The EG Interview: Argent’s David Partridge on taking the BPF presidency

It’s all too easy for an agenda to be taken over. David Partridge recalls Oxford Properties’ European head Paul Brundage making that point of his stint as British Property Federation president between 2017 and 2018 – Brexit and its ramifications for the real estate industry dominated the agenda, leapfrogging much of what Brundage had expected to define his year in the seat. Partridge has an inkling of how Brundage must have felt. As the Argent senior partner takes over the trade body presidency from Grainger’s Helen Gordon, he too anticipates one issue to be at the fore. The coronavirus pandemic has “completely and utterly sideswiped” not only real estate, but almost every other industry and every part of society, he says. With that in mind, Partridge knows that the year ahead will call for the BPF to use its voice clearly. To help guide the industry through the recovery process, rebuild businesses and rebuild communities. “There’s a huge responsibility,” he says, adding with typical good humour: “You don’t want to drop this particular ball when it’s been punted at you up and under with the whole of the New Zealand front row coming at you – it does feel a little bit like that sometimes.” You don’t want to drop this particular ball when it’s been punted at you up and under with the whole of the New Zealand front row coming at you – it does feel a little bit like that sometimes But there is a sense of optimism as well as obligation. Partridge believes that a better, fairer society can come out of the events of recent months, one in which real estate has a mark to make. There will be a greater focus on issues such as the climate crisis and diversity and inclusion, he predicts. “They were there, but there’s a spark that has been lit, which I think we all in our heart of hearts feel that we should, could and can respond to in an incredibly positive way.” Above all, he sees a chance for real estate to reset its priorities along with much of the business world. “It’s almost a feeling of renewal,” he says. “An enormous amount of people suffered in a way that they should never have had to. But in terms of rebuilding society and economy, we’re all looking to do this in a better way than we would perhaps have done if the status quo had just continued.” Call to arms The BPF should be front and centre of that drive, Partridge says, not least through the continuation of its “Redefining Real Estate” initiative, a campaign for industry change centred on contributing to a productive economy, developing a diverse and skilled workforce, strengthening communities and protecting the environment. “Our call to arms resonates even more now,” Partridge says. “The fundamentals of what we’ve been trying to achieve and the drum that we’ve been banging are even more important and more relevant in the recovery.” Partridge has long been an advocate for real estate prioritising environmental, social and governance issues, and since 2017 has been a trustee for the UK Green Building Council. Now he hopes that the ‘S’ and ‘G’ in ESG will come into focus as much as the ‘E’ has in recent years. The BPF plans to publish a report on the social value of real estate in the coming months. “I think the environmental piece is something that, while absolutely crucial, people have got,” he says. “I’d like to move the attention beyond that, into the social and governance piece.” At Argent and Argent Related – its tie-up with Related Companies of the US – every proposal put to the board now needs to demonstrate “what are we doing for the environment and what are we doing in terms of social value as well as the results that we expect to deliver our investors”, he adds. Partridge points to the global reaction to the death of George Floyd at the hands of US police and the subsequent growth of the Black Lives Matter movement as the kind of societal and cultural development that real estate can no longer ignore. “There’s a shift in the zeitgeist here, where attention can begin to be paid to what we really mean by social value?” he says. “How can the real estate industry properly demonstrate that it plays an important part in creating opportunity and encouraging diversity and ensuring inclusion for everything that we do?” Influence the future Partridge knows his voice can only be part of the answer to these questions. His experience is unquestioned – we speak the day after he receives a cake and champagne to mark 30 years with Argent, whose work at King’s Cross is seen as an exemplar for urban regeneration. But he acknowledges that a younger, diverse generation must be welcomed into the real estate industry if it is truly to reflect the communities it serves. “Let’s face it, you can look at the board structure at all of the big REITs and none of us are going to be able to demonstrate beyond a certain amount of representation,” he says. “We are representative of a different era and it does take time for this diversity to come through society. Our responsibility is to ensure that we open up the passageways for the future generations, who will be more representative. They will be the people who actually have the influence on the future. Our job is to make that easier for them rather than to stand in their way.” The BPF Futures initiative, a networking group for junior real estate professionals, is part of that push. Now with some 1,400 members, BPF Futures also has a seat on the BPF board, currently held by chair Harvin Chohan, a member of the central London occupier advisory team at CBRE. That allows Chohan to bring the voice of a younger generation to board-level discussions at the federation, Partridge says, and to feed back that talk at the top to younger members in the networking programme. [gallery size="full" columns="1" type="slideshow" ids="1043603,1043604"] The need for real estate to pay more heed to unheard voices has long been a priority for Argent and Argent Related, Partridge notes, recalling the work that kicked off the King’s Cross redevelopment. “When we did the consultation back in around 2001, we went to the community before we put the planning application in and spoke to absolutely everyone,” Partridge says. “[Then-Argent chief executive] Roger Madelin was brilliant at this – he literally used to hound people in the local laundromats and things like that to get the community to tell him what they thought.” Their thoughts centred on two key points, Partridge says. One, make the neighbourhood safe. Two, open opportunities for the local community – the latter request leading to the establishment of the KX Recruit programme to help locals find work as the redevelopment lifted the economy. Those efforts to ask and listen before acting continue today. At Argent Related’s latest project, a redevelopment scheme in Brent Cross, an Argent Related-driven community group has already been operating in the area for 18 months, Partridge adds. “You do that before you start the development and then the development can begin encompassing a lot of things that the community wants,” Partridge adds. “A lot of people do it the other way round. They fly something from outside and then go, ‘oh, by the way, what do you guys want?’. Well, most of them just say ‘we wish you had never turned up’. But by being there in the first place, you got an opportunity to listen, to make sure that you’re designing everything that you do to meet their ends rather than the ones that you might perceive to be important from a helicopter.” Plumbers and estate agents Partridge knows that for all the efforts, there are many individuals who will only see the real estate industry as money-hungry developers and landlords, taking but rarely, if ever, giving back. A perception survey of the industry carried out last year by the BPF showed that the image of the industry was “dire”, he says. “It’s plumbers and estate agents, that’s where most people interact with the real estate industry,” he says. “They don’t acknowledge that every time they go to the office, every time they go to a shop, the houses that they live in, [those places] have been through the same process.” The Covid-19 crisis has put the issue in the spotlight again, with some government actions to support the high street seen as favouring retailers and tenants rather than landlords. But Partridge believes a more nuanced conversation is now being had – and that the government is at last listening to the real estate industry. “It got off to a bad start,” he says. “The retailers and hospitality industry jumped in first. Quite right – they were the guys who were suffering on day one. No pubs, no restaurants, no shops. So there was a swing with a moratorium on statutory instruments that went one way. That has swung back now, over time, as government has realised that while there were a few high-profile people who were perhaps not behaving correctly, most of the property industry, and certainly the really big responsible investors and landlords, were acting in a pragmatic and sensible way.” He adds: “None of us want empty offices or shops because it doesn’t help us. And so if we can support businesses to get back on their feet, then that’s got to be the best thing for us in the future as well.” Over the coming year in the BPF president’s seat, Partridge will need to balance that long-term view with a focus on the nearer-term challenges of the recovery. For an executive who has dedicated much of his career to redevelopment and regeneration, that probably comes as second nature by now. “I don’t underestimate the importance of the next couple of months in terms of supporting everybody in the economy and all the people who are going to be out of work,” he says. “We need to do our bit to help soften the blow of that – and never lose sight of the big prize, which is to deliver the societal change which we all believe in.” To send feedback, e-mail tim.burke@egi.co.uk or tweet @_tim_burke or @estatesgazette