INWED is an international awareness campaign to raise the profile of women in engineering and focus attention on the amazing career opportunities available to girls in this exciting industry. It takes place annually on 23 June.
Nicola Oldfield IEng ACIWEM MICE,Senior Project Manager
Nicola is responsible for large and complex flood risk management schemes. She is an Incorporated Engineer and has been an active ICE member for 17 years. She is also a Member of the Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management (CIWEM).
She says: “Engineering provides society with all the infrastructure it needs to function – water treatment and distribution, transportation, energy to name a few. I’ve spent most of my career working in flood risk management, delivering many interesting projects in both rural and urban areas.”
“These projects help improve life for people and have a wider impact in terms of supporting and improving the local and national economy. Engineering is about changing things for the better and managing and maintaining the systems we have for the benefit of everybody; balancing the needs of communities, the economy and the environment and using resources wisely.”
“I enjoy working on a project from start to finish – taking a problem and investigating the potential solutions, working with a team of different specialists to find ways to overcome challenges, refining the final details and then putting the solution into place. It’s not just about building stuff, there are so many other skills a civil engineer needs, including good communication skills and the ability to innovate and find different and better ways of doing things. The satisfaction for me is completing a project and seeing the difference it makes for people, knowing that all the hard work has paid off and enjoying what I do!”
The engineering industry needs a good mix of employees from all social backgrounds and both sexes. Engineering is not a natural career choice for many women as it has been historically viewed as a male occupation. Whilst attitudes are changing there is still a lot to be done to encourage women to enter what can be an exciting and rewarding profession.
Nicola continued: “Working on my current project I am part of an almost all-female team with the design engineer, geotechnical engineer and project director.”
"The UK’s productivity lags behind the rest of the G7 group of industrialised nations by some way and a world class engineering workforce is a key to closing this gap. However, the UK has faced an engineering skills shortage for some time now, and the uncertainty of Brexit brings further challenges. It is vital that we look to bring underrepresented sections of our society into the infrastructure sector.
"Women represent 12.7% of ICE's total membership and female applications to ICE are slowly rising, with graduate numbers at 16.4%. But there is a long way to go, and we must take every opportunity to ensure we show women and young girls that engineering can offer a creative and richly fulfilling career.
ICE continues to support International Women in Engineering Day, and works across the year to develop programmes to address the gender imbalance within the sector. Nicola took part in the 2016 International Women’s Day and, the ICE Peterborough Branch 50th Anniversary celebrations giving talks to local groups.
One of the her most memorable projects is the Whittlesey Washes Flood Storage Reservoir or ‘washland’ Which dates back to the 1600’s to aid drainage of the fens and hold water during high tides.
“I am following in the footsteps of those innovative 17th century engineers, delivering projects to keep the washland functioning and protect people, property and land from flooding. The washland is subject to the requirements of the Reservoirs Act, 1975 and is also a significant site for wildlife, being designated under the Habitats Directive, which in itself presents a number of challenges to engineering works.”
“Under Section 10 of the Reservoirs Act, works were required to ensure the continued safety of the reservoir dam. I led the Whittlesey Washes bank strengthening works through initial studies, option appraisal, detailed design and construction.”
“Managing a team of consultants and contractors, I delivered the £26M project a year ahead of programme, with savings of around £5M. The flood storage reservoir will continue to protect hundreds of properties and 7,000 hectares of high grade agricultural land for many years to come. I’m proud that I have contributed to the future of a system which was created and has been improved by many famous engineers over the centuries.”
Image: Nicola Oldfield at the Whittlesey Washes.
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