“Two men enter, one man leaves” is the iconic line from Mad Max Beyond The Thunderdome and this afternoon it felt a little bit like that at The Construction Training Centre in Salisbury as two very determined teams faced off to win the contract to build the Constructionarium Australia Seymour Whyte All-Female Story Bridge.
The morning session was a flurry of activity as Team Merle and Team Else finalised their tender submissions ahead of the 12-noon deadline. References were checked, costs recalculated, schedules finalised and methodologies refined as the clock ticked down.
With a palpable sigh of relief, both teams met the deadline by providing their tender to our review panel of Harry, Neil, Deb, Alex, Rychelle and Gary for review ahead of their afternoon presentations.
For today’s lunch and learn, Seymour Whyte’s Will MacDonald joined our cohort to talk about the Seymour Whyte philosophy and share his experiences of a career in construction and infrastructure.
This was an invaluable session for our cohort, who once again had access to a senior leader from across our industry and someone who is a passionate champion of Constructionarium Australia. Constructionarium Australia would like to thank Will and Seymour Whyte for their support and leadership across multiple build projects.
Up first was Team Else who delivered a confident presentation focussed on the important elements that they wished to convey to their client.
Team Merle was up next, once again delivering a high-quality presentation that was extremely comprehensive, logical and methodical.
It is fair to say that our panel were in a feisty mood this afternoon, leaving no stone unturned as they assessed, analysed, questioned and reviewed our teams’ presentations. There were some curly questions asked, responses challenged and elements questioned as our team replicated the real-world experience that our cohort will face as their careers develop.
Before we get to the winner, it’s important to remember that prior to this week, the vast majority of our cohort were strangers to each other and to the tender process. Each representative of our panel was fulsome in their praise of their effort, their articulate presentations and the exceptionally high standard of work that had gone into submitting their tender.
And the winner of the contract to Build the Constructionarium Australia Seymour Whyte All-Female Story Bridge is….
Team Merle!
Congratulations to Team Merle, and commiserations to Team Else. Both teams did an amazing job and were separated by the smallest of margins, less than 2 points across all 6 judges aggregated totals.
Following the contract signing ceremony, it was time for a vital part of the week; team rebuilding. So at the start of the day, even though two teams entered, one unified team left ready to take on build week.
