Ingram’s September 2022

Tom O’Grady PRESIDENT, HNTB CORPORATION

Tyler Nottberg CHAIRMAN/CEO, U.S. ENGINEERING

TomO’Grady and HNTB are celebrating amajor contribution to the econom ic picture. “As industry leaders in transportation infrastructure, we’ve been engaged heavily in communicating the need for significant infrastructure investment to strengthen the country’s safety, efficiency, and competitive ness, We’re proud that our longstanding and broad efforts contributed to the passage of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and that those investments are now benefiting KC and communities across the country.”

According to Tyler Nottberg, over the past year, “The most impres sive achievement is how well each leader consistently focused on the growth and development of individual team members.” That may just be pudding-proof of a retention philosophy he shared with us: “Ensuring we cultivate a high-performance culture where everyone feels like they belong is a high-priority strategic commit ment for our organization.”

COLLEGE: B.A., Middlebury College ON CULTIVATING TALENT: “We are proud to be investing in the work force of tomorrow, and not just through our own organization but by investing directly in high-quality early childhood education programs, high schools, and local higher education institutions.” COVID PERSPECTIVE: “We have a unique work force in that two-thirds of our people are required to do their work at a construction site or at a customer facility. This work for our customers is “essential,” so most of our team members continued to work as normal, though with additional precautions for health and safety. .. We’ve learned to utilize communication technology much better..” KC’S NEXT BIG THING: “I believe the next big thing is not even on our radar yet. With all the work that the business and civic community has done to elevate our profile nationally and internationally, I strongly believe that the best is yet to come for the Kansas City region.”

COLLEGE: B.S., M.S., Civil Engineering, Vanderbilt University ON TALENT: “The key is the complete employee value proposition. In a somewhat unexpected way, we are seeing net positive value in our ‘better together (work from the office)’ approach, where people are seeing the benefit of growing their knowledge and careers by being back in the office on a full-time basis.” COVID PERSPECTIVE: “The experience has been difficult and exhausting, but the overall impact has been very reinforcing of our key culture elements of technical excellence, integrity, collaboration, and sustainability. The experience strengthened our collective resiliency in ways we wouldn’t have imagined.’ KC’S NEXT BIG THING: “The streetcar extension will bring a decade-plus of redevelopment and invest ment along the Main Street corridor. A downtown Royals ballpark will also bring significant transformation.” CHIEFS PREDICTION: “11-5. Everybody is going to be circling the Chiefs on their schedule, but we have the leadership and team talent to succeed against the best.”

John Olander COO, BURNS & MCDONNELL

Patrick Ottensmeyer PRESIDENT/CEO, KANSAS CITY SOUTHERN RAILWAY Passionate about the inherent efficiency of moving freight with steel wheels on steel rails, Pat Ottensmeyer put the capstone on his career last year by helping orchestrate KC Southern’s union with Canadian Pacific Railway. When the rebranding is complete, Canadian Pacific Kansas City will be uniquely positioned among North American rail systems to move cargo from coast to coast and from Canada to the Panama Canal.

There are pros and cons to being the first. The pro? You get to blaze your own trail without being compared to your predecessor. The con? Well, you have to blaze your own trail. John Olander was the first chief operating officer in Burns & McDonnell’s history, responsible for man aging and facilitating new processes and tools to improve efficiencies and collaboration for more than 10,000 engineering and technical pro fessionals in offices and project sites throughout the world.

COLLEGE: B.S., Electrical Engineering, North Dakota State University; MBA, University of Kansas BIGGEST ACHIEVEMENT: Delivering results to the communities where we work. ... In 2021, we had a record-breaking year with $4.6 billion in revenue supporting nearly 17,000 projects. We expect to continue our rapid growth and grow by 13 percent this year.” DOWNTURN DEFENSE: “Burns & McDonnell is intentionally diversified in our service offerings allowing us to weather ups and downs in our markets.” CHALLENGES AHEAD: “We continue to see higher demand with lagging supply. This year will again be challenging, and we are here to help our clients and partners with short- and long-term supply chain issues. Utilities have no choice but to operate.” KC’S NEXT BIG THING: Leverage the new KCI, link entertainment/hotel districts; ”offer visitors, conference organizers, sports organizations, and businesses a compelling reason to come to KC.”

COLLEGE: B.S., Finance, Indiana University THE ROUTE TO KC: Early in his career, Ottensmeyer sold homes for his father’s real estate business, then went into corporate banking. Working with Santa Fe Pacific Corp. as a client, he piqued his interest in railroad leadership, and he ultimately found his way to Kansas City Southern as CFO in 2006. BIG SHOES: Ottensmeyer credits his two predecessors—Mick Haverty and then David Star ling—with positioning the railroad to capitalize on the current boom in logistics and trans portation, allowing him to leverage dramatic changes in railroad technology. KCS ORIGINS: The company was founded in 1887 as Kansas City Suburban Belt Railway.

Lenora Payne CEO/FOUNDER, TGS

Rosana Privitera Biondo PRESIDENT, MARK ONE ELECTRIC

With a background in word-processing equipment services that included operations management, employee training, sales sup port, and human resources, Lenora Payne had all the tools needed to light her entrepreneurial fire. She struck that match in 2005 by founding Technology Group Solutions and, over the next decade, turned it into one of the biggest minority-owned firms in the Kan sas City region, eventually surpassing $100 million in revenue.

Once upon a time, a woman running a big electrical services and consulting company would have been—forgive us, here—shocking. But with Rosana Privitera Biondo at the helm and her three broth ers filling out the team, Mark One continues to be the power player their parents, Carl and Josephine, started in 1974. Today, with more than 200 employees, and with Carl and Josephine’s nine grandchil dren on-deck, the future is looking safe and sound.

EDUCATION: Kellogg School of Management, Kauffman FastTrac Growth Venture, multiple IT sales and technical certifications VALUES-BASED: Payne built her business on four philosophical pillars: Integrity, honesty, depend ability, and being customer-centric. BEFORE TGS: She honed her IT-world skills while working in various roles for GE Capital Information Technology Solutions, MicroAge Computer Center, and other IT resellers. HONORS/AWARDS: In addition to multiple appearances on Ingram’s Corporate Report 100 list of the region’s fastest-growing companies and Ingram’s 100 list of the largest by revenue, Payne has been a recipient of Women Executives-Kansas City honors. Others include the 50 Fastest-Growing Women-Owned/Led Companies World-Wide, EY’s Entrepreneur of the Year awards as a 2013 Central Midwest finalist), Diverse Small Business of the Year, Supplier of Year, MBE Supplier of the Year, Kansas Woman-Owned Business and others.

CULTURE IS IMPORTANT: The Privitera family spirit that fuels Mark One extends throughout the organization and was instrumental in seeing the firm through the pandemic. It will also play a crucial role in riding the rough economic tides some believe are coming down the road. STAYING CLASSY: Where a lot of people got a little—shall we say, unkept—during the on line-meeting world of the pandemic, Mark One made it a point of pride to have the staff maintain a level of presentation and personal appearance throughout that kept things as normal as possible for clients. SPEAKING OF CLASSY: Community spirit is part of this family’s culture and Privitera Biondo displays a lot of it with leadership roles in initiatives such Kansas City Area Development Council, CREWKC (for women who are construction executives), Women Construction Owners & Executives, and the United Way’s board of trustees, to name just a few.

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September 2022

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