INTERVIEW | SASHA KRSTANOVIC CIBSEs 2021 Engineer of the Year, Sasha Krstanovic FCIBSE, took the bold decision to form a new consultancy at the height of the pandemic. She tells Alex Smith how she is using her knowledge and experience to help clients and communities work with designers to decarbonise their building stock FOR THE GREATER GOOD T CURRICULUM VITAE August 2021: HS2 design panel August 2020: Founder, mstep December 2019: Director, the Equilibrium Network Group 2018: Trustee and board member of Higher Education Design Quality Forum March 2004 to August 2020: Director, Aecom 1992-94: Bachelor of Engineering (BEng Hons), mechanical engineering, Imperial College London 1986-1991: Bachelors degree, mechanical engineering, University of Belgrade Interests Krstanovic is a keen diver and director of the London Diving Centre, where she manages the social media channel. She says diving brings her closer to the environment and has made her aware of the responsibility of humans to protect the oceans. he past 18 months of the Covid pandemic has seen profound changes in the way we work, with many people reassessing their careers and taking on bold new challenges. One of them was CIBSEs 2021 Engineer of the Year Sasha Krstanovic FCIBSE who left her job of 16 years at Aecom to start her own company in the midst of lockdown last year. Krstanovic worked for some of the biggest building services engineers in the UK including Hoare Lea, BDP and Aecom before starting mstep with two partners, Cristiano Michelena and Fiona Esler. The fledgling building services consultancy works on newbuilds, but mainly specialises in decarbonising existing building stock. I never thought I would say this so soon in the 21st century, but new buildings are easy to get to net zero. However, there is an energyintensive network of buildings that need to be operated properly, says Krstanovic. Msteps founding core values of equity, inclusion and responsibility are reflected in the work it is doing to decarbonise buildings in communities that dont have the finance or knowledge to improve their properties. It is currently developing an assessment tool to help councils prioritise the decarbonisation of their building stock. Councils need help, says Krstanovic. There are four million council homes in the UK. If local authorities are to hit net zero targets by 2030, then they will have to look at reducing carbon in their existing homes. Forward-thinking Mstep stands for Mind, Skills, Tools, Environment and Planning, and its no coincidence that the thinking comes first. We as engineers are inventors, thinkers, tinkerers, says Krstanovic. Its a waste of talent if we always default to the way things have been done before. I really dont like lazy engineering, where we wont look at something if someone says it wont work. For example, engineers will specify fan coils because in tall buildings agents will say clients dont want anything else, but thats crazy, says Krstanovic. Were the engineers, and were meant to be suggesting whats better for the building, the owner and the world. Its a waste of talent if we dont. All four full-time mstep staff work from home, with Krstanovic based in her North London family home of more than 20 years that she shares with her scuba diver husband and techy/arty younger child. Her eldest son is studying ocean science in Plymouth. By her side on my visit were her two doting dogs Tia a Hungarian Vizsla and Zhuchka, a Serbian street dog. She is a keen supporter of flexible working and believes office space is too valuable in terms of carbon and energy for someone to be sitting in a chair all day writing emails. Rather, she says, they should be reserved for creative collaboration and the exchange of ideas. I believe organisations will get the best out of people if they support their lifestyle, whether that be working nine to five in the office, working from the beach or anything in between. She believes Covid has accelerated the move to more flexible working though she believes construction was becoming more receptive to home working even before the pandemic. At Aecom, where Krstanovic was a director, a Freedom to Grow plan gave 70,000 staff the opportunity to work where they liked. Flexible working is particularly beneficial 24 September 2021 www.cibsejournal.com CIBSE Sep 21 pp24-26 Sasha Krstanovic.indd 24 27/08/2021 15:53