doing everything I can to provide all the information that they need to be able to make a decision

and coming with suggestions to you know they're not always taken but I know that they appreciate

that I'm trying to be a part of the solution as opposed to just relying heavily on that to solve the problem.

Welcome to the Fine Home Building Pro Talk podcast, our regular discussion with building industry professionals.

This is Fine Home Building Contributing Editor and Production Manager at TDS Custom Construction, Ian Schwant.

Today I'm joined by project manager Adriana Gretz of Left Design Build in Sonoma County, California.

You can find the Fine Home Building Pro Talk podcast and the original Fine Home Building podcast at

finehomebuilding.com slash podcast. You can leave feedback and ask questions there too.

Adriana, thanks for joining me today.

Thanks so much for having me. I'm really excited.

You're the third person from the venerable left design build to sit in the

chair for an interview. What's an honor. I'm looking forward to it. So tell us about your background. How did you get in

construction project management? Sure, I'd love to. I originally thought I wanted to be an architect. I truly didn't know that the role of project manager existed for construction. I don't come from a construction background, no one in my family is a builder. But when I went and did a job shadow at an architecture firm, I quickly realized that was not the track for me. I'm less of the creative and more of the planner, which I think was pretty evident to my father,

who set up that job shadow way back when.

And he really wanted me to go to a specific college, Cal Poly San Lisbisco, in central California. He found the degree of construction

management. So I went to school for it. And then right out of school, I jumped into commercial

construction in the greater Bay area. And I've been here ever since. What was it like to go from

the polytech kind of education background to what I

got to think was a pretty stressful commercial contracting industry in the Bay Area?

We were just out there visiting you guys as part of the Remodeler's Advantage Group,

and I was really marveling at the downtown infrastructure of San Francisco

and how much work there was going on.

...