{"id":3158,"date":"2026-09-02T08:25:48","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T07:25:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/?p=3158"},"modified":"2026-06-10T13:28:55","modified_gmt":"2026-06-10T12:28:55","slug":"making-design-a-reality-what-is-site-civil-engineering-like-on-a-university-placement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/careers\/2026\/09\/02\/making-design-a-reality-what-is-site-civil-engineering-like-on-a-university-placement\/","title":{"rendered":"Making design a reality: What is site civil engineering like on a university placement?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Hello! My name is Isaac<\/a>, and I am currently nine months into my industry placement with Knights Brown<\/a>, working on the Weymouth Walls Harbour replacement scheme<\/a>. Below, I\u2019ve put together a typical \u201cday in the life\u201d and what to expect when working for a civil engineering contractor.<\/p>\n

Before starting my placement, especially having just finished my second year on the Civil Engineering and Architecture course<\/a>, I had no idea what to expect as a site engineer. Lots of CAD? Coding? Load analysis? So far, the reality has been climbing into excavations with a GPS and spray can, carrying a total station across site, and briefing a team of carpenters and steel fixers on the dimensions of a complex concrete pour\u2026 and I love all of it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Starting the day<\/h3>\n

My day starts at 7am in a site cabin with a strong coffee and a bit of toast. I immediately check my to-do list from yesterday and begin writing dig permits for work starting in an hour. I sit in on the foreman briefing, getting a rough idea when and where things are happening today, so I\u2019m not chased for levels and inspections half a kilometre away. A good start in the morning usually sets the tone for the entire shift, especially when the blokes can get right to work at 8am without waiting for me to set a grade laser for their dig.<\/p>\n

Being in a welfare cabin 50 hours a week, you must make it a second home. I bring nice coffee, keep a fridge stocked with small meal-prepped dinners, and use my own nice stationery. I will admit that by Friday, my desk has about five of the same drawings with illegible scribbles for temporary work ideas and two unfinished coffees somewhere, but I do find time to tidy.<\/p>\n

\n

Life on site<\/h3>\n

Before anyone starts digging or installing any types of work, we need to make sure everything is set out properly. If the setting out is wrong, and concrete has been poured wrong or deep holes have been dug incorrectly, it\u2019s twice as much effort, time and money to fix it, so there\u2019s a fair bit of pressure to get it right first time. I would say 90% of my work revolves around levels and alignment. For most of January and February I was setting out sheet piles with a total station, making sure they go in at the correct line and level. It sounds straightforward until you\u2019re dealing with an 80T vibrator pile rig that blocks the line of sight, heavy rain, 50mm tolerances on X, Y and Z axis alignment, and you\u2019ve just hit a band of clay that prevents the pile from going any deeper.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Tolerance is everything in civil engineering. When you first look at kerbs, footpaths, houses, or bridges, you might think \u201cclose enough\u201d will do. It won\u2019t. A few millimetres out at the start can turn into meters out at the end. Drainage falls won\u2019t work properly, new kerbs won\u2019t transition and tie nicely into existing, steel bolt holes won\u2019t line up, or theoretically flat concrete slabs end up with strange gradients. That\u2019s why one of the biggest lessons you learn is to measure twice, then thrice, then whilst it\u2019s being installed. I admit I learnt the hard way with installing sheet piles, and when you ask a team of four machine operatives to pull a 17m pile out of the ground, you will never say \"close enough\" ever again.<\/p>\n

When I\u2019m not out on-site ensuring drawings are followed, I\u2019m also doing material takeoffs such as calculating concrete volumes, footpath formation stone quantities, asphalt surface areas and figuring out what we need for tomorrow or next week. \u00a0This is more the estimator\/QS side of engineering, but with DWGs being released with drawing packages, it\u2019s a lot easier to click a hatch than it is to print in A1 and measure to scale.<\/p>\n

The importance of documentation<\/h3>\n

One thing people massively underestimate is how important documentation is with a busy and fast-paced site. \u00a0If it isn\u2019t written down, photographed, signed, and filed properly, it may as well never have happened, especially if it wasn\u2019t priced in tender.<\/p>\n

I end up documenting:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • how long did the concrete breakout take<\/li>\n
  • downtime caused by weather<\/li>\n
  • when subcontractors stopped for maintenance<\/li>\n
  • inspection records<\/li>\n
  • QA forms<\/li>\n
  • as-built surveys<\/li>\n
  • photos of setting out before work starts<\/li>\n
  • compaction results, PSD tests, Concrete cube strength test results<\/li>\n
  • pour records<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    Taking photos is a huge part of the job. Before concrete gets poured or drainage gets buried, you need evidence showing everything was built correctly. A quick photo of setting out points, levels, reinforcement, or pipework can save massive arguments later about what went wrong.<\/p>\n

    Level books are another important piece of documentation. Every datum, reduced level, invert level, formation, and finished level gets recorded because eventually someone will ask where a number came from, or why something doesn\u2019t look right. A good level book acts as a live document of your thinking and executed process. I will admit this is something I need to get better at; a photo with a level edited on top is not always the best alibi when something looks wrong.<\/p>\n

    Teamwork and collaboration<\/h3>\n

    One part of the job I am massively grateful for is having a strong team around me. Good projects need a good team, and they happen because the foreman, engineers, project managers, machine operators, and health and safety teams all work together properly.<\/p>\n

    The foreman usually knows the practical side of the job inside out and can spot issues before they become major problems. Typically having decades of experience, it\u2019s likely they\u2019ve done this before, and more importantly know where things go wrong. Other engineers help double-check setting out, solve problems, and keep the workload moving when the site gets hectic. Project managers keep everything coordinated, informing engineers of the short-term programme, ordering materials, delegating subcontractors, client communication and deadlines. Whilst I do not work for a tier 1 contractor, we have a Health and Safety team that operates like one. \u00a0On busy, kilometre-wide civils sites with excavations, lifting operations, plant movement and buried services, safety must come before everything else.<\/p>\n

    The challenges and the reward<\/h3>\n

    Some days are stressful. One day you can sit back in the office and look at drawings; next you\u2019re in the pouring rain for two hours, aiming a total station at a 3m tall concrete shutter and monitoring it to ensure it isn\u2019t creeping as concrete goes in. You can spend hours future-proofing setting out just for a drawing revision to change your levels. Sometimes prefabricated beams don\u2019t fit, or you make the call to send a concrete load back on a Friday as the mix is out of spec.<\/p>\n

    But other days you stand back and look at a 500m sea wall in your hometown and you know it was because of your setting out.<\/p>\n

    An element of my placement that I have particularly enjoyed is drawing interpretation. A lot of DWGs and drawing releases come back with \"TBC on site\" or \"Interpretation\". This has meant levels and alignments that I propose can be used, with no drawings to follow. This was a great opportunity for creative freedom in aesthetics like landscaping design (despite being with a contractor), and it again adds to the pride of knowing what I have built was of my design and setting out.<\/p>\n

    Final thoughts<\/h3>\n

    Civil engineering isn\u2019t glamorous (I have probably tracked kilograms of muck and dust in my car seat by now), but it is satisfying when done right. Every structure starts with someone on site making sure where we start is exactly to a design. Most people will never notice the work that goes into civil structures (especially when it\u2019s mostly underground or behind a wall), but they will notice when it goes wrong.<\/p>\n

    I hope I have given a good insight into what to expect in a contracting placement and a career. I personally really enjoy my work, and despite the hours, I still find the time to do what I enjoy, as I am part of a band and have on many occasions gone straight from work to a gig with a guitar in the boot.<\/p>\n

    I hope you look at site work and contracting in a different light, and once I return to university from my placement, I will certainly have a new outlook on what I want to do in the future and what to focus on during my studies.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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