Gray Construction Chairman Featured as Founding Father of the Design-Build Institute of America

Jim Gray was part of group that started the organization 25 years ago

Gray Construction chairman Jim Gray has been recognized as a founding father of the Design-Build Institute of America.

At the organization's 2018 annual conference, Gray took part in a founding fathers panel to celebrate the DBIA's 25th anniversary. Other members of the panel were Preston H. Haskell of Haskell; Kraig G. Kreikemeier of Kreikemeier Group, LLC; Richard M. Kunnath of Pankow Foundation; and Donald G. Warren of McCrory Construction Company, LLC.

“DBIA’s Founding Fathers were design-build ‘true believers’ at a time when many in the industry considered alternative delivery processes risky and a threat to the status quo,” says Lisa Washington, CAE, Executive Director/CEO, Design-Build Institute of America. “25 years ago, Gray Construction was already proving the naysayers wrong by delivering some of the nation’s best design-build projects, and Jim Gray was determined to expand those successes to all 50 states. It’s not often an individual can impact an entire industry; Jim Gray is one of those people. America has found a better way to build, thanks to his courage and insight.”

The organization's founding fathers started DBIA to expand the role of design-build in the project delivery process. Over that time, the method has come to be recognized as an important part of the project delivery process, instead of as an "alternative" project delivery method. More than 75 percent of Gray Construction's projects use design-build.

“It’s so rewarding to see a 25-year-old vision develop to such an extraordinary level, proving that ideas are the DNA of everything that’s important,” says Gray.

Casey Laughman is the former Editor in Chief of Food Engineering magazine. He has almost two decades’ experience as a writer and editor for mainstream and trade publications. He spent several years as a writer and editor for two news services before becoming the editor of a legal publication and managing editor of a trade magazine that covered the commercial facilities market.