Experience
The Sidara companies have figured prominently in helping drive the Digital Integration revolution across multiple industries and are committing to digital integration fluency – GIS, BIM, Digital Delivery, automation, and more – throughout the firm.
I am excited to be part of the TYLin team that will help advance our universal adoption of industry-leading Best Practices for today and tomorrow.
We have a great Vision that I look forward to pitching with my usual enthusiasm. We have the structure and execution plan to ensure success and the support of experienced leadership.
I look forward to building adoption systems that are, lean, compelling and self-sustaining, maximizing the synergy of worldwide experts.
Not everyone has to know the details of ISO-19650, but soon enough we'll all have to conform to it. It's the new infrastructure infrastructure infrastructure. Let's clear a path.
Everyone up!
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- Category: Experience
Rail/Transit Experience
At Intergraph Corporation (1992-1993), due my systematic approach to evaluating "new discipline" software and my organized documentation, management had me certify much of the "roadway-adjacent" software: Site (InSite), Drainage (InFlow), Sanitary (InSewer), Bridge (InSpan), and Rail (InRail). My first overseas trip was three weeks in England as sole US representative among a multinational team to certify InRail. The primary InRail/InRoads superset at that time as alternative transitional curves, cant, switches and turnouts, and regression analysis.
During my 10+ years at Bentley, I did not directly support OpenRail, but kept abreast with how the software was progressing with respect to InRail.
I worked on Edmonton's LRT Valley Line West in Subsurface Utility modeling (existing) using OpenRoads and a lot of BIM to tame the chaos (and View Display Rules to streamline the feedback cycle). That work inspires me in promoting the greatest immediate new technology ROI available right now in the OpenRoads/OpenRail ecosystem: Tomorrow's Tech, Today's Profit. I also spent time designing and modeling proposed Electrical Duct Banks for the project.
BIM Experience
Asphalt isn't particularly BIMmy, although DOT-level Digital Deliver efforts are becoming much more so. Drainage and Utilities clearly benefit from BIM. I've been using Item Types (Bentley BIM) and Property Sets (Autodesk BIM) extensions for years to streamline workflows and improve communication (which improves quality).
Leadership and Strategic Vision
My overriding tenets:
- have a growth plan based on best practices and opportunities
- lead centrally as appropriate
- fully-leverage distributed expertise.
- ensure that your platforms work effectively to support your goals.
Infrastructure Industry Growth is in Digital Integration today and Digital Twins tomorrow - particularly for Owner Operators and those serving them.
Have a Growth Plan Ready
Be ready now; execute quickly upon approval
While execution times and levels are highly dependent on business vision, income forecasts, and growth strategy, it is absolutely critical to have a technology and business practice Adoption Plan in place immediately, so that actions when greenlighted are executed quickly, effectively, and consistent with the long-term vision.
Keys in Success Strategic Adoption include:
- Prove the Value: show the specific benefits to what the teams do (general generics do not inspire action).
- Detail the Risk and Cost: Rosy promises of easy adoption are simply not credible. Clearly understanding risk - throughout the entire adoption process (including to ongoing projects and existing clients) - is essentially to ensuring trust in the Innovation and Adoption team and effective project and team advancement.
- Investment Strategies: to distribute the adoption investment costs. Some technology adoption or process change - the learning curve - can significantly impact smaller projects or for pathfinder projects for a particular client. Having the Early Adopters bear the costs of staff uplift actually punishes the early adopters and stifles innovation.
- Lean, Focused Support: Engineers don't fear change, and they certainly don't fear learning; they fear uncertainty and the inefficiency and costs of chasedowns outside of their expertise. Minimize the uncertainty, minimize troubleshooting, minimize filler. Just Enough, Just In Time.
Design for Scalability
Little of what we do is unique. Design for scalability. If you design for scale, then it is easy to scale. It's also easy to "one-off". But if you do not design for scale, then everything is harder, slower, more expensive, less effective.
It is not expensive to design for effective and scalable communications to drive collaboration, synergy and innovation.
Design for Collaboration
One direct immediate benefit of having well-designed, scalable (findable, accessible) communication and documentation in one department, project, or scope is that it greatly facilitates communication to external groups and management.
Coordination and Collaboration with adjacent and extended disciplines (Digital Delivery and other Sector leads) shall be intentional, systematic, and supported to ensure synergy among colleagues - it's too important to leave to chance and "winging it". There is readily available technology built for this; it just takes some leadership and energy.
Adoption Methodology
Adoption, Innovation, and Synergy are products of excellent communication. Dialog, not monolog.
Broad effective continuous two-way communication is the cornerstone of adoption. My three decades of experience in design technology, training design, and communication systems support provide an agility to predict, plan and adapt. While I am energetic (and at times bold), I do possess a wisened (and wizened) humility where my primary goal is to serve and enable. Our greatest expertise and ability to serve clients are distributed across the organization.
My goal is to inspire colleague participation and leadership and to ensure we have a system that fully leverages their talent. I think my greatest leadership is in maximizing theirs.
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- Category: Experience
My "least immersive" experience working professionally with government was as a young engineer designing highways for Florida DOT. Obeying their standards without having a direct relationship with the staff.
Since 1995, my relationships with Government have been built around process improvement, whether it has been software/standards automation or staff training and training development. Even at CalTrans, where my job was production, I was continually working with staff and leadership to streamline their processes.
I worked for HNTB for two years as an InRoads Highway Designer. FDOT was our primary client.
I spent five years consulting to the City of San Diego. Initially I was an independent contractor with San Diego Data Processing Corp (SDDPC) leading their InSewer (InRoads Sanitary) product implementation, training development and staff training. Ultimately, I was a Principle Engineering Analyst for SDDPC, managing Engineering Services Contracts for the City (MicroStation, InRoads, InSewer, InFlow and other products).
I was Technical Lead for OkDOT's migration from MicroStation/J to v8 and InRoads. Bohannan-Huston Inc. (BHI) owned the contract and Brad Adams managed it. I was given wide lattitude in how I worked with the client and staff, how and when we met, staff education, consensual decisions, and implementation of newly-decided standards.
While most of the on-site was in Oklahoma City, I led a consulting team from multiple states and worked with staff from multiple OkDOT regional offices. I started a website to facilitate collaboration between BHI staff. It grew into an education and collaboration core that erased the geographic distance among participants.
Another great project where I worked with Bohannan-Huston, Inc. (BHI) and Brad Adams. BHI had a contract to migrate CDOT from AutoDesk to Bentley. I was technical lead, developing the standards implementation. Later, I wrote their initial InRoads Storm&Sanitary Training Manual.
In my Civil XLr8 days, I bid for and won a contract to deliver InRoads Training to UDOT's Roadway Engineers and their Bridge Group, using my standard training material as well as custom content for the Bridge engineers.
The four classes I taught stand out as some of the most enjoyable in my career. Great people and testament to the ability to have a great time while staying very productive (my favorite way to work).
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I worked directly embedded with CalTrans for 18 months as part of their Staff Augmentation Program (through CH2MHill). I worked in a construction trailer for a year as part of their Phased Construction (equivalent to Design-Build) for I-15 HOV Widening. I worked primarily on a highly-constrained and ever-changing Direct Access Ramp geometric and drainage design.
My last six months at CalTrans was in the new District 11 Headquarters doing interchange widening studies for I-5 (geometric and drainage design).
My engineering work at Kimley-Horn was for CalTrans. While at Bentley, I taught StormCAD at District 1 (Eureka) and Headquarters (Sacramento).
Virginia DOT was an early adopter of OpenRoads Drainage ("Subsurface Utilities"). As one of Bentley's top experts and co-creator of training material, I worked with VDOT Drainage HQ staff to identify gaps between their needs and Bentley's training offerings. I authored new courses and taught classes at their headquarters and throughout the state. I worked with their Drainage Managers to ensure their comfort not only with the software but with Quality Assurance tools and techniques. They wanted to be sure that the additional power (complexity) of the software did not lead to errors.
In 2018, I spent a week at a number of DOTs working with their Hydraulic Leads to help define their implementations of OpenRoads Drainage.
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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
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- Category: Experience
First "Solo" Project
My first job out of school was for a 3-person site engineering company, Dieter Engineering Services. My first day on the job I asked Barry, "who does our Surveying?" "We do."
Broad responsibility, long hours, good equipment and software (386s, SVGA monitors, AutoCAD and DCA Software), the smell of ammonia wafting from the blueprint room. Ink pens drying out on halfway through an overnight plot. Fedex Tubes driven to the airport a couple of times a week.
My first big job, 30 acres, 1 designer (me). full site plans, grading & drainage. dozens of store footprint changes. all the changes and their ripples were performed manually, all the way through.
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How fast could I do it today with new software?
Big Project Collaboration
In a small, tight group, you didn't lose a lot of productivity with handoffs or poor communications.
It wasn't until working within design teams in a multi-disciplined organization on big integrated projects that it became obvious that fast-typing was not only NOT a reliable way to increase productivity. Hurrying was, in fact, a reliable way to reduce quality. Improving the system speed saved a lot more time than clicking faster. Better tools, better handoffs: better systems.
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Qualifications for Supporting the City of San Diego
For a video of me talking through this page: https://youtu.be/BqSWr8K3jyI
Pre-City #1
Site and Drainage Engineering. AutoDesk & DCA Civil Engineering Software. Leitz Sokkia SDR2. 1989-1992.
First "Solo" Project
My first job out of school was for a 3-person site engineering company, Dieter Engineering Services. My first day on the job I asked Barry, "who does our Surveying?" "We do."
Broad responsibility, long hours, good equipment and software (386s, SVGA monitors, AutoCAD and DCA Software), the smell of ammonia wafting from the blueprint room. Ink pens drying out on halfway through an overnight plot. Fedex Tubes driven to the airport a couple of times a week.
My first big job, 30 acres, 1 designer (me). full site plans, grading & drainage. dozens of store footprint changes. all the changes and their ripples were performed manually, all the way through.
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How fast could I do it today with new software?
Intergraph!
1992-1993
InRoads InSewer InFlow - Water Resource Engineering Certification and Support Lead.
Big Projects = Collaboration & Quality
HNTB 1993-1995
In a small, tight group, you didn't lose a lot of productivity with handoffs or poor communications.
It wasn't until working within design teams in a multi-disciplined organization on big integrated projects that it became obvious that fast-typing was not only NOT a reliable way to increase productivity. Hurrying was, in fact, a reliable way to reduce quality. Improving the system speed saved a lot more time than clicking faster. Better tools, better handoffs: better systems.
City #1
1995-2000
1995 - City of San Diego - Engineering Applications
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- Category: Experience
Subcategories
Skills
Detailed lists of my skills, including running a consulting company, organizational leadership, and, of course, engineering.
Employers
A list of places from which I drew a salary (or where I was CEO or Sole Proprietor)
Clients
A list of contracted employment - direct or as a subcontractor.
Thank You!
Thank you to some of my favorite mentors, bosses, and clients.
