Content Manager

“Thinking about others, holding out your hand to help and not judge them is a duty we owe to everyone. Putting others first doesn’t put you second. It just means you care, and hopefully, someone will care for you in the same way if you ever need it.”

How did your experience in the military help you to build a strong career in the security sector?

A career in the security industry is a fairly natural and, I think, pretty common route for ex-forces personnel. You can look at the army as a corporation with a clear mission. To fulfil its mission, it needs the right people in the right place and for all of them to understand what is expected of them and make sure they are properly trained to do it.

I joined the army as a boy soldier at 16 and became a ‘junior leader’, basically training for potential non-commissioned officers – sergeants and the like. I enjoyed myyears in the army and ended my time there as a sergeant in 7th Parachute Regiment RHA. The skills you learn doing any kind of leadership in the army are the same as managing people in civilian life.

The real difference between the army and a civilian organisation is that you tell people what to do in the army, and they have to do it. That doesn’t happen in the civilian world in the same way, and you need to take people with you. But common to both is explaining the job or mission and making sure your people are equipped to be able to do it properly. 

We understand you are very active in sport. How has this helped you in your role?

I am a member of the 100 Marathon Club with 149 marathons or ultra-marathons under my belt, and I’m out cycling 100 to 200 plus kms most weekends.

Sport allows me to clear my head and think through issues away from constant messages. The time away lets me think about how to achieve our goals. Obviously, I’m a bit competitive, and I like to achieve challenging and difficult things. That’s an attitude I bring to my work, too. 

Many of your colleagues would call you creative. Is creativity important to you?

Thank you, that’s very flattering. One of the things I like about this work is solving what are often quite complicated problems that involve a fair few stakeholders who can often have different aims and opinions.

Being what you call creative is thinking about what we are trying to achieve and what our clients are also trying to accomplish and making sure they go hand in hand. If you can understand what your client or stakeholder wants to get out of something, you can then have a constructive chat about it. Sometimes clients need help to identify what they need most, so thinking creatively about it really helps.

You have recently completed a course in mental health. What prompted you to seek this qualification, and why do you value it?

We live in a world where admitting to weakness, particularly emotional weakness, can be very tough. The pandemic and the isolation and dislocation it has caused is making this even tougher for some people. Making sure our mental health, as well as our physical health, is properly looked after is so important.

Thinking about others, holding out your hand to help and not judge them is a duty we owe to everyone. Putting others first doesn’t put you second. It just means you care, and hopefully, someone will care for you in the same way if you ever need it.

You are very approachable and personable. Does this help you in your role?

Does that mean I talk too much sometimes? I like being with people and understanding more about them. I wouldn’t want to live in a world where everyone is the same. Listening, as well as talking, is a skill we all develop with experience.

Managers need to be approachable, reasonable and ready to listen. Otherwise, how will you find out what is going on and identify potential issues before they become a problem? It also lets you coach and help your staff. It also gives me great pleasure and pride in my work.

“I am a firm believer in being a life-long learner and will never stop educating myself practically and theoretically. Education is the key to opening your mind. Both practice and theory combined are a powerful tool and will allow you to see business through a different lens.”

You have had a lot of success at an early age. Tell us about your journey to becoming a Director of Operations

I have a passion for working with people and a hunger for management and leadership. I attribute this to being naturally competitive. I come from a household with 6 boys and 1 girl so I got a taste for competition very early.

My background is in highly regulated environments. I stumbled upon facilities management back in 2004 while working as an engineering maintenance planner at a pharmaceutical Biotech facility. This role didn’t provide me with enough room for growth. During an annual review meeting with my then manager, he directed me toward the FM department. I began my career as a Soft Service FM team leader with a team of eleven people.

My 6 months in my new role were difficult. Not all strong individuals make great people managers. I was a young supervisor and I didn’t have the skills or experience in people management that I needed. My career has been a learning journey, and you will not always have the tools available immediately. However, it is important to have the will to learn. This can be through further education, training, personal development, and peer support. I advanced to the position of Soft Services FM after two years and my team grew to almost thirty. Following this, I was promoted to a contract manager and held responsibility for the hard and soft services teams. This was my first exposure to commercial responsibilities and budget forecasting.

I joined Bidvest Noonan in 2011. I held a meeting with the Managing Director of the business who sold me on the culture and values of the company and convinced me to join the business. He highlighted the opportunities he saw for me within the company. Further promotion to Strategic Account Lead and Life Sciences Lead roles followed from 2012 to 2019. Late in 2019, I applied for the position of Director of Operations for the strategic accounts of Integrated Solutions. With a strong business strategy and a path for success, I set about putting my leadership team together in line with the direction that the business was heading.

What characteristics or abilities have helped you most to be successful?

I believe my willingness to work hard and to do whatever it takes to ensure the client is happy, as the reason for my growth within Bidvest Noonan. I am a firm believer in being a life-long learner and will never stop educating myself practically and theoretically. Education is the key to opening your mind. Both practice and theory combined are a powerful tool and will allow you to see business through a different lens.

I find my ability to both think and act like an owner as another reason for my success. I go to work every day with the mindset of “If this was my business I would…”. My father always said to me: “David, dress for the job you want and not the job you have”. My interpretation of his knowledgeable words was to always strive to be successful in the role you have and always make yourself available to support your boss, and their boss too.

You have very strong relationships with clients. How have you built these?

I have 21 years of service in this industry as a service provider. This has enabled me to work closely with some strong and challenging clients. Taking my father’s advice and changing it slightly, I openly engage my clients and try to understand what success looks like for them. When you truly understand your clients’ goals and objectives, both personal and professional, you will be able to design a solution that is built for success.

I believe that all people, irrespective of status or position, should be treated with respect and spoken to with honesty. Relationships are formed and based around trust, and to earn the trust, you must always deliver on your commitment to support your client. I focus on effective service delivery and identify opportunities by challenging the status quo of the service delivery on my client’s behalf.

What was your proudest moment at Bidvest Noonan?

I have had many proud moments working at Bidvest Noonan but among the greatest is seeing the growth and development of my colleagues, many of whom are now leaders within our organisation. If I was to retire tomorrow, I would be happy in the knowledge that I helped develop, mentor, support, and grow some of the future leaders of our organisation.

I am also immensely proud to have overseen contracts that have become winners at our company’s best-managed contracts awards.

Jonathan Moore is a Director of Operations in our Security Solutions business. He shares his fascinating career journey, lessons from his international experience, and his vision for security in the post-pandemic world.

What was your path into the security industry?

I started my career in the British Army, where I served for 7 years in a variety of environments. The Army helped me develop a resilient mindset, discipline, loyalty, and a passion for problem-solving.  I learned many lessons in the Army, particularly about myself which I feel helped me mature quickly and shaped who I am today.

I joined the private Security sector over 15 years ago. I worked in the world of consultancy before moving into Security Management, in which I settled. My first role was as the Head of Security for a large steel manufacturing company.  Since then, I’ve had the opportunity to work in senior leadership roles for a variety of large multinationals and take on security challenges in diverse regions such as The Americas, EMEA, and APAC. I was very fortunate to spend some time living in Singapore and India where I gained memories and experiences I will cherish for life.

What lessons did you learn from your international experience?

I have had exposure to a wide range of regional and country-specific challenges which gave me the opportunity to develop solutions to unique problems. I have also been privileged to work with extremely talented people of all cultures and backgrounds. This was invaluable, and I have made many great friends along the way. Professionally, it broadened my perspectives and deepened my expertise in the fundamentals of Security and Leadership. Most importantly, it reinforced my long-held belief that in the security industry, as in so many other areas, the ability to build strong relationships and communicate well is critical.

What attracted you to Bidvest Noonan?

Throughout most of my career, I have been an end-user of security services. I was frequently frustrated and disappointed by the quality of the product I received. I believed that a service provider that put people first, was client-centric, and delivered a quality product could be highly successful.  I identified Bidvest Noonan as a business that puts its people and client needs at the centre of its decisions and delivers great service. After meeting with members of Bidvest Noonan leadership, I was convinced that this business shared my values and ambitions, and I wanted to be a part of it.

How has the pandemic impacted your role?

I am proud to say the pandemic has not detracted from our ability to support our teams and clients. We have been able to tailor our service according to demand and helped many of our clients navigate through what has been difficult commercially. In many ways, we have become stronger as a business and forged much deeper relationships with our people and clients.

I believe this pandemic has made us more resilient as an organisation. At Bidvest Noonan, we immediately got a good handle on the developing situation and were adaptive and agile in our decision making at every point. Of course, not every decision was correct, and we learned from our mistakes as well as our successes. 

Our people who have been affected in so many ways by the pandemic. For me, personally, demonstrating visible and transparent leadership through the period has been fundamentally important. The first consideration of any decision I have made has been to our people.

How has the pandemic impacted the role of security?

It has been demonstrated that the role that our operational teams is more important now than ever before. Where many premises have been unoccupied or have had reduced members of staff on-site, our teams have remained present to ensure the buildings remain functional and people kept safe.

We have needed to be adaptive and agile to ensure the well-being of our teams and clients we look after.  We have developed and implemented new security procedures required to maintain Covid Secure environments. Our work gives people confidence that they are safe when they return to the workplace.

We accelerated our innovation programmes to respond to the pandemic. We have employed new subject matter experts, invested in technologies, improved how communicated, and reimagined our solutions. With vaccines in distribution and growing optimism, we are ready to deliver even more value to the market. I am excited about our industry’s role in the post-pandemic world and especially about the bright future of our business.

Tomas Mazrimas is a Security Supervisor at the flagship store of one of the UK & Ireland’s largest and most successful fashion retailers.

2020 was a difficult year. Positive stories were few and far between. However, in times of adversity, heroes often emerge, and our business certainly saw many. Meet Tomas Mazrimas.

Tomas is a Security Supervisor at the flagship store of one of the UK & Ireland’s leading fashion retail chains. This store attracts millions of shoppers each year. Tomas is a critical member of the store’s operations team, overseeing the day-to-day running of security on site. Tomas puts our credo into action and embodies what it means to put people first. Keeping so many people safe in a busy store amidst a global pandemic is a challenge like no other, but he met it head-on. Tomas was the driving force behind new training methods to meet Covid-19 standards.

Understanding that sharing fast and accurate information is critical in times like these, Tomas developed communications in multiple formats including email, toolbox talks and videos.

Such was his impact, the client and his colleagues on site named him Hero of the Year for 2020. He was also a champion at the Irish Security Industry Association Awards (ISIA). He was crowned Security Supervisor of the Year for 2020.

Nick O’Connor, Integrated Accounts Retail Lead at Bidvest Noonan had this to say about Tomas:

“The transformative impact made on this contract would not have been possible without Tomas. From the moment Tomas joined our business in 2009, he has embodied our credo and has been responsible for developing one of the strongest performing security teams the Island of Ireland has to offer”