THE QS AWARDS 2006

Best All-Round Firm

Winner: Turner & Townsend

The rise of Turner & Townsend has been the success story of the decade in the QS and project management markets. The judges singled out the firm's ability to combine surges in growth in the
UK and abroad with a great service offering as key to its success in the last five years. There is an energy in the firm that is nurturing creativity, innovation and great financial results. Investment in both IT and people underpin future growth and achievements.

QS Young Achiever of the Year

Winner: Anooj Oodit

In a highly competitive category, our judges singled out Anooj Oodit as the most outstanding candidate. After moving from his native Mauritius to study as a QS in the UK in 1995, he then joined Turner & Townsend and has never looked back. Last year, he was made an associate director at the age of 28, and heads a team of 20 working in the rail sector. He has overseen a 350% increase in rail income over the last three years and become an ambassador within his firm and beyond. He supervises APC candidates, is an APC lecturer on risk management and works closely with the RICS Mauritius branch.

Highly Commended
The judges also highly commended Turner &Townsend's Penelope Crompton, who they saw as a potential star of the future. Penelope is a non-cognate graduate, having originally taken a maths degree at the University of Edinburgh. Since switching to the quantity surveying profession in 2004, she has thrown herself into her work, delivering projects in the corporate end-user commercial sector, as well as playing a part in setting up the firm's young person's forum.

Best New QS firm

Winner: AA projects

The judges said they were highly impressed by AA Projects. They believed the firm has the potential to be a strong regional player across the north of England. It has already leapt from having just four staff in 1999 to employing 35 this year, and it is expecting turnover to hit the £3.8m mark for 2006/2007. The strong work that AA is doing in the education sector was singled out by our panel, because it was a clear sign of an excellent service offering.

QS Employer of the Year

Winner: Bucknall Austin

Bucknall Austin lives and breathes training and development, the judges noted. They were impressed by the culture which the firm has developed, above all by the fact that a third of its employees have become shareholders. Our panel were dazzled by Bucknall's online training facility, the 'Young Board', and financial investment into training and CPD.

Best Project Management Firm of the Year

Winner: Hornagold & Hills

With minimum fuss Hornagold & Hills has established itself as one of the premium project management brands in the UK over the last two decades. So much so that it has attracted the attention of the services group Mouchel Parkman, which acquired H&H for a cool £11m last month. The firm has an unrivalled array of work on its books, which total a mighty £12bn, including the transformation of Elephant & Castle in south London, the largest regeneration scheme of its kind in Europe. The judges also singled out the firm's service as excellent, in spite of its significant growth in recent years.

Best In-House Team

Winner: Shepherd Construction

A finalist in 2005, Shepherd did one better this year, proving that hard work and a focus on delivering an efficient and innovative service can pay off. The five-strong team for the contractor has established a standard library for bill of quantity production and developed its own whole-life costing document, which the judges felt were impressive achievements. And it is doing the basics well, a crucial element behind the performance of this major contractor.

Best M&E Specialist Cost Consultant

Winner: Franklin + Andrews

The Project Diamond scheme proves that Franklin + Andrews’ 30 years of experience in M&E advice is bearing significant fruit. The project will create the world's brightest light to help scientists look at atoms in the greatest detail in history. The firm also displays its considerable skills across other sectors, such as data centres and sports and leisure facilities. It is spreading the M&E word, playing a role in the foundation of the Whole Life Cost Forum and publishing a price book specifically for M&E. The judges considered the firm to be delivering a quality service and promoting best practice.

Best Strategic Construction Advisor

Winner: AA Projects

Many people in the sector talk about offering a cradle to grave service; AA Projects is one of the few firms to actually deliver it. The work the firm has carried out on the new £35m Darlington college scheme is ample proof. It was an opportunity for the firm to use its Curriculum Modelling Process for the further education sector. The process enables clients to ascertain their space requirements at the earliest possible stage of a development. The judges were full of praise for a good idea that has worked well in practice.

QS Champion of the Year

Winner: Frank Maitland

Maitland's achievements deserve major recognition. Last year his firm received the award for M&E QS of the year, a testament to the reputation that MaitlandQS has built up within the industry for consistently good service. However, it is in the field of training where Maitland has come into his own. He has responded to the lack of specialist skills in the UK by leading the firm's creation of a new M&E QS degree with Salford University to provide training.

Best Innovation

Winner: Needlemans

Needlemans was considered by the judges to be well ahead of the competition in developing the use of the NEC contract within the sector. The judges believed the firm's early work has certainly paid off. They were impressed by the practice's strong combination of traditional values and new technologies, which it achieved through working with joint venture partner Process Systems & Services.

Best Training Initiative

Winner: MaitlandQS

MaitlandQS has responded to the widespread industry complaint about the lack of M&E training in the best possible way: it has started up its own university course. The firm has teamed up with the University of Salford to form the only M&E QS course available. The judges considered this a truly outstanding achievement, given the unenviable challenge of establishing a new tertiary route for the specialism. The course is RICS accredited and starts in 2007. The firm also sponsors 32 of its employees to study, displaying a commitment to nurturing future generations of industry talent.

International Achievement

Winner: Turner & Townsend

It has been quite a year in the development of Turner & Townsend as an international player. Organic growth and a major acquisition in Australia has resulted in a 57% jump in turnover to £43m in the last year. The firm has set up a plan to nurture multi-national clients, such as Nissan and the Royal Bank of Scotland, and follow them across the globe; it has stuck to it and it is now reaping the rewards. There are few firms in the UK market that are performing so well or as consistently on the international stage.