What Is A Civil Construction Design Manager And What Do They Do?

At Smart Nine Project Management, we specialise in civil engineering and project management recruitment, helping companies find highly skilled civil construction professionals on a full time, part time or contract basis. One of the professionals that we specialise in placing are Design Managers.

In this article we endeavour to explain what a Design Manager is and how they fit into civil construction projects.

What is a Design Manager and what do they do?

Put simply, Design Managers take on the management of all the individual processes it takes to produce a set of drawings that a building or structure are built from.

They oversee and make changes to design and manage the desires of a range of stakeholders to ensure the project is built not only to the contractual obligations but to the individual site challenges that arise.

Also known as Design Coordinators or Design and Build Managers, they are a key part of the successful completion of any construction project.

What a some of the key responsibilities of a Design Manager?

A professional Design Manager is required to manage the interface between architects, structural engineers, service engineers, specialist designers and key stakeholders with the aim of producing a coordinated result.

Some key responsibilities of a Design Manager may include:

• Providing professional expertise and solutions across all stages of development and delivery.
• Manage the end to end design review processes across the project including continual review and investigation of project designs.
• Liaising with a broad range of specialist design reviewers to assess design in terms of contractual agreements.
• Assessing all proposed design changes with respect to the ongoing operation and maintenance of the asset being built.
• Leading a team of Senior Project Engineers (SPE’s) and Project Engineers (PE’s) and encouraging them to cultivate best practice outcomes for the project.
• Identify and address safety and environmental hazards that may arise during the operational and maintenance term of the project.
• Manage teams of SMEs (subject matter experts) in various disciplines
• Manage the interface of all stakeholders in terms of the project design.

Desirable qualities and experience of a Design Manager in the Civil Construction Industry

Aside from the obvious traits of being highly organised and motivated Design Managers need to be excellent forward planners and manage large teams who usually have differing goals.

These are some of the desired qualities of professional Design Managers:

• The ability to keep cool under pressure, to communicate effectively, resolve conflicts and overcome challenges.
• Require good people skills, the ability to evaluate ideas effectively and on the spot.
• They need the ability to resolve complex design issues under time and commercial pressures.
• Confident in their abilities, they need an in-depth knowledge of all aspects of a construction project and be efficient document managers.
• Excellent communicator who can deliver complex and technical information in a simple and understandable form to a wide range of audiences.
• Able to create a culture of inclusivity and support to colleagues across multi-disciplinary teams.
• Design Expertise in their industry (Smart Nine Project Management specialise in the areas of civil engineering such as tunnelling, pavements, bridges, electrical and ITS).
• Strong Operations and Project Management knowledge in the Operations and Maintenance of major infrastructure.
• Chartered Engineer (Civil or Mechanical)
• Familiar with standard design software including AutoCad.

Qualifications

A Design Manager usually holds bachelor or masters qualifications in engineering, construction or architecture. They often also have many years of experience as a Project Engineer or in a Design Management role for a builder.

They may also have experience with software such as InEight, BlueBeam, AutoCAD and other CAD software, along with various other design modelling tools.

Are you looking for your next role?

If you’re looking for your next opportunity, contact us today at people@smartnine.com.au or browse our vacancies.