Openreach expands by creating 16 new roles and opening a new base in the NW

Launched in in July 2020, the department initially created eight new roles within the business to support its Ultrafast Full Fibre broadband build within the region.

With the success of the team of eight thus far, it is now expanding further with new roles ranging from Civil Engineering team members to supervisory positions and opening a new base in the North West area. This significant investment will provide greater opportunity to connect people to our Ultrafast Full Fibre network and will largely support people living in Belfast and the North West area of the province.

Mairead Meyer, Director of Openreach Northern Ireland, said: “As the largest digital infrastructure provider in NI, new recruits to our Civils team will join our existing dynamic team of over 1000 skilled, resourceful and innovative people. As demand for faster and more reliable broadband continues to grow, our teams are working right across NI to build, manage and maintain the broadband network. Our recently formed Civil Engineering department is central to this and I’m delighted that we can continue to create employment opportunities after a challenging year.”

The Civil Engineering department, which is currently based in Mallusk, has already played an important role in the development of Openreach’s network infrastructure and support existing service delivery and engineering teams in bringing faster, more reliable 1 Gbps capable broadband technology to homes and businesses across NI.

Specifically, the team are responsible for installing new underground infrastructure to carry the fibre cables right into customers’ homes, supporting the rollout of Openreach’s broadband network in urban and rural communities.

James Burleigh, Contracts Manager at Openreach NI, was central to the launch of the Civil Engineering department, having worked closely with Openreach colleagues across the UK to learn from their experiences in launching similar teams.

He explained: “After seeing how successful Civil Engineering departments across the UK have performed, I thought it was a great opportunity to establish a similar team in Northern Ireland to help support our Ultrafast Full Fibre broadband build programme. Based on the insights shared from our Openreach colleagues and the operating models they have in place, the team have been agile and responsive, able to mobilise at any time to support our colleagues as they work on the network. I’m proud that the team has had great success so far and look forward to welcoming further recruits over the coming months.”

In addition to the expansion of the Civil Engineering team, Openreach NI recently announced that they would be recruiting 100 new apprentice engineers between 2021 and 2022 as part of their £100 million investment in Northern Ireland.

For more information on the roles available at Openreach and to apply visit https://bt.taleo.net/careersection/external/jobsearch.ftl?lang=en&keyword=Civils.

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