Cost Engineer Overview

There are certain skills that many cost engineers have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed speaking skills, initiative and math skills.

When it comes to the most important skills required to be a cost engineer, we found that a lot of resumes listed 13.3% of cost engineers included project management, while 10.6% of resumes included construction projects, and 6.9% of resumes included cost analysis. Hard skills like these are helpful to have when it comes to performing essential job responsibilities.

When it comes to searching for a job, many search for a key term or phrase. Instead, it might be more helpful to search by industry, as you might be missing jobs that you never thought about in industries that you didn't even think offered positions related to the cost engineer job title. But what industry to start with? Most cost engineers actually find jobs in the construction and technology industries.

If you're interested in becoming a cost engineer, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 55.6% of cost engineers have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 30.8% of cost engineers have master's degrees. Even though most cost engineers have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.

Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a cost engineer. When we researched the most common majors for a cost engineer, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or master's degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on cost engineer resumes include associate degree degrees or high school diploma degrees.

You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a cost engineer. In fact, many cost engineer jobs require experience in a role such as project engineer. Meanwhile, many cost engineers also have previous career experience in roles such as project controls engineer or cost analyst.