TZL 1456

TRANSACTIONS BOWMAN EXPANDS TRANSPORTATION INFRASTRUCTURE SERVICES THROUGH ACQUISITION OF EAST COAST FIRM MCMAHON ASSOCIATES, INC. Bowman Consulting Group Ltd. announced that it closed on the acquisition of McMahon Associates, Inc., a company specializing in delivering a full range of innovative transportation planning and engineering services to private and public sector clients. Founded in 1976 and headquartered in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania, McMahon focuses on projects oriented to roads and bridges; traffic and parking; signals and ITS (intelligent transportation systems); community transportation; and public transit. The firm is comprised of over 200 dedicated professionals working out of fifteen offices located throughout New England, the Mid- Atlantic, and Florida. “McMahon is well respected throughout the transportation field and will be an outstanding addition to our firm,” said Gary Bowman, CEO of Bowman. “Their leadership and team of consummate professionals bring tremendous value to our staff, our clients, and our shareholders. As we have gotten to know McMahon’s business, we have become highly confident that this complementary

combination will have a long-term positive impact that will be much greater than the sum of the parts.” “The array of transportation services we can collectively provide our clients will continue to grow as client needs dictate, while we continue to deliver on our commitment to personalized attention on every project,” added Bowman. “The addition of McMahon will provide a broad platform from which to continue growing our share of the transportation market throughout the nation. We are just getting started on our 2022 acquisition program and I am pleased that we continue to deliver on our commitment to strategic growth in such a meaningful way. Everyone at Bowman joins me in welcoming the employees, clients, and business partners of McMahon.” “For over 45 years, McMahon has specialized in delivering forward-looking transportation, planning, engineering and technology solutions to our clients”, said Joseph DeSantis, president and CEO of McMahon. “By joining up with Bowman, we gain access to new resources and technologies that allow for an even greater investment in the delivery of innovative transportation solutions to our clients, while continuing

to offer the same personal attention and trusted relationships our clients have come to expect from us.” The acquisition is Bowman’s second of 2022 following the acquisition of Perry Engineering earlier this year. “This is a significant step toward our stated goal of acquiring $75 million of annualized net revenue this year,” said Bruce Labovitz, Bowman’s CFO. “The addition of McMahon nearly triples our transportation infrastructure business which will, over time, meaningfully impact our composition of revenue by market. While the acquisition is within our target multiple range, we believe McMahon’s operating margins will benefit from being part of Bowman and ultimately reduce the effective multiple. As is our practice, we will provide more detailed information on our M&A activities and communicate updates to guidance in connection with our upcoming earnings call.” Headquartered in Reston, Virginia, Bowman is an engineering services firm delivering infrastructure solutions to customers who own, develop, and maintain the built environment.

My point of this story is this: Had Russell Laird not decided in his mind that I was the guy they needed to hire and then kept at me over months and months, there is no way I would’ve even talked to Carter & Burgess, much less accepted an offer from them and moved to a new city. I was an owner in the company I worked for. We had a newer, five-bedroom, two- story colonial in a nice neighborhood with a community pool. My company car was a new Nissan Maxima. My then-wife had a good job working as a psychologist for the University of Tennessee Health Science Center. There was no reason to make a change. Yet I did. This was a lesson I never forgot. Later in my career, there were people I wanted to hire who I talked to for as long as five years before convincing them to come to work with me. Persistence pays off. Mark Zweig is Zweig Group’s chairman and founder. Contact him at mzweig@zweiggroup.com. “Later in my career, there were people I wanted to hire who I talked to for as long as five years before convincing them to come to work with me. Persistence pays off.”

MARK ZWEIG, from page 11

good investment or not. I was only 26, and if I were an owner, I would not only get a better company car, but my typing would get done a lot faster by the typing pool. That’s about the time I started getting calls from my old client and friend, Russell. Carter & Burgess was experiencing tremendous staff turnover. In 1983-1984, their turnover rate was a staggering 43.8 percent! While they had a personnel manager there by the name of Ken Pusey, he was overwhelmed. According to an ACEC peer review that they had gone through, they needed someone in charge of what was starting to be called “human resources management.” Every month or so I would get a call from Russell. He kept saying they really needed someone like me and they wanted to fly me to Fort Worth to talk to me. And every month, I told him things were going well, and that while I appreciated their interest, I just couldn’t do it. Needless to say, at some point, after one of Russell’s calls, I finally said “yes.” I don’t know if I had had a bad day or what prompted me to acquiesce, but I did. They sent me a plane ticket and I flew to Fort Worth and met with their board of directors. Some time after, they made me an offer I couldn’t refuse and I said “yes.” I took the job and we moved to Fort Worth.

THE ZWEIG LETTER SEPTEMBER 12, 2022, ISSUE 1456

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