Some sectors have grown in pandemic

AuthorBarry McCall
Published date17 December 2021
Publication titleIrish Times: Web Edition Articles (Dublin, Ireland)
Industries such as biopharma and medtech and the online payments sector were among the most obvious beneficiaries but there have also been winners in areas such as logistics and in-home entertainment thanks to the mass switch to e-commerce and the closure of live events. Meanwhile, manufacturing generally has come through the past 21 months in rude health

One company that spans many of these sectors is PM Group, which manages the design, construction and commissioning of high-tech facilities for the world's leading pharma, food, data centre and medtech companies. With more than 3,500 employees in 16 offices across 10 countries in the US, Europe, and Asia, the company had revenues of almost ¤400 million in 2020.

"We have experienced significant growth over the past number of years, the last three in particular, and now have 53 different nationalities working in the business," says PM Group head of recruitment and talent acquisition Dave Egan. "We continue to go from strength to strength. We opened new offices in Germany and Philadelphia in last year.

"A lot of our clients are continuing to invest in their facilities across the world, where many of them are involved in the development of vaccines and new treatments for COVID-19. This activity is likely to increase in 2022 and beyond."

The organisation coped well with the pandemic. "It forced remote work on a lot of organisations," Egan notes. "But if you stand back and look at it, there was definitely going to be a change in the work environment. The pandemic accelerated that. A lot of our people had been working on their laptops for a long time and were ready for the move."

The people element is equally if not more important, he adds. "People need to interact and engage with each other and have those five-minute chats at the coffee station. We miss those informal moments when important information can get shared in an unplanned way. The key thing for us has been constant communications so that people always know what's going on."

The company has surveyed its staff to establish what they expect from the workplace. "The consensus was that people wanted to spend two or three days in the office ," says Egan. "This is the voice of the people, and we listen to it. This is part of our culture as a 100 per cent employee-owned organisation. We want our employees to know that they can play a part in shaping the future direction of the business."

While recruitment can be challenging, the nature of the business helps...

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