International Women’s Day – Caroline Cozens

Published: 8 March 2024

To celebrate International Women’s Day, Caroline Cozens, Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust’s director of capital development, shares what it’s like being a woman at the top of her game in a traditionally male industry, and why she wants to see more girls and women wearing hard hats on building sites.

Caroline Cozens has always been curious about how things work.

Whether it was playing with Lego as a child, watching her plumber dad fix burst water pipes as a teenager, or transport planning the new town of Sherford, Caroline has always been driven by a desire to make things better.

And now, as Torbay and South Devon NHS Foundation Trust’s Director of Capital Development with responsibility of overseeing the building of a new £400million hospital in Torquay, she has set her sights on inspiring women to join the construction and engineering industries of the future.

“I’m naturally curious and I always want to know ‘how does that work?’” she said. “It has definitely helped me in my career to successfully deliver complex, large-scale projects on time.”

While she attributes her love of solving problems as providing a firm foundation in her career, Caroline pays tribute to her close circle of female friends, and in particular her childhood hero Ruth Kelly MBE as her inspiration.

She said: “Ruth was my Girls’ Brigade Captain and I learnt a great deal from her. She was a really strong leader and had high expectations for girls to embrace their talents, establish new ones and in particular to develop leadership skills. She was quite a formidable woman who gave a lot of time to supporting girls and young women. Ruth worked in pathology in Exeter for the NHS and I hope she would be proud if she could see me now.”

Caroline’s passion for improving communities has been a big part of her career, which before working for the NHS has included a number of infrastructure and project roles in local government. This included project management of the Plymouth and South Devon Freeport, the redevelopment of The Box, Plymouth’s museum and art gallery, and Plymouth Sound National Marine Park.

“The Box was one of my favourite projects,” she says. “The project management role was so varied and diverse, from managing the construction, exhibition fit out and the reload of two million objects back into the building, to supervising the installation of Mildred, a life-size replica woolly mammoth into her new gallery. That’s what I love about my job, I get to work with a range of people to deliver big changes that impact society. My skill is being the glue which brings everything together.”

As a member of the South West Women in Construction, Caroline is committed to working with her peers to encourage more girls and women to consider a career in construction and engineering, particularly in Torbay and South Devon.

She says: “I am always a bit disappointed when I’m the only woman working on a project. We desperately need more women in construction, including engineers. It’s such an exciting industry to work in. Our hospital in Torquay is getting £400 million of new buildings which will transform the way we deliver care, from state-of-the-art single rooms, modern new operating theatres, to a new emergency department.

“Engineering is a big part of our new hospital programme, including mechanical, electrical and civil engineering with a big focus on sustainability and carbon net zero. Women only make up about 12% of the engineering workforce in the UK and there are lots of opportunities for young women and girls who are talented in maths and physics. There are opportunities at colleges for routes to engineering roles, employer-sponsored degree apprenticeships and traditional degrees. Other roles include project managers, architects, quantity surveyors, estates and facilities management, skilled construction trades and a growing number of digital roles.

“I’m love my job and feel very fortunate to work on exciting projects. I like big, complicated challenges that can be solved in innovative ways. The joy comes from the feedback we receive from our staff and patients when we deliver projects such as our new endoscopy unit and theatres which are delivering such value to people’s lives. People are so impressed with what we can deliver with £20million and I have to tell them ‘wait until you see what we can do with £400million’.”

She encourages girls and women to surround themselves with people who will be an advocate and want them to succeed, and to never let people say you can’t achieve something.

“I was given some great advice several years ago when I struggled to see my next career step. I was told to get out of my comfort zone to learn and grow. It spurred me on to think about what I wanted to achieve. Trying new things can feel a bit scary, but you might also see how your skills can be transferable.

“Both conscious and unconscious bias surrounds women, and this is something I have experienced in my career. It can become a self-limiting belief, but I have grown to believe in myself and my abilities and I know that people value the impact that I bring. I’ve been described as feisty, highly-driven and focused, and I recognise this, and make people judge you on the value that you bring to your work.”

Caroline and her industry colleagues at South West Women in Construction and at Building Torbay are working together to grow a community workforce through outreach work with our schools and colleges to encourage people – particularly girls – to consider a career in construction.

“I have such a cool job, and I would encourage girls and women to not limit themselves, to be bold and to be brave. It’s such a fantastic industry to work in and the opportunities to make a real impact on people’s lives are endless, and it’s such a great feeling to have that at the end of the day you can say ‘I made a difference’.”

You can find out more about a career in construction at Building Torbay at www.investintorbay.com/build-torbay