In January, the council announced its intention to bring council engineering employees and the staff of council-controlled organisation Lakes Engineering Ltd in house, as one entity.
"We are now moving towards creating a group of people who will work as one team under one structure," council chief executive Duncan Field said.
The move would decrease the council's need to use external consultants and more effectively manage those consultants retained, which in turn would result in a large cost saving for the community.
The council estimated a reduction of $3.3 million - or 26% - in the cost of engineering management and a 4.5% reduction in the cost of the capital programme once the proposals were fully implemented.
"Ultimately, it will also mean a better outcome for community infrastructure," Mr Field said.
All positions underwent an evaluation process.
The new combined structure would carry 24.5 full-time equivalent staff. At present, there are 18 employees in total.
In some cases the new positions in the new structure aligned with the role already being done by individuals. Those people could be offered the new position, although they were being encouraged to apply for other roles in which they had an interest.
Other positions were changed to the extent the roles needed to be advertised.
An additional 6.5 roles were new positions. Six staff were being required to re-apply for amended roles, which would be advertised.
"I need to stress that this was not in any way based on current performance.
"It is, in my opinion, the only way to go about the process and ensure that we have the best people in each role," Mr Field said.
The council began advertising widely at the weekend, in jobs ranging from the general manager of infrastructure services through to project managers.
By advertising the positions at the same time the council hoped for a short recruitment period.
"We want to establish this new team as quickly as possible," Mr Field said.
