Celebrating our RREF Network - March

This month we hear from Becky Sleath, MSc Real Estate graduate.  She shares her career journey, and what has led her to found Human Infrastructure (Hi).

At the start of 2025, I founded Human Infrastructure (Hi) to focus on social sustainability within real estate. After first studying People (BSc Psychology) and then Property (MSc Real Estate), I joined the CBRE graduate scheme, becoming a Director in the West End Office Leasing team before returning to university to study Purpose (Executive MSc Social Business & Entrepreneurship). 

I then moved client-side to join the Dutch developer Edge – the team behind the “world’s most sustainable building” according to BREEAM – where I helped establish their UK presence. Approaching leasing through an ESG-led lens, I worked between the HQ innovation and the UK development teams to drive commitments to people and planet that could be implemented at both asset and company level, with a particular focus on the ‘S’.

My passion, experience and ambition for buildings to do more for people – within and around them – led me to start Hi, and now I work with landlords and developers to enhance the value of their assets with strategies and actions to facilitate human connection and purpose.  I also have two young children, so running my own business gives me the flexibility to manage their needs and my professional work.

What do you love about working in the industry?

What I love most about working in the industry is that it sits right at the intersection of ideas and reality. You can be talking about economics, climate change, design, or social issues one minute, and then see those conversations turn into something physical that will shape how people live and work for decades. That sense that the decisions you make today will still be visible in the world long into the future is both a responsibility and a huge motivation.

I also enjoy the breadth of the industry – no two projects are ever the same, and the best work happens when you bring together different perspectives and experiences from a variety of specialisms. It means you’re always learning, and if you stay curious, the job never really becomes routine.

What do you see as some of the key challenges ahead?

One of the biggest challenges ahead is balancing the drive for growth and development with the realities of climate change, resource constraints, and social inequality. The industry will need to become better at taking a long-term view, even when financial and political cycles push towards short-term decisions. There is also a growing need for better collaboration between sectors to tackle these problems; they can’t be solved by developers, planners, or investors working in isolation. 

I do think the industry still has work to do in moving beyond group-think, but there are encouraging signs of progress. Efforts to diversify the profession are improving, particularly at the grass-roots level, and it’s important that people from a variety of backgrounds are not only brought in, but feel able to contribute their own perspectives rather than having to fit into an established way of doing things. Whilst real estate operates in a complex space, the more open the industry is to different ways of thinking, the better equipped we will be to respond to the social, environmental and economic challenges ahead. That growing openness gives me real optimism that we can deliver places that are more sustainable, resilient and inclusive in the future.

If you could offer some words of wisdom to the students about to graduate from a Real Estate & Planning programme, what would they be?

Stay curious and don’t feel you have to follow a perfectly defined career path straight away. The real estate and planning world is broader than it first appears, and some of the most interesting roles sit between traditional disciplines. Build diverse relationships, keep learning beyond your specialism, and try to understand the bigger picture behind the projects you work on – that perspective becomes more valuable the further you go in your career.

Thank you Becky for sharing your experiences within your career and your inspirational story.