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Behind the Hard Hat: Meet the leaders of the energy transition
From an apprentice bricklayer to Head of Retrofit at a tier one contractor, Peter Park's career reads like a lesson in never stopping learning. Now leading retrofit delivery at United Infrastructure, a dynamic nationwide business that delivers critical infrastructure to communities across the UK, he is using that grounding to lead a little differently.
Peter's route into retrofit was not planned. Two decades in social housing, starting on the tools before moving into project management, gave him a feel for how buildings go together. His move into decarbonisation came almost by accident, when he was handed a struggling retrofit project with little context. "What is retrofit?" he remembers asking. "It kind of manifested from that point, taking the project on, learning these technologies."
From Design and Technology at school to working on push bikes and motorbikes in his spare time, Peter has always liked practical work. "I've always been interested in how things are put together. I really like practical outcomes, too. When you're working with your hands, you enjoy the fruits of your labour." This led him to an engineering qualification and then an apprenticeship in bricklaying.
Peter’s curiosity has carried through into how he thinks about his own development. As his role and responsibilities grew, so did the learning he sought out, from site supervision through to a master's degree in building surveying, completed at 40, each arriving when the work called for it. "Without those opportunities to train and learn, I wouldn't be where I am today," he says. Peter notes that it's just as much about learning on the job as in the classroom. "My practical experience on sites, and working in social housing, really helped with that analytical process, especially when you look at defects or construction methods," he explains.
Peter is direct about why training matters beyond ticking a box, not just for him, but for his whole team. "I'm a massive advocate for people being upskilled. That continued professional development is paramount, and when we look at retrofit, that's the key driver," he says.
For Peter, competence is what enables a job to be done, and done properly. "The key delivery outcome here is that we're doing a quality install, but the correct install as well," he explains. Tier one contractors like United Infrastructure also need to think about competence beyond their own team. "Training shouldn't be focused purely from a delivery perspective. I think it's across the board," he says, meaning sub-contractors, clients, and residents alike, "and that's key for getting understanding, key for buy-in, and key for successful delivery of a project."
Getting that training right, for Peter, means keeping it specific to the person receiving it. "This is why I think you see a lot of the relevant training courses, Greenworkx included, offering role-specific training," he says. "It needs to be relevant to each individual, and it needs to be at the right level for them."
Delivering a project well also means everyone involved understanding what is happening and why, in language that lands. "It can be difficult to communicate when you start talking about EPCs and retrofit assessments," Peter notes. "People just sit there and glaze over. It's got to be pitched at the right level."
He sees this playing out powerfully with residents. Get the explanation right, and something useful happens beyond the household itself. "If residents are getting the correct information at the correct level, they can talk to other people in their local communities about how they've had a heat pump or solar installed, and champion the benefits of that."
Peter's trades background also shapes how he leads. "The way I lead is not from the front. I'm very collaborative," he reflects. "I'm not a believer in dictating. Everyone has a voice."
This includes contractors on site. “I’m able to go out on site and give pragmatic advice, and ask contractors to do something that I know I could do myself, because I've got that experience."
And it pays off under pressure. "If you treat people well and you're pragmatic and understanding, they're more likely to pull out all the stops to get the job done."
Asked for his advice to the sector, Peter is clear that decarbonisation is not the only reason work needs to happen on people's homes. Decent Homes standards, energy efficiency requirements, and Awaab's Law all sit alongside it, and residents often need planned maintenance regardless of any retrofit programme. "We need to start looking at these properties holistically," he says. In practice, that means combining retrofit with planned maintenance rather than treating them as separate jobs, which United Infrastructure is already doing across its own projects. "Whilst we've got the scaffolding up, we're undertaking a re-roof, doing the loft insulation, putting on the solar," he explains. "It's a more efficient way of working, and there's less disruption for residents."
For Peter, that resident experience is the measure that matters most. "It's about making healthy homes for residents," he says. "That's the key."
United Infrastructure is a member of the National Home Decarbonisation Group (NHDG), with Peter as primary representative. This includes feeding into policy discussions with the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ), and he is hopeful that longer funding periods are on the horizon for the sector as a whole. "What that's going to create, I'm hoping, is the ability to train and retain staff for longer periods, which will lead to a more knowledgeable and experienced team, and improved delivery,” he says.
It is a fitting hope from someone who has continued learning throughout his career, and wants everyone in the sector to get the same chance to build competence and grow, which is what helps make healthy homes for residents possible.
