DAVID CHANDLER: Hi it's David Chandler here. NSW Building Commissioner.
And today I've got the opportunity to have a fireside chat with Steve Mann.
He's the CEO of UDIA NSW,
and one of the things we've identified is capability and developers
really understanding the credentials you need to have
to be in a modern construction industry.
STEVE MANN: Yeah.
DAVID CHANDLER: Tell us why you think this learning module
will help with that understanding.
STEVE MANN: Fundamentally in that development process,
you've got to own the whole process, don't you?
You've got to own the team you put together,
and then there's all sorts of skillsets that create a great product.
However, the developer has got to take greater ownership
and greater knowledge of that whole process.
A good developer has dirty shoes.
So, what I'm saying there is, get on-site.
You've got to know what's going on on-site.
I saw four big challenges early on, David.
One was potentially the price of change to the medium-sized developer.
I saw concerns about design-and-construct as you did,
and I was worried that that opportunity to share the risk would be lost.
I was worried about sales off the plan. And I was worried about the customer.
If we lose track, if any industry loses track of their customer,
then you're not going to last, are you?
DAVID CHANDLER: The ride back, for example,
and we really started to get that focus back on to
the developer makes the decisions
and you can make good decisions and bad decisions.
What were your messages to your members?
STEVE MANN: So, I think it was about put a task force together.
And so I think they bought into the story that
both they needed to grow, and the industry needed to change.
And, you know, we couldn't stand back and have different
cohorts of industry playing a different game. We actually had to come together.
DAVID CHANDLER: It's been a case of...
STEVE MANN: Yeah.
DAVID CHANDLER: How do we mentor an understanding that, you know,
there's good, bad and ugly, and we want great, at the end,
but we've got a journey to go on, haven't we?
STEVE MANN: One of your first steps was actually to introduce the OC,
six months before.
And the fact that you would go to randomly audit a whole bunch of projects.
But then similarly, the most important thing you did is that traffic light approach.
So you might not be green, but you're orange,
and we'll work with you to get to green.
So I think what we're seeing is, the change is happening.
I think the big problems were in a small part of the industry.
There were a few areas that had become systemic.
Waterproofing was one of those areas that you've gone as far as
to look at the complexity of building a building these days.
The systems in facades and the drop-in boxes from overseas,
and how all those things work together.
And you're looking up and down that supply chain to, you know, get it right,
for the consumer and for the developer.
DAVID CHANDLER: Yeah, we've been able to do a lot of things.
It's interesting, the focus we brought to actually getting women back into the industry
and realising that we want a workplace that's actually friendly to women as well.
If this project was all about
just simply beating up the bad guys and leaving them crumpled up in a corner,
it wasn't really going to tell the customers very much.
So we've been on this journey together to, in fact, say, well,
'How do we actually identify the trustworthy buyers?'
STEVE MANN: And you recognised that we both need to reward trusted developers.
And I think introducing the ISET Process has been part of that,
which the banks have been able to rely on.
So it's helping financing, which the customers will be able to rely on.
DAVID CHANDLER: The rating of trusted players is in fact
the beginning point where insurers are saying, well,
'You show me a cohort of people that we're prepared to insure,
'and then we'll become more enthusiastic about getting back into the sector.'
STEVE MANN: The decennial liability insurance
vision that you've got a product that is in many countries overseas, but not here in Australia,
because of the work we've done to
step-up industry and be able to communicate that to insurers
we're now attractive to that market.
DAVID CHANDLER: Building learning modules is really something that most
regulators haven't thought about doing in the past.
I think we've done about 20 learning modules so far,
responding to requirements of the industry.
We've had over 30,000 people subscribe to those learning modules,
and over 67% have completed them.
So what I'd urge everybody to do is to do this learning module,
because it's really about what does it look like to be a trusted developer,
what does it look like to be a resilient developer?
STEVE MANN: Yeah.
DAVID CHANDLER: And then what's it like to have a brand
that customers are attracted to?
So I really appreciate your support, Steve. It's been fantastic.
STEVE MANN: Excellent. Thanks, David.