Quantity Surveyor Review

My role, at the moment, nearly 2 full years into the apprenticeship, is to help assist on daily tasks that a quantity surveyor would normally complete. This can range from pre-contract tasks such as helping in procurement, cost estimates or measuring to post contract tasks such as costing change and whole life costing. I am doing this over various projects, but mainly working on one.

Everything I have learnt has been a new skill to me so I have been constantly learning. I have learnt how to use CostX to accurately measure drawings to scale, how to cost items of construction, the process of tendering, how to analyse valuations and write up recommendation for payment letters and certificates and I have learnt how to use knew software such as SmartSheets.

I enjoy my programme a lot. It is flexible so I am able to choose the best day for my study leave day and tutors and colleagues are always happy to help with University work. However, I feel like there is a lot of information to cover and knowledge to take in for 1 day a week. It forces you to work into late evenings, weekends and in work hours if capacity is free which I feel is a bit unhealthy while working 4 days a week.

It is very structured, I have regular meetings with my apprenticeship officer and line manager to keep up to date and organised. The university work is very organised into 2 modules, into specific weeks which makes it easy to follow and understand. At work, it started slightly unorganised, well it seemed that way to me anyway being new into the role and industry, but now I feel like I am progressing into a regular structured days.

I feel very supported. If I am ever unsure or misunderstood, I always know I can ask anyone from my company/department to help me and they will gladly. When I first joined I was even assigned a work buddy who help me get set up and still checks on me to this day, and teaches me new things.

UCEM offers as much support as I need, if I needed it, however I am mostly and independent worker and try to figure things out myself, but I know if I was ever stuck, I could ask a particular person working on the specific module and receive help quite quickly.

I find that the qualification is not that job specific and up to date with how we actually work and perform in our role. I would say it is useful for vocabulary and terminology, but can be outdated and not specific enough as a lot of projects these days are very bespoke and there are a lot more problems that arise which are new and we need to figure out there and then. I feel like I learn a lot more about my job at work, but that is what is meant to happen; the qualification is good support though.

There are many extra-curricular activities to get involved in. I have already played in a charity football event at Aston Villa FC with my work colleagues and I regularly play football with a group of colleagues every Wednesday after work.

Yes

Arcadis is full of great people who want to see you do well. Whatever the role you want to do here, they will be there to push you and help you do your best. They pay fairly, host great social events to get everyone one together and support everyone working there. They make you feel comfortable and happy at work and if you ever have any issue, you can go to anyone to get the right help. They also win very good and interesting projects for you to be a part of.

Make sure it is the best application you have made as you do not want to miss out because it is a great company to get into where you can also do a lot of networking. Only apply if you actually want to better and challenge yourself because they love pushing people to the next level to keep progressing.