A QS Estimator position is open at our home renovation and extension design and build business Pencil and Brick Architects Ltd.
Particulars
- Job Advert ID : J26.11
- First Published : 260223
- Salary : Variable on experience.
- Working location : Currently our Brick Lane office, 6 Links Yard, London, E1 5LX.
- Your location : Only applicants living in London will be responded to.
- Contract type : Freelance or PAYE Employment, Full time 5 days per week.
- Full Time Hours : 40 Hours / week, Monday to Friday. Flexible with common hours 9am to 6pm.
- Probation Period : 6 Months
- Employee Benefits :
- 30 days Leave inc BH.
- Loyalty/Long Service additional days off.
- Phone/tablet/bike business-use cost contributions.
- 4% Employer pension contribution.
- Enhanced sick and compassionate leave.
- Deadline / Start Date : ASAP. Though we’ll wait for the right person. First Come First Served.
- We’ll remove this Ad from all locations when the position is filled.
- Career Path: This role will involve different specialism career paths in the build side of our business – this is a rare opportunity to have in-depth exposure to the construction and logistics of architectural projects.
- Example Career Progression Path :
- QS Estimator
- Project Manager Assistant
- Project Manager
- Head of Department
- Associate Director
- Director
- Shareholding Director
Who we are
We are a unique architect-led design and build company shaking up the tired traditional status quo. We are a RIBA Chartered Practice, and heavily involved in the Federation of Master Builders (FMB), represented on the London Board and the national Standards Committee.
We are people who not only improve people’s lives, we transform lives. We leave the world a better place than we found it. We are our Values. We are an architect-led design and build business, who specialise in home transformation works predominantly for the north and east London private residential market. Our designs and our builds are award winning. We work from our office near Brick Lane, Shoreditch. We love refining, iterating, innovating and delivering magical homes for people to wake up in. We leave the world a better place than how we found it. We do a small amount of commercial development work too, but focus on residential.
Our Values
Read our group-written Values text here: https://www.pencilandbrick.co.uk/our-ethos/
- Integrity /// We do what we say we’ll do – our words have power. And what we do works.
- Impeccability /// We put everything in it’s right place, so the end result feels effortless.
- Trust /// Being worthy of trust means operating with integrity, we speak up and challenge when it works to do so.
- Passion /// We bring joy, curiosity and genuine care to every project
- Teamwork /// We champion collaboration, supporting each other to reach goals.
- Ambition /// We’re driven to improve sustainably, thoughtfully and boldly – raising the bar and helping others do the same.
The Opportunity
You would join us to be a build professional with architectural background, with a strong focus in being a build QS Estimator, and opportunities to be Project Manager Assistant for our private residential home transformation projects in London, and be a team member to pull the company forward in line with our Values. We are currently six architectural/build professional staff in the practice and two others, and are looking for a new team member to drive and enable the construction project management efforts, with some elements of pricing, purchasing and managing logistics and costs. The role will include many speculative and construction site visits but mostly working from the office.
The role will regularly require the application of architectural skills. You would report to the Salvo, the Build Lead who is also Project Manager and Senior Architect, who is accountable for the whole build department.
Who we are looking for
– A full time talented and creative QS Estimator. Formal Further/Higher education in a construction related course (surveying, architecture, engineering, build etc) is ideal. Our office is a safe haven and incubator for people pursuing rich non-traditional professional career paths.
– This role is potentially also suited to ambitious non-QS people; e.g. architecture trained candidates, engineers and surveyors, anyone who is interested in forging a new exciting career and wanting to have an adventure with a principle-driven, architect-led design and build home transformation company.
– The role is NOT suited to candidates with no construction pricing experience.
What are your responsibilities?
You will be required to carry out all reasonable estimating and construction-project-enabling duties within the build team, including tender pricing, presentation to clients, purchasing of any items that may be needed for the construction site, and some health and safety tasks. There is space to grow and have a long and fun career with us, accrue benefits and ultimately steer the business.
Initial responsibilities would be approx :
❖ 70% Estimating home extension/renovation projects, and assisting project management and project acquisition.
❖ 30% Purchasing and logistics for the projects on site.
Some day to day tasks would be:
❖ Detailed Pricing
- Prepare early detailed pricing (EDP) to address the client’s budget and scope.
- Prepare detailed estimates for residential projects.
- Reading buildings and drawings to establish thoughtful Bills of Quantities.
- Being able to verify quantities and reliable information on the packages provided.
- Finding cost-impacting construction issues that others haven’t spotted.
- Prepare a detailed list of Inclusions and Exclusions for the construction works for each estimate.
- Visualise/Communicate a Baseline scope of works with efficiency and clearly, being able to sketch and use the drawings provided.
- Establish creative ways to fit project costs to the client’s budget and provide value engineering options.
❖ Pricing & Purchasing
- Negotiating : Seeking good commercial trade deals, and being artfully stubborn to improve the project’s performance.
- Retrieve quotes from trusted subcontractors and review, flagging any relevant information to the project manager.
❖ Data
- Develop and refine a replicable template for costing to standardise the costing process.
- Project and Pricing Data management : Being exceptional and creating and nurturing impeccable project spreadsheets, and contributing to the teams general housekeeping and systemisation of data. We are a data-driven business.
- Prepare occasional cost analysis to assess market trends and review company rates.
❖ Project Management Assistance
- Help the project managers to prepare Variations and explore options to resolve a specific cost query.
- Report to the manager to ensure workflow and deadlines are met.
- Help the project managers of specific projects to purchase project related items.
- Coordinate site logistics with the dedicated team and make sure it is reflected in the pricing.
❖ All Staff Members Must Be Ready To :
- Have excellent communication and social skills, to leave colleagues and customers feeling listened to, respected, taken care of, and demonstrating strong empathy skills.
- Measured Survey of properties for the design and the build teams.
- Opportunities for drone, thermal survey training.
- Bring to bear on the build projects and pricing an architectural expertise for design, statutory regulation compliance, health and safety management, on-site aesthetic decision making (eg setting out, or product switching) and optioneering.
- Communicate with the accounting department to efficiently prepare payments applications.
The Minimum Requirements To Be Demonstrated
- Private Residential estimating/pricing/quantity surveying experience. Burden to prove construction knowledge and pricing abilities is on the candidates applying.
- Willingness to learn, try, fail quickly and grow fast. Openly learn from mistakes and share findings and new solutions.
- Problem solver, not just a problem finder.
- Particularly good and clear communication skills – in such a way that you inspire others.
- Be proactive, someone who generates and shares knowledge, not someone reactive who sits waiting expectantly.
- Finds efficiencies and makes them repeatable for others.
- Be a good fit with our current teams : polite, passionate, intelligent, proactive.
- Be a good record keeper and error flagging.
- Be hardworking, honourable, and loyal to your team and company.
- Focus-orientated, not easily distracted when doing fast, repetitive, brain taxing pricing.
- Not afraid of the phone and to ask for discounts and special deals.
- Care about impeccability where it matters.
- Protects the company’s reputation as a priority.
- Work from our current studio, 6 Links Yard, London, E1 5LX, 9am – 6pm, 5 days a week, although we have a flexible working policy and a whole studio WFH policy currently working from home on Fridays.
The Preferable Situation
a. Mature beyond your years, and you excel in knowing yourself, you have a command over your unwanted habits and automatic behaviours.
b. Understanding of architectural and structural drawings, in particular Building regulations packages for resi projects.
c. Preference for candidates demonstrating quantity surveying, construction, architecture, engineering and other estimating related education and experience case studies.
d. MacOS fluent.
d. Google Drive fluent, especially Google Sheets or Excel.
e. Attention to customer needs and requirements.
f. Excellent time manager and organizational skills.
g. Have a love of maths and spreadsheets.
h. Has minimum notice period with any current employer or obligation.
j. Preferable if you have less than 45 minutes commute by your preferred means.
The Hiring Process
- You apply via the Monday.com Form only.
- We create a longlist + we email everyone.
- Longlist Created : Short Videocall Interviews
- Shortlist Created : Request shortlist to fill out a psychometric questionnaire.
- Shortlist Interviews : In-Person Interviews
- Job offered, accepted (hopefully!) + all notified.
As part of our commitment to building a collaborative and values-aligned team, shortlisted candidates will be asked to complete a 15 minute psychometric questionnaire before any first interview. By applying you are agreeing to do this.
How to Apply
- Fill Out Monday Form. Follow instructions impeccably. https://wkf.ms/4tRDtHA
- We will email you.
- We plan to work fairly fast to fill this role. We’re not in a rush, but time matters.
- Only shortlisted candidates will have feedback from us.
- As a way of respecting your precious time, we’ll keep longlisting questions simple and short and only ask you to invest more effort and time in this application if you’re longlisted or shortlisted.
