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Cheers to Turkey Hill!

Turkey Hill Minit Markets is joining a number of other convenience stores, grocery chains, and other retail entities offering the sale of beer and wine. A Pennsylvania law passed in 2016, called Act 39, specifically allows the sale of alcohol (beer and wine) in convenience stores. Thus, consumers have updated their expectations and many are asking when they might be able to find local convenience stores that are selling these products. A change of this magnitude is not a quick and easy evolution, however. Horst Construction has participated on the team that is evaluating what this will mean for the impacted stores.

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Diepak Kasi to Inspire Project Managers at IPM Day 2017

Diepak Kasi is one of IIL’s featured presenters at IPM Day 2017. His topic, The Power of Vision in the Digital Age, focuses on using vision as a path to fulfilling a higher level of satisfaction—both on the job and in one’s personal life. According to Diepak, “Many people do not have inspiring long-term goals or motivations. They perform their jobs and collect their paychecks without really questioning why they are doing what they do. However, a life without inspiration or the joy of making a contribution bigger than oneself results in feeling unfulfilled in the long term. On the other hand, if you have a vision—where you want to go and how you would like to contribute to society—you will be inspired to make that vision a reality and you can enjoy a higher level of fulfillment and satisfaction.”

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Horst Construction Selected to Convert, Preserve, and Expand One of Collegeville’s Most Memorable Places

Horst Construction is excited to announce that it has been selected as the General Contractor for a new Providence Place Senior Living Community in Collegeville, PA. Construction is scheduled to begin later this fall.

The site is the former Collegeville Inn, located at the intersection of Germantown and Ridge Pike in Lower Providence Township. Locals fondly remember the Inn for its smorgasbord restaurant, banquet facility, and of course, the carved bear that welcomed guests. The site is both nostalgic and scenic. Its proximity to the Perkiomen Creek will create a peaceful setting for future residents.

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Meet the Client: Horst Construction

A Master at Capturing Space… One Church at a Time

by Francine Carb, President

Meet Rick Lown, RA, NCARB, Master Planning and Preconstruction Services at Horst Construction, and our client.
“In 7th grade, all the students were required to take woodshop, metal shop, and drafting. In drafting class, we had an assignment to design our dream house and project it as a 3-D image. Game over…I was beyond fascinated. From that moment on, I was determined to follow my dream and become an architect. The idea and act of ‘capturing space’ is what keeps me energized and engaged every day.”

 

Rick has over 29 years of experience in design and construction. Having been involved in the planning, expansion, and renovations of over 150 religious institutions, his specialty is Master Planning and Design-Build projects.

Rick’s journey was filled with challenges and rewards. He was the only one in his family to go to college and was accepted to Lehigh University. When he was just about to graduate, Pennsylvania changed the rules to become a Registered Architect; he would now need a master’s degree or specific Architecture Degree in order to practice the profession. He attended Drexel University’s night school, driving from his job in Lancaster to Philadelphia and back—for 6 years! He sat for the intense 12 hour-a-day, 4 day exam, and passed it. In those days, becoming an architect was similar to preparing to become an MD, including 3-4 years as an apprentice. Even back at Lehigh, the curriculum was designed to weed out those less serious about the profession.

At Horst Construction, Rick’s job—and passion—is bringing a church’s vision to reality. He works intently with building committees to listen to their vision, evaluate their programming needs, and create schematic sketches that offer options to consider, while keeping with the original goals of the committee. Rick began developing his own Master Planning methodology back in 1998 and continues to develop this journey—keeping it current and modern. As one of his clients, Fellowship Church states, “It felt like we had found the missing piece—a company whose desire was not just to complete a project for us, but also to work by our side as our partner throughout the journey.”

As a member of the Marketing and Business Development team at Horst, Rick aims to make a connection with his clients early on—creating an atmosphere of teamwork, partnership and trust. According to Rick,

“Our partnership with Markitects keeps Horst engaged and focused on what is most important and effective for the company. They help us vet and develop the best ideas into actionable plans. I appreciate Francine and her team—they always bring us back to strategy, goals, and ROI. More than a sounding board, they have our best interests at heart, and help us execute in line with our objectives.”

Learn more about Markitects’ partnership with Horst Construction.

IIL to Feature Shobhana Gupta at IPM Day 2017

How Do You Solve Today’s Ecological, Health, and Planetary Challenges…in Two Days? Ask Dr. Shobhana Gupta, AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow at NASA.

The short answer to this question is by participating in NASA’s International Space Apps Challenge. ‘Space Apps’ is a hackathon that occurs over a 48 hour-period in cities around the world. This year’s event, Space Apps’s 6th anniversary, attracted over 25,000 participants from 69 countries. Coders, scientists, designers, storytellers, builders, technologists, and pretty much anyone else who is enthusiastic about space came together to address some of the toughest challenges we face on Earth and in space!

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IIL Announces Keynote Speakers for 14th Annual International Project Management Day

International Institute for Learning, Inc. (IIL) is pleased to announce its line up of Keynote Speakers and Corporate Sponsors for the upcoming 14th annual IPM Day Online Conference taking place on Thursday, November 2, 2017. The conference is tailored to project management and agile professionals, as well as other business leaders who utilize project management principles to achieve business success. IPM Day is expected to attract 50,000 attendees representing the most respected companies around the world.

IIL’s distinguished line-up of keynote speakers includes leaders and innovators in their respective fields. Dr. Shobhana Gupta, AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow, NASA, will present Inspiring Innovation, featuring her role as Project Manager for NASA’s ‘Space Apps’ international hackathon contest. Maxine Hill, Vice President, WSP US Transportation Business, will present The Unwritten Rules of Project Management. Dr. Harold Kerzner, futurist and Senior Executive Director at IIL will present, How Changes in Project Management Support Agile and Scrum Methodologies. Dr. Jeff Sutherland, Inventor, Co-Creator, and CEO, Scrum, Inc. will present, The Path to Agile.

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Meet Joanna Durand, Global Head EPMO & Enabling Services, TD Bank and a Featured Speaker at IIL’s IPM Day 2017

If you were to have a conversation with Joanna Durand about her career and her wealth of accomplishments, you would think that everything was perfectly planned and executed—just like an ideal project. However, Joanna more accurately ‘fell into’ project management as part of a career change from stockbroker to supporting a merger between two financial institutions. As part of that learning experience, she had the opportunity to gain knowledge from one of the Big 5 Consulting Firms, Accenture. Under their tutelage, Joanna began to learn the job of project manager, without knowing that it was an important profession—one that would soon define her fast-paced career.

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Horst Construction Features Partner, Providence Engineering Corporation

Providence has been working with Horst Construction since 1992—beginning with Horst’s corporate headquarters, followed by two major performing arts projects, American Music Theatre and Sight & Sound Theatres. Horst has also partnered with Providence for several Lancaster Bible College projects, numerous church projects, auto dealerships, work with West Pharmaceuticals, and many other projects over the years.

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IIL Features Dr. Jeff Sutherland, Inventor and Co-Creator of Scrum

In addition to its rugby roots, Scrum also can attribute its beginnings to two Japanese thought leaders. Scrum was modeled after “The New New Product Development Game” by Hirotaka Takeuchi and Ikujiro Nonaka, published in the Harvard Business Review in 1986. Nonaka was hired by the Japanese government after World War II to help analyze why they lost the war. Takeuchi is considered to be one of the top ten business school professors in the world.

According to Dr. Jeff Sutherland, “Together their formal model has led us down the path to an extraordinary implementation of their vision of Scrum project management. Both of these teachers are surprised and impressed with the wide-spread adoption of Scrum in software.”

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Horst’s Top Ten Tips for an Efficient Project Meeting

Making sure that project meetings are efficient—and useful—is no small task, so we asked one of our Project Managers, Jake Moyer, to share his advice on the subject.

“As a project manager, I am generally the person running the meeting. Therefore, it is my duty to ensure that the meeting stays on task. It is critical to the project that I stand my ground regarding expectations and conflicts, acting as the owner’s best advocate at all times.”

Read Jake’s Top 10 Tips

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