Thabang

“I remember being very young – in the early grades – tearing apart my toys so that I could put them back together. One day, my aunt looked at me and said, ‘someday you’re going to be a mechanical engineer’. And she was right.”

Junior Mechanical Engineer Thabang Ramashapa joined Royal HaskoningDHV in 2016 on a bursary for his undergraduate degree. When asked what attracted him to RHDHV, he shyly admits that he initially didn’t know much about the company.

“The day I applied for my bursary was actually the first I’d heard about RHDHV. So, I did a bit of investigation, saw the kind of projects they were involved in, and that they were not only a big company, but an international one too, and that’s one thing that attracted me to them – the opportunity to grow not only locally, but also internationally.”

Designer at heart

Thabang officially started in his role in 2019 and is currently studying towards his Master’s in Engineering Management. But he relates, first and foremost, to being a designer; to the endless possibilities that a blank page holds.

“My heart lies in designing something fresh, seeing it come alive on paper, all the way to something tangible; something that people can use.” The fact that the projects he works on in the water department serve a purpose and have a direct impact on the quality of people’s lives brings him great satisfaction.

Thabang confesses to being a bit of a nerd when it comes to anything engineering-related. “I’m fascinated by technology and machines, and it’s this interest that steered me in this direction.”

Proudest moment?

Two come to mind: My first-ever design was implemented in the NFA wastewater treatment plant, and a paper that I just wrote was approved to be presented at the FIDIC conference in Nigeria.

Thabang speaks fondly of getting to travel across the country while working on various projects, an opportunity he says he never had growing up. It’s abundantly clear that he enjoys working for RHDHV, but would he recommend it to others? “Without a doubt,” he says, “especially for young engineers. I'd recommend it because of the vast knowledge that we have in our senior engineers, and most of them are quite open to sharing information and guiding you through everything. For example, I’m working towards becoming a project manager, and it's been a very difficult change for me. But then the guys that I'm surrounded by, they’re always there to support me and give me the guidance when I need it. So, I think that's something essential to have for a young engineer.”