02 - Alejandra Menchaca

Featuring Alejandra Menchaca  from AIRLIT studio. 

Join us as we chat about mentorship, entrepreneurship, and how to be "sneakily" sustainable in the workplace.   

Resources mentioned:
1. Healthy Buildings by Joe Allen and John D Macomber - book

Transcript

Kiersten: All right. Hello, friends of the pod. Welcome or welcome back. Today we're speaking with Ale. She holds a PhD in mechanical engineering from MIT and has lectured at MIT's department of architecture and the Harvard GSD. By combining her expertise in mechanical engineering and architectural design, she's truly become a world leading expert in quantifying how design decisions impact indoor air quality, thermal and visual comfort, and carbon emissions. Ale, welcome.

Alejandra: Thank you. I'm so excited to be here.

Kiersten: So thrilled to have you. We're going to get started by asking if you can tell us a bit about your career journey up through your current role.

Alejandra: Yes, happy to do that. My career journey has been somewhat unconventional, but I feel that in modern days is probably more common to have very sharp changes and careers as one goes along. I started off, not necessarily relevant to my current career, but I started off as a rocket [00:01:00] scientist. have a master's in engineering, aerospace engineering, and I focused on training astronauts. that was really cool, but it has nothing to do with sustainability. And then I was a bit disheartened about many things and realized that I was much more interested in, planet than I thought I was in this planet rather than another planet. And so decided to get my PhD in mechanical engineering and passive design specifically. I should note, I knew nothing about buildings before doing my PhD. I just thought the topic was cool. And my advisor seemed nice, but I really started from zero in terms of building science. After that I specialized on passive design, as I mentioned natural ventilation specifically. And right after finishing my PhD, I went to work for Payette, which is an architecture firm that has a very well renowned building science in house team. So it's a bit of a think tank where building performance and [00:02:00] sustainability and all the thinking behind it happens within the architecture firm rather than through hiring consultants. And so I got to be part of that for several years and it was very, very exciting because I got to learn. I mean, that was really my schooling on architecture. I got to work with many architects and understand the purpose of design, the value of architecture and really understand what our role is for people like me, how are we intended to advise architects.

I should say that until then, I had the belief that many engineers have of architects don't know what they're doing. You know, it's all really inefficient, you know, oh, so much glass everywhere, which I still think that way. There's so much glass everywhere. But I do remember um, judging a lot, you know, and thinking, Oh, a box would be much more efficient. And then, of course, once you get to meet architects and understand architecture per se, you realize that is why they hire architects and not [00:03:00] engineer to design buildings, because we would be building very energy efficient boxes that would not be nice and pleasant to be in and I would say Payette was definitely my school.

In terms of building science and architecture. The detail about payette is that they specialized back in the day, almost exclusively in hospitals and labs my specialty from my PhD was passive design and natural ventilation and you can't quite open windows and labs and in hospitals in the US, at least.

And so that drove me to, choosing to move to Thornton Tomasetti, which is a large engineering consulting firm. And they didn't have sustainability group in Boston. And so I got hired at open that and that was really exciting. I got to work on many more climates, many more building typologies with a very, very, very nice kind group of people. and so I did that for several years. Until a year and a half ago, when a [00:04:00] colleague of mine who had also done his PhD with me at MIT and had also worked at Thornton Tomasetti, we decided to branch out and start our own consultancy. And so I am a founding principal of Airlit Studio which it's the boutique consultancy on building science.

Aparna: Fantastic. Thank you so much for detailing all the different steps on your journey, Ale. You've had such good experience and seen things from a couple different points of view now, right? And how we have come from the energy efficient box to gorgeous buildings that tell you where you are, that draw on the environment that they're built in and offer such a beautiful experience to the people that spend time in them.

So kudos to you on the journey and thank you for sharing that with everyone here.

Alejandra: Thank you.

Aparna: The current role that you're in, you are a sustainability design consultant. I really want to open it up to you. Could you tell us what a typical day in the life looks like and what you actually [00:05:00] do for work?

Alejandra: Yeah. are many, many, many facets to being a sustainability design consultant. And so I feel like I need to clarify within the sustainability design consulting world where I fall and where I do not fall. there are sustainability design consultants who specialize on certification programs, right?

So LEED, WELL, Living Building Challenge are more consulting and advising clients on how to meet those certifications and those goals. That's not what I specialize on. And I really, really deeply value those who do it because it requires a skill set that I do not have. role as a sustainability design consultant is on the technical side.

And so it's quantifying building with numbers. And with simulations of various kinds. whether it's energy, whether it's comfort whether it is rain comfort, we've done rain comfort analysis, carbon emissions and body carbon. So really assisting the clients in [00:06:00] making informed decisions with data at hand.

And so um, when an architect is trying to pitch a design strategy versus the other is trying to say, well, you know, we think this design or this orientation will be better for occupants and better for, for the planet and they're trying to convey that to the client. We, what we do is we assist the design team and quantifying that.

Because the client will inevitably ask, well, how, how much better? Walk me through that. That's very interesting. And so from an energy standpoint, we've been doing that for a long time. We know how to quantify it. The reality is that quantifying energy these days is kind of missing the point. We spend a lot of time talking about energy savings and in reality, that is rarely what owners are looking for and or employers looking for. If you're thinking about an owner or a developer that's trying to lease their building to someone else. Energy savings are really just a tiny bit of the pie of the financial benefit of designing that are [00:07:00] conducive to wellness and that are energy efficient at the same time.

And so We spend a lot of time trying to figure out what is the right metric to quantify benefit. And so Oftentimes it is occupant productivity, right? And so yes, the strategy might not lead you to saving that much energy per se. But it might lead to say a 1% increase in productivity in your occupants or your employees. And so if you multiply that times the salary the numbers start to become much more relevant.

Kiersten: Love some different metrics that we can talk about for quantification. I wanted to touch on the other part of your role. So not only are you a consultant, but you also are the co founder of your current studio. From an entrepreneurial aspect, I'm curious if there was a specific need that you saw in the market that wasn't being met that compelled you or anything else about what it's like to take that next step in your career and become your own boss.

Alejandra: It is a roller coaster, a very exciting one. I think that what we offer and what we feel [00:08:00] is quite unique is that we're a questions first practice. And so we tend to be the consultant who might say you're actually not going to need that simulation and that's a shift from what we had seen before.

And so oftentimes we would be approached and a client would say, well, we need an energy model and there might be a need to say, well, you need an energy model and a daylight model and this and that and that And by the end of the time when we were running that, we stop and then ask ourselves, well, why are we even running it?

You know, we might come to a result where you realize, well, we had the answer from the get go. Why did we spend three weeks running this? And, we felt that we weren't seeing that level thoughtfulness in like really understanding why are we running this? And do you really need me to run it?

I think that there tends to be just a desire to, sell services in a way, right? there's a standard [00:09:00] definition of a good salesperson. It's someone who will sell you as much as you think you need. And sometimes we beat ourselves for this, but on the other end of thinking, you know, someone already ran this. already have results for this. So how about we help you think through this rather than just run the simulation one more time? And so I would say that our approach, was quite unique. We are researchers at heart, and so we like to dive really deep into certain questions that might never have been answered and then not spend too much time trying on questions that have been answered a thousand times so my role these days, is we're a small firm and so we're still a little bit on doer seller mode and that is very different to working for a company that has an accounting department and human resources department and that has taxes figured out. have to go on our own and get our tax consultant and have our, marketing advisor and many roles that we didn't [00:10:00] really know existed before. So it takes quite a bit of time also to run your own company, but it is deeply rewarding.

I would say that for the first time in our lives, get to work 100 percent of the time with people we like and enjoy working with because we get to say no to those projects that we don't want to do, where the chemistry isn't quite there. Also, when you're a small business owner, chemistry is essential, because when you're hiring a company, you could say, well, John isn't quite the match for this project, but Lucy is awesome or something like that with us. It's the two of us, right? Who are managing and leading the projects. And so the beginning, that was a bit overwhelming, I would say the feeling that you're selling yourself as a person as opposed to, you know, you're selling a concept to, but if there isn't chemistry, then it's not going to happen.

We have come to really appreciate it because we're finding really fun, nice chemistry with folks that we weren't really having chemistry before. We just get to have fun with people we [00:11:00] like every day. And so I can't complain despite the fact that running a company is, does take quite a bit of time is stressful because you are at the forefront of making sure money is coming in and that we're getting paid I don't think we could go back.

Aparna: It's almost like good stress, right? Like it's fun stress and it's something that you know you can do. It's something you have done in the past and you have all these cool experiences you've met all these interesting people along the way. So almost type one fun, fun in the moment, but aspects of type two, a little look back, but if you will.

Alejandra: I am deeply grateful to mentors who have jumped in to mentor us without without us asking for it.

I feel I am myself a mentor to young in the industry and I've always advised them on the career path side. Like this is what you're going to be doing on the day to day. And a little bit on the life [00:12:00] side, particularly women you know, we're still figuring out how to navigate a pretty much male dominated environment and that's not easy and so I tend to mentor on that side. However, I did not think I was going to need mentorship on the business side but everyone else around us knew we were going to need it because they have all gone through it. And so it's like the folks who have kids and who see you pregnant, and he will just, bring you under their wing, whether you want it or needed or not.

And suddenly realized, Oh, this is why. And so there have been actually, a couple of architects. So clients have taken the dual role of also just checking in but I still get the hey, kiddo. How's it going? And so to your point part on the fun.

Sometimes it's not fun. It's really stressful because we've never Okay. ever gone through it. And so There are certain things that we just haven't thought about. And so I've gotten some really good advice on this. Someone told me over coffee, like first month of [00:13:00] opening the company, took out his notebook, made a pie chart and said, okay, I'm going to spare you 10 years. Because it took me 10 years to figure this out. You need to diversify your project portfolio. You can't just do schools. You can't just do higher ed. You can't just do developer work. You need to do, and he gave me the percentages. He said, this way, when there is a downturn, you're going to be solid. It's like diversifying your financial portfolio. It was just like, that would have never crossed my mind. And he said, yeah, it didn't cross my mind until 10 years later. So I'm just saving you some time and that has become some of the most valuable advice. I take notes and I just like, my screen is full of post-its and I just write down that kind of stuff.

And so, It has been quite amazing to have all those mentors who I did not ask for it, frankly didn't think I needed it. And they have become a rock.

Aparna: Yeah. And it'd be hard to imagine business without them, right? Life without them at this point, I have a little notebook that I carry around and, if [00:14:00] I I hear hear something interesting if I see something that is inspiring. I just like take little notes along and one day I'll look back through it.

And I think there'll be some interesting nuggets in there. So on the topic of mentorship, you've been mentored and you do mentor in turn. So if there were people who wanted to follow in your path and were thinking while listening to this episode, wow, Ale, like that's such a cool job and an interesting life path.

Are there skills certifications that maybe you'd encourage people to get?

Alejandra: Ah, you know, very good question. When I went out into the workforce I just knew what I knew how to do, but I didn't quite know how it applied to the industry. so I remember being in interviews and not being aware that I was interviewing for a mechanical engineering role versus a sustainability consultant role and it took me being a couple of [00:15:00] years in the industry to understand, oh, shoot. That a mechanical engineering job. I would have been doing stuff that is completely different to a sustainable design consulting job but even as I mentioned within sustainability design consulting, I could be doing certification and that is totally different than to doing energy modeling, which is totally different than to doing daylighting modeling or comfort modeling. My advice tends to be talk to other people in the industry that are roughly your level, right? That have maybe two or three years ahead of you. I am someone who would cold message people you know, I'd find some people on LinkedIn and say, "Hey, I see your profile similar to mine." I tend to encourage people if they went to connect through the alumni network or try to find people.

And so I might give them advice on what companies to look at to check out and then say, if you think this is a good match, Just go on LinkedIn and find someone with whom you have something in [00:16:00] common so that you can just message them and say, "Hey, I'm entering the workforce, and I don't really know what I want to do."

I wish someone had done that for me because I had no clue. out of my first job, I could have been a mechanical engineer. So designing HVAC systems. I could have been a facade /envelope performance consultant. So designing and detailing facades, vapor barriers, and stuff like that. An modeler who does energy modeling full time or a mixed bag, think tanker, which is what I ended up doing. Thanks to Payette my job at Payette really allowed me to not define my role for quite a bit of time. Because I got to think about, so many topics.

And so it gave me a few more years to realize what I wanted to do, but I would be five different people. Had I just said yes to that job, because maybe he was in the nice city or they had nice perks or people were nice, but the career choice was dramatically different. when I speak to people I'm mentoring, I try to tell them, if you take [00:17:00] this job and I, at this point, I know companies very well, and so I'll say, if you work for this company, you are going to be this type of specialist. If you work for this other company, you're going to be a bit more of a generalist. So it really depends on what you want. And if you don't know what you want, either just take your first job and realize it or talk to other people few years ahead of you.

And so I wouldn't necessarily say I mean, I'm LEED AP, right? And I feel that LEED certification is a good entry level for any sustainability design consulting job and might get you a job at an architecture firm. probably that is the most basic accreditation, that one could get. But honestly, I shouldn't say this out loud, but if you ask me much about LEED, I don't remember much about it, right? So it's in the radar, but it's not at the top of my head, if that makes sense.

Kiersten: Absolutely.

I think I've taken a similar approach at times talking to people first saying not where do you want to end up, but what do you like? Do you like the part of your job where you have to speak to other people or would you prefer being [00:18:00] behind, an e quest all day? Or do you want to do this or that?

And help them narrow down from there. Because we've noticed a lot of times that the same job title can mean very different things across different companies. And I completely respect that answer. I want to continue in that vein and say, let's say you didn't know exactly where you ended up, but you were interested in sustainability and yet you find yourself in a job that isn't necessarily sustainable. One hypothesis we have on the podcast is that every job can in fact be a green job. I'm curious if you have any thoughts on how folks might turn a not overtly sustainable job into one that has more of that focus and concentration.

Alejandra: Oh, this is a trick question, because the first thing that comes to mind is just get away. Go somewhere where someone believes on this. Right. But, but I agree. Where change is the most needed is where the sustainability thought process isn't, I have met so many [00:19:00] people throughout my career that are that champion who keeps saying, wait, but I'm not really sure why we're doing this way.

Why are we doing this way? Can we do it in a different way? And if they are persistent enough then they start to change practice. Right. And so I would say almost every job can be a green job. And if not, don't beat yourself to death and just move on and go somewhere else. But I would say that there are a million ways to incorporate sustainability into your daily job and your daily routine. I would say that on paper, my is to crank numbers and to give numbers to people.

The reality is that 90 percent of the time my is, and for anyone who has kids out there will understand this, my job is to figure out how am I feeding spinach to my clients, is it? openly in a salad where we all agree that spinach is the best thing in the planet and everyone wants it and they're just [00:20:00] hiring us to get the best spinach and the healthiest salad in the planet or it someone who really hired us to check off boxes because they need to comply with certain things right oh the owner really wants us to be green and so we just need you on board but we're really not going to do anything that you tell us to do. So for those in thinking of the picky toddler, You're not going to tell them there's spinach in the soup, You're just going to say it's like fun green from space, or it's like, you know, candy or whatever, so what is fascinating about being a sustainability design consultant in a time like ours is that we are a bit psychologists.

you really need to understand who you have in front of you because wants the best for something and for someone and in general, people are not evil and are not trying to create bad buildings their, their interests are different in their, their motivators are different. I tend to tell students and then people I mentor that [00:21:00] I am not an iPhone user. And I am someone who is somewhat frugal, and so I rarely see the need to have an iPhone, right? And so I'm someone who spends 300 bucks on phones at most, once every six years, but I am willing to advocate for spending a little bit more on sustainability and on sustainable strategies, Sometimes I will bump into the grumpy, I'm going to call them facilities manager, They tend to be much more focused on budget and just being like, yep, nope, too expensive, nope, nope, this needs to be practical. I need to be able to repair it well. I need it. Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. And then you look at the table.

You just look right next to their hand and they have an iPhone. You're like, okay, so you're someone who's really budget driven, but you're willing to spend a thousand a year or every two years buy a phone that on paper can do just about the same thing [00:22:00] as my phone. It can pick up a call. You can open your bank app. It will do everything cheap phone does. I do know that if I speak to an iPhone owner, right, and you might be those people, you'll tell me, yeah, but there's something else. Like you don't get it. There's just the experience. And to be fair, I'm a Mac user.

And so I get the experience, I just don't believe in spending that much money on a phone. And so I will check people's phones sometimes and I'll say, okay, if this is someone who's spending so much on a phone and values experience, then maybe we need to talk about experience a little bit more. We need to hide the spinach a little bit more and just talk about, well, this is what you care about. So this is the same language. not tricking people, but it's just trying to find the same language. And so going back to every job is a green job. 90 percent of figuring out how to succeed at convincing the rest of your work environment that perhaps have more sustainable practices is understanding, well, [00:23:00] why aren't they doing it? And how can they help them achieve what they want to do while, oh, by the way, being sustainable, they maybe don't need to be told this is sustainable every five minutes, right? You just need to say, you know, this is the most practical way of doing it. It's going to save us money. It's going to save us time, you know, go for it.

Oh yeah, the company is called green something, but just don't pay attention at that, we can get it red to, and move on. And so I think that it's about psychology.

Aparna: Very much agree with a lot of what you just said, and you don't have to say it's sustainable. It's practical. Like being sustainable is practical and that's a really cool coupling of words that I haven't said in the same sentence before.

So I appreciate you for bringing that up and making that connection for me and hopefully some other folks on the pod as well.

Alejandra: Well, let me add one thing. There is an advantage and a disadvantage of being of being the sustainability person or not yet being that person and a job. the disadvantage, which is it's my [00:24:00] role every day is that on paper. I'm the sustainability consultant I'm the spinach deliverer, right?

And so it's really hard to pretend there's no spinach if my role on paper to everyone and the way I need to introduce myself every single day has the word sustainability in it. And so if there's someone who's already anti sustainability for some reason, they are already biased against me. If you are not that person and you're an architect who is, I'm just gonna use quote unquote, just an architect, but doesn't have that sustainability tag attached to them, then sometimes it is much easier to hide the spinach to start talking about other things and without using the word sustainability. And so that's an opportunity. So those who don't have the role should see it as a pro that they are not labeled as that

Aparna: Biases come into the workplace as much as they come into every other facet of our life. So if you don't have it in your name, sneakily sustainable. We recommend this. So you've talked about a couple of the [00:25:00] misconceptions we have about sustainability consultants about just the word sustainability and the jobs that we all do ourselves.

So I'm curious if there are other misconceptions about sustainability in your industry that you'd like to address.

Alejandra: No, I feel that I've covered it pretty much. I mean, it's this feeling of sustainability is more expensive, Again, it goes to the iPhone is more expensive. Yes, it is. But the photos. Right or the value we talk about money, but we rarely talk about value. And I think that tends to be our mistake as sustainability consultants. People ask, well, how much, and we answer how much, if you were an iPhone salesperson, if someone said, how much your answer would be, let me tell you what you're getting, me, let me show you the box and let me show you the photos. And oh yeah, this is a thousand dollars, but really what you're getting is so much value.

And so I would say that we're, we're not talking enough about value [00:26:00] and we're focused too much on, on money. And so people think we're expensive and sometimes we're not worth it,

Kiersten: going off of that, I'd love to hear if you have a favorite mechanism for achieving sustainability. So you talked a little bit about being a psychologist, looking at the phone, hiding the spinach, which I love and also made me feel a little hungry. But I'm curious, do you have a favorite metric?

Because you also said sometimes energy efficiency is not perhaps the best presentation. So a favorite metric that you find makes the case the most or a policy that you've seen implemented that really had a big punch.

Alejandra: Metric, yes money in productivity. So increased productivity and occupants, particularly when we're working on office buildings. It is just so much easier to tie better daylight, more comfortable spaces to a particular increase in productivity. And we know salaries pretty well, we know costs pretty well.

And so it's very easy in a way to put a number to that. would say that as far as a metric, [00:27:00] that is probably the most successful one. It is people dependent, 100 percent. In of policy, maybe this isn't quite answering your question, but I say that the other way to achieve sustainability is by tightening regulations and rules. Regardless of the metric, there are certain cities or certain campuses will set measurable targets for something, right? So you might have a campus whose goal is resilience. And so they'll give you specific metrics that you need to meet a little bit you know, setting the expectation for how much spinach we're consuming now, or it's a spinach podcast Any policy in general is quite useful. if it is generalized for, buildings.

Kiersten: I wanted to share a little fun fact for listeners and Ale, you're probably familiar, but the 3-30-300 rule. So in general for real estate, for every [00:28:00] 3 that you spend on utilities, 30 is spent on the real estate O&M and 300 is spent on payroll. So that 1 percent you threw out earlier as an example for increased productivity, you can see the scale there of which number you're impacting with that increased utility.

So if a listener is out there trying to make the case and wants to take a little bit of Ale's methodology and this rule, you'd have a really strong point for yourself.

Alejandra: Love it.

Aparna: So, Looking back at your industry then, and where you find yourself, we are wondering if there are any emerging trends that excite you?

Alejandra: Two in particular come to mind. We are starting to think about embody carbon much more. For those of you who don't know what embody carbon is, is what is the impact to the planet in producing and a product building in particular? Thank you. What is the impact to the planet?

The [00:29:00] planet doesn't see emissions as, Oh, those emissions came from the electricity that powered a building. And those emissions came from gas. And those emissions came from X, Y, and Z. The planet just sees emissions and there are many emissions that are generated in producing the materials and the products that we use. used to build buildings. So concrete is probably the most popular example, and that concrete is very emissions intensive. And so concrete buildings, even though they could be purely passive, they have strong impact on the carbon emissions associated to the building just by how concrete cement in particular was produced. Particularly in the U. S. I would say where buildings are torn down and rebuilt. I'm trying not to get too ranty on this, but I am bitter and sour about it, particularly having lived in Europe as well. we estimate that buildings have maybe a 50 year lifetime, right?

And so if you are replacing buildings over and over and [00:30:00] over and over again, every 50 years, how many emissions are associated to building that building to generating those materials becomes very, very important, right? That is very different. If you are in France, and you are retrofitting thousand year old building, reutilizing that.

And so Europe has moved forward into reusing buildings much more because they recognize that building new generates a lot of emissions. And the U. S. is still lagging a fair amount. I'm not really sure they're ever going to catch up. And so embodied carbon as a metric becomes very important.

And so I would say As a trend, the caring about embodied carbon, the questioning, well, is this really worth it from an emission standpoint, this is really good.

I would say the other one has been what I mentioned earlier, finding other ways to quantify the benefits of good design which we haven't done a good job so far.

Aparna: interesting anecdote on your Parallel with the French in particular, being very good at preserving old buildings, retrofitting them for current use. [00:31:00] My last job here was working in historic preservation, and a lot of the technologies that we used for preservation were rooted in the European studies, cause you've seen them performed on old cathedrals, old basilicas.

Kiersten: Good stuff. We are going to move into our final two questions for you. The first one is we always want our listeners to have a little takeaway. So if they wanted to be involved in the sustainability shift, are there any books, documentaries or other resources that have been favorites of yours that you'd recommend?

Alejandra: Yeah, so I would recommend, given everything that I've mentioned, there is one book that I would strongly recommend. It's called Healthy Buildings, How Spaces Drive Performance and Productivity, written by Joe Allen from the Harvard School of Public Health. And John D. Macomber it's fascinating book where Joe brings the quantitative aspect of occupant productivity into the game. And John Macomber brings the real estate like numbers approach [00:32:00] as to like, how do you convince people to make decisions? And so I would say that if if you're trying to learn how to feed the spinach, whether it's openly or hiding it this, I would say, is the one book that you should read.

Aparna: Thank you for sharing that. And I'm such a kale person, but now I'm rethinking that I'm like, should I be out there getting some spinach from the grocery store?

So Ale, we have one final question for you and it's what legacy do you hope to leave behind through your work?

Alejandra: All right. That's a really good question. There are a couple of things I would say I enjoy my day to day. We were talking about my day to day and I do many things on my day to day. I do consulting, And so if we were talking about. Specifically, the impact that I'm having on buildings. I am trying to have as much impact as possible as many people as possible. And so focusing on the human centric aspects of good building design, easily ties to preserving the planet and everything else.

But if we [00:33:00] make comfortable, attractive buildings, hopefully they will live beyond that 50 year time frame, and we will have done something for the planet. However, I have colleagues goals are to maximize the square footage that they impact sustainability wise, and I've always felt that I am more of a dive deep, unique kind of building typologies.

We work in a lot of schools, so I have to say that my passion for working on schools is the fact that want kids to be inspired to me, while the building is, yes, reducing some emissions because it's well designed. I the thousand who go through that school every year to be inspired by what the building is doing And so building as a teaching tool. Is something that I am very passionate about, and that I hope that through teaching either within design or teaching outside that one can inspire other generations. And I would say The last thing, and this is a [00:34:00] philosophy that is quite unique of our firm is that we believe that the more people know how to do what we do. And that includes the competition, the better off we are, and so we are on a path to training and teaching as much as we can to as many people as we can of the stuff that we've spent, we tend to dive really deep into things. So we learn a lot of things that people might not have time to dive deep into. And so we try to share that knowledge as much as we can. And we also try to partner with other specialists who are open to sharing their knowledge with us. And so we have created these really fun partnerships where instead of having each consultant and each engineer in their silo, we share scripts, we share calculations, we share research, we share it with architects.

Then the architect gets really interested in it and dives even deeper in through fostering those teams. We think everyone wins. And so I would say as a legacy, [00:35:00] if we could change the way teamwork happens in design and it's more collaborative and less scopey delineation, and I know it's tricky.

but I'm just saying it feels really nice to not have any boundaries and to not be afraid of, sharing, you know, knowledge because of X, Y, and Z is going to get mad. I think that the world is going to be a better place.

Kiersten: 100 percent agree. Well, Ale, thank you so much for joining us. We definitely heard some great strategies for current practitioners in the industry and some excellent frameworks for young professionals to consider as they think about where they fit in the space. So really appreciate your time. Thanks again for joining us.

Alejandra: So exciting. Thank you so much for having me.