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September Luncheon: Making Magic in the Media

Is getting the press to cover a story as difficult as pulling a rabbit out of a hat? Do you wonder what is needed to convince the media to appear? Your company does great things – how do you make sure your clients hear about them?

All will be revealed by a panel of local and industry media professionals at our September luncheon. Editors from the Austin Business Journal, Community Impact and Texas Construction and Engineering News-Record will share tips for promoting your story ideas, deadlines, working with PR agencies, and other secrets of the news media. In addition to marketing professionals, firm leaders should attend to hear from those who determine, predict and even influence what is newsworthy in our industry. The panelists will also share the trends and issues they consider to be “hot topics” for the A/E/C industry, the stories they are most likely to cover, and how the economy and social media are affecting their reporting.

PANEL
Eileen Schwartz, editor of Texas Construction and Texas liaison for Engineering News-Record
Colin Pope, editor of the Austin Business Journal
Shannon Colletti, managing editor of Community Impact

MODERATOR
Rebecca Martin, MA, IOM, Senior Vice President Marketing & Communications, Austin Chamber of Commerce

When: Tuesday, September 14, 2010 @ 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM

Where: University of Texas Club - President's Room
2108 E. Robert Dedman Drive
Austin, TX 78712

Click here to register for the luncheon!

Project Tour: Norman Hackerman Experimental Science Building at the University of Texas at Austin - August 26th, 2010

SMPS Austin invites you to tour the Norman Hackerman Experimental Science Building, The University of Texas’s newest state of the art laboratory building.

As part of the College of Natural Sciences at The University of Texas at Austin, the 320,000 SF Norman Hackerman Building features modern office and laboratory space designed to help the school competitively recruit and retain faculty and students in critical academic areas such as neuroscience, computational biology, environmental science, pharmacy and molecular and cellular biology. Prior to beginning construction on the new facility, Beck had to demolish the 55-year-old existing science building as well as perform hazardous material abatement. The new 7-story, $124 million building includes office spaces, conference rooms, teaching labs and utility rooms. The project is seeking LEED® Silver certification.

As the building is nearing completion, but still under construction, please bring your hard hat, safety glasses, closed toed shoes, and appropriate attire. Keep in mind that hard hats must be worn at all times during the tour. If you do not have a hard hat and/or safety glasses, there will be a limited number provided on site.

Please park at any of the visitors parking garages and meet at the job trailer (parking map will be sent to registrants prior to event). Registration is at 4pm and the tour will be begin at 4:30. Light refreshments will be provided after the tour, so feel free to stay and mingle!

Registration ends on Wed, August 25 and space is limited, so reserve your spot now!

When: Thursday, August 26, 2010 4:00 PM -6:00 PM

Where: Beck Job Trailer
University of Texas at Austin
2405 University Avenue, Austin, TX

Attire: Construction Site Appropriate

Event Registration Fee: Member $10.00
                                   Non-Member $20.00

Click here to Register for Project Tour

Next Year

I am really excited about this upcoming year. We have had several people, who have been active on committees in the past, take the next step forward to become a part of the 2010-2011 Board. With half our board being new this year, I anticipate many fresh new perspectives and ideas to help make our Chapter even better. Those new perspectives mixed with the returning experienced board members will make a winning combination.

As Paulette mentioned in an article earlier this year, being on the board is a lot of work. We meet as a board once a month to discuss chapter issues and make decisions. Most of the committee chairs also meet once a month with their committee members to discuss the logistics of everything including programs, communication with members, special events, and how to implement a new initiative. In addition, everyone puts in time on their own preparing materials and flyers, arranging meeting spaces, sending out invitations, contacting speakers, balancing the books, soliciting sponsorships, etc. (Did I mention this was a volunteer position?)

I will miss our outgoing board members this year - they have done a fantastic job and have set the bar high for our future leaders. I have no doubt that the 2010-2011 board will rise to the challenge and make this new SMPS year a great one. One of my favorite sayings is “nothing gained is something lost.” Although I stole that saying from the lyrics of an old .38 Special song, there is a lot of value in that statement. Because if we sit idle and don’t continue to grow and improve we really are losing an opportunity to advance our chapter and our careers. So, keeping that in mind as we move forward, our goal will be to continue to grow the chapter and make it stronger, find new and innovative ways to administer all aspects of the organization, and provide our members with the best possible service.

Erika Passailaigue, CPSM
Datum Engineers
SMPS Austin Chapter President-Elect

New Member Spotlight: James (Jim) Brewer, PE

James (Jim) Brewer, P.E.
Gray-Jansing & Associates, Inc

Join SMPS in welcoming new member Jim Brewer, P.E. to our ranks.  Jim is a fun guy: he spends his free time on canoe and kayak trips on Lady Bird Lake and Inks Lake, snorkeling and scuba diving in tropical waters, and saltwater and freshwater fishing. When on land, he runs 5Ks. He and his wife of 27 years are about to become empty-nesters; their youngest child will head off to the Air Force Academy in the fall. Their future plans include going to football games at all their kids’ schools: at the Air Force Academy, at the University of Arkansas (where his middle son is on the team), and at Texas A&M.

When not on the water or with his kids, Jim spends his time as Director of Engineering Services for the Austin office of Gray-Jansing & Associates, Inc. where he has been since 1999. There he manages engineering and technical staff and takes an active role in marketing the firm’s services (hence his new membership to SMPS!). Other professional gigs included stints with GeoSyntec Consultants, and CH2M-HILL in McKinney and Carrollton, TX and Irvine, CA. He is an Aggie with a B.S. in Civil Engineering and a Master’s Degree from Georgia Tech.

Gray-Jansing & Associates, Inc. (GJA) is a full service civil engineering consulting firm with offices in Austin and El Paso, TX. GJA specializes in the design of single-family subdivision layout and construction drawings, commercial and multi-family site plans, and municipal infrastructure engineering projects including water and wastewater facilities, roadways and drainage improvements.