Liz is the Head of Communities and Social Value at the Breyer Group, a leading property services provider that has been working with the public sector for over 60 years. We’ve been collaborating with Liz and her Community and Social Value Manager, Bobby Lorraine for the last couple of months and wanted to share what we’ve learnt about some of the work they’re doing. We caught up with Liz recently.

Breyer recently signed up to use Match My Project’s new features, which will help Liz and Bobby create more pathways to work for local people – and share Breyer’s good work far and wide. For a preview, have a look.

What’s a typical day like at Breyer? 

Our role as the Social Value team is to support the Breyer Group through facilitating and delivering Social Value impact in line with the contract KPI’s. There is no typical day as it varies, depending on the needs of our communities and business priorities.

It can include bid writing, strategic planning, report writing, or collaboration with our contract teams and external partnerships, such as charities, local government, training organisations and SMEs.

We will also attend job fairs and community events where there are opportunities to meet and engage with residents.

What’s the community project you’re most proud of?

We worked with Allen Edwards Primary School in Lambeth to support their Eco Club. We donated both time and money to help students develop their fruit and vegetable growing areas. We gave £1,000 towards buying seeds and plants for the Primary School, which were chosen by the Eco Club students.

Then, later in the spring, a number of Breyer staff joined students and parents for a planting day. 

Deputy Headteacher, Nicola Harris:

“We are so grateful to Breyer Roofing for helping transform our allotment area and for joining the Eco Club students on numerous occasions to discuss plants; help plant seeds; and to deliver and establish bigger flowers and vegetable plants. It has been an amazing learning experience for the students involved and the results will be enjoyed by all of us at the school. Thank you!”

That’s great. What’s coming up in the future? What are you really excited about? 

We are very excited to be launching the Breyer Virtual Employability Academy. This will enable residents and students to access pre-employment training modules, that are usually only available to our employees online, in an environment in which they feel safe to explore construction. 

Part of the programme offers access to a town hall Q&A session with Breyer professionals to hear about their career journeys and why the construction sector is a great place to have a lifelong career plan. 

Each learner will receive certificates of completion and an interview to access suitable work placements, apprenticeships, and employment opportunities.  

What would you change tomorrow if you had a magic wand? 

One area we would change immediately would be the way Social Value is procured, measured and reported. It needs streamlining. We are a small team and the resource required to manage the multiple different approaches is confusing and unmanageable.

The key factor for us is to ensure the procurement requirements meet the demographics of the communities we are working in.

For instance, there is no sense in focusing on apprenticeships when the real need is to improve education for students, promote apprenticeships in construction and the built environment or to provide residents with clothes and food for their families because of the cost-of-living crisis.

Finally, what’s the best piece of advice anyone has given you? 

Listen, collaborate and be innovative in order to find solutions that meet the needs of individuals and communities.

Thanks Liz!

If you are looking to create more successful apprenticeships in the local communities you serve, our up coming new features will be helpful – please take a look! If you want to know why we’re doing this, have a look here.