TRAINING 1 (QUANTITY SURVEYING TEAM and CONSULTAN TEAM FOR PRO-MAN (MTIUS) LTD)
 

During the course of the first training that I had at the new airport terminal in Mauritius, I felt a little bit lost in the beginning. This mainly because I recently started a Construction degree at the University of Cape Town and was not used to be involved in such a big project. I stared slowly by learning the different construction processes and learnt about the Bill of Quantities. I also looked at the architect’s drawing and tried to figure out what was happening. What really helped me understand the drawings and construction techniques was the frequent site visit. Then the facts of seeing in front of me the way they were actually building helped me understand most of the building process.​
 

The junior quantity surveyor was very helpful as he would regularly take me to meetings with the contractor and I had the feeling of being involved. I got to see how the negotiations between client and contractor happen. Furthermore he would teach me how to measure but since at that time I haven’t done any measuring at the university it was not making much sense.​
 

Therefore I was more helpful to the consultant team during that period. I basically helped in producing monthly reports and got acquainted to the various documents produced to the contractor and client on a monthly basis. That open my eyes on seeing how big the project was in tem of resources used in the construction industry. The consultant team consisted of a big team of design, structural consultant and engineers also. One of the engineer’s (a civil engineer) took me under his wings and showed me the way around. We would go to meet up with the project manager, the contractor and many other people and it used to get very technical about what they would talk. Gratefully he would later explain to me afterwards what was happening and I could see the reason why you should know your work very well. If you are not well trained and have a good knowledge about what you are doing you are bound to fall behind in your work and it is most likely that people would take advantage of you.​
 

So in general the experience and knowledge that I gained from the few weeks that I gained in being involved even though my role was of little significance in such a big project (probably the biggest project that Mauritius had had in a long time) was very important to me as it made me aware of how massive the role of construction is and all the resources it uses. Therefore I learnt a lot form that training experience and could only move forward from there.

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TRAINING 2 (QUANTITY SURVEYING TEAM and INSPECTION TEAM FOR PRO-MAN (MTIUS) LTD)

 

For the second time that I went on training, I chose the same company. The reasons behind this choice were very easy since they are a very big international company operating in Mauritius and the project that they were working on was the biggest one in Mauritius. So therefore I consider myself very lucky to have been accepted and had the opportunity to work with professional people of this high standard. This time around having completed a second year in Construction and Economic Management at the University of Cape Town and most importantly having learnt about the basic measuring techniques, I started straight away in the Quantity Surveying Team.
 

They initially updated me about the construction, how things had been going on and I was a little bit amazed at how fast the main contractor has been building. They were done with the superstructure, roof and all they had left to complete was the finishes inside the building. This was very interesting and when I went on site I was surprised that the quality of the work was very high and it actually looked like they were going to be done soon. So when I went back to the office the senior quantity surveyor told me that most of the measuring was done and what I could help with was the measurement and calculation of variations. This consisted of measuring the variations that is changes in the initial drawings like changes in finishes. I had the opportunity to measure a variety of things including the new location of power supply plug points and the changes that the power cable would incur, also measured the finishes in walls and the changes in blockwork. This was very helpful as I actually learnt how to understand drawing on drawing programs like autocad and measured using the different techniques provided by the software. The junior quantity surveyor assisted me in measuring these things and also made taught me a lot about autocad. He showed me the easiest and most straight forward ways of measuring.
 

Furthermore in the training I was introduced to cost implication of omissions. These gave the chance to measure and calculate the cost of items that would not be required in the project anymore. I had to find out the money that could be saved if any on the project. It was not an easy job as some items had already been built or was in the process of being built when the client did not want it anymore. So we had to go on site to find out how much the contractor had actually built and tell them to stop the work. This caused a little bit of problem as the contractor wanted to get paid for what they had already done and it was my job to measure that and report it to the senior quantity surveyor. This part of the job was very interesting and kept me buzy for quite some time.
 

Also during the training, part of my job was to update bottlenecks and issued definition and chronology of works that has been going on from the beginning of the project. I had to find out if any work that still needed to be done was actually completed or if not update the list and send it to the project manager. This gave me the opportunity to work with the project manager on a few occasions. We once went to investigate the amount of people working on site. It was a safety issue and we counted all the workers and it was found out that there were too many people on the site. This issue was later raised with the contractor and appropriate measured were taken to avoid any safety problems. This gave me an insight of the job of a project manager and how to communicate with the contractor and employer.
 

After this I carried out site investigation with the Inspection Team on site to keep a record of the progression of work. Some construction faults were found namely in the waterproofing of windows and these faults were recorded and reported to the project manager and the contractor. It helped me realise and pay attention to every single detail of what is happening on site. The inspection team showed the techniques to look for errors and constructions faults. I think this greatly helped me pointing out mistakes that would go unnoticed to amateur eyes.
 

During the couple of weeks that I was involved in the measuring process I learnt and gained more experience than ever before. This was very helpful to pursue my tertiary education and I think it made me more ready for the working industry. I saw that it was not an easy job working for big companies involving enormous amount of resources and money but with the right learning abilities/techniques and hardworking spirit/never giving up attitude, you can make it even in the hardest working environment.

 

TRAINING 3 (QUANTITY SURVEYING TEAM, SUGAR INVESTMENT TRUST, MAURITIUS)

 

During my final year in the under graduate programme for Construction and Economics Management at UCT, I did my last practical training at SIT, Mauritius, in their in house quantity surveying department. Although SIT is a division of the public sector which deals with the management of sugar canes plantation through Mauritius, in the recent years there has been a drastic decrease in the export of sugar in the market and as result, they had to change their objectives to survive in the economy. After strategic planning and re-structuring the organization, a quantity surveying frim was implemented to assist their new development. They basically were in the process of converting sugar cane fields in new housing development. The project that they were currently busy with involved a residential development called Aurea.

 

When I joined the company, I was assigned to that project. My role was to assist the quantity surveyors in the project. During the course of my training, I was involved in a number of activities ranging from measuring, tendering and preparing quotations. I was part of a team of four junior quantity surveyors who were still in the process of obtaining their degree and there was one senior quantity surveyor who studied at the University of Cape Town. The latter was more of a mentor and showed me the way around in the firm. I gained valuable knowledge working for him and tried to make the most of the time I spent there.

 

SIT was the client in the residential development and there were a number of teams which assisted the construction. There were contractors, sub-contractors, architects, engineers and consultants who all worked together in the project. My role as being part of the quantity surveying department was to ensure that tenders being sent out to contractors and sub-contractors were well prepared and conformed to all legal aspects. I also checked the tenders receive to confirm that they were aligned to the specifications and the rates given were reasonable. Although they worked on a competitive bidding process where a number of sub-contractors could submit their price, the lowest bidder was not always chosen. This is mainly due to the fact that some contractors could have omitted a certain element and they would struggle to comply with their prices. Therefore this reduces the risk of going in a venture with these contractors and also reduces the possibility of coming across cost and time overruns.

 

During my traineeship, I did some quantities take-off. This helped in my leaning of the measurement process and how bill of quantities are put together. The help from the senior quantity surveyor was really important since he had been doing this for a long time and gave me an insight of how this process is carried out in the industry. In general my time with the quantity surveying team at SIT was very helpful. I learnt a lot about the measurement process, tendering and dealing with sub-contractors. This should prove to be very important should I chose to go down the quantity surveyor path in my career.

 

TRAINING 4 (SITE MANAGEMENT AND CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT, HYVEC PARTNERS LTD, MAURITIUS)

 

After completing the under graduate programme at the University of Cape Town in Construction and Economics Management, I opted to do the Honours degree in Construction Management at the same institution. The requirement for the successful completion of this degree involved a four weeks practical training in any field of construction. I therefore decided to complete my practical training at the beginning of this year (2015) so that I would be more prepared to cope with my academics.

 

For the purpose of this training, I sought some experience in the construction industry related to my degree in construction management. I was lucky to be accepted at Hyvec Partners Ltd which is a contacting firm which was involved at that point in the construction of a six storeys hi tech building. They were the main contractor on the project and I was part of their site management and construction team. This could not have been a better opportunity as I was after some site experience which I think is very crucial to my development in the construction industry. So, I joined Hyvec as an assistant site manager and my duties and responsibilities were to help the site manager, civil engineer and project manager in any possible way towards the daily management of the site activities.

 

During my time at Hyvec, I learnt more than I could have possibly imagined. I was given more responsibilities and work to do compared to all my previous practical training. I think due to the fact that I was a UCT graduate, people tend to trust you more and willing to give you more tasks to carry out. I was involved in a number of activities ranging from preparing cost allocation schedule, measuring quantities of different elements, preparing programme of works, putting together progress reports, carrying out daily site visits, supervising the works on site, attending site meeting with sub-contractors, clients, architects, consultants and engineers.

 

Also the amount that I learnt from the project manager in that short amount of space cannot be compared to any past experience. The team that I worked with have been together on many past projects and had a good communication and coherence amongst them. The project manager and the foreman had a good understanding of each other way of working and progress on site was very smooth. The project manager was a graduate from a university in England and had over 20 years of experience under his belt. He worked for some of the biggest contractors in the past and was very knowledgeable and prepared in everything he performed. It was very interesting to just sit down and watch how he work and understand his chain of thought. To me that was the most important part of this training.

 

The way people communicate on site is also very different to the language used in an office. I found out that one must be prepared to raise his voice to make sure that your idea is being heard and adhered to. This is very important specially when dealing with general workers. Although everything might be perfectly planned if the communication between the office and site is broken, nothing will work accordingly. I also had an insight of how to deal with sub-contractors and how to supervise them. It is very important to be on site regularly to monitor the progress of work and ensure that regulations are being adhered to. I witnessed what happen when work is not being done to the specified standard and the client issue a stop order. This created a lot of setbacks. The site manger had to update the programme of works so that the project does not fall behind and receive penalties for time overruns.

 

This was definitely the most important and valuable training that I did since the beginning of my studies. I learnt a lot in terms of how to manage a site and construction activities on a daily basis. I think that this will be very helpful in my professional career especially if I find a job as a construction manager.