The realities of being a builder: Hard work, grit and groundwork
From grave digging to running his own building company, Brian Tabony joins us this week to talk about his career as a builder. We discuss the skills required to thrive in the construction industry, and why resilience and hands-on learning are more important than formal qualifications
Participants
- Emily Slade - podcast producer and host, Prospects
- Brian Tabony - builder
Transcript
Emily Slade: Hello and welcome back to Future You, the podcast brought to you by graduate careers experts, Prospects. I'm your host, Emily Slade and in this episode I chat to Brian Tabony who works as a builder.
Brian Tabony: Okay, so I'm Brian Tabony and I've got my own building company.
Emily Slade: Amazing. So let's start at the beginning. What did your educational journey look like?
Brian Tabony: So I left school when I was 15 and then When I was 16, I went into a Brickland College, got an NVQ2 in Brick laying, then went from there, become a grave digger for a couple of years. And then I worked for a firm for about 18, 19 years doing groundworks.
Emily Slade: Oh, okay. So can we talk briefly about being a grave digger? What does that entail?
Brian Tabony: So yeah, it's purely what it says. So grave digging, but because it was in a cemetery and you can't use diggers, it's all by hand. So you dig the graves, then they come along, obviously put a coffin in, and you backfill it.
Emily Slade: Oh, wow.
Brian Tabony: But I gave that up because burying kids was hard. God, I can imagine. It was so emotional. And then after a couple of years, it started affecting me.
Emily Slade: Yeah, no, that's valid. That's, yeah, you don't think about that. So is it a particular cemetery that you're involved in?
Brian Tabony: So it was Rochford in near Southend. Oh, OK. Yeah, Rochford Cemetery.
Emily Slade: Yeah, That's fair. Two years is enough.
Brian Tabony: It was quite bad.
Emily Slade: Amazing. So then you went in to work for a company?
Brian Tabony: Yeah.
Emily Slade: So what did that look like?
Brian Tabony: So that was a company called Seabrook Developments and they do groundworks all around London and all over the country.
Emily Slade: So what's groundwork?
Brian Tabony: Groundwork is like anything concrete, basically digging holes, anything to do with digging, laying patios. concrete work, that sort of thing.
Emily Slade: Nice. And was that just purely like you did that as a job or did they train you while you were on the job?
Brian Tabony: Yes, so I mean, I started as just a labourer for them and then just worked my way up. I got trained as I went along.
Emily Slade: OK, so would they pay for your training or is it just part of the job?
Brian Tabony: Yeah, no, they paid for my training and because most of the work was up in London in factories, so I got a lot of tickets for forklifts and machinery. But they paid for all that, yeah.
Emily Slade: Brilliant. Amazing. So when you say work your way up, so you start on the ground, where do you go up to?
Brian Tabony: So I was like, obviously I worked my way up to a foreman, so I was in control of all the lads that worked for us.
Emily Slade: Okay, so you just sort of get more and more leadership management positions? Yeah, Just with...
Brian Tabony: But I got to the limit of where I could go. There was nowhere else for me to go up the ladder.
Emily Slade: So what did you do then?
Brian Tabony: I went and worked for a local company, M Jarrell Construction, which went bust. I worked for them for a couple of years.
Emily Slade: In a management position.
Brian Tabony: No, so I was, again, I was their head of groundworks, so I run all their groundworks.
Emily Slade: Okay, and what did you do after that?
Brian Tabony: And then when that all went up, went wrong. Then me and Dean Skinner, who's my part business partner, we set up a little company about 18 months ago.
Emily Slade: Oh wow, so it's still really new.
Brian Tabony: Yeah, and so that's what we are now.
Emily Slade: Yeah, so what prompted that decision?
Brian Tabony: Just because we were both out of work, but we both had a little bit of our own work, and then we thought we'd just collaborate together. And so Dean's predominantly a carpenter and I'm a ground worker, so we thought it was a good mix that we could sort of carry on with that.
Emily Slade: Perfect. So how hard was that to start your own business?
Brian Tabony: So it wasn't too hard because we had a few jobs lined up, but after a few months, obviously it was hard because of, I mean, I'm new to any sort of advertising or trying to get the work in or anything like that. So it was tough at the beginning, but now it's starting to come around. Nice. I mean, we haven't really stopped, you know, since we started. So yeah.
Emily Slade: So do you rely on a lot? Of sort of word of mouth.
Brian Tabony: Word of mouth seems to be how we get all our work, because we're a local Hadley-based company, we get a lot of work in our own town, so I like to think we're getting a good reputation.
Emily Slade: Yeah, that's brilliant, so that saves our marketing costs, yeah, exactly, yeah, that's good. And then, in terms of admin stuff... of building up the business? Is that all stuff you've had to learn?
Brian Tabony: Yes, still learning, still learning. That's where I'd say that's the hardest part of the job is anything admin, paperwork, accountants, it's all.
Emily Slade: Yeah, of course. And are you keeping that internal or are you getting people in to help you?
Brian Tabony: I'll get an accountant in for that sort of thing.
Emily Slade: Yeah, nice. Amazing. So what does a typical day in your role look like?
Brian Tabony: A typical day? Well, usually I'll start around... Half 7 in the morning, 8 o'clock. Yeah, it's quite, since I'm working for myself, I do a little bit less hours. And then, so we finish by about 5 o'clock.
Emily Slade: Nice, it's fairly standard.
Brian Tabony: Yeah, it's not a long day.
Emily Slade: Yeah, and is it dependent on the job as to what you're going to be doing?
Brian Tabony: Yeah, of course.
Emily Slade: Nice.
Brian Tabony: And weather related as well, because a lot of my work's outside. Of course. So that can affect us.
Emily Slade: If it's raining, for example, do you have to call up the client and cancel?
Brian Tabony: Yeah, it depends on the job. If I can't get on, like if I'm laying a patio, obviously I can't do it in the rain, then I'll call up the customer and let them know. But I usually tell them before round that could happen.
Emily Slade: Yeah, of course. And so that just then delays the finish time.
Brian Tabony: Yeah, exactly.
Emily Slade: Everyone's aware of that. Nice. And what are the different variety of things that you can do? You could be laying a patio, you could be, do you build houses or is that something separate?
Brian Tabony: Yeah, so I mean, we We do anything really from laying a patio to extensions. We've done so far, we've done 2 extensions and we've just booked another one just down the road. Yeah, anything really. Most of the building work covered.
Emily Slade: Yeah. Have you ever had anyone ask you for something that you didn't know how to do?
Brian Tabony: Yes, of course. Well, it's not that, I mean, I don't know how to do certain things, but things like resin driveways because Even though I know how to do it, I'm not fully trained. I can't give them that 10, 15 year guarantee, so I won't do anything like that. I'll only do what I'm comfortable with.
Emily Slade: Yeah, completely. No, that makes sense. So if someone wanted to enter into this industry, what advice would you give them?
Brian Tabony: What advice would I give them? Study harder at school and don't. No, Find a local builder and start from the bottom. That's the way I've done it. I think that's the best way. There are college courses and everything, but I don't necessarily write a lot of college courses because we've had a few people come out of college. We had a young lad that was apparently a qualified bricklayer and he couldn't lay bricks. It was strange, but The best way, I think, is to find a local builder, stay with them for a few years and learn the trade.
Emily Slade: Yeah, definitely. Amazing. What kind of skills do you think you need to pursue this kind of work?
Brian Tabony: In building, just work ethic. Well, specifically what I do, ground works, is just hard work because everything's heavy and it's digging, so it's hard on your body. So I'll just say hard work really.
Emily Slade: Yeah, and like resilience.
Brian Tabony: Yeah. Just keep going and you'll get there in the end.
Emily Slade: Yeah, amazing.
Brian Tabony: Can I just name drop my company, F2F?
Emily Slade: Yeah, of course.
Brian Tabony: F2F and we're Hadleigh based in Suffolk.
Emily Slade: Amazing. That's brilliant. Well, thank you so much for your time today. Thanks again to Brian for their time. For more information on getting into property and construction, head to prospects.ac.uk. If you enjoyed the episode, do feel free to leave us a review on Apple or Spotify. Thank you, as always, for listening, and good luck on your journey to future you.
Notes on transcript
This transcript was produced using a combination of automated software and human transcribers and may contain errors. The audio version is definitive and should be checked before quoting.
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