Civil Engineering Introduction, Branches, Career & Scope

WHAT IS CIVIL ENGINEERING

Civil Engineering is the oldest engineering discipline. Great pyramids of Egypt, Stone henge in UK and remains of ancient civilizations like Indus valley civilization, Egyptian civilization, and Maya civilization indicate that it is one of the oldest branch of engineering. Now a days man can build skyscrapers with the help of modern machines but his forefather built marvelous buildings without any technological help. Civil engineering deals with the design and construction of all kinds of physical structures including residential buildings, dams, tunnels, highways, bridges and skyscrapers. Its a challenging and creative profession. Civil engineering is also an art as well as technology.

Civil Engineering Introduction, Branches, Career & Scope

Branches of Civil Engineering

There are different branches of civil engineering related to specific tasks such as
Architectural engineering
Environmental engineering
Geo-technical engineering
Geophysics
Geodesy
Control engineering
Structural engineering
Transportation engineering
Earth science
Atmospheric sciences
Forensic engineering
Municipal or urban engineering
Water resources engineering
Materials engineering
Offshore engineering
Quantity surveying
Coastal engineering
Surveying
Construction engineering
A good civil engineer possess the basic knowledge of all above fields as he has to work as a team member with the experts of other civil engineering fields.

Career & Scope
Civil engineers have to work in a team.In the beginning of their career they are deployed on a construction site while after gaining practical experience they can get managerial position such as chief engineer or supervisor of projects. They can get lecturer job in public and private engineering schools. They are endless demand of civil engineer in middle east and other Arab countries due to massive construction activities going on in these countries. Its an highly paid profession all over the world.

A civil engineer seldom has to face recession period in his whole career. In our country the job opportunities for civil engineers are increasing day by day due to booming housing industry and major construction projects in private as well as public sector.  There is a high demand of civil engineers in private housing schemes, Defence housing societies, consultancy firms and construction companies. They can also find jobs in mega projects of different departments of provincial and federal government including military engineering core. They have also good scope in consultancy field. For joining teaching or research career you will have to go for Master degree at least.

Qualities Required
A civil engineer must have a creative/analytical mind and hardworking nature. He has to work in field and at far off places some times for months. So a civil engineer should be of adaptive/flexible nature. He should have passion for his profession. He should have ability to work in a team. He must have thirst for knowledge. He need to know the construction related laws. If you want to excel in this field you must have excellent computer knowledge as there is great involvement of computer software in this field. An ideal civil engineer has multidimensional knowledge about his field. He also requires good communication and managerial skills.

Area of Employment
Housing schemes
Engineering universities
Private consultancies
Quality testing laboratories
Road projects
Mega construction projects
Public departments
Infrastructure projects

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