Somewhat fittingly in the year of our 150th anniversary, Works Supervisor Beth Bowran has become the 150th member of our team to achieve Chartered membership of the CIOB.
If you had told Beth Bowran 10 years ago that she would eventually become a Member of the Chartered Institute of Building she wouldn’t have believed you.
That’s because Beth used to work in social care before deciding in 2014 that ‘it would be good to get a trade’ and joining us as an apprentice Works Manager. It’s a role in which she has built on the people skills that were so important in her previous work.
“My favourite thing about working in construction is the people, but it is also the most challenging,” says Beth. “People often have their own ways of working and you get a lot of resistance sometimes.” For Beth, the trick lies in being empathetic and ensuring that others appreciate your perspective. “You need to get on with people!”
The other essential is persistence, a quality that stood Beth in good stead when it came to achieving chartership. “It was a bit of a slog to get there,” says Beth. “I had to take the Construction Manager Professional route, which involved undertaking practice work, writing an 8,000-word report, sitting an exam, submitting a professional review of personal competencies and sitting an interview.”
And whilst becoming chartered is a real personal achievement, Beth is quick to recognise the support she was given.
“The company encourages people to become chartered; I only had to ask for it and they gave me it. And I had a good mentor who really took me under her wing and helped a lot with competencies writing.”
To those thinking of chartership Beth says that, in the long run, affiliation with a professional body is worth the effort but that you need to make sure you are really committed.
“It’s taken me five years,” says Beth. “I’ve got letters after my name – and whilst some people won’t know what it is you’ve done – I know what I’ve done. It’s a validation of my hard work.”
Our structured approach to Building Information Modelling (BIM), our willingness to use new technologies to drive improvements in the way we work, proved all the incentive BIM Manager, Peter Vlaar, needed to make the decision to join us.
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We worked with the CIOB and ITN to launch ‘Building a Legacy’
