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Why am I Here? (in front of class)

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Parent Category: Leadership

Category: Training

One of the first things I do when I start an on-site class is ask:

"Why Am I Here?"

• What value do I add by being here?
• Why did your company pay me money to teach you something that is available for free?
  • Videos of these lectures and exercise are availble online.  In fact, in many of them, I'm the narrator (unlikely now, but common at the time).
• Why Am I Here?

1. It forces staff to spend the time 24, 32 or 40 hours taking the training.
2. I can answer "detail" questions and provide context.
3. I diagnose, triage, and curate.  There is a LOT of content available, some of it is critical to you, much is not.  Some has a negative consequence.  The first hour I spend focused on learning your needs, picking appropriate foundational material to work through for the first day.  Over the course of the day (and the next), I refine my understanding of what you need and then find the best material available.  Generally if there is a day 4, I've got some new custom exercise that fill the biggest gap in the material that fits your needs.
4. I can translate the generic workflow to how you do things or how you should be doing things for your projects' unique or quirky needs.

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Professional Experience

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Category: Experience

Civil XLr8 (the Connect Edition)

As much as I was enjoying banging on Civil3D (and its Hydraulic extensions), it was clear that I was never going to be truly bi-lingual.  I'm happy to have had a deep dive back in the other half of the duopoly, but Bentley solutions is my home.  It was time to resurrect Civil XLr8.

I've been doing a lot of workspace development (particulary Survey, Sheet Seed development, Annotation - filling in subscopes I had neglected), some training, and business development (see CivilXLr8.com).

My primary focus in the Bentley Ecosystem is helping organizations grow by adopting better practices and broadening internal and peripheral integration with the tools they already own.  The greater efficiency and expanded services footprint = succe$$.  

Parsons Corporation (2021-2023)

In November 2021, I accepted a position at Parsons Corporation as a Supervising Drainage Engineer. My goal was to get back into industry that had changed so much in the thirteen years I had been watching a remote vantage point at Bentley (involved, but not embedded).

Parsons is known for their expertise in Multi-Discipline Live-Collaboration MegaProjects.

I worked on these MegaProjects

• US-183 North Mobility Project, Austin TX: ProjectWise-Managed Roadway&Drainage Rehabilitation.  I worked Drainage using OpenRoads Drainage and Utilities software.
• Edmonton Light Rail Transit, Valley Line West, Edmonton, Alberta: Light Rail Extension through downtown Edmonton.  I worked modeling existing and new Subsurface Utilities using ORD Drainage and Utilities. Note this is absolutely a subdiscipline where moving chaotically-source data to the (extended) OpenRoads Data Model (Item Types) yields huge benefits in schedule, cost and quality.  Utilities is so well-suited for OpenRoads BIM and Digital Twins capability.
• JFK Airport Redevelopment, New York: Multi-discipline $19 billion project.  I worked drainage modeling and design in Civil3D, SSA, AutoDesk Construction Cloud and supporting programs.

Other opportunities at Parsons included

• Leading the drainage portion of a phase of a $570M highway expansion project bid (which we one).   FAST detailed modeling for estimates! (It seems that the Construction firms are in an arms race to fully model a project so that they can get really precise estimates.  This really increases the costs of bidding.)
• Using Teams to share new Best Practices for OpenRoads Drainage

Bentley Systems (2008-2021)

Prior to being recruited to join Bentley Systems in 2008, half of my career had been responsible engineering design and half had been developing training, implementing and training InRoads and InRoads Drainage (Storm&Sanitary).  Half had been as an employee, half had been as a self-employed consultant.

My role at Bentley initially had been to extend our Training Content available for InRoads and then later to transform how we delivered training: to facilitate remote OnDemand Learning.  

Additional major Learning System responsibilities included rolling out OpenRoads Technology, incorporating the Haestad (OpenFlows) drainage software, on-site training and consulting, and managing the Civil Content Development Team.

My current role at Bentley is Blueprints Portfolio Manager for the Design Integration Products (these include the OpenRoads, OpenPlant, OpenBuildings, STAAD/RAM product families and the MicroStation Platform).  Our goal is to transform how the spectrum of value - from short job-aids through large Consulting projects - are consumed by Bentley users.  Our goal is to dramatically facilitate the consumption of training and consulting - similar to how we transformed the delivery of training from Instructor-required to OnDemand self-service.

I have a Bentley page with more detail.

Please see sub-menus under Experience for discipline summaries and highlights, like 

• Drainage Engineering
• Highway Engineering 
• Government Experience

Drainage Engineering

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Parent Category: Experience

Category: Skills

I had a consulting manager at Bentley say to me once, "I had no idea that you knew roadway."   I KNOW Roadway really well, but when I'm pulled from my Bentley "day job" to provide consulting services, it's for drainage "hot projects" or to consult with leadership teams to plan OpenRoads Drainage Implementations.

I think I defensively answered "I'm roadway first" (because Bentley Civil is roadway first), but upon reflection I'm not sure that holds up to scrutiny.  In the three-way split between Roadway, Site, and Drainage Engineering, Drainage does, in fact, get the edge.

I may be the same sized Big Fish, but the Pond of Drainage Experts is much smaller than the Great Lake of Roadway Experts.  

OpenRoads Drainage (it's currently called "Subsurface Utlities") is a full implementation of StormCAD and CivilStorm within the OpenRoads Designer environment.  I've been deeply involved in its development and rollout since its early days at Bentley.  The Product Manager and I developed most of the training (until recently when I moved to promoting all Engineering Applications).

After getting a full complement of Drainage Training published, I started with Virginia DOT extensively.  I developed additional training material per their needs and delivered multiple weeks of training at their headquarters and regional offices.  I worked with hydraulic managers to address their concerns (they were less about the software than being able to assure the quality of projects submitted by staff and consultants.  StormCAD and CivilStorm are considerably more sophisticated than the software they were replacing.  We worked to develop customizations of in-software tools to help flag issues and automate review).

I most recently spent weeks with the Hydraulic Leads at ALDOT, TxDOT, OrDOT, and WSDOT, and a top 5 Design Company going over details of the product's spatial and hydraulic capabilities and how to meet their detailed design criteria (see The Surprise Barrier to OpenRoads Drainage Acceptance).

The last drainage course I authored prior to my current position was Placing a Ditch and Culvert Networks. A direct result of writing that course is a series of enhancements to the software to allow easy layout of ditches whether the terrain reflects the ditch or not.  This is an example of where the code was sufficient for "standalone" Haestad workflows, but required enhancements because of the level of spatial accuracy one expects in the OpenRoads BIM/Digital Twin-ready modeling environment. 

This is actually a major consideration when implementing OpenRoads Drainage: because you can be extremely accurate spatially (even photorealistically), how much do you let that capacity "distract" you from your contracted deliverables.  There is a tendency to chase spatial perfection even though it is not required hydraulically or even contractually.  What is the balance? Balancing this question is especially true for agencies setting up their standards.

Read more: Drainage Engineering