Creative thinking and consistent approach
Combining a recruitment service with a health and safety consultancy has proved to be a successful business model for Coyle Group
From its base in Blanchardstown in Dublin, specialist health and safety company Coyle Group continues to deepen its level of service to the gas, power generation, wind energy and construction sectors.
Having started out as a health and safety consultancy business in 2011, Coyle Group supplies safety people on a contract or permanent placement and offers safety advice for these high-risk, fast-track, large-scale industries. Its growing client list includes Vestas, Siemens, Alstom, ESB, Energia and Enercon.
According to founder and CEO Gavin Coyle, customers that started out using its recruitment services are now also looking for consultancy, and vice versa.
“We have recently expanded our services into software with the acquisition of a recruiting software business and the development of a safety auditing compliance tool,” he says. “We are consistently looking at smart ways to further increase our value-add to our loyal customers.”
Coyle holds an MBS in safety, health and welfare at work from Dublin City University and has over 20 years’ hands-on experience in the health and safety area, particularly in construction.
He had set up a health and safety consultancy and training partnership in 2006 before founding Coyle Group. “I had a vision for joining safety consultancy and recruitment together,” he explains.
Companies approached Coyle seeking recommendations for health and safety professionals because he knew the industry so well. “I was outsourcing these
people and didn’t really realise that I was actually falling into the recruitment game. So I made it more defined as a model.”
Now, at any given time, the company has up to 100 people contracting globally. The company only works in high risk areas. “These could include a power station or electrical infrastructure overhaul project; a new-build data centre, a wind farm project, a major demolition or large-scale construction project,” Coyle explains.
One of Coyle Group’s biggest contracts is with ESB Networks, which needed to improve its safety performance after two employee fatalities within two years. “Immediate measures were required, so I quickly prepared a strategy. That was the consultancy side of the business,” Coyle explains. “To resource the strategy, we required 20 health and safety professionals, working on high voltage and medium voltage projects.”
The company also has a contract with Energia for all of its wind farms and retail and offices premises, as well as its power station at Huntstown. It has a global agreement with Vestas, which designs, manufactures and installs an average of 20,000 wind turbines each year. “At any stage, Vestas can ask us for health and safety professionals for its projects. We currently have people in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Germany, Poland and the UK working for that one client.”
This year, Coyle Group’s turnover will be around €4m. The aim is to increase that to between €5.5m and €6m in the next tax year.
“We are consistently looking at smart ways to further increase our valueadd to our loyal customers”