Hello. My name is Gus Maimis. I am senior vice president and northeast territory manager for STV Construction. Just to give you a little background about myself and STV, if you don't mind. I've been in the construction industry for close to 30 years. And I've had the pleasure of working with numerous what I consider to be pretty prestigious projects ranging from the multiple high rises, the white plains airport terminal. One of my favorites is the grand central terminal restoration, which is a monumental task. And the most current of course, my favorite of all was the construction of the 9/11 memorial. Which of course, it kind of touches on everybody who's been associated with that project, cuz it wasn't just a regular project really. It was predominantly, I hate to use the old cliches, like a labor of love, but it was a lot more than just a project to those of us who were associated with that. Over my past 30 years, I've been, I basically grew up in a construction industry. I've been an assistant superintendent, superintendent, assistant project manager, helped both many managerial positions. From small firms to managing my own firm, to running a substantial firm such as STV Construction, whereas northeast territory manager we have over 200 people from between New York and Washington. And honestly at this point in time, I'm managing close to eight, no, that's not true. Close to $9 billion worth of construction, with some very landmark projects such as the LaGuardia Airport terminal. Still working down at the World Trade Center. Managing multiple healthcare facilities and higher ed facilities for such prestigious clients such as NYU Medical Center, Mount Sinai Medical Center, Columbia University of course, and many others, which that's not what we're here to talk about. The focus of us getting together today is to talk about the role of a project manager. And if you don't mind, I'm gonna focus on the construction management slide of project management. Which I'm gonna try to share some of my experiences, trials and tribulations, errors that I've made, have seen others make, and some of the highlights and what I consider to be critical in someone being an effective project manager. Cuz some of the things that, well, let me not get ahead of myself. So let's look at the course objectives, right. What I considered to be some of the key skills for a project manager, okay. First and foremost, okay, you have to be able to evaluate, identify evaluate and manage risk. That's what you're there for. You're like the gatekeeper between your firm and the project. As well as the client, which you are in a sense representing to manage their risk. And how do we go about doing that? First and foremost, is you need to understand your contractual obligations. We're gonna talk about that briefly. I'm not gonna get into legalese, but I think there's certain issues that need to be addressed, okay? Developing a logistic plans and of course safety requirements. Over the next whatever, half hour to an hour we're gonna be together. You're gonna hear me mention the word planning, am a big planner, I love planning, I plan everything from my day to the project, to a project I should say, to how to put together a team, how to put together a proposal, how to put together even something as simplistic as an invoice. All right, because if you don't plan there's no way on Earth you'll be able to actually act out and achieve the kind of success that is really expected of you, okay? So keep in mind the word planning. Review of schedules, another planning factor, right? When I was younger somebody mentioned to me the fact that If you can't put it on paper, you can build it and it kinda stuck to me. So before every project even was still in the conceptual stages and the planning stages. Sitting down and locking yourself away and of course getting input from your team members in compilation of a schedule is critical. Okay, because I mean, another adage of course, the old GIGO garbage in, garbage out. Too many times, I've seen schedules that are just totally garbage, okay. And to do that, it's an injustice to the team. It's an injustice to a waste of effort, it's an injustice to the resources that you're wasting. We're gonna talk about, briefly, bidding and preparing leveling sheets. I'm gonna touch on bonding and insurance. I'm not gonna profess to be an insurance expert but I think the certain key aspects of bonding insurance that you should be aware of. Some of the benefits, and what's available to you as a project manager. Negotiating change orders, and how to avoid claims. I mean, we'll talk about that shortly. And of course last but not least, the most critical aspect of project management, is probably communication and maintaining documentation. So let's go on to the next slide. With that in mind, let me just go over what I consider to be the four critical aspects of an effective project manager. Some of the qualities associated with being an effective project manager. First and foremost, you're a leader. You have to be a leader. You have to have some conceptual skills okay? The team relies on you from the superintendents, the assistant superintendents, the assistant project managers, the schedulers, the estimators, the accountants, all these individuals, and you will see the org chart shortly. They all depend on you because you are really the brain trust of the project. And let me just offer something else. An important leader doesn't necessarily manage down organizationally. A good leader has to be able to manage up. Okay, and what does that mean? You have to manage up in your own organization, right? Such as your project exec, the VPs, the SVPs, whoever they might be. And you also have to be able to manage up to your clients because proper communication, which is the next item, right, to be able to communicate well Is a key component to being an effective project manager. So with that in mind, let's talk about communication, okay? We talked about leadership, but the next component to that is communication. The ability to direct, guide, mentor individuals, especially younger folks, I've always stressed mentorship in many of our project managers. Because let's face it, in today's world we are, one of our biggest resources is some of the young talent that's out there, the people that are coming up, and we recognize it. Us old folks, the ones with the gray hair are on their way out and the best thing for our industry, the best we can anybody, actually, is to mentor them to bring them up to the point where they become successful, to the point they become engaged. To the point they become a future leader and take on the responsibilities that someday, you will vacate. So, communication, ability to lead and work with others, but, more important, mentor and motivate, okay? And how do you go about doing that? First and foremost as a leader who communicates well let's say, the most important thing you can possibly show is your experience. Okay, people look up to you. People will look up to you in a sense that what do we do? Okay, and listen there's no way that you're gonna know everything. It's impossible. None of us do. And anybody who professes they do is full of baloney. So, the experience level, your technical skills, the ability to problem solve, okay, and you're considered the individual as a leader to be able to have that kind of knowledge or some aspect of the knowledge. And if you don't know what the answer is, how to get that answer? So having that level of experience and having the technical skills and technical knowledge that you'll be able to communicate and do the problem solving will be an integral component to you being an effective leader of your team. Last but not least, an effective project manager has to be a politician. And you're gonna ask me why? If you're a good leader, if you can communicate well, and of course you have the experience and technical skills to lead the team, what's the political aspect for? Why do you need the political skills? Because you're also the face of your organization, okay? And you have to be able to function and function effectively within, not just your organization, but also outside of your organization within the client's organization. Or perhaps, if you're in a public agency project, to be able to communicate and function within a public agency can be sometimes quite it could be trying, okay? But in addition to that, as a good politician, and the reason why I'm saying you have to be a good politician is because, as a project manager, you'll be asked to be a salesman for your firm as well. So you have to have the political skills to not only be quick on your feet, to be able to converse with everything from, say, a laborer to a CEO of an organization, okay? That takes a skill. Not too many people can do that. To be able to give direction to a laborer, or a tradesman, or journeyman to the point where you communicate effectively that he or she understands what you wanna say, to your team, to the various levels all up to the CEO. When you're in front of them and you're trying to sell the abilities of your firm. I didn't get into salesmanship because I kind of think if you have the communication skills, the political skills, the experience skills, and the leadership skills you'll be able to do very well in the ability to do the salesmanship and represent your firm to outside clients. To the point where we lead to new opportunities for both, let's face it, you and your firm. When I first started working I always had three things in mind when approached a project, okay. First and for most, I wanted my project manager, my project excec., my CEO to love me to the point to say I did a great job and you're going to be promoted, okay? I wanted the client to say you did a great job, I want to hire you. And you needed the client to come back to say you did such a great job, here's my next project. Or the architect as well because let's face it, the architects are a component of getting future work. So between those three things you have to keep in mind that you're not only promoting your firm, you're also promoting yourself and how you carry yourself both in front of your team, in front of the client, in front of trades people, is a great component, is a huge component to being an effective leader and project manager.
