During these uncertain times, we can easily get trapped with all the bad news in the world. Perhaps now more than ever, we need to focus on the good news, and look to celebrate successes and wins wherever possible. With this in mind, it brings MVIS Ltd and Bartco UK Group MD, Pat Musgrave much pride to announce some exciting staff promotions this year. He comments, “a lot of businesses currently are going through a period of uncertainty, but MVIS have continued to sail the waters at a steady pace, ensuring all staff stayed employed and were not furloughed. This was led by the MVIS and Bartco UK management team”.

Despite the immense challenges faced this year, MVIS has managed to keep its hire fleet utilisation at a steady rate. Bartco UK has not only won sales in this climate, but has also served as a case study on adaptability and safety, keeping all staff working with new safety measures in place and nurturing mental wellbeing. With this amazing dedication overseen and managed by the MVIS and Bartco UK management team, Pat has promoted key members of the team as a thank you for their long-term service and loyalty to the company.

Anne Ashman, who has been with the companies since their start has been promoted from UK Group General Manager to UK Group Commercial and Operations Director. 

Anne has been part of the ‘global group companies’ executive team since 2015, working closely with the directors and her colleagues in Australia on a weekly and monthly basis.  She has worked with Pat since the incorporation of MVIS in 2012 and then Bartco UK in 2013, previously joining Colour Mobile VMS originally in 2011 as office manager, moving over to MVIS, as office and finance manager, when it was formed for the Olympic project in 2012.

Her quick thinking makes her a great problem solver and helps her to come up with new ideas that along with her organisation skills makes sure the business strategies are implemented all the way through both the UK companies and the group.  She has been a major implementor of both MVIS and Bartco UK’s success from the very start, leading her qualified teams for the last 8 years and especially stepping up to the challenge of the last 6 months during the pandemic.  During her time with the company she has written and implemented all the policies and processes that the UK work to, ensuring the best of service for our customers, implemented and gained certification for an integrated ISO management system and recruited and trained the majority of the staff, which MVIS and Bartco UK consider to be the best trained in the portable ITS industry at present. 

She has also herself took on further training, gaining her Open University Business Management Degree last year, her HR qualification in 2018, ITOPS in 2019, even completing a Directors Development program during the lockdown, to name but a few, she is keen on making sure not only does she have the necessary skills and knowledge to keep making the UK companies move forward, but that her whole team do to, to ensure the UK companies growth in an ever changing market place.

Anne will continue to oversee both UK companies and lead the teams, whilst continue working with the executive team to work on global business strategies and ideas for the whole group.

Graeme Lee who has been with the company since 2012 as Sales Manager has been promoted to Sales Director.

Graeme started with the company when it was in its very early days and only had a minimal customer database after the 2012 Olympics.  Since then he has worked tirelessly with Pat and Anne ensuring the company growth and has been a major player in getting the company to where it is now as the UK market leader in the hire of ITS.  During his time with the company, he has attended trade shows and built relationships through customer visits, single handedly building a large customer database and made traction with all the major tier 1 contracts, which clearly shows in our Major Projects Time Line.

Graeme is not only well liked and trusted within the company, but also within the industry. He brings with him a wealth of knowledge of over 15+ years of working within the rental and sales highways and TM industry.  With his new promotion, Graeme will work closer with Anne to build the reputation of the companies and strategies to keep growing both MVIS and Bartco UK alike. He will also be working closely with our marketing team to make sure the strategies align with the market’s needs. Part of his new role will be to also work with the new sales manager we are bringing on board to ensure they have the knowledge of the industry and also work with them to bring in new business in new markets.

The last promotion and by far not the least is Dominic Bridge, who has been promoted to the company’s Operations Manager.

Dom started with MVIS back in 2013, almost a year to the date after Graeme.  He started as an admin apprentice and over the 7 years has completed several courses to recently earn his CMI Level 5 Diploma in Management and Leadership.

Dom has been the voice and organiser behind most of the delivery phone calls for the last 7 years, been involved in all the planning for the delivery to events, major projects, highspeed works and TM requirements. During his time with the company he has gained a wealth of knowledge and is the main trainer for other staff on the companies’ IT systems. 

He’s regularly the fall back for all staff with any IT issues and was the main person for implementing the way the company worked on the IT systems during the lockdown back in March when all the office staff and managers moved to home working.

Dom’s reliability, eye to detail, organization skills and non-fazed attitude really does make him exceptional in the role of Operations Manager, nothing is too much trouble for him, and he will always find a solution for our customers enquires.  His peers all speak highly of him and he really is Anne’s right-hand person, working with her on the ISO systems since they were achieved and making sure all staff work to the processes in place.

Dom has also recently qualified as a fleet manager, his new promotion will see him looking after all the company vehicles and give him the opportunity to work closer with his team in deliveries on a more strategic basis, looking at cost savings and also reducing our environmental impact in this area.

Pat comments, “when you identify talent within the workplace, you do everything you can to encourage the people to grow and stay.  Business really is about relationships, but that starts with the people we employ. Get the right people and they will grow your business for you! Here at MVIS and Bartco UK we really have a great team.  Part of keeping that team is to give them new challenges and let them flourish, but equally give them the recognition they deserve.”

He adds, “All three people here have been with the companies a long time, Anne 9 years, Graeme 8 and Dom 7, so as a company we want to keep this wealth of knowledge and thank them for their dedication to date”.

Dom Bridge has been with MVIS since 2013, starting as an apprentice in recent years progressing to Assistant Operations Manager. Dom’s record of achievements during his years at MVIS are vast and growing, from completing his apprenticeship, to taking an instrumental role in helping the company recertify for our ISO accreditations in quality (9001:2015), environmental management (14001:2015), and health & safety (45001:2018).

Now overseeing our deliveries and transportserving as a key member of staff within the company, Dom’s achievements just keep on coming, having achieved his OCR Level 3 Certificate of Professional Competence for Transport Managers (Road Haulage) in September 2019 and recently his CMI Level 5 Diploma in Management and Leadership. 

This course offers a more extensive qualification in equivalence to a foundation degree, giving students a “broader knowledge of middle management skills while focusing on the specific leadership areas” appropriate to their workplace.

To achieve this Diploma, Dom was required to complete 7 dissertations about-

• Personal development
• Information-based decision making
• Managing teams
• Financial management
• Project management
• Managing performance/HR
• Operational plans

He was also required to complete a L5 Knowledge test and create a 15-minute presentation that he was required to deliver to a panel of CMI assessors. On top of all this, over the duration of the course, Dom had to gather a 2-year portfolio of evidence and maintain a 2-year CPD log.

Dom’s achievement is the latest amongst a line not just from him personally, but from the MVIS team, who continue to improve on what it means to be ‘experts’.

This doesn’t just make MVIS great to work with from a client’s point of view, but it also makes MVIS a great place to work for its employees. The wider effect this management approach has on morale and loyalty is measurably positive, with MVIS boasting incredible staff retention rates.

Dom comments, “I was supported by Anne [Ashman] throughout the Diploma, especially when it came to HR, financial controls and operations. Knowing that your manager supports you makes development a rewarding and encouraging process. It’s great to learn professional skills in the context of my role here at MVIS.”

Anne adds, “Customer service makes up a huge part of our business and we take it as seriously as our clients do. Continuing professional development ensures that our team are trained and experienced so our service always lives up to our reputation.”

Anne continues, “We are very proud of Dom for having completed his Level 5 Diploma. It marks a significant achievement for both him and MVIS as we support the ongoing development of our team. We’re already talking about what’s next!”

A few months ago, we covered a training session that saw one of our Operations and Customer service team members, Mizzy Watson, take part in ‘hands-on’ training out in the field with one of our delivery drivers, Jon Larkins.

In this post, we explore the necessity of this type of training to help our staff understand aspects of everyone’s roles, allowing us all to be more effective as we can understand the risks and complications that occur in that job. 

“Mizzy, who started at MVIS towards the end of 2019, works closely with MVIS customers and their requirements. Part of her role is communicating this to the delivery team, organising our delivery drivers over the phone, organising our operations in the field to ensure that units are deployed safely, in the correct location and display the correct messages as per our customers instruction. However, whilst she works with our delivery team on a regular basis, Mizzy is still fairly new to the organisation and in striving for a vertical understanding of our operations, it was decided that she should experience ‘a day in the life’ of one of our delivery drivers.”

Since this training, MVIS and Mizzy in particular, have been receiving more feedback on top of what we already considered to be a good number of positive comments. The feedback, which is due to be published to the website soon, is always a welcome email or phone call for our team. Knowing that we are delivering a service  our clients are pleased with is incredibly motivating. 

However, this feedback signifies more than just our effectiveness in a customer service setting; it also shows our vertical training model is paying off. With the particular focus on Mizzy in this recent wave of positive comments, we wish her special congratulations and thanks for being a clear asset to the company when dealing with customers. 

But it’s not just Mizzy’s work with customers that seems to be pulling in praise. Mizzy was nominated by her work colleagues back in May for June’s Employee of the Month. She was awarded this specifically for : “always being there when she is needed. Work related or not, she is always ready to listen. Helping staff during weekend cover in her own time, contributing to new ideas and owning her strengths, Mizzy is a highly valued team member who brightens up everyone’s day!”

To have such glowing feedback from her peers for her caring nature and actions during the COVID-19 lock down is something truly remarkable and really goes to show that when you equip the right people with the right training, they are given the understanding to contribute in a meaningful and impact way, helping to bring the best out in everyone.