Why Your Planning Shortlist Only Has Two Names On It

I’ve worked in construction recruitment for a long time, and planning has been my main market since 2014. It’s never been an easy market, but right now there is one problem I keep coming across: everyone is looking for the same people. When I speak to clients, I sometimes have to explain that getting two genuinely strong candidates for a planning role can be a very good shortlist.

It isn’t because we haven’t looked hard enough. There simply aren’t endless numbers of experienced planners sitting in the market waiting for the right opportunity. Contractors, consultancies and infrastructure businesses are all competing for a relatively small pool of experienced people, and that competition is only heading one way: the CITB forecasts that construction will need an extra 41,200 workers a year between 2026 and 2030, around 206,000 people in total, just to meet demand. So the question is: why has the planning pool become so small, and what can we do about it?

Where have the junior planners gone?

Five or ten years ago, we saw far more Assistant Planner and Junior Planner positions come through. They still exist, but nowhere near the numbers the industry needs.

Most businesses understandably want someone who can join and immediately take responsibility for a programme. They want someone who knows Asta or Primavera, understands the sector, has worked on similar projects and can sit in front of a client from day one. I completely understand why. Margins are tight, projects are under pressure and taking someone on who might need 12 months of development can feel like a cost and a risk.

But if everybody takes that approach, who trains the next generation? We end up with companies competing with each other for the same experienced planners, salaries keep moving upwards and the number of people coming through underneath them gets smaller. Experienced planners can earn very good money, particularly at senior level, and there are plenty of opportunities available to them.

So the biggest problem isn’t planners leaving the profession. It’s that we haven’t brought enough people into it.

Are we looking in too small a pool?

This is where the real opportunity is. Some of the best future planners don’t have “Planner” on their CV yet.

If I was looking to grow a planning team, I’d be looking very seriously at Site Engineers, Civil Engineers, Construction Managers and other people who have spent several years actually delivering projects. They understand sequencing and logistics. They know what happens when materials don’t arrive, access changes, a subcontractor falls behind or a sequence that looked fine on a programme simply doesn’t work in the real world. That experience is incredibly valuable.

You can teach somebody how to use Asta or Primavera. What is much harder to teach is how a construction site actually works.

I’m not suggesting anyone can become a planner. The best planners have a particular skill set. They can think ahead, understand risk, challenge a programme, communicate with different stakeholders and spot problems before they happen. But there are plenty of people already working on construction projects who have many of those skills. They just haven’t considered planning as a career.

We’ve seen it ourselves. We recently helped two Civil Engineers move into planning positions with a major infrastructure consultancy. Neither had previously worked as a Planner. We approached them, talked them through what a career in planning could look like and explained why the experience they already had was relevant. They made the move and have gone on to do extremely well. That’s a good example of why we need to stop focusing so heavily on someone’s current job title.

What would I change?

If a client told me they had been trying to recruit a Planner for three months without success, my first answer wouldn’t automatically be to add another £10,000 or £15,000 to the salary. Sometimes salary is the problem. But quite often I’d look at the brief first.

Widen the search. Could a strong Site Engineer, Civil Engineer or Construction Manager make the move into planning with the right support?

Question the must-haves. Does somebody genuinely need every software package and exactly the same sector experience, or are we unnecessarily reducing the candidate pool?

Look for construction knowledge. A person who understands sequencing, logistics and project delivery already has a very strong base to build on.

Give people exposure earlier. Rotate engineers, site managers and graduates through planning teams. Some of them might discover a career they had never previously considered.

Move quickly when you find somebody good. Strong planners are rarely speaking to only one business. Taking two or three weeks to arrange another interview or approve an offer can be the difference between hiring them and losing them.

Hire planners, not just schedulers

Moving bars around a programme is only part of the job. The really good planners understand construction. They understand why something is being built in a particular sequence and they are confident enough to challenge it when it doesn’t make sense. That’s why site experience is so valuable. Someone who has spent three or four years dealing with the reality of delivering projects already has knowledge that is difficult to replicate in a classroom or software course. Give that person the right planning training and mentoring and you can create an excellent planner.

We need to start creating the next generation

Everyone is fishing from the same pool right now, and that pool is incredibly tight. But that doesn’t mean the people aren’t there. Some of them are just sitting in different roles. There will always be positions that need an experienced Senior Planner, Planning Manager, or Project Controls professional who can hit the ground running. I’m not suggesting otherwise.

But we can’t solve a long-term skills shortage purely by moving the same experienced people from one contractor to another. If planning is going to get its share of the 206,000 extra workers the industry needs by 2030, we have to create more routes into the profession. That means giving people exposure to planning earlier, being more open-minded about transferable experience and investing in people who might not tick every box on day one. Because if we don’t start doing that now, in five years’ time we’ll still be having exactly the same conversation about the shortage of planners.

Cobalt has spent 25 years specialising in real estate recruitment across the housebuilders, contractors and consultancies shaping the built environment in the UK, US and Germany. That depth shows up in the detail: hiring strategies, workforce planning, and remuneration advice grounded in what the market is actually doing right now.

If you’d like to discuss the current market, or a talent challenge in your own team, speak to Luke Kinsey, Executive Consultant, Project Planning and Construction.

Sources

CITB, Construction Workforce Outlook 2026–2030, June 2026 — an average of 41,200 extra workers needed each year between 2026 and 2030 (around 206,000 in total).