“Hello, my name is Rachel, and I am currently working as a Graduate Quantity Surveyor with Farrans. I started my placement year with Farrans in 2023 working within the IF105 Framework with Northern Ireland Water which has provided me with an all-rounder skill set to progress onto other frameworks, such as Uisce Eireann which is a much larger in scale.
The first part of the recruitment process is a casual conversation which really put me at ease as it allowed both myself and Farrans to get to know each other which is something a lot of other companies didn’t do, the second part of the interview was ‘STAR’ questions to assess the skill set I had before started the job. Three days later I was offered a placement role with Northern Ireland Water. Before the job commenced, I had a Teams call with my managing surveyor and my line manager to meet the team I would be working with which helped me integrate into the team on arrival. The first two days at the company we were grouped together with our fellow peers, and we completed the necessary training and other activities. Overall, I found the recruitment and onboarding period to be very informative but fun at the same time.
The thing that surprised me the most about Farrans is how much of the skill set is filtered down from high level people within the company. I guess I just had a misconception from my other jobs that managers are there to only manage however this is not the case in Farrans. Once a month our managing surveyor holds a commercial workshop on the NEC contracts, which includes employees from a placement level to a senior surveyor level. Framework tender meetings with senior surveyors and the utilities director stopping to explain to the placement/graduates and apprenticeship students the terminology being used in the meeting, so they have a better understanding of what is going on. People throughout the whole company will always have the time to explain something to you no matter which level they are at, and I have experienced this firsthand throughout my 2 years in Farrans.
Be prepared to expand your skillset… Farrans have many training programmes both internally and externally to further your knowledge in specific areas. Farrans Foundation is offered to the new graduates entering the company to take them through specific topic areas to help gain more knowledge across the board. This encourages people to explore outside their skillset; for example, it makes our engineers more commercially aware. Alongside this I have been offered many other training programmes such as the ICE law exam to further my knowledge on the NEC contracts. I personally think Farrans are continuously improving their staff at all levels within the company."
