply chain have been broken down and we are now in a much more positive place.

7. What was your first job and how did you enter your current line of work?

I was an articles clerk at quantity surveying firm Leonard Voyzy in Erdington. I entered the property industry when I realised that there was no chance of making a career out of sport. I then decided that surveying was a good move because it was part in the office and part out on site. I have never regretted this decision and still love making projects happen today.

8. What do you most enjoy about your job?

The people, the people and the people. I love working with the team and watching a project move from a vision to reality. I still get a great sense of pride when a project is completed too.

9. What is the best piece of advice you have been given?

Treat everyone from the dustman to the Duke with the same respect. This is an ethos that is practiced by Rider Levett Bucknall today as well as many others that we deal with.