Ingram’s January 2023

2023 • Executive of the Year

“Burns & Mac was just becoming an employee-owned company when I started,” Kowalik says. “Owning a piece of the place I worked for sounded like a great idea coming out of college. Everyone suf fers from some burn-out, but getting to build some innovative solutions to our customers’ challenges always made me feel like I was making a difference.”

everyone wanted to lead their team to make a real difference. Now, I know Ray’s leadership and entrepreneurial approach will create new and exciting advancements for our firm, clients, and communities.” The two had developed a strong re lationship over the years, and Kowalik was paying attention as the firm was making huge strides in its growth un

In the six years since Kowalik took the reins at Burns & Mac, the firm has grown from roughly 5,000 employees worldwide to 10,000. That pace of growth creates enormous pressure on any company’s leadership, and in his case, it meant onboarding thousands of engineers and support staff, most of them coming from organizations and cultures that don’t always align perfect ly with that of a 100 percent employ ee-owned company. For Kowalik, the key to that suc cessful integration comes down to a single word. “’Culture’ is the most overused word,” he says. “The word I like is car ing. If we hire people who care about each other, our customers, our com munities, and their company, then ev erything will be just fine.” In addition to being one of the re gion’s biggest employers, Burns & Mc Donnell is among the most prominent corporate citizens. Its presence here helps sustain Kansas City’s reputation as a national center of design excel lence, punching far above its weight in the number of engineers employed per capita. Kowalik lives that civic commit ment on a personal level, as well, in vesting his time and energy to support organizations in the fields of education, health, and economic development. His calendar with current and past service has included board chairman duties for United Way of Greater Kan sas City and seats on the boards of the Kansas City Area Development Coun cil, Union Station and Notre Dame de Sion, the executive committee of the Civic Council of Greater Kansas City, and the Dean’s Engineering Advisory Council for the College of Engineer ing at his alma mater. On the business side, he’s a member of the Kansas City market board for U.S. Bank. Taking Risks Not long after taking the reins at Burns & Mac, Kowalik found that even a wholesale commitment to driv ing the region forward could lead to a case of No Good Deed Goes Unpun ished. After years of civic-leader cries for a better airport—and just as many years

Double Duty: Kowalik and his wife, Jill, have been actively engaged on the non-profit scene in Kansas City, including their work to chair the Treads & Threads fund-raiser for The University of Kansas Health System.

That he was, and not just for cli ents; as he helped the firm grow, he was positioning himself for personal advancement. Kowalik became an offi cer of the firm in 2001; six years later, was promoted to president of the En ergy Group. The decade that followed saw him earn a seat on the company’s board of directors in 2009, then move up to executive vice president and president of global practices in 2015 before he was designated to succeed Greg Graves as chairman and CEO in January 2017. “I had the opportunity to give Ray his first promotion to project manag er not long after he joined the firm,” Graves said in announcing his suc cessor. “He was immediately the one

der Graves’ direction. “Greg’s leadership was always being a cheerleader,” Kowalik says, “I learned it’s better to err on that approach than the other.” Attaining the pinnacle office was n’t part of a grand plan, and moving into the leadership ranks necessarily required a step back from engaging directly with clients at the project level. “I just try to do my job well, make our clients successful, and whatever else comes will be icing on the cake,” Kowalik says. “I miss the interaction with our energy customers, but I still have a soft spot for the business and keep in touch with many of my old cli ents.”

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I n g r a m ’ s

January 2023

Ingrams.com