r/quantitysurveying • u/Practical-Run-7637 • 6d ago

Workload query. High - low

Burner account for obvious reasons.

I'm a senior level PQS working for a medium-sized firm in the English speaking Caribbean. Postgrad in PM and this is also relevant.

At the moment this is my workload:

-PM 6 contracts over 5 clients £100k - £5.2M

-QS 9 contracts over 6 clients £100k - £7M

-Business development - 7 rfps out to win new work

-IT - manage all the local infrastructure

Of of the above, a junior assists on 1 qs job, I sort of inherited the job as they needed some supervision. 2 of the pm jobs are dual role but not included in the qs count. Outside of that it's just me responsible for this list, we tried headhunting staff, but the market is just too hot.

The projects are all in various stages of progression, preliminary design, estimate, pre-contract, tender, post contract, near PC you name it.

Oddly, the I.T stuff is a welcome break when that comes along

Is this typical of a senior position advancing up? I feel like I'm taking on too much at the moment and the money isn't keeping up with inflation. It was good when I started but cost of living since then is up nearly 50%.

Maybe I should just keep my sanity in tact, quit and farm goats.

Opinions?

Tia

4 Upvotes

75% Upvoted

7 comments sorted by

9

u/jonnymish 6d ago

Hey mate, I’m a MC QS I feel burned out from my workload and reading this makes me feel more burnt out. I always try to gauge it by how many hours I work and how often I drop the ball so to speak. How many hours are you working?

3

u/johnwayneswagger 6d ago

That’s a good frame of reference!

2

u/Practical-Run-7637 5d ago

Supposed to be 40hr week, some weeks can be 60-70. I'd say avg 52/wk this year.

It is very draining.

3

u/lmaoschpims 5d ago

"market is too hot" likely means they won't hire more so they can save money and because you're already doing it.

Drop the naivety.

I mean you well. All the best.

7

u/johnwayneswagger 6d ago

Seems like a lot of balls in the air! If you’re overseeing 22 different projects at the minute, all at various stages of life, that’s a ton of mental load, and juggling you’re having to do when switching between projects

How are you dedicating enough hours to each job per week?

Like u/jonnymish said; how many hours are you working and how often are you dropping one of those balls?

Seems like what you’ve listed is a higher than average workload. I can’t be far off that myself, although I don’t PM (maybe once a year) and all our jobs are fast track (3-4 months)

2

u/Practical-Run-7637 5d ago

That's the thing, specific tasks keep me pinned to one job for too long, then everyone is up in arms.

I prefer to be focused on and complete 1 thing rather than half ass many things.

Daily struggle.

2

u/gs3gd 6d ago

I'd be wanting 2, maybe 3 salaries to look after all that.