Job Descriptions: Civil Engineer

A Civil Engineer is a specially trained professional who deals with the construction and planning of the built world, with remits stretching from bridges and buildings to roads and train lines.

Civil Engineers are responsible for designing, building and maintaining the built world, with specialities ranging from buildings and bridges right through to rail networks and roads. Working mainly on a project by project basis, Civil Engineers are expected to design safe and lasting structures and oversee their construction and completion, combatting and overcoming issues such as changes to landscape, climate change and natural disasters.

This is a career usually reserved for those who have studied a Civil Engineering degree although similar disciplines to allow access to this kind of role. The important nature of much of a Civil Engineer's work requires high levels of specialist knowledge. Whether this is construction processes or design and architectural processes, it is vitally important that Civil Engineers are apply this knowledge properly and safely. Other requirements that graduates need to be successful as a Civil Engineer are strong maths skills and strong analytical skills. They are required to ensure that the work is carried out with precision and accuracy.

Civil Engineer Salaries

The average starting salary for a graduate Civil Engineer is £26,559. This is a superb salary to start on and, in a field like Civil Engineering, this will only increase rapidly as graduates become more experienced and specialise in specific areas.

As the comparison shows, graduate Civil Engineers earn a competitive salary compared with graduates in similar engineering fields. It should also be noted that there is always a shortage of trained graduates so Civil Engineering employers are offering great incentives to attract the best talent away from finance careers.

The Daily Duties of a Civil Engineer

As mentioned before graduates in Civil Engineering tend to specialise in particular areas when they join companies. However, independent of specific fields and applications of practices, there are a range of duties that graduate civil engineers will undertake as part of their daily duties.

• Assessing materials - A central understanding that is needed for graduate Civil Engineers is understanding and assessing materials needed for particular projects. This could be relating to budget constraints and levels of durability for projects that are going to be undertaken.
• Developing designs - This is the main function of Civil Engineers. They will develop complex and detailed designs for projects. This requires thorough understanding of the latest Civil Engineering practices and advancements. It also requires the use of complicated programmes to produce these designs. These are highly important and Civil Engineers need to ensure these are both feasible in practice and able to be done within the set budget.
• Project management - A large part of Civil Engineers work is project managing to ensure their plans are put into operation correctly and efficiently. Project management also would require graduate Civil Engineers to deal with problems that arise in implementation and find solutions as they come along.
• Site visits - Visiting sites where projects are going to be situated is an important part of the process for graduate Civil Engineers. They are able to assess the area, the ground and any environmental scenarios that might impact on the work they do.
• Working with other professionals and departments - Civil Engineers are not required to do all the work themselves and are often looked upon to delegate parts of the project work to building firms and other subcontractors, as well as other professionals like Architects and Surveyors. This brings with it its own problems of organisation and delegation.

Civil Engineering is a fantastic career for graduates who are precise and able to bring creative solutions and designs to life, and maintain these for the future. Civil Engineering strikes the balance of creative designs and practical and precise applications and the career can be extremely rewarding when Civil Engineers see their designs realised.