A career retrospect with Craig Brown, Programme Director at Dounreay

This week (11th-13th September), the NDA group will be attending Nuclear Week in Parliament in London. The week provides a fantastic chance to engage with parliamentarians and industry representatives on the opportunities that nuclear energy presents, to bring together key stakeholders and decision-makers to hold productive conversations and to help drive forward the UK nuclear industry. During the week, the NDA group are sponsoring the skills and apprenticeship fair taking place on Tuesday 12 September, as part of their industry partnership with YGN to promote early careers opportunities in nuclear decommissioning and develop the next generation of the workforce.

The NDA group, made up of 17,000 staff, has a proven track record of investing in early career development and embracing diversity, offering a wealth of development opportunities and other benefits for those who join. Career opportunities vary from radiation protection to accountants, engineers to cyber security specialists and commercial officers to project managers.

Providing opportunities to apprentices is key to the NDA group’s skills agenda, so we spoke to Craig Brown, Programme Director at Dounreay, who began his journey in the nuclear industry as an apprentice and got his reflections on his career journey.

When I left school, some 35 years ago now, I just knew that I wanted to do something that was exciting and challenging.

I was no scholar, so I turned to something more practical and hands on; learning a trade as a chartered electrical engineer within the nuclear apprenticeship scheme and it was everything I wanted it to be. Since then I have never looked back and have been proactive in grasping every opportunity offered to me to collaborate and work on some amazing projects, with exceptional people all across the world.? Examples of these projects include the building new nuclear power stations securing future energy needs, helping to decommission nuclear facilities that had advanced our nuclear knowledge; restoring our environment using innovative and sustainable practices; delivering socioeconomic benefits that provide a positive legacy for the future and next generations.?

The nuclear industry is a community of people and so vast in opportunity and diversity. Alongside this, it is so well connected through its people who strive to support each other, who continuously push the boundaries to learn and advance our understanding of how nuclear science can be harnessed to enhance human life.? The history of the nuclear industry is steeped in breakthroughs and ‘eureka moments’ like few other sciences, and to this day there continues to be moments of excitement: will we ever capture the essence of the sun through controlling nuclear fusion? Will you be the person that achieves the impossible? Which is why I am confident that the nuclear industry is so attractive to those looking for an interesting and varied career.

I can honestly say there has been so many highlights in my career, and I realise it’s a cliché when I say there are too many to mention. Working in the nuclear industry has allowed me to travel the world from America to Japan, through Vietnam, Lithuania, Finland, Italy, France, Spain and many more, finally resting in the very north of Scotland at Dounreay.?

Progressing my knowledge, experience, and career through many varied roles as an engineer and now programme director has been genuinely gratifying. However I can honestly say one of the most satisfying parts is working as a STEM ambassador supporting science within the local schools. This takes me back to when it all started for me, the questioning to learn more, the sheer fun of doing something different, making new friends for life. And most importantly, it’s seeing elements of myself in those young people who are eager to enter into the same industry as me. It’s the reason why whenever I have young people looking to begin an apprenticeship within this industry asking me for advice, I keep it simple: give it a go – who knows where it might lead. That is what makes the nuclear industry so exciting: it unlocks so many possibilities and provides a future that you might never have imagined was possible.

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