Former quantity surveyor gets out from behind her desk to become housing site boss

The 35-year-old swapped life as a quantity surveyor to train as an assistant site manager in the housebuilding industry.

After three years in her new role in the construction sector, Maddie, who lives in Lichfield, joined Bellway West Midlands as an assistant site manager at the Dove Manor development in Doveridge, near Uttoxeter, in 2020.

“I did not like sitting behind a desk all day and the only aspects of the job that I really enjoyed when I was a quantity surveyor were the times I got to go onto sites and talk to the teams there,” said Maddie. “Instead of staring at a laptop all day, I liked the challenge of meeting lots of different people and trying to problem solve as a team.

“Despite having no real construction background, I took the plunge and joined a housebuilding company as an assistant site manager and loved it. When the opportunity came up to apply for a job at Bellway – a big national developer – I jumped at the chance.”

Maddie is telling her story to celebrate Women in Construction Week (3 to 9 March), a national campaign to encourage more women to make a career in the building industry. Bellway has set itself a target to improve the gender diversity of its directly employed workforce to a 60/40 male/female split by July 2025. Last year this split was 69/31.

In January 2023, in collaboration with the Home Builders Federation, the not-for-profit organisation Women into Construction and eight other housebuilders, the Women into Housebuilding Programme was launched to attract more female recruits into trainee assistant site manager roles.

After spells at a number of Bellway sites, Maddie was called in as acting site manager at the company’s Rolleston Manor development in Rolleston on Dove in August 2023.

“Construction work has been completed here and there are a few residents still to move in,” said Maddie. “The former site manager moved onto another project and I am charged with finishing here.

“My assistant site manager here for a while was Sophie Crockford and it was fantastic to have two women running the team, in roles which have been traditionally filled by men. Once this is completed, I will be taking over as site manager at the Chellaston Fold development in Chellaston when work starts on site later this year. The 120 new homes there will be built under the company’s Ashberry Homes brand and I can’t wait to get started.

“Not for a moment have I regretted my decision to change career as I love what I do now and I am working for a great company. Bellway has supported me from day one and has encouraged me to back myself and given me the opportunities to progress my career which I think I have made the most of.”

Marie Richards, Sales Director at Bellway West Midlands, said: “Maddie came to us with a fierce belief in her own ability and a real desire to succeed. She made the brave decision to leave her job as a quantity surveyor for a job on a construction site and we are very glad she did.

“Maddie shows just how you can make a career change and, if you put the effort in, be successful. We are proud of our association with the Home Builders Federation to support the Women into Construction initiative. Our Women into Housebuilding programme has successfully recruited its first trainee assistant site manager and the latest cohort will see the introduction of a further five female recruits into the programme in the new financial year.”

For more information about careers at Bellway, visit https://www.bellwaycareers.co.uk/.