RICS Senior Professional route to membership

A ‘senior professional’ is someone who operates at a senior level within the industry, exercising extensive leadership and management skills. RICS has a route to membership specifically aimed at senior professionals. You should read this article if you think the route might be for you.

The requirements are:

To decide whether you qualify, the first step is for you to send your CV to RICS using the resume template which can be found in the downloadable section on the right of this page. One of our professional advisers will make an initial assessment.  If you meet the requirements for the route, the next step is for your CV to be reviewed by a vetting panel of RICS members who will decide whether you are in a senior industry position. 

If this panel agrees you are sufficiently senior, you will be asked to send in a number of written submissions.  The final stage is a competency based interview, using these submissions, conducted by RICS assessors.   

If the vetting panel does not put you forward for interview, RICS will advise you which of our other routes to membership might suit you better.

The senior professional vetting panel’s standards are high.   So RICS is offering you this advice to give you a clear idea what they will be looking for.

Am I ‘senior’? 

There can be no precise definition of what makes someone a senior professional.  But the Senior Professional route was designed to offer a way into membership for the market leaders, highly-respected practitioners with influence in the property industry.  It is not enough, for example, simply to have the word ‘senior’ in your job title.  You must be someone whom other practitioners in your professional field would consider senior.

And although you must have the specified period of experience to qualify for the route, experience on its own does not necessarily make you senior: the quality and career progression matter more.

Here is a key test you can use. To become an RICS member, every applicant must achieve a set of competencies reflecting his/her professional discipline.  But there are three extra competencies that only senior professional applicants have to achieve.  Here they are, with their definitions:  

Leadership

“provide evidence of application of your role as a leader appropriate to your area of practice”.  

There is a difference between management and leadership.  The vetting panel will be looking for more than simply having a number of people reporting to you: they will want evidence of behaviours and styles which create an environment in which progress and change can take place.

Managing people

“provide evidence of the application of the skills required to manage people”.

Managing resources

“provide evidence of the application [of the knowledge and understanding of the resources required and their cost for the effective operation of a business] in your area of practice, giving reasoned advice on the most effective use, allocation and cost of resources”.

As a rule of thumb, the vetting panel will be looking for strategic management of people and resources, at an organisational level - rather than, say, the day-to-day operation of a small-to-medium team.

Can you demonstrate all three of these senior professional competencies? The vetting panel, and subsequently the final assessment panel, will both be looking for clear evidence that you can.

What if I am a sole practitioner?

It is probably more difficult to persuade the vetting panel of your seniority if you are a sole practitioner or consultant, or a specialist in a particular technical area.  That does not mean it is impossible.  But can you show that you are an established name in the industry, or that major clients come to you because you are an acknowledged authority?  If you are, say, a director of your own firm, your market position will be all-important. Some indicators here will be your client list and the type and level of work they bring to you; and external recognition such as prizes or awards, press coverage in industry journals, or involvement with Government.

Background reading

Before you prepare your CV for the vetting panel, you should read carefully

• the Senior Professional Route Guide for Applicants
• the APC/ATC Requirements and competencies guide
• the pathway guide (this is a document prepared by expert practitioners, that explains in detail how the competencies are interpreted in the context of your particular professional discipline)

You should then do a self-review to make sure you have all the necessary competencies at the necessary levels.  Completing Template 2 at the back of the Guide for Applicants will enable you to do this.

1. One of the first things the vetting panel will look at is your organisation chart.
   • Do make sure you have a professional, well-presented chart that clearly shows your position in the organisation.  And make sure you give the panel plenty of information about the organisation itself – size, market position, clients, etc.
   • Don’t send a chart that shows only your team or department – the panel needs to see where you fit in to the organisation as a whole.
2. Many applicants send in a list of projects they have been involved in (often mentioning the value of the project).
   • Do give examples of the calibre of work you have done. If you are referring to a number of projects, show clearly the extent of your involvement in each one, the position of influence you held, or the degree to which you were responsible for its strategic management.
   • Don’t simply send an undifferentiated list.
3. Obviously, when you are deciding whether to apply via this route to membership, you will compare yourself with others in your field.
   • Do make comparisons if you think they will be useful for the vetting panel – for example, you might say that you are considered the leading expert in your firm/area on a given subject.
   • Don’t feel tempted to exaggerate or embellish: remember that the vetting panel is only a first stage.  There is no point in trying to get through this hurdle if you cannot substantiate what you are saying when it comes to the professional interview.
4. RICS is a professional organisation that prides itself on its high standards.
   • Do present your initial application in a way that will impress – the sort of standard you would expect to see in a good professional report.
   • Don’t see the initial application as just a form-filling exercise.  The vetting panel sets a high benchmark for these applications.

It may be useful to see some examples of the standard we expect.  Here are some examples (names omitted) of applicants who have succeeded in gaining RICS membership through the senior professional route. 

• Commercial property
• Quantity surveying and construction

with

• Planning and Development (Profile 1)
• Project Management (Profile 2)
• Quantity Surveying and Construction (Profiles 3 & 4)

RICS thanks you for your interest in membership, and wishes you every success with your application.