re: How can I get into commercial/civil/industrial construction estimating?

My years of experience selling to GCs disagrees with the idea that you can't estimate if you don't know how it's built from field experience.

I sell to big firms like Balfour Beatty, Brasfield & Gorrie, Archer Western, Gilbane and about 10 others in the National Top 200 GCs. Every one of these firms is loaded with fresh out of college estimators. The Atlanta offices are filled with Auburn, Clemson, and GT graduates. It is the lowest tier project team position at every company. It is the starting position for anyone without field or management experience. It is a stepping stone to assistant PM. Project Manager is the next promotion. Senior Project Manager follows that. Division Manager is next. Regional Manager or VP of a division is next after that. That is usually about a 15-20 year journey to get from new hire estimator to VP or a Division manager. Of course there are exceptions.

Here is the kicker for the OP. I don't know what region of the country you are in but in the big construction markets around the South, all of the new hire estimators have usually interned at the company they get hired by. Auburn, Clemson, Florida, GT and even Kennesaw State and Georgia Southern to lesser degrees have construction management programs. There is no shortage of students to intern and fill the positions after graduation. And I can tell you they hire more than they actually need to estimate projects because that is not the end game for them. These kids are starting in estimating but the GC is really hiring future PMs. A big GC in a market will only have about 1 or 2 career estimators while they might have 8-10 estimators at any given time. The career estimators are titled Senior Estimators. They supervise the young ones who will eventually be PMs and make sure they 1) don't screw bids up and 2) are proficient enough to promote.

Without any previous intern experience, you will probably have to go after it a little harder. Not having a degree in CM doesn't help. I think you said that you only have some classes in CM. It really comes down to can you sell yourself without having certain qualifications that the GCs generally hire on? If you have a degree of any kind it should not be to hard if you interview with a lot of firms. You don't need field experience for that entry level job. Hell, the people promoted to Asst PM don't have it either. Once they get that promotion, they are basically being coached for a couple years or more on how to run their own job. They sit silently in meetings and listen and learn. Can't tell you how many times over 18 years of job site meetings I have seen 23-26 year old Asst PMs sit in our team meetings and not say a word. If you really want this, I think you can get it but you have to be impressive in an interview.