IAM Faculty Chair, Board member, and strategy manager at Scottish Water Jim Conlin on how he found a better way in asset management, why it is time for the profession to shine, and messing about on the canals of Venice Why asset management? I have been involved in aspects of asset management throughout my whole career in the water industry, I just didnt know it at the time. I imagine that like many people who have worked for a long time in the same industry, I found myself constantly thinking there must be a better way to do this. When I read the IAMs Asset Management an anatomy for the first time, I knew instinctively that I had found the better way and that was the start of my conscious asset management journey. Asset management enables organisations to be effective, efficient and sustainable, and if there was ever a time for the profession to shine, it is now Get involved The key role of the IAM Board is governance in all its forms: fiduciary, good practice and good conduct of members. The IAM Faculty is appointed by the Board as the primary technical authority for the Institutes products, publications and knowledge activities. It ensures that all standards, guidance, knowledge and other outputs produced by the Institute are developed within a common asset management landscape and aligned with the IAMs objectives. Read more about the IAM Board and IAM Faculty, or contact the IAM How do you describe your job to your family and friends? When you say your job is asset management strategy, you get a lot of blank looks so I tend to follow it with its about making sure that water and waste water systems work today and will continue to work for a long time into the future that seems to do the trick. I am very passionate about the sustainability of the water industry and, as such, it is easy for family and friends to wind me up about how seriously I take my job. Tell us more about your roles as IAM Faculty Chair and Board member My first challenge as Chair of Faculty was to get Faculty back up and running again. I have done that during the past year and the committee is now fully functional. We have great links with Patrons and NxtGen and the Knowledge Leadership Group. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the members of the committee for their time and dedication. It is a great group to be part of and more fun than the name would suggest. My role on the Board is to coordinate knowledge development and ensure that we are able to develop and deliver knowledge content. I believe that, as an Institute, we are unique because we understand and promote asset management as a whole. Many other organisations and institutes say they do asset management but actually they only look at one aspect, such as life-cycle delivery or maintenance. I want to use my roles to promote and organise the development of knowledge within the Institute so that we can share that with members, and with other institutes and organisations, so that the IAM becomes the go to place for information about asset management as a discipline. What are the three most important issues in the asset management profession at the moment? The most important issue facing everyone at the moment is the climate change emergency. Infrastructure asset management organisations have always faced the challenge of how to be effective, efficient and sustainable. Most organisations can get good at the first two, but now climate change and achieving net zero has made the sustainability challenge much harder and much more important. Asset management is the discipline that enables organisations to be effective, efficient and sustainable and if there was ever a time for the asset management profession to shine, it is now. How do you like to relax? Reading is my main form of relaxation, mostly science fiction and history books, and if they can be read somewhere sunny and warm, then all the better. I also find walking relaxing, whether along the beach close to home or climbing a Munro in the Scottish Highlands. Where would you like to be right now? Almost anywhere rather than working from home. If it was during the day, I would say the top of the Tarmachan Ridge, above Loch Tay, because the views are fantastic, but seeing as it is a cold winter evening, I am going to plump for Venice, a city I love. If you werent doing your current role, what job would you like to be doing? I think I would be happy to work in any infrastructure organisation helping them align their strategic objectives with their asset management plans. Alternatively, I would like to be a vaporetto pilot cruising up and down the Grand Canal in Venice all day, but perhaps I will save that until after I retire.