As part of his commitment to CPD Hulbert completed an MSc in Facility and Environment Management at University College London in 2012. As part of his MSc Hulbert became intrigued with industries that were dominated by low-wage working and the people that worked within them. Hulbert explains "I became frustrated with the negative way in which industries such as cleaning were being portrayed. Staff were often treated unfairly and were just seen as a 'shift' rather than a human being. I wanted to take a different approach to managing these teams.”
Hulbert turned the industry thinking on its head and ask his cleaning teams ‘how can my job work for you?' After interviewing the staff directly and taking on board their recommendations Hulbert made a number of changes to shift patterns. The results saw a large reduction in absenteeism and turnover that was proved to have mathematical significance. After Hulbert saw his theory had worked in practice, he set the operational strategy for the whole business.
On completion of this course Hulbert commented "academic development and training are absolutely vital to raising the standards of the facilities management industry. Courses such as this from UCL are leading the way in facilities management academia across the world. We must continue to provide opportunities for staff at all levels to have access to this strategic learning".
The document entitled “Reducing absenteeism and turnover in the contact cleaning sector using job design intervention” can be found show cased on the UCL website: http://www.bartlett.ucl.ac.uk/graduate/programmes/postgraduate/mscdiploma-facility-environment-management/documents/A_Hulbert_2011-2012.pdf