04.01.2007

Nationwide announces new Organisation

Nationwide Access has announced that it is restructuring its business, moving to what it calls a ‘General Management structure’.

The net effect is that the company will once again combine its sales and operations, creating seven regional self propelled businesses and two for Skylift truck mounted platforms.

Each region will have a general manager who will be responsible for the sales, the fleet, deliveries and service as in a traditional regional company.

The Nationwide sales and training operations will move into the Lavendon UK structure, which also includes credit control and Human Resources.

The company says that the overall aim is to simplify the business making Nationwide an easier company for its customers to deal with.

In a separate move Nationwide is also adding 12 industry sector managers who will focus on specific market sectors. These include:
Roofing/Cladding
Steel
Media
Telecoms
Signage
M&E
Main Contractor
Re-Hire
Local Authorities
Utilities
Major Projects
FM

Known as ‘business sector managers’ the 12 national specialists will report to Peter Douglas, Nationwide’s commercial director, along with the general managers of the two Sky Lift regions.

The seven self propelled regions, each of which will have its own general manager, will report to Peter Whittall, the recently appointed managing director of Nationwide Access.

The seven geographic regions are:
London East & West
East Anglia
Midlands
South West
North & North East
North West
Scotland & Northern Ireland
See management changes at Lavendon

Vertikal Comment

This restructuring makes good sense, in the past few years Nationwide has tried to depersonalise the business along the lines of car rental. The idea of sales teams that focus on customers leaving a national or even regional logistics team to focus on providing the product, makes sense…in theory.

However there is no getting away from the fact that this is very much a people business, it is not Hertz or McDonalds and may never be. While Nationwide’s strategy might have appealed to some large national businesses it is clear that it was not to the taste of many local and regional customers.

Lavendon’s strategy of acquiring regional players such as Panther and A.M.P appeared to be aimed at providing both formats within the same group. However it now looks as though
Nationwide will add back some of the personalised and entrepreneurial service features of the past, possibly re-learning them from the regional players it has acquired?

Its idea of adding in sector specialists adds a new feature which could prove to be a major advantage. The key to this will be how well the sector managers can work with the new regional general managers.

All in all this looks like a positive move for Nationwide employees, Lavendon shareholders and perhaps the industry as whole.