THE MOST IMPORTANT THING WE'VE EVER BUILT IS CULTURE.
OUR VISION AT INTERPLAN IS BOLD: TO CREATE SPACES THAT CELEBRATE HUMANITY.
For a long time, I talked about that vision in the context of our work. The restaurants we design. The retail spaces we help create. The environments we help bring to life across the country. And that’s real –
that work matters to us deeply.
But somewhere along the way, I realized the vision had to start closer to home. It had to start with the people inside our own walls before it could
mean anything in the spaces we create for others.
That realization changed how we built this company.
WE HIRE FOR POTENTIAL. WE BUILD FROM THERE.
When I think about the team we have assembled at lnterplan, I am struck by how many of our people arrived here not fully seeing the path that would unfold for them. Some came without fluent English. Some came from countries where the doors they knocked on were locked for reasons that had nothing to do with their ability. Some walked in for one job and turned out to be exactly what we needed for a completely different one.
We made a decision early on that language would not be a barrier to opportunity at this company. Some of our
strongest engineers, the people who have grown into leaders on our team, started here navigating two languages at once. That is not a liability. That is resilience. And we wanted it in this building. We also made a decision that career growth would not be left to chance. When someone on our team wants to pursue their PE license – their Professional Engineer designation – we create the space for that to happen. We provide the support, the time, the resources. A license should not be a privilege reserved for people with the
perfect circumstances at home. We try to level that playing field inside these walls.
And three years ago, we brought in an organizational psychologist to work with every level of this company. Not for a workshop. Not for a one-day retreat. For three years, embedded in how we communicate, how we lead, and how we show up for each other. Because culture is not a statement on a wall. It is a living practice. And sometimes you need someone in the room to help you see where the gaps are.
WHAT I DID NOT EXPECT.
This year, we launched a campaign called Women Who Engineer. Six women from our engineering team. An editorial shoot. Their stories, told fully, shared with the world ahead of Women in Engineering Day on June 23rd. I knew these women were exceptional. I have watched them work. I have seen what they deliver. I knew their talent.What I did not know – not fully – were their journeys.
I did not know that one of them fled Venezuela with five children and spent two years cleaning hotel rooms while thinking in engineering procedures the entire time. I did not know that another walked into a job interview in America with nothing but a Tehran mall she had designed – and used it to help secure her visa. I did not know that one of them was turned away from college after college, told by a counselor she lacked the capacity for a math class she had already passed. I did not know that another arrived at her first interview at lnterplan barely able to draw a line in CAD, and became the first woman to ever hold the project manager title in our civil department.
I knew they were good. I did not know everything it cost them to get here.
Hearing these stories has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my career. Not because they are
dramatic – though they are. But because they reveal something about who these women are at their core. The way they show up every day here. The way they lead. The way they mentor. The way they absorb difficulty withoutmaking it the story. Now I understand it differently. I understand where it comes from.
CULTURE IS THE COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE
We often say we are a team of teams – each department operating with excellence individually, thriving most whenwe work together. Collaboration is our strength. Empathy is our differentiator.
Those are not words to us. They are how we have built something that attracts people like the six women in this
campaign. People who have survived more than most, who have built more than anyone gave them credit for, and who chose to bring all of that here.
When you create a culture that actually celebrates humanity – that meets people where they are, that invests intheir growth, that asks nothing beyond the quality of their work and the depth of their character – you do not haveto search for great talent. Great talent finds you. These six women found us. And we were ready for them.
That is the whole point.
