Variety fuels Squitieri’s career at Mead and Hunt

Amy Squitieri studied to become a professor.

So, of course, she got into construction.

“It wasn’t planned,” Squitieri said with a laugh.

But as she was completing her master’s in architectural history, Squitieri said, she realized she was not cut out for academia. She said she wanted more diversity than her single subject would allow, and she was not comfortable with the inherent competition among colleagues.

“I wasn’t sure what I was going to do,” Squitieri said, “so I started asking people, ‘What do you do with a master’s in architectural history?'”

She took a job documenting historic bridges for the National Park Service and then switched to a role as a compliance consultant for the Environmental Protection Act and the National Historic Preservation Act. But it was that first job that led to her professional specialty and drew the attention of her future employer, Mead and Hunt Inc., Madison.

“I sort of fell into it,” said Squitieri, the group leader of the engineering and architectural firm’s transportation, historic preservation and municipal projects. “I started the practice at Mead and Hunt not really knowing what would become of it. And now it’s a separate unit.”

For the past eight years, Squitieri has overseen the company’s western infrastructure division, leading a team of about 90 engineers, planners, historians, scientists and technicians, and managing transportation, cultural resources, municipal infrastructure, and wastewater and water treatment. She is also part of the company’s mergers and acquisitions team, and she is a treasurer with the firm’s board of directors.

“There are a few aspects to (my work),” she said.

But it’s that variety that Squitieri said she enjoys the most.

“The problem solving, working with the team and the clients to address the challenges that they’re having, especially with historic bridges,” she said. “There’s always a lot of challenges because you’re trying to keep them in use and, if you can’t, you’re going through the compliance process to maintain the history and not demolish it.”

The Daily Reporter: When you have a bad day, what keeps you coming back to work?
Amy Squitieri: The nature of consulting is that things are going to be up and down, so I move on. Sometimes I’ll shift gears for a while. There’s always something different to do. If something is not going right, set it aside and come back later.

TDR: What is the most useful thing you’ve learned since starting your job?
Squitieri: I think that if you have an idea, bring it forward and be ready to do something to implement it. I encourage everyone else to do the same thing. If you see something that could be better or an opportunity that we don’t do yet, how are we going to make it happen?

TDR: What do you consider your biggest achievement so far?
Squitieri: I am particularly proud of our acquisition of a firm that brought us five new offices in the mid-Atlantic and Southeast. It got us into a new geography and helped accelerate Mead and Hunt’s growth quite a bit in the last year. Certainly, I didn’t do that by myself. But being involved in that group of about 85 people feels really good.

TDR: What can you spend hours doing that’s not work-related?
Squitieri: Hiking with my family. We recently started trying to do that every Sunday. It can be hard to fit in, but our dog really likes the new plan. And, when it’s snowing, we’ll mix some skiing in with that.

TDR: If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?
Squitieri: Something that I always try to remember and work on is leaving time for personal interactions with people who report to me and the larger team, listening to what’s going on with them and their families, nonproject issues. I’m trying to not let the pace of things interfere with the people side.

TDR: What are you craving right now?
Squitieri: I’ve got a plate of wings right here, and I’ve only had two of them. So, I can’t wait to finish them.

TDR: Which famous person would most like to have a drink with?
Squitieri: Well there are so many people it’s hard to pick one. But Aung San Suu Kyi, the dissident leader of Burma. Unfortunately, we’ll probably have to have tea.