To support Coron Projects’ delivery, we collaborate with partner project managers and consultant planners. Their backgrounds add to the diversity of the team, giving us a breadth of expertise which we bring into all our client projects.
About Simon Jones
While studying Aerospace Business Systems, Simon found a sandwich placement at a power station, designing and implementing outage planning systems. He remained in the power industry for several more years before moving into rail and transport, and latterly, shifted into electrical engineering. He says, “I’ve always enjoyed engineering project planning and I learned a lot from my boss who mentored me when I was looking at complex planning scenarios. It’s a people-centric job, entirely reliant on building relationships with others and good communication.” Working with Elite’s clients, Simon would typically be hired by an agency to fill a resource gap. His skill is viewing the planning needs and resources across a portfolio of projects. He reviews the terms of the contract to establish the scope of work and then meets with the delivery teams to develop the detailed schedule behind the programme of works.
Collaborating with Coron Projects
Simon originally met Gerwyn when Gerwyn was appointed as lead project manager on a programme where Simon was handling the planning. They rapidly realised they could smooth out any timing or resource issues together and shared a mutual passion for building best practice. While attending a project management conference, Gerwyn voiced the values which Coron focus on and how their relationships with clients work. Simon partnered with Coron on their next project, providing the integrated engineering project planning expertise the client needed. Simon recalls, “I found it refreshing to see how client-focused Coron was, quickly seeking all the input about the contractual obligations of a project then turning that into practical steps and finding the right solutions.”
Teamwork and efficient information management systems
Coron Projects works with clients to look at the bigger picture and see whether planning can be done more strategically, offering sustained value. This blends well with Simon’s approach where he’ll review plans across a whole portfolio and create as much transparency as possible for all stakeholders. He notes, “Coron ensures the right information flows between the clients and their end-clients which improves the communication on complex engineering procurement construction projects. As a team we all use document collaboration tools and have an excellent process for recording everything. Having better processes means we stay efficient and can provide engineering project planning service over and above the customer’s requirements. I benefit from the team’s combined experience and working with Gerwyn has shifted my approach to ask more questions. I now seek to understand the specifics of what they want, how important that is and the root cause of those requirements – in case we can provide something different and over and above what they think they wanted. I love the variety and flexibility of working with Coron or Elite’s direct clients as Coron is incredibly supportive to help achieve a good work-life balance.”
