p.k. murphy construction limited
Building and Public Works Contractors

PK Murphy builds success story in Tyrone

Kieran Murphy receives the Spirit of Enterprise Award

Tyr­one firm PK Murphy Con­struc­tion Ltd. has been named as the second monthly win­ner in the new series of Spirit of Enter­prise Awards. In a period of extreme dif­fi­culty for the con­struc­tion sec­tor as a whole, PK Murphy has been recog­nised for its abil­ity to diver­sify and grow des­pite volat­ile conditions.

The Spirit of Enter­prise Awards series was estab­lished by Chartered Account­ants Ulster Soci­ety in part­ner­ship with North­ern Bank and Busi­ness Eye to reward indi­gen­ous com­pan­ies that demon­strate real entre­pren­eur­ial spirit, as well as innov­a­tion and the cre­ativ­ity to succeed.

PK Murphy fol­lows Seopa Ltd as the second monthly win­ner in this series and will go for­ward for con­sid­er­a­tion for the over­all award when all ten monthly win­ners have been named.

The com­pany star­ted in Pomeroy in1996 with hus­band and wife team Kieran and Ros­aleen Murphy and has grown to become a mar­ket leader in both private sec­tor and pub­lic sec­tor con­struc­tion in North­ern Ireland.

Kieran Murphy says: “I star­ted out as a car­penter work­ing as a sub­con­tractor on some major local build­ing sites. My wife and I saw an oppor­tun­ity to build the scope of what we were doing so we star­ted to increase the level of pub­lic sec­tor work we were doing with the North­ern Ire­land Hous­ing Exec­ut­ive and local Hous­ing Associations.”

This decision paid off, as PK Murphy now holds the Hous­ing Executive’s 5 year planned main­ten­ance con­tract for two of the five areas cov­er­ing North­ern Ire­land – that’s over 38,000 homes. From this expert­ise in the pub­lic sec­tor, the com­pany has been able to expand and diver­sify into new areas and now deals with new build, refur­bish­ment, main­ten­ance and civil engin­eer­ing projects.

The abil­ity for Kieran and Ros­aleen to re-invent the com­pany and diver­sify has been a key strength.

Kieran says: “When times were good and the massive boom in private sec­tor hous­ing was tak­ing place many people told us to get out of pub­lic sec­tor con­tracts and focus on where the real money was. But we felt that we had a strong repu­ta­tion in that area and while we did have interests in prop­erty devel­op­ment, we felt it was import­ant to main­tain and build on our suc­cess in the pub­lic sec­tor as well.”

As the con­struc­tion sec­tor began to enter a more uncer­tain time in the past couple of years, Ros­aleen and Kieran recog­nised the need to slow down the income stream from prop­erty devel­op­ment in order to con­cen­trate on pub­lic con­tract work.

The devel­op­ment of vari­ous sites pur­chased in both North­ern Ire­land and the Repub­lic of Ire­land were put on hold as the com­pany tailored its expert­ise towards pub­lic ser­vice works. This was hugely suc­cess­ful and by the end of 2008, the company’s cap­ab­il­ity and effi­ciency in the pub­lic sec­tor meant that over two thirds of the firm’s income was from such contracts.

This income stream has been main­tained in light of the con­tin­ued prob­lems with private hous­ing devel­op­ment and the dir­ect­ors are now look­ing towards expand­ing their oper­a­tions to meet oppor­tun­it­ies within the Eng­lish and Scot­tish markets.

Kieran says: “Cer­tainly con­di­tions within our industry are extremely dif­fi­cult, and will prob­ably remain so for some years to come, but for us this isn’t a time to sit still. We’re now look­ing to oppor­tun­it­ies in new geo­graphic areas, par­tic­u­larly Eng­land and Scot­land. Hous­ing Asso­ci­ations there work on the same Egan prin­ciples that we do here in North­ern Ire­land and we believe that our com­pany has a strong repu­ta­tion built on exper­i­ence, qual­ity and com­pet­it­ive­ness. Our skills can be very eas­ily trans­ferred into new markets.”

PK Murphy’s com­mit­ment to innov­a­tion and qual­ity is reflec­ted in its accred­it­a­tions and achieve­ments within the industry.

The company’s cur­rent focus on pub­lic sec­tor con­tracts does not leave it com­pletely sheltered from the reces­sion though. Kieran says: “In the com­ing years there will be con­sid­er­able pres­sure on pub­lic spend­ing and we expect sig­ni­fic­ant cuts, although at this stage we do not know how much this will affect social hous­ing pro­jects. It’s a major chal­lenge for every­one in our industry, but we must be able to respond and we believe that our focus on qual­ity and the team that we have in place will allow us to con­tinue to per­form strongly.”

Asked if he has any advice for bud­ding entre­pren­eurs Kieran says: “Be ready to put in a lot of long hours and a lot of hard work. You really need to put the busi­ness first, and that means some really big com­prom­ises, even when it comes to your fam­ily. Make your busi­ness as effi­cient as pos­sible and don’t for­get to get some good advisors beside you. We’ve been very grate­ful for the guid­ance we’ve received from Sean Cavanagh, Aeveen Daly and Des Kelly at Cavanagh Kelly.”

Sean G. Cavanagh of Cavanagh Kelly Chartered Account­ants, who nom­in­ated PK Murphy for the Award says: “In the past few years PK Murphy has dis­played an ambi­tion to be a mar­ket leader in both the pub­lic and private sec­tor in North­ern Ire­land in its respect­ive fields of expert­ise and still holds this ambi­tion as the eco­nomy rises from the depths of recession.

“Ros­aleen and Kieran are con­stantly look­ing to diver­sify and expand and we can anti­cip­ate fur­ther growth with an increas­ing num­ber of con­tracts secured in the Eng­lish pub­lic sector.”

Philip Melville, Busi­ness Man­ager with North­ern Bank, spon­sors of the Award, said: “PK Murphy is a very worthy win­ner of the Spirit of Enter­prise and a very wel­come example of suc­cess within the local con­struc­tion sec­tor dur­ing test­ing times. The PK Murphy story shows the import­ance of local com­pan­ies being will­ing and able to adapt their busi­ness to cope with a dynamic and volat­ile industry.

“We believe that it is vital, espe­cially in the cur­rent cli­mate, to high­light and reward our best young busi­nesses and so North­ern Bank is delighted to be involved with the Spirit of Enter­prise Awards.”

Nom­in­a­tions for the Spirit of Enter­prise Awards are encour­aged. The cri­teria by which the win­ners of the Award are selec­ted are not profit growth or invest­ment raised, but rather ideas, ambi­tion and determination.

From: Spirit of Enter­prise Pro­file for Busi­ness Eye

Posted in News