Hello and welcome to the mentor Dino YouTube channel I’m your host Caitlyn Rosier I am an architect and founder of Mentor dyo each week I interview amazing Professionals in and around the architecture engineering and construction industry to help Foster learning growth and inspiration in others thank you all to our current
Subscribers and if you’re new we’d love to have you join our community so hit subscribe it really does help others be able to discover this resource so let’s dive in I hope you enjoy this conversation i’ like to welcome Edmond gavo Chief planning Branch installation Readiness Division of the US Army Corp
Of Engineers thank you Edmond for taking the time to speak with me today not a problem and if you’re going to say core of Architects oh I would love you in measurably I was trying not to mess it up it’s a very long rooll en title that
You have so and make sure I don’t mess it up but for my listeners would you mind introducing yourself and a little bit more what you do in this role okay uh my name is Ed gavo I am the chief of the planning Branch within the Kors installation Readiness Division
Very simply put most of the stuff that I do is to the far left end of the facility spectrum that is mean we do installation Master planning in terms of how we develop things I have a we have a software package which helps develop the requirements for facilities which go
Into the into the military construction budget that goes to Congress annually and then I also have a bunch of folks who work with various Army organizations to develop their facility requirements and that itself is very interesting because of course they are constantly changing the requirements depending on what
New toy or system that they come up with and we have to figure out a does the existing facility accommodate or B do we have to do something new now what are all the divisions that are options well just well installation Readiness takes care of basically a
Whole bunch of stuff I mean we do like the the restoration modernization projects which are basically renovation jobs which is about a 7 billion dollar program we also do a lot of the energy initiatives uh we also do some things in terms of uh Mission Assurance which is
Which is a fancy way of basically making sure that uh our installations are able to be resilient in case of any disaster or uh occurrence uh we also within this is within the director to military program so we have major construction we also have a whole environmental division
Which is very active doing both work for the Department of Defense as well as for civilian agencies we do a very we do a lot of EPA work for them we also have an active Group which deals with other agencies and international work uh we do stuff for you name the federal agency
We’re probably doing work for them at this point but also of course we do overseas work uh and as I like to say about where the core the core is either already been there they are there or they will be there now how much like what percentage
Are you guys doing all in house versus putting out for proposals uh well mostly at least in terms of In-House work we usually try to do about 20 to 25% in-house to maintain technical expertise the rest of the design work gets contracted out to the private sector and construction is 100%
To the private sector seor to give you an idea and I just saw the number today La in fy22 we awarded 1.8 billion dollars in Architects and engineer fees that’s crazy and I’m going to I’m going to drop that little reminder to AIA National so just let them know how much
Work you’re doing uh yes and that’s just the core of engineers I’m not including the Navy the Air Force or other DOD services in there now how did you get started working on the federal government side oh that’s lots of fun well came in college I finished the
Last year my of my degree at Notre Dame my father is a career civil servant and so I wanted to do something different so I made a very public pronouncement the fact is the last place I wanted to work was for the federal government well this
Is back in 1980 of course that we we had a recession in terms of the building industry and it was very difficult Landing a job in the private sector so after some time I finally decided to okay we’ll go through the process to try to get a job
In the with the federal government and a few months later I was offered a position down at the the public works department at Fort Stewart Georgia which is just outside Savannah so uh my father reminded me that of a few years ago just said what happened to that well the Army offered
Me a job when no one else did and at that time and this is 1981 mind you 16 thou a year was a lot better than zero yep so but I will say working at a military installation in their Public Work section it’s tremendous experience because you’re not pigeon hold into just
Doing like drawing bathrooms or wall sections you you get to go out and meet with clients you come up with basic requirements you come up with designs you work with the other engineering disciplines because guess what they’re all sitting right next to you so you get
To you get to learn all that uh get the contract awarded but then also construction oversight uh they may not always be big sexy projects but the thing is they are important to the folks uh and users and it was great experience I will admit the fact that going from Detroit
Down to Savannah was a bit of a culture shock very different environment I’ve been to both yeah so so but uh so I was there for a couple of years then uh I got the opportunity to take a position with a navy installation outside DC uh
PX at Naval Air Station which is about an hour south of uh of Washington uh doing the same sort of stuff but for a different Service uh did well with there a couple years later I was off I got the chance to go back to to Detroit with the
Core of engineers for the Detroit District uh but sometimes as you know sometimes you make a job change and you find out shortly after you get there may not have been the best idea in the world so I toughed it out but then a few months later a friend of mine back in
Maryland says you want a you want a promotion I says yeah what do I do so so applied and got a job up at Aberdine Proving Ground which is northeast of Baltimore at the North End of the Chesapeake Bay and there still in public works but now mostly doing more project
Management was working with the core in terms of for major construction projects and it was a great job uh had a lot of friends there it was a great experience but then a couple years later I got a chance to get a promotion and go down to
DC to go work for the Food and Drug Administration believe it or not they have a facilities section so uh got to do that and there started dealing with a Nationwide Area of facilities instead of just an in a local installation now you’re doing installations across the
Country and so I was there for about six years interesting experience for the military but uh so we were doing that and then u i then was made aware of an opportunity to go work for the core of engineers in their medical facilities office and so I go down I interviewed
And sounded like a great idea idea and I figured okay well they’ll let me know in a couple weeks well within 3 hours after I got back to my office I get this phone call saying Ed we’re offering you the job and I said oh my God I told him can
I can I get back to you tomorrow it wasn’t that I wasn’t going to take the job I was just so shocked because usually yeah government process takes a long but uh uh my boss Jim alred basically if he saw somebody he wanted he had the folks basically say do the
Paperwork get the offer in now and get get them on board so uh but I’ll I’ll do the tie in with Jim alred later but so so I worked I worked at medical facilities for six years and that was again this time you’re going worldwide in terms of uh hospitals clinics
Research facilities all around the country and overseas it was a great experience you got to do large projects very as you know medical is very complex and Technical lots of people playing in the game but it was a it was a great experience uh but then I had then I had
The interesting six months is around 2001 uh Jim had retired get new boss they needed somebody to go down and head up a group down at our Huntsville office I and then I got volunteered volunteered Vol and told uh basically volun told so wasn’t too thrilled about that
But given the option that either take that job or you have no job I said okay so he went down there I did not move my family because at that point it was the middle of a school year it says hey my wife works for a school system I’m not
Pulling my daughter out of school mid year we’ll figure it out well about 3 months later I got a call from the Navy basically saying hey we need an archit TCH I said you want to come back I says yes well it’s going to be a little bit
Of it’s a downgrade I says I’ll take the downgrade the pay difference wasn’t that bad so came back to DC and I worked for the Navy’s medical facilities office so and that was excellent and then about three months later because I was still applying for other jobs and then one
Morning I get a phone call I recognized the number oh it’s from core headquarters who’s calling me turns out it was the senior civilian at headquarters and of course I immediately go yes sir and decided oh and I’m thinking oh God did I do something that they’re calling me why is the senior
Civilian calling me up he says oh Ed you put in for this position I says uh oh yes sir I did well let me tell you what the job really is about is need my executive assistant are you interested I said when can I start sir and I got my
Promotion back but it was a case of getting out of project and program management and all of a sudden now tailing one the most senior officials in the Department of Defense which uh if you’ve ever seen a general or an admiral they usually have some young officer that’s trailing and basically doing
Stuff well I was the equivalent for Bill Brown to do that and it was uh it was a great experience because then you got to see the entire organization and see what they do and you get to be in the room where you’re talking to senior officials
In that uh doing that I lost my fear of generals senior EX Ives and political appointees but did that for once you’re in the room with them all the time uh as Bill told me 90% of the time where I go you go and of course the fact is you get in
The room and then uh we have a meeting and when they went away Bill closes the door and basically okay Ed what what do you think and you very quickly realize when they say what do you think he means what do you think so let’s just say it’s probably a
Good reason the door is closed because we probably said a few things about folks that should never go outside the door but uh but the case you’d be very candid in terms of of hey is this person being truthful or are they just blowing
Smoke and and also the fact is I had to oversee repairing briefings that went up to Capitol Hill and I’d get some briefings and I’d look at it and it would be all engineer e i just says oh God and I’d have to go back and and say guys turn it into plain
English Hil yeah Congressional staffers they are not Engineers they’re not Architects and the only three questions they have is why are you here what are you proposing and what do you need from my boss and you have to basically get and if you can’t make those points very succinctly they’ll be very polite
They’ll just stare and then the minute you walk out the door your presentation goes into the waist basket so it’s so that was really a learning basically in terms of how to presents how to present things and also how things on high really start working and of course they
Got a lot of FaceTime with the commander of the core of engineers too but uh so after a couple years then U they had to find a place for me to go and I ended up in what we then called installation support so I was doing program
Management for stuff but I was also running the career program for 15,000 Engineers Architects and scientists across the army so a lovely little collateral Duty which actually was a lot of fun got to really help folks in terms of how you do development uh their professional
Development um I can tell you got a lot of folks that uh back then who are now in senior positions with the core and elsewhere in the Army so that is a that is a personal uh accomplishment that I feel strongly about uh then eventually I got promoted
To my current job about 10 years ago and it’s been it’s been pretty adventuresome especially the last couple of years because we are growing our programs in fact I just mentioned to my boss today that for the system that we use to develop military construction documents uh we just got another major customer
And they’re throwing let’s just say a good deal of money at us and and he basically says we need to come up with a big with a business plan you’ve got a little Enterprise going I says yes I do so well we have this particular capability we’ve got over 20 agencies
Using it so uh so it is it is a big deal the fact is is that we have a product which agencies want to use and they’re and they don’t barter on the price they say okay it’s worth the investment so nice to be able to have c yeah it’s nice
To have clients that don’t argue about fees yeah now I know a lot of these transitions you mentioned were all from like phone calls more than probably applying uh most of them that more how uh the federal government works no there are you still have to apply like for
Example when I got the job at aine I mean I basically talked to my boss before I formerly applied for the job but uh and there are ways they can basically in terms of uh so like I mean they could they could shorten the application period they can limit the area consideration
And I mean there are ways to do it I mean you still have to basically go through the motions but um now I mean like for example then when I went back and was executive assistant the job that probably was an assistant director and I just say well
Okay I’ll take a shot it didn’t really say what the real duties were but I’m pretty sure Bill knew me he pulled my name out and said hey I want it so at the senior civilian headquarters says they want somebody it’s usually it’s Yes sounds like and go sounds like sounds
Like a great idea yeah now what do you find is the biggest challenge working on the facilities side but also on the federal government facilities the biggest challenge is always dealing with the bureaucracy uh it’s it’s a case of that you sort of okay you have rules and regulations some
Of them appear to some of them do actually make sense because we are responsible for taxpayer dollars but on the other hand sometimes we put internal processes in in that uh we tend to be Our Own Worst Enemy sometimes in terms of we put so many processes in it may be
For a good reason but you just all of a sudden think uh excuse me so but the challenge it’s actually opportunities is that the fact is not everything is always black and white you always look for the gray areas where you can where you can actually affect and it’s the
Gray areas that you can usually take the opportunity to really instigate change I will give you an example and it goes back to my medical facility days uh we did a I was doing a project out in California for the Food and Drug Administration they wanted a regional
Laboratory and office and what one of the things they wanted to do was to have a an office concept where the analytical lab folks could work easily with the investigators and team up if there was a if there was a problem say for example there’s a bad strawberry
Thing going on and they wanted to set up a strawberry team well we start worked with the AE and it was a zgf out of their Los Angeles office really signature firm way through the concept and then uh we got to in terms of looking at the codes code basically says
Two hours SE solid separation between a lab function and an admin function and I’m says well that’s not going to work so I then decide to start looking through the NFPA standards fire protection codes and they have a code for Laboratories and I look through there and they said if you use active
Protection you could actually go to a 45 minute separation now of course as you know a two- bit wall and a 45 bit wall are two entirely different objects and we said o so so because of the fact that the federal government brought bought the property so it was it was titled
Titled to the US government and because it was not a military project I had to tell folks we’re using commercial standards and my team flipped out says you’re what yeah we’re going to do what the rest of the real rule does we’re going to use the building codes but I
Told them because of the fact is we use NFPA 45 as the basis of your design and the and the architect says you can do that of course we can do that and they went ahead and did that and design came out it was a it’s a signature
Project agency was very happy with it and before it went to construction we went to the Fire Marshals because it sat on the line between Newport Beach and Irvine California we decided to have both Fire Marshals take a look at it and they looked through and they said NP 45
They did their calculations they took a look hey this will work so project got built within six months after completion the agency moved in and started using it and they loved the building it did it functioned the way that we wanted it to function uh the
AE got a lot of inquiries from other companies saying hey can we have something like this so they generated work and then about 3 four years later I met up with the design team at a different function we went out to and they told me oh by the way they
Changed the building code I says you mean my crazy stunt I got a code change darn so needless to say that was part of my faia application before we jump into the faia um questions I have when you mentioned you’re going to build this with the commercial standards I know I have not
Done government work or military work in my background what does that mean in terms of what construction you can do at different grades uh there are the military obviously they do well the federal government does have a building code it’s in is in the unified facility
Criteria section if you go to the whole building design guide you can find all the UFC’s and a lot of that deals with the standards which are used not just with DOD but with all other federal agencies and that is generally the standard uh in this particular case
Uh because we bought the property and all that uh we and there was really no at the time there really is no UFC so the agency said okay that’s use your best judgment and we decided okay since the at that time the UBC controlled construction out in California we decide
Okay we’re going to go we’ll use UBC thankfully this is before Title 24 so we didn’t have all the energy stuff that you now have to go through in California but uh but it it’s actually now an epilogue is that they’re now doing some retrofitting on that facility to meet
Title 24 standards naturally of course but yeah it’s a it is a challenge because sometimes you have to figure out what the appropriate standard is uh in this case of course obviously we were we had gotten the property from the University of California Irvine they gave us a very nice deal on the
Property but at that point we pretty much had free reign now that is not always the case like for example if if you build within the District of Colombia or for the national capital region you have to go to the national capital Planning Commission uh for
Approval for things and if it’s is and depend on the building you have the commission of Fine Arts I mean you look at anything gets built on the mall I guarantee it goes through goes to Fine Arts for their vetting uh but it just depends on the
Jurisdiction and I mean the nice part about military installations is the fact is okay you really don’t have to deal with the commercial standards at this point you deal with the military standards but by the same token you do have to make them durable and usable facilities because right now the average
Life of a building on a military installation is about 70 years that’s 70 plus yeah so it’s uh so yeah it’s important and of course you know that building is going to be repurposed several times over its lifetime yeah making sure it’s not only flexible for
The future but at least a design that can withstand time uh yeah withstand time and of course the fact is is that of course if you’re building an earthquake zone you have to deal with that and of course now building for resilience it just depends where you’re
Located I mean if you’re in a coastal area yeah you have sea level rise but you also have hurricanes if you’re in the middle of the country you have tornadoes you have drought you’ve got oh if you’re in Oklahoma you have to deal with the effects of
Fracking uh it’s just the fact is of course you know when they say climate change uh it’s more than just sea level rise it’s a whole host of other things and I think over the past year year or two I think we’ve seen just within the us all the different variations of
Climate change that have happened yeah it’s definitely I don’t know if it’s because I’m in architecture and seeing and talking about all the time that then I just see it even more or if it’s just even more frequent over the last couple years it it’s yeah what’s happened of course is
That and because the core of engineers is FEMA’s Engineers say if there’s a natural disaster and FEMA gets called in the core is the engineering arm for FEMA and we have an operation Center and we track dis both natural natural and man-made disasters all the time
Uh I mean in terms of of course hurricane season of course is wrapping up we track all the Hurricanes in both the Atlantic and the Pacific uh certainly anything in terms of earthquakes uh we had if you course earlier this year of course we had the
Uh the the effects of all the excess rain out in California or precipitate California where we our drought disappeared in a case of about three months we went from extreme drought to extreme oh my God we got more snow than we can imagine but uh and the fact is is that
It’s the incidents of that are more frequent and the intensity is more it is higher than it has been in the past I mean that’s what we’ve been seeing at this point yeah and we’re yeah we’re pretty Savvy on that but yeah we see the trends coming
And yeah I mean and we can recommend but like I said contrary to some people’s popular belief we’re not as omnipotent as as some folks think we are says Hey the core does stuff as we are directed and we are funded to do we I mean we have A90 billion
Workload but I can tell you virtually all of it is customer funded interesting do you have any advice for any I guess probably two-part question um advice for anybody interested in working within the federal government as an architect or engineer or if there’s a particular personality type or strength
That would lend to successful career on the federal government side tough question I think the the fact is at this point you sort of you have to be willing to serve it’s I mean you’re face it if you if you want to make a ton of money federal government any level of
Government is not where you want to work uh I think you also have to be able to show patience uh because obviously things don’t always get done at the at warp speed sometimes they do but most of the time they’re not also understand and understand process but would say that you have to
Understand it even if you’re practicing the private sector because hey you have to go through there are steps you have to go through to get a building built so and in that regard it’s not all that different I’ve talked to my private sector counterparts and I basically say
The main difference between what I do and what you do is that the private sector is profit driven the public sector is Mission driven where we we have we we have a direction that we get from our customers from the Pentagon from the White House from Congress and they all love to tell
Us what to do and hopefully they give and hopefully give us money to do it most times they do but I think the fact is is that but you also have to look is that there are tremendous opportunities I mean you get to deal with programs of national
Significance certainly the or were’re a worldwide organization so you have the opportunities to work overseas I mean we a lot of stuff in Europe in Asia uh we also do as I said uh we’re currently active in about 35 countries but we have a we touch down on stuff in like over a
Hundred so we we get to do work which frankly in a lot of cases it just isn’t done in the private sector it’s just it’s it’s either too hard to do or folks just say uh no really not interested but it’s uh you get to do a lot of interesting
You get to do a lot of interesting stuff and that has been what has been key for my career is the fact is I’ve had opportunities to do various projects and programs I’ve been able to certainly I’ve been traveling all around the country there’s very little
Of the US I have not seen yet uh I not not that much overseas but uh will uh who knows I will still have an opportunity to do that at this point but uh you never know where your career will take you uh no I think the fact is
There’s an analogy that one of our former Chiefs of Engineers used when somebody said well well General how did you become Chief well it’s sort of like walking down a corridor with a bunch of doors and all of a sudden this door opens and you go through it and voila
And I would say basically the fact is is that take advantage of opportunities that come if you’re a student if there’s a nearby what is not not just the core but any federal agency they may very well have intern programs or Su are hires take advantage of those so at
Least you can get a flavor of what they do uh I’m going to give a quick commercial for the Society of American military engineers uh the local posts around the country most of them including DC they do have scholarship programs and we also work with the private sector to
Create opportunities for summer and again it’s something is that is is being able to do something bigger than yourself yeah and what’s the the scholarships going towards college or yes for like summer stien uh they’re they’re pretty much like the DC post it’s for it’s for college tuition at
This point uh we currently have I believe I believe active we have about five or six students within the DC posts who are have scholarships to various schools uh there’s a couple out at Catholic University of America which is not far away from my office uh in fact
I’m going to speak to one of their civil engineer classes next week about trying to reestablish a student post out at Catholic University um also DC post as a mentoring uh program and I volunteered there was a young woman architect at Howard uh we just met last month that
For coffee and just chatted about how she go out her career um of course I found out that two of her professors are are faia peers of mine so I’ll just uh of course they want say oh Professor so oh Ronnie or nia of course he oh profess
Say okay you you you call him professor I call I call him on their on their Prof on their personal basis uh yeah mainly because both of them I help coach through fellows the fellows program with the DC chapter yeah so let’s dive into the
Fellow program um oh yes so I know a lot of students in college they kind of get AIA because of AAS but soon as you throw fellow out they get kind of confused on what that means what the process is um and I know we’ve even talked about
There’s multiple categories of fellow um can you kind of describe story and a little bit about it uh I can do that well first of all if if somebody had gra at my graduations has said I would be a fellow in AIA I would have probably asked what did you smoke last
Night but seriously I I think because my career been so varied I knew it was there but I it wasn’t really something I thought about I think it took until about about five years of poking from colleagues who were fellows including a couple chancellors of the College of
Fellows basically said okay I get the hint now and so of course started looking into that and I looked at the body of my work says well you know I might be able to do this now when you apply for fellow if you go to the fellow’s page they now have six objects
That you can be elevated to let’s see first one is design of course that’s self-explanatory second one is is practice and there’s subdivisions in that with dealing with with your technology or management or what have you third one is service to The Institute say for example you’re extremely active within AIA and you’ve
Had leadership positions and that sort of stuff fourth one is service to is is is service to people which includes government and that’s the category that’s the object that I was elevated within the fifth one is sort of a catchall it’s sort of a miscellaneous that uh
Odds and sods as I say that doesn’t fit in any other category and then they separated a new one that started a year ago which now is education because a lot of the education stuff was coming up through object two and I think there was just so many people there say okay we’re
Just going to create a separate object and so when you do as fellow you will pick one of those objects that you want to be elevated in now when at least with the DC chapter when you go through our coaching program I mean and and everybody there is a fellow so I mean
They all are looking but but they will look at your your work with a very critical eye and they’ll say oh you said object four maybe you should be object two or what have you and that’s stuff you need to think about when you say coaching are they like training you or
Reviewing it’s it’s sort of a little bit of both uh okay very short uh in DC we have one one of the be best programs to prepare candidates for fellow you have to do like a five-page summary of your work and your resume is considered by the fellows committee within the DC
Chapter and they can make the initial determination of whether you qualify for the program or not and I will tell you not everybody always gets in uh but we go through and then it’s about it’s a six-month program or as some of us affect refer to it as boot camp because
You have a schedule you have deliverables you have presentations and the nice part is that will break up and will move you around the different the different fellows so you get various perspectives but I will tell you the hardest jury you will ever go through is
The first time you have to put your 35W statement up on the wall and you have 37 people in the room can all all throw stuff at it or will’ll question it if you thought your college juries were were tough this is a real tough one and
It’s not and there’s not even a building involved it’s just a a couple of sentences yes but those words are important because it serves as the basis of why you want to be elevated and it’s also the hook to get the jury interested okay what what is this person saying
That they want to do and it’s it is something you you basically have to create a storyline I mean that’s the statement is the basis of your storyline and it says what are the major points of how you get elevated and then of course it’s your work it’s
Your it’s your involvement with AIA it’s any Publications it’s any speaking stuff that all has to be accounted for and then of course you have to put your exhibits which uh okay then you get to pull out the pictures and the pretty drawings and that sort of stuff but I
Tell folks it’s both a writing exercise and a design exercise because hey we’re visual Critters so yes we want to look nice and then actually look it reads well but also the fact is as they say words matter and you really have to go through the words and especially for US
Government types we have to stay away from acronym heaven and spell things out because another thing you have to consider is that you have to consider that you have no friends on the jury and they have no clue what you do so you have to basically I won’t say dumb it
Down but you basically have to make it very clear that what you do do not assume that they know all the acronyms I mean and certainly the military has its own set of acronyms unto itself so that was uh that was one of the challenges I
Went through and then of course you also have to get set seven letters of recommendation and but then and then you basically you beat yourself over your head for six months trying to craft it all right take all the input figure out okay what what’s actually good what’s okay and then
There’s some stuff you’ll get okay okay appreciate your appreciate your thoughts thank you because at the end of the day it’s still your submission it has to be you it has to be your voice and what and that’s and that’s the hardest part in me and and the jury
Of course the fun part is now I recognize some of my peers who are now sitting on the fellows jury and it’s just the case is that hey we’ve all been through this we all pretty much we can pretty much figure out what when are true voices and when something’s coming
Out that uh either came out of the marketing department or just does not read well at this point uh and I will tell you last year the jury was especially tough because the percentage of submissions that uh were elevated to fellow was like only a third it normally
Had been about 40% but last year was like only 33% so last year was an especially tough lift for folks now is there like a quantity they look for or is it just based there is no quotas it I mean that’s always been of things is oh there’s qu no there are no
Quotas it’s strictly based on the quality of the submission what happens is that when they get I mean and they’re going through this now you get the number of submissions AIA makees sure okay did you at least follow the requirements that of what had to be submitted are you
Eligible did you are you are you current on your licenser and on your continuing education once they do that they split the P the big pile into seven smaller piles each of the jurors gets their pile and they then spend a couple months because they the assigned jur will read their
Assigned submissions cover to cover and they will be the ones that present when the jury convenes in late January early February and they will present they’ll say okay this is this is Ed gavo he’s going to object four these are the strengths that I see these are areas that we need to talk
About and they all look at stuff and yeah they will discuss in terms of hey does this has he really raised the bar for the profession is it I mean is it just his day job or he do go above and beyond the day job because there are folks that
Will come through and says well isn’t that what you’re supposed to be doing how did you really raise the bar I mean I will use a takeoff of what Justice Douglas said years ago regarding pornography I can’t Define it but I know it when I see it and I think this a
Similar thing goes with ar factors I can’t can’t tell you I can’t describe a successful fellow’s proposal but I know it when I see it and pretty much I mean I can even see when we do the last round of reviews before we submit the DC candidates in I usually at that point
Can pretty much have a pretty good idea okay these are the shoe inss these are the ones that are uh pretty close and these are the ones okay we’re going to send them through but I don’t think they’re going to make it and uh surprisingly I’ve been pretty accurate
On it for the last several years when I’ve done that now this year I did not participate because I was sponsoring a candidate from New York and I wanted to concentrate all my efforts on getting her getting her through the process but now um ter remember bro I was gonna ask um
For the people who don’t get fellow do they get feedback on yes like why uh yes they will get some feed they will get feedback in terms of how the strength of your spons on your sponsor letter uh in terms of your overall presentation areas that J thought that
Could use improvements or things that were not the things that were strong things that were not strong uh it doesn’t really get down to the nuts and bolts but at least it gives you an idea uh yeah now if you do not get in the first time you were allowed to
Reapply a second and a third year but if after three consecutive attempts you do not make fellow you then have to sit out a year and then start the cycle over again and gotcha and like I said uh I have had we’ve had candidates uh that uh
We’ve had a couple candidates from DC who stuck through third time they got through on the third time I think they’re both still smiling at this point so now what’s I you speak about fellow like it’s a smaller um camaraderie like can you speak about that sure I always maintain
Being the College of fellows is the fraternity I never got to join in college but it’s there it’s only 3% of all AIA members that uh are in the College of fellows it is very much these are folks who in various aspects of the profession have raised the bar
Now of course when I got in I just said oh my God but when when you had an investure there’s a luncheon before that where everybody gets in there and you start talking to everybody and you think and they say well this is what I did for
Oh that sounds oh that’s interesting and you all of a sudden that everybody does different stuff and you find those stuff that is really intriguing the fact is is that the great diversity of folks even like within particular objects that you just say woo that’s interesting we need to talk later
And yeah I have established some very good friendships both within my fellows class but also with other fellows uh I’ll tell you a true story about a year after I made fellow one of our district commanders in Japan who graduated from the University of Miami with his
Architecture degree he was trying to get folks from Miami to come out and be like summer students or even to get full-time employment he’s calling his old professors and he’s not getting the with day out of them say Ed I’m not getting anywhere Tom let me take a shot at it
Well it turns out Elizabeth Platter zyber who had been the dean when Tom was there she had stepped down as Dean but was still on the faculty and I had met her briefly a couple of times so I craft an email to Liz and say we have a common
PR in Tom verell and I described the situation said hey could you possibly help a day later I get an email back from Liz say Ed got your email we’re willing to help we could do this and like within a week getting inundated with with from ref what could we do what
Can we do to help you three months later he’s in DC for a meeting and he says Ed what the heck happened all this stuff happened I says Tom there are times in life where getting an F is a good thing but it just shows the fact is
That it’s not Six Degrees of Separation within the fellow’s community it’s more like one to two degrees of separation in terms of being able to find folks who do stuff and I will say that if you talk to AIA National if you’re if you’re faia they tend to return your messages a lot
Faster and it’s and you speak about like your FIA class and like a fraternity are you closer with the people of your class or does it become more of the holistic bigger Community it’s more holistic at this point uh I will the simply the fact
Is is that I’ve met fellows from I mean who who have been fellows for a long time and then of course some of the more recent fellows is that we’ve had some Communications uh I think the fact is that all of a sudden you get the F and
Of course it’s not just the fact is that it’s not just for what you’ve accomplished it’s also for what you start giving back to the larger Institute at this point uh I mean I take that pretty seriously the fact is that the fact that I’ve been extremely
Fortunate to actually have done a body of work that uh my peers consider worthy and so it’s uh it’s like I said it’s an honor I never really expected to get but the fact that uh I’ve received that I will certainly embrace it for everything that it’s worth both uh the
Personal accomplishment but also the fact is that I am it’s called start bringing the Next Generation up with you uh right now in fact uh I am mentoring a young female architect in DC works for a construction company very bright she is the current chair of the project
Delivery knowledge community and I just got some late breaking news she had asked to put in for an atlarge position on strategic Council and she just found out this afternoon that she is now member of the AIA strategic Council that’s awesome Yep so uh and Laura a couple years ago saysi
Want to go for fellow I says and how long have you been a full member uh just over two years I says well you got eight years before you’re eligible but and we meet and we meet on a regular basis and every time we bring up a fellow’s
Conversation in terms of okay what have you done recently okay you I hope you have she has a file where I keep reminding her where if you made a presentation or there’s an award or you got another position it goes into your file so that when the time comes when
You’re eligible you have all that material handy we don’t have to go looking for it and we can start uh start building your case yeah I even give that advice for people as they work for future portfolios or resume work like start just having a folder of work
You’ve done or feedback from clients just have that like folder so when you need it you’re good yeah yeah and certainly that’s what I’m doing now I mean I maintain that right now I’m doing the best work in my career at this point and I have 42 years of federal Service
Uh so but as I tell folks to say Ed when are you going to retire I says why I’m doing the best work of my career I got a great staff I’ve got great management that supports me and we’re doing some really good neat stuff now that’s not
Discounting the fact that I would uh I also tell folks I am looking for the next adventure but on the other hand it has to be a really nice adventure for me to consider where I’m going right now so yeah I mean I went down to Arkansas
Right the end of the September to go look at a project that the core is working on I was more interested in the master plan but there was some other stuff going $500 million program so I take a look it’s fine I sent notes back to headquarters about going on and then
I come in Monday morning and the first person I run into was General Scott Spelman who’s the chief of Engineers my big boss and of course I say hi and says how are you doing and says well I just got back from Arkansas he says oh you
Did so I sort of had to give him the one minute dump told him all that and he says Ed could you forward all that stuff to me when you get a chance I says sir as soon as I log in I will forward everything I sent to
You because obviously he’s the chief of Engineers he has to deal with his peers who were beating up on him and says hey when you going to deliver this program but U and it’s we we got a good bunch of headquarters it’s it’s amazing that even though we do have a lot of
High-powered people it’s a relative collegial organization at the headquarters level I mean we’ve had folks come in from other Army organizations and they’re surprised about the fact that we’re pretty we’re relatively inal about the only people that we say Sir or ma’am to are the general officers
Face it they’ve earned it but even our senior Executives most of them just say I have a name call me my by my name it’s not sir or ma’am but uh well but we do get formal if we have company coming over but otherwise if it’s just just the family
The family we’re we’re we’re relatively informal but it’s uh I just think it’s a it’s a great organization I mean I I will tell you and this is something for the folks out there the core of Engineers is 38,000 great people around the world they are almost without
Exception they are bright they are intelligent they are quick and they are all willing to serve and I mean we deploy we have folks literally around the world like for example with the ha the fires out in Hawaii we have a whole I’d say we have about three dozen folks
Who stood up and said I want to go and they’re right now out there helping in terms of helping the people out there going through the cleanup and taking care of things out there so it’s uh it’s an amazing organization I mean we’re not perfect believe me I know we’re not but
I think the fact is that we get to do stuff which nobody else does in the federal government nobody yeah your boots on the ground and get things done yeah we literally are boots on the ground to do stuff and uh and and like I said it’s a great
Experience and again for anybody’s looking for working in government at all levels you have the opportunity to basically affect your whole Community it’s not just a building you get to affect your entire community and in our cases we’re dealing with large military installations but even the communities outside those installations uh we affect
And it’s uh get a lot of satisfaction out of it yeah has there been any um significant mentors along the way that’s influenced you it took it took a while to do that because especially at a lot of installations you it’s hard to find folks but I will say I will give at
Least a little bit Jim alred who was my boss for the medical facility’s office and the only other core architect to ever make fellow he was certainly uh he was sort of help in that Bill Brown who was my boss when I came back to the core and he’s honorary
AIA he we had a lot of great conversations in terms of in terms of professional development and just on family and that also got to learn about all the black fraternities and sororities so I have a fairly working knowledge of those uh and it have other folks at this
Point it’s just uh that would be the right I that really in even in government find a mentor and it doesn’t have to be within your agency it can be it can be somebody else somebody you trust I mean I mean Laura and I have a mentor mentee relationship and hey I
Work for the core of engineers she works for Mortenson and there’s and not to mention there’s about a 30-year age difference but by the same token it’s uh it’s a case that we just hit it off and it’s something that um I passed we trade stuff back and forth but I also offer
Suggestions to her in terms of I mean she’s still relatively early in her career but she is gaining she’s gaining some experience and some already starting to move up the ladder and I offer her suggestions in terms of what to do uh both in terms of her own within
Her own within her own firm but also in says what are you doing with AIA what are you doing with dbia and that so and other things so we uh we have a pretty good relationship on that and I think in retrospect I would have loved to have
Had something like that but by the same token at this point I just feel the fact is I want to be able to do that for others now if I know I get a lot of questions from Young professionals that are starting their career if they should
Join the AIA and I know it can be expensive especially when you’re in debt from school and starting to look look at paying for the Ares uh do you have any advice for the recent grads recent grads I mean certainly if you’re an aias that’s a starting point
Uh I would hope the fact is that and I know some firms do pay your dues some firms do not uh that’s that’s that’s a decision the reason I joined AIA even though the fact that I’ve have never worked in the private sector was the fact is that I just felt important
Enough is that hey if you want to be able to have a seat at the table or able to influence influence things you have to be you have to be at the table and I joined I did not I was not an aias in fact I don’t think we had an active
Chapter when I was there but uh soon as I got my license I joined AIA got involved in the public Architects committee uh basically You’ gotten other stuff uh I will I can tell students that if you go to an AIA function and you start hanging around with some off folks there
Like I said you have to watch who you drink with because all of a sudden you might end up on a task force or two no but it that’s how you get B and told into doing things well but it is an opportunity for you to be able to stand
Up and do stuff and be able to affect things uh I mean I know yeah it’s tough these days and especially with the exams the good thing is that n carb has gotten rid of the 10-year limitation on exams so I think that will be extremely
Helpful yeah and that will be a help because I know it’s hard it’s hard regardless because you have debt you’re you’re just starting out you’re not getting that and then of course all of a sudden hey you get married you want to have a family and that this point I mean
That just makes it tripy hard at that point so uh and I feel for I feel for my female colleagues who basically they basically in some some ways they have an even steeper Hill decline because I mean mean the family and then of course you have the residual effects so the fact is
Is that oh geez it’s still it’s still a male a white male club and I says well it’s slowly changing at this point the fact that we have we will have three consecutive female presidents of AIA I mean that is something into s um and
I’ve talked to Kim Dowell a bit I mean the fact is that all the fact s that she’s going to bring in when she assumes the assumes the position in December I mean between being the 100th president the first black female the first Millennial to be AIA president so uh
It’s it is it is changing at this point uh I think Co has certainly done a lot in terms of looking and firms are starting to relook in terms of their structure uh I know I can tell you several firms right now who never really have had they do not set up a
Traditional Studio they’ve always been virtual uh if you talk to Leia Bayer of four four Architects out in C out in the west coast she set up basically she set up when she started the firm she did not hey she want to be able bring folks in
But did not want to be tied to an office so she set up the processes and the software to make networking easy and they focus on multif family housing and they’ve been extremely successful so yeah I’ve seen her speak a couple times and yeah she’s awesome yeah and we’ve
Talked a couple times and I’ve already told Leia say Leia when you’re ready ready to go for fellow let me know I will write a letter for you yeah and I was at uh the AIA women’s Leadership Summit in Boston this year and I got to see the next three AIA
Presidents all staying together and they all be female and and as a young professional it’s just amazing to see that growth and change within the AIA firms it’s kind of depends on the structure to what that changes but seeing that in terms of within the AIA
Is just it took my breath away like being in that room and seeing always always a tremendous change at this point and if you look and if you look at the AIA National senior staff now the difference from five years AG go to now is just it’s it’s it’s almost a complete
Change at this point uh I will say I am sure that there are some traditionalists out there who probably are they’re probably very quietly grinding their teeth and I will I will say the fact is is that it’s great that we are starting to get more women involved and in leadership positions
Both in the Institute but also within firms that’s the next thing particularly the larger firms we want to be able to see the fact is that it’s great I mean like Allison steel who’s the DC chapter she’s now the president of Quinn Evans uh Teresa Shields who’s one of the uh
One of the main principles for GU gensler’s DC office both of whom I help coach up to fellow uh I think the fact is there’s still a long ways to go uh certainly in terms of minority representation I mean we still have a very long ways to go in
That uh it will it will evolve the the only concern I have and I’ll throw a little fly in the ointment is the fact that I just want to make sure that while we work on diversifying what Architects look like that we remember that Architects still design
Buildings I mean at the end of the day regardless of who you are you’re being retained to basically provide spaces and places that’s that’s what that’s that’s what we’re trying to do in life at this point and I did mention toh Britt Lindberg I said in terms of it’s great
That the women’s leadership conference is there it’s well attended and all that I just says okay when are we going to get a few more guys there so and I’ve asked them take a look in terms of you might want to look at how you Market it in order
To to make it at least that more men would want to attend at this point I almost did this year but I think I had some conflicts I couldn’t do it so but uh yeah I know there was a few but it’s a lot like I I like attending Noma
Events because even though I am male female more of a minority I don’t feel as much of a minority as other races and being in a room where I am then a minority within that space it makes me be in their shoes yeah as little as I can but it’s the same
Concept yeah and I certainly NOA I will tell you my experience the first time the first trip I went with Bill was to the blacks and government conference in Los Angeles we get out he’s the keynote speaker we go into the convention Center to the main hall there’s probably like
Over a thousand people in the hall and of course I don’t care of stuff and as I’m going up the aisle I just see everybody smiling and it came the fact it was not lost on me the senior African-American engineer in the Department of Defense is addressing the Blackson government
Conference and who’s carrying his bag and I yeah the irony was not lost on anybody in the room including me yep so and but uh no we had dinner that night and I basically said look bill I grew up in Detroit I Ran So I understand but
Today was really the really first time that I think I got to be in your shoes a little bit so being being the only one in the room but it’s uh so yeah I think it’s the fact I think we’re get it’s getting there but like I said it’s a crawl walk
Run thing we’re not going to get there as quickly as we would like but I think the fact is we’ve come a long ways just in the last uh in the last decade or so at this point uh I mean I will tell you my my graduating class at Notre Dame I
Think we had 607 folks and we only had like six women now most of the classes there are over 50% women yeah but we’re still just seeing what happens in the industry and where things change and and the important part is okay the over 50% at the schools now
Let’s see what happens as you go into the work world at this point and that’s uh those statistics yeah there’s still a long ways to go in there particularly in at senior levels but U yeah I will tell you my immediate boss may be a white
Male but my my next two level bosses above me are both white females one’s a PhD engineer the other’s a two star general I don’t know what I’d be more afraid of uhds all get out smart than the general is just like whoa uh well I know General colon pretty well I
Remember I knew her when she was a lieutenant colonel so I’ve I know and she’s actually an architect by education she went to RPI I asked her one time why didn’t you pursue registrations well blowing up things doesn’t really work well for narb I says yeah you’re right they probably wouldn’t
Accept that very well so it’s not really good experience that they’ll accept but uh but at least she understands AR Architects and architecture so yeah knows how to take stuff down yeah oh yeah she does oh yeah and actually build some stuff back up too so uh she’s got
Uh G has responsibility for all our stuff at military installations but also all International work so uh W she has a pretty big portfolio to deal with yeah that’s awesome yeah yeah her portfolio is probably around the order about 25 to30 billion worth of stuff
Oh yeah yeah that’s even hard I even my larger scale projects it’s dollar amounts that like I’m just not used to handling because well the year after I made fellow I was at the AIA convention in New York I was at a I was at a party
I was talking to RK Stewart former National president and our we know each other and RK say so Ed what are you up to and I Happ to be the acting division Chief at the time so I very casually told him oh I’m running a $6 billion
Doll program prog after he scraped his jaw off the floor I says all right I’ll give you the 30 second commercial about what I do for a living and so I explained what we were up to and he says wow that’s something I says yeah my
Portfolio is a lot different than 99% of the other folks here at the convention I mean it’s only the other public architects who like work for like major federal agencies or even some like the large cities like if New York City yeah you do some pretty big stuff in New
York but uh yeah yeah there aren’t that many people there at the convention who who would who would be able to say we could probably put everybody in one in one small room and be able to do that so but uh otherwise I would just say it’s
Been an interesting ride at this point and and I don’t think it’s over yet I’m not I’m not ready to park things in the garage yet let’s put it that way still having fun yep you got it and I think that’s the important part of the fact is
And I mean you know Architects I mean we will we as long as we’re interested we will keep going until the end I mean uh how many how many how many bigname Architects you know basically worked up almost all the way up till the last day
At this point so yeah it’s more of a shock when people retire uh well yeah I mean like for example Wright of course worked until about until about the last month of his life uh Bill helmouth who passed away last year as the head of art
Of H now he had not been well for several months but uh and but he said but he had already set up the transition plan so when he passed the H plugged in the transition plan and they have transitioned to their new level of leadership uh yeah you know the fact is
That you want to work but the same point you have to be ready to fact is hey you have to pass the Baton at some point so it’s just a case of you prefer to be able to do it while you’re still vertical let’s put it that way yeah
Definitely and then I had one last question for you sure do you have any advice for young professionals just starting their career be open to the possibilities that is I will tell you in school they do not to indict not to indict all the educational folks but by
The same point you don’t necessarily see the variety of options that you can have out there I mean they all figure oh you’re going to do design well everybody I mean even in school there’ll be folks who design say I really don’t like design I’d rather do construction or hey
I really into computer stuff at this point uh certainly one of the things during one of the recessions back in the 2000s that we lost a lot of Architects that went into various Fields with the because of their background with both Cad and of course eventually with 3D
Stuff hey they went into other stuff and they found fulfillment and frankly made more money uh but I think the fact is is that whether I got examples out of my class we have folks that went into development uh got folks that were into health care
We have others that uh have I mean some that served in the military did stuff uh across their careers of doing other stuff now um couple of examples just uh within the Sam Community uh guy that was five years behind me uh got told you should probably do something else besides
Architecture well he did his time in the Air Force then worked on Capitol Hill for Senate committee eventually he was uh he was appointed to be the assistant secretary of defense for installations back in the prior Administration which basically means yeah but he thought like an architect
Still does I have another another guy who was few years behind me served in the Army was head of the Army’s fac Health Facilities planning agency which basically got to plan medical facilities well he did his time uh retired as a full Colonel less than a month later
He’s wearing a gray suit and he’s now the head of the veterans Department of Veterans Affairs office that oversees building of VA hospitals around the country and uh and I think the fact is is that you just to say be open to options uh it may not be the thing that you originally
Were think thinking about but you can certainly find a niche somewhere with your education to be able to do stuff and I mean whether it’s in business whether it’s in law whether it’s engineering whether it’s a whole different Allied field uh the options of an OP architecture education at least
You you get the ability to think a bit outside the box and that is something I think we can uh as I say the engineers like to to go from A to Z no go through each letter Architects will probably do loops around say well wait a minute l no we need to
Go back and do this or we’re going to go off this way so uh and that’s the ability that we have we we can say hey it’s not always a linear solution it sometimes has to be you have to be circular or even sometimes uh very obtuse but uh yeah and the education
Side they’re more trying to explain the lure process and that’s fairly straight but if you either aren’t going to go through that process or you hit the get license and then you’re like well now what what do I do how oh yeah I had had
Guy a year behind me he told me he passed the exam went to his boss and said hey I passed my exam and his boss says so what you’re the same person that was before the exam he has to say he went and got a job
Elsewhere but U I just I think the fact is is that yeah I mean I would would hope I mean I need to get back to Notre Dame I I do owe the dean there a visit but I would also say hey I want to talk to the students and basically just say
Hey hey yes I know what Notre D’s program goes through but hey you have options out there it’s uh not everybody is going to do neoclassical design I mean there’s just not that I mean there’s just not many and the fact is you might get out in five years later
You’re going to say this is not what I want to do and that’s the whole thing is that if you don’t like what you’re doing look at other options there are they are out there and sometimes you have to create your own yeah you never know where opportunities will take you I can
Guarantee you even last year I did not think I would be in this position right now talking to you let alone graduating and having any idea where I was going to go with my career and helping other professionals well yeah and I think there’s a lot of stuff I mean right now
Now I’m talking to a young woman out of Sydney Australia she writes she’s not an architect but she writes for Architects like doing their website and all their marketing stuff and and messaging uh is that Nikita am I saying your name right yeah Nikita Morel yes oh yeah we’ve in
Fact we even had a we even had a teams call of course 14 time zones you have to figure a good time when we can both talk yeah and without being super tired uh yeah well by the same point I mean I just by the you know Nikita 10 years 10
Years ago we probably couldn’t even be doing this right now the technology wasn’t allowed that we could basically have we could see each other on the screen from uh 10,000 miles away but uh I actually helped her write helped her write her proposal for a session at convention next year we’re
Hoping we can get it through so it’s just uh yeah I mean she’s very talented I mean it’s certainly she she’s definitely quirky but by the same token she has very great points and I asked her well who are all your clients I mean you’re based in Sydney and she says oh
Most of my clients are in this in the US says okay obviously obviously what you’re pushing it resounds with a lot of folks so so but no we’ve been in contact and like I said she is a I’m hoping we get her into convention I do want to
Meet her in person she is just uh she’s a joy she’s a joy to talk to yeah definitely and I know I’m gonna be planning around DC next year so well let me know there I’d love to meet her yeah and hey you’re be in town let me
Know we’ll do but I wanted to thank you again for coming on um my YouTube channel if anybody is intrigued with this conversation or wants to learn more is there a good way to get a hold of you uh you have my email address correct cor
That’s probably the best way to do that so all right I can put um your email below I know I reached out to on LinkedIn so I will also put your LinkedIn on there as well so my LinkedIn my LinkedIn page will work but also my personal email address which is
6157 gmail.com we’ll do so if you guys have any questions at all working in the federal government the FAA process or if you’re in DC and just want to get a coffee I’m sure Ed will be more than happy to meet up with you the co the coffeee shops are all operational they
Four of them within walking distance of my office I hope you enjoyed our discussion today check out the description below for any resources links and contact information we discussed did you like the conversation today is there something you’d like to know more about or a topic I should
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