STRUCTURE magazine November 201468 STRUCTURE magazine

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NCSEA WebinarsNovember 20, 2014 Tilt-up Eats Hurricanes for Breakfast - Five Things Every Engineer Should Know When Designing Tilt-Up PanelsJeff Griffin, Ph.D., P.E., P.M.P., structural engineer and project manager, LJB Inc.

December 4, 20142012 IBC, ASCE 7 & 2008 SDPWS Seismic Provisions for Wood ConstructionMichelle Kam-Biron, P.E., S.E., SECB, M.ASCE, Director of Education, American Wood Council (AWC)

More information on the webinars can be found at www.ncsea.com.These courses will award 1.5 hours of continuing education. Approved for CE credit in all 50 States through the NCSEA Diamond Review Program. Time: 10:00 AM Pacific, 11:00 AM Mountain, 12:00 PM Central, 1:00 PM Eastern. NCSEA offers three options for NCSEA webinar registration: Ala Carte, Flex-Plan, and Yearly Subscription. Visit www.ncsea.com for more information or call 312-649-4600.

As a boy, I read about people with vision and passion and was amazed by their accomplishments. People committed to a cause have changed the world; the root of their success was a vision of what could be and a desire to create it.Capturing a vision can be difficult. A picture I enjoy by Pawel Kuczynski shows a person warming himself by a small fire in the shadow of a long, tall wall. Beyond the wall is bright blue sky and presumably greater opportunities. Against the wall rests a tall ladder with the bottom ten rungs cut off and being burned as firewood thus rendering the ladder useless. It is a self-created prison. The message is clear: Opportunities are plentiful for those willing to use the ladder to look over the wall and envision a new future instead of using its rungs as firewood.The desire to create is frequently found in many, but especially

prevalent in engineers. I once received a totem pole with a face carved into each of its four sides; each face displays a differ-ent emotion. The totem pole is a reminder that we have the opportunity to create our day every day. We create our day by choosing our attitudes, opinions, and focus.Each day, whether we consciously make a choice or not, we

make a choice in how we create our day. Knowingly making a decision to not create our day is as binding as making a decision to take control of our destiny and create our day. Each day we choose whether to dine at the big banquet table and partake of the bounty our profession has to offer, or to dine on crumbs. The choice is ours – everyday. Franklin D. Roosevelt said it best when he wrote, “Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.”The structural engineering community needs to understand

and embrace the idea that we can create, improve, and modify our profession. We have been given charge of a trusted profession and we have a responsibility to all we serve to choose a destiny that will benefit us all. We have an obligation to our profession to choose to look over the wall and create a better future.But change can be difficult and engineers are traditionally

suited to resist change. In our professional work we must adhere to the content of codebooks – a laborious checklist of do’s and don’ts. Our codebooks give us answers that we do not have to think about because someone else has, we assume, done the thinking for us. It is easy. We like that.The problem is that the desire for easy answers creates an addic-

tion to dogma. Adherence to dogma is alluring because at its core is the ‘do-nothing alternative’. The do-nothing alternative is an economics principle that uses doing nothing as a baseline when comparing options. The sirens-call of the do-nothing alternative varies but often is verbalized as, “No one cares”, “It will take time”, “It will cost money”, or “They won’t let us.” Especially persuasive to those addicted to dogma are the phrases, “But that’s the way we’ve always done it.” and, “No one’s dead yet.” It is easy to follow dogma because someone else has, we assume, already done the thinking for us.It’s easy to fall into the do-nothing alternative trap, but it may,

in the long run, be doing us more harm than good. Imagine what the world would be like if people like Susan B. Anthony, Gandhi,

Martin Luther King, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, and John F. Kennedy had chosen the do-nothing alternative. Each was willing to ask the question: “What if…?” Those of you that enjoy clean running water, flush toilets, and electric lights should be grateful that someone broke with the norm, chose to look over the wall, and asked themselves, “What if...?”The codes we use are revised every few years to dump outdated

dogma and update our understanding of how a particular type of structure or material behaves. Should our profession also have a regular review and update? When is the last time we looked at our profession by climbing the ladder and looking into the future and asking, “What if…?” When is the last time we looked at our profession and wondered if we couldn’t and shouldn’t create something better, something that suits where we want to be ten or fifty years into the future? Should we pause and ask ourselves: Is this the direction we want to go? Or, is there a better way?We have the opportunity to create our lives and our profession

every day. Not only do we get to choose our future but we also get to create it. We have an obligation to take that responsibility seriously and not seek the ease and comfort of the do-nothing alternative. We should use the ladder to peer into the distant future and make decisions that will guide us to a better destiny and provide those using our services with a better experience.NCSEA is in the process of developing a strategic plan to

outline the direction the organization will take for the next five years. We are using the ladder to peer over the wall and look into the future. We are gathering the information needed to create a better profession and safeguard the public. It is your profession and you are invited to participate in that process by supplying input. Email me at barrya@arwengineers.com or any NCSEA Board member with your suggestions. Making a choice to provide your insights and thoughts will help us create a better future for structural engineering and the public.

Your Profession, Your ChoiceBarry Arnold, NCSEA Board President

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How do you provide additional value to your clients? What are the buyers of your services thinking, and what are they looking for? When do you compete on prices? What is your banker thinking, and how does a bank value an engineering firm?These questions and more will be addressed at NCSEA’s third

Winter Leadership Forum. Structural engineering leaders and firm principals will gather to discuss the issues confronting engineering firms in today’s environment. The Forum will fea-ture roundtable discussions, presentations from firm principals and professionals in banking and finance, and a debate between structural engineering leaders on “How to Grow.”The topics of this year’s Forum will focus on ways to grow your

firm and provide additional value, as well as on issues relating to acquisition and finance.Sessions will include:AEC Business Development: The Decade Ahead by Scott Butcher, Vice President, JDB Engineering Inc., SMPS Foundation Trustee and Co-Chair of Thought Leadership Committee. Information is vital to anyone selling design and construction services – what works, what doesn’t and how do clients want to be sold? The SMPS Foundation interviewed more than 100 buyers and sellers of A/E/C services to answer these questions and will share their findings with attendees.How Can Engineering Firms Increase Their Value to Clients? This panel discussion will focus on ways to increase billable

2014 NCSEA Annual Conference exhibitors: American Concrete InstituteAISC Atlas TubeAZZ GalvanizingBekaertBlind BoltCast Connex Chance Civil ConstructionCFSEI Delta Structural TechnologyDesign Data Engineers Alliance for Arts Euclid ChemicalFabreeka InternationalFive Star Products Fyfe CompanyHeaded ReinforcementHilti HolcimIndependence Tube Corp.International Code CouncilITW Red Head, Ramset & BuildexITW TrussteelLindapter USA

hours, increase and provide more comprehensive services, and improve specialties.How To Get Your Firm Hired and Retain the Relationships will discuss pre-positioning, business development, and go/no go decisions. Part 2 will address strategies for building relation-ships and creating repeat clients.Organic Growth vs. Growth by AcquisitionThis panel discussion will focus on the avenues for firm growth, their pros and cons, and understanding which approach, if any, is right for your firm. The session will include a debate on the two approaches.Banking RelationshipsBank Chairman Terry Vanderaa will discuss how engineering firms and banks can develop relationships that benefit both parties, and how banks value firms.Case Study: To Purchase or To Pass? by John TawreseyAn interactive case study will focus on whether or not to acquire another firm. Attendees will function as the Board of Directors making this decision.

More detailed information on the Winter Leadership Forum sessions and speakers can be found in the editorial on page 7.

Register now at www.ncsea.com.

September 19, 2014

NCSEA thanks the sponsors of the 2014 NCSEA Annual Conference:

DiBlasi Associates, P.C. • Euclid Chemical

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For information on exhibiting at the 2015 trade show, contact Susan Cross, scross@ncsea.com.