Sweett Group, an international construction and property consultancy, has appointed Douglas McCormick as Chief Executive Officer of the company.

The appointment will be effective from 2 March 2015, at which time John Dodds will revert to being Non-Executive Chairman.

Douglas has over 30 years' experience in the construction industry and was until recently Group Managing Director, Rail, Atkins (UK), managing more than £200 million (US$309.7 million) of revenues and over 1,700 staff across the UK, India and China. He joined Atkins in 2002 and latterly served as Trading Director of Atkins Rail from 2007 with responsibility for the unit's commercial function, business strategy and development, marketing and communications.

Prior to that, Douglas was the Commercial Director at Metronet Alliance and Trans4m Ltd and had previously been a Project Management Director at Faithful + Gould, Scotland and Ireland.

Douglas is a Fellow of The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and holds an MSc in Construction Management and a BSc in Quantity Surveying. In addition, he is a Commissioner for the UK Commission for Employment and Skills, a non-executive Director of the Institute for Collaborative Working and sits on the Editorial Board of RailReview Magazine for Bauer Consumer Media.

John Dodds, Chairman of Sweett Group, said:

 "I am delighted to announce Douglas's appointment as Chief Executive of Sweett Group. He has the ideal background and combination of skills necessary to reinvigorate the company and I am looking forward to working with him in taking Sweett Group into the next stage of its development."