The state of hiring in the built environment

The squeeze is in the middle

Graduate intakes have recovered and senior leadership benches are reasonably deep. The real pressure sits in the middle: project managers, senior engineers and contract managers with eight to fifteen years of hands-on delivery behind them.

These are the people who turn a design into a building and a contract into a working service. They are also the people most likely to be approached several times a month, which means the best of them rarely apply to adverts.

Where demand is strongest

Some disciplines are feeling the pinch more than others. In our day-to-day conversations with clients, the hardest briefs to fill consistently include:

• Data centre and mission critical delivery — commissioning managers, electrical leads and construction managers with live-environment experience
• Mechanical and electrical engineering — building services designers and MEP consultancy specialists
• Fire engineering — fire engineers and fire safety specialists, driven by an ongoing focus on building safety and compliance
• Facilities management — technical and hard services leaders capable of running complex, critical estates

What candidates are asking for

Salary still matters, but it is rarely the deciding factor on its own. Candidates want clarity on the project pipeline, a credible route to progression and a working pattern that reflects how the industry actually operates today.

Increasingly, they also want to understand who they will be working for. A clear, honest account of the team and the leadership often does more to secure a candidate than an extra few thousand pounds.

What this means for employers heading into 2027

Speed and conviction win. Employers who define the role tightly, keep interview stages short and give fast, specific feedback are consistently securing the strongest people.

Those who wait for the perfect CV to arrive tend to lose good candidates to competitors who moved first. In a tight market, a decisive process is a competitive advantage in its own right.