Rapid growth in its Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) Group led Haskell to hire its first full-time Mechanical Commissioning Agent this year. Less than three months later, it’s created a second such position.
The company is seeking an experienced professional whose responsibilities will include oversight of commissioning activities, engineering, design, coordination, client communications, and associated construction administration and field-related troubleshooting efforts.
Throughout most of Haskell’s history, the mechanical engineering team that designed a job also checked it out. Those same team members tested all equipment and ensured that systems were 100% operational at turnover. But accelerating growth and the scale of CPG projects created the need for a different approach.
“On large jobs, that could be months at a time, and it took away core people from designing the next job,” said Matt Ford, Haskell’s Chief Mechanical Engineer. “For the past couple of years, we’ve been hiring third-party commissioning agents to free up our core resources but still provide the highest level of quality and turnover, because we absolutely need to functionally test all of the equipment before turning it over.”
The presence of an in-house resource to handle the load provides the benefit of allowing design engineers to stay focused and creating an added degree of value for each project, Ford said. It also keeps jobs moving, a vital factor as clients seek competitive advantage in the speed to market Haskell’s integrated delivery model provides.
“The responsiveness of having someone in that role and able to help at a moment's notice has helped the team tremendously,” Ford said. “We’re able to further improve our quality by having a resource for the teams to utilize on functional checkout, and when we have control-related issues on jobs, they can come in and do quality checkouts as well.”
The Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) Group at Haskell supports the Food & Beverage, Consumer Products and Beer, Wine & Spirits markets throughout the United States, as well as the Latin American and Asia-Pacific regions. Providing construction, architecture, and engineering for more than 55 years, Haskell partners with many Fortune 500 companies. It’s now been ENR’s No. 1-ranked Food & Beverage contractor two years in a row and three of the past five.
“Our CPG team is a melting pot of industry-leading experts who collaborate across architecture, engineering and construction disciplines to provide the best possible solutions to our clients,” Ford said. “By joining the CPG team, they’ll become a part of a close-knit family that supports each other and our clients. It’s a unique opportunity.”
In addition to providing a highly collaborative and fast-paced environment, Haskell operates with the direction of six strategic pillars, the first of which is to “Provide Team Members the BEST Job of Their Lives.” It offers a robust benefits package that includes a 401k match and an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP), which creates stock ownership for every full-time team member.
The successful Mechanical Commissioning candidate will have at least five years of experience, and while Professional Engineer’s (PE) licensing is optional, they should have their Building Commissioning Professional Certification (BCxP). Responsibilities will focus primarily on mechanical systems, HVAC, utilities and plumbing, but expertise in other disciplines is a plus. Home location is flexible, but frequent travel is required.
“The ideal person is probably someone who’s worked in the control industry, someone who worked for a Johnson or a Honeywell or a Siemens,” Ford said. “They've installed these systems, and they've tested them. Either that or they've been a commissioning agent previously. "
“If they have certified commissioning license, then they’re high on our list. That comes with a lot of weight. They can do internal quality control and third-party certification, and we would like to have the flexibility in that role to do both.”
View the complete job description and apply.
