NEWS & BLOGS

Meet Tom, Fabrications Manager at Connell at our Taranaki office!

Tom had set his eyes on a job with Connell because of the great chance to grow his skillset and career at a trusted organisation.

“Working for Connell seemed like such a good opportunity. There’s more room for growth, and I get to be a lot more hands-on with the management side of the business.”

Tom’s role is a core component of our service offering to customers and he acts as a key touchpoint throughout an entire project.

“We handle the full delivery of fabrication components, generally this involves site visits, pricing, procurement and management of relevant subcontractors.”

“We’ll be engaged a client early, visit the site, review the tender drawings and price the job.”

He’s driven by challenges, and loves it when clients approach him with problems they need a unique solution for.

“I like a challenge. I want to be given something difficult for me to figure out. Give me a tight time frame, critical work, and logistical challenges.”

“We have great clients who come to us looking for solutions to ideas and asking how we can help… trying to overcome problems that they might not have encountered before.”

Tom played a role in Connell’s award-winning Potou Intake and Tunnel Erosion Repair project in 2023 for Genesis, repairing the Potou intake within the Tongariro Hydro Scheme.

The project had raised significant health and safety risk including confined spaces, water management and isolated works.

For Tom, that meant finding solutions for the civil and fabrication side of the process, including working safely two hundred meters up at the inlet pipe in a tight, five-week timeframe.

The project won Connell several awards including the $1-$5 million project category, Health and Safety award and overall Supreme award.
Tom’s made good friends with the Taranaki team.

“Some of the guys here are now my best mates. They’re people you can ring up for a yarn or hang out with outside of work. Just a good group of people – and very proactive as a team.”

In his spare time, Tom is hanging out with his wife and kids, spending time in the family caravan or looking after the animals on his lifestyle block.