Construction management is a highly specialized field that covers all aspects of construction. It encapsulates all minute components of the industry. The area covered is the construction of residential buildings, commercial buildings and large scale building projects. Though it is a site superintendent who is looking after a site it is the construction manager who is responsible for the project to the project owner who is the customer.
Qualifications of a construction manager
In order to be a competent manager of construction projects, you need to have at least a four year degree. For some projects having a masters degree is essential. They could be specialists on any of the related subjects such as construction management, architecture, accounting, engineering and any other related field.
As the construction industry is gaining momentum once again the career prospects and the remuneration are very good for those who are engaged in the construction management sector. When it comes to responsibility they are responsible for every aspect of a building starting from the blue print stage. Even the blue print need to be inspected thoroughly by them in order to find flaws and they could be corrected if any is found.
Responsibilities
Construction Manger is responsible for the control of expenditure on a project to stay in a profitable margin after executing the job to the satisfaction of the project owner. Therefore, he should control the construction and labor costs to stay at the optimum in order to make a successful project. He has to collaborate with the architects, project managers and site engineers for the project to go ahead smoothly and efficiently.
Construction supervision is not an easy task as the full responsibility of the project lies on those who are engaged in this task. They need to have hands on experience on all aspects of building construction. Most companies expect a construction manager to have thorough knowledge on building codes and laws also. However, they are people who are thorough on subjects like architecture, design, engineering and draftsman’s jobs.
Construction management firms vary in size and most often they work with small building contract firms. When it comes to large firms each of them has its own construction manager in order to execute all tasks of construction management for the company. Due to their importance in construction projects these construction management personnel are heavily paid. Most often they are paid six figure salaries.
If given the proper resources, a construction manger is able to take responsibility of handling even a multimillion project. Therefore, the payments also reach millions as everything on a building project is handled by him and the responsibility also lies on his shoulders. In order to carry such responsibility such a person needs to be highly versatile. Though it is a rewarding career it also is a challenging job. With the slightest mistake an entire project could lose its value but these professionals are so well trained that nothing of the sort will happen in a construction project. Even if anything goes wrong on the way, they know the immediate corrective measures to take in order to avoid damage.