The Room Where It Happens

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Got the co instead of both the CEO and founder of Shadow Ventures and KP Ready Company . Kp , welcome back .

But what we do here at KP Unpacked is we take one of KP's LinkedIn posts and unpack it . It's that simple . So if you're not following him , you should follow KP Ready on LinkedIn . So it's just KP Ready R-E-D-D-Y on LinkedIn .

Follow him because he posts at least once a day , usually more , and all of his posts are very insightful about the AEC world , about innovation , about the future of professional services for the built environment , and I get to come here and spend a little bit of time talking about one of those posts with KP , asking what the inspiration is and digging a little

deeper , and so we're going to do that here again today . The post that I've picked out this is actually a post that you reshared from our company page , so from the KP ReadyCo page . You re-shared this and it goes like this so many events in the AEC industry focus on panels that report back to the audience on the case studies of their work .

So the past they report back on the past . They rarely shape any predictions of the work . So the past they report back on the past .

They rarely shape any predictions of the future , mostly because they're there to promote their product or service , while our Catalyst Network and that's our online network for KP Ready Company we have a community online on the Circle platform , if any of you are familiar with that .

It says while our Catalyst network has no crystal ball , they're hard at work contributing and collaborating on how innovation will shape everyone's future . Do you want to be in the room where it happens in quotes which you're going to tell me in a minute where that quote is from , because I'm not as cultured ?

Do you want to be in the room where it happens , or would you prefer to be Aaron Burr ? Okay , that was the . That was the big hint , right there , right ? So what's that quote from ?

I'm less interested in going , sure , because it means it's probably terrible , um , but I did go and I thoroughly enjoyed it and I was fortunate to meet some of the cast members , uh , and stuff like that . So super cool , um , but yeah , that's where it's from . Yeah , but there's very few like plays on recommending these days .

I don't go to that many yeah , that I understand we can .

I don't really like making that comparison , but I think it's understandable for people . It's a community where a platform where our community can gather and the people that are in there are leaders from ENR top 500 firms . They are people that are our mastermind members , our innovation leaders , our construction technology leaders , our early and mid-career , our AI pros .

They are founders from our incubator companies . There are a lot of different people on our platform in that community , that catalyst network , but they are as you say , they are the doers , they're the people that are shaping the future of the built environment . So that is the room . That is a great way to describe it .

Like it's pretty bad , like we don't get a lot of sponsors , um , and it's partly because a lot of sponsors are like , hey , I'd love to sponsor your event , I'd love to sponsor , love to sponsor your podcast .

We get those , but then they want us to like only talk about , um , they don't want to talk about , like we have to talk about their nonsense , right , and I don't . I'm not gonna talk about whatever they're schlepping today .

Um , I'll talk about stuff that people are schlepping if I believe in it , but I'm not like sure , I don't know what are they gonna pay us ? Like 20 grand or something for what ? Like that's a big , so what ? Um ? So I'm not , I'm not .

I think what's happened is we have this industrialized event system in our industry , right the industrial complex right , whether it's the um , um , the , the alphabet soup of organizations , whether it's Built World , dnr , like the media side of things , where they're not really media right .

If you think about DNR , probably a little bit more media , they report on projects and stuff , so there's like a journalistic component to it , whereas like Built World , there's no journalistic component to any of it . It's just really events and programming based on what sponsors want to do and that's fine . I'm not going to judge people's business models .

That's their business model . I think the challenge with that is it becomes an echo chamber of the same companies and the same topics , because everybody's kind of selling the same stuff , right . And I think you know , one component we've added into our kind of ecosystem really has been owners and that's continuing to grow .

And so the conversations that owners are having with us you know these are everyone's customers about how they want to work with us . I don't think I've ever seen that before in any community because there's just not a great forum for that . So we're going to continue to double down on our owner relationships into 2025 .

But you know , the Hamilton reference is basically that Aaron Burr gets like shut out of the meat , like when they talk about creating our country and the economic system and all those things and what this country stands for . Aaron Burr is not invited . I'm not sure why . I'm not sure what he was schlepping . Maybe he was schlepping something .

Hey , no infomercials in here .

man Like you can't come in here and tell us about what you're selling , um , but I think it's important , you know , and I think people keep asking us to define what we've been building and what I've been building like , oh , like you guys are events , you guys are community , like it's just like all the above , and I was like , maybe , maybe I don't need to .

You know , we're not funded from the outside , right , you know , all these other organizations have investors . There's only one stakeholder here , like me . Right , so I get to do whatever I want to do in many ways , but there is some method to our madness in terms of really trying to move the industry forward on multiple levels .

Right , madness in terms of really trying to move the industry forward on multiple levels . Right , on multiple levels , whether it's education , creating safe spaces for people to communicate to each other , by keeping some people out , you know , you create a safe space by curating the right people in the room and not letting the wrong people in the room .

Right , right , right . So I think that's kind of why I was

. You know , the post was interesting to me , other than you know , does anybody how cultured is our audience ? I think , I think I'm the only one that reposted . I'm probably the only one that , like , reacted to it . So apparently our , our community is a lot less cultured not very I . That . I thought that . I thought I guess it's football season .

Who can think about Broadway ?

it's not already in what we do , and it's this idea of and understand you know , no hate mail , please , because I'm not going to apply this term absolutely properly but the idea of the circular economy .

There's so much of what we do , and you mentioned having owners in the room and this thing that we're going to launch probably Q1 , maybe towards the end of Q1 2025 , is 100% focused on the circular economy , in that , when we talk about innovation for the built environment , what we mean is how it's designed , how it's developed , how it's constructed you know the

materials and things that go into it how it's operated , how people live there , how people work there , whatever , whatever the use is , whatever the , the , the solution is . I suppose part of that . That's what I'm not completely properly referring to as the circular economy .

It's everything involved in the built environment and in creating and operating in the built environment , and so the owners are a big piece of that right and so the room where it happens is , like you said , echo chamber . You know , and you come from a civil engineering background . I come from an architecture background . I've been a member of AIA .

You know part of the alphabet soup for decades now , have spoken at all of the alphabet soup events , as you have , and the thing that stands out is , yes , those , those are echo chambers . I go to an AI event and it's architects and sponsors , generally speaking .

I go to other types of events and they are , you know , it's this narrow swath and maybe sponsors , right , but our circular economy , you know , the room where it happens is truly the room where it happens , because it's the owner saying , hey , this is what we need , and it's the architects and engineers and contractors responding to that .

It's not just this , oh , this is the way we ought to do business , it's got , it comes full circle the circular , circular economy .

But if you think about it , in any system , if you take a systems thinking approach to anything right , and that's what we're designing and building , operating as systems , right , they're not buildings , they're systems .

In what universe do they not have a seat at the table right and where we're giving them a feedback loop to say , hey , that next chiller you designed for your next version , here's some feedback on the existing one and here's the trends , here's some great feedback so that when you guys design your next chiller or you're inventing your next thing , we're giving you .

I mean , I always tell people it's this odd thing where you know , if Apple designed an iPhone and never talked to the camera manufacturers and the glass manufacturers and everyone else and just kind of did it in a vacuum and said , oh , foxconn , go figure out , go figure it all out , right , that's what we're doing .

It's absolutely absurd in the room right that are able to share an opinion and a voice and have like an integrated voice , so to speak , to drive change .

I think that's really what we're doing and you know , a lot of people are like you know , it's kind of funny when we do some of these things and , of course , we have a revenue model associated with it , and I think I've yet I think we've yet to turn down somebody that is super passionate and , for whatever reason , their budget cycle or whatever that we say ,

hey , like we're going to exclude you because you can't pay to enter the room .

I think we've been pretty good about making exceptions for the right people , right , the right people , and a lot of times it's just , you know , it's budgets and budget cycle , like whatever it is Right , and we've actually had a lot of people pay , like out of their own pocket , to be in the room because their boss is like no , I don't think you should be

doing that , fine , right , they just do it themselves . So I think , while there's kind of a price of admission to the room right , I don't , I don't think that's where we're hanging our hat Now , with that said , like the revenue model allows us to drive growth right , allows us to make new hires , have more and more scale to what we're doing .

So that's a necessary requirement . But I think foundationally we are just we're actually trying to drive change and not in a committee policy way . Right , if another alphabet soup organization starts another innovation committee , you know it's basically like a nothing .

You know they're not doing anything right , or always related to like hey , how's that BIM standard going ? You know from 15 years ago , like how's ?

I was just tired , right , it's like my LinkedIn post . Not all of them are winners . Sometimes I'm just tired y'all . But sometimes I had maybe one or two bourbons and I'm a little sleepy too . But I think foundationally right , it's that drive to really make a difference . And I think the herd mentality is sometimes the circling of the wagons .

Right , when I meet with these large firm roundtables and they all have a point of view , that's just absolutely wrong . That is a circling of the wagons and fear of the future . And if you're afraid of the future , like , go play somewhere else , go to Built Worlds . By the way , I love Built Worlds . A lot of my people are there built worlds .

Uh , it's kind of funny . A lot of my portfolio companies . They've been sweeping up on the awards over built worlds . So I should probably have a better attitude towards it . But , um , because they do , they do help us out a good bit , uh , whether they like it or not , but , um but I think it's just what you're into , right , it's just what .

What do you want to do ?

And so , as as you're , as you were saying , that I'm thinking about , like our mastermind groups , right , in a way , you know , as a , for instance , our innovation leaders mastermind group . That's a , that's a role focused mastermind group . So this is people that are director of innovation , chief innovation officer , right , they ?

They have responsible responsibility at the strategy and budget level to guide innovation for their firms at the strategy and budget level , to guide innovation for their firms , and they are from architecture firms and engineering firms and construction firms .

But this is also a room where they challenge each other , they ask questions and they you know , I have a lot of people . I do all the vetting for our mastermind groups and a lot of people are like , oh , I want to get into that group , and so they come . This is what I can bring to the group .

This is what I can bring to the group , and so that's great . What do you want to take away from this group ? Because it's a two way street and it can't be .

You can't come to whether it's our community , our catalyst network , or it's our community , our Catalyst Network , or one of our events , like the executive briefing in Miami about a month ago , I think , as we record this our mastermind groups .

You can't come with the idea of this is what I bring to it , because if that's what you bring to it , that's sort of a fixed mindset approach to it . Right , okay , this is , this is how I'm coming in . I don't care where you come in , I want to know where , where it is that you're going out . We have the same conversation in the incubator , right ? If ?

If you have the same idea four weeks from now that you did today , there's a problem yeah , you bet .

happens , right , that's where progress is made . It's not made through . Let's all decide on something together . Made through . Let's all decide on something together . Like let's all decide on something together .

Yeah , that just means that we're gonna all decide on something that meets half of our needs right mediocrity for the architects out there , you know , because that those are my people , right ?

And if you think about it I was , you know , I was talking to some architects about this They've like outsourced everything . You have a lighting consultant , a lead consultant , they basically become like project managers and once owners kind of start figuring that out , that they don't actually do that much , they're just outsourcing it all , then they love it .

Owners love working with people that outsource everything , like general contractors . So I think it's an interesting time to really and these are the conversations we can have . I mean , I'll have them in a public forum , I don't care , but if you're in an architecture firm and you're in one of our , you know you're in the room we're having these conversations .

Right , it was not only like the aesthetic , the exterior , you know , the elevations and whatnot , but it was also the experience of the spaces , and we understood that we weren't that great at producing the construction documents . We were proficient , we were competent , all those things , but we were slow and all that . So we did exactly what you're saying , right .

We started to basically pare our practice down with the goal of clients who really , really wanted a certain level and expertise and there were specialties involved here , but that wanted that design expertise .

Pay us for that right , pay us what we're worth for that , and we will happily let somebody else , you know , do the AutoCAD , the Revit models , the detailing , the whatever . You will consult with them , you know , to make sure that the design is is carried out .

But I I could easily see , you know , the , the profession headed in a direction like that , or becoming a whole bunch of subspecialties . I think you know , I think the quote-unquote full service firms are kidding themselves because , because they can't right , they can't be the best at all of those aspects and arguably , they aren't the best at any of those aspects .

Yeah , so I think what you're saying holds a lot of water . We really need to rethink the , the model , the business model , certainly , or business models that are possible , um , not only with technology , but in in the marketplace yeah , I think it's .

It was actually ui , it wasn't even ux , was like ui , right . And then they would create these heavy adobe files and then we'd basically have to carve them down into being JPEGs . And there were these elaborate things that quite honestly showed up in print but didn't show up on a screen back in the day for ADP .

So they had to dumb it down a bit for the internet . And then we had a programmer that would take those up , take those and implement them in HTML . That was the system . Now , that's insane . Now we talk about full stack developers . The full stack developer understands the UX , the CX for those that you don't know user experience , customer experience .

They understand that . They understand what can be done on the coding side . So in many ways back then the architects were like the graphic designers and the software coders were like the engineers and contractors , like , oh , how are we going to get this to work right ? Oh , you put too much detail here .

This is impossible to build , we're going to have to dumb it down for the internet , right . And now in software it's this full-stack developer , right . We used to have software engineers that didn't even have Adobe products because they were expected to be fed the images and where to put them right . That's what they did . Where do you want this image ?

Now we have full stack developers . It's kind of fully integrated right In most cases . So it's like , as you think about that , what does full stack look like to get the overall like impact for an owner ? So , anyway , we digress a bit , but I mean honestly , these are the digressions we have or talk about this stuff .

But I think I think the time has come in a way . We have generational shifts . I mean the conversations I'm having and you know how busy it is for me , but just what the owners are telling me and they don't have a voice and they spend all the money . How do you spend all the money and you don't have a say ?

So you don't have a voice in the industry , like that's .

out there that have closed their mind to this idea that they're in professional services .

These are professional services fields , right , and if we are not creating a client experience and a client outcome , right , that our clients find value in , right , the value proposition of these things , then we lose and I think the owners are headed towards a place where they're better able to leverage uh , leverage that reality .

I think that's going to have a huge impact on the way business is done going forward yeah , it's super interesting .

Now I'm in a motorcycle phase , but in my car phase it was an interesting time because if you bought a bmw , you had to be able to afford the maintenance , which was insane . It was they're all very problematic cars right at a point . And then BMW came out and said hey , for the first 60 000 miles , maintenance is included . That's when they took off .

Yes , because it was like hey , I , you know , I , I love my BMW the day I buy it . But then a year later , it's my nemesis , right , like , oh my God , I just spent . Every time I go into the dealership it's $1,000 . I can't afford to do this . And I think sometimes that's where we are with owners .

Right , they get a building designed , they go through all the pain and suffering of it , they go through the financing department and , just like when you buy a car and you try to get sold all kinds of nonsense you don't need and there's negotiations and they do all that stuff right .

But they finally get what they think they wanted and they are so excited , right . I always tell people the 10% , 10 , the closeout docs . The reason why closeout docs don't happen is the owners just don't care anymore yeah , they have , they've been beaten into submission . They just want the damn keys to the building . Yeah , they're just ready to move in .

Yeah , yeah , whatever closeout docs , get them to me later . They never follow up , they never get delivered , right , because they're just so excited to move in . And then they release that 10% retainage or whatever the retainage is .

Then they go into building and they're like so excited , it's like that new building smell , right , all those VOCs coming off the carpets and the paints . Fantastic , right , it's that vibe , right . But then , five years from now , damn , they're unhappy with their building . This hasn't worn well . Oh my god , that damn chiller's always given us a problem .

Um , there's , I mean , all the things right , but everybody's gone , everybody's gone and they're done , so now they're unhappy . But the problem is the people that are unhappy with it never have a voice on the next project , all the maintenance people .

So I feel like that's where we are in a moment in time where there's so many things , just amazing things happening in the world right now in terms of projects and airports and stuff like that . However , um , I think the owners are are figuring it out yeah , yeah , we could .

You know we talk about trickle-down . What always amazes me is I used to here's something that our audience doesn't know I used to race mountain bikes and there was a particular brand .

But it used to always amaze me in the days when dual suspension bikes became attainable dual suspension bikes became attainable that a lot of the technology that was on my bike whether it was the suspension fork or the shock for the back , a lot of that was coming directly , indirectly , was coming from Formula One .

And you think about that and go , okay , well , you know you guys are talking about these owners that you know that are big owners or whatever it's like . It trickles down , it's coming down , whether it's in the form of tech or expectations . It's coming down and it will drive the market . So , again , we could do a whole series on this .

Maybe we should , but these are the things that are discussed at executive briefings and are discussed in mastermind groups , that are discussed in the Catalyst Network , which you refer to as sort of the basis of this post that we've been unpacking . So let me recap . I'll read the post again and again .

If you're not following KP Ready K-P-R-E-D-D-Y on LinkedIn , you should be . This is actually one that KP reposted from our corporate page , from the KP Ready Co page , but it pops up , of course , on his personal feed here .

So many events in the AEC industry focus on panels that report back to the audience on the case studies of their work , so , in other words , the past . They rarely shape any predictions of the future , mostly because they are there to promote their product or their service .

While our Catalyst network has no crystal ball , they are hard at work , contributing and collaborating on how innovation will shape everyone's future , and you know you may read that or hear me say that go , that sounds odd .

We're referring to our community , the Catalyst Network , in that sense , and so the question is do you want to be in the room where it happens the Hamilton reference or would you prefer to be Aaron Burr ? If you haven't seen the musical , maybe you need to Google that . I don't know what you need to do in order to understand that .

Maybe re-listen to KP's explanation at the beginning of this episode , but hopefully this has been intriguing , thought-provoking . We've gone a little bit all over the place in this conversation , but I think it's been a good one . Thank you for this , KP . Absolutely . We'll be back again next week .

We publish one of these episodes every week where we unpack KP's LinkedIn posts . If you're not following him again , kp Ready on LinkedIn Once , twice , three times . The latest on LinkedIn , kp's posting things that are definitely relevant , that are thought-provoking and may challenge you in terms of the way things are happening and will happen in the AEC industry .

So thanks for listening . We'll be back . Our producer , ethan , will post everything in the show notes , all the links and things that we've talked about , and we'll see you again next week . Thanks everybody , thanks KP , hey .