Team player with passion to deliver more value

BUILDING IT BETTER: As a senior project manager for Gilbane Co., Karen Colby uses Lean manufacturing principles to help her team deliver what clients want, when they want it and with the greatest value. / PBN PHOTO/RUPERT WHITELEY
BUILDING IT BETTER: As a senior project manager for Gilbane Co., Karen Colby uses Lean manufacturing principles to help her team deliver what clients want, when they want it and with the greatest value. / PBN PHOTO/RUPERT WHITELEY

For Karen Colby, senior project manager at Gilbane Co., her focus on continuous improvement and her abilities to harness the power of collaboration have proven to be the keys to success in all of her work on construction and engineering projects.
Colby has championed Lean manufacturing at Gilbane – formulating it into a strategy to deliver what the client wants, when they want it, with maximum value and minimum waste.
In the past, Colby said, the construction industry “has often been very siloed and confrontational.” Using Lean [management] processes of expending resources to create value for the customer makes for a better project and better project managers, she said. “We’re taking the process in a much more collaborative direction, really accomplishing our [objectives] by what we bring to the table,” she said.
A graduate of Case Western Reserve University with a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering, Colby has worked at Gilbane for 15 years. She had initially pursued a major in biomedical engineering, but changed to construction and civil engineering after spending too much time, as she put it, walking along the sidewalk watching the new library construction on campus.
She is certified as a LEED AP, BD+C engineer, a top standard for professionals participating in the design and construction phases of high-performance, healthful, durable, affordable and environmentally sound commercial, institutional and high-rise buildings. Colby is currently preparing to become a certified construction manager through the Construction Management Association of America.
Colby has worked on numerous Rhode Island construction projects for Gilbane, including projects for Fidelity Investments, Cox Communications and Amgen. One of her personal favorites was her work as a manager on the InterLink, which connects rail passengers and rental-car counters with T.F. Green Airport in Warwick. Colby was involved with the project from its initial design phase through its completed construction, a valuable professional experience, she said.
“I am very proud to be part of the decision-making process to get it built and get it completed,” she said. “From early on, I was part of the preconstruction, able to collaborate with all of the clients and all of the design team. And I’m proud to take my family and travel through it,” she said, having just used the InterLink to travel to Boston by train.
Colby laughed when asked if she left her passion for Lean at the office, or was it something she carried home with her.
“Lean is not about the need to change how you do a task,” she explained. “It’s about changing how people think about it. And, once people are really thinking that way, it doesn’t stay confined to the workplace.”
In her home, for instance, her two daughters have their own pegboard, creating a visual guide to communicate to let them know if they are on track with certain tasks, such as brushing their teeth, Colby said. “They made the pictures themselves,” she said.
In the construction industry, Colby said, successful projects are the result of successful teams. “People want to work with other people who are smart and collaborative and get great results.”
That’s a very good reason why so many companies in Rhode Island want to work with Colby as a member of their construction and engineering team. &#8226

No posts to display