06 HEALTHCARE FOCUS - WSP Group

INTERVIEW Andrew Seymour
Postcard from...
Doha
Andrew Seymour is country director, Qatar
for WSP Middle East
What are you working
on at the moment?
Right now, we’ve got a lot of
going on, including a couple of key
projects. We’ve won one of the
main municipality contracts for
roads and drainage in the whole
of the north of the country. Our
client is ASHGHAL, the Public
Works Authority, and it’s a fiveyear
framework worth about
$90m, which we secured working
in a joint venture with a local
company, Khatib & Alami. On top
of that, we’ve also just heard that
we will be developing a masterplan
and the complete detailed design
for a new national coastguard
facility, just north of Doha. It’s a
great project with more than
30 buildings including warehouses,
offices and accommodation, as well
as shooting ranges, football pitches,
a museum, Olympic swimming
pools – all within a completely
self-contained development.
And we also have lots of smaller
projects where we are providing
services such as M&E, structural
engineering, and specialist services
like fire and safety. All in all we
are quite pleased with how things
are moving.
How many people
do you have out there?
Right now, we have eight people
in the country and our growth
will be limited to mainly focus
on having the client-facing team
here and then drawing on the
expertise from around the group
for different projects. Not only
can we tap into the large resource
pool of our colleagues in the
UAE, but I am also determined
to ensure that we will be drawing
on skillsets from the WSP group
worldwide as well, whether the
expertise is in Sweden, India, the
US or Hong Kong.
So it sounds like the
Qatari market is pretty
busy right now?
Absolutely! Qatar is hosting the
2022 FIFA World Cup, so instead
of speculative construction, they
are actually working towards a
major milestone event, which is
fantastic. This means that from
a development point of view the
initial focus will be on infrastructure
for the next few years.
Once the roads, rail network
and other transport systems are
in place, then many other items
will inevitably springboard from
that. For example, the New Doha
International airport has already
been extended, and now there
will also be a major expansion of
the Doha port in order to cope
with the volume of construction
materials that will be required to
be imported.
Other major initiatives that we are
likely to see in the next five to 10
years are the construction of an
extra 85,000 hotel rooms, along
with the associated investment in
the development of public realm,
additional retail and leisure facilities
such as golf courses.
My goal for Qatar will be to use
our global expertise and hopefully
tap into the various different
market sectors. Obviously, if
we have the capacity within the
WSP Middle East group then
we will go for some of the lead
consultant roles, but initially we
are looking to form joint ventures
with other companies and carefully
considering the clients that we
work with.
What’s Qatar like
compared with other
places you’ve worked?
I’m Canadian, but I started my
career in the UK and worked in
London, Scotland and all over
the Midlands. Then I went back
to Canada, and then to the
Caribbean – I was in Barbados
for seven years – and I’ve now
been in the UAE for the last
eight years, so the transition from
tropical hot to arid hot wasn’t too
bad! In terms of how built-up it is,
Qatar is a few years behind the
UAE but it’s well on its way.
Having been a typical expat for
most of my career, the one thing
I find about working in all these
different countries is that it’s all
about people. Whether they’re
Canadian, Caribbean or British,
people are people no matter
where you are in the world.
Everyone likes a good joke, a
good meal, and all of the locals
are proud of the country they
live and work in. Generally, Qatar
is a great place to work, as the
people are very friendly. Before
you get down to business they like
to get to know you over a cup of
tea or coffee – but actually that’s
probably not different to many
other places! One thing to always
remember here is that Qatar
has a very small population, so
you soon find out that everyone
knows everyone else.
What’s a typical
day like for you?
The word I would use is “eclectic”.
It changes from hour to hour. One
minute you could be dealing with
a client, the next resolving technical
issues on a project, and the
next dealing with IT, procedural
or staffing issues, but I can also
guarantee that it is always really
rewarding – every day you feel
like you’ve achieved something!
andrew.seymour@wspgroup.com
solutions March 2012