Insight from TRB 2007 Alums

One year later, we catch up with staff members who we met (and eventually hired) at TRB 2007.  Jamie Henson (left) works in our Walnut Creek, CA office, Charlie Alexander (center) and Matt Kittelson (right) work in our Roseville, CA office.

We met you at our TRB hospitality booth in January 2007 - what motivated you to come by? 

HENSON: Two things motivated me.  The first was looking at the web site and seeing the type of progressive and interesting projects on which Fehr & Peers works.  I thought that the firm was progressive and, despite being located across the country, would be worthy to speak with even if the conversation only gave me a better idea of what to look for in an East Coast firm.  The second motivation came from speaking with a former classmate whom I knew was trust-worthy: Lacy Bell who works in our Denver office.  After speaking with her, my initial thoughts about the firm were confirmed.  She told me that the firm would give me opportunity to learn and lead quickly and encouraged me to go to the hospitality suite.

ALEXANDER: I attended TRB last year as part of a Mass Transit course for college - there were only 5 students in the class, and one of them had already interviewed in Roseville with F&P.  He had been invited to the suite and invited us to tag along.

KITTELSON: I attended the F&P hospitality suite last year because it was my goal at TRB to talk with as many quality companies as I could while there to get a real idea of my job opportunities.  I had heard very good things about F&P and I wanted to have some face to face interaction to start assessing for myself.

How many other firms were you considering at the time? 

HENSON: I was considering quite a few at the time and had already eliminated considerably more.  Any firms I did not consider progressive in their work or approach were eliminated.  I was looking mostly at planning-focused firms rather than traffic/transportation planning firms - I thought these were the more progressive.  A reasonable estimate would be five other firms at the time of TRB.

ALEXANDER: At the time, I had two other job offers, neither of which really appealed to me.  One was an environmental engineering job with the Department of Defense in Maryland, another with land development company in Philadelphia.  I knew that transportation interested me, but wasn't sure whether or not I wanted to pursue a career in it.  I wanted to interview for different types of jobs - ones in environmental and transportation - as a means of determining which field interested me the most.  I also had a non-engineering job offer to teach English in France.

KITTELSON: Last year at this time I was considering at least 4 other firms, some of whom focused on Aviation Design and/or Airport Planning.  TRB was another chance for me to evaluate which field of transportation I wanted to go into.

What things were attractive to you about F&P specifically?

HENSON: Initially, the types of projects and the ability to learn the technical side of those projects were attractive to me.  Being a planning student I did not want to solely focus on traffic operations (which had been my hesitation to interviewing with firms more focused on traffic engineering) thus it was very exciting to hear that Fehr & Peers worked with smart growth projects and not solely on traffic operations.  Also, and maybe more importantly, Fehr & Peers could actually analyze those projects rather than just speaking in vague generalities as do more planning-focused firms.  This was important to me because after planning school, I had heard high-level discussion about smart growth but never any discussion on how to analyze it and make it work.

ALEXANDER: I immediately was drawn to the breadth of transportation projects that F&P is involved with.  Especially coming right out of college, I wasn't exactly sure what I wanted to do.  During the interview we discussed what types of work F&P does and it appealed to me much more than jobs in the environmental field.  Also, since F&P does so many different types of work within the transportation field, I found the company very flexible in allowing you to choose the path that most interests you once you find it.

KITTELSON: I was attracted to F&P because of the fact that we only do traffic.  When I realized for sure that traffic is what I wanted to do, it was important for me to be around people that were really good in the field of Transportation Engineering and were really passionate about the field as well.  I got the impression that both of these were true about F&P while at the hospitality suite.  Also, it was important to me that F&P put an emphasis on the work / life balance.  Just coming out of college, the last thing I wanted to hear would be that my life would now consist of work and only work for the next 30 years.  This, obviously, is not the case year.

How would you describe your day-to-day projects and efforts, and which are most rewarding?

HENSON: My day-to-day projects are broad in scope from a basic parking analysis to transit-oriented development (TOD) trip generation research.  The work I do is very broad and is very regularly broad.  That is, I have interesting projects on a regular basis rather than on an infrequent basis.  This is allowing me to develop a large and deep set of skills necessary to work on a variety of projects.  I am not doing just one small part of a process.  It has been most rewarding to learn the technical aspects of my job.  I have truly enjoyed engaging in and learning the process of technical analysis.  I am understanding that the basics of transportation and have also been able to integrate research I have done into a separate project on which I am working.

ALEXANDER: The projects I am working on right now are all very different from one another.  I've spent lots of time working on the FIDS (Fresno-Madera Interchange Deficiency Study) Project since my first day, which has probably been the most rewarding on a "do-good" level.  Our goal in the project is to develop a fee program for the Fresno COG for the improvement of their freeway interchanges and to decide on which interchanges it is best for them to spend their money.  Working for the public sector has provided to be very rewarding - I feel like this is something that actually makes a difference.  The project has been very difficult, however, since it is very large and has required lots and lots of analysis on many different levels.  I've also been working on a VISSIM simulation near San Francisco for the City of Belmont.  The City has been investigating the replacement of an all way stop intersection with a roundabout or signal and asked us to develop simulations for each scenario.  This project has been fun and rewarding - the software is really cool and helping the City make a more educated decision is rewarding.  Again, no project is perfect, and there is going to be a certain level of stress and tediousness associated with everything that is done, however, my outlook on the projects remains positive.  I enjoy the work I do and believe that my efforts contribute positively to society, something that was important to me when searching for a job.

KITTELSON: The best way to describe my day to day project would be that they are diverse and exciting.  Every one of them is different and every one of them has a new challenge that I hadn't faced before or maybe didn't even realize existed before.  Lately I have spent a lot of time doing modeling work with a TDF model, but in the past I have spent a lot of time working with Synchro, SimTraffic, Traffix, going to public meetings, working on trip generation, trip distribution, and many other things as well.  In my first 6 months I have had the opportunity to work on many, many different things and there are still some areas I haven't touched yet!

What do you wish you knew then, that you know now?

HENSON: This one is actually pretty easy.  I wish I had known how much this firm really believes and practices its core values, and I wish I had known how well this firm would formally and informally (through one-on-one conversations) train me to be excellent.  If I had known these things, my career search would've been much shorter.  The helpfulness of my coworkers is astounding.  Most firms talk about good training programs and values, but I have only seen or heard of two firms in our industry that are close to matching it.  People in our firm want to help.  I believe that there are MANY people in our firm who truly care about me, not just my work, and want me, not just my work, to be the best possible.

ALEXANDER: F&P has made the transition from university life to "real life" much better than I expected.  I think the idea of graduating a moving into a full-time job is a very daunting idea to graduates - it definitely intimidated me a lot.  However, I think that the flexibility the company offers us (so long as we don't abuse the privilege, of course) has made this much easier for me.

KITTELSON: I wish going into TRB last year that I understood better just how broad the transportation field is.  During the typical undergraduate degree, students aren't really exposed to 90% of what we do.  In addition, there is so much more to the transportation field than even the stuff we find ourselves working on.  As I mentioned before, I spend time at TRB exposing myself to the Aviation field which I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to explore in one class in college.  Most students don't even realize that these types of career paths are an option.  Simply put, there is so much to the transportation field that I didn't even consider before I went to TRB.

Lastly, I think it is important to point out that I was able to realize the differences between a company like F&P and one of the larger engineering companies.  While we can do the same types of projects and bid on the same work, the approach to transportation is completely different between the two.  My exposure to "all things traffic" has been so much greater here than it would have been at another type of company.  Furthermore, all the people around me do what I do, meaning my resources are so much greater here than they would be a general civil or large engineering company.  While those other places may be good for some, there was no doubt that this is a much better fit for me and my career goals.

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What things were attractive to you about F&P specifically?

HENSON: Initially, the types of projects and the ability to learn the technical side of those projects were attractive to me.  Being a planning student I did not want to solely focus on traffic operations (which had been my hesitation to interviewing with firms more focused on traffic engineering) thus it was very exciting to hear that Fehr & Peers worked with smart growth projects and not solely on traffic operations.  Also, and maybe more importantly, Fehr & Peers could actually analyze those projects rather than just speaking in vague generalities as do more planning-focused firms.  This was important to me because after planning school, I had heard high-level discussion about smart growth but never any discussion on how to analyze it and make it work.

ALEXANDER: I immediately was drawn to the breadth of transportation projects that F&P is involved with.  Especially coming right out of college, I wasn't exactly sure what I wanted to do.  During the interview we discussed what types of work F&P does and it appealed to me much more than jobs in the environmental field.  Also, since F&P does so many different types of work within the transportation field, I found the company very flexible in allowing you to choose the path that most interests you once you find it.

KITTELSON: I was attracted to F&P because of the fact that we only do traffic.  When I realized for sure that traffic is what I wanted to do, it was important for me to be around people that were really good in the field of Transportation Engineering and were really passionate about the field as well.  I got the impression that both of these were true about F&P while at the hospitality suite.  Also, it was important to me that F&P put an emphasis on the work / life balance.  Just coming out of college, the last thing I wanted to hear would be that my life would now consist of work and only work for the next 30 years.  This, obviously, is not the case year.

How would you describe your day-to-day projects and efforts, and which are most rewarding?

HENSON: My day-to-day projects are broad in scope from a basic parking analysis to transit-oriented development (TOD) trip generation research.  The work I do is very broad and is very regularly broad.  That is, I have interesting projects on a regular basis rather than on an infrequent basis.  This is allowing me to develop a large and deep set of skills necessary to work on a variety of projects.  I am not doing just one small part of a process.  It has been most rewarding to learn the technical aspects of my job.  I have truly enjoyed engaging in and learning the process of technical analysis.  I am understanding that the basics of transportation and have also been able to integrate research I have done into a separate project on which I am working.

ALEXANDER: The projects I am working on right now are all very different from one another.  I've spent lots of time working on the FIDS (Fresno-Madera Interchange Deficiency Study) Project since my first day, which has probably been the most rewarding on a "do-good" level.  Our goal in the project is to develop a fee program for the Fresno COG for the improvement of their freeway interchanges and to decide on which interchanges it is best for them to spend their money.  Working for the public sector has provided to be very rewarding - I feel like this is something that actually makes a difference.  The project has been very difficult, however, since it is very large and has required lots and lots of analysis on many different levels.  I've also been working on a VISSIM simulation near San Francisco for the City of Belmont.  The City has been investigating the replacement of an all way stop intersection with a roundabout or signal and asked us to develop simulations for each scenario.  This project has been fun and rewarding - the software is really cool and helping the City make a more educated decision is rewarding.  Again, no project is perfect, and there is going to be a certain level of stress and tediousness associated with everything that is done, however, my outlook on the projects remains positive.  I enjoy the work I do and believe that my efforts contribute positively to society, something that was important to me when searching for a job.

KITTELSON: The best way to describe my day to day project would be that they are diverse and exciting.  Every one of them is different and every one of them has a new challenge that I hadn't faced before or maybe didn't even realize existed before.  Lately I have spent a lot of time doing modeling work with a TDF model, but in the past I have spent a lot of time working with Synchro, SimTraffic, Traffix, going to public meetings, working on trip generation, trip distribution, and many other things as well.  In my first 6 months I have had the opportunity to work on many, many different things and there are still some areas I haven't touched yet!

What do you wish you knew then, that you know now?

HENSON: This one is actually pretty easy.  I wish I had known how much this firm really believes and practices its core values, and I wish I had known how well this firm would formally and informally (through one-on-one conversations) train me to be excellent.  If I had known these things, my career search would've been much shorter.  The helpfulness of my coworkers is astounding.  Most firms talk about good training programs and values, but I have only seen or heard of two firms in our industry that are close to matching it.  People in our firm want to help.  I believe that there are MANY people in our firm who truly care about me, not just my work, and want me, not just my work, to be the best possible.

ALEXANDER: F&P has made the transition from university life to "real life" much better than I expected.  I think the idea of graduating a moving into a full-time job is a very daunting idea to graduates - it definitely intimidated me a lot.  However, I think that the flexibility the company offers us (so long as we don't abuse the privilege, of course) has made this much easier for me.

KITTELSON: I wish going into TRB last year that I understood better just how broad the transportation field is.  During the typical undergraduate degree, students aren't really exposed to 90% of what we do.  In addition, there is so much more to the transportation field than even the stuff we find ourselves working on.  As I mentioned before, I spend time at TRB exposing myself to the Aviation field which I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to explore in one class in college.  Most students don't even realize that these types of career paths are an option.  Simply put, there is so much to the transportation field that I didn't even consider before I went to TRB.

Lastly, I think it is important to point out that I was able to realize the differences between a company like F&P and one of the larger engineering companies.  While we can do the same types of projects and bid on the same work, the approach to transportation is completely different between the two.  My exposure to "all things traffic" has been so much greater here than it would have been at another type of company.  Furthermore, all the people around me do what I do, meaning my resources are so much greater here than they would be a general civil or large engineering company.  While those other places may be good for some, there was no doubt that this is a much better fit for me and my career goals.

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