Peter Aves
Tel: 07827 336137
Email: peter.aves@emcltd.co.uk
Peter is a trained Quantity Surveyor who has spent 40 years in business, most of it at the ‘sharp end’ of operational management in the construction and property sectors.
After graduating, he spent seven years with Bovis Construction before joining the Hunting Gate Group as Commercial Director in their civil engineering subsidiary where he was involved in the development of many warehouse and office projects.
In 1982 he joined a private development group in Essex as Commercial Director responsible for end-to-end project management of a number of office and industrial developments. He was also part of the team that trebled the group's housebuilding output in four years, taking specific responsibility for site appraisal and acquisition, budgeting, forecasting and the supply chain.
When the group was taken over in late 1986, Peter carried out a small development of his own before joining the board of Bellway Homes' Hertfordshire division as Operations Director. In 1989 he was headhunted to become Managing Director of the Kent division of Walter Lawrence Homes where he assumed full responsibility for the division's performance until it was acquired in 1991.
For a time, Peter provided ad-hoc project management services to a variety of clients combined with running a restaurant business with his wife who is a caterer by profession. In 1995 he was asked to project manage the design and build of a new warehouse and office project for an Ashford company, and on completion of this, the business owner asked him to review the operational management of a specialist kitchen supplier which was part of the group and where the financial performance was causing concern. The review led to Peter being invited to join the board as Operations Director, and when in 1999 the MD decided to retire, Peter led an MBO and took on the role of Managing Director . Over a five year period Peter led the company through a complete transition of its operations and increased turnover from £2.4 million to £9 million, widening the customer base to include a number of major PLC house builders.
Since leaving to become a consultant in 2007, Peter has:
- been involved in several construction projects
- carried out an operational review for the three UK divisions of an international CAD / CAM software group
- worked with EMC's Desmond High and Martin Stanton on the attempted turnaround of a specialist window company
- helped a client company to move to new premises, including handling lease negotiations and the construction and fit-out of a new-build office block
- carried out project management on behalf of a Kent design and build contractor
Peter's strengths lie in the areas of process management, forward planning and budgeting. He is also adept at getting people to understand and buy in to the "game plan" and ensure that they understand what they are able to contribute to the end result. His logical approach to problem-solving has earned him the nickname Spock from colleagues!
