Formula and grant funding play a crucial role in the civil engineering industry, allowing for the development of innovative projects that improve infrastructure and support sustainable growth. Without these public funding sources, many engineering projects would not be possible. While infrastructure funding has typically been legislated on a formula basis, in recent years, we have…
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Civil engineers are not typically wired to make intuitive decisions. We’re taught to make decisions based on empirical data. While the day-to-day brain functions associated with engineering may tend to crowd out our intuitive side, intuition becomes much more important in leadership roles. We all know what intuition is, but it’s challenging to define it….
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When you think of mentoring, what comes to mind? An older senior executive partnering with a young up and comer? This is what most people picture, but experience has taught me it’s so much more. The window of what people often think mentoring applies to is very narrow. But it doesn’t have to be confined…
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When Randy Sain took the helm of leadership at Sain Associates in 1997 he made it his mission to build a company culture that would make Sain a great place to work. He accomplished that through investments in training, improved business practices, family-friendly work policies, encouragement of working parents and women engineers, and lots of…
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Last month, Sain sponsored Southern District ITE’s first-ever Speed Mentoring event. Discussions about mentoring and the value it generates have been part of the leadership training that SDITE has provided over the past decade. Still, they had never hosted a mentoring-specific session until the 2021 conference. I provided a brief keynote address to introduce the…
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(With apologies to Edgar Allan Poe) Once upon a workday dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of coronavirus rules— While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of someone gently rapping, rapping my home-office door— “ ’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping my home-office…
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For each of the past eight years, Sain has hosted a fish fry lunch for clients and friends. We’ve enjoyed those events so much because they allow us to show appreciation to those in our network who contribute to our success. It’s our annual “thank you” event. With the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, we are taking…
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“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’ To this day, especially in times of ‘disaster,’ I remember my mother’s words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are…
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On March 13-15, the Alabama Transportation Planners Association (ATPA) gathered in Gulf Shores for its annual conference. The mood was decidedly more cheerful this year, thanks to passage of the Rebuild Alabama Act, which will provide more money to fund transportation infrastructure needs in Alabama. In addition to celebrating the good news for funding, participants got to…
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