Introduction and Panel Reflections

Kim 0:03

Welcome to AASHTO Resource Q&A . We're taking time to discuss construction materials , testing and inspection with people in the know . From exploring testing problems and solutions to laboratory best practices and quality management , we're covering topics important to you .

Brian 0:18

Welcome to AASHTO Resource Q&A . I'm Brian Johnson and I'm Kim Swanson . Today we have Steven Read from the City of Seattle . Welcome'm Brian Johnson and I'm Kim Swanson . Today we have Stephen Reed from City of Seattle . Welcome to the podcast . Thank you , brian . Thank you , kim , good to be here . Stephen recently attended , well participated , in the technical exchange that was held in Bellevue , washington , in a public works panel . So , stephen , how did you enjoy being a panelist ? Oh , I had a good time .

Steve 0:46

Um , that goes with you know me just being a big ham . You know , give me , give me a crowd , so you talk in front of I'm . I'm perfectly willing to jump up and talk in front of it . I , you know , I don't know where I got that from . I , you know , I'm kind of a shy guy a lot of times . But you know , you , you give me a crowd and I'll , I'll talk to them all , you know your shyness didn't come through at all in the panel discussion and and I will I will tell you the reason , the whole reason .

Brian 1:16

So originally that panel was not supposed to be public works . Originally that was going to be building code discussion and I was going to get all these people from all the you know the building code officials from that area , you know state , city , all that . And then I found out that there was a big building code meeting going on that week and so a lot of those people were tied up and I was like you know what ? There's this guy that I have emailed and chatted with over the years in that area , that is a wealth of information and is not shy about telling me what he thinks about stuff . And so I reached out to Stephen .

Kim 2:00

And .

Brian 2:00

I was so grateful that you were excited about it and willing to participate , and I knew you would be a hit in the panel .

Steve 2:08

It's just fun . They're my people . They're my people . You know , you can always talk to your people .

Brian 2:14

Yeah .

Steve 2:15

And emailing and chatting up with you over the years is it's . Brian , what did you do to me now ?

Brian 2:22

Yep , what are you thinking ? What's going on me now ? What are you thinking ? What's going on ? What's going ?

Kim 2:27

on .

Steve 2:28

Because I've just had an assessment and it's not going well , brian . Why is that ? But it's what we've always . Over the years , we've worked everything out , you've given me good information about the things I need to know , and even , once in a while , I manage to change your mind . And that's keeping an open mind and that's the way it's supposed to work . That's , you know , that's why we're fans , right , that's . That's . That's why I said , yes , I'll do what you . Yeah , I'll go do your conference .

Brian 2:51

That's fine , because , you know , I I thought it was worthwhile for you guys , I think it was good stuff , it was enjoyable it was , and we did get some good feedback from the session too . So the reason why I was so eager to get this recording done this week is because steven is about to retire on friday and he has assured me that he meant by saying the word retire

Stephen's Retirement and Career Philosophy

Brian 3:14

. He means he's actually going to step away . Is that correct ?

Steve 3:18

that is correct , I've it's time to let the young people have it . I've had my say um , there's some things I'd like to do . I think you spend more time with my wife and do a couple of things I haven't done before . I'd like to work on the right side of my brain . God knows , I have bulked up the left side for long enough . The right side is about the size of a pea and I think I'd like to get it to at least the size of a walnut before I go away . Do something in the arts , do something different , and it's time . It's been a long career and it's time . You know I've put my time in and hopefully I've given what I've been able to give to the younger people and let them carry the torch .

Brian 3:55

One thing I always hear about in this industry is this concept that the younger generation or the next people coming in aren't getting the information or the training they need from the older generation , or the next people coming in aren't getting the information or the training they need from the older generation . Well , they don't typically frame it that way . They typically frame it like it's the younger generation's fault for not absorbing all the information that they aren't training them on . But can you talk to us a little bit about what your process has been like , as you've been looking into retirement and thinking , hey , I need to get the next people ready . What does that look like to you ? You know ?

Steve 4:32

getting people ready . I never really thought about my retirement in terms of educating my people . You always want to bring your people forward . That's really important . First and foremost . I'm a teacher a teacher , and I'm trying to teach the people that are with me the things that I know , and bring my experience and hard lessons and give them before they have to learn them . I have smart people I work with . I have smart people that work for me .

Steve 4:58

The I has never really been towards retirement . It's always been career development I think is a better term for it . Whether they want to stay in this business or this office and move forward or go outside and do something different , the idea has always been to make them better at what they do and broaden their knowledge so that they can go out and be successful in anything else they choose to do . That's important to me . That's important to me . It's something that early in my career , nobody thought about .

Steve 5:26

Earlier in my career , they certainly didn't really worry about my career development . You were labor , you were just a just a body and to do some things for us , and when we're done with you , we're going to move you on . I've never felt that way and it it goes back to another philosophy about , about how you manage staff . You know , because if you're just in it for the business purposes and not not interested in the people you're actually bringing along , I think you're doing everybody a disservice . I mean , I think I think you're doing the business a disservice . I think you're certainly shortchanging the staff . You're shortchanging your clients . You want your people to be as good as they can be whenever they can be , and if they choose to move on from this business , do something else . I want them to be successful .

Steve 6:07

My interns , all the interns I've had over my career . I am very , very , very proud of my interns . I think they've all done well . I am glad I was able to help them if I could . But that's sort of the philosophy . It never really was getting them ready for me to retire . It was always was getting them ready for me to retire . It was always about getting them ready for life and getting them ready to forward their career . That's kind of my

Career Journey from Equipment Operator to Engineer

Steve 6:30

take on it , my philosophy about that sort of subject .

Brian 6:33

Yeah , that's great . So you didn't even have to change anything . You're just continuing to operate the way you have .

Steve 6:40

Right , and the only thing that really changes . I mean , there's some things about my particular job . You know how do you pay a bill . You know who do you call to go get your concrete debris taken away and recycled , I mean that sort of thing . But in fact , the knowledge it takes to actually do this job everybody in this office has at some point in time been our quality manager , for example has at some point in time been our quality manager , for example that teaches you a lot about this job , right ? Everybody in this job manages their own projects as materials engineers for the various projects we do in the city , so they know how to work with people out in other agencies and other positions . They run their own thing .

Steve 7:21

I'm not a micromanager by any stretch of the imagination . Delegate , delegate , delegate , delegate . Let people do what they need to do . It's their job . If they need help or backup or advice , I am always here for that . But they get to run their own little businesses and that makes them qualified to do this thing other than just the nuts and bolts . How do I pay a bill ? The simple stuff .

Brian 7:46

The tasks that come with that job .

Steve 7:50

Which is a big change over the way when I got this job . In fact , the person who was sitting in this chair when I got here 20 years ago is the mother of one of my senior engineers . Actually , mary Lee said to me when I showed up . She handed me the keys . She says my senior engineers , actually . And Mary Lee said to me when I showed up . She handed me the keys . She says it's all yours and walked out the door and the first thing there were two things . One was I had to do a retirement party for the guy who had actually hired me because he was retiring , so that was going away , and I had to get ready for my annual assessment from AASHTO , from AMRL . At that point in time , who .

Steve 8:30

Right , so we learned fast Unfortunately , I'm a fast learner , you know and then managed the people and all the other stuff that come with it . The learning curve was really , really steep and hopefully we've averted that on this go-around and the next guy that actually sits in this job permanently will probably come from one of this office and will probably be very well hopefully very well equipped to do the job .

Brian 8:50

Yeah , it sounds like your onboarding philosophy has been shaped by your entry into your position .

Steve 8:57

Yeah , you can say that You've learned .

Brian 9:00

Sometimes you learn what to do . Sometimes you learn what not to do . At times , right Pain is a good teacher .

Steve 9:07

Yeah , for sure , if it hurts , you learn , yeah , okay .

Brian 9:11

So I'm going to ask you a question that I probably can guess at your answer , but it's one that comes up a lot in this industry is how did you get into this industry ?

Steve 9:24

Oh my God , you got time . Have we got time ?

Brian 9:27

for this . Oh , we have time we can edit out half of what you say .

Steve 9:33

So my dad was . My dad was a truck driver for a construction company , right , so we're gonna go back in history here , because there's some history to this . Um , so I kind of grew up in the construction industry . Sort of my first job in the industry was as an oiler on an asphalt plant . When I was 18 years old . I flunked out of college the first time . I needed a job . That was the first time I went to college . Then I got picked up and began a career as a heavy equipment operator , mostly asphalt paving , but also doing some other stuff .

Steve 10:03

I can run a bulldozer with the best of them , but then you spend a lot of time on yellow iron , working for people who are not the greatest , and you're sitting in that seat and you're going . He's not the brightest guy in the world , why am I working for him ? And I went back to college . My wife and I had met and she was working at a community college . I said maybe I'll go take an algebra class just for fun . Well , nine years later eight years later , I should say eight years later I graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering . I was 35 years old at that point in time I'm stuck around , did a master's degree , went to work for a little company called Pavement Consultants . I think we were working on airport pavements , because I was a paving guy . I wanted to build pavements and the interesting thing about working on pavements is that it is all about the kinds of materials that we do in this shop . It's about aggregates , it's about soils , it's about asphalt , it's about concrete . Those are the things that we really work on in most of our labs . I mean you guys do a lot of other things , but I mean , for the kind of places that we do , this , that's the bulk of our work . I mean it's a study of those materials . I do that for a decade .

Steve 11:16

And along comes a buddy of mine who'd worked for me at PCI , who's working for the city satellite . He says , hey , steve , he says the best engineering job in the city just opened up . You should apply for it . I said , well , what's that ? He said , well , the materials lab supervisor job just came open . Why don't you apply for it ? And I was happy . Where I was at , I was perfectly happy . I like working on airports , I like airplanes , and I dashed off a cover letter and some resume I had laying on , mailed it over . Lo and behold , they hired me and I'm here and I've been here ever since . I've been here for the last 20 years . He was right . This is the best engineering job in the city , the city of Seattle .

Steve 11:53

If people don't know , we have our own utilities . We pipe our own sewage . We pipe our own drinking water . We treat our own drinking water . We sell drinking water . We treat our own drinking water . We sell drinking water . We have our own electric company .

Steve 12:06

We have those guys have four dams , one of them . One of them is up in the far northeast corner of the state . The dams are pretty . You should , if you ever get out here sometime , get a chance to go up and look at the dams where the City Light has their dams . It's their gorgeous areas . So I get to work on a lot of things . I work on transportation , I work on water , I work in wastewater , I work on on dams , I work on roads , I work on vertical . I've worked on everything . If we've done it in this city at some point in time , I've worked on it , and that , for an engineer , is is Nirvana , frankly , I mean , I don't know a lot about anything , but I know a little bit about a lot . Because of that , you know it's been a great job is that is that why that was framed .

Brian 12:49

That way is the best job , yeah , that you could get is because just the variety and and what you get to have an impact on , yeah exactly , and we talked , and I talked to all departments .

Steve 13:02

You know , um , we consult with all departments . Jeez , I was just out yesterday with some . We redeveloped our waterfront down here . I think we talked a little bit about that at the thing , right , it was a huge job , monumental job for the city of Seattle , and the women that run that job said , you know , I said , hey , steve , we got to go out and have a drink after you know , before you go . And so we did last night and we talked about that .

Steve 13:27

What made it a good job ? Well , it was jobs like that , it was the people like that , it was the people you get to talk to and interact with and your influence you have on everything from this seat , because materials engineering affects everything , whether we're going to build a park , we're going to build a dam , we're going to build a roadway , we're going to build a roadway , we're going to build you know what choice of pipe , pipe materials , right , pipe materials have changed over time . How do you rehabilitate ? We've picked up plastic for crying out loud around here because we're lining pipes with cured in place plastic pipe so that we don't have to dig them up and replace them . Um , I mean all of that stuff and so and so , from from a person who's just plain curious and likes is a little bit gregarious and likes to interact with people , it's been a great job in that sense , you know . So it was yeah , it's , yeah , it's , it's , it's been a great job .

Steve 14:11

I mean I haven't moved on . I mean I stayed here for 20 years . That's not my normal thing . I moved . I've had a lot of jobs in my life . Actually , when I go back to the 10 years I spent , I didn't think I'd spend 10 years at the PCI . I spent 10 years because that was a pretty . Working on airports was a pretty good job . But you just your fingers are in everything At some level . Your fingers are everything . I answered a phone call today . Steve , what do we do ? What do we do ? I don't know , but you give advice , you know , and people take your advice , hopefully . But it's yeah , it's , this has been a . This has been a good ride . I've been a really good ride .

Brian 14:51

Yeah , that's great . I the the one thing I definitely want you to address more , because before we started chatting on here in the recorded part you mentioned something that you're doing there to help with the help , draw out the gregarious nature in your staff , because that is an important part of development of any professionals , right Is you can't just know things , you have to be able to communicate those things that you know , right ? So do you mind just sharing a little like just what you told us earlier ? Sure , I mean , that goes , that goes .

Steve 15:23

that was that story we were talking about , about you know us earlier . Sure , I mean that goes . That was that story we were talking about . About , you know , back in my consulting days when I was working at airports , you know we were one of the things . We were small companies so everybody pitched work . Right , we had to go and do dog and pony shows in front of you know . Sell I mean sell ourselves an engineering firm for projects , and where I was in I think it was cleveland , it was one of one of so one of many I was at and there was a whole bunch of principals from some rather large engineering firms standing around and we were all chatting up and the thing they were talking about what was the difference between a staff engineer , somebody who sits in a cubicle and does calculations , and someone who actually comes out , pitches , work and runs the company and it comes out of communications . Can you take your ideas and present them in a way that is coherent and meaningful ? And it was a great point , it was well taken , it was really well taken .

Steve 16:10

So one of the things we like to do , we make people do presentations , and it's five minutes , a five minute thing , right , you get up and give me five minutes on any subject . Today was , for example . I was with my intern today and she was doing Muhammad Ali and this was on the books for a while . We hadn't quite gotten to it . I said are you ready , jamie ? And she says , well , not really . I said , but I've got my notes . I said , well , then we'll do it extemporaneously . You get up and talk , because that's an important thing as well , because when your boss comes to you and your boss says , can you tell me about what it is you're doing or where you need to go , you get up and talk and present that stuff now , not study and write notes and go practice like you would do for a major presentation . You need to talk now . That's the sort of thing that gets you moving up the ladder . And so we did it . And the other part of that is we critique . When one of us gives a talk , the crowd sits around and says what is it you did right ? What is it you did right ? What is it you did wrong ? How can you improve ? Because it's important .

Steve 17:08

If you can't be understood , you can't go forward . And if you can present in a way that is

Communication Skills and Staff Development

Steve 17:14

fluid and meaningful and can engage people , you will move forward . That's the kind of people you want in management . Seriously , you want in management . If you're going to particularly I'm not in public works , we'll take almost anybody in public works . But if you're out in consulting for the private side of the world , for example , you have to bring the personality with you . You have to bring the thing that engages people and gets them thinking you know , believing and understanding what you say . Um , and that's what we're trying to do . I mean , I want all it's always about you know .

Brian 17:49

I agree , Kim . I've been hogging all the questions . Do you want to jump in ?

Kim 17:53

to moving up and succeeding and all of that stuff . So I loved that story and that you instill those skills and help develop those skills for your staff . I love that .

Steve 18:23

We're all smart people . That's the thing , right . We all have chops , we all know how to do what we do and we're really good at it . But can we bring that forward and give that to other people who want to hire us to do the things that we do ? That's where the rubber meets the road in the business world .

Kim 18:37

Yeah , for sure . Now , I love just hearing you talk . So when you were just like I was talking , I'm like I was learning a lot . I'm very much enjoying this part of the conversation . But since you've been with the city of Seattle for 20 years , I'm just curious of , like , what has been the biggest change that you've seen from maybe your first few years there to now , as you're , you know , kind of wrapping up and getting ready to go on to your next adventure . What has been the biggest change , or most maybe noteworthy or memorable change , for you ?

Steve 19:13

Wow , that's a that is a really difficult question , and I'll tell you why . We're not as old as perhaps Boston . Right , we're not that old , we're a mere 125 or so years old . But we're a mature business . We've been at this for a while . We've been building things and maintaining things and providing utility services for a while . So we are kind of bound up into the way we work and the things we do . We don't see big changes . We're a government . We don't change very fast at all . In fact , the SPU , the Seattle Public Utilities Way , the actual division I work for it just takes a lot of process to do anything . We love our meetings . So I don't think there's anything that really shocks me .

Steve 19:59

I think one of the things I've noticed in the city of Seattle that really , really encourages me is how women have moved in the engineering world and the STEM projects have moved into leadership positions . The girls I was with last night , for example , who led and ran that monstrous project down there in fact we were talking about that last night . It's unusual , because women in engineering or in STEM are plus or minus 15% right Not very many and to have the plus or minus 15% right Not very many and to have the really good , smart people that I work with in that 15% from that 15% , it's pretty darned amazing . I think it's really , really , really good . I think it's something I don't know if it's a change , but it's something that you see that is really encouraging . And one of the things that we also do is make sure we do our STEM outreach right Our science , technology , engineering and math outreach , particularly for people of color , minorities and women , to bring them over , because we're shorthanded , we are really white , we are really male , and we need to change that .

Steve 21:12

And we need really white , we are really male , and , and we need to change that and we need to bring that forward , because diversity is the answer to solving a lot of things . I mean , everybody brings their own point of view with them , uh , and the city is good about that , and they have been for 20 plus years before I got here . Diversity is is one of those things that we're really really , we really really do in seattle , um , and and it and I can tell you it works . I mean , collaborative solutions here are awesome , because when you're sitting at a table full of people who don't all look the same , they all bring different perspectives to an issue , and when you're collaborating , wow , you can come up with some cool ideas . It's , you know , anyway , but in terms of taking changes , nothing really huge , but but except for again like seeing , like seeing more women come up through the STEM side of things , engineering side of things , I think it's been really , really encouraging .

Brian 22:02

This is a question that was kind of callback to our panel discussion , that most of our audience hasn't heard but the so

Women in Engineering and STEM Diversity

Brian 22:09

, so this reference makes no sense to them . But I did ask you about what the challenges of working with different departments . You know , you guys are kind of integrated in the city of Seattle where you have public works , you have utilities , you have all these other things that maybe some of the other cities don't have . But you also are dealing with county and state and EPA and FAA and all of these other entities .

Steve 22:36

How does this work ? And this monstrous thing called Sound Transit ? So , if you don't know about Seattle , we don't have an integrated mass transit system here quite yet , and so we're building trains , we're building a lot of trains , we're building trains , we're building a lot of trains . It's by an entity called Sound Transit , which is cities , counties in the Puget Sound area , all sort of ganged up and created this thing called Sound Transit .

Coordinating with Multiple Government Agencies

Steve 23:02

That's another entity . The person who is the executive in charge that I was having drinks with last night , who's the executive in charge of the waterfront redevelopment , which is almost finished , is now going to work for the city coordinating with Sound Transit at the executive level . How do we solve all of these issues ? There's land use issues . There's permitting Permitting is a huge thing as Sound Transit wants to build their trains across town Construction issues , outreach , as you sat down last night and town Construction issues outreach to I , just as you sat down last night and just outlined . It's just a whole plethora of things that has to be coordinated with Sound Transit and it's huge . And you know how .

Steve 23:43

You know I'm not a very high level guy . I'm kind of a low level guy and of course I work with state departments . We work with WSDOT , washington State Department of Transportation , king County , our county folks , and my advice always was you know , when you have let the entity be what the entity has to be , we all have needs in our own system . So if I'm going , if I'm city of Seattle , I have to work on a WSDOT system because working on that project intersects with theirs . Wsdot has their requirements . Let them have their requirements . Their system is what their system is . Their rules are what their rules are . We're not there to change them and we do the same to them . We're doing something coming off of one of the floating bridges by the University of Washington . It's a big giant interchange WSDOT is doing and a lot of it intersects with the city of Seattle and we didn't back off on our rate . We don't have quite the same specifications , the same way of doing things that they do . We said no , you're going to do it our way . It was really and if you've got a good coordinator and you always have to have a coordinator it worked really well . That was really smooth . But we level . If you're trying to solve issues and you solve them at the lowest possible level , you're in the less , fewer turf wars . People get , particularly as you move up in the chain , get fiefdoms . They have this thing that they have and they're the boss of it . They're going to be the boss of it . They're going to have it their way , which can lead to some really , really gnarly conflict . And I think that's why Angie , being as good as she is as an executive project manager , that's why she got the sound transit job . It's because , yes , that's going to be the high level and , yes , there are a lot of features , but she is really good at working with people and smoothing the way , picking the right people .

Steve 25:25

That leads to an aside that we were talking about last night and this really resonated with me . Angie Brady is tall and she's's blonde and she's got blue eyes . She's really smart . But she says when I walk into a room , when I walk into a room and the room is full of men , she says what I have to say never carries weight . That's what she says . That's why I hired a guy to do that for me . I tell him what I want them to say . He goes in that room and says it and they believe him . I hate that , but it's managing . It's managing , yeah , and I said smart move , she says .

Steve 26:00

And she says I don't have a problem with that , I get the message across , it gets done . That's what I'm here for . It's outcome , not process , and that really resonated with me . And again , so how you deal with other agencies is what's that thing that you have to do to get the message across . My thing is I work at the lowest level possible . I have a lot of friends who move up the food chain and when we solve issues , we sit down and we talk about it and we solve it . We don't get all bound up in dog wind and try and think about what is best for everybody involved . That doesn't always happen as you move up . If you have to elevate your issues , then you're going to get into those fiefdoms , those things where people really dig their feet in and say I can't , it's just my way , or the highway and I've been down that road too it's really , unfortunately , you can't do anything about it . I'm a public employee , I have a boss .

Brian 26:54

My boss tells me what to do , I get my marching orders and I go . So I like that lesson about the having the solving problems on the lower levels where you can actually get the work done . You have the people who are doing the work right . You understand what the complications are getting them all together . So nobody's imagining what the other group is might or might not be thinking too . That's really important . I think all of us have at some point in our lives experienced making that mistake of imagining what is going , you know , anticipating what oh that person might be interested in that . Well , just ask them , right , Maybe you get there faster For sure .

Steve 27:28

You know for sure . Just ask . I mean , it doesn't take anything to ask the question . The worst answer you can get is no , and that don't hurt very bad .

Brian 27:37

No , it doesn't , and it tells you what you need to know .

Steve 27:40

Yeah , I mean , god knows , you've told me no enough times , so you know it didn't hurt me much .

Brian 27:46

Yeah . Well , that was another thing I wanted to point out . I find that when I have people who are willing to push back and when not that I want to invite every laboratory in the program to push back , but when we have those kind of conversations and debates about different things , it always leads to something better , like a better understanding , a better , like a better relationship . I now have this relationship with you that I wouldn't have if you were just like yeah , yeah , whatever you say , we'll do this thing , but I appreciate you and all of your perspectives and I've learned some things and I think it's great and it helps us all get better .

Steve 28:25

This is one of the things . This is a business thing you're doing . Brian , right , you're not the only game in town , right , right , and to a certain degree you are . Ryan , right , you're not the only game in town , right , right , and to a certain degree you are , but to a certain degree you're not either . And so you're running the business , being willing in a customer service aspect , being willing to listen to your customers , being able to react to your customers , tell them why you do things and why it's important and why we just did this thing that you don't particularly agree with , but we think it's necessary for the better good that's appreciated . That's why we stay with Asheville . That's why I'm willing to engage with you at any point in time is because I'm heard . You listen and we get feedback from each other Throughout business , throughout the construction process , throughout all the things that we do . That's how we communicate . That's how we do things .

Steve 29:11

You have to talk to people because you're trying to influence , and communication is a good thing , because if you don't at least try to communicate , how do you know what you're going to get back out of it ? You can't assume I don't know what you're thinking . I can't assume what you're thinking . I can ask you for certain . If I ask you , hopefully you tell me the truth . Not all people do that , but hopefully you'll tell me the truth . Um , but , but without , without and and communication .

Steve 29:36

The style of communication is really , really important , you know , particularly particularly when you think about constant , the idea of constant improvement , which is something that you guys are all about for sure . That's one of the reasons why we love to have you guys come around and not at our work and look at our labs . The things that we do was because it made us better at the end of the day , and so how , how you communicate . So all , all communication , all criticism is is constructive . It's sort of it's okay to say you didn't do that the right way or that was a mistake , it's okay , but here's how you can correct it , how's we give it , and don't be punitive about it , don't , don't , don't make it hurt , just say here's how we can get better , how we can move forward . And that's a large part of what you guys do as well . I mean , it's pretty positive working with you guys , pretty positive getting forward , and always approach , you know , those visits with the attitude that they're here to make us better at what ?

Kim 30:26

we do .

Steve 30:26

And that's the way we do it , and I think that's any audit and we've had this God . We get audits on federally funded or state-funded projects . We'll send auditors to look at us and how we've done our work , and the idea is , as long as we keep the eye going forward is that their findings are there to make us better . We come out better in the long run , because now you don't get into fights , you don't get lawsuits from the government , you don't get fines , you don't get hurt , you approach it the right way . That's what the auditors are about . That's what they do . They want to make you better . Here's the things that we need you to do and here's how you can improve . We ask those questions as well . That's the other great thing about having you guys come around .

Steve 31:08

We pick up a new test . We don't have anybody to gauge . How are we doing on this test , for example ? Because we don't understand . We're doing it , we read the rules , we look at the YouTubes , but your assessors come in and they have seen it . They've seen it and we will ask how does someone else , what can we do to get us where we need to be ? And that's helped a lot . Yeah , we're fans . We're fans . Yeah .

Brian 31:36

Hey , that sounds great to me . I like hearing that If we can do anything to help people , we're happy about it . But I think it's when we get quality-minded people like yourself involved . Getting feedback from you is really valuable . Getting feedback from somebody who's doing the bare minimum , it's not valuable . And if we have people you know like talking about customer service , I mean , customer service is important to us . But when we have people who are not well-intended , don't want to get better , if they want to walk to somebody else , we're happy to see them go and Hopefully they change their mind and come around .

Brian 32:18

We're not in it to build our customer base to as big as it can be . We want the better ones to stay with us .

Quality vs Schedule in Public Works

Steve 32:24

The reason we come to you guys is because it gives us credibility , because of the high standard that you guys provide and make us work to . It gives us credibility . I cannot remember a time when someone actually contested a finding of ours . I just can't remember it . And one of the things is because at the top of my report it says AASHTO Resource . It says we were accredited for that test by these guys and that's hard to argue with because they can't bring anything better to the table to say that you guys did it the wrong way or your findings are not valid . Hopefully we did a good job Because you know how those things work . Right Errors ?

Brian 33:04

Oh yeah , oh sure .

Steve 33:06

But nobody argues with it and we get through it , and so that's why that AASH it's , that's why that actual resource , not moniker is is really . You know , it's .

Brian 33:16

It means a lot in our business yeah I mean I'm sure it helps , but , like I think , what ? When you're dealing with those kind of situations , I think it's more you than it is the accreditation , because you have the experience and , like I , you know , kim is just hanging on every word . She's just trusting everything you have to say . So I think that probably your communication is helping a lot in accepting what you have to say .

Steve 33:40

This might get edited out , but there's a saying here on here we get in compaction beefs , particularly on asphalt , once in a while , right , and I've never lost a compaction beef . The thing is , you know , you take your nuclear gauges out until you're in your relative compaction of the gauge . You show a subflow the contractor always and there's resolution to go cut cores . That's always a resolution and I say fine , but the way we wrote the spec was that the engineer gets to pick the cores , core locations . It's not random . It is not random . Oh wow , and we never lose a compaction beef . Because I will go pick the cores and I am an old asphalt guy .

Steve 34:21

My master's degree it was something , my thesis had something to do with asphalt paving . I got a clue we never lose , we never , ever lose . And because and I say that you know that sounds awful , it does sound , but have faith in our results . If we've been out there and we've done more testing than necessary and we've just determined that you're noncompliant , I have great faith in my people and procedure and equipment because it's been maintained , calibrated , the people are trained , they're tested , we're accredited , we understand , I have great . You don't have to prove it to me with cores , we've already done it , and so I just go out , and you know then we don't lose , we just don't lose . I'm not interested in anybody winning , but we're not going to lose .

Brian 35:10

Well , and if somebody really wanted to press you and take other cores , they could certainly do that , but they're not going to get anywhere , I'm sure .

Steve 35:18

Oh no , because by the rules , this is public works .

Steve 35:27

By the rules , my lab is the pay lab . So one of the things that's come along lately is the FHWA has begun pushing more contractor quality control programs onto grants , which is a great thing . Now we can have a long conversation about contractor quality control , but it's a great thing . But at the end of the day , there's also quality assurance . That goes on and that's us . We're the owner's lab , we're the quality assurance lab . We may not sample at the same rate , but the pay gauge . This usually comes out of compaction Compaction of proctors usually but the pay lab is our lab . You can do what you're going to do , but if you want to get paid for it , you better be paying attention to our results , and that brings the quality control labs into compliance pretty quick . It snaps their heads around and brings them to the table and doing good work pretty quick as well , because they can't be telling their client that they're good when they're not , and we do .

Steve 36:20

I mean this is , this is not . I don't want to . I don't want to say that we're all imperious and you know we don't listen to you or what you're doing . By all means . We have discussions about this stuff , we talk about it and we look at things and but what we find most cases is that we're doing it the right way , someone else is doing it the wrong way and that makes a difference in your test results , and so we , you know . So that says we're a little , we are a little bit imperious , that's just . That's kind of me too .

Brian 36:46

So that's all right , it's important work . You know you're protecting the investments and the infrastructure of the city . Right , that's pretty big responsibility Indeed indeed . So what has been the most difficult part of your job ? You know ? 20 years in public works uh it , you know , protecting the integrity of this infrastructure in seattle , uh what , what's the biggest challenge , or what's what was the ?

Steve 37:18

hardest thing that is . That is a great question . I have to . I , yeah , cause I think my job has been great . Right , it's , every problem is already solved and I and no one , no one thing makes your life miserable . I think the thing that , uh , yeah , I .

Steve 37:35

So the old thing is that when you go on a project , there are there you can have , you can have quality , you can have money and you can be quality . Scope , scheduled right , pick two , pick two right . That's the old adage and that's pretty close to true . Scheduled has driven because in public sector work there's always politics right Meaning so we're going to go into your neighborhood and we're going to do this thing and we're going to be done by this date . If it all goes sideways and the quality isn't there , schedule tends to jump up and say we have to be out of here by this date . We're going to have to accept something less , and I find that highly annoying . I always say I'm the quality guy . I think my job . I always say I'm the quality guy Because this comes a bit from my background in pavement management on airports , meaning how long can we make something last ?

Steve 38:29

And it's also an environmental thing , it's a carbon thing as well , because the least green thing we can do is be tearing things up because we didn't build them well and we have to replace them earlier than planned . That's not really green , and so my perspective is always from that standpoint and also the standpoint of the value for public money spent is is it going to last as long as we intend it to last ? And sometimes schedules gets in the way and you don't get to do the things that you want to do because they have to be done quickly or on schedule . For me that's a hard pill to swallow because , okay , so it's going to take a week longer .

Steve 39:09

That's not politically accepted and that ripples down through the construction manager for the manager , people all the way to the top . It goes down and up and down and up and it resonates . I've had some really interesting conversations with people saying I don't care about your schedule , I don't care , I don't care , I think the quality needs to be this and um , I don't win all those arguments . Sometimes I win and we get , we get things right . Lots of times I'd lose and it's very hard for me to pill , for me to swallow .

Brian 39:42

Um , that's just , that's just the way I'm built , that's just me . Yeah , you're made for this

Material Standards and Advocacy

Brian 39:44

, uh , okay , so I don't want to be too negative . Let's , let's , uh , and , and I'll say end . But maybe kim will have another question to mix in here too . But , uh , what has been the most rewarding part of your job ? Like what ? Was there a certain event or a project that you see ? No , no , none of that none of that .

Steve 40:04

It is absolutely the people I have worked with , absolutely the people I have worked with , um , the people who've worked for me . I can't say enough about them , I just can't . They've been fantastic people , fantastic people to work with . The people I've worked for , generally speaking , fantastic people , fantastic people to work with . The people I've worked for , generally speaking , have been fantastic . The people I work with in other departments have been fantastic . I have worked with a lot of smart , dedicated , intense , good-meaning people and that is the rewarding part , the part that we are not this is a hard part of the current political situation in this country that's really hard for me to swallow is okay .

Steve 40:42

There's a lot of dead meat in in um government . Meet the people I know . Work with the people I know , see how hard they work and and and what their thought processes are and how they go to work every day and what they want to do for the people they work for . Spend the money the right way . Um , it's , that is . That is the thing . It's the people . It's always the people I mean . I've done a lot of jobs in my life . I've done a lot of great things , really cool things From a professional standpoint . Yeah , that's awesome , but at the end of the day it comes down to us . It comes down to Brian and Kim . It comes down to yeah , it's just the people . I'm really rewarded having worked with some really smart , intelligent , nice , well-meaning people .

Brian 41:28

I'm sure a lot of them have the same thing to say about you over your career .

Steve 41:34

There might be a few out there . In fact , I'm disappointed . Not everybody's going to like you , not everybody's going to hate you .

Brian 41:42

Steve , thank you so much for your time today and thank you for engaging with us at the Technical Exchange and for always being willing to debate things with me about standards and quality , and it's been a great relationship . Like I said to you when we were there , I wish I had gotten to meet you years ago so we could have had more of this going on over the years . So I feel like I had a missed opportunity there to get more of this kind of interaction with you over the years , but I appreciate what I had .

Steve 42:13

There should be a few people like me out there . I mean , there's characters in the business . You know I'm just one of them , you know . You know I don't know if engaging you 15 years ago would have done you any good or not , but I mean , some of your quality analysts have certainly paid the price .

Steve 42:29

You know and Brian , I'll tell you some of the stuff we talked about . You know , because you guys are here the standards , right , the standard says this is what we're going to look at , and sometimes that's not quite right , you know . I mean there's a couple of things I have in mind because , because standards are written by people with PhDs , Sometimes we don't understand it . You know , some of the things we do don't need to be that exact or that much that that close . We can get by with something you know , like Platon's being need to get that flat . Do you know how hard that is to get , how much it costs you to get that sort of thing ? And then , does it matter ? And can you show me the data that says it does matter ?

Steve 43:12

I mean things like that that it would be nice if that resource would advocate for us and look at some of those things and say , look , here's the argument we're getting from our people , and you're on ASTM I know you are , because I already gave you you know hell about that one you know kind of advocate for us down those lines with ASTM and AASHTO on their standards and say , you know , look , these are the things that really matter , these are the things that really don't , because you guys understand as much as we do and , in a lot of cases , more more so . Um , but I also understand where you're at . You're in the middle , you're absolutely dead square in the middle and and it's not your job to advocate for anybody .

Brian 43:49

But that's kind of that's kind of where I'm at I , I , I like that and I do think that that's been a a good opportunity for us to to be in the middle and to communicate . And really that goes back to your point about being good communicators . It's really incumbent upon us to do a good job communicating with those committees , communicating with our customers , trying to bring along this continual improvement mindset and try to make sense of the things that don't make sense to people , try to get reasonable tolerances . That's been that . That's a journey I've been on the last several years is try to talk some sense into some people about some of these requirements . But you know there's always that assumption out there that oh , it must have been important to be in there in the first place , and I would say it's just what they had when they wrote the standard .

Steve 44:44

Exactly , exactly , exactly . And the other thing when you sit on ASTM committees , particularly ASTM committees , you can see there's agendas in those committees . It's like anything else , it's like any other body there are agendas and being able to winnow out the agendas and over my career , the thing I wish had worked a little bit for somebody like Lafarge or Holson or somebody like that , where I could attend more ASTM meetings in person . Because to really argue out in the committee some of those things that I see , my reputation on some of those committees , on CO9 in particular , is not particularly good because I will vote a negative on almost anything . If I think it's not right , I will rescind it . If they can make the case , I don't have a problem taking my word back . But I will say no and I'll say show me why , tell me , why does this make a difference and how does this affect the consumer ? Not just the two people involved in that transaction , but how does this affect the consumer out there , the guy who doesn't know as much about these things as we know .

Steve 45:48

I lose a lot of those , I win a few , I lose a few . There you go . That's all part of the process . At the end of the day . I think we're pretty close to right . We're not exactly , but we're pretty close to right . We're not exactly , we're pretty close to right .

Brian 46:03

We'll keep getting closer , yeah , but all right , well , hey , thanks again . Thank you , I appreciate your time and happy retirement , yep . Hope you enjoy exercising the other side of your brain for the next many , many years .

Steve 46:16

I am Thank you . Thank you so much for having me . It was a lot of fun . I really enjoyed it . Oh good , thank you . Engaging with you guys is always fun , so thank you . Thank you so much for over the years .

Kim 46:27

It's been a great ride

Episode Conclusion and Quality Tip

Kim 46:28

, man . Here's your quality quick tip of the day . A common problem with QMS documents and records is that they're inaccurate . Be careful not to copy the examples in R18 verbatim or borrow information from other organizations . You probably do things at least a little differently . You can learn more by going to the ReUniversity section of our website and check out the Road to Developing an Effective QMS articles for more information on this topic . Thanks for listening to AASHTO Resource Q&A . If you'd like to be a guest or just submit a question , send us an email at podcast at aashtoresourceorg , or call Brian at 240-436-4820 . For other news and related content , check out AASHTO Resources social media accounts or go to aashtoresourceorg .