Project Consultant Fabienne Brutin’s reflections during lockdown

by | Jul 13, 2020 | News

Fabienne Brutin
ABC-Salt Project Consultant, Fabienne Brutin from Ayming Consultancy, France

During lockdown, we have been speaking to various partners and teams within ABC-Salt. Fabienne Brutin is the project’s consultant. We asked Fabienne for her thoughts and what she has been working on during lockdown.

Ayming is an International Business Consulting company specialized in providing decision making support and tools in order to increase the economic performances of its customers. Ayming operates in EU countries including: France, UK, Spain, Germany, Benelux, Italy, Portugal, Hungary, Poland & Czech Rep but also North America (USA & Canada) and Asia with 1 300 employees worldwide and generates revenues of 170 M€. Ayming Grants department owns a core expertise in innovation management with 40 experienced consultants trained in various fields, from finance to science & technology. In this perspective, we propose our services in building consortia around new R&D projects, and support them in preparing applications to obtain co-funding with funders such as European Commission. We lead each project to fruition and success by implementing management methods all throughout the project’s life.

Career advice

I trained as a chemical engineer. I was told very early (by teachers and relatives) to forge my career in chemical plants. But very soon I realised that there were many other opportunities, among which I selected Ayming! So my advice would be to open your mind to opportunities as your initial training/background is only a first step. The most important thing to remember for your own career is to find a way that addresses both your needs and wishes/desires.

What’s unique about ABC-Salt

The main reasons I enjoy working on ABC-Salt are that we have a great consortium which emcompasses a great deal of experience, expertise and all the different personalities complement one another. Multi-cultural, multi-sectoral and multi-disciplinary contexts have always been very rich areas of learning for me, and help me to ‘grow up’ again and again. ABC-Salt is a very ambitious project that may lead to pioneering results, and I find this exciting and highly motivating.

Lockdown

I found lockdown very challenging as I thrive on relationships and connecting to others, although all the new online tools have of course, been very supportive! But in parallel, I also had to manage homeschooling for my children and it was sometimes hard to keep them motivated… My insights however are that we all discovered new ways for communication, although we have to improve our methods, and that we definitely gain benefits in spending more time with our family.

What have you learned from ABC-Salt and its partners

Thanks to ABC-Salt, I have had the opportunity to run my first summer school as a consulting business expert. I delivered a 2-hour course on boosting one’scareer with EU projects/funds. It was a unique change to share my 20 years’ worth of experience in this domain. This kind of work and knowledge-sharing will continue during the next ABC-Salt spring school taking place in Stuttgart, Germany, in March 2021. I hope that many young researchers will join us there.

Decarbonisation and the road ahead

I think the road is quite steep, but we are seeing light on the horizon. Of course some technical and obviously economical breakthroughs have still to be made, but there is no way we can shirk back now from creating a greener future. ABC-Salt  and similar projects will for sure pave the way for political changes to come in the coming months.