A Chat with Gary Ey, Senior Superintendent at Barton Malow

By Chris Maday Schmidt

Gary Ey is a senior superintendent with Barton Malow with over two decades of industry experience. He’s also the only construction professional active with the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards. Join Construction Superintendent as Ey talks about giving back to the industry through community involvement, recent project challenges and rewards, as well as key takeaways he’s gleaned over the course of his career.

(Q) How did you get your start in the construction industry?

I was working on a small commercial construction site as a day laborer. The superintendent liked my work ethic and hired me onto his carpentry crew. As the project progressed, he started having me cover weekends and watching subcontractors that needed to work. He would give me a list of who was supposed to be there and what he expected to get accomplished. That started teaching me the basics. After that, I was able to get hired by a small commercial construction company as a superintendent doing mostly commercial interior construction and renovations, and the rest is history.

(Q) Talk a bit about your recent election to the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards’ BOD as the only construction professional active with the organization. How did that come about? What are your responsibilities?

The National Council of Architectural Registration Boards is a nonprofit made up of the architectural licensing boards of the 55 U.S. states and territories. The organization’s mission is to protect the public by facilitating the licensing and credentialing of architects. To do this, hundreds of architect volunteers establish national model laws, the architect experience program and licensing exam. As the public director on NCARB’s board of directors, I am able to provide a unique perspective as both a consumer and collaborator of architectural services. I have served on a number of the NCARB’s national committees related to education and experience. The chairman of the Maryland State Board of Architects got me involved at NCARB about six years ago. NCARB has a position on its BOD for a public (consumer) member. When the last public member was at the end of his term, I decided to take a shot at the position. This was a new thing for me, as there was a good deal of campaigning that I had to do, both in person and virtually. In the end, I won the seat. Volunteering has always been important to me and having the opportunity to give back to the AEC profession while representing the public’s interest has been a highlight of my career.

(Q) You’re also involved with the Maryland Board of Architects and Harford County Public School System’s Career & Technology Education Committee. What role do you play on each?

I was appointed by the Governor of Maryland to the Maryland State Board of Architects in 2003 as a consumer member. He felt that my construction background would be a good fit since I consume architectural services daily. We have five licensed architect members, and two consumer members. On the Maryland State Board of Architects, our mission is to protect the health, safety and welfare of the citizens of the state. Our board works with laws and regulations to regulate the practice of architecture in Maryland. I also co-chair the Complaint Committee for the state board, along with one of the licensed architect members.

My time on the Harford County Career and Technology Education Committee was a span from 2009 to 2014 to help monitor the various career, technology and magnet programs within the Harford County school system. The largest portion for me was to be an industry representative for the construction trades programs at Harford Technical High School, which just happens to have been my high school alma mater. This committee made sure the programs were teaching the students with up-to-date methods and materials.

(Q) What would you say has been the most rewarding project you’ve worked on over the years? What were key takeaways?

Probably my most rewarding project was the Kennedy Krieger Outpatient Project in Baltimore (Maryland). This project was completed in two different phases, with a couple of years between them. First, we cleared several city blocks of old row homes and infrastructure, and built a new 7-level precast parking garage. The second phase was the construction of a new outpatient building. This building served several different programs for Kennedy Krieger, including audiology, physical therapy, aqua-therapy and the International Spinal Institute. Kennedy Krieger specializes in the treatment of children with autism. The outpatient building had several features in the public spaces that were designed with autism in mind, and to help occupy the patients while they were there. Some of these were a huge aquarium, special tactile surfaces and 6-foot-high glass and stainless guardrails at balcony areas. This building also had two aqua-therapy pools on the sixth floor to take advantage of the view. It was rewarding to see patients taking advantage of the building features once it opened.

(Q) Talk a little about the scope of your current project at the Ocean City Convention Center in Ocean City, Maryland. What types of challenges does it entail? How have they been mitigated?

We are adding on a new 30,000-square-foot exhibit hall, enlarging one of two existing loading docks and adding new pre-function space for the new exhibit hall, as well as several smaller interior renovation areas. All of this work is taking place around a fully functioning convention center in a seasonally busy beach resort town. We have weekly meetings to coordinate with the convention center management so everyone on both sides knows what to expect from the different events it hosts. I relay all the upcoming show information to every level of our subcontractor team through project manager meetings and foreman meetings, and every event is also shown on our pull planning boards.

(Q) What is the best advice you’ve received during your career?

Clear, concise, truthful communication.

(Q) In your opinion, what is one quality an aspiring superintendent should possess to be a success in the industry?

The ability to listen and learn. You don’t come out of college with the street smarts that this position requires. You need to be able to communicate with your subcontractors and learn what it takes for them to get the different aspects of a project done.

(Q) Any time-management tricks of the trade you can share with our readers?

Not so much a tip or trick, but being a superintendent is not a 9-5 job. I come in early every day to have time to plan for the day and have the site open before the trades arrive, and stay for whatever it takes to get the job done.

(Q) How do you approach conflict resolution?

I try and deal with people in the same way I want to be dealt with. You can resolve so much more with a reasonable, thought-out approach than you can by losing your cool.

(Q) What’s your latest go-to tech tool? How does it make your job easier?

It’s a tie between Barton Malow’s new Flypaper system for daily reports, FlyPaper Daily and our new QR code-based pull planning system.

(Q) How is Barton Malow handling COVID-19 on jobsites?

Barton Malow took COVID-19 seriously from the very beginning, and continues to refine and adjust ongoing operations guidelines according to the CDC and local health authorities. From self-assessment questionnaires each worker must fill out before entering the jobsite each day, to appointing a COVID-19 onsite point person, to best practices that include mask wearing and regular disinfection of common surfaces, we’re doing everything to keep our team members safe, prevent disease transmission and ensure that our core business functions aren’t severely impacted.

(Q) What is your own personal safety dogma, and how do you sell this to your crews on the jobsites?

I want everyone to leave work at the end of each day in the same, or better, condition as they were when they arrived. I try to be a safety educator instead of the safety police. You can’t just tell someone they are doing something unsafe and then walk away. You need to train them how to do the task right and hope that knowledge stays with them in the future.

(Q) What’s your favorite pastime when you’re not on the job?

Riding my Harley.

(Q) Is there any little-known fact about yourself or a favorite project you’d like to share with Construction Superintendent readers?

I had the opportunity to work on a NASCAR track project at Richmond Raceway a few years ago. At the end of the project, I spent an entire race weekend in an “on-call” capacity with an all-access pass. That made up for all the hours that it took to get the project completed on time. The best part was the on-call duties only consisted of a handful of calls for tripped circuit breakers. That says a lot about the quality of the work.