How Technology is Reshaping Engineering Business Models

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Hello, and welcome to the Engineering Influence podcast with the American Council
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of Engineering Companies.
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My name is Thomas Grogan, and I'm really excited today to have a guest with
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us, Ron Satin, CTO at Rincon Consultants. Ron, how are you doing today?
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Hey, I'm doing really good, Tom. I appreciate the opportunity to join you today
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to talk about something that I've been thinking about for quite a while.
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Sorry, go ahead, Tom. Oh, no, I was going to say, you know, we're going to talk
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about business models, but why don't you give our guests a background on yourself
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first before we then dive into that topic?
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Yeah, sure, Tom. I've been operating in AEC space, you know,
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for all of my career and focused entirely on technology the whole time from traditional IT,
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quite a few years back and much more recently looking at how,
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you know, digital and our service intersects from a commercial perspective.
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So this is an area that I'm really interested in at Rincon, my lead to technology
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strategy and operations.
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And I'm really focused on, you know, how we bring those modern platforms,
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data, responsible AI, and really helping our business translate those into better client service.
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And obviously, how do we do that and continue to, you know, maintain revenue and value of our firm?
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Right. And so, you know, I think as.
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Business models are evolving, what I was really excited about,
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you know, when we were able to get you to join the podcast is that we have,
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you know, a chief technology officer talking about business models, right?
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And so, you know, why don't we kind of first start with what are the traditional
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or were or are evolving the traditional business models in the engineering industry,
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and kind of, you know, think about how,
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those are performing today.
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Yeah, sure. You know, just for clarity, you know, just to define a business
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model, you know, it is in my mind and, you know, what you'll see online is it
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creates, delivers and captures value, right?
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What do we offer our clients? We offer our expertise and we offer our expertise
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to help them solve problems, right?
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And obviously, at the end of the day, it's how we get paid.
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And in the past, most firms have relied on T&M, cost plus, fixed fee,
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lump sum, in some case, retainers and task order contracts.
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T&M, especially in this country, has been the dominant model for a long time
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because it feels transparent and it really helps, at least from the professional
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services firm, reduce risk to some degree.
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Right. So it's a little more open ended and it allows for some flexibility in
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how we deliver our effort.
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Right. And so, you know, when we talk about TNM, we're kind of basically talking
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about like a billable hours model.
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Right. I do X number of hours of work and I charge a set fee for those hours
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and then, you know, deliver the deliverable project, task, etc.
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How have you seen, you know,
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that model, you know, the limitations to that model, and then with your background
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in technology, how are you seeing technology basically impact,
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you know, that specific time and materials billable model?
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Sure. One thing I wanted to mention, you know, at a very high level and, you know.
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You know, T&M has a natural constraint, I think, on how a business,
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for example, you know, one of a consultant firm can actually generate.
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Right. So it's very dependent on how many people you have in your organization.
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Right. So you can only bill as many hours as you have available.
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Right. So there's a cap to how much revenue a particular firm can can generate.
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Right. And if, you know, some of the messaging that I've seen and heard over
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time is the, you know, the labor pool in general for the type of skills that
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we need is actually not as large as we need it to be.
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Right. So I think as an industry, there's a there's a concern that,
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you know, sticking with T&M will eventually reach a natural cap as to how much,
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you know, any firm can make.
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Right. So the you know, so how do you fix that? Right.
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You need to change how how you choose to provide your service and charge your
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client for for what you deliver and the value of what you deliver.
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But, you know, that's difficult. Right. So it's it's difficult to change.
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Our industry tends to lag a little
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bit in some areas. And I think this is certainly one of them, you know.
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So, but it's really about, you know, how do we solve that client problem and
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how do we price that and value that from their perspective and,
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you know, work with them to figure out, you know, how to build a business model
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around outcomes and value versus just,
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you know, labor, labor hours.
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Right. And so, you know, if we're thinking about basically a business model
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pricing the outcome and value,
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from your experience, what have been some successes you have seen in essentially
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using, you know, a non-T&M model?
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Well, in my role previous to this one at RankCon, you know, we were working
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towards building out a delivery platform that clients could come in.
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You know, that's how we would deliver our value to the client,
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right? So you can think about a portal or a way for a client to get access to our information.
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And through that, we built a number of applications or modules or domain applications
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that went alongside our services, right? So we looked at this domain plus serve plus technology.
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And we were successful in some cases to get a client to pay a subscription fee
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for access to that platform model and the value it delivered.
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Because what it did is it gave them a different way to see what we were delivering.
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It gave them the opportunity to look at it without, you know,
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having to pick up the phone or ask somebody for it, right? So it was really valuable in that way.
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And that was successful. Now, to be frank, that often was paired with a time and material contract.
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So the ability to balance out the hours with the subscription was an interesting
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model. And it's not a bad one either.
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You know, it does provide some additional flexibility against the time and material,
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contract, you know, to either generate more margin or, you know,
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perhaps lower the number of labor hours that we had to charge.
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Yeah, I definitely want to come back to the concept of a subscription-based model.
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It's one model. One, yeah. Just as we talked about a success,
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what are the current challenges today for firms who are basically trying to
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work with clients and, you know, move away from a billable hour model?
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Yeah, there's a lot. There's a lot.
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You know, I think I think, you know, the first place to start is within the
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firm itself. Right. There's there's a dramatic mind shift that has to take place,
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you know, you know, in my industry and, you know, and other firms that I've
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I've worked with or seen, you know, that.
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Concept of time and material and, you know, we build labor hours is deeply entrenched
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and it's very difficult to consider how we would sell our services any differently,
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at least for a lot of people it is.
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And to compound that, you know, clients have very specific procurement rules in a lot of cases.
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They have, you know, in a lot of, you know, in many cases, you know,
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we have to operate against the client contract and the client contract will
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specify how they want us to build them.
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So there's a real challenge in getting to sit down with a client,
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you know, eye to eye and say, look, we think there might be a better way for
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this to work for both you and us.
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You know, here's some ideas for how that could look and here's why.
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And, you know, really see if we can move the needle because that's what has to happen.
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You know, clients that we work with have to start to want different business models, right?
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And people within our firm have to really become comfortable with talking to
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clients about, you know, how we would bring our services to bear without a TNM-based approach.
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Yeah. And then, I mean, have you seen, noticed maybe any common thread or similarities
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for the clients who do have an appetite for a different business model?
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You know, obviously, to your point, procurement rules are basically the box
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and constraints they have to operate in yeah,
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but you know just as you know engineering firms have their own mindsets and
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cultures maybe different clients have different mindsets cultures might be a
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bit more innovative uh you know in the,
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in the out in the market you know what have you noticed for those who are willing
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to i guess be a bit more innovative yeah,
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You know, I think, you know, it starts obviously first with,
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you know, having a good relationship with the client, you know,
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when you when you've got a strong relationship or a long long standing relationship
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with the client or someone within the client organization, there's a little
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bit more trust there, perhaps to have that conversation about,
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hey, guys, we're really, you know, we're really seeing some things change here.
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And, you know, it's it's, you know, it's our benefit and your benefit if we
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could look at this from a different perspective.
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So I think the relationships are important. I can't say that I've seen any specific.
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Trend either way. Obviously, the more, I'd say, the higher up,
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let's say, in the government, you know, space or, you know, the larger the organization,
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the more rigid their rules are.
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So I guess smaller organizations and, you know, private organizations,
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obviously, if those are your clients, there's certainly a lot more flexibility there.
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So, I think, you know, the goal for the firm is to find that one or two or three
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clients that we could sit down with and have this meaningful conversation with
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and try a few things out, right? Right.
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Like I said, we've had some success. I've had some success in previous roles
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and where I'm at now, we're working through how, you know, and getting our people
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trained on how to have that conversation with the client, because that's important.
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You know, you have to really know what we're trying to offer and be able to
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describe it confidently to the client so that they understand it enough to,
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you know, to want to give it a go.
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Yeah, no, that makes total sense. And so, you know, kind of coming back to focusing
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on the firm for firms out there today in 2026,
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what can they do to be ready for, you know, basically these technology changes
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that are then going to impact business model changes?
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I know one thing you mentioned is the mindset, you know, let's say culture,
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for lack of a better term.
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Maybe we could talk a little bit about that. And then, you know,
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are there kind of more, you know, skill set operational things they need to consider?
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Or, you know, maybe it doesn't matter, you know, we could be kind of vendor tool agnostic.
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Is it more, you know, with respect to kind of the people and processes you have in place?
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But I'd love to get your, you know, thoughts on that. Well, it's interesting.
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You know, we've been talking for a little while here. And as a CTO,
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we haven't mentioned technology once yet.
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But, you know, obviously, you know, I think technology has a big role,
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you know, from my perspective on how, you know, we can move to these models.
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So in order for that to happen, obviously starting with culture and people is
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first and foremost, but when you do start to look at the technology itself.
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As a firm or an internal firm, you know, I think there's a few things you have
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to do to be prepared, right?
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You have to have your data estate in order, right? Because in order for us to
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be able to successfully,
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you know, deliver some of these outcomes or some of the value that we're trying
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to describe, and, you know, we'll talk about AI a little bit because it's,
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a big part of this now, but having your data in line, right,
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making sure you understand your processes, right, making sure you're clear on,
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you know, how you've optimized certain ways of working within the firm,
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right? Because that's where this starts, right?
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You're beginning to operate differently. You're beginning to change some things
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about how you might've worked previously. And those changes,
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for example, I'll use AI as an example, may reduce the overall time it takes
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to do a particular task, right? That's one of the things we'll hear.
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Oh no, now what am I going to do? I can't build all those hours,
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right? Big problem. That's the one, you know, that's the first one that pops up.
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And in reality, that should not be a revenue problem. That should be an opportunity.
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That's the way I think about it. And the key to that is, again,
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you know, being able to really understand the client problem in depth, right?
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And then be able to describe how we're going to solve the client problem or the client's problem,
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you know, through that combination of our expertise, our knowledge,
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and our reputation in some cases tied in with the technology, right?
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There's a lot of ways to tackle that. You know, that's probably another two-hour
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podcast, I think, to talk about that.
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But I do think it's really being understanding how we do what we do to solve the client problem.
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You know, how efficient we can get doing it and how we can describe that value to a client.
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I'll give you an example. I'm going to try to give you an example on this one.
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And it's an old one that we've used for a lot of things, right?
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The Uber example, right? And if you think about it this way,
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if I'm the client, I am the client, and I'm in New York City and I have to get
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from here to downtown, there's a bunch of different ways I can get there.
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I can get on the subway, that involves walking and lots of complexity.
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I can take a cab, the old-fashioned cab. I can wait on the street waving my
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hand, hoping one of those yellow cabs pulls over. There's a lot of uncertainty
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there. I don't know when the car is going to come.
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A lot of things about that that, you know, as a client, I don't like.
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And I think clients see that in the T&M model. There's a lot of uncertainty there.
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Anyway, but, you know, if I do it the old-fashioned way and I happen to get
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a cab and I happen to sit in it, you know, what happens? The meter starts.
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What does the meter look like? It looks like labor hours, right?
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I might sit in traffic for a while, right? The driver might take a route that's
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not optimal, right? And before you know it, that meter's gone up quite a bit.
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What do I as a client want? I want some certainty and I want some understanding
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of what it's going to actually cost me to get the outcome that I'm looking for. So guess what?
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If I'm a client and I'm able to open up my phone and click on the Uber,
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I know exactly where the car is, I know when it's going to get here,
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and it tells me how much it's going to cost before I get to where I'm going, right?
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And to me, that's a ton of value, right? I want, you know, it reduces that uncertainty.
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It reduces the risk of me being late for my appointment or whatever it is, right?
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And if you translate that into our business, especially in the environmental
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services, our job is to get things in place so that, for example,
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a contractor can get trouble in the ground.
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And the faster and more efficient we can do that, the better it is for that contractor.
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So the long way around is that is the level of depth we have to understand what
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the client problem is. What do they actually want us to do for them?
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It's certainly to do what we do well, but there's other factors,
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time, risk, you know, all those things have to be taken into account.
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Well, I think that's a great example. And it kind of talks about essentially the outcome,
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that a client wants as opposed to really getting into the nitty gritty of, you know, the process.
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And essentially, if I want to get to destination B within this time,
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within this budget, that's what I want.
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I don't need, you know, the...
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Explanation of the 1200 hours and how they're going to be divided by this team and that team.
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I just want you to provide, you know, this outcome or in the case of our members,
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this service and, you know,
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how contracts evolve over time or basically being able to charge that versus
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the traditional TNM, you know, definitely has a big appeal there for folks.
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You know, one thing you were talking about and kind of came up with the discussion
00:17:17.187 --> 00:17:21.047
about AI is thinking more about opportunities.
00:17:21.047 --> 00:17:24.358
And I think that is something, you know, from my own perspective,
00:17:24.782 --> 00:17:30.407
that maybe is getting lost in this conversation around technology and especially AI.
00:17:30.743 --> 00:17:36.087
You know, firms are very concerned about costs and what ROI are we getting.
00:17:36.087 --> 00:17:41.192
And, you know, you mentioned an example of maybe using AI can help save a little bit of time.
00:17:41.633 --> 00:17:46.667
But the flip side of that coin, instead of thinking maybe about this cost savings
00:17:46.667 --> 00:17:50.817
ROI, is really what are new things we could do?
00:17:51.067 --> 00:18:00.168
What is a new service we could offer that we previously weren't able to because we now have technology?
00:18:00.853 --> 00:18:04.257
And, you know, this then kind of segments a little bit to what I wanted to come
00:18:04.257 --> 00:18:08.150
back to about the subscription. You know, traditionally...
00:18:09.250 --> 00:18:15.395
Especially in professional services, customer hires you, basically give a report
00:18:15.395 --> 00:18:18.725
or a document or some sort of deliverable, and that's it.
00:18:19.509 --> 00:18:23.595
Technology, you could license a subscription to some, you know,
00:18:23.595 --> 00:18:28.408
report that may be or a website, a web link that then gets updated
00:18:28.779 --> 00:18:33.355
monthly, yearly, that they then or basically, you know, it's kind of that software
00:18:33.355 --> 00:18:36.475
as a service model buying into, you know,
00:18:36.855 --> 00:18:41.415
what have you seen technology allow, you know, firms do,
00:18:41.875 --> 00:18:47.727
new services being offered, you know, today that really weren't available 10, 15 years ago?
00:18:49.835 --> 00:18:54.535
There's a lot to unpack on that one. You know, you know, obviously,
00:18:54.895 --> 00:18:59.575
you know, the first model that I, the first example I gave, you know, where, you know.
00:19:01.193 --> 00:19:07.305
A client can sort of subscribe to the You know, to the firm's access point to get added information.
00:19:07.305 --> 00:19:11.625
That's one way to do it. And then add some value in there by providing a few
00:19:11.625 --> 00:19:17.385
domain level applications that they may have had to hire us to do on a TNM basis
00:19:17.385 --> 00:19:20.015
or on a, you know, specific project basis.
00:19:21.422 --> 00:19:25.326
You know, what you described, I usually, I use kind of the terms efficiency
00:19:25.326 --> 00:19:26.366
and opportunity, right?
00:19:26.366 --> 00:19:32.396
AI provides two sort of value points to a firm, right? On the efficiency side,
00:19:32.396 --> 00:19:36.286
it's the how do I do what I do better, faster with more accuracy,
00:19:36.286 --> 00:19:40.107
right? More quality, you know, and all those things. So that's your efficiency side.
00:19:40.763 --> 00:19:44.356
How do you turn the efficiency into an opportunity, which is the other side
00:19:44.356 --> 00:19:46.376
of AI, well, the opportunity space, right?
00:19:46.376 --> 00:19:52.036
To your point, what new thing can I bring to, you know, to a client,
00:19:52.036 --> 00:19:56.755
you know, because I've been able to either, you know, and again,
00:19:57.359 --> 00:20:02.386
on the efficiency side, if we've really honed our process down so that we're
00:20:02.386 --> 00:20:07.220
really clear on how much exactly it's going to take to do a thing.
00:20:08.160 --> 00:20:12.426
You can imagine you can do different things like sell a bundle of those things
00:20:12.426 --> 00:20:15.466
right so if there's a series of reports that we know we're going to do over
00:20:15.466 --> 00:20:20.466
a year rather than you know saying well it's going to take us 20 hours right
00:20:20.466 --> 00:20:21.626
you do it that way saying no you can.
00:20:22.618 --> 00:20:26.746
You can subscribe to 10 reports a year for x right and and the certainty that
00:20:26.746 --> 00:20:31.126
we have with how much it's going to take to do it gives the client the certainty
00:20:31.126 --> 00:20:34.396
to say yeah okay fine you know like you know it's going to be a fixed price
00:20:34.396 --> 00:20:35.966
per each one of these, right?
00:20:35.966 --> 00:20:40.626
So it starts to lead into how the business model can change, right?
00:20:40.626 --> 00:20:43.936
Because it changes, you know, the way we can sell.
00:20:43.936 --> 00:20:48.436
Now, from a pure technology perspective, you mentioned, you know, a few ideas.
00:20:48.436 --> 00:20:52.486
And so one of the things that I think, you know, we haven't mentioned agents
00:20:52.486 --> 00:20:56.396
yet, but that's, you know, the agentic nature of AI is really interesting,
00:20:56.396 --> 00:20:59.346
both on the opportunity and the efficiency space.
00:21:00.884 --> 00:21:05.072
You know, I did an experiment with a colleague of mine outside of work where
00:21:05.072 --> 00:21:10.342
he was doing some consulting and, you know, he wanted me to provide some interesting feedback.
00:21:11.149 --> 00:21:14.942
And we did something pretty cool. He basically built an agent on his side that
00:21:14.942 --> 00:21:18.637
was doing some research and thinking about a certain topic.
00:21:19.328 --> 00:21:25.072
And I had a similar agent that was doing research in the area that I was working
00:21:25.072 --> 00:21:27.548
in, and we connected those two together.
00:21:28.372 --> 00:21:32.047
Right. So those were they were sharing information. Right. So there was this,
00:21:32.825 --> 00:21:35.502
sort of an agency connection.
00:21:35.502 --> 00:21:38.852
Right. And the reason I bring that up is there's there's the potential to do
00:21:38.852 --> 00:21:44.352
something very similar with the client consultant relationship using,
00:21:44.352 --> 00:21:49.792
you know, that that, you know, that type of mechanism where you could imagine, you know,
00:21:50.500 --> 00:21:54.722
a client has a couple of questions that they'd have to either pay us for or
00:21:54.722 --> 00:21:56.936
go through a process to get in touch with somebody.
00:21:57.355 --> 00:22:02.472
To get an answer to when in reality, you know, we can provide a level of common
00:22:02.472 --> 00:22:08.442
information based on the knowledge within the firm that the client could subscribe to and, and,
00:22:09.255 --> 00:22:12.272
you know, have access to, you know, and, and, you know, using,
00:22:12.272 --> 00:22:15.442
you know, there's an escalation model, for example, you know,
00:22:15.442 --> 00:22:18.387
when they get to a certain level of question, you know, then it's okay.
00:22:19.535 --> 00:22:23.125
We need to have a chat. So, I mean, it's just, you know, I'm,
00:22:23.125 --> 00:22:27.485
I'm just throwing it out as, as sort of a, an out there type example where I,
00:22:27.485 --> 00:22:28.565
I haven't seen that done.
00:22:28.565 --> 00:22:31.215
You know, there's probably some niche players out there that are thinking about
00:22:31.215 --> 00:22:36.025
it and hopefully they're not listening to this podcast, but you know, you know what I mean?
00:22:36.025 --> 00:22:39.845
It's, uh, those are the kinds of ideas. Like how do we, cause,
00:22:39.845 --> 00:22:41.445
cause what, what's our true value?
00:22:41.445 --> 00:22:46.475
Our true value is our knowledge, right and what we we we own with the people
00:22:46.475 --> 00:22:51.383
within our firm right that's our that's our ip that's our that's our trade,
00:22:52.305 --> 00:22:55.975
you know how do we leverage that in different ways to solve client problems
00:22:55.975 --> 00:22:58.505
i think is really where i'm trying to get to with this and.
00:22:59.455 --> 00:23:04.465
Agents are one way you know other other mechanisms of delivering that information
00:23:04.465 --> 00:23:09.811
in different ways opens up some of those new business models that aren't TNM-based.
00:23:10.229 --> 00:23:15.285
Right. And so, you know, to your point, professional services firms,
00:23:15.605 --> 00:23:17.044
the value is their people,
00:23:17.555 --> 00:23:22.775
the knowledge, you know, whether it's called data, information management,
00:23:22.775 --> 00:23:24.285
knowledge management, that is,
00:23:25.105 --> 00:23:30.595
the super valuable, you know, differentiator in why clients hire us to do the
00:23:30.595 --> 00:23:36.525
work because of that expertise we bring kind of now, instead of everything just
00:23:36.525 --> 00:23:40.085
being all scattered within the firm,
00:23:40.926 --> 00:23:44.435
you know, at a high level, what are some things and, you know,
00:23:44.435 --> 00:23:49.486
maybe Rincon is doing this now that are kind of almost like institutionalizing
00:23:49.923 --> 00:23:56.152
innovation, or, you know, maybe frameworks that firms can think about so that
00:23:56.372 --> 00:23:59.304
the stuff isn't happening in a silo?
00:23:59.821 --> 00:24:07.257
How can the firm as a unit move forward into this new world?
00:24:08.828 --> 00:24:12.718
So one of the things that I was able to do when I started at Rincon,
00:24:12.718 --> 00:24:17.048
and one of the tasks that I was given was to, you know, bring our,
00:24:17.048 --> 00:24:21.063
you know, what we call our innovation process into the modern age. Uh-huh.
00:24:22.496 --> 00:24:25.507
Clearly, you know, one way to do that, which is the way we chose,
00:24:25.987 --> 00:24:30.023
was sort of an autonomous or an agent-based approach, right?
00:24:30.225 --> 00:24:34.481
A very clear and single pathway for ideas to be brought forward.
00:24:35.560 --> 00:24:40.030
A really clear, defined rubric for how we look at those ideas and measure them,
00:24:40.867 --> 00:24:45.067
prioritize them. Obviously, we can't solve every, you know, we can't do all
00:24:45.067 --> 00:24:46.507
the ideas that everybody has.
00:24:48.187 --> 00:24:52.957
We're not positioned to do that. So how do we find the best ideas?
00:24:52.957 --> 00:24:58.325
How do we find similar ideas? And how do we bring those together in a way that,
00:24:58.766 --> 00:25:01.847
you know, we can then invest properly in those ideas?
00:25:01.847 --> 00:25:05.707
So for us, that was a big deal. And it's been very successful.
00:25:05.707 --> 00:25:10.477
We're seeing ideas coming in from all over the place. And sometimes one,
00:25:10.477 --> 00:25:13.679
two or three ideas are disconnected. But when you look at them,
00:25:13.975 --> 00:25:16.017
when they come, you know, when they all show up, you can say,
00:25:16.017 --> 00:25:18.956
hey, this one plus this one plus this one's an even better idea.
00:25:19.567 --> 00:25:22.027
And then you start to be able to build those things out, you know,
00:25:22.027 --> 00:25:27.117
and I think, you know, a small step for a firm to really think about,
00:25:27.326 --> 00:25:29.897
you know, and, you know, as far as, you know, you can do innovation however
00:25:29.897 --> 00:25:31.877
you want, but what are you looking for, right?
00:25:31.877 --> 00:25:35.727
What is it that we're really looking for? And we definitely want to start with,
00:25:35.727 --> 00:25:40.547
you know, small steps. You know, I think find a really high volume workflow,
00:25:40.547 --> 00:25:42.389
you know, map that process, right?
00:25:43.208 --> 00:25:50.393
Identify at least one AI-enabled workflow that you can really focus on.
00:25:50.597 --> 00:25:55.257
Put the guardrails in place, right? Measure the success, test it against client
00:25:55.257 --> 00:25:59.747
impact, right? And then if it's a good one, then you can either package it up.
00:26:00.447 --> 00:26:03.971
If it's an opportunity side, as you recall, we talked about efficiency and opportunity.
00:26:04.580 --> 00:26:07.997
Is this a product or is this a solution that we could bring to a client that
00:26:07.997 --> 00:26:14.537
they'd be willing to pay for in a way other than TNM or it's just simply you
00:26:14.537 --> 00:26:18.847
know a really really good level of efficiency that we can bring but.
00:26:19.723 --> 00:26:24.903
You got to start somewhere, right? And I think one of the risks that an AI brings
00:26:24.903 --> 00:26:29.913
this risk up a lot, it's tempting to try to do what I call boil the ocean, right?
00:26:29.913 --> 00:26:35.923
You want to try to do all the things, right? And that's risky and very often,
00:26:36.863 --> 00:26:42.503
will create a situation that's unsustainable and difficult to manage and therefore,
00:26:43.623 --> 00:26:45.034
reduce value, right? So...
00:26:46.398 --> 00:26:50.487
Temper the approach, you know, start slow, start deliberate.
00:26:50.487 --> 00:26:53.975
Deliberate is a big word, right? Be very deliberate about what we're doing.
00:26:55.158 --> 00:26:58.461
And I think you'll see the ability to get those outcomes in place,
00:26:58.583 --> 00:27:02.701
whether it's on the inside or on the client side, going well.
00:27:03.683 --> 00:27:08.432
Well, you know, now we've talked a bunch about firms and clients.
00:27:09.048 --> 00:27:14.537
What advice would you have for, say, an early career professional who's just
00:27:14.917 --> 00:27:20.129
starting or maybe has been with their firm a year or two, who is interested
00:27:20.385 --> 00:27:23.594
in technology, interested in this disruption,
00:27:24.019 --> 00:27:28.929
you know, what can kind of they do to position themselves for success,
00:27:29.208 --> 00:27:31.709
you know, over the long term?
00:27:32.099 --> 00:27:37.240
Are there any specific skill sets they need to invest in?
00:27:37.711 --> 00:27:43.127
You know, just thinking of, know where you are today versus you know how your
00:27:43.127 --> 00:27:48.287
career started you know what advice would you give to our young professionals out there today,
00:27:49.071 --> 00:27:54.735
well you know i mean i think it starts with you know having an open mind right,
00:27:55.687 --> 00:28:00.537
you know be be curious about what these different tools and technologies are
00:28:00.537 --> 00:28:05.167
that are coming on board you know six months to a year ago we were talking about,
00:28:05.753 --> 00:28:08.817
the opportunity that might be available with AI, right?
00:28:09.817 --> 00:28:13.557
Now we're talking about the reality of it, you know, so things are moving quickly,
00:28:13.557 --> 00:28:18.657
right? So obviously stay abreast of what's happening, at least in this space,
00:28:18.657 --> 00:28:20.118
particularly, you know.
00:28:21.257 --> 00:28:26.047
And, you know, in our case, you know, if you have an idea or you're looking
00:28:26.047 --> 00:28:33.010
for those ideas, I think the best way to, you know, to kind to get visibility or to, you know,
00:28:33.684 --> 00:28:39.597
grow in this new world is to be the one that comes up with that new idea or
00:28:39.597 --> 00:28:41.973
that identifies the problem, right? Because that's.
00:28:43.368 --> 00:28:47.274
You know, in a lot of firms, the best ideas, and, you know, this is an old statement,
00:28:47.274 --> 00:28:50.514
generally will come from the people that are actually doing the work, right?
00:28:50.514 --> 00:28:54.594
And in our firm, that, you know, that tends to be, you know,
00:28:54.594 --> 00:28:57.874
some people that are entering the firm or, you know, newer in the firm,
00:28:57.874 --> 00:29:01.544
right? So, you've got a bird's eye view on where the problems are, right?
00:29:02.264 --> 00:29:06.004
And I think if, you know, you can identify those and if you have a mechanism
00:29:06.004 --> 00:29:11.144
like I described at Rincon to bring those ideas forward, I think that's a great,
00:29:11.144 --> 00:29:13.694
you know, that's a great way to tackle this, right?
00:29:13.694 --> 00:29:17.434
And how does it enhance the craft or the art or whatever it is that we do as
00:29:17.434 --> 00:29:20.717
a service, right? Because we don't want to lose that, right? It's really important.
00:29:21.724 --> 00:29:25.644
And I'll stress this over and over again as a CTO. It is not about the technology.
00:29:25.992 --> 00:29:30.947
Right. It's about our domain expertise and how we can use technology to improve
00:29:31.139 --> 00:29:33.867
what we do better for the client, et cetera.
00:29:34.461 --> 00:29:38.864
Yeah. Well, you know, I really appreciate all the insights.
00:29:38.864 --> 00:29:45.744
I think having the CTO on and, you know, this is a thing that comes up again
00:29:45.744 --> 00:29:50.804
when we talk about technology is really it's about change management with the people.
00:29:50.958 --> 00:29:58.024
Less about the technology, but it is definitely refreshing to hear that again reiterated from you.
00:29:58.379 --> 00:30:03.875
Before we wrap up, I'm going to ask a wildcard question. What is your Pearl Jam album?
00:30:04.973 --> 00:30:11.354
Oh, my favorite Pearl Jam album is, it's the one that probably most people don't
00:30:11.354 --> 00:30:13.682
like the most, but it's binaural.
00:30:13.990 --> 00:30:15.733
Most people forget about it.
00:30:16.917 --> 00:30:19.957
For me, it's the one that, you know, if you've listened to it,
00:30:20.497 --> 00:30:25.997
it's definitely a different sound from those guys. And I don't know, I just love it.
00:30:26.457 --> 00:30:29.317
I think they did some interesting things with the sound mixing.
00:30:29.617 --> 00:30:33.077
And, you know, if I get really stressed out, that's where I go,
00:30:33.377 --> 00:30:36.042
right? Because it's sort of a calming one, you know.
00:30:36.737 --> 00:30:38.900
That's a great question, but I love all of them, by the way.
00:30:39.196 --> 00:30:44.827
Well, I bring it up because I actually have been on a versus kick recently.
00:30:44.827 --> 00:30:50.347
So before we had talked a few weeks ago, I had been listening to that a lot.
00:30:50.347 --> 00:30:54.167
And then, you know, for our listeners, Ron was wearing a Pearl Jam shirt.
00:30:54.167 --> 00:30:57.723
And then I didn't get to ask you that then, but I just thought it was somewhat,
00:30:58.216 --> 00:31:01.757
serendipitous because I haven't listened to that album in a long time.
00:31:01.757 --> 00:31:03.569
And then all of a sudden I was going through it.
00:31:04.039 --> 00:31:06.982
You were wearing the Pearl Jam shirt. And I thought, you know,
00:31:09.112 --> 00:31:13.737
quite the coincidence. Well, Ron, thank you so much for joining us today.
00:31:14.120 --> 00:31:18.607
I want to thank all of our listeners and I want to encourage you to like and
00:31:18.607 --> 00:31:21.597
subscribe the Engineering Influence podcast.
00:31:22.377 --> 00:31:23.925
And with that, have a great day.