How long have you been at Norman R Wright & Sons?
I’ve been with NRW for 2 years managing the major commercial aluminium boat projects we have in build. Prior to that I spent 2 years as the Technical Sales Manager with Austal, and 20 years with Strategic Marine in various roles including Production Manager and General Manager based in Singapore. Over my time I’ve managed commercial projects from 6m to 150m in aluminium or steel including Assault Boats for the Singapore Army to large Dive Support Vessels. We also focussed on 40 metre crew boats for the oil and gas refineries and wind farms in Europe.
What do you enjoy most about your role?
Working with the team, all the guys are great and we work well together. Everyone is on the same page, from management right through to all the guys on the floor, and everyone is really good at what they do. We also have complete autonomy and trust from the management team, just makes doing your job so much easier.
How have you seen the business change over the years?
One thing I have noticed is that there is so much more local production and manufacturing, which is great for the industry. We’re seeing a lot more people happy to price and commit to projects locally versus looking overseas.
What has been your most enjoyable or memorable project?
Reef Resilience and Tamoya have been my most enjoyable projects so far. There were a lot of challenges that we had to manage and overcome, and I’m certain they are 2 of the most complex aluminium builds recently completed on the East Coast of Australia. Specifically to these projects was the amount of equipment and functionality that had to be integrated, the fast launch and retrieval system aboard Reef Resilience presented specific challenges that were great to overcome and see it working so well in practice.
