We bring you an interesting interview from one of our long-Term tenants David Jamieson, Director of DRL Services and RailTrain UK.

David’s goal is to focus on establishing, improving and growing his businesses. He has a strong knowledge of ESFA funding guidelines, qualifications/apprenticeship frameworks and standards, as well as quality assurance. He also has  a strong rail background having worked on the track fo0r a number of years, as well as in the rail training sector.

1) How and why did you get started in this line of work?

“So, we’ve got two companies operating from here, we’ve got DRL Services which deals in government funded training, getting unemployed people back into work and that kind of thing, and we have RailTrain that deals in Rail Safety Critical training. I got started in DRL when I used to work in Finance, Compliance and that sort of background, and I ended up controlling some training at Lakeside Shopping Centre which I used to work for, I got involved in apprenticeships and just breaking away and doing my own thing, RailTrain, because we were training Rail apprentices and getting people opportunities in the railway for people we knew, we ended up starting RailTrain so we could facilitate all of their Rail training as well.”

2) What is most important to you in a company?

“Honesty, easy answer, honesty! I value that I can have an honest conversation with someone, it doesn’t always have to be something I want to hear though, most of the time It’s not what I want to hear, but if someone can tell me straight, this is how it is and there’s no messing around, that is by far the most important thing to me.”

3) How would you describe your business to a potential client?

“I would say we’re your one stop shop for your training and Rail related needs.”

4) Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

“Retired, is that too much to ask? Realistically its expansion, its more offices, we are currently looking at opening an office in Barnsley, so we are already looking at the National side of things, getting the North covered, so within 5 years I’d like to be a prime contract holder with the government for delivering apprenticeships and on the RailTrain side of things I would like to have multiple offices around the country.”

5) How has our business helped your business?

“Coming to the Thames Enterprise Centre as a fairly new business, we had had offices previously which we shared with other companies, so this place was really our first office as solo, so it was actually nice to get a bit of support and help with what office space we needed and the flexibility, we had a smaller office to start with, we had some flexibility on how the new office we were moving into would look, so its been quite nice as a small business to have that support and understanding. We’ve seen the changes here, the development and the effort that the Enterprise Centre has made to visually look more welcoming, to look like a more appealing space to come into in comparison to when we first came here, it was one small door and you would come to a little pull back window, and now we have a lovely full reception area still keeping hold of the Historical elements of Bata here, and when I have clients or visitors they ask about what the shoe moulds on the wall are all about and its nice as it’s a nice easy talking point.”

6) In 3 words describe our Enterprise Centre.

“Welcoming, Helpful, Eager and by eager, I mean quite keen to improve and quite keen to learn and develop yourselves as a business and eager to develop the businesses here.”

7) How did you first hear about Thames Enterprise Centre?

“We were looking for office space, it was online but can’t remember which website it was on, we visited a couple of places and actually when we come here and the conversations we had we just felt like it was the right choice.”