Faye Burnett

Faye Burnett works at the forefront of Mace’s retrofit offering, driving innovative solutions to tackle the climate emergency and create more sustainable buildings, estates and places. Joining the business in 2007, Faye has risen through the ranks as part of the Consult team, delivering value and service excellence in each and every project she works on.

How did you get into what you do?

I've always been passionate about the environment and tackling the climate emergency. It’s undoubtedly the single biggest challenge of our time and I want to help both Mace and our clients make positive steps to create a more sustainable future. 

I leapt at the chance to join the team in 2020, working with Hertfordshire County Council. We secured £24m of public sector decarbonisation funding for the client, as well as developing a broad programme to drive energy efficiency measures across 218 projects. 

Following this, I joined the Government and Housing team to help develop our retrofit strategy. As a business we’ve been delivering excellent retrofit services over the last decade, but now we’ve united our offer to help our clients make their portfolios safer and greener.  

Since joining the business in 2007, Mace has always offered me opportunities to develop my skillset and steer my career in my own direction. It's been hard work and required a lot of drive, but I’ve been fortunate to work for a business that enables its staff to grow and learn.

What do you enjoy most about your current role at Mace?

As a business we touch on a wide variety of different sectors, industries, clients, and subjects. The chance to collaborate with my colleagues, to share our collective knowledge and experience is exhilarating and demonstrates how much expertise there is across Mace’s people. I also love the opportunity to help tackle some of the largest challenges our clients face day to day. Our work not only supports them to become a better fit for the future, but also has a real impact on the communities our clients interact with.

How do you redefine the boundaries of ambition?

My team and I work every day to pursue a sustainable world. We work with our clients to help them navigate a path towards net zero or even net positive carbon. This is relatively new ground for our industry and a lot of our clients do not know the best way forward to align with government policy on carbon emissions and building safety. We are pushing the boundaries for how our entire sector tackles the climate emergency, building new and innovative methodologies to drive real change.

What's been your proudest achievement at Mace so far?

In March 2022 Mace Consult launched its retrofit strategy, which was a culmination of our retrofit experience and service offering over the past decade. I worked across our business to unify how we tackle retrofit projects, and the final approach not only reflects a great service for clients but also showcases the best of Mace.

Why Mace?

Mace is one of the most forward thinking, diverse, socially aware and climate conscious organisations in our industry. Why work anywhere other than the best?

What motivates you everyday?

I love helping our clients tackle important concerns, like climate change, social value, fuel poverty, rising capex costs whilst having the opportunity to make real positive change for our world.  The feeling of continually driving positive change is what gets me out of bed each morning. Every day brings the possibility of having a lasting impact on the communities we work within. It’s great to work for a company that’s as committed to the same goals as I am.

What skills do you need to be good at your job?

The biggest skill I rely on is my ability to bring disparate people together and engage them on and in a journey. Project management sometimes feels like a giant jigsaw puzzle - but everyone in your team owns different pieces. So you need to bring people together, manage a wide variety of roles and personalities, while still delivering the desired outcome on behalf of your client.  I enjoy building that puzzle and the process of bringing people together to focus on an end goal.

What advice would you give to someone getting into what you do?

There is sometimes a concern among graduates and trainees that you need to be a sustainability expert to enter a field that tackles the climate emergency. This simply isn’t true! The task of addressing the climate crisis is broad, touching on every part of our society. Everyone has their part to play in tackling it and just having an understanding of current climate and social issues will put you on the right path.

And while you can teach skills, you can’t always teach drive and ambition. If you want to work in addressing the climate emergency, your passion will sometimes be more valuable to employers than your skillset.  

What are you passionate about outside of work?

I’m a keen snowboarder and try to get away to the slopes as often as I can. Music is also a big part of my life and I take drum lessons in my spare time. However, most people will know me as a dog lover!