Case Study: Purcell Miller Tritton
Purcell Miller Tritton is a leading architectural practice with a reputation for excellence established over 60 years of work on many of the UK’s best-loved buildings and spaces. Especially known for their skills in conservation architecture, their work is recognised on landmark buildings such as St. Paul’s (RICS Project of the Year, 2009) and Canterbury cathedrals, others like the Athenaeum Hotel and the National Gallery in London or, slightly further afield, Scott and Shackleton’s Huts in Antartica. With total staff numbers in excess of 150 and 12 design studios the Practice is one of the larger dedicated architectural practices in the UK.
Our management systems specialist, Dr. Graham Ward, first became involved with Purcell Miller Tritton in early 2006 when the Practice was looking to employ a full-time Quality Manager to update and run their ISO 9001 management system. In common with many companies Purcell Miller Tritton had developed a quality system based on the early, procedure-based interpretations of the ISO standard. Such an approach was not compatible with the knowledge-based services of an architecture practice.
Graham offered Purcell Miller Tritton an approach to updating their management system that would move the concept of quality management away from form-filling and box-ticking, to focusing on the key outcomes of the Practice’s workflow and the inherent controls within their working process that support these outcomes. The need for having a full time Quality Manager appointed was also avoided.
The system updating project included rationalising the system documentation and moving the “quality manual” to an intranet format. Internal audits were then focused on improvements that supported the evolving management requirements of the Practice, such as transferring commercial management skills to a wider set of professionals in keeping with the scale of growth in the business.
The built environment is recognised as a major contributor to carbon emissions (estimated at 50% in the UK) and as architects Purcell Miller Tritton’s role is therefore central to minimising this impact. Conservation and sustainability are increasingly key elements of the Practice’s services, for both clients and staff, and knowledge and application of sustainable architecture principles is essential to meet these increasing expectations. To reinforce the Practice’s commitment and drive for improvements, Graham designed and implemented an ISO 14001 compliant environmental management system which was externally certified within six months.
The Practice has now published two annual Environmental Reports and has achieved reductions in both its direct carbon footprint and the indirect footprint arising from its architectural services. Performance on the latter is monitored through an in-house assessment tool which is used to review the inclusion of key carbon governance elements within every project.
Following on from this commitment, the Practice
was ranked in The Sunday Times Top 60 Best Green Companies for 2010 and
has been shortlisted as Sustainable Designer of the year by Building
magazine (to be announced 30 November 2010). These are justified recognition for a business that has recognised the explicit link between its services, sustainability and the expectations of many key stakeholders and taken effective action to strengthen this.
Follow this link for more information on the skills and services of Purcell Miller Tritton.
For further information on the management system services that Tripos provide contact Graham Ward at [email protected].
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