Profession: Surveyor Offshore
Name: Carmen Tang
Education: BSc Surveying and Mapping Sciences at University of East London
Required skills: An understanding of spatial awareness, computer/networking skills, mathematics, analytical processing and
problem solving.
Best thing about the job
´Every project is a proud moment for me. To work on such great engineering feats offshore, in the middle of the sea. It requires intense teamwork, because everyone is a cog in the wheel.´
After graduation Carmen Tong started working in Civil Engineering in London for a large civil contractor. When a university connection asked her if she’d like to go offshore for a global offshore survey company, she went for it. ‘When an opportunity like such arises, I had to give it a try. Since then, I never looked back.
I gained a lot of my land survey knowledge from my civil experience, which has brought great advantages offshore with many transferable skills providing an asset as my base knowledge of surveying.’
Working in the offshore industry may sound exciting, but it is surely not suitable for everyone. It takes a certain perspective on the working environment. Carmen explains: ‘The flexible working shifts/rotations, working everyday 12 hours for a long duration, not seeing your friends and family in the evenings and weekends.
Sharing a small area, close to other people, who you have to see and work with. All these can be negatives, but I find that with these negatives there are positives. You have a longer stretch of quality time at home, or in my case enough time to travel and see another part of the world and dive into experiencing the culture. You make close friends quickly offshore, being in such confined space together means you don’t get the filtered, fake, watered down version of someone. This to me shows so much respect for each other. Yes, I really enjoy the offshore environment.
As a surveyor I get the opportunity to liaise with everyone from the marine crew, to the deck crew to the engineering department on a regular basis. To work alongside so many interesting professionals who excel in their field.’
Curious to where the future of her career may go, Carmen has her focus on renewals: ‘For now, I am keen to look forward to the future of wind industry, it is currently taking a firm stance in the energy sector and I hope to continue seeing this move forward.’
Our candidates
We mediate positions at every level of a company or project, from blue collar to white collar. We think it is very important that candidates feel that they are not employed ‘through iPS’, but rather ‘by iPS’. Candidates are willing to commit themselves to us, because iPS actively anticipates career perspectives and takes the needs of candidates into consideration. In addition, our payroll candidates are always paid on time, regardless of whether or not our client pays on time. In doing so, we create a privileged relationship with our candidates.
