Competing against consultants from around the world including Arup and Atkins, the teams managed a construction company in the form of a computerbased simulation. This involved making financial decisions on investing in other companies and how much dividend to pay shareholders. Decisions also had to be made on bidding for projects and how many people to employ in different roles to ensure the projects finished on time.
Samantha Hayden, Project Manager and Gaussian Eliminators team member, said, "The final in England made the whole competition more realistic because we were competing against the other companies, not just a computer."
"The competition was a great way to meet colleagues from different offices around Australia and New Zealand and expand my professional network," added Samantha.
Aurecon’s teams comprised of members who specialised in a number of expertise and came from South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, reflecting the diversity that exists in our global company.
Entries this year were sponsored by Limelight, an internal forum which enables Aurecon’s emerging professionals to network and support one another in their careers. Limelight empowers emerging professionals to ask questions, make recommendations and challenge current practices to ensure continuous improvement.
Aurecon is looking forward to the challenge of the 2013 MERIT competition and is confident it will be our winning year.