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BUSINESS NEWS RASMITH NAMED A MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL 2021 TOP WORKPLACE raSmith was recently recognized as a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel 2021 Top Workplace and received special honors for its “clued-in senior management.” This recognition is based on standout scores for employee responses to survey questions. raSmith has been honored as a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel TopWorkplace for nine consecutive years. This year, the firm ranked 13 out of 59 in the category of medium company size. “We are excited, honored, and humbled to receive this special recognition of our leadership and to be identified again by our employees as one of the best places to work in southeast Wisconsin,” said Ricky Smith Jr., raSmith president. “Our staff has helped to create an amazing environment at raSmith by
working well as a team, demonstrating their passion, dedication, and resilience throughout the COVID-19 pandemic to continue to take care of our private and public sector clients.” Wendy Wolfgram, raSmith human resources manager, said, “raSmith’s family-friendly culture; generous compensation and benefit programs; and opportunities for personal development, team building, and volunteering all combine to help make the company a great place to work. We are currently looking for more talented people to join our growing teams in Wisconsin, Illinois, and California.” The Top Workplace Awards program recognizes the top workplaces in southeast Wisconsin based on employees’ anonymous responses to survey questions. Companies
are measured on qualities such as employee engagement and development, company leadership, workplace culture and flexibility, compensation, benefits, and the impact that company policies have on innovation and morale. raSmith is a multi-disciplinary consulting firm comprising civil engineers, structural engineers, land surveyors, development managers, landscape architects, and ecologists. Its services are focused on our public and private sector client needs in design and construction including site design, structural engineering, municipal engineering, transportation and traffic, surveying, construction services, and geographic information systems. The firm works on projects nationwide from seven locations in Wisconsin, Illinois, and California.
KEVIN BROWN, from page 9
Even though I haven’t experienced some of the challenges other groups face, I do firmly believe that outreach and mentorship are transferrable. While the approach may be different, it can and should be applied to other underrepresented groups. “An outreach program – the ACE Mentor Program of Greater Philadelphia specifically – is the reason that I have the career I have today, and it has been important to me to continue mentoring through this organization.” When it comes to outreach and mentorship, I do not believe we should solely focus on the underrepresented – I simply believe we should diversify our outreach efforts. I understand that it may be challenging because it’s outside of the comfort zone of some or is difficult to connect to, but we in the AEC industry literally solve challenges every day. I plan to continue to diversify my outreach and mentorship efforts and challenge others in the industry to do the same. I think this is how we collectively achieve diversity within our companies and organizations. An outreach program – the ACE Mentor Program of Greater Philadelphia specifically – is the reason that I have the career I have today, and it has been important to me to continue mentoring through this organization. I have mentored many students over the years, and my employer has hired two of my previous high school mentees. They are now full-time employees with us. I am living proof that outreach and mentorship work. I would like to see more people in the industry who are invested in diversity and inclusion supporting these programs. KEVIN BROWN, PE, is a transportation construction manager at Urban Engineers. Contact him at kbrown@urbanengineers.com. Urban Engineers is showing its commitment to outreach and mentorship through its annual donation to the Kevin Brown, Jr. Scholarship with the ACE Mentor Program and the annual Edward M. D’Alba Leadership Award Scholarship. Learn more about the firm’s diversity initiatives here.
of redlining, mass incarceration, and the war on drugs – it isn’t hard to see how we still feel the effects of that today. Because of this, Black people started out behind – behind on education, financial literacy, and with creating and sustaining generational wealth. This is why outreach and mentorship are important when we speak on diversity and inclusion, because, just like generational wealth is a cycle where wealth is passed down and used to generate more wealth, these disadvantages get passed down too. We need to be able to step in, educate, motivate, and guide. We perform outreach because a lot of underrepresented schools lack the capacity to be able to educate students on technical career paths, and we can open their eyes to a world they may not have known existed. We mentor and guide because after a student decides they want to pursue a career in science or engineering, they will face many challenges and obstacles. These challenges are typical of someone on the path to a STEM career, as well as those who are byproducts of that cycle of disadvantages. Without a mentor or guidance, these challenges are often so great that they derail their goals. I believe that through outreach and mentorship, we can get a more diverse group of people entering the pipeline for STEM careers. Now, one could say, “C’mon Kev, Black people aren’t the only ones who deal with these obstacles.” And I would agree. But I would add that our nation’s history increased our chances of not being able to have access to a good education system, of not being able to benefit from generational wealth, of growing up in a broken family, of being the victims and perpetrators of gun violence, of being discriminated against today, and thus, has played a role in many of us not making it into the pipeline. My intent isn’t to make anyone feel guilt or pity, but to bring awareness to a topic we all find hard to talk about. I understand there are many groups that are underrepresented in our industry, but I wanted to focus on Black people because, as a Black man, I have faced some of these challenges and overcome some of these obstacles.
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THE ZWEIG LETTER JUNE 14, 2021, ISSUE 1396
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