Wired for Growth: Lessons from Construction Projects

Good afternoon, morning, evening, depending on where you are in the world.

And welcome to another Atlas webinar.

We are super excited today to have a fantastic group, uh, from the Atlas community, talking about lessons learned from construction projects.

Um, so buckle up.

We kind of have some questions that they're gonna go through, but please feel free to interact in the chat.

We'll try to get to audience questions, um, towards the end if we can.

But for now, I would love each of our panelists to go ahead and introduce themselves, starting with a fonde.

Hey there.

Um, I'm Fendy, uh, director of technology here at, uh, children's Day School in San Francisco.

Uh, we are a pre-K through eighth with about 466 students over two campuses.

Um, so we completed our construction project, um, let's see, a year ago, um, a year and a half maybe.

Uh, we built up an early childhood center serving our preschool and, uh, transitional kindergarten.

Um, so the project broke ground five days after graduation in 2023.

Um, and then ribbon cutting was the first day of school, 2024.

So exactly, you know, one year, one school year turnaround time.

Um, our budget was, uh, 17 million being in San Francisco, California.

So that number's kind of high.

Um, the reason for our construction project, uh, was our preschools were housed in temporary structures, um, of 10 years.

Uh, that, you know, we kept renewing permits, uh, year upon year.

And then finally it was, um, fiscally possible for that expansion to happen.

Um, so my role, uh, in the construction project, um, luckily our school, you know, due to our location in the Silicon Valley, we we're very tech forward.

So I was invited really early on, uh, in the conversation, uh, to join the committee.

Um, and, you know, my school knew it was beneficial to have my input rather than leaving, you know, a tech director in the dark.

Allie, why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your school.

Yes, good morning or afternoon.

Um, Ali Wenzel here from Stevenson School out in Pebble Beach in Carmel, California.

We are a PK 12 boarding and day school, about 740 kids.

Um, we, uh, have about 55 total acres of campus and about 300 borders.

So our big construction project that we are just finishing up right now, we should have the keys turned over to us.

Uh, April 1st is a $45 million math, science and engineering center.

It's been about a 18 month project that we've been, um, well from when we broke ground.

It's been about 18 months, and, uh, it's, it's wild.

Our old science building would fit in the basement of this new building.

Uh, and so it was more, you know, just really aging infrastructure.

The building we're replacing was built in the seventies.

So it's, it's pretty exciting to have all this new technology.

And my, um, my role is obviously all of the infrastructure, everything from cameras access control.

Now, all the BMS systems are now obviously connected to technology.

Um, I've been fortunate to have our director of facilities and capital projects, uh, keep me in the loop from the very beginning, uh, because it is, as II said, it's just super important that we're involved because of the, the reliance on the network for all of these, these new construction projects.

Awesome.

Thanks, Allie.

Jack.

Hi everybody.

I am Jack Hardcastle.

I'm the Chief Operating Officer at McDonough's School.

Um, we are located outside of Baltimore, Maryland.

We are 1,460 students, uh, co-ed, um, a day school with a very small five day boarding program.

And, um, in my role as Chief Operating Officer, I'm now the, the primary point person on campus for, um, all of our construction and capital projects.

However, um, for the, the 13 or 14 years prior to that, I was the, uh, director of technology and chief information officer here at McDonough, and was involved in the construction of a number of, of our buildings, uh, new STEM building at, at, uh, F 45,000 square feet, a new science center at 75,000 square feet.

And, and, uh, for the purposes of today, a a new middle school at about 67,000 square feet.

So being involved from the, from the early stages of its sort of inception through construction completion on those projects.

Um, our middle school, uh, was replacing a 19, um, thirties vintage, uh, 1940s vintage structure that had really long, um, bowling alley sized classrooms that had been a dormitory at one point.

It had been, um, you know, locker rooms and athletic spaces at one point, and, and obviously was doing duty as a, as a middle school classroom building prior to that.

So that project, uh, began just before the, uh, the pandemic and completed, uh, in, uh, I think April of 2021.

So going through and, and trying to get that building open in time to have more space, it replaced a 28,000 square foot structure.

So about twice as big, uh, was able to bring some programs from other buildings back into the middle school, which has been great.

Thanks, Jack.

And last, but definitely not least, Kevin.

Thank you.

Yes.

Uh, my name is Kevin Renda.

I'm the Director of Information Technology Services at the Hodgkiss School here in the Northeast.

Uh, we are a, uh, a rural campus, grades nine through 12, uh, 622 students, mostly boarding, but with some day students as well.

Um, we have a, a large, uh, 500 acre plus, uh, main campus, as well as a 200 acre farm down the street in terms of our facilities.

So our most recent project, uh, was a $55 million dining hall.

Uh, that includes the cost of temporary dining and a number of other, uh, enabling projects.

It to take a, it was an existing dining hall that was being renovated.

So, you know, with the boarding population, you have to make a lot of provisions to continue to feed people.

Did take, uh, two years start to finish.

Uh, that was an accelerated timeline.

Uh, we were supposed to open, uh, much earlier, but due to many delays, we just opened, um, a soft opening in December of last year, just before the kids left, um, for, um, winter break and then full, full dining operations when everyone returned in January.

So we're only on our second month.

Uh, and the punch list still exists, our March break coming up here, we'll be an opportunity to, to blow through most of those, uh, last second items, but things are going pretty well.

Awesome.

Thank you everyone for giving us the lay of the land, um, on these projects.

Uh, sounds like we have everyone's in different phases, um, and different scopes, so I'm excited to learn from all of you.

Um, for those participating, feel free to drop questions in the chat.

Um, we'll try to make time for them, and if not, we will definitely capture them, um, and try to answer as many afterwards.

But let's go ahead and dive into this conversation, starting with the early stage planning and governance for construction projects.

So, um, at what point do you think that technology should be involved in the construction planning phases? I don't think there's a time to be too soon to involve technology leaders.

I think even if Ally said and hers, like, we gotta be right up front.

Uh, I've, I've been in both situations personally and far more issues develop when I've been brought in much later, especially, uh, again, as Ally said, everything relies on technology now, so that's probably more true with today's projects than even 10 years ago.

There, there's nothing about a building that doesn't run on technology now, so the sooner the better, from my perspective.

Absolutely.

We've, we've heard some horror stories from the community of having to, uh, dig up concrete and, um, rewire and everything.

So, um, that's wonderful.

When planning the project.

Um, what governance structures work best? So in terms of committees, um, who has rights to what decisions, um, standing check-ins, do you guys have any feedback in that regard? I gotta speak from, um, my own experience here in that, uh, our, our director of capital projects and facilities has been really good about navigating when it's important to be there so that we don't have to be at every single meeting.

But, um, but, you know, really important, you know, when we were talking about data drops, especially for any, all the technology, in other words, you know, whether it's, um, for building management systems or cameras or access control or classroom audio visual, it's really important that, that we have, um, that visualization of, of the, the physical plans.

And so they were really good about bringing us in, um, to, to, to review all of it.

So in other words, the contractor is gonna, you know, spec things out and then have us review it and say, does this make sense? And, you know, being able to mark things up and, and give it back to them.

Um, so yes, it's committees and one-off meetings, but it's, it's just a lot of back and forth.

I find that, and, and for us, the technology leaders at our schools, I think it's really important that you, you don't sit and wait for people to, to ask you.

You have to kind of put yourself there and say, Hey, what's going on with this? You know, and just have those relationships so that, um, you don't seem as like a nuisance, but a, a real partner and making sure that the project's effective.

I want to build on that and also ape what Kevin said in terms of the, I I think that one of the things I think is most important is understanding really early in the process what the scope is.

You know, we, uh, we learned from hard experience.

They built a, a building on campus, um, 15 years ago, and the, the school hadn't fully understood what the, what the scope of the project was in terms of what they were trying to do with the building.

They understood that they wanted classrooms, they understood what kind of kinds of classes they wanted, but the board hadn't really navigated all of the conversations around the size and, and the cost and all those sorts of things.

So early in the process, they had talked about, you know, we were a school that at the time did not have access control.

They had talked about putting access control on this building as the first one on campus.

They very quickly decided that wasn't gonna be in the budget.

And so it was never talked about, again, the month before the building opened, somebody said, we really need access control.

So without talking to us, without talking to anyone, they went and found somebody who slapped access control in the building.

And we were stuck with that platform for the fi first five years of the building before we were able to rip it out and replace it with something else that we actually would've selected.

So I think that having a, a, an early conversation with key stakeholders at the school, regardless of what your ongoing structure looks like, if it's every two weeks or every week or whatever, but making sure that there are key stakeholders who are in the room, right? Folks who have the, the director of capital, uh, projects or facilities or whatever that role is, knowing what's important to you.

It, it helps them go into those conversations and be able to say, Hey, ally, we need you at this meeting next week, because we're definitely gonna be talking about, you know, interactive whiteboards and where, which wall they go on and how we're gonna do that in each classroom.

It really helps be able to set that up for success.

Yeah, what Jack just said is so important because the, the key area that, in my experience, where cost escalations happen are when you're not clear on scope and you add those things later, the technology leader can really be in a key position to help people understand the cost of things that you're gonna add.

Whether it's a month before you're done or three years after you're done, doesn't matter.

If you haven't put in the infrastructure to support those things in advance, you're gonna pay a premium for that.

So for, for the people that care about the money, they will listen to the fact that you're gonna, you're gonna say, listen, you're, we're not clear on scope.

It could cost exorbitant amounts of money to solve that later.

So be clear on that upfront and the cost of put something in now, even if you're not gonna turn that on or put that in right away, just having the wire in the wall or the, you know, something to support whatever that thing is, could save a ton of money.

So, so, so heed that advice for sure.

That's been my experience.

Awesome.

Thank you.

Thanks.

All right.

Let's talk about speaking of money.

Um, so what were some of the operational costs that were underestimated, um, for each of you during your projects, if any? Sounds like there are some.

Um, yeah.

We, we built our building around, uh, century old a elk trees.

Um, uh, trying to save that tree ended up costing us a lot of time and money, uh, because a lots of hand digging had to happen to make sure that the roots of the trees are not compromised.

Uh, we had the city come in sending arborists that have to sign on, uh, checking at, you know, many stages during that project, making sure this tree is like, safe and protected.

And they even at one point asked the school to start watering the tree, which is kind of out of this world.

I mean, it's an outdoor tree, like, you know, it's been around for hundreds of years, like, why are we watering this tree? But we did it, you know, and, and that was definitely not expected from anybody on our, our side.

Wow.

Talk about other duties as assigned tree waterer.

I'd? I'd say we experienced a number of different, um, financial related challenges.

And in this particular project, again, this was the dining hall, so we had to have a, a, a temporary dining facility.

So the planning for that started long, long ago, and multiple options were considered, uh, in terms of, you know, do you reutilize some space you already have? Do you bring in some kind of spring form temporary thing? And, you know, lots of conversation and, and scoring of those options, um, was done.

But ultimately, um, you know, the trustees and the head of school decided on a timeline that kind of forced our hand on, on a solution to that that maybe wasn't the top of the list.

And that that presented some cost escalations too.

Um, both the timeline and the fact that we, we chose to, to turn an existing building, um, into, uh, a temporary dining house.

So there were costs both to construct that as well as cross going right now to actually put that back to its original, uh, condition and purpose.

So, um, even when you make, even when you consider multiple options, you know, decisions about certain timelines or, or when you're doing things where you are, if Fani said, you know, if you're in a certain part of the country, maybe certain costs are higher too.

Those all play into, uh, where those cost overruns can come.

I'd say the other big area, it's important I think for folks to understand who they're working with.

Especially, um, you know, the architects are gonna have a, a huge, um, impact on how a project is run.

You know, what expertise they bring, what consultants or subcontractors they may bring in as well, not just a construction company who's actually building the product.

The architects will have a an outside role in that, and they're gonna help navigate that too.

They're gonna wanna make a lot of decisions with you, uh, kind of, as Jack was saying, some things will get value engineered out, you know, they'll, you say you want it, but then you find out it's too expensive to do other things won't.

Um, so making a key partnership with them to understand the trade-offs and, and how they're gonna approach a project or how, you know, your school has instructed them in terms of how to handle situations like where there are cost overruns or financial challenges, uh, is that that's a key partnership to forge early.

Again, I think, uh, a technology leader can be a leader in that respect, just to kind of weigh those options and, and help them understand those trade-offs.

Value engineering something out now to save money may actually cost money later, as I said earlier.

So, um, that's why you want to be in those kind of situations.

And our situation, there wasn't enough effort put into coordination of various, um, drawings.

So there was a lot of change orders after the fact to correct those deficiencies that, you know, again, better communication, tighter partnerships with the right people may have avoided some of that upfront.

Oh, thank you.

That's, um, really important.

And what advice would you give anyone, um, did you have to fight to make the case for any of these technology investments? What kind of data should you bring to the table, um, to avoid those kind of costly, uh, realizations in the future? What would you recommend for anyone listening? Well, part of it is you have to really stay, um, stay close to the project.

So, for example, um, we were building a new faculty house a couple years ago, and, you know, I expect everything on the technology side, but the implementation, you know, a sub will hire a sub who hires a, a sub, you know, and by the time it gets to the actual workers, you know, it's like playing a game of telephone and they, they usually don't know what they're doing.

And, you know, they had wired this whole house with old cat five infrastructure, and it was clearly stated that it was cat six and they had stapled everything into the choice.

And I'm just like, you know, so, um, fortunately because it's kind of who I am, you know, I've stayed really close to the project and, and called it out and they're like, oh, well, you know, they, they wanted to just go on with it and I made 'em rip the whole thing out and do it appropriately with Smurf tubes and, and things like that.

But those that could have cost the school a lot more because of, if it hadn't been caught, um, they would have to go back.

'cause you know, there's, there's certain things that need the, the higher performance cabling.

And for a brand new house, you don't wanna be putting in technology that's, you know, 20 years old.

Um, that's just, just one scenario.

Uh, I, I want to, uh, uh, sort of hold that up a little bit.

I think that staying really close to the project for me could mean a lot of things.

I think one of the things that's, that's important, not just in attending the meetings, but make sure, as Ali pointed out, make sure you actually go visit the site throughout all stages of construction.

Go see how they pour the, the concrete foundation, understand what is being put into there.

Oftentimes as they're doing that, they'll be leaving sleeves for future expansion of conduit.

There have been a number of cases where we've said, Hey, as we're seeing this, we are not seeing sleeves.

It looks like you all may have missed this.

And they were really grateful to be able to have somebody who was looking out for each of those elements of the project, who was able to point out places where, you know, something that had to be fixed, was able to be done before they put a wall on top of it, you know, and built a second floor on top of that.

So just make sure that you're visiting and you're, you're carrying around a site, uh, a version of the plans on site.

Yeah, and I agree with both Ali and Jack there for sure.

I, I mean, I, for major projects, I walk it daily, uh, and I, I, I caught so many things that were easily resolved because I noticed them right away rather than after the fact, or, you know, they weren't then sealed up for us to find years from now.

Uh, and back to Ally's point, I think part of, part of that starts very early in understanding the drawings and the spec, and also understanding the fact that sometimes the drawing and the spec don't match.

And if that's not caught in coordination, that's where you can provide some value to.

We had a number of situations because of the way this, the project that I was most recently on was structured.

Uh, you know, a consultant wrote the spec and provided some, some drawings that then someone else was supposed to kind of coordinate and fine tune.

And that didn't actually happen.

You'd have a situation where would reflect one thing and the spec would actually reflect something else.

And in our project, the spec took pre precedence.

So if someone just looking at the drawings, they're like, yeah, it looks right.

Like, yeah, but the spec actually called for something else, and that's what they followed.

And so as you're, as Jack said it, as you're walking around, have those things with you and be looking at things and compare, compare notes.

But you can catch some of these things really upfront by, by noticing discrepancies or issues where they don't match up, make sure they match your needs or what you've specified.

You know, don't just take some consultants boilerplate they may have used from some other project.

If you're the, if you're, if you're not looking for that, if you're looking for something that meets your specific needs, make sure that you know the actual things that have been voted on or accepted or signed off on, you know, by the time you reach, you know, like a 90%, um, construction document phase, those things should be really be buttoned up.

Um, 'cause they're gonna start building from those.

Awesome.

Yeah, just to piggyback on that, you know, uh, you know, I agree.

Technology leaders need to be there checking in because one of the gotchas that we experienced was, um, the construction company that we use does a lot of projects in San Francisco.

So they're, they're very, you know, experienced.

Um, but some, for some reason they were wanting to dig a trench to put in copper cabling to put a parts line for our emergency elevator.

Um, so that would have, you know, added costs, added more time to the project would definitely push our project further than what we planned for.

Uh, that's when, you know, I immediately bootstraps on, immediately find out, you know, people that have done this work before, other experts, like, you know, Ellie, Kevin, and Jack, um, I had a, a tech director that shared that for their project.

They used VOIP to parts converter that had like a cell phone back backup.

So, you know, I, at that time, I wasn't aware such thing exists.

The construction people definitely did not know that such a thing exists.

So I was like, we need this device, no copper lines, no trenching.

And they immediately pushed back hard.

They were like, no, we need this elevator to pass.

This will cause the project to not work out.

So I had to double down.

I had to push back even harder.

Like, no, I know what I'm talking about.

Please, please, please, please, please, please, listen, this is what we need, please do it.

And ultimately they realize that yes, fend is onto something here.

Let's, let's go with his suggestion.

I wanna highlight something, if any just said, I think it's really important.

I think a lot of times I, I'll lemme speak personally from my experience, right? We came into this with, I came in with a great deal of technical background, but zero construction experience, had never built a building, had never been part of a, of a 20, 30, $50 million construction project.

Didn't understand the acronyms, didn't understand the shorthand that the construction folks and the architects were using.

Uh, you can get, uh, intimidated by, you know, OACs and all of these permitting things that have to go on, ask questions, make sure that you are pushing in, make sure that you're getting uncomfortable with those conversations to make sure that you are, uh, not just sort of letting things go by.

There's a lot to learn and it's, it's every bit as, as much a specialty as the world that we work in, right? Folks who don't understand virtual servers and, and all of the rest of it that we deal with on a daily basis.

But the construction interface with technology that is so critical to make sure that your voice is part of that conversation.

And if there are elements of those conversations you don't understand, ask questions.

Folks who are happy to typically happy to answer those, to make sure that you understand what's happening.

You know, Jack, I'll say, as someone who came into my most recent project with plenty of experience, I still have the same situation with every project because every project is different.

And as I said before, every architect's gonna be different, every construction company's gonna be different.

'cause unique challenges.

So even as someone coming into, you know, I've, I've done $80 million, $30 million projects before.

I've done small scale, large scale public school, you know, independent school.

Now, my dad was a single engineer growing up.

My wife was an environmental engineer.

I got plenty of people around me.

Even then, every project is different.

So, so your point is, is right on there, you know, a ask for help, ask for people, you know, partner as ally, partner with your facilities person.

They're gonna, they're gonna bring a subject matter expertise and you guys can work together, you know, on some of those problems too.

One thing that I wanna highlight also is, um, uh, another school that I'm helping support, and they are in a big construction project and there is an owner's rep, but what's happening is the owner's rep isn't really the owner.

It's somebody that a board member knows somebody.

Anyway, what, what's happening is that the technology team is kind of being pushed back because they think that the tech team is gonna push slow things down.

And so they're implementing things, um, that are gonna have to be torn out.

For example, you know, putting in an access control system that doesn't, isn't the same access control system that the school's already using, you know, the same camera system.

They just kind of go, oh, well, this is cheap.

We'll just install it and it's fine.

We're saving the school money.

You know, they're not partnering with you.

So I just say be really careful and mindful of that when you're going into a construction project that the school itself is the owner's rep and that they are collaborating one-on-one with the, um, architects and the construction team don't outsource that.

Um, I, I've just seen this kind of blow up.

So it's just really important to have that, that real partnership with the, the architect where you have a voice.

Yeah, owner furnished equipment or OFE is definitely, uh, an acronym that can be your friend.

And if you can talk to the right partners and make sure they understand that if, if your school has a standard for something that the spec can be written to say that it'll be furnished by the school, but installed by, you know, the contractor or subcontractor, if that's appropriate in the situation.

Or it could be something that'll be just provided by the school, you know, and that that's a, that's a separate budget, uh, line item.

You know, we actually ran into a situation where with our audio visual system that we put in the standing hall, there was a component of it.

The, the projector that would come out of the ceiling that really needed to be some components of that needed to be put in during the steel work.

That was long before we were gonna have an av, you know, person on, on campus or anything we would do ourselves.

So that part of it was actually written as a, as part of the subcontract, you know, the, it would be provided by the av uh, vendor well in advance, but it was gonna be installed by the contractor when they were in there doing steel work.

The AV contractor came later and the rest of the equipment, again, was part of a separate contract and took a separate, um, thing out.

One of the things we ran into was that someone, again, and, and I didn't look closely enough myself to catch this, but someone had said that the screen itself was part of the subcontract.

And so we actually ran into a situation where the subcontract budget, uh, wa you know, was larger and we had to kind of claw back some of that money to get it from the right place.

And so there, there was this, there was an unnecessary, uh, unforced error on our farts.

Again, I didn't look closely enough at the, the fine details of that.

We were actually trying to do the right thing there to say, have, have the construction company put a piece in that made sense for them to, and do the rest ourselves.

And we still didn't get it right.

And that's gonna happen, you know, on projects, you're still gonna make mistakes and you work through that.

And we had an, we had an owner's project manager ourselves, you know, Colliers, uh, was onsite representing us, and they're a large firm, and that was a great re re relationship to have as well, because they are, they were there to advocate for us.

But as Ali said, like that, that relationship's important.

They have to understand what, what is the school or the technology director bringing to that in terms of expertise and what things do you want, you know, to provide from the school, you know, that are aligned with your standards or the systems you already have, so you're not ripping stuff out later or putting in things that are unnecessary that no one's gonna use.

The other thing on cost, I'll point out in terms of owner furnished equipment is that there are oftentimes when you can get the stuff cheaper than the subcontractor can, right? We're a member of, I don't, 5, 6, 7 purchasing consortiums, right? Mid-Atlantic, Eastern seaboard, all of those, we can oftentimes, especially with nonprofit pricing, we can beat the price that the subs are getting for our equipment.

They're never gonna come close.

And so we talk about how we're gonna purchase the equipment and put it in this particular location, and then we're happy to have somebody else install it, and obviously we'll do the configuration after the fact.

But that has saved us money in a number of different situations.

Again, the key is that communication and coordination.

You don't wanna hold them up and you don't want them holding you up.

This conversation is the perfect segue into our next session of a section of questions I wanted to hit on, um, in terms of infrastructure and systems decisions.

So, um, oh, you all have touched on some of these items already, but let's dive in.

What core infrastructure decisions have had the longest downstream impact in your projects? Um, one decision that we made, um, was to go fiber connection to connect the existing building to the new one.

Um, again, the love those architects love the construction people, but they were planning to have separate services brought in to this new building, which means a siloed network.

So we did not want that.

I wanted our campus to be, one campus is a campus expansion, so our network has to be expanded.

So that was another difficult, difficult conversation to have, you know, please put in this fiber optic cable.

They were like, carbon fiber, what are you talking about? You know, so, so I was learning a lot from them and I was also happy that they, I had something to also give back and like, Hey, you know, let's, let's do five connection to connect buildings, because I just want everything to just work great, work fast, and don't have to worry about it for, for a while.

That makes sense.

I think we can never, um, have enough drops.

I think that there, a lot of times value engineering comes in where they're like, oh, we only need two drops there.

We're not gonna do that.

And inevitably, everything connects to the network.

And yes, a lot of it's wireless now, but there is a lot of, especially the building management systems that are wired.

And, um, so in our new building, for example, we have drop ceiling, so it's pretty easy to just bring in some extra connections and just leave them in the ceiling, um, for later.

But, uh, it's, you're gonna save money by having those drops put in before you finish a building, because you all know that the surface mount, for example, looks terrible.

And, um, they, you know, having that infrastructure just availability capacity, um, to go to add more is just super important.

I, I would say a couple things really stand out to me.

Um, one conduit is better than none, and two, conduits is better than two is better than one.

Mm-hmm.

You know, we have never regretted putting in a conduit.

We have had plenty of regrets where we didn't put something in.

So, uh, you know, uh, we've, we've gone from not having anything to having a half inch or a three quarter inch spec and saying, is it really that much more expensive to put in a one or one and a half, or even a two or a pair of twos? Um, you know, running conduit underground, uh, under sidewalks, under streets, uh, making sure that you can get from point A to point B so that there's a pathway.

We don't know what we're gonna put in it, but we know that in the future we might want to connect this building to this building in order to create a loop, in order to create redundancy.

Those kinds of things.

So having make sure, making sure that we have, um, a place to run that cable, and then it's gonna be easy to do that.

Uh, service loops are your friends.

If you don't know what that is, you run a cable and you make sure that you create a big loop up above the ceiling so that there's room to move that cable.

So, for instance, you've got a drop in a location, but you don't use that drop anymore, and you can move it to the other side of the room by going up above the ceiling grid, taking that service loop, unwinding it and sliding it over to another wall, uh, making sure that you have extra cables for future expansion.

I have not seen, I mean, I, it, I'm impressed every year with how much stuff has run over ethernet these days.

Um, or at least over RJ 45.

So running USB over RJ 45, running HGMI over RJ 45, all the building access controls, uh, building management systems are all run, uh, managed through RJ 45.

So having network drops in every single location, you, you might not think you're gonna need a network drop in that, in that broom closet until the housekeeper comes back and says, oh yeah, we want to use this temperature managing, you know, device that's gonna monitor the situation in this space.

All of a sudden you need an RJ 45 in that room.

So cable is cheap, uh, labor is a little bit more expensive and conduit is really cheap.

So that's, those are my recommendations.

Yeah.

Jack's hitting the nail on the head on on that.

We, we have a pretty much standing rule.

Uh, my current school, if you open the ground, you're putting conduit in, whether you're putting something in or not.

So, you know, even we had a, a solar array they put in and I insisted they put a conduit along the, the gravel driveway they were building for that.

And they're like, what? That's just wasted costs.

I said, it costs almost nothing.

And sure enough, a year later we needed to connect the athletic fields that were adjacent to that, and we already had the conduit because of it.

So, so ask and explain, you know, why, why you're doing that.

Uh, Jack's Jack's exactly right.

Service loops are your friend for sure.

And, and pull, pull two or three of everything for.

Yep.

Awesome.

That's great.

And so that's a great, it's like you guys read the questions in advance.

That's a great segue.

Um, so how do you plan for flexibility and future growth, um, without over engineering the whole space in the whole project? Obviously we talked about you cannot over-engineer for, um, wires, but any other advice in that area? I think there is a delicate balance.

This, this is a topic that I'm very passionate about, having been through a few projects where I've seen some things, decisions made that really were an over sophistication o of things that should not have been.

And it's not just the cost, the, or the, at least the initial cost, right? They the, they're the total cost of ownership.

Um, that's a term often used to think about what is the cost over the life of that? Anything you put in, especially with technology, we all know, like we have to replace it at some point.

You have to have a plan to, nothing's gonna last forever.

Um, but also just operating that or maintaining those things, uh, can be tough and isn't just about the technology, like the particular materials or the type of ceiling, you know, to be able to get access to certain things could all play into how easy is the thing you're gonna build easy to maintain over time or even replace those things.

You know, there's a few components of the system that we built in the current dining hall that I'm not sure what we're gonna do, uh, if I'm still here in 10 years and when we need to replace it because we make like, I don't even know.

Um, and those are just things we'll have to live with.

There are some intentional decisions that could be made, uh, that a technology leader can kind of lead that discussion on.

Have you thought about what will happen when it comes time to refresh that, you know, or what, what will you do if we need to repair that? You know, can we even get access to the things to repair it? The situation we're in now is that there was a architectural decision made about a particular type of ceiling.

The purpose was actually because we have a large cavernous space, that they really wanted to dampen the sound and that that's an important piece of the puzzle.

But if we can't service any of the things that are above it ever, because it, you just like, 'cause it requires special handling of the tiles, tho those are gonna become added costs later.

So anyway, like I said, I'm passionate about this because I think this is where technology leaders can really help lead the conversation by thinking to the future, not just the, when you open that building, it is the delicate balance between saying, do we have enough wires to support things so that we're not adding things later, but also not just putting in as many as you can because it's cheaper upfront if you're never gonna use those things, you know, or having lighting systems that are totally computer operated when all you really needed was a light switch on the wall, you know, if no one can operate it because it's so sophisticated, you know, or toilets that only flush with batteries that have to replace constantly.

There, there's this, there's a, a never ending list of things that have been over sophisticated and these products are sold, you know, to architects and to schools, you know, from people that wanna sell these things that's not always in the best interest.

So coming back to kinda what Jack had said originally, like, scope is really important.

Understand what is the use case of the thing you're building and what your needs are, and try to find that good balance is my, my recommendation.

Thanks Kevin.

That was great.

Anyone else have, uh, thoughts on how to plan for flexibility and future growth, growth without over engineering? So another situation in our current building is we have a, like an indoor amphitheater and there's an outdoor amphitheater, but it wasn't, um, engineered by the original architect to actually even have like outdoor speakers and outdoor conduits.

So, because they wanna live stream everything these days.

So, so, you know, fortunately I saw that and we were able to, as you know, Jack and Kevin were saying, get that conduit run while the ground was open and we, we haven't figured it all out, but we got the speakers up and we, we have everything tied in.

But, um, yeah, you just, you wanna catch that stuff really early so that you're not trying to dig something up from a brand new project that's been finished.

And, and also to Kevin's point about, um, you know, the, what we've run into a lot is the architects want the aesthetics, uh, but the functionality is also extremely important.

Not just, um, the, you know, it's, it's function and the ability to use it, but, um, that it looks, you know, super nice also that, that there's a tension there that has to be navigated with, um, the architects and, and the reality of making something functional.

Absolutely.

Great.

Thank you.

I love Amanda's comment in the chat, but just 'cause it can connect to the internet doesn't mean it, it has to.

I, that that is a cue.

Sometimes it's easier to just not Yeah, Absolutely.

Um, great.

Well, let's talk about security, safety and risk.

Um, were there any technology related risks that surprised you? Um, not necessarily during construction, but once the building was occupied? Yeah, I can share our experience.

Um, so due to accessibility, we installed an automated door.

Um, so, you know, employees can just like scan a badge or use their phone.

This door will swing open, folks walk in.

Um, and due to accessibility, we need that door held open for a certain amount of time.

And being in the mission district hot of San Francisco, we have like random people mm-hmm.

Near our property all the time.

So door swings, open employee, just walks in, somebody piggybacks, somebody follows one in.

Luckily so far has just been, um, delivery drivers, you know, delivering packages.

They just saw an open door, they just walked in.

But because of that now, you know, uh, all school communication about, you know, what's piggybacking what's best practice, you know, maybe scan your badge, let the door open, check that the door closes behind you and nobody's following you.

Small thing.

I mean, luckily again, it was just delivery drivers, but it could have been interesting.

Yeah, that's, that's a very good point.

Let's talk about, um, cha well real quick, I do wanna point out to anyone, um, participating, I'm keeping an eye on the chat if you have questions, um, as we kind of head into the last part of this conversation that you really want to make sure are answered in this webinar, um, I'll keep an eye on that.

Um, but we do have some other topics, so I'll go ahead and move on and, um, just keep an eye out for questions from the audience.

Um, so moving into the change management and adoption side of things, how have you, um, in your role as technology leader supported faculty and staff as they've transitioned into new spaces? So, uh, I can talk about that a little bit.

We, um, our middle school building was replaced a, a structure that was, you know, 80 years old.

Um, we went from a model where, you know, teachers owned their own classrooms, um, to a model.

The building was designed, I'll, I'll put it this way.

The building was designed with a model where it was more of a flexible situation where teachers would rotate from room to room throughout the day.

Teachers were given these little rolling carts where they could put their materials, they could lock their, um, personal effects in a drawer at the bottom of the cart, and their laptop would sit on top, they could roll into the room, connect to the screen in that room wirelessly and begin with their day.

Um, we moved from largely projectors mounted to the ceiling with speakers mounted to the ceiling, uh, in the old building to these, uh, interactive whiteboard displays on moving carts, and the carts could move around the room.

And, uh, I will say the design and the actual implementation of the building, there was something lost because we had some leadership changes during that process.

Uh, actually two leadership changes between when the design happened and when the building opened.

Some of that, that idea about, uh, the, the intent for the space being less residential and more flexible was lost because once everybody got in there, they wanted to hang their posters in their classroom.

Um, but the technology also was a big change because we were moving from a model where you would plug the HDMI cable in and project to a model where we suddenly had to teach everybody how to, how to connect to their displays wirelessly, how to use the audio wirelessly.

And this was on the heels of just having gone through the early phases of the pandemic.

So we had just gotten everybody used to, you know, zoom and using that in their, their teaching.

We were, at the time, we were a sort of a three, two hybrid.

So they would be, uh, in person for three days a week and hybrid for two days a week.

And all of a sudden having them bring them into the classroom and say, this is your space and you're connecting to the board wirelessly.

And also needing to maintain zoom school for the kids who were stuck at home on a five or 10 day quarantine.

Um, that process was something that we had to spend a lot of time with.

And, uh, thankfully our middle school head at the time was also a, a, a former, uh, tech director, was our former director of ed tech.

And so had that, uh, tool in her tool belt to be able to, to lead some professional development, showing faculty how to use it, um, but making sure that people understand the tech that's, that's in the building.

It was also a big change to go into a building where all of the build the, the doors were, uh, swipe card access controlled versus, you know, old fashioned brass keys.

Having teachers understand, uh, double tapping to unlock and unlock their door in the morning and leave it unlocked throughout the day versus, you know, uh, using a key to sort of toggle it open.

Um, the, the paging systems were new, the, you know, the classroom systems and the library were new.

So just making sure that you're planning for that and you're not just dropping an all on them once they've moved in, but you're actually getting demonstration units that you can use in another space, potentially even before you move into the building so that people feel comfortable, they feel familiar with it prior to, to going in and seeing that, that technology for the first time.

Great.

Thank you so much.

A lot of, a lot of your work is in relationship building and change management, so great pieces of advice.

Um, you already touched on this a bit, Jack, but I wonder if anyone else has examples, um, if any assumptions were made about how people would use the building that turned out to be wrong? I'll say a little bit more.

I, I would, I would say that one of the things that we consistently, uh, struggle with our architects on, uh, and I'm actually struggling with them right now, we're going through a, a, a multimillion dollar renovation of our lower school planning for that.

Uh, architects want everything to be, and I have my camera blurred because my office is a disaster of stuff all over the countertops and surfaces.

Architects want everything to be very crisp and clean.

They want everything hidden away because the, the form is as important as the function.

And I will say in my experience, uh, with a couple hundred humans walking around campus, that, um, not everyone has the same attention to organization and minimalism.

And so storage has been a consistent challenge as we navigate what the architect has designed versus what's planned for in the building.

So there have been a number of spaces where, you know, we've said, oh, this is going to be the place for storage that ends up getting taken over by, you name it, right? We've had, um, room closets turned into it, closets, we've had, uh, you know, small conference rooms turned into, um, mother's rooms or nursing rooms depending on, you know, the, the, the, uh, time when the building was built.

So things happen, you know, conference rooms that turned into offices later.

Um, being aware that, that this, this is a flexible space, we plan for 50 years, I think about what this building that I'm in was doing 50 years ago and this was probably a dormitory.

Hmm.

So what is the space going to be doing, you know, 5, 10, 15, 20 years from now? How are you planning for that? And then making sure that you understand that not everything is gonna make it all the way through from the idea phase to the construction phase.

And what are you gonna do when that happens.

Thank you so much.

We do have a question from Amanda in the chat.

Um, so I'll read that out and then we will, uh, wrap up with some kind of looking back and, and forward, um, topics.

So from a security perspective, I'm wondering if you're putting in outdoor PA systems and if so, are you building that during construction and planning and is there any pushback on that piece of the project? And then she, um, wrote further tying it into your current PA system, if you have, and tying into the existing VOIP systems if applicable.

Yeah, so I can speak to that just 'cause I was literally working on that yesterday.

Um, so we use informa cast for example, and we have, um, a lot of outdoor speakers for our, um, emergency broadcast, uh, outdoor pa and literally a year ago I had to purchase five outdoor speakers that they built into the infrastructure as they were building, you know, so I mean it's, it, it worries me a little bit because if we, again, to Kevin's point earlier, like if you have to service it, it's like, I'm not sure how I'm gonna service that.

'cause it's literally like flush with the building now and it's built in, you know, I'm gonna have to like dig it out to get outta the building to replace it.

But, um, so yeah, you, you, fortunately, again, having a good relationship with the, the team, the architects, your, um, director of facilities and capital projects, just so that all of that, that stuff happens, you know, even getting, you know, camera mounts, um, and we have really fragile tiles that had to be especially diamond bit drilled and, you know, I mean all of that sort of thing.

Um, it just takes a lot of coordination and, um, again, just working with them on the functionality versus a aesthetics and serviceability that, as Kevin was talking about, the total cost of ownership for any of these pieces of the construction.

Yeah.

And, and this is an area where I've experienced the most cost escalation comes from not getting it right the first time.

Yeah.

But most of these things require a building envelope, you know, pathway, or it's in brick, or as Allie said, it's in some, you know, special thing that has to be cut or drilled a certain way.

The inside of a building can sometimes be a little more forgiving, especially if you've got a drop ceiling or something, you know, or if you have to put a raceway on.

So, so for us it's the, it's the access control hardware for doors.

Um, any kind of intercom, door intercom systems, um, that, that might be in play.

Uh, you think about like, um, if you call them blue light phones or security phones, um, that, that call back somewhere in emergency, those are usually attached to buildings or on pedestals, um, security camera mounts, and then the outdoor speakers for, for any purpose, whether it's for entertainment purposes or for um, PA systems, those all need to be tightly coordinated because they're, and again, this is where you can kind of balance the future thinking.

What we did in this project is we don't have a lot of that.

Like, we don't have a lot of outdoor cameras in our canvas, and that's a decision that has been made.

But again, to Jack's point like this, this construction's gonna last another 50 years at least if that position changes later, we just put in some conduit and some boxes in places that are just covered and could be turned into that later if we want to.

And if not, they can remain the way they are.

So, um, you kinda have to hedge yourself on some of that.

But this is, uh, to, to Ali's point, a key, a key area that you've gotta get right early because the outside of that building's gonna be finished long before the inside.

And so that's gonna be coordinated and done well in advance, at least for the infrastructure piece of that.

All right.

Thank you.

Awesome.

I think you answered Amanda's question.

That's wonderful.

Okay.

So, um, if you were starting the, the most recent project you've done or your current project today, what would you do differently from a tech standpoint, if anything? Again, prior to this first, uh, to this current pro, this current project was run very well with our partnership, but prior to that, I would've wish I would've been included earlier on, but I finally drilled that into their heads after 25 years of working with people.

So yeah, it's just get in early and often.

Awesome.

And Manny just put in a question that speaks to that alley.

Um, he joined us late, but, um, how do you feel, how, how do you deal with being brought in for the end? Um, he says, you know, he's constantly emailing and reaching out for plans and access and information, and the group covered that early on about just, you know, stay in touch, build the relationships early.

Um, remember that you do have expertise and while you might not be a construction expert, um, you know, you are a tech expert and be sure to offer that and speak up often.

Um, I'll say what I would do differently is, and I spoke to this earlier a little bit, I think I assumed certain things were happening by other people that were responsible for them in terms of either coordination or, you know, checking for consistency between specs and drawings and things of that nature.

I think if I were to take this specific project on, again, I wouldn't make so many of those assumptions.

I'd check for myself, I would dig into those details just to confirm that someone had thought about that or done that part.

There's just so many different stakeholders in a, in a large project that some stuff can get missed even when there's someone assigned to do that coordination.

Um, you know, we're, we're all human, so we bring different expertise and, and, and, um, availability to that too.

So I'd say for me it would be double check the work I didn't, 'cause I had an opportunity to and I didn't, and that's a missed opportunity.

Awesome.

I, I would say from my standpoint, you know, we got talked into a system in our, in our middle school building where, uh, we were looking at overhead paging, emergency announcements, those sorts of things.

We've got VOIP overhead paging in all of our older buildings, but it's been a bolt on.

And so, you know, we had a contractor who said, Hey, I've got a great solution for you.

You've got sound in the, in the classroom ceiling that you're connecting to the TV system in that classroom.

Let's just, let's just bootstrap and use that for our overhead paging.

We'll put a unit in the closet.

It was a system we weren't familiar with.

It wasn't a system we were super comfortable with, but we lean on the expertise of the vendor and it's been a, a support nightmare ever since.

Right.

In the last four years, the building's been open, so having to go back and, and literally have a broomstick with a label on it that we have to use to reboot the, the units in each of the classrooms whenever we lose power, uh, to make sure that they connect to the system.

Um, so I would say make sure that you fully understand what you're putting in your building.

Make sure that you have, um, a good handle on what that technology is, how it works, make sure you're comfortable with it.

Be a don't be afraid to use vendors and, and products that you are, that you prefer because you know their reliability and you know how to support them.

And, um, yeah, don't, don't let yourself be sold a bill of goods without sort of checking it out.

So.

Awesome.

And then, um, playing off that topic, what advice would you give to any technology leaders here who are about to enter their first major construction project? Allie, you were muted.

I know.

I'm just saying, hold on, baby.

Hold on.

It's, it's, uh, it can be a wild ride, but it's really just look at it as a learning process.

It's a lot of fun.

Um, just stay curious and, uh, don't be afraid to stand up for the school and what you know is right for the organization.

I would say leverage the network, right? I mean, if you're watching this webinar, you've already taken the first step right there to, to, to hear probably more so what not to do than what to do on any given project.

And again, I think every project's different, but, you know, Atlas is a great organization.

Many of us have done some of these things, so just know if, if you're going into your first project, you don't have to go into it alone.

Um, certainly partner with the people locally and the stakeholders involved in the actual project, but I'll speak for myself and say, reach out.

Let me, you know, I'm happy to, to share, uh, all those lessons learned the hard way.

I'd like to see someone else avoid them.

Thank you.

I am speaking of that, Kevin, I'm about to drop a link in the chat for any Atlas members who aren't aware.

We, um, did a transition to a different online community, um, a few months ago, and we do have a separate kind of sub-community about construction projects project, so that's a great place to do kind of that first touch.

But of course you can reach out to the Atlas staff and get connected with anyone.

Um, okay.

We have a couple minutes left, so let's just do a quick lightning round.

Um, real quick answers and I'd love to hear from everyone if I can.

Uh, first question, what is one thing you would never compromise on again? Uh, for me it's the, uh, entrance to our data center in the new building.

Um, they designed it in a way where I had to enter classroom to get access to that.

Um, early on I was like, well, we are only gonna put like network switches in there and some amplifiers.

I don't need regular access.

You know, every now and then I might need to just reboot it.

That ended up being not the right decision on my part.

I should have fought for a separate entrance so I can get access to my networking gear without going to a classroom and disrupting a class.

Thank you.

I would not compromise on the standards.

Uh, so we actually have a pretty mature standards document, which tells contractors exactly how our data rooms should be constructed, what products to use.

Uh, and if I was doing this again, I would've, uh, strenuously objected to some of the things that we allowed to, to not be up to standard.

It just creates, you know, inconsistencies and different products we have to support.

And, um, you know, like every time we step into a new cloud that now it's different from a previous one.

When we had a standard that could have easily been followed, uh, I wouldn't have compromised on that.

I'd say the vendors and the products that are put into the building, ultimately we're the ones supporting it for a long time to come.

And whether it's the access control from our first building or the, the speakers in our last building, just making sure that we are, are choosing the products that we are, are gonna have to be there for every single day.

Yeah, just to echoing what Jack and Kevin have already said, and, but they, we value engineered out, um, a new security system that I would've preferred in the long run, I think is better, you know, speaking to you Jack, if planning, you know, 50 years out.

Um, but it was value engineered that it was less expensive to stay with the technology we currently have in the new building.

And, and, um, and it's, yes, it is compatible with our existing system, but it's also an opportunity to leverage that into upgrading everything.

But, um, yeah, it's, it's money, but I, I think in the long run it's, it's a, it was a mistake.

Mm-hmm.

Okay.

Let's end on a high, um, what decision are you most proud of in a construction project? For me, just to, it's really fun to see all the Lego pieces come together and, um, the projects are just, you know, us techies, we, we get bored easily.

We like to always have a lot of new things to do.

So I, I just think it's, it's fun and I'm proud of the relationship that I've been able to have with, um, the whole construction crew.

You know, they like, Hey, how's it going? You know, they're, they're, it's just, you know, you feel like you're part of a team, which is what I like to do, to be part of a team.

So That's great.

I'm glad we for me, sorry, go ahead.

Oh, go Ahead.

Um, I'm glad we, uh, decided to record the time lapse of the construction project from start to finish.

Uh, in fact, I shared it, um, at the link that Kelsey shared on in the chat, so you can see that time lapse there.

That's great.

Yeah, we do time lapses on all of our projects and it is a, it's a nice artifact, you know, for the community to look back on too.

Uh, and I would say like I, I'm most proud that I made the decision to, to walk to site every day and to go to the construction meeting every week.

You know, it's a lot of time commitment and, and there are far more things that, that don't have anything to do with technology, but you learn a lot by, by listening to that and being a part of the problem solving process and you're there when, when the things do come up that you can help catch.

So say that, that was my good decision.

I think I'm most proud of being a really curious pain in the butt throughout the entire process, making sure that everyone in that process knew that I was gonna be coming and asking them really, really tough questions and, and really trying to educate myself along the way, but making sure that they knew that I was gonna be there because it made them pre, you know, sort of gather information and, uh, and get some stuff in advance that, that I think made the buildings better.

So.

Awesome.

A fonde.

Kevin, Jack and Allie, thank you so much, um, for all of your advice, all of your input.

This will be recorded.

Um, I also invite everyone to attend the Atlas annual conference this spring.

I believe all of these wonderful panelists will be there and you can ask them your questions firsthand.

Um, there's gonna be some great sessions and awesome networking.

So thank you all on behalf of the Atlas team and the Atlas community for just always being willing to share and help one another.

And, uh, with that, have a great rest of your day..