Staff Interview
Previous experience? Where are you based in the main? Eg office/branch/home: I live just outside of Warrington in the North West, I try to pop down to London at least once a month and will be in and out of the CLC Warrington office on a weekly basis.
Who’s on your immediate team?
Any shout outs for members of your team? My immediate team are Keely Gallop, Paul Raggett and Gareth Marshall. They are all superstars in their own right; I’m so grateful to have come in to such a talented bunch of people. Aside from their impressive bidding skills, Keely is lovely to chat to, she points me in the right direction and is a wealth of knowledge. Paul is full of great ideas and has put forward some great ways of
working. Gareth is a massive team player, always putting himself forward to help others wherever he can, he’s also a decarb guru which is always helpful on a retrofit bid!
What were you doing immediately before joining us?
I was working with Pennington Choices, a surveying and consultancy provider to social housing. I was their Head of Sales for several years, managing the bid team, business development team and key account team.
Previous experience and qualifications?
• MBA
• MLitt – Writing Practice and Study
• MA – English and Creative Writing
Name Aileen Gilchrist
Job title Bid Team Lead
Department/Division Bid Team
Date of joining Axis CLC 01/09/25
Reporting to Chris Haynes Group Head of Bids
• P405 – Management of Asbestos in Buildings
• IOSH Working Safely
• NVQ Sales and Marketing
First impressions of us all?
Everyone is so friendly, I never felt like an awkward newbie at any point, everyone genuinely wants to see people succeed and feel happy in their role, which is lovely. It’s great to see that the operational teams get so involved with bids, too – it is definitely a team sport and needs everyone’s input to create winning bids.
Immediate priorities – what does your day look like? My immediate priority is always my team – a number of us are quite new so I want to make sure that I support them as well as I have been supported in my first few
weeks. This includes taking on feedback from everyone’s experiences, old and new, to build on the great processes we already have in place. Personal development is also important and I want to make sure everyone is supported to reach their own targets.
My day to day is really varied, which I enjoy; some of my regular activities include reviewing bid documents to ensure our bids are bespoke, tailored to the client and that there are no sinister clauses lurking that might be a risk to the company. I review bid drafts, work with my peers to manage bid writer capacity, support junior members with their development, as well as working with the senior team on bid stats/data to inform our bidding strategy. At the moment, I am also supporting on recruitment, as we have a couple of exciting vacancies in the team.
Goals for the business?
The long term goal within the bid team is to ensure a gold standard approach to bidding. The recent merger of CLC and Axis has combined two brilliant
bid teams, giving us a great opportunity to cherry pick the best processes from each, and including feedback from new members from similar industries and competitors. Our current project is to design and roll out the best of both worlds to create a first class approach that will increase win rates and attract even more talented individuals to the team.
What do you need from the business/us to achieve these goals? As I mentioned previously, the operational teams are really engaged with our work; they’ve been really responsive to our requests for feedback. Similarly, it’s great that board members share and actively drive our vision – they’ve taken a hands on approach along the journey. There are some great innovation projects in the pipeline, including external training and IT solutions which board are actively behind. This ongoing support is all we can ask for.
Any challenges you are experiencing or can predict that you would like to share? Recruitment seems to have been a little challenging off the
bat, however, the market seems to be softening and I fully expect to see a full house by the end of November (touch wood!)
Finally…. Any hobbies, clubs, beliefs, activities you would like to share? Hiking – I am currently completing the Wainrights, which are a series of 214 mountains, hills and fells in the Lake District. I’ve completed over 100 so far.
Food – I live for food. I have been a vegetarian from the age of 10 - back in the day, restaurants seemed a little behind the times with limited options and so I made it my mission to learn to create as many exciting and interesting dishes to compensate.
Anything else you would like to add? Thanks to everyone across the business for making me feel so welcome, I am really looking forward to the future and to working with you all.