We're proud that Marshall Day Acoustics has always been a company that thinks creatively with a dynamic organisational culture that nurtures the growth of our team members.
We’re always talking about innovation and encouraging our staff to take risks, explore opportunities and not be afraid to think differently. We recently put our money where our mouth is and began a pilot international employee exchange program with a like-minded company – Aercoustics, one of Canada’s leading acoustics engineering firms. Lachlan Deen, one of our star consultants based in the Melbourne office, recently returned from a six-month stint as our first exchange program guinea pig, working with Aercoustics in Mississauga, just outside Toronto. For Lachlan, who has been with Marshall Day for seven years, being able to see if the grass really was greener on the other side, but in the best possible way, with the guaranteed safety of his position when he returned, was a once in a lifetime. Apart from the shock of a record-cold North American winter, Lachlan took to his new role like a duck to water. Sharing his technical knowledge and Australian sense of humour with his Aercoustics colleagues, he could look at their organisation as an insider which was an invaluable experience and one that he fully intends to leverage to affect change and improvements at MDA.
While Lachlan was attending ice hockey and baseball games (and working on some pretty special acoustics projects Monday to Friday), we had the pleasure of welcoming Addie Denison from Aercoustics to our Collingwood head office. Apart from being a delight to work with, Addie who came to Aercoustics straight after graduating four years ago, embraced the Melbourne sunshine and really enjoyed being able to make a positive contribution to MDA on a variety of acoustics projects she worked on.
An international exchange is a bold move and one that both Addie and Lachlan were thrilled to take up. From a management perspective, we’ve discovered a lot of synergies between the way our two companies operate and we’re using the insights gained on both sides to synthesise work practices and improve client experiences. Expanding our working partnership with international counterparts like Aercoustics, not only directly benefits our staff, it also widens our experience and the expertise we can provide. In addition to injecting new ideas and challenging the status quo, the program continues to have wider advantages and flow-on effects that have enhanced internal systems and bolstered long-term relationships.
Attracting and retaining talent is really important to us and the exchange program is just one of the ways that we stand out in our commitment to provide our team with the best possible opportunities for personal and professional development. We hope this is the first of many international exchanges, both of people and ideas, and we will continue to invest in our people.
A big thanks to Aercoustics President and CEO, Steve Titus, who shares our vision, and fellow MDA consultant Dan Griffin, who really championed the idea of an exchange program. Dan’s commitment to making the program a reality may have stemmed from his own time living and working overseas and we’d like to credit his drive and contribution.
For Addie and Lachlan, the exchange was a big step in their career evolution. Working in a new environment was an opportunity for skill diversification, international networking, personal discovery and perhaps most importantly, social and cultural interactions that created memories to last a lifetime.
For more information about our colleagues over the pond, please visit aercoustics.com
For more information about us, please visit https://au.marshallday.com/about-us/
