Mitie Construction

Honesty and trust is a big part of how Mitie Construction does business. Just ask its owner Paul Carter.

“The whole handshake and trust thing has almost disappeared and people were almost getting to the point where the moment you sign a contract, you immediately set in place contractual blocks to  protect yourself in every way possible, thus creating an immediate division between you and the client. And that’s why I’ve come out and said we want to do this differently. We want to be able to trust our clients and trust our designers and our subcontractors.”

Together with John Farrell, Paul Carter set up Mitie Construction in 2004. The company has a vision of providing large or small projects, equally with honesty and integrity. Within three months of forming it secured its first major contract with the major iron company Fortescue Metals Group in Port Hedland. The feedback was fantastic and so began a steady influx of work ever since.

Today, based in Perth, there is a steady inflow of work coming in throughout the year. Their project list is quite balanced between residential and commercial builds, with slightly more business coming from the former.

“Around 60% of our builds are residential and 40% are commercial. We build multi-storey, mixed use buildings. The majority of our work is design and construct, and negotiate. Some of our work is tendered although we do very few of those.”

The feedback has been exceptional. Word of mouth and the company website are the main methods of marketing for the company. www.mitieconstruction.com.au  Good feedback from previous projects spread quickly.

“We are happy that a lot of the projects which we get are from repeat clients. With our clients it has been nothing short of exceptional. We are fortunate to have worked on a few projects with FMG – we just completed 16 houses for them on a design and construct contract. The timeframe was very quick but we got into it and finished both the projects two weeks ahead of schedule.”

The company employs twelve full time staff. Almost all the work for the building projects are subcontracted out to a range of different trades people; everything from electricians to plumbers and painters. When looking for potential staff members or subcontractors, Carter again emphasises the importance of values; these have remained the same since the company was formed.

“The only way we were going to be successful is if we set a number of principles and running with those principles and working within the guidelines of those principles. What we’ve done diligently during the period that we have been in business is that we try to engage staff that have the same set of principles; hard-working and maintaining a healthy work life balance. We find it very important that we engage with the correct staff and that we look after our staff and pay them appropriately. Of course that’s only a small part of it all. We treat them well.  Happy staff, happy company; that’s what I say.”

There have been many learning curves for Mitie. Embracing the diverse construction work force has been one big area. A recent project saw Mitie putting in place a program to subcontract $1 million of work out to indigenous owned and operated companies. Broadening the capabilities of the company has also seen new horizons being reached. This has allowed a broader customer base to be tapped into, from corporate entities to governments departments. From single storey to multi storey, it’s within the capabilities of Mitie. “We are quite diverse in what we do,” says Carter.  “We focus on the metro and regional parts of WA and we’ve been very successful in finding clients there.”

Overall business confidence has dropped slightly. While economic confidence remains high in Perth, it has decreased in areas of Western Australia. Twelve months ago, the majority of companies who approached Mitie would sign on to work with them. Currently, less than half do, due to the current economic conditions. Carter is optimistic about the situation going forward though.

“It has been a tough last 12 months, from a position which has been good to one where we’ve had to work a bit harder to secure our work. But we’re confident and we’re very happy with our structure.”

While technological advancements continue to develop rapidly, there are customer requests and company requirements that remain timeless.

“Everybody wants the best price they can possibly get and they want it done as quickly as possible. We need a good quality trade base to be able to provide out your clients and give them what they want. We like to make sure the end product is right,” says Carter

Mitie Construction always set out to be the niche company who worked with high quality and trustworthy clients. Looking ahead they hope to continue forging strong working relationships. Success to them is getting return clients.

As for their end goal? “We want to be the first choice for quality developers, and that means being a reliable and trustworthy company that delivers on time and for a fair price.”

Mitie Construction is also proudly an award winning builder, recently winning two MBA Awards and also making it to the final list for another. They won an award for construction excellence for one of the FMG housing projects up to $6,500,000. Another award for construction excellence was also won for their work at the Boonderoo Warehouse in Tom Price. This is a sign of a quality builder with more awards in their sights.