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By Milly Sordo | Neurodiversity awareness can help AEC firms build more inclusive workplaces where all minds are empowered to succeed.

By Melanie Carrido | Three decades in AEC show that while technology reshapes our work, strong communication and partnership still determine success.

By Nam Douglass | Operational lessons and compliance priorities for AEC firms in 2026.

By Ken Douglas | Enduring design firms pair creative ambition with business discipline, strategic clarity, and the courage to grow.

By Gregory D. Teague | A strong culture isn’t built once – it’s nurtured daily through shared values, genuine investment in people, and lasting community impact.

By Liisa Andreassen | President and co-founder of Peralte-Clark, LLC, a firm that specializes in managing, planning, designing, and implementing public and private infrastructure projects.

By Kyle Ahern | A closer look reveals hiring and retention pressures demanding smarter, people-focused strategies.

By Justin Gough | Group captives can offer design firms flexibility, savings and control over employee benefit programs.

By Liisa Andreassen | President of TPD, Inc. (Pottstown, PA), a consulting engineering firm specializing in transportation engineering and related environmental and construction services.

By Ezequiel Tovar | Ownership transition is all about trust, so develop leaders early and communicate clearly to ensure lasting success.

By Morgan Stinson | Attracting and retaining top talent in the AEC industry requires adapting to what employees value today.

By Josh Crawford | Our industry currently faces unique hurdles; success hinges on adopting tailored solutions combined with tried-and-true principles.

By Javier Suarez | Companies should focus first and foremost on “doing” and then worry about “saying” what they are doing.

By Mark Zweig | These qualities will be essential for entrepreneurial leaders in the AEC business to have in the coming months and years ahead.

By Mark Zweig | Embracing curiosity, open-mindedness, and positive thinking leads to personal growth, stronger connections, and greater success in life and business.

By Mark Zweig | These four things are beyond essential if you are serious about building an enduring organization that will evolve over time.

By Kyle Ahern | Firms that adopt these competitive strategies will be better positioned to achieve sustained success.

By Chad Coldiron | Takeaways from Zweig Group’s 2024 ElevateAEC Conference & Awards Gala.

By Eileen Shields | Growing from a startup to nearly 100 employees, this firm thrives through agility, teamwork, and delivering high-quality solutions at the core of its business.

By Mark Zweig | Sparkplugs are the people in your business who make things happen – and they are essential if you want to grow beyond what you alone can ignite.

By Liisa Andreassen | President and CEO of Vierbicher (Reedsburg, WI), a community planning and engineering firm that is a proven partner for thriving Wisconsin communities.

By Lalitha Benjaram | Committees are an efficient way for young professionals and newer employees to meet other team members and develop a strong connection to their organization.

By Stuart McLendon | The professional labor gap is an opportunity to rethink, reshape, and revitalize how we work.

By Kevin Brown | Five resume red flags to help AEC firm recruiters identify and set apart the best applicants from the rest.

By Mark Zweig | LLCs are often ill-suited for growing AEC firms, leading to legal entanglements and hindrances later on.

By Jennifer Haddad | When leaders combine a strong company culture with workplace flexibility and employee empathy, they can create an environment where hybrid work can thrive.

By Mitch Fortner | Ensure employee growth and success by implementing innovative approaches to career development, like diverse training programs and leadership initiatives.

By Ezequiel Tovar | Neglecting succession planning jeopardizes the future of your company’s internal transition.

By Lauren Martin | If you find yourself facing a lawsuit alleging malpractice, here’s what you need to look for when considering an expert witness.

By Mark Zweig | Work should be an integral part of life, so why do so many people working in AEC firms clearly not feel that way?

By Will Swearingen, Kevin Johns & Alexis Martin | Finding extra deductions or credits will serve you now and when the time comes to transfer ownership.

By Liisa Andreassen | Board chair and CEO of Lochner, a firm that specializes in planning, environmental, design, construction engineering and inspection, and right-of-way services.

By Jane Lawler Smith | Elevate your marketing services by asking yourself what your firm’s request for marketing services would include and how your team would respond.

By Ezequiel Tovar | You must consider the financials before you can fully understand what it takes for a succession plan to be feasible.

By Wendi Shafran | Representation matters and cultivating a diverse pipeline of future leaders can establish a foundation for inclusive and equitable decision making.

By Mitch Fortner | As demand for our industry’s services continues to increase, the firms that listen to their employees and evolve to meet their needs will continue to grow.

By Travis White | The benefits that come with being a growth-focused firm far outweigh the risks.

By Mark Zweig | Becoming an owner in the firm you work for means you are making a total commitment – don’t make it carelessly.

By Chad Clinehens | This year’s ElevateAEC Conference is an opportunity for you to drive personal and professional growth.

By Wesley Jones | Empowering diverse groups within your organization is paramount to understanding your employees, your clients, and the industries you serve.

By Mark Zweig | Know the pros and cons of both, and don’t kid yourself about the ramifications of either insisting everyone be there or allowing people to work remotely.

Zweig Group and ACEC have partnered to develop a groundbreaking DEI&B benchmarking tool for AEC firms.

This interactive tool will allow AEC firms to compare performance to peers, empowering them to take steps to strengthen DEI&B efforts.

By Adrian De la Garza | Insights and considerations that can help you decide if you’re ready to buy another firm.

By Liisa Andreassen | Executive principal and chief strategy officer at AG&E (Dallas, TX), a full service firm that provides sustainable structural engineering design for all types of projects.

By Mark Zweig | People who exhibit these qualities are likely to be well-thought of by their people and, more importantly, are able to achieve goals that others deemed impossible.

By Sara Parkman | Human resources director at CORE Consultants, Inc., a professional services firm that empowers its people to thrive at home, at work, and in their community.

By Liisa Andreassen | Co-president and CEO of DB Sterlin Consultants, Inc., a 100 percent minority-owned firm comprised of professional engineers, architects, planners, and surveyors.

By Tim Dunn | If you want to hire people with diverse backgrounds and experiences, it’s important to understand them and provide a comfortable, motivating space for all.

By Liisa Andreassen | President of Living Stone (Black Mountain, NC), a design-build firm that has been crafting luxury, award-winning custom homes for more than 25 years.

By Nea May Poole | If we truly want a diverse community and to provide equitable pathways to the profession, we need to support efforts to broaden the track to licensure.

By Mark Zweig | Hiring often takes a lot of time and a real commitment to get the key people you want.

By Liisa Andreassen | Partner at Method Architecture (Houston, TX), a full-service architecture firm that is uniquely ego-free in its commitment to a systematic, client-focused creative process.

By Sol Sim | It is in the interest of both the project owner and contractor to critically review risks and allocate them to the party most capable of controlling them.

By Nea May Poole | Universities do their students a disservice if they leave their programs without a fundamental understanding of what the career they have chosen entails.

By Liisa Andreassen | Principal at VMDO, an architectural planning and design firm that creates community-centered environments that connect people and place through design.

By Liisa Andreassen | President of Campos Engineering (Dallas, TX), an MEP engineering, testing, adjusting and balancing, and commissioning firm.

By Andy Chavez | Who are these private equity extraterrestrials, what do they want, and how long will they be here?

By Andy Chavez | What characteristics are highly desirable to buyers in the AEC industry right now?

By Jane Lawler Smith | When it comes to our clients, employees, and brand, are we competing like AEC professionals or acting like Family Feud contestants, simply guessing at answers?

By Will Swearingen | A clear understanding of how your firm will be managed after a large shareholder’s exit can greatly increase success going forward.

President of Lockwood, Andrews & Newnam (Houston, TX), a civil engineering firm that delivers exceptional quality and measurable value for the nation’s infrastructure.

By Christina Zweig Niehues | This year’s cohort has picked up where last year’s group left off – taking on creative ideas to solve both historic and emerging challenges.

By Jim Pappas | How scalable systems can be used to find the right people, bring a new product idea to life, and help it grow quickly and profitably.

By Mark Zweig | Stop lamenting the labor shortage and start doing what you should to find and keep the very best people in spite of it.

By Mark Zweig | We create much of our own good luck – and a lot of that comes down to understanding probabilities and doing things that increase our odds for success.

By Laura Rescorla | We must work intentionally to remove barriers and provide opportunities in our industry for people of all backgrounds.

By Chad Coldiron | Over the last 12 months, firms have been forced to rapidly adjust how they approach many workplace strategies – including recruitment strategies.

By Liisa Andreassen | President and CEO of Fuss & O’Neill (Manchester, CT), a company that – since its founding in 1924 – has grown to include 10 regional offices, one LLC, and more than...

By Kyle Ahern | A good, standardized parental leave policy is a major benefit that can set your firm apart.

By Talin Espinoza | A conversation about how improving gender representation in the workplace benefits everyone and how the AEC industry has evolved regarding women professionals.

By Christina Zweig Niehues | While we’re entering 2021 with a renewed sense of purpose and greater clarity, there are still a lot of unanswered questions.

CEO and president of SEH (St. Paul, MN), a firm that’s simplifying the world’s complex challenges by designing better places, engineering clean water, and renewing infrastructure.

By Will Swearingen | Management incentives can be used to motivate key staff and to build capital and liquidity for individuals in the event of a transition.

By Mark Zweig | Answer these questions and many more, or you will, at best, be a decent copy of a firm or firms that do as well or better than you already do.

By Mark Zweig | Entrepreneurs and small business owners have fundamentally different views on the opportunity each has in front of them.

Managing partner at Method Architecture (Houston, TX), a firm that practices ego-free architecture, creatively solves problems, and provides unparalleled customer service.

By Will Swearingen | Don’t let the concept of treasury stock cloud your transition strategy.

Zweig Group, a leading provider of advisory services, research, and education for the AEC industry, is pleased to announce a partnership with Workfolio, the innovative leader in professional visibility applications. With the increasing reliance on...

By Jamie Claire Kiser | Generational differences can be a powerful source of innovation and adaptability.

Co-founder and principal at CWE (Fullerton, CA), a  civil engineering, water resources, and environmental engineering firm whose experts pledge to create a better tomorrow, today.

Co-founder and managing partner of Shear Structural (Chamblee, GA), a 100 percent women-owned and women-managed structural engineering firm.

Zweig Group and Client Savvy are joining forces to bring AEC firms critical feedback from their clients. Because the COVID-19 situation continues to rapidly evolve, getting real-time feedback and data from the clients that support...

Founding principal of Kudela & Weinheimer (Houston, TX), a landscape architecture firm that has produced beautiful, exceptionally built environments for more than 25 years.

Through solid communication, planning, and leadership support from both organizations, a smooth transition is under way.

“If you have lofty ambitions for the growth of your firm, but aren’t exactly sure of what you need to do to accomplish it, here is my best advice.”

CEO of EDiS (Wilmington, DE), a fifth generation family-owned firm that has been thriving in the same region for more than a century.

“There is no question that after working as long as I have in the A/E industry with so many firms throughout the land, certain common undeniable truths present themselves.”

It’s important to understand your business model and the various outside factors that can affect the execution of an ESOP transaction.

Founders of HILGARTWILSON (Phoenix, AZ), an exemplary multidisciplinary firm that was formed in the middle of the Great Recession.

CEO of Ardurra Group (Tampa, FL), an engineering consulting firm with a focus on the positive.

President of Baldridge & Associates Structural Engineering, a full-service structural engineering and forensic consulting firm based in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Mid-Atlantic firm O’Donnell & Naccarato adds Indiana office through merger with Carmel-based McComas Engineering. O’Donnell & Naccarato has merged operations with structural engineering firm McComas Engineering. With four offices in the Mid-Atlantic region, this merger...

President of Reaveley Engineers, a national structural engineering firm based in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Whether it’s growth, ownership transition, diversity and inclusion, or technology, firms shouldn’t shy away from change if they want to be successful.

President, Choice One Engineering Corp. (Best Firm Civil #2 for 2018), a 45-person firm based in Dayton, Ohio. By Richard Massey Managing Editor “Work-life balance is a phrase thrown around a lot, but we believe...

Director of Global Diversity at Perkins + Will, a 2,500-person architecture firm with offices across the world. By Richard Massey Managing Editor The Bronx, New York native Gabrielle Bullock has been the Director of Global...

Diversity and inclusion are good for your bottom line. To get the right people, you have to cast your net in the right places, and jettison the bias. It’s alarming. According to 100 percent of...

Once you get to be 60, your perspective changes. If you look ahead, you know that you have, on average, another 12 years left to live (longer if you are a woman). And that’s an...

President and CEO of Ghafari (Hot Firm #54 for 2017), a 550-person multi-discipline firm based in Dearborn, Michigan. By Liisa Andreassen Correspondent “I would describe myself as a people person and am elated to see...

It might be a blunt mantra but it has a broad application across all facets of life and work, including the AEC industry. We all have leaders and figures in our lives who leave an...

President of Burns Engineering (Hot Firm #88 for 2015), a 220-person firm based in Philadelphia. By Liisa Andreassen Correspondent “The downside of the seller/doer model is that staff often likes the doing more than the...

Let’s try to tell our story so that we can go above and beyond the traditional marketing that AEC firms are known for. Think about some of the most iconic advertisements of the past. Many...

President and CEO of BSB Design (#87 Hot Firm for 2017), a 180-person architectural design and development firm based in Des Moines, Iowa. By Liisa Andreassen Correspondent “My advice is to get on it!” says...

Jamie Claire Kiser and Christina Zweig Niehues join ownership team FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. (Friday, January 6, 2018) – ZweigWhite LLC (Zweig Group), a global leader in products and services to the architecture, engineering and professional services...

There’s plenty of excuses as to why you won’t bring one of your rising stars to meetings with clients, and none of them are good. The best training is experiential. Take your rising stars to...

In this episode of the TZL Lifehacker Series, Randy Wilburn and Sanjay Jenkins discuss their morning routines, the importance of having a routine, and some steps A/E professionals can take to make the most of...

Here is the full transcript of a great conversation that we had with Mark Zweig. He gave us a history lesson on AECWorkforce and the importance of an effective job board for the Design and...

Here is the full transcript of a great conversation that we had with Mark Zweig. He gave us a history lesson on AECWorkforce and the importance of an effective job board for the Design and...

AECWorkforce.com, a digital ecosystem where great firms can find great people. Transformative job site launches in November. For the past several months I’ve been working with a fantastic team. We’re figuring out just how many...

President and CEO of EAPC Architects Engineers (Marketing Excellence #3 Website and #1 Holiday for 2017), a 140-person firm based in Grand Forks, North Dakota. Editor’s note: EAPC, founded in 1967, is celebrating its 50th...

One of the best things we can do as leaders is create more leaders, but to be effective, the effort must be deliberate. It’s a rare organization that succeeds without a solid succession plan identifying...

In this episode, Randy Wilburn speaks with Ozzie Nelson, chairman and CEO of NELSON, a global integrated services firm focused on design, architecture, and strategic consulting. Ozzie started working for his dad at NELSON after...

Open book management is a big card to play, but it puts everyone on your team at the table, and that’s where you want them to be. One of the trendier ideas in management consulting...

Book about elevating sustainability as a national strategic imperative is an impressive guide on how the US can shape a prosperous future. My daughter was at a sustainability conference in Santa Clara, California recently. She...

I’m about to make some generalizations that could get me in trouble with people I care about. If this includes you, please forgive me! Engineers have problems. You heard me. Engineers have PROBLEMS! I have...

CEO of Wantman Group, Inc. (#5 Hot Firm and #19 Best Firm Multidiscipline for 2016), a 310-person engineering consulting firm based in West Palm Beach, Florida. By Liisa Andreassen Correspondent “The easiest work is repeat...

Should you buy a firm or sell yours? That’s the question, and regardless of the answer, there’s a lot that goes into a successful merger or acquisition. In the ever-evolving AEC industry, both large and...

HELIX CEO Michael Schwerin headed into the New Year with double-digit profits and a strong book-to-bill ratio. By Liisa Andreassen Correspondent In 2001, Michael Schwerin started as an assistant environmental planning group manager with HELIX...

Office amenities are shifting from a focus on whimsy to a focus on meaning, and that adds up to improved productivity and increased profitability. As someone who designs workplace environments, it’s fascinating to participate in...

If you want to drive traffic to your website and your brand, it helps – a lot – to be an expert in your given field. It’s true. The origin of your web traffic is...

Sure – it’s hard to hire good people. There are lots of reasons for it. One of them is that we aren’t keying into the talent pool all around us. People in our network. People...

From job to job and firm to firm, all with the push of a button on a mobile app. Is that the future for the design industry? There’s plenty out there who sure hope so....

Did your interns live the dream? If so, great, but if not, it might be time to retool your program by taking these six simple steps. As a communications major with an interest in broadcast...

New York engineer Paul Grosser wasn’t afraid to make a change in 1990 when he needed one, and after 25-plus years of growth, he’s still hungry for more. By Liisa Andreassen Correspondent Since founding PWGC...

End-of-year bonuses and evaluations are obsolete. Try monthly or quarterly perks for your staff. It's clear to me that A/E firms are all in a huge rut when it comes to how they pay their...

Understanding the nuances of a Happily Employed Job Candidate can boost your ability to hire the best people. I recently received an email from a client who was in the middle of arranging an interview...

Rapid hiring during the recovery has changed the complexion of many firms The rapid recovery in the A/E industry has led to unprecedented growth for many firms. Most firms have rebounded, surpassing their pre-recession revenue...

Need help identifying targets for potential recruiting? The answer is in the headline. Sometimes in the recruiting world, you’ll hear the term “sourcing.” It sounds like something you would hear in the buying/procurement business, right?...

Pent-up demand means more hiring, so here are some critical musts for attracting and retaining great people. July is a time for grilling hamburgers by the pool, packing everyone into the family Denali or minivan...

Press Release: October 18, 2011 FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. (October 18 , 2011) – The fastest growing firms in the design industry are relying on traditional methods to achieve marketing results. According to the ZweigWhite’s 2011-12 Successful...

By Jeremy Clarke Getting top talent is still a critical priority… even in this economic environment. How so? Well, because business needs are still evolving, and employee turnover is still an unavoidable reality. All of...

By Julie Kyle Newsletters Editor, ZweigWhite I have many friends who are in business for themselves. As a creative type, I enjoy helping them come up with marketing ideas; it’s fun for me— designing new...

Press Release: March 7, 2011 FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. (March 7, 2011) — ZweigWhite has partnered with American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC) to produce and publish a co-branded version of the 2011 Financial Performance Survey of...

It’s commonly said that a design or environmental firm is only as good as its staff. That’s why I always felt recruiting was so critical and one of the MOST important functions of any firm...

Just about every firm in the A/E/P or environmental business today has identified its number one problem as “not having enough good people.” Solving this ongoing problem takes a lot of hard work and some...

I had a lengthy conversation the other day with someone who is currently in the throes of helping his company design a new incentive compensation plan. This fellow is a smart guy. He had done...

We can all take a lesson from my old buddy Bert Johnson (not his real name). He is a classic case of the entrepreneur who lost interest in his business, but figured out how to...

It is conventional wisdom that our companies are only “as good as the people we employ” and that “our greatest assets go home each night.” Over the years, I have heard literally thousands of owners...

On the whole, A/E/P and environmental firms seem to take themselves and their marketing too seriously. Sure— many of you DO have life-and-death responsibilities attached to much of what you do. You are serious people...

Here’s something I have observed in many different A/E and environmental firms around the country— certain employees who act as if they don’t understand how critical it is for them to be responsive. This one...

When it comes to predicting the future of a successful A/E or environmental enterprise of any sort, what’s more important— the market conditions, the passion of the individuals leading it, or the unity of those...

Thank God for technology! If we didn’t have the technology that we have today, there’s no way most of us who travel could keep up with the demands of work and life. For example, I...

Years ago, I coined a term called “supply-side human resources management.” The basic theory of supply-side human resources management goes something like this: If an A/E or environmental firm invests heavily in its recruitment function,...

It is so valuable… being THE place to work. What I mean by THE place is the firm that everyone wants to work at. It is the cool place, the desirable place to be, the...

Jose Piranha listened to his two partners, Stephanie Straighthair and Jason Loseria, discuss how to dole out the firm’s profits in the coming year. They were sitting at their favorite table at Hugo’s, the little...

Sometimes it’s amazing how little things change, huh? The challenges of implementing change, the myth of the dual career path, the hassles of poorly performing principals, the confusion resulting from messy office environments, why firms...

At the end of every year, Larz Picklefranz, managing partner of architecture and interiors firm Picklefranz, Lordosa, Fauna, and Schlossenberger, got the blues. Maybe it was just that the holidays reminded him of his long...

When I worked inside an A/E firm as a human resources director, I would occasionally have someone in my office telling me that they wanted to be an associate. And I have to tell you,...

Doug Pocketprotectus sat in the high-backed leather chair in the executive conference room and desperately tried to stay awake. It was hard to do. The meeting was so boring, and he was sleep deprived as...

Is your firm a compassionate firm? Do you choose what’s humane over what’s best financially in certain situations? And what difference does that make, anyway? Business is business. And we all know that to be...

I just heard a story the other day about one of our clients from another clients (both large A/E firms). Evidently, the first firm had been called by a big client for help on a...

The idea came to me at 3:50 p.m. on Sunday, January 2, 2000. It was a balmy afternoon here in the Boston area— temperatures in the 60s, sunny and bright. I took out my wife’s...

Whenever I see people get all upset about some trivial detail in their lives or their work, I find it distressing. Life is so much easier if you spend appropriate amounts of mental and emotional...

Everything I need to know was not taught in kindergarten! In growing our own business and working with hundreds of firms over the years to help them grow theirs, I feel like I have learned...

As hard as it may seem to believe, 1999 is already wrapping up. We’re into the last quarter of the year now. Over the next couple of months, many A/E/P and environmental firms will be...

With the tight market labor, Gen-X employee turnover, inefficiency from internal competition, and record backlogs of project work to be completed, it may be time to take a hard look at your compensation policies and...

Believe it or not, as good as things are in the A/E/P and environmental industry, there are still some firms out there that need to be turned around. These firms just can’t make a profit....

The headline for this week’s editorial sounds like the title of a bad country and western song, but there’s a lot of truth in it. Maybe it’s human nature, but we don’t seem to appreciate...

Opportunity is all around us. A lot of how successful you are depends on how you see things. The fact is, most A/E/P or environmental firms could do a better job cashing in on assets...

Did you ever notice how some companies muddle along while others seem to keep advancing? What allows some firms to make so much more progress and to get so much more accomplished than others? It’s...

Believe it or not, having fun helps your pocketbook. If your people are having fun, they’ll work harder, longer, and put out better quality work. And that will make you more money. I’m convinced that...

I thought about a headline for this week’s treatise along the lines of “Second guessers, naysayers, and negative thinkers,” or “No more excuses,” or “Let’s cut the crap.” But I decided that none of these...

Most of us in A/E/P or environmental consulting firms who are at project manager level or higher must travel occasionally. The probability that you will have to travel increases the larger your firm is, the...

Let me tell you a little story about two managers. Both head divisions for the same large, international engineering and environmental company. By most any standard, one of the two, who we’ll call “Jed,” is...

On Monday, December 20, 1993, William Edwards Deming, the 93-year-old management guru of Total Quality Management (TQM) died in his sleep. A statistician with a doctorate in Physics from Yale, Deming was credited with engineering...

Several recent experiences with consulting engineering firms lead me to believe that it’s time all of us looked at our compensation schemes and put some incentive back into the business— especially for principals. The desire...