Turley, Robert

Since graduating with a BSc in Environmental Studies in 1998, I have witnessed and contributed to significant advancements in Governance Risk and Compliance. Initially specialising in asbestos, my passion for protecting people led me to broaden my expertise to various compliance areas, including fire safety.My interest in fire safety was sparked in the mid-2010s while working alongside fire-safety colleagues. Despite being five years into the FSO2005, the sector was still evolving, and I was eager to be part of its development.My initial ventures into consulting on fire safety involved review of policy, quality checks of FRAs and development of fire safety policy and procedures for clients with multiple properties to manage. In order to support that, I studied the regulatory reform fire safety order in detail, along with the fire safety in blocks of flats, LACoRS and latterly the NFCC Guidance for Specilised Housing. I gained my early experiences in the sector with Frankham Risk Management Services, guiding residential clients on how to meet compliancy, including fire safety. I then took a role as Compliance and Servicing Manager at a housing provider Saxon Weald, where I provided the strategic lead on compliance assurance and M&E servicing for the organisation, being responsible for delivering a £4m budget across revenue and capital works including reviewing FRAs, overseeing fire equipment maintenance, gas servicing, emergency light maintenance etc. In this role, I did extensive self-study to remain up-to-date on relevant regulation and legislation in addition to attaining both the NEBOSH Certificate in Fire Risk Management, and Certificate in Fire Safety and Risk Assessment, both with Credit. This gave me the confidence then to venture forward as a freelance consultant in 2018, when I began to conduct my first fire risk assessments on residential accommodation. In spite of the covid outbreak, I was lucky enough to remain employed with a variety of assessment, consultancy and asbestos survey work, all being essential safety work. During this time, I conducted FRAs for property guardian operators and residential/social landlords, which offered a range of opportunity to assess some relatively complex life-safety risks to manage. I also took secondments at two registered social landlords where I oversaw the delivery of FRA programmes and remediation/maintenance work, as well as reviewed and developing policy and procedure.It was during this time, towards the end of 2019 that I was approached by my current employer, initially in a freelance role, to help them towards obtaining third-party certification of our systems BAFE under the SP205 scheme. Prior to achieving certification, my initial role was to help with the validation of FRAs conducted by the team, drawing on my previous experiences both as a quality manager for asbestos, as well as in my role as compliance manager at Saxon Weald and in various secondments. In addition, for Tersus I developed the FRA report templates and alongside the quality manager, we obtained our BAFE certification in January 2021. Since then, I have validated and undertaken several thousand FRAs, ranging from HMOs, converted residential properties, retail premises, low-rise and high-rise residential, warehouses, depots, schools, offices and public buildings. As an SSAIB Approved Validator, I also carry out on-site audits on my team either to validate they are competent to conduct a particular type of assessment that is relatively new to them, or as part of ongoing monitoring. I also undertake and validate fire door inspections, which I have supported by attending the FDIS course in fire door inspection, obtaining the diploma in 2023. Additionally, I have been integral to the ongoing development of our document templates, both in MS Word and within the assessment application that we use (Riskbase), evolving the content drawing on both my experiences and that of the team, in line with the changing legislation and guidance.Our values at Tersus (Respect, Integrity, Accountability and Reliability) resonate closely with me. It has always been important to me to help and protect people from harm and, being in a position enable others to do that for themselves being equally important to me. So I was delighted to be given the opportunity to lead the Fire Safety business unit in 2023. This unit includes our Quality Manager, validators and a team of assessors (experienced and trainee) primarily involved in conducting fire risk assessments, fire door inspections and compartmentation surveys around the country. As Head of Department, I am responsible for the performance of the business unit, financially, from a customer service perspective and in terms of quality. Through ad-hoc contact, one-to-ones, team meetings and regular face-to-face CPD, together with our Quality Manager, I seek to promote a strong set of behavioural ethics amongst our team, aligning with our company values and code of conduct. We have sought to ensure each of our assessors is registered with the IFSM, where the extent of experience and training allows, and we promote taking pride in developing each individual so that we can offer a sustainable service to our customers. Making regular contact with our team and validating 100% of our assessments helps to promote these values, as well as enables us to improve on a continuous basis, bringing continuity and integrity to the work we do. As a leader, through considering the relative merits of a rigid, rules-based approach vs a more flexible, integrity-based approach, I seek to promote in our team the ability to apply either where the situation determines it, in a bid to engender an overall risk-based and reasonably practicable approach to what we do. My aim is also to ensure that our team retains and improves upon a strong sense of ethical values, so that through our work, we demonstrate integrity, professionalism, competence and a considerate approach based on self-reflection and appropriate CPD.To support my role, I continue to develop my skills knowledge and experience, through self-study, internal CPD sessions and attendance at industry conferences and courses. I am always interested in learning something, whenever I identify where I might not be fully informed or just for the sheer enjoyment of finding out something new.I am dedicated to quietly getting the job done, staying informed about sector developments, and sharing insights with colleagues to enhance our collective expertise, through mentoring, team meetings and an open door policy. My goal is to provide the best possible service to our customers, ensuring their safety and compliance.