Facilities @ Management

2.25 Journey into FM

Stan Mitchell

The Beginning

In hindsight my journey into Facilities Management (FM) probably started when I opted out of school. I left before the term ended on the basis that by the time, they found me (I had escaped to the Highlands of Scotland) it would be too late to get me back! My escape route was via a job in farming, which while introducing me to a workplace that was different every day with challenges from equipment, animals, and people, introduced me to some of the skills I apparently had and would serve me extremely well later in my career.

Engineering

Following several years of life on the farm, my longer-term thinking brought me back to Glasgow to serve an engineering apprenticeship and map out a career leveraging an apparent natural trait for getting things working. As would have been predicted by those wiser than me, that move took me back to education which became a prerequisite if I was going to get anywhere in my chosen vocation. While learning the practicalities of my trade building equipment for the nuclear industry I was also progressing formal educational qualifications. During that period of my career, I worked alongside old seadogs who were always reminiscing about the time that they spent at sea in the merchant navy, visiting glamorous parts of the world. However, they did tend to omit elaborating quite so much about the 24/7 lifestyle that was a necessity between ports of call. I was smitten and soon left to take my career to ...