Mary Beth Robinson, Associate Professor

This week started off busy; I got a call as soon as I walked in on Monday from one of the designers, Alana, on her way to work. She had found out last minute that she had to fly down to Miami on Tuesday evening for a presentation and she needed a lot done! So we worked all day Monday and Tuesday to get renderings done showing different finish options for corridor floor patterns, nurse stations, patient rooms, patient corridors, and a patient bathroom. It was intense but I discovered that, like in school, I can work really efficiently under pressure. By Tuesday at 4:55 I had finished all of her renderings and she was ready to go! Here's some pictures of all that we did:

so many renderings!corridor floor pattern options

patient room elevations

The rest of the week was relatively slow in comparison. We lost Carolyn and Lauren, they went back to school. In their place this week we got two new interns from the University of Cincinnati (Lauren (another one) and Sam), and Haley from Mississippi State. Our intern space is getting cramped! Wednesday I got to plan a trip itinerary for a designer, Angela, who is taking a healthcare client to the Merchandise Mart in Chicago. We had a couple of great reps come in this week, my favorite was the 3-Form presentation showing their new "etched glass" like product. The rest of my week was spent ordering lots of samples, attending lunch and learns, and helping to train the new interns.

Lauren at the intern workspaceThis is Lauren, one of our new interns form Cincinnati. She is about to start her 4th year and this is her second internship location. Lauren loves to ride horses and has a horse named Max!

ESa markets their services in a number of ways. First of all, 85% of their business comes from repeat clients. However they are constantly advertising in magazines with articles on different projects, mailers with pictures and information that go to specific client types, on their website, and they also are very involved in the community which helps to give them a good reputation. The main market that ESa targets is healthcare and education, however they are trying to build up their hospitality, so currently a lot of marketing is being done to try to attract new hospitality clients.

here is the firm's website, which is really great and pretty much captures the firm's attitude. The site features information about the company, its ideals and mission, and a full portfolio of completed and in progress work:

ESa: people, places, perspective

here is a link to the Spotsylvania Regional Medical Center project in the online portfolio that potential clients can view (I have been helping with this project this week):

Spotsylvania Regional Medical Center

As far as strategic planning goes, the firm is working really hard to start training employees to be leaders as early as possible, always thinking about the future. The company really strives to maintain a focus on positive attitudes, a desire to work together to solve all problems, and most importantly building relationships with clients and coworkers. That is what makes ESa so successful is the relationships they have with their clients, hence the 85% repeat client base.

Accounting at ESa is accomplished in house and is overseen by the marketing director, under which a few accountants work. As far as billing hours, the timetables are set up so that employees can log hours worked on individual projects. Supplies used for each project are also logged, whether it be binders, foam core, shipping costs for ordering samples, printing, etc. The accountants sort out all of this and bill the clients.

Here are a couple of pictures of the office:

intern computer workspacepart of the materials librarymy favorite: the view of downtown Nashville from the materials library window!