As firms continue to expand and thrive they are increasingly facing a critical obstacle, a lack of qualified surveyors to recruit.  This is why RICS West Midlands is this year dedicating itself to tackling this issue along with others crucial to the profession, under the leadership of the RICS WM Chair and the support of new board members.

The RICS West Midlands Chair, Gurdip Chamba has put developing membership at the top of his list of objectives for the organisation in 2007, and he has been quick to translate this into practical action by setting up a new Membership Development Group.  The group has already met and started to review what practical action can be taken to increase membership at all levels and in particular to encourage new entrants coming into the profession.

Gurdip Chamba highlights the variety of ideas being reviewed by the group, “A range of ideas are being considered including hosting more in-depth careers events at schools and colleges, encouraging university surveying students to become RICS members through visits and seminars and creating a RICS West Midlands office job board to collate opportunities available to students from work experience to sandwich placements in the region’s practices.  In addition the group has also discussed expanding the remit of Regional Training Advisors to offer one to one support to APC students as well as employers and the setting up of an employer’s forum to meet twice yearly to share good practice, careers promotion, recruitment techniques and to consider issues like diversity and flexible working.”

New RICS West Midlands board member Ian Pitt, head of client services at Bruton Knowles in Birmingham, has recently joined Gurdip and 15 other members to support this core initiative.  Ian is a RICS qualified APC assessor, heads up the Bruton Knowles APC programme in the West Midlands and is familiar with the challenges facing the sector.

Ian Pitt explains, “Recruitment is proving to be an enduring problem for the profession.  Although we have over 7,000 members of RICS West Midlands, making us one of the organisation’s largest regions, practices in the area still struggle to recruit recently qualified and newly experienced surveyors.  As the country’s second city with a lower cost of living to London and a cosmopolitan city living lifestyle on offer we do attract more than our fare share of good candidates, but nationally as a profession we are suffering from a downturn in courses offered and taken in the late 1990’s.  I am delighted to be joining the RICS West Midlands regional board at a time when under Gurdip’s leadership we will be able to offer practical support to tackle this problem.”

Gurdip also highlights two other core objectives for the RICS West Midlands in 2007, “As well as pushing forward this major focus on membership development I am also keen to maximize the attendance and merit of our networking events, the use of our excellent CPD training courses and to obviously raise the profile of the organisation.  I think we can be of real professional value at a time of critical growth and expansion in the sector.  I would also welcome anyone who would like to get more involved in RICS in the region to get in touch.”

One of Ian Pitt’s own priorities in joining the committee is to liaise with other business organisations such as the West Midlands Business Council, Birmingham Forward and the West Midlands Regional Assembly to represent surveyors’ interests more directly in these forums.   He is also keen to raise the profile of the organisation to help surveyors make the most of the support that is available to them both individually as professionals and in supporting businesses in the sector.

Ian comments, “I am looking forward to helping to raise awareness of what the organisation can offer.  The RICS can be a valuable resource for surveyors but it is one which is not currently fully made use of. I think more surveyors need to discover or revisit some of the services on offer including the invaluable networking opportunities, core skills training, professional guidance and insights into the raft of policy changes that now affect our working lives on an almost daily basis. ”

To find out more about RICS West Midlands please visit www.rics.org/westmidlands or contact Gurdip Chamba on (0121) 609 4144 or email This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it