A SAFE PAIR OF HANDS

Southey Contracting

Southey Contracting is a company with a long and distinguished history. Formed in 1939, they started out as a painting and insulation contracting company for the mining industry. In the nearly three quarters of a century since then the company has grown and evolved. Today, as part of the Southey Holding’s Group they have branches in Cape Town, Johannesburg ,Durban and Richards Bay from where they provide services including painting, thermal insulation, high pressure water blasting, thermal spray coatings and scaffolding to all the heavy industries.

With clients in the mining, power generation, petrochemical and paper and pulp industries the company is currently undergoing a period of expansion, with projects in Angola, Botswana, Ghana, Zambia, DRC and Tanzania on the go.

According the company’s manager, John Humby, the reason for the company’s success is surprisingly straight forward.

A Foundation of Safety“It’s safety,” he explains to us. “We are currently ISO

9000 compliant and working towards ISO 14000 and OHSA 18000 compliance. We have a great safety record, and we’re extremely careful about preserving that. We believe those

Southey Contracting has been supplying insulation and painting services to the heavy industries for almost three quarters of a century, building a solid business on its reputation for exemplary safety standards and strong investment in their staff and sub-contractors.

Southey Contracting

are one of the fundamentals of good business.”This is an attitude that permeates to every level of

the business.“We’ve got a very proactive safety department, with an

extremely capable technical director,” Humby says. “We do enormous amounts of training towards safety. We also incentivise safety performance as well as the reporting of safety incidents so we’re kept abreast of what’s going on. We do the same thing for any reported near misses or minor incidents so we get a real picture of what’s happening. If safety is being applied throughout the contract and we meet our safety targets we reward the employees financially, and that’s been very successful. But it’s essential we make safety a priority right from the beginning. It’s not a bolt in. We pride ourselves in it.”

The company’s strict safety practices and impressive record aren’t just good for attracting customers either. A strong safety record makes Southey an appealing prospect for potential employees and contractors as well.

“Safety is a fundamental with us, which becomes an incentive which attracts people in the field. We provide valuable training to all our contract labour to ensure they have the skills we require. We assess and continue to train, which makes us attractive to contract labour.”

But safety is just one of the values that have led Southey Contracting on the road to success. To maintain their position as a dominant player in the market the company has built a foundation of solid values that are visible in everything they do.

Values to Live ByThis includes respect and trust for their employees and

contractors, selecting, training and developing the careers of their staff constantly so that they are able to realise their full potential. It can also be seen in the company’s high standards of corporate governance, which adhere to internationally recognised levels of integrity, honesty and transparency in the way they do business.

This continues to every level of the company, where employees are held accountable for their actions, but are encouraged to take responsibility for them. This results in an environment where people aren’t afraid to admit their mistakes, but instead work quickly to find solutions for them.

Southey extends this emphasis on responsibility in the way it considers the impact its work has on the environment, and the company is engaged in continuing projects to reduce their carbon footprint.

However the company’s philosophy of responsibility, safety and accountability doesn’t mean they’re above taking risks commercially, and entrepreneurial flair is one of their touch stones. Staff are encouraged to act creatively and proactively to the challenges of their business, sometimes even if it means making mistakes.

Investing In SkillThe current challenge that Southey Contracting faces

is that of getting the right people, with the right skills, on board.

“Skills availability is a bit challenge,” Humby admits. “We can retain contractors while we have lots of work, but

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Southey Contracting

Southey Contracting

obviously business expands and contracts and getting skills back can be difficult.”

The company put its own training systems into place to mitigate that, ensuring not only that they’re training contractors up to a standards Southey is able to use, but also making Southey an appealing prospect for contractors looking to boost their CV.

Southey also ensures that it invests in its permanent staff.We retain our permanent staff for an average of eleven and

a half years,” Humby says. “We make use of contract labour for a large percentage of our employees but our fundamental core staff is long term, with contract labour being brought in to help us manage peak business.”

As with their stellar safety record, the key to Southey’s hih staff retension is their ability to offer strong rewards.

Humby explains, “We have a very progressive and rewarding incentive scheme for our management staff. In our Johannesburg office for instance, everyone is on an incentive scheme that is related to the general performance of the whole division. This means that everyone has a personal involvement in the company, from the cleaning lady to the MD. Everyone is incentivised in one way or another.”

While they ensure staff are rewarded for hard work, Southey is also building itself a reputation for equality, and is an active propagator of Black Economic Empowerment. They have adopted an integrated approach that allows black people to make a meaningful contribution to the company at every level.

Southey Contracting

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Southey Contracting

Southey also ensures that, where possible they buy goods from suppliers with a Level 4 BEE accreditation or above, and use sub contractors and labour suppliers that are managed and owned by black people. Within the company they ensure that black people are educated, trained and mentored to ensure their advancement.

Indeed, the Southey Group as a whole has level 4 accreditation and over a quarter of its shareholders are black.

It’s been a good year for Southey, as Humby is happy to tell us.

“Over the previous year we’ve seen growth of around 15 percent for South Africa alone,” he tells us with a little pride. “We’ve done well because we’ve targeted markets that we believed there would be growth in, and that’s paid off. We foresaw the downturn in the mining industry years ago, and reacted to it then. We moved into power generation about 5 years ago and that’s going well.”

As for the future? Humby has big plans.“While we don’t believe the South African market

is entirely saturated yet, and there’s still plenty of potential here, we’re also going to be moving our sites further afield. The wider African continent is by far the biggest opportunity that exists right now, so we’re keen to follow our clients who are also expanding into that arena.”

We can’t wait to see what they do next.

“where the attitude’s different”

City Air Rental was formed out of White Knight Consultants cc in February 2009. City Air Rental is a specialized compressor rental company which only uses the latest European and USA compressors that comply with the rigorous emissions, silencing and fuel saving standards adopted in those countries from 2008 onwards.

The founders Vee and Brian Shekleton were also the founders of Rand Air (28Years) before selling it to Atlas Copco of Sweden in 2000. Their vast experience enables them to select and offer for rent the latest and best compressors available together with an “attitude” which is different. They really do know and understand Customer service and have a reputation that goes before them in the Construction, Mining, Industrial painting, Pipeline services and Manufacturing industries.

Their vision is to rapidly grow this new business and to specialize in meaningful long term rentals where efficiency and reliability really make a difference, saving money and time whilst building sound long term relationships.

With offices in Sandton and a Yard/Workshop in Wynberg they are ideally placed in Gauteng the “Hub” of South Africa’s massive infrastructural development.

City Air Rental (Pty) LtdTel: 011 262 2650 • Fax: 0865 380 626 www.cityair.co.za • Email: info@cityair.co.za

Suite 207, Private Bag X9, Benmore Gardens, 2010

821 Pretoria Main Road (Western service road) Nearest junction Lee’s Road Wynberg (opposite Total between All-Quip and Afrox)

Southey Contractingwww.southey.co.za+27 11 579-4600

By Chris Farnell

www.littlegatepublishing.com