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BUSINESS NEWS BURNS & MCDONNELL OPENS NEW WASHINGTON, D.C. OFFICE Burns & McDonnell has announced the opening of a new office in Washington, D.C. This office will allow Burns & McDonnell to better serve its clients in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. Derek Brown, senior railroad and transit project manager, leads Burns & McDonnell’s team of talented experts in Washington, D.C. Burns & McDonnell’s new space ensures
the firm will continue to deliver specialized engineering expertise for its clients’ toughest transportation and infrastructure projects, and will allow Burns & McDonnell to attract the very best talent in the region. The address for the new Washington, D.C. office location is 100 M Street SE, Suite 600, Washington, D.C. 20003 Founded in 1898, Burns & McDonnell is a full- service engineering, architecture, construction,
environmental, and consulting solutions firm, based in Kansas City, Missouri. Burns & McDonnell’s staff of 7,000 includes engineers, architects, construction professionals, planners, estimators, economists, technicians and scientists, representing virtually all design disciplines. Burns & McDonnell plans, designs, permits, constructs, and manages facilities all over the world, with one mission in mind: Make our clients successful.
STEPHEN LUCY, from page 3
and take tangible action to address the problem. Overall our industry has not been effective in taking action and implementing change. Answering these questions may help to guide a firm’s efforts to change: 1) Is your firm’s culture inclusive and open-minded? 2) Do you offer career paths that are gender neutral? 3) Do you bring women into the management process, including strategic planning discussions? 4) Do you promote and compensate equally? 5) In evaluating future leadership, do you weigh your selection based not only on skills and contributions but also on inten- tionally diversifying your top ranks? Don’t misunderstand me, promotions and opportunities must be based on ability and performance. However, based on my 30 years of experience, I know how hard women can work, how intelligent and competitive they can be, and how much their performance can impact a firm’s success. But the barriers are still there. EMBRACING THE FUTURE THROUGH DELIBERATE CHANGE. Our reality is that we cannot immediately hire ourselves out of this is- sue. We can hire ourselves into addressing it better moving forward. With so much generational transition ahead, it is imperative that we plan for greater gender diversity within our ranks, and that it involves a thoughtful, well-planned, multi-year process. Moreover, if the future is to remain bright and vibrant for women, we have to start earlier with our support. Gender disparity in high school is most evident when twice as many young men earn STEM credits than young women. At college, twice as many men select STEM majors compared to women, according to the 2018 National Science Foundation Science and Engineering Indicators Report. And scholarships and grants for women in engineering are profoundly lacking in size and scope. Perhaps this is where our legacies can and should prevail as firm leaders: Through earlier mentoring and classroom conversations about STEM opportunities. Through financial support in the form of scholarships and grants, earmarked for women. Through greater visibility of the achievements and contributions of women in our profession. And, ultimately, through partnerships, ownership, and equitable promotions and pay. STEPHEN LUCY is CEO of JQ Engineering with offices in Austin, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, Lubbock, and San Antonio, Texas. Contact him at slucy@jqeng.com.
engineering at TAMU in 2018 – well above average for the overall college and above prior years – and the top civil engineering graduate is almost always a woman. Yet, even with those gains, today’s headlines read: “We’re addressing gender disparity in engineering way too late,” and, when astronaut Dr. Mae Jemison talks about STEM programming efforts, she says we are losing talent and capability through systemic hurdles for women. SOLUTIONS BEGIN WITH AWARENESS AND ACTION. At first glance, our firm would be considered ethnic and gender diverse with approximately 50 percent of our workforce comprised of minorities or women. Granted, we have made overall in- roads to becoming diverse, but we struggle within our lead- ership ranks where we remain 100 percent male despite our best intentions. We give ourselves an out by saying this is no different than most firms in our industry, but that is such an amazingly poor excuse. Most of us can talk about the research proving business benefits that diversity provides, from improving performance and recruitment, to enhancing the culture and demonstrating a more representative team among our clients and communities. Then, we turn right around and talk about the downside – the number of women leaving our profession after only a few years. “We have made overall inroads to becoming diverse, but we struggle within our leadership ranks where we remain 100 percent male despite our best intentions. We give ourselves an out by saying this is no different than most firms in our industry, but that is such an amazingly poor excuse.” Do we know why women are leaving? Are we to blame? Have we created an unequal gender balance by not addressing those issues which impact women’s lives? More importantly, have we ignored systemic inequities that persist among ourselves as firm leaders? As with all problems, the most important first step is to acknowledge the problem and as an industry we appear to have taken that step. The harder next step is to determine
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THE ZWEIG LETTER June 3, 2019, ISSUE 1299
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