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By Janki DePalma | When we measure collaboration instead of individual wins, teams shift from rivalry to shared success.

By Brandon Pinkerton | Small decisions compound into either prisons or possibilities, and today offers the rare opportunity to choose differently.

By Mark Zweig | If you want people to work harder, hire the ambitious, lead by example, and reward real performance.

By Mark Zweig | In a relationship-driven business, clients hire people they know and trust — not just the firms they represent.

By Mark Zweig | Winning big design projects requires strategy, preparation, credibility, and connecting authentically with decision-makers to secure long-term success.

By Mark Zweig | Most AEC firms play it safe with bland marketing, but bold, consistent outreach is what actually drives results.

By Mailena Urso | The path toward success is shaped by your courage, curiosity, and resilience.

By Mark Zweig | Don’t turn yours into a joke by getting the wrong help and taking the wrong direction with revising your strategic plan.

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

By Mark Zweig | This is the math that firm owners who pursue mergers and acquisitions use to create a lot of value in their businesses.

By Mark Zweig | At some point leadership has to take action and act like leaders versus just talk a good game.

By Ying Liu | The hidden signs your firm’s plan is neither strategic nor growth-driven.

By Mark Zweig | Some of the ways entrepreneurial small firm owners create value and differentiate themselves.

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 Mark Zweig | Stand out by steering clear of cliches, as they make firms seem generic and may push clients away.

By Mark Zweig | Those who read your emails, letters, reports, social media posts, and resumes are all deciding how intelligent you are in large part from your writing.

By Luci Hogue | Whether you love your job and want to get to the next level or if you’re feeling unsatisfied in your current position, these tips may help gain perspective.

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

By Joseph Losaria | A happy team is more productive and engaged, so make sure happiness isn’t just a personal goal but a business goal, as well.

By Ying Liu | Organizations must proactively develop strategies to identify and retain top talent.

By Mark Zweig | Don’t forget that the real purpose of this exercise is to have something meaningful that everyone in the business can get behind.

By Mark Zweig | As a business owner, people problems will probably be at the top of your “problems/opportunities” list.

By Joseph Lauk | No one is “above” the work of others, and developing staff this way ensures succession within the firm will carry the values of the firm for years to come.

By Liisa Andreassen | Vice president of corporate development at J.S. Held, a global consulting firm providing technical, scientific, and financial expertise across all assets and value at risk.

By Mark Zweig | If you want to be an effective leader, you must help others, build trust, and set the best example every day.

By Mark Zweig | This is the time of year many of us, and many of our clients, will take a family vacation, so do what you can to step away and enjoy it.

By Mark Zweig | In the new year, remember that we're responsible for creating our own luck. You can start by focusing on these five things.  

By Dave Martin | To be an effective leader, you have to be authentic, acknowledge what you don’t know, and be willing to make mistakes.

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.

Current world events are changing the way we value everything. This pandemic highlights the need for collaborative and equitable decision-making between leadership and staff.

By Mark Zweig | None of these is a panacea. All of these things do, however, have the potential to bring you new clients, opportunities, and projects.

“You would be surprised how quickly your employees get in the bandwagon when they can be part of the solution.”

“Entrepreneurs are not unique to the ownership group of small, privately-held companies. They can also be found working as employees in larger organizations.”

In 20 years as an in-house graphic designer, the lessons learned are simple: Serve the customer, protect the brand, meet the deadlines, and communicate with the client.

By John Bray | It’s easy to send texts and emails, but to make a great and lasting impression, frequent phone calls throughout your network are essential.

“Just as it is easier (and cheaper) to keep an existing client than to get a new one, so goes it for your employees. Keeping good people is essential to your firm.”

“After devoting my entire career – since getting out of grad school at the ripe old age of 22 – to the AEC industry, I have had plenty of time to reflect on where we’ve...

As it relates to the AEC “industry,” we all should know by now that those who can sell a lot of work are the people who rise to the top of their firms, have the...

A principal currently serving as president with W&M Environmental Group, LLC (Hot Firm #81 for 2016), a 50-person environmental services consulting firm based in Texas. By Liisa Andreassen Correspondent “One thing we didn’t expect is...

You can leverage M&A to accelerate strategic shifts and implement your growth strategy, but there are plenty of risks along with the reward. While M&A is not a strategy in and of itself, it is...

When you think about it, management of the design process for a complex construction project is all about accomplishing things through others. Many different people have to come together to get something done by a...

By Phil Keil | Strategic planning is the roadmap to your firm’s success. Without it, you might get knocked down and never get back up.

Business planning in an AEC firm is such a critical function. It really is one of the key roles of the CEO. Yet we seem to struggle with it. Here are some of the ways...

Strategic planning is the roadmap to your firm’s success. Without it, you might get knocked down and never get back up. I have a lot on my mind this week, so get ready, buckle up,...

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...

Move forward in 2017 with Zweig Group seminars across a range of essentials – business development, project management, marketing, and more. For a short while during my undergraduate years, I majored in management. After a...

The two don’t have to be at odds with each other. Make sure someone’s at least answering the phones so perks don’t impede responsiveness. Coming off the high of our annual Hot Firm and A/E...

Change is a powerful force, so embrace it, learn from it, and by all means, take account of its effects and be reasonable in dealing with it. Life would be more comfortable if clichés helped....

This over-used word can be working against you. In one of our seminars, we ask the attendees to spend 5 minutes developing a short pitch to convince a potential client why they should hire the...

The motherload list of truisms that makes Mark Zweig’s blood boil. One benefit of aging has been a certain calmness that I now have that I didn’t have when I was younger. That makes each...

This article first appeared in The Zweig Letter (ISSN 1068-1310) Issue # 994 Originally published 2/11/2013 Twitter is riddled with management experts. Mark Zweig dispels them all. I spend a little time every day on...

Press Release: July 1, 2011 FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. (July 1, 2011) – North America’s hottest design firms are descending in glitzy Laguna Beach, Calif., in October for a glamorous awards and event that could well rival...

By Debbie Frederiksen We all strive for it and talk about it in our marketing materials, but are we truly innovative or is it just fresh lipstick on the same old pig? It didn’t take...

By Mark C. Zweig Many folks in our business want to act like they have a “purpose-driven organization.” What is that, you may ask? To me it is very simply a company that exists for...

As many firms in our industry are still reeling from a tough market for what they do, it is becoming almost blasphemous to suggest that they get back to a growth philosophy. It’s not that...

You may think that I am crazy to write an article about recruiting when some estimates place unemployment among certain sectors of the design industry at more than three times the national average. But the...

Selling is what everyone in the A/E or environmental business WANTS to do right now. I mean really— who doesn’t need more work? That said, selling is something that most firms don’t talk about much...

As I begin to write this article I am sitting at “The Tournament of Kings” show at The Excalibur in Las Vegas with my two oldest daughters. Earlier today we finished off the 10th annual...

As a board member for an international engineering firm I have recently been participating in a series of interviews and meetings related to their brand. What their brand is, how to make it real, and...

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...

NOW, not later, is the time to take a hard look at your strategic plan for improved performance. The new year is just around the corner. The environment is volatile. It’s hard to see what’s...

Regardless of how you feel about the results, the national, state, and local elections are now over. Yea! We can move on with our lives and get back to business. Lord knows many A/E/P and...

There’s no question in my mind that using personal letters is one of the best-kept marketing secrets for architects, engineers, and environmental consultants. Newsletters are overused. Every firm has one. And if the firm is...

Most of us could benefit at times from a new perspective. This is especially true when you start considering the subject of business planning in A/E/P and environmental consulting firms. But a new perspective is...

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...

Last week, we held our first-ever conference on mergers and acquisitions, the 2003 AEC Mergers & Acquisitions Summit, at the Omni Parker House in Boston. It was a successful event with a wide range of...

In tough times like those we are in right now (and they could get a lot worse), it’s easy for people to lose perspective. Little problems get blown up beyond their importance. Fear takes over....

There’s an interesting article elsewhere in this issue of The Zweig Letter about the workplace of the future. It sounds like a fantastic design that the architects, engineers, planners, and designers have cooked up to...

It seems that our readers in A/E/P and environmental firms can’t get enough on project management. No one out there appears content with how he or she is handling it. Although my treatise a few...

Everyone in the A/E/P and environmental consulting business wants to be more “successful,” but I don’t recall ever seeing “success” clearly defined. It’s one of those good-sounding words that architects, engineers, and environmental consultants use...

Some readers might think that a discussion of writing has no place in a management publication aimed at architects, engineers, and scientists. They couldn’t be further off the mark. Good writing skills are absolutely critical...

As Art Linkletter observed: “Kids say the darnedest things.” The other day, my daughter Christina, who is in the first grade, said to me, “Dad, why don’t you do a commercial where you tell everyone...