5 minutes with Courtney Meyer, Quantity Surveyor

What does it take to be a great Quantity Surveyor? Courtney Meyer, a Quantity Surveyor based out of the Gleeds London office believes it’s as much about the people skills as the technical knowledge and numbers.

“You have to be good with people, especially when it comes to communication," she says. "Understanding your client is vital. There’s a lot of negotiation, talking, and teamwork as you work with your client to manage costs and procurement."

“I had always known that construction was the sector I wanted to work in but had always assumed that the route to doing that would have been through architecture or engineering,” Courtney explains. “I was shadowing an architect - attending project meetings and observing the different roles of each team member - when I met a Quantity Surveyor for the first time. My attendance at those meetings and finding out about quantity surveying showed me there were other routes into construction.”

After investigating quantity surveying, Courtney completed a BSc in Construction Studies Specialisation, followed by a BSc (Hons) in Quantity Surveying at the University of Cape Town where she got involved in the CIOB Global Student Challenge, a competition that asks students to deal with simulations of construction scenarios and project manage them. She and her team made it to the final six and were flown to the finals which took place in Hong Kong, alongside the CIOB Annual Members’ Forum.

“It was a fantastic opportunity to challenge myself and learn a lot about the key skills I now use every day on complex projects, except now they aren’t simulations. The competition was how I met Chris Soffe from the Gleeds Americas team, and I really liked their approach to construction consultancy."

On leaving university, Courtney was supported by Gleeds to relocate to the U.S to join the Gleeds team in Atlanta, and then again with her subsequent move to London. Since then, we have been proud to support her in developing her career; most recently by supporting her as she worked towards her MRICS accreditation.

“Obtaining my RICS accredited degree was only the start. There were still about 24 months of work and exams to complete before I would be fully qualified. Gleeds really supported and encouraged me, not just in terms of providing me with valuable work experience and industry exposure or the financial costs of exams and memberships, but they have an excellent training programme that involved pre-mock and mock examinations. They helped me build my confidence before I sat my final assessment."

“Working towards my MRICS professional designation has helped me develop those skills even further and now I have a globally recognised accreditation that is reinforced in the eyes of my colleagues and clients. It’s another step in developing my career and I’m excited to be doing that in the construction industry. It’s an environment that really does challenge you but it’s also really rewarding.”

If you’d like to make the move into working in construction with Gleeds and really be supported in developing your career, take a look at our current vacancies at gleeds.com/careers.