Leading the Way: Insights from DBIA's First Collaborative Delivery Leadership Academy Graduate

In a recent Design-Build Delivers Podcast episode, we introduced Rene Divelbiss, the first graduate of DBIA’s Collaborative Delivery Leadership Academy. Starting out in the field, Rene advanced to project manager for a general contractor specializing in design-build projects.

Rene joined the Academy to enhance her leadership skills and better support her project team. In the episode, Rene shares valuable insights from the six-course curriculum and encourages other design-builders to hop on board with her. She talks about the diversity of roles in the room with her, the path to an impact statement and the ways in which the Academy increased her self-awareness and adaptability, making her better prepared to be an integral part of her design-build team.

To hear more about Rene’s experiences, tune in to the Design-Build Delivers Podcast and visit the education page on our newly designed dbia.org.

Access all our free design-build resources and learn more about Design-Build Done Right® at dbia.org.

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Chapters

• 0:09 A Round of Applause: Celebrating the First Graduate of the Collaborative Leadership Academy
• 3:05 The Next Logical Step: How the Academy Equips Design-Builders with the Leadership Skills For Success
• 6:01 Calling All Members of the Design-Build Team
• 9:29 Laying the Foundation(s): Reflecting on the First Course of the Academy
• 11:54 Tying the Academy’s Lessons Together
• 15:17 Identifying Your Impact: Leadership Requires Knowing How You Shift the Tides
• 17:03 Take it From the First: Making The Case for the Academy
• 19:56 Academy Lessons in Everyday Work

Transcript

A Round of Applause: Celebrating the First Graduate of the Collaborative Leadership Academy

Erin Looney  0:09  

In February DBIA, launched the collaborative delivery Leadership Academy in partnership with Barbara Jackson. With the continued growth of design build and DBAs 30 year anniversary last year, we started to look at the future, we started to think about what comes next for design build what comes next for you? How do we go from just shaping design build to shaping the leaders who front that growth and who makes sure we're always doing design build, right? The six pack of courses in the Academy are intended as one of those steps, equipping design, build team members with the unique characteristics necessary for leading design build projects. And that doesn't just mean owners or project managers, any team member at any level can benefit from attending, like our guest, Rene DeVilbiss, who holds a special place in the story of the collaborative delivery Leadership Academy in DBIA. I am Erin Looney, and this is the design build delivers podcast brought to you by us CAD. Now Rene is a special place deserves congratulations, Renee, you are the first person to finish all six modules. So welcome to the DBIA history books and cue the round of applause.

Rene Divelbiss  1:16  

Thank you. Thank you. And I'd like to say Yay, it's done. But the truth is the courses are complete. But the work is far from done. This is changing how I listen, respond show up every day. It is not an overnight matter or courses completed. Yeah, you're done. lots lots of work ahead. Yeah.

Erin Looney  1:37  

But I'd say the heavy lifting part is done. Yes. I just want to do

Rene Divelbiss  1:41  

I feel okay, celebrate. We're celebrating. Yeah.

Erin Looney  1:45  

So like I said, you've entered the annals of our history. So it's probably a good idea to get to know you better so that everyone else who comes after you in this grant achievement is going to know a little bit about who you are. So give us a quick rundown of your career path.

Rene Divelbiss  1:59  

I started my career in the industry. As a laborer for a concrete company. It was a summer job between my junior and senior year of high school, I was 17. And I loved the industry as a whole. I did work in the field after completing high school and worked my way up to the field office, it where I was on site every day and just managing things from a field engineering perspective. I did take some civil engineering classes at the local community college in the evenings to not finish the degree. Today, I have 26 years in the industry from starting in the field to now a project manager for a general contractor that focuses on design build projects, I am on the cusp of figuring out where I'm my career and and what's next for me. So with my experience so far, I know that I have a story, have a contribution to those coming up in the industry, I want to help and expand my knowledge of what I've learned and work on developing the next leaders in our industry. And based

The Next Logical Step: How the Academy Equips Design-Builders with the Leadership Skills For Success

Erin Looney  3:05  

on what you just said, you clearly have this extensive background, lots of success, a commitment to the industry, you you truly know your stuff. Now, given that experience that on the ground in the projects, doing the work you do what made you decide to take the collaborative delivery Leadership Academy courses and why now,

Rene Divelbiss  3:22  

I'm the project manager on my first design build project. Now I've had involvement and design build projects, just not in this role. And I came into the current project with you know, design development drawings that were under review for permitting, I was new to this company, new to the project team. And you know, there were some changes within the architects team. And I was seeking out ways to contribute to the success of the project team as a whole and for any future projects. And I've read the flyer for this course, or the six classes of this course. And what they were being offered was what I was seeking said, this is going to help me this is going to help me to be a better leader on this project team. Little did I know it'd be far far greater reach than just this project team on this current job I'm working on. I've learned a lot. And um, that's really what got me started was, you know, understanding that this would help me in my current role.

Erin Looney  4:17  

You mentioned before something about the next logical step. And it sounds like that's how you view this academy that this is where you go next. This is what helps you take what you know, add in what you're learning now and become even better at what you do. And as our first official graduate, though, you have a fresh, unbiased, unfiltered take on the academy. There's no one who can influence your perspective. So what are some key takeaways across the six modules?

Rene Divelbiss  4:42  

By taking these courses, I've just more confident in my role and my ability to work on making the team better, you know, taking this courses providing me the roadmap to my next experience in the industry to my next level. I didn't know at the time I registered that I was going to be the first one finish by the way. That just happened to be I just I saw that this these courses are being offered, they applied to, to me in the situation I was in, I just signed up right away. And just turns out, I

Erin Looney  5:12  

happen to be the first one done and a hell of an Ambassador.

Rene Divelbiss  5:14  

Thank you so much. But yeah, I just feel like I've learned some of these tools that are going to help me be successful not just on the current project, but on future projects. I wanted to better understand the design build done right leadership approach in comparison to what I've already experienced in the industry as a leader. Now working from on these hard bid or MP jobs, these different contracting types, you have a different mindset than what's required on design build, you have to be more open. And I knew that there was something that I needed to learn. To help me with that I needed to have a go into this at this foundations class, knowing that I was going to find out what that was to get me to the next level of understanding.

Erin Looney  6:01  

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Calling All Members of the Design-Build Team

And so when you looked around the room in the foundation's course, which is the prerequisite course for the other five, when you got in there on day one, you started to learn a little bit about the other people in there with you, because that's a big part of the experience. So what did you notice who was in there? Were there any surprises?

Rene Divelbiss  6:51  

No, there weren't any surprises. But there were people from all walks of the industry. So there was architects, we had engineers, with some consultants, there was even an attorney. And when working on traditional design, bid build projects, you have these preconceived notions on each of those trades, you don't really get to engage in a learning environment with these other people that you work with on a regular basis, but you're not really together in a learning situation. So this opened up a lot of conversation, we would have breakout sessions, and I would, ironically, was in a group with an architect, a consultant, an engineer, and a contractor. And we all talked about the stereotypes that we had against each other. And it just opened up for us to be able to say, Okay, this is no longer an us versus them environment. Design Build is not, hey, this detail is wrong, you're gonna pay for it. Like, that's not it. And the contractors are not after every change order anymore. It's not the damy on the back of the yacht, you know, the yacht being the change order, thank you being in the cup. That's not That's not where we're at anymore in the industry. So there's a mindset shift, you have to change how you interact with these different partners. And they are they're your partners or your team. So that was really insightful for me was just to break those barriers and come up to the reality of that's not us

Erin Looney  8:21  

versus them. And that is exactly what we promote at DBIA. And with design build done, right? It's not us versus them, it's just us. So what did you know, or let's say, think you knew about yourself as a leader prior to the Foundation's course,

Rene Divelbiss  8:35  

we fill out a survey prior to the class. And when you're taking that survey, that really is when the lesson started. For me. It's like, okay, I know what I want to be. I know that there's a way that I see myself, there's a way that other people see me, and there's a way I want to be, but what is the reality of the way I am? So I tried to answer as honestly as who I thought I was to get the best results. And I was so surprised that I was on this more passive, not assertive, and I feel like I'm an assertive direct, kind of, let's talk it out hash out the issue and move on with though I my reactions to situations were not what I expected. And it was eye opening because the more I dove into what those results meant, and where I needed to be like if I react in a certain way, naturally, how do I need to change that to react in a design build environment. So

Laying the Foundation(s): Reflecting on the First Course of the Academy

Erin Looney  9:29  

you had doesn't sound like a total sea change. But it does sound like you became a little more self aware, significantly more self aware. And you can see the relationship now between the way you would respond and the way your design build team would respond to your response. So at the end of the day, at the end of the foundation's course, what thoughts did you leave with?

Rene Divelbiss  9:50  

I really had to look at elevating my consciousness on how I listen, how I respond, and how I engage With everyone in my world, not just my direct project team, but in life, what you put out is what you get back and you're putting out an environment of teaming and you want to come together, I just knew I had to work on myself that this wasn't as much learning how to lead in the design build environment, it was figuring out who I am and how I react to things so that I can adjust to be a better team member this environment.

Erin Looney  10:26  

Obviously, through the first half of this conversation, it's clear, you wanted to take these courses, and you were excited about it. And you saw a clear direction for using what you learned. But what reservations did you have before you started? And how were you able to alleviate those? Well,

Rene Divelbiss  10:42  

I had taken some other leadership classes in the past. And I wanted to see really how what I previously learned about myself could be a benefit in the design build world, I knew that I'd have to change, I knew that there would be some changes required of me. And that was a little intimidating. I didn't know what to expect. And change is always scary. But I came out knowing that I can take my personality traits as they are. And I can make betterman sense to them, I can make little adjustments, and how I listen, how I speak and how I respond to achieve better results

Erin Looney  11:18  

now is what you're saying that you don't necessarily have to change who you are or what you believe. But you do have to think in terms of the impact of your presence on a team, how your perspective affects the project. It sounds like it's more of a change what I can for the better, but don't sweat what I can't, that is

Rene Divelbiss  11:36  

a fair assessment. And it's opening your eyes to the personality traits of other people on your team, which is a little bit beyond the foundation scores, you need to get into the teaming and you learn a lot more about paying attention to everyone on your team, understanding their personalities, and how they like to receive information, having a level of understanding to be able to collaborate,

Tying the Academy’s Lessons Together

Erin Looney  11:54  

the collaborative delivery Leadership Academy is self paced, it can be taken in any order, as long as you start with that foundation session. The courses each look, as we've noted at something a little bit different. But there's a unifying theme. Of course, that's what we've been talking about preparing you to be a leader on a design build project, regardless of the role you hold within that team. So again, it's not just for owners, it's not just for project managers, or somebody said to me at our spring conference, just casually, oh, yeah, I'm not going to take that that's for the young folks. And that's just simply not true. You know, at any specific point in your career path where you want to change or at least evaluate the way you approach your work in the grander scheme. The Academy could help. Now looking at that whole six pack of courses, they they all do work together, as we've said, no matter the order, but how did you find that each of those courses ended up tying in with the others

Rene Divelbiss  12:46  

I like to speak the first part is that you mentioned that it only applied to younger generation. No, this is for all of us. 26 years in the industry. And I knew that there was something within this leadership academy that was going to benefit the current project. And me personally moving forward. Each class focuses on a single aspect of leadership and working on the design build team, but they do all work together. And you have to take the class to see, I think you should, everyone should sign up. It's not just for project managers. It's not just for architects or engineers. It's not for a specific person, each individual on my team, each person within the company can benefit from this course. It's really looking at yourself. And it's looking at other people and finding that common ground to work together to create this environment for collaboration and communicating clearly with each other, which of course, surprised you the most every course actually surprised me with more than I expected. And that's pure honesty. I went into each course. And Farber starts the class with impact statement. And the impact statement at the start of each class was the most challenging thing we did. And it was really, you know, answering the question of What difference do you make? Not simply, what is your role in the project? What's your role in the company? It's not what your project you're working on? It's what impact do you have as a whole? What are you trying to achieve? You know, I'm working on a medical treatment facility, it's Recovery Clinic, and I'm working on bettering the community. I'm providing resources for recovery. You're not just building a structure, you're not just checking a box to finish a job. You're providing a resource, you're bettering the community as a whole. So it's opened my eyes to what impact do I make every day? How do you show up? What are you trying to achieve? It's not just hey, we're going to meet schedule, we're going to meet budget, and we're going to do it as a team. No, it's you know, what is your true impact in the industry? It was the start of every course that she does adjust Have questions. So you can't have a copy and paste answer for every course. So heads up to those that are taking it. You know, if you make it through the first foundation course of what's your impact, the question will be adjusted for the other forces. So you cannot have a copy and paste answer for this. 

Identifying Your Impact: Leadership Requires Knowing How You Shift the Tides

Erin Looney  15:17  

Gotta make it a challenge, right? And I actually thought is, and I'm a part time professor myself, I teach communication. I was listening to that section thinking I absolutely love this. In the session I attended in Orlando, they were the attendees were struggling a little bit, you know, I mean, these are people with anywhere from a week to 30 odd years in the industry. And every one of them to almost the same level, we're hitting the same roadblocks while trying to create that impact statement. And Barbara was pushing rebutting everything they said, encouraging them to go like a step further and a step further toward something quantifiable. And I 100% will be stealing that in some of my classes, because it's really an important thing to understand that we don't spend a lot of time talking about that. So when you're finished with foundations, do you take that impact statement with you to the next course, and then to the next and on into your work?

Rene Divelbiss  16:09  

You build on it? Another thing I couldn't say, today, what's your impact statement today, I do not have it recited, I do not have anything memorized. And I feel like if I say it today, that Barbara would like, call me or email me and question it and make me take a deeper dive into it.

Erin Looney  16:23  

100%, she would.

Rene Divelbiss  16:27  

So I will say that my general statement is that I'm calm in the eye of the storm that I want to be the center. And you know, the the eye of the storm is the commerce part. So when all the chaos is happening, no matter what's going on, and the people I work with live, I want to be a place where they feel safe to come and talk to me if there's a problem in the field, I would like trade partners to be comfortable to come talk to me about it. And in all the chaos, I want to be that calm in the eye of the storm. So that's my general impact. But that can be subject to change.

Take it From the First: Making The Case for the Academy

Erin Looney  17:03  

And of course, as you said, it changes a little bit as the classes go on. And I don't want to give away the farm because we really want people to take this, you know, we don't want them to go in with the answer already written out. But speaking of getting people to take this, if you had to pitch this to someone, if you had to say to somebody, I took the collaborative delivery Leadership Academy, and it was fantastic. And here's why you should do it. How would you do that? How would you approach that conversation? And who would you encourage to complete the Academy,

Rene Divelbiss  17:32  

I would say anyone that's working around a design build project needs to take the leadership development course, anyone, and we are the ones that are going to be changing leadership of the past to the present leaders. One takeaway is you change the weather by how you show up every day, people that have taken these courses, we're the ones that have to spread this message to everyone. So the more people to take the courses, the more people that we're going to be on the same page on a project, you know, hopefully, we work together. And we can say, Oh, you took that course. So we're on the same page. It's a shift and how we do business. It's not the ways of the past anymore. We need to we need to evolve, we need to change how we manage and it starts with every individual.

Erin Looney  18:18  

Well, I think that would convince most people. So taking that and going sort of to the logical next step. The academy is designed to elevate design, build professionals, and DBIA. You know, we elevate design build this is to create that culture of leadership across those design build teams that fits in with what we do here. We've been talking about this as sort of a natural evolution that we set the standard for design build with our best practices, we've got clear benchmarks for what makes a successful design build project, tireless advocacy at the state, local and national levels, a lot of other efforts, of course. So now as you alluded to, we have designbuild growing so rapidly and people equipped to take on the project but we need to build the leaders, we need to develop the people who will keep that momentum going and Renee you are the first of what we hope will be a long list of confident and competent design build leaders. So welcome again to the DBIA InDesign build history books. Now you're finished with the course what comes next,

Rene Divelbiss  19:18  

I'm going to take the information that I've learned back to my project team back to my company, we're going to share in our monthly meetings I'm going to express what I've learned take a little bit of time here to skip parts and pieces and recommend that they sign up and take the classes themselves because what they get out of it is not going to be maybe everything that I got out of it because it is really a look into yourself and how you interact and how you present yourself and how you talk and work with other people. And every individual needs to to experience the six courses and they need to experience what their impact is sharing

Academy Lessons in Everyday Work

Erin Looney  19:56  

with everyone is one thing like you said though the experiences Different for anyone who takes the course for some, there may be a big shift in the way they approach their work for others possibly a reassurance or building on what they've successfully done. But regardless of how much of a change you come away with in your leadership style, the courses are applicable on the daily. So what does your work post collaborative delivery Leadership Academy look

Rene Divelbiss  20:20  

like? There are a lot of things that come to mind. In the course of a normal day where I react to something, I maybe get an emotional response. And I can stop and I hone it in, I think it's part of or say, or there's a statement that comes to mind or there's a piece of information that I'm like, wait a minute, you need to set that trade aside, Rene, you need to go about it this way. So it's really identifying. And I've learned myself in a way, I'm more attentive to who I am. And I acknowledge right away when I need to change and you can always reset, you can always just pause and reset. The biggest takeaway I have is that, you know, the ones that take in this leadership course, are the ones that are changing the industry. The future is designbuild. It's time to get on board. Let's all be great leaders. One of the slides throughout the courses is quote, that you're leading and nobody's following. You're just taking a walk. That's a pretty common one throughout and that's, that stays with me as well.

Erin Looney  21:27  

Renee might be the first but she definitely won't be the last graduate of the collaborative delivery Leadership Academy. In fact, we will talk to some more grads in the coming weeks so make sure you follow the design build delivers podcasts so you don't miss out. And to learn more about the academy so you really don't miss out so you can sign up and take the courses, visit the education page on our newly designed dbia.org. Today's show was produced and edited by Fred Yee and brought to you by us CAD Learn more at us cad.com/dbia

Transcribed by https://otter.ai