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By Milly Sordo | Goal meetings are a way to set individualized goals with your employees steeped in energy, intention, and – most importantly – support.

By Mark Zweig | There are nine reasons why selling your firm to the right buyer can strengthen opportunities, stability, and growth for your people.

By Mark Zweig | Show everyone it’s not business as usual and your firm is in a new era – you may find it a helpful tool to reinforce your change program.

By Brad Thurman | Building true, long-lasting professional relationships with your clients takes a lot of work – but will pay off for you in the end.

By Mark Zweig | There are things you can do to stay positive and prevent pessimism from ruining your ability to lead.

By Gabe Lett | Enhance marketing by embracing creativity and disruption to craft surprising, memorable, and engaging campaigns.

By Sara Parkman | Zweig Group’s 2024 Marketing Excellence Award winners share the strategies behind their winning campaigns and the impact on their firms’ success.

By Sam Graves | Effective team management involves setting clear expectations, equipping and empowering members, and fostering engagement and evaluation.

By Mark Zweig | You don’t have to be a genius to figure out what you are doing to demotivate people; you just have to stop doing whatever it is now!

By Janki DePalma | It’s hard to shake off the feeling of being lazy, but it’s critical that we redefine our work-rest balance to enhance well-being and productivity.

By Mark Zweig | Things are only going to get more competitive, so it’s time to raise the bar with your marketing.

By Mark Zweig | There’s still time to get your head on straight and do a few things to make the most of the new year.

By Liisa Andreassen | CEO of Psomas (Los Angeles, CA), an employee-owned firm providing engineering, environmental, construction management, and survey/geospatial services.

By Mark Zweig | If you are a leader in an AEC firm, it’s crucial that you stay positive in spite of all the bad news we’re seeing these days.

By Michael Britt | It’s important to examine how your company can maintain culture and continue strategic growth in a new work environment.

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 Tom Godin | Like Wheel of Fortune’s most strategic letters, there are aspects of AEC firm operations that nearly always merit attention.

It comes down to respect and providing for your employees. If you do these two things, your people will quickly become your biggest cheerleaders.

By Mark Zweig | Are you doing what you really should be for your business right now? Or are you just floating along on a sea of uncertainty, afraid to move or you’ll turn over your...

Even if you’re at the lower rungs of the org chart, there are plenty of opportunities for meaningful acts of leadership.

“When it comes to branding for an AEC firm, I wouldn’t look to other AEC firms. Frankly, we make a lot of branding mistakes in this business.”

It is a widely-accepted idea that one of the defining characteristics of a successful enterprise working in a mature market is differentiation from all the other firms that provide similar products or services. Yet, in...

With the environment we are living in – crazy political stuff – potential nuclear war – mass shootings by maniacs – it would be easy to let it all get to you. But you can’t....

As a coach, your choices can impact the fate of your team members, so take pains to put the right people in the right places. I didn’t grow up in a very sports-centric family. We...

As designers, it’s time to redefine the world and make it better, and that starts with preserving our resources. As I read the various architecture, interior design, and engineering journals, I see many people, firms,...

Do whatever it takes to get your foot in the door, and then keep your foot on the gas pedal if you want to compete in a big market. Had I known in 1995 what...

McKim & Creed’s Building, Energy, and Infrastructure division is taking off in North Carolina and is set to expand in Florida and Texas. By Liisa Andreassen Correspondent In 1978 McKim & Creed, Inc. (Best Firm...

Show paints difference between risk-takers and everyone else. Mark Zweig shares some additional food for thought. Watching “Shark Tank” episodes back-to-back last night was a great case study in the differences between entrepreneurs and most...

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...

By Ed Friedrichs I admit, I’m of a generation that grew up and spent the early part of my career without a computer, to say nothing of the Internet, e-mail or Facebook. Every time I...

It’s pretty well accepted by most firm owners that if you want to be successful in the A/E/P or environmental business, you MUST keep the good clients you have. No one’s marketing is so good...

Stereotypes exist for a reason. Sometimes there’s a lot of truth in them. Good examples of this can be found in how bosses are portrayed in pop culture. The problem is if any of these...

When it comes to architecture, engineering, and environmental firms, or just about any business for that matter, weird can be good. How so? Being weird means being memorable. Being memorable translates into more calls from...

It seems like yesterday that I was “the young guy.” And that’s the last thing I wanted to be. I always tried hard to look and seem older than I really was so people would...

There’s an interesting article in the latest issue of Inc Magazine on PR firms that get paid only when they get results for their clients— results being a press mention in the local paper, a...

If you watch reality TV at all, you’ve probably heard the new word. It’s “pop.” Everything is supposed to do it— and you, as the orchestrator of change— are supposed to make it happen. The...

After seeing their black and white VW New Beetles running around town all of the time, I just saw an ad the other night on TV for The Geek Squad (Richfield, MN). If you don’t...

Every single A/E or environmental firm in this country needs more people who can sell work. These people feed the rest of the firm, allow the owners to sleep at night, and are generally the...

I’ve written before in The Zweig Letter about the need for passion. Anyone who is going to be truly successful in an A/E or environmental firm has to have it. You have to LOVE what...

Last week, I took my oldest daughter Christy (she’s a high school junior) and one of her friends on a day of college tours. We went to three schools and took the guided tour at...

Paul Weir, president and CEO of Weir-Sofein Architects and Engineers in Albany, New York, had a problem. He and his primary business partner, Wolfgang Sofein, usually saw eye-to-eye. There was a long history of mutual...

Fred White, Claire Keerl, and I just got back from the 21st annual Inc 500 Conference at the Westin Rancho Mirage Resort in beautiful Palm Springs, California, held March 27th-29th. It has been a few...

In spite of the post 9/11 travel slowdown, it seems like there are more trade shows and conferences for A/Es and construction companies than ever before. As dutiful ZweigWhiters, we seem to get to all...

Victor Goodcoat knew he had a problem. Sure— he may have been a principal at Honest Engineers for the last ten years but things weren’t like they used to be. Clients weren’t calling and he...

September 11, 2001— I was talking on the phone when I looked through the glass interior wall of my office out into the rest of our space and noticed people standing around a TV monitor....

“God, it smells good out here,” Bob Trunkwater thought to himself as he started out on his early evening walk around the neighborhood. Trunkwater had just recently made the decision to start his own company....

Paul Schipperknocket’s alarm went off at 5:30 a.m. After a quick workout in his basement gym, he turned on the coffee maker he’d gotten ready the night before, and then woke up the rest of...

I had a 56-year-old client say to me the other day that he just isn’t having any fun anymore. He wants to change his life, and he had decided to sell his firm so that...

Traveling all the time is no party, as anyone who does it can tell you. But it’s a fact of life for many of the top people working in the A/E/P and environmental (as well...

I’m convinced that it’s part of the job description for principals and managers of A/E/P and environmental consulting firms to keep reminding their employees and themselves why this is a great business to be in....

We’re in the throes of our annual business planning process here at ZWA. You know the routine— get everyone together, have an office party and a holiday dinner at a nice restaurant and spend a...

One of the great things about the A/E/P and environmental consulting business is that it always provides you with a challenge. Right now, many firms are feeling particularly stressed— with a higher than normal workload,...