Getting To Know You: James Doyle, Managing Director of Endeavour Group

We sit down with James Doyle, Managing Director of Endeavour Group, a building safety consultancy and training provider supporting duty holders responsible for some of the UK’s most complex and high-risk buildings.

Based in the North West and operating nationally, Endeavour Group brings an evidence-led, engineering discipline to the built environment as regulatory scrutiny continues to increase.

With more than two decades of experience spanning offshore oil and gas, process safety and fire engineering, Doyle applies high-hazard industry methodologies to residential and commercial settings, helping organisations work through the requirements of the Building Safety Act with a clearer understanding of their responsibilities.

His team works with clients to strengthen building safety through intrusive assessments, safety case support and accredited training. As an approved ProQual training centre since 2018, the business delivers nationally recognised qualifications across fire safety, passive fire protection and health and safety, and is currently launching three new Fire Risk Assessment qualifications at Levels 3, 4 and 5.

Alongside its UK work, Endeavour has delivered UK-standard training internationally through remote delivery for several years. More recently, this has developed into direct conversations with overseas organisations, including engagement in Dubai, who are seeking to better understand how competence, evidence and decision making translate into live, occupied buildings.

In this interview, Doyle discusses the challenges duty holders face under the Building Safety Act, why evidential rigour matters, and the principles guiding decision making in a sector where the stakes are high.

What is the main problem you solve for your customers?

The single biggest issue our clients face is a lack of reliable information at a time when the expectations placed on duty holders have never been higher.

The Building Safety Act has transformed the regulatory landscape, yet many assessments across the UK are still carried out through visual surveys or templated reports that do not meet the level of evidence the legislation requires. That gap creates legal, financial and operational risk.

At Endeavour Group, our role is to give clients a clear picture. We carry out intrusive compartmentation surveys, fire risk assessments, building risk reviews, safety case reports, resident engagement support, remedial action planning and ongoing compliance management, all underpinned by photographic evidence, technical justification and structured reasoning. Every finding is linked back to fire strategy intent and the statutory definition of a relevant defect so there is no ambiguity about what the issue is or why it matters.

Through our partnership with Riskflag, we also support clients with a digital golden thread that organises their evidence, actions and decision making in an auditable way. When people work with us, they gain confidence and a route to compliance.

What made you start your business?

Endeavour Group began in 2018 after I moved from more than two decades working in offshore oil and gas, process safety and fire engineering. In high-hazard environments, assessment quality, intrusiveness and evidential strength are not optional. You learn very quickly that reassurance means nothing if it is not supported by facts.

When I stepped further into the built environment, I could see an increasing gap between what the legislation would ultimately demand and what was being delivered on the ground. Many reports were non-intrusive. Many conclusions were based on assumptions rather than evidence. Organisations responsible for buildings were making important decisions without the technical understanding to identify risk properly.

I created Endeavour because the sector needed a consultancy that applied engineering discipline, communicated clearly and delivered assessments that could stand up to legal and regulatory challenge. What began as a specialist consultancy has grown into a national capability supporting high-rise residential, supported living, student accommodation, retail, commercial, education and transport.

What are your brand values?

For us, competence, clarity and integrity are not marketing terms. They are the foundations of how we work.

Competence means having the technical depth to interpret fire strategy, identify relevant defects, challenge assumptions and build evidence that supports decisive action. Clarity means presenting findings in a way that duty holders, residents and regulators can understand without ambiguity. Integrity means reporting what the evidence shows rather than what people hope to hear.

These values guide how we approach every survey, every safety case and every piece of advice we give.

Do your values define your decision making process?

Yes, completely. We always ask ourselves: would this stand up to regulatory, legal or third-party scrutiny? If the answer is no, we refine it.

Through years of working with the regulator we understand their role in asking the ‘what if’ question, and we ensure that our reports comprehensively satisfy this requirement with appropriate mitigation. We test our findings and their failure modes adapted from offshore safety case methodology, which ensures every conclusion is traced back to justification.

The same standard applies to our training centre, where evidential discipline underpins everything we deliver.

Is team culture integral to your business?

It is essential. Our team is our strength.

The work we do spans high-rise residential, student living, supported living, care environments, commercial and educational settings. Each brings its own challenges, and our ability to deliver depends on a culture built on openness, technical curiosity and shared accountability.

That collaborative approach also supports our international conversations, where the emphasis is on sharing experience and understanding how similar challenges are managed in different operating environments.

In terms of your messaging, do you communicate clearly with your audience?

Clarity is central to everything we do. Building safety is technical, but communication should not be.

Our reports explain the issue, the evidence, the risk and the action required in straightforward language. We avoid jargon and prioritise giving duty holders information they can use immediately. The same approach shapes our training, where real-world examples help learners understand how legislation applies in practice.

What is your attitude to competitors?

There are organisations in the sector that deliver excellent work, but there is still significant variation in standards.

We regularly see surveys that lack intrusive inspection or fail to link findings back to the definition of a relevant defect. These reports may reassure people in the moment, but they do not provide the level of evidence required under the Act.

What we do is driven by quality, not comparison. We know our methodology is robust because our evidence has already changed outcomes, including cases where developers have accepted responsibility for defects once they reviewed our findings. Strong evidence drives accountability.

What advice would you give to anyone starting a business?

Focus on building deep expertise and do not compromise your standards. Consistency, honesty and high-quality work are far more valuable than volume.

Surround yourself with people who share your approach and invest in their development. If you concentrate on doing things properly, reputation and growth will follow naturally.

What three things do you hope to have in place within the next twelve months?

First, the full launch of our Building Safety Masterclass to help duty holders understand relevant defects, liability pathways and evidential requirements under the Act.

Secondly, increasing the portfolio of higher-risk buildings being managed and achieving successful Building Assessment Certificate approvals.

And third, continuing to explore international conversations, including recent engagement in Dubai, where organisations operating complex, occupied buildings are asking similar questions around competence, accountability and how UK-standard training and assessment translate into real-world decision making.