Covid changed the workplace forever as employees adopted work from home. Now employers want their teams back in the office. Can they compromise? In this issue, employers make their case for the office.
Sometimes the best way to move forward is with an honest conversation. Back once more to share onsemi’s return-to-work compromise is Test
Development Engineer Dave Stout. In our last edition, Dave shared how he has successfully managed remote teams from home. In this edition, he shares how empowering managers is an essential step to bringing remote teams back to the office.
Dave Stout Test Development Engineer in Boise onsemi
Localized Control: Empowering Managers
Imagine being a leader with offices around the world implementing a return-to-work policy. Not only is it complicated, but also impossible for any one person or even team to manage. Yet, this is where onsemi’s leaders were a few months ago—trying to bring back hundreds of employees to offices all around the world who were comfortable at home. While they are still transitioning, the key to their
success has been leaning on their management teams. “There is no replacement for face-to-face interaction, and I think that is important to the executive team. At the same time, they recognize how difficult it is to go straight back to the office after working remotely for two years. So, they decided it was in everyone’s best interest to have employees work directly with their managers (at least in the U.S.) to determine what works best for their teams.” This way, managers can advocate for what is best for their team.
Connect With Employees
With control in the hands of the individual office and manager, each team can function at its best. For Dave, that means he can have honest conversations with staff about their productivity. “With Covid, you found out quickly who couldn’t efficiently work from home. I had to sit down with some of my team
members to solve those problems. I think it is crucial to make it an “us” issue rather than a “them” issue. One of my employees has terrible internet at home, so he needed to be in the office for better internet. Another lives in a small home with kids, so it is distracting. Having those conversations and understanding the root of the issue helps us have an open dialog and solve the issue. If I were to say, ‘You’re not getting anything done; therefore, you must work in the office,’ that wouldn’t go over well. Instead, we can reach a conclusion together with it being their idea. Then the employee is more open to the differences between their situation and someone else’s.
By bringing human connection into the equation, onsemi is on its way to a successful return-to-work compromise.
Covid changed the workplace forever as employees adopted work from home. Now employers want their teams back in the office. Can they compromise? In this issue, employers make their case for the office.
By now, almost everyone has heard the ultimatum that Elon Musk gave Tesla employees around working from home. In short, the message was, get back in the office or get out of Tesla. This move has inspired some companies while others choose to navigate things differently. To weigh in on the return-to-work compromise from a management point of view, we invited David Berry back to share his perspective.
In our last edition, Senior Project Manager, David Berry shared his experience working from home and some of the great ways it has helped him prevent burnout and prioritize his family. In this edition, David shares three reasons why the office still plays a vital role in the success of a business and its employees.
David Berry Senior Project Manager in Boise POWER Engineers
Realigning Employee Expectations
POWER Engineers recognizes that things have changed over the last two years, and they must take time to realign expectations. “A challenge companies are facing is that if you told someone two years ago that they could work from home two days a week, they would have jumped at it. Now bringing people back to the office is like pulling teeth.” To help realign employee expectations, they are breaking down requirements by job role. For example, it makes sense from an accountability standpoint to have production staff in the office. Meanwhile, an engineer can be hybrid. Depending on the job role, industry, and a person’s social skills, some individuals need to be in the office.
Socialization & Personal Interactions
Regarding productivity, David recognizes that while employees have been more productive, they lack socialization. “When you’re in the office, you might have banter that lowers your efficiency but improves your network, socialization, and maybe your self-actualization. That is a key benefit of having the office. It is great being in the office to see staff, but you also collaborate more. You also talk about what it means to be an employee in a company, and those personal interactions are so important for personal growth.”
Promoting From Within
Perhaps the most valuable part of being in the office is growth. POWER tries to promote leadership within the company. “A lot of those decisions are based on direct interaction with employees. It is difficult to determine growth on phone interviews or email responses. A lot is based on the knowledge and expectation of how someone will interact and their leadership skills. I think it will affect their growth trajectory if people don’t go into the office to meet with key staff. In that regard, the office will always be an integral part of any company.”
Whether it is for accountability, socializing, or personal growth, the office still plays a vital role in an employee’s success.
Erin Warwick is a finance director at TELEO Capital in Boise, but recently she has been wearing many other hats. One of those hats includes bringing the new TELEO headquarters online.
TELEO Founding
TELEO Capital is a lower middle market private equity firm. They are targeting opportunities in the technology & software, healthcare IT, business services, and industrial sectors. Private equity firms like TELEO Capital are the go-betweens connecting investors to private companies looking for capital or helping investors buy into private companies to diversify their portfolios. Three coworders founded TELEO in 2018 by three coworkers who decided it was time to build something themselves. George Kase and Andy Martines specialized in deal sourcing, while Robb Warwick complemented their skills with his operational experience. Together they formed a strong team that would eventually lead to a company with two offices. One is in Los Angeles, California, and now, a beautiful headquarters is in Boise, Idaho.
Private Office
TELEO Building Its Space To Support Its Culture
Over the last few months, it has been Erin’s job to bring the owners’ vision to fruition. With 27 employees split between two offices, creating and maintaining a strong culture has been top of mind. “We have a culture of integrity, honesty, hard work, and fun. The founders want to create a place where our team can work hard and go home to be fully present with their families. They know the importance of balance and believe that if you take care of yourself, the quality of your work improves.” To help both teams benefit from this culture, the new office in the 11th & Idaho building has many open workspaces to accommodate the LA team when they come to town. This encourages camaraderie between the offices and helps them feel connected although geographically apart.
“We have a culture of integrity, honesty, hard work, and fun. The founders want to create a place where our team can work hard and go home to be fully present with their families. They know the importance of balance and believe that if you take care of yourself, the quality of your work improves.”
Erin Warwick | Finance Director
Conference Room
Designing Their Space For The Future
OEC designed the extra room to support the future of the company. “Robb calls [this office] the ‘Center of Excellence.’ He dreams of bringing acquired companies into this space to get them on their feet and share in our culture. Then, once they grow enough, they can start looking for an office space of their own.” By using their space as a “launching pad,” TELEO will be able to intentionally grow their business by bringing more portfolio companies into their office. The new office encompasses three-quarters of the floor. It is filled with workstations, private offices, a kitchen, and Erin’s favorite, a giant OEC conference room with a view of the foothills.
Kitchen
Now enjoying its new headquarters, the TELEO team has its sites set on the future. A future guided by the principles of its name. When it came time to pick a name for their new company, the founders took a while. The Greek route word “teleology,” coined by Aristotle. It has the same meaning as the famous Arabic phrase “It is finished,” as pronounced by Christ on the cross. This idea of completing, performing, and accomplishing resonated deeply with the founders and is what guided them then and what will guide TELEO Capital into the future.
Movement is important in nearly every aspect of your life. Regarding your work life, movement is key to having a healthy, productive, and pain-free work experience. Here are three ways I like to incorporate movement into my work routine to add variety and give my body a break from sitting in the same position.
Change postures.
This is where furniture can really help. In my situation, I have a height adjustable desk. I move it in four different positions during the day. Regular ergonomic sitting position, standing, perching at my chair armrest, and down low so I can put my feet up. Also, my task chair is ergonomic and has some natural flex and bounce, which helps.
Get up and walk around the office.
Every couple of hours or so, I’ll take an intentional break and go to see somebody different in the office. Sometimes just a quick catch-up at their desk, or I’ll even jump in the car and do a short gas station or coffee run. This week I was feeling a bit antsy and even did a walk around the block. It was pretty hot, so just one loop sufficed.
Change the work location.
I like to work in different areas. Right now, I am sitting upstairs on a soft sofa with my feet up. Not only does this give my body a rest from the typical ergonomic office chair, but it places me in a different physical environment which helps change my mood and clear my mind.
Drop me a line sometime and let me know how you incorporate movement in your work experience.
Keep moving.
Scott Galloway
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Despite employers’ best efforts to entice everyone back to the office, people are dragging their feet. Their reluctance isn’t about COVID. If you look at the data, far more people have been to a restaurant, movie theater or traveled on an airplane than who’ve gone to the office, according to the Kastle Back to Work Barometer. People’s resistance doesn’t seem to be about flexible work either. Hybrid work has been embraced by 71% of global leaders. They are giving people the option to work two-to-three days from home or other locations.
Hesitancy to return theories range from the dread of wearing work clothes to long commutes. But maybe the most obvious reason is being overlooked. Do people believe anything has really changed if everything looks the same?
In offices around the world, organizations have adopted hybrid work policies. However, they haven’t changed their offices to support the new realities of hybrid work. Some say they’re waiting until employees are back in the office to make changes. But hybrid work means people will come and go at different times. Without changes, the office is often likely to feel empty and lack energy. After two years of isolation, who wants that? Hybrid work also means people will spend a lot more time on video calls. So, they will look for more privacy to meet with remote teammates. Or worse, they’ll do video meetings in the open and become the hybrid version of the office loud talker.
Hybrid work policies will work better if an organization’s space changes in tandem.
The new era of hybrid work means people will have choices about where to work and, in many ways, the office has to work even harder to attract people and keep them coming back. Offices will need to earn people’s commute by meeting a new set of needs: support hybrid work, establish connections, create a sense of belonging and promote wellbeing — all of which suffered during the pandemic.
A NEW INSPIRATION
This requires a shakeup in thinking about the future of the office. The workplace should draw inspiration from a new source — the vibrant communities in which we live. Jane Jacobs, author of “The Death and Life of Great American Cities,” argued decades ago people need diverse neighborhoods to thrive. Places where homes, bustling sidewalks, shops, parks and public spaces come together and “exist in extraordinary variety.”
WHY A HYBRID NEIGHBORHOOD?
A hybrid neighborhood exudes vitality and energy — nothing is static — places and activities adapt and change. The neighborhood is where people form relationships, feel a sense of belonging and build trust.
Today, organizational psychologist and author Adam Grant agrees. “A better vision for a workplace is a community — a place where people bond around shared values, feel valued as human beings, and have a voice in decisions that affect them,” says Grant. The best neighborhoods are ones that foster inclusion and exude personality, where ideas are born and trends are launched.
This is what people at work need more than ever before.
BUILDING A HYBRID NEIGHBORHOOD AT WORK
Organizations can create diverse neighborhoods in their workplace as a tangible way to communicate their values and shift their culture. The workplace can create the same energy and connection people feel in a cafe or in the privacy of their own home.
Neighborhoods at work, like the ones people live in, are a homebase for people and teams, departments or project teams. They include a variety of interconnected spaces that support different types of work, a mixture of uses and the natural flow. They include:
Individual spaces assigned to one person or shared amongst the team
Collaboration spaces for in-person and virtual interactions that support the different ways people need to come together
Places with appropriate privacy for individual heads down work or finding solitude and rejuvenation
Areas to gather, socialize and learn with teammates
Neighborhoods become a destination. People feel comfortable and confident they can find their teammates and the tools they need to do their work.
For a neighborhood to truly work for people it has to be based on a fundamentally new employee experience.
A Framework for Employee Experiences
Equity: Create a more equitable and inclusive experience for all participants. Set a design goal to eliminate the gap between co-located and remote employees.
Engagement: Design settings for a range of experiences that help people participate fully, focus deeply and stay in flow longer.
Ease: Design a variety of intuitive virtual and physical experiences that are easy to navigate and control.
4 KEY DESIGN PRINCIPLES
Every neighborhood has its own distinctive character — four key design principles guide their creation.
Me + We
Just as city neighborhoods have homes and shared spaces, the new neighborhood at work supports both individual and team work. The amount of space for each will vary, but they support people doing different types of work throughout the day. They help people make quick shifts and give people more options and autonomy over their day.
Fixed-to-Fluid
Great neighborhoods evolve when new people move in or a new store opens. At work, change is constant, sometimes in small ways as teams need to grow, or collaborate. A hybrid neighborhood is modular and flexible — embracing change instead of resisting it.
Open + Enclosed
Privacy in the office has become even more important during the pandemic. People struggled with open office plans, after working from home, and are sensitive to their privacy. Great neighborhoods blend private and public spaces, making the neighborhood diverse and dynamic.
Braiding Digital + Physical
Urban planners are creating smart cities and hybrid office neighborhoods need to do the same. Video meetings are a new norm in the office and everyone needs to interact equally. The technology needs to be easy to use, but also the right space and size.
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When Magic Valley Electric (MVE) decided to build their first office in Eastern Idaho, they wanted something special. It had to be a place that reflected their values and was also an exciting place to work. Owner and President Billy Salts started the company in 2013 because he wanted to create something different in the trade. The company has two wings. Magic Valley Electric offers electrical for new construction, including agriculture, industrial, commercial, express, automation, and solar, while Magic Services (established in 2019) provides electrical, plumbing, and HVAC for the residential market. The expansive offering is not the only thing that sets the company apart. According to Salts, “We have an amazing team, and that comes from our core values. We hire and fire off our core values: attitude, character, integrity, vision, and determination. They are our true north.”
Billy Salts Magic Valley Owner & President
“We have an amazing team, and that comes from our core values. We hire and fire off our core values: attitude, character, integrity, vision, and determination. They are our true north.”
Billy Salts
Building Something Different
Salts started in the trade after graduating from high school with no intention of starting a business later. However, after loving the work and moving up in some great companies, he wanted to create something special in the trade. “None of us knew what culture was back then, and the construction industry has always been a little behind the times regarding treating and valuing people. I wanted to be transparent with my team and empower them to be leaders in the company. I wanted to see people succeed and one day take my position. My vision was to build something different; something focused on our team.”
Conference Room With Workstations Behind
Bright Colors & Open Sightlines
Thanks to their values and excellent team, Magic has just moved into its new location in Boise. When you walk into the building, it looks very different than other electrical contractors. With bright colors, clean furnishings, and open sightlines, it creates an energetic atmosphere that makes it an amazing place to work. It is the same way for all the offices. With such a unique space, no one would know how close Magic came to looking like everyone else.
Environment Affects Culture
In 2018, just before finalizing design plans for Magic Services’ building in Jerome, Salts visited DMA, a lighting vendor in Boise. He had an office design that he didn’t love but was ready to move forward with when a chance encounter changed things. While walking through DMA, he noticed how great their desks looked. The owner quickly shared that the Steelcase desks had come from OEC down the road. Salts stopped by the OEC showroom to investigate and was blown away. “I remember taking a ton of pictures. We were about to move forward with an expensive build that, while special to us, wasn’t going to be different. After leaving OEC, we stopped everything and redesigned our entire office. Our culture is so important, and our environment makes it so much better.”
Workstations
Culture In Action at Magic Valley Electric
The strong culture at Magic and MVE has enabled them to accomplish a massive project recently when they landed a solar project for Circle D Farms. By pulling together their whole team, 215 solar trackers were installed on 43 different sites in the Minidoka and Murtaugh counties. The entire project was done in-house, including six miles of trenching, thirteen-hundred yards of concrete, and a very tight deadline. “It took every one of us from our admin team to everybody in the field to make it happen, and we finished within two days of the deadline. It challenged us to dig deep, and that is when our culture really showed up. Our people were smiling and running and gunning and when we finished, it was a celebration. So many of us grew from it, and now we know we can take on even more.”
With teamwork as the focus and a great new office to support its new Boise team, the Team at Magic and MVE is excited to see what the future has in store.
Dave was sent home on Friday the 13th. In true spooky fashion he got back from lunch having no idea what was going on as his coworkers walked past him, carrying laptops and monitors. His entire office was being sent to work from home with no specifications on what equipment they could take or how long they would be gone. Some individuals brought home task chairs, while others who rode their bikes had to beg for a ride home with their gear. It was a little unnerving and understandably so. Now, Dave would be managing remotely for the next two years.
Dave Stout Test Development Engineer in Boise onsemi
When Managing Remotely, Make Information Accessible
Unlike many who were sent home, Dave was partially prepared for remote work. As the manager of test engineering for onsemi’s industrial and commercial sensor division, Dave is used to managing teams in Meridian, Taiwan, and Bangalore, India. “Managing remotely is not a new thing for me, but I definitely think working from home is new for the individual contributors.” Dave started managing a local team before taking on his remote groups, so he had to learn a different management style. This semi-prepared him to help foster the development and the transition of other people from working
strictly in the office to working out. “In a way, it was perfect preparation for when we all came home for COVID. It allowed me to use similar methodologies for my local team. In the beginning, I spent a lot of time showing employees how to find information on what they were doing in different systems. Before, they could ask someone down the row from them. Now, it is more efficient for them to check our system.”
Eliminate Distractions
However, managing remotely is different than working remotely yourself. “I have a wife and three kids (two kids at the time) and a dog. The kids didn’t have school and figured that since I was home, I could play. So, it was not just an adjustment for me but for my kids and my wife, who already worked from home full time. We had to figure out how to coexist during working hours while two kids were doing school online, and my wife and I had constant conference calls.”
Once everything settled down, Dave discovered that he got more done at home than at work. “I love working from home. My kids know not to bother me, whereas when I am working at the office, someone will come to talk to me, and I’ll get distracted. I feel like I’m a lot more efficient at home because I can eliminate the distractions of the workplace.”
“When there are issues, we will have daily meetings for a few minutes. I can ask if there are any problems I can help with and be done in five minutes compared to an entire hour. “
Dave Stout
Do Five Minute Remote Check-Ins
Unfortunately, working from home does not work for everyone. Some of Dave’s team needs to be in the office to be most productive, while others split their time. With this new flexibility, Dave has implemented some procedures he does with his overseas teams. “When there are issues, we will have daily meetings for a few minutes. I can ask if there are any problems I can help with and be done in five minutes compared to an entire hour. It is a way we can stay in tune with each other as if we were talking over the cube wall.”
“Working from home allows me to be more creative, energized, focused, and intentional at work and with my family.”
Dave Stout
Use Your Flexible Schedule To Be With Your Family
Maintaining a good work/life balance is hard in the tech industry because it is cutthroat and busy. It can often look like eight-to-ten-hour days in the office with additional work at home. For Dave, working from home helped relieve the stress and find balance. “With my first two kids, I didn’t spend nearly as much time with them as I could with my third child when she was born. When the first two kids were born, I took three or four weeks off, and then it was back to work. There was a lot of growth in the first two years of their life that I wasn’t there for. “
“At home, I can walk into the kitchen, and there’s my 18-month-old running around and running up to me. I get to spend more time seeing her develop and participating in her development. My other kids come home from school now, and I can spend time with them. Then I get back to work after they go to bed and catch India as they are coming online. Working from home allows me to be more creative, energized, focused, and intentional at work and with my family.”
Solve Problems In -Person
As great as it is to work from home, there are times when Dave chooses to go into the office. Typically, it has to do with solving problems. “When we are jotting down ideas to solve problems, it is important to have someone’s full attention and brainpower. People don’t have their cameras on working from home, so I don’t know if they are actually paying attention. A lot of times, they are multitasking. So, when I need someone’s full attention, I’ll ask for us to sit around a table and hash it out, which gets better results. The other thing is the personal relationship with employees. Having face-to-face contact is important for developing relationships. It is easy to turn off a computer screen at home and not form relationships, so improving my relationship with my team will always pull me back into the office.”
*Dave will be featured in our next edition discussing how onsemi is handling the work from home compromise.
Read Part 1 and Part 2 of the Great Workplace Compromise now!
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Before Covid, Brendan was living and working full-time in San Francisco. He had an apartment in Presidio Heights and took the bus into work every day. Now, he works remotely and splits his time between the Bay Area and Boise as a digital nomad. As a Product Manager at Autolist for their Android app, Brendan can work remotely as long as he has his computer and a good Wi-Fi connection.
Brendan Spillane Senior Project Manager in San Francisco & Boise Autolist
The Bay To Boise
When Covid hit, San Francisco shut down, so Brendan decided to not renew his lease in the city and spend part of his time in Boise, where he grew up. “I get the best of both worlds. San Francisco and Boise are very different, and I enjoy both, so traveling back and forth has been great.” When he made the change, there were still many unknowns about when the office would reopen, and luckily Autolist did not require a hard and fast return.
Onboarding Is Critical
However, remote work isn’t for everyone. It is no secret that some employees have felt isolated while working from home, perhaps more for those onboarding remotely. Autolist has had to be proactive about bringing on new, remote staff. “If you had already been established at a company before the company went remote, it’s easier to keep strong relationships with other teammates. But if you are starting new at a remote company and don’t know anyone, it is more challenging. At Autolist, we believe onboarding is critical for new hires to meet the broader team. Each new hire has a 20-minute casual meeting scheduled with every other teammate (we only have twenty-five people), which helps the new hire meet everyone within a couple of weeks.”
Set A Strick Calendar Schedule
For those used to the office, transitioning to a full work-from-home experience was not easy, and Brendan learned a few lessons along the way. “I learned how important it is to set a strict calendar schedule. When working remote, there is not a natural end to your workday like leaving the office to commute home. Work and personal time can blend together, and it can be hard to keep these priorities separate. I learned to set a strict schedule and put both work and personal responsibilities on my calendar in order to achieve a healthy work-life balance.”
“I recommend people invest heavily in their home office space. If you are going to sit in a chair and use a desk all day, getting the right equipment to create an environment for success is super valuable.”
Brendan Spillane
Create A Productive Environment As A Digital Nomad
Brendan’s favorite thing about working from home is his office. “I like that I can customize my home workspace more than I could in an office. With a stipend, I can buy anything from wall art to a desk plant, which allows me to set up an environment where I can be most productive. I recommend people invest heavily in their home office space. If you are going to sit in a chair and use a desk all day, getting the right equipment to create an environment for success is super valuable.”
Check “The Great Workplace Compromise Part 1” now!
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When Covid hit in the early months of 2020 there was speculation that the office would change forever. Employees were sent home without return dates and in many cases they were unprepared for the challenges that lay ahead. Fast forward to the present and those remote employees have settled into the comfort and flexibility of working from home and are loathe to give it up for the same old office and schedule. A great workplace compromise is coming.
Now Employers Want Their Teams Back In The Office
After undergoing such a massive change and adapting to their new environment, is it fair for employers to call their staff back to the office full time? Are there benefits to working from home instead of the office? This is a debate that many companies are having right now.
In This Issue Employees Make Their Case For WFH
At OEC, we believe the opinions of employers and their employees should lead the decision-making in this great workplace compromise. In the next two issues we will hear from both sides on the work from home issue and learn how local companies are adapting to the new landscape.
David Berry Senior Project Manager in Boise Power Engineers
David Berry is a busy man. When he isn’t managing design teams at five different locations with POWER Engineers, he is brokering deals between companies, lecturing at BSU, and helping his wife care for their five-month-old twins.
For some, juggling these jobs would seem impossible, but as David says, “I’m a short attention span person that likes a challenge.” And a challenge is exactly what he got when he was sent to work from home over two years ago. He quickly went from traveling about one hundred days a year to ten and does most of his work in his laundry room office. After undergoing such a large change like this, it is understandable that employees would want a workplace compromise.
Improve Communication & Onboarding
One of the main challenges David has discovered is communication. “So much of the way we communicated and interacted before the pandemic was face to face. Since then, direct communication has fallen off, and there are also generational aspects to consider. Our younger staff is very good at using instant messaging and emails rather than phone calls, but they struggle to ask questions effectively.
Mentoring has been a difficult process over the last two years, and younger staff need to know how to find information and problem-solve to be successful.” To help fix this problem, David has been creating time templates or outlines for onboarding so they can get remote staff up to speed quickly. Additionally, using video conferencing and other technology has been the key to POWER’s success and growth through the pandemic.
“Mentoring has been a difficult process over the last two years, and younger staff need to know how to find information and problem-solve to be successful.”
David Berry
Learn How To Disconnect
The flexibility of working from home is a double-edged sword for David and his team of consultants. “Walking a couple of rooms over to work is great, but it is also harder to disconnect. My team and I are billable commodities selling our time to firms, so we are always on call. It’s difficult to shut off.”
David tries to have a hard stop every day now at seven. He often works an eleven-hour day, but being home allows him to help care for his kids, which is impossible to do in the office. Having the hard stop for family time keeps him from inevitably being drawn back to work. “I think everyone will continue to struggle with defining those work/life boundaries because working from home has become the norm. It will be interesting to see how that affects our mental fatigue and burnout.”
Prevent Burnout By Recharging
The idea of burnout has not gotten a lot of analysis or investigation. Those who have worked from home can attest to how easy it is to work longer hours, and David makes a good point. “No one can really go from college to a twelve-hour workday. In the same way, very few people can work longer hours without recharging. Some can push through weeks with sixteen-to-eighteen-hour days like accountants in tax season, but then they allow themselves to recover. It is the same way with working from home.”
Workplace Compromise: Realign Client Expectations
Without a doubt, there will always be more work to do. So, the best way David has learned to create time to recharge is by realigning client expectations. “I want to be the manager I feel like I never had in my first ten years of work. I never felt like my manager would bump a schedule for me or fully advocate for the production staff when we were stretched thin with deliverables and deadlines. So, I am trying to align customer expectations, so my team members know I have their backs. If we can’t make a deadline or feel as though quality is suffering because we’re rushing, I will do what I can to internally address items, and then I will have a transparent conversation with the client to reset their expectations.”
*David will be featured in our next edition discussing the work from home compromise from a leadership point of view.
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Layton Construction has been in business for almost 70 years. It has grown from a small, family-held construction company to a major Contractor operating in eight states. Idaho is just one of the states where Layton’s Interior Construction Specialists (ICS) branch operates. To learn more about Layton and the incredible team at ICS, OEC met with ICS Senior Project Manager Tracey Felix and Layton’s Superintendent Jason Horst at an active job site in Meridian.
Dark To Dazzling
At the moment, Elase Medical Spa is a 3,400sf gray jungle of metal framing. However, in the fall of 2022, it will be a dazzling white, high-ceilinged consultation and treatment center offering high quality services with everything from BOTOX and CoolSculpting to skincare and laser hair removal. This Meridian branch will be Elase’s fifth location, with the other four currently in the Salt Lake region.
The project is a design-build, and even as Tracey gives the tour, there are decisions she is making with the owner. What kind of bottle filler do they want, how can they get the most usable space out of their storage room, and how will OEC install the gauzy blue curtain in their lobby? Having a trustworthy construction partner like ICS is what brings customers back time and again.
Elase Medical Spa: Sugar House Location
Local ICS Projects
ICS was founded in 2000 to supply the demand for sophisticated, quality tenant improvement and remodeling services. Since its founding, ICS has become the Top TI Contractor in the Intermountain West. It’s not just Elase that has built a trusting relationship with ICS over the years – companies like Traeger Grills, Google, Pluralsight, Zions Bank, and Workday, to name a few – have partnered with ICS time and again to ensure the most quality, predictable outcome. ICS expanded to Denver, Colorado in 2018 and last year, officially opened an office in the busy Boise market.
The Key To Success: Hiring the Right Team Members
What is the key to their success? It differs depending on whom you ask. Tracey says, “I think it is the fairness to subcontractors. We want to see them succeed and that is why we are so particular about whom we hire.”
Jason plays off Tracey, adding integrity as a significant factor. “We always want to do the right thing and hire people with integrity. We don’t cut corners, and we want to get it right the first time by communicating with owners.”
Layton’s Integrity
Layton headquarters would be proud of these two. According to their value statement, Layton’s goal is to construct with integrity through honesty, safety, unity, and quality. Honesty includes having sometimes hard but truthful conversations with owners to make good decisions.
They are also intensely dedicated to the safety of their teams. Their teams stretch and flex every morning and conduct random safety checks to ensure everyone is compliant. Layton also implements unity through mutual respect and guarantees quality by paying close attention to the details.
Layton’s project team at work
Celebrating Their Staff
By staying true to these values, Layton and, by extension, ICS retains excellent talent. For example, the Elase Job Superintendent has been with the company for over fifteen years. Layton also celebrates their staff on their five-year anniversaries by giving them a paid trip. Their teams work hard, and they take care of their teams in return.
When considering the fantastic work Layton and ICS are doing on its projects, it is no wonder Elase has chosen to partner with them again. Under the watchful eye of ICS and Layton, Elase will be having its grand opening in no time.
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