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About

36 Years in AEC, One Signature Underneath It All

I’ve spent 36 years in AEC and public infrastructure, most of it figuring out the same problem from different angles: how do good engineers and good firms actually win the work, deliver on what they promised, and build something that outlasts any one person’s calendar.

I’ve helped deliver over $8 billion in constructed infrastructure. I’ve sold nearly a billion dollars in professional services — not from a sales seat, but as an engineer who learned business development because nobody was going to hand our firm the work we deserved. I served as Executive Director of Operations and PMO for a multi-entity professional services portfolio, which is a formal way of saying I spent years inside the operational mess that most growing firms eventually hit, and helped build the systems that got them through it.

Somewhere in there, I started writing it down — what actually works, what doesn’t, and why most of the advice out there sounds better in a conference room than it holds up on a real project. Eight books later, that’s still what I’m doing: taking what I’ve lived and handing it to the next person before they have to learn it the hard way.

I’m a licensed PE. I still think that matters.

Association Leadership

Chair, APWA Membership Committee
Co-Chair, Public Works Institute
Past President, ASCE Sacramento Capital Branch and Section

A Career Highlight

In 2019, the business unit I led was recognized as NV5’s fastest-growing internal business. That August, I got to ring the Nasdaq closing bell in Times Square — a genuinely surreal way to mark years of work, made better by having my wife, Andi, standing right there for it.

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For advisory inquiries, contact Waldrop Advisory. For speaking, media, or anything else, reach out directly.

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