Ian McGillvray
Synergie Scotland
01463 227570
Project management can mean many things to many people but where Synergie are concerned it’s all about buildings and construction. Synergie provide everything you need to build a building and to make the building work. In the past they have managed the Fairways Business Park and still manage the Synergie building they are in. They have also project managed the build of the Centre for Health Sciences, the European Marine energy Centre in Orkney, buildings on Forres and Dingwall Enterprise Parks and the power project on the Isle of Eigg.
Ian can appear quiet but he is disarmingly honest too about his business. Like when he tells you that his experience (when employed as a Civil Engineer) on a number of badly run projects gave him a unique insight into what not to do when he set up Synergie in 2001.
Synergie grew by 50% a year and in 2008 reached a turnover of £1.9 million and had 24 employees. Of course the business environment changed dramatically in 2008 and Synergie has changed its dynamic accordingly. A year ago Synergie had slimmed to 17 staff and the directors decided to split the company into two more distinctive arms. Environ operates from Aberdeen and Glasgow and has 8 staff. It carries out strategic consultancy in waste and energy issues. Synergie Scotland concentrates on project management and training and now has a staff of 9 with Ian heading up the team.
The training arm of their business has continued to be successful– they provide IT technical training, CISCO and Microsoft technical training. They recently completed a £10,000 training contract in Nigeria and whilst the trainers they use are all specialist subcontractors – they are well known to Synergie as are most of their suppliers which means a particularly strong relationship.
They aim now to work with larger contractors rather than trying to compete with them, helping these companies benefit from Synergie’s local knowledge, expertise and contacts. They want to be known as a one stop shop so that all the skills you need to complete a building project are within the Synergie building but not necessarily within Synergie itself. They currently have 2 “incubator”workspaces in their office available to small companies which offer services complimentary to Synergie. They want to bring these small companies in to Synergie, so whilst they are independent and take a small amount of equity in them so that as Synergie supports them both businesses can grow and expand. It really is about taking “partnership” a step further.
Synergie has great plans for the future and they are keen to grow organically and more steadily than in the past. Their changed structure has not come without pain but Ian is clear that he wants more sustainable growth for the future. Ian is clearly enthusiastic about the business and the opportunities ahead and fellow Fusion members will find a fount of knowledge, hidden behind a somewhat modest exterior, when they meet him.
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