Four members of the team at Adderstone Construction all started out as placement students – and between them, they now represent every stage of the career path the scheme was designed to facilitate.
Jonathan Kershaw is now Director of Construction. He joined Adderstone as a placement student from Northumbria University, and stayed – working his way up through the business over the years that followed, learning the job on live sites rather than in a classroom. This month, he takes on Harry Gee – the same placement scheme, on the other side of the desk.
Louis Fawcett is now a full-time Quantity Surveyor. He first joined Adderstone as a placement student, then stayed on part-time through his final year of study before walking straight into a full-time role on graduating – the kind of outcome not every student gets the chance to land in their chosen field. At Adderstone, it’s the reward for showing promise and putting the work in.
Dom Cunningham is currently an Undergraduate Quantity Surveyor, balancing the role with his final year of study – one step behind Louis, on the same path he started on as a placement student.
And this month, Harry Gee joins as the newest Trainee Quantity Surveyor on placement from Northumbria, taking the first step on a route that, at Adderstone Construction, has a track record of actually leading somewhere.
Adderstone Group has supported more than 150 placements over the years, and the Construction team’s current line-up reads like a case study in what happens when a company treats a placement scheme as a genuine pipeline rather than a box to tick. Elsewhere in the business, Philippa Schumann-Nixon, who also joined as a placement student, is now Director of Adderstone Nova – showing it’s an attitude embraced right across the Group.
This year’s wider cohort of placement students also includes Millie Tindall, joining Adderstone Management as a Marketing Assistant, and Will Goadsby, joining as a Trainee Surveyor.
Michael Shipley, Group CEO of Adderstone Group, said: “Some of our most senior people started exactly where Millie, Harry and Will are now, and that’s no coincidence.
“Backing placement students is one of the ways we build this business for the long term and how we invest in the North East.
“Giving these students real responsibility on real projects shows us, very quickly, who’s got what it takes.”
Adderstone Group’s placement scheme spans Construction, Marketing, Property Management, Affordable and Social Homes Development, and Civil Engineering – and remains one of the company’s most direct routes into a career in property and construction.