Choice Mindsets

Choice Mindsets

11 Aug

Posted at 10:54h in Uncategorized

Zach Borchers:
“Once you do it once, you’re the expert.”

We have a joke here at Choice One that if you do something well on your first try, you are the official company expert. So when Zach did a fine job taking care of a couple of dead birds the other week, he knew he was “doomed” to a lifetime career of roadkill cleanup.
What other resident experts do we have here? Let’s see…
  • Jake Bertke is our best water modeler (and not just because he uses sound engineering on water system analysis).
  • Same goes for Casey Reichert and her ability to model sanitary sewers quite beautifully.
  • Adam Gill is a whiz at traffic safety studies. Perhaps he should share the wealth to help others with some physical self-safety practices.
  • Brian Schmidt is an expert plan reviewer. He also has a knack for “reviewing” all snacks whenever a taste-test “review” is needed.
  • Megan Bornhorst is the expert at spelling Dan Perreira’s last name. Except when she’s not.
What instantaneous expert talent will be discovered next? Who knows? Perhaps we’ll discover someone who can actually hook up a coffee machine right the first time or can pronounce “Goettemoeller” or “Goubeaux” on the first try. Until then, Zach will be our expert at being the newest expert.

21 Jul

Posted at 08:17h in Uncategorized

Inquiring Mindsets:
What was a memorable summer vacation for you?

It’s that time of year when Brian Barhorst takes his summer vacation to spend his Canteen earnings. So we wondered: what memories have other Choice Oners made on summer vacations?

Dane Sommer, Roadway Engineer We went to the beach every year, but I don’t recall what we did at the beach. What I do remember is removing the middle seats of our Ford Aerostar van so we could lie on the van floor and following where we were going on the paper road atlas.
Jacqueline Huelskamp, Landscape Architect My family once stayed in remote cabin in Canada. The cabin did not have electricity and had three large bunk rooms. My brothers and I thought we could sleep in separate rooms from our parents but ended up scaring ourselves so much we all ended up in the same bunk room.
Adam Gill,
Traffic Engineer		 When I was about 8-years-old my extended family went on a cruise. We kids all got to run around together without much supervision and the only rules were “don’t get lost” and “don’t jump off the ship.”
Casey Reichert, Wastewater Engineer My parents loaded up our Oldsmobile Silhouette and took us through a drive-thru safari. The giraffe put its whole head through the open driver side window. It was terrifying.
Michael Seeger, Site Engineer I was 3 or 4 years old when my family went to Badlands National Park in South Dakota. I fell down and busted my knees open—I still have faint scars on my knees. So at that age I was pretty stuck on the fact that the Badlands were BAD.

01 Jul

Posted at 07:53h in Uncategorized

Lexy Yohey:
“I don’t think that is how a keyboard works.”

Is Loveland survey coordinator Jesse Waggoner cleaning out his keyboard? Banging his head against it? Hoping he can use mind power to make words appear on the screen? We’re not really sure, but what we do know, as Lexy pointed out, he’s probably not going to get far with his keyboard in this position.

 

Perhaps Jesse’s expressing feelings of inefficiency—he only has three monitors, and we know his Sidney counterpart Ryan Francis thinks he needs four. Then again, maybe he’s celebrating a win during a made-up Choice One sporting challenge (perhaps involving typing?) by hoisting the keyboard up like a trophy. Possibly, he’s working on his telekinesis, trying to make the keyboard levitate (in hopes he can someday read minds to finally understand field surveyor Frizz…).

 

Whether he’s imitating a hardcore rock star like Jimi Hendrix, “playing” the keyboard with his teeth or using the keyboard to shield his eyes from our bright lights, we figure Jesse has a purpose. We just hope it doesn’t involve bad luck—that’s the one Ryan Francis characteristic we don’t need Jesse to adopt!

16 Jun

Posted at 08:06h in Uncategorized

Nick Sanders:
“I don’t have a snappy quote for a Mindset, but I do have great GMAE socks.”

Our friends at Garmann Miller Architects & Engineers (GMAE) are at it again, just being generally awesome. When site engineer Nick Sanders was injured in a car crash earlier this year, they sent him a “speedy recovery” basket of goodies, which included some socks in at least one familiar color. (Nick has been recovering well, thankfully, and can now probably add some to the impressive tally of hardware sported by Choice Oners.)

 

Thanks, GMAE, for helping to keep Nick smiling during a challenging time—it’s partners like you that make our work fulfilling and fun beyond just survey and design. Did we mention GMAE and Choice One were both awarded national best firms to work for awards by ZweigWhite? Maybe it’s because both firms value a positive, fun, hardworking company culture. Or maybe it’s our shared love of the perfect shade of green—it’ too close to call.

02 Jun

Posted at 11:36h in Uncategorized

Brian Schmidt: “Heard it was National Doughnut Day today. We should implement some kind of ‘Choice One Day.’”

What good news—National Doughnut Day—on a Friday! Coincidently, Isaiah Winhoven, Choice One’s newest engineer, treated us all to his obligatory first paycheck doughnuts in honor of the day.
Schmidty, we should definitely implement a “National Choice One Day.” Perhaps it could combine all of the favorable aspects of Duplicate Name Day, Pocket Appreciation Day, Give (or Avoid) a Hug Day, and Roundabout Day, all wrapped together with (hopefully) Free Lunch Day and Wear Green Day. When would we celebrate National Choice One Day? We could celebrate on October 24 (Sidney office’s founding), August 30 (Loveland office’s founding), or January 27 (when we all remind Jeff Puthoff he’s old).
In reality, for us, every day is Choice One Day, which results in an daily enjoyment of engineering, landscape architecture, surveying, and debating the merits of such things as pizza, cheese, and all things sports. So happy National Doughnut Day… and enjoy the first official National Choice One Day of many!

19 May

Posted at 09:49h in Uncategorized

Brian “Goub” Goubeaux: “No, I didn’t have one. Only Barney was allowed to get one.”

Recognize the instrument in the photo above? Neither did our newest AutoCAD technician and 2022 high school graduate Aiden Helman. It’s a design relic from the 1990s, long before Aiden was born: an AutoCAD SummaSketch III Digitizing Graphical Drawing Board (you can learn the history/see one in action in this video).

Now that the technical details of this Mindset are out of the way, we can get to the point: that only Brian “Barney” Barhorst had and used this device. Other Choice One designers of the 1990s, including Goub, were not “allowed” to get one. It’s kind of like how Matt Hoying is never “allowed” to get a perfect score for his opinions, or how Dane isn’t “allowed” to answer the phone anymore.

Despite never seeing a Summasketch, Aiden was able to quickly guess what the contraption was, and appreciated learning the history of his craft. Don’t worry Aiden, despite Goub’s disappointment towards never getting a Summasketch, Choice One has improved over the years, and we’ll be sure to provide you with the best tools for design efficiency. Before long, you’ll be designing circles around those old geezers Barney and Goub, no SummaSketch required!