I’ve worked in the ITS industry for over ten years, and I’ve yet to see a company that comes even close to Aspen Communications’ dedication to excellence. The prevailing attitude from most ITS companies I’ve worked with is to simply “get it done.” At Aspen we believe in getting it done the right way, and that is very important to me professionally. When I complete a project, I think of it as finishing a work of art, and I wouldn’t sign my name to something I’m not proud of. We believe in following BICSI standards and the codes set forth by the NEC, IEEE, and ANSI to the letter. We have one of the most well put together installation teams in the southwest, as well as several RCDD’s whom lend their expertise to our teams at a moment’s notice. Having them available as resources has been great, because let’s face it, no matter how carefully you plan out a project, there will be hiccups. When I hit one, there’s nothing like having a full team of engineers on speed dial.
One of my first projects as a lead technician for Aspen was a Science Center for the National Park Service. The project had been pulled from a low voltage contractor with virtually no credentials, and was ultimately awarded to Aspen after the building was already nearly “finished”. This was, in my opinion, a very good decision by NPS because a lack of skilled personnel performing network installations is almost always a recipe for a disaster. The fact that we were walking into a job in progress did however produce its own challenges. Typically we have several stages of an install that we begin to deploy during the early stages of a building, but the state of things when we entered the picture meant a lot of foundational work had to be retro-fitted, significantly increasing the difficulty.
Despite the hurdles we needed to overcome, we were able to complete the project to our standards and on schedule, through careful planning and coordination between our RCDDs, myself, and my installation crew. As the lead on this project my job was to coordinate the junior techs in the most effective way possible and to ensure our project milestones are met. It’s also my job to ensure that the quality of our work meets or exceeds both my own and the customers’ expectations. In the end, that ugly duckling of a project, with its litany of delays and problems, became a crown jewel of the park’s Information Technology System. Not only that, but with careful planning and a little value-engineering, it was completed on time *and* under budget. That combined with the overall system performance and aesthetic appearance make this project not only one of my first projects at Aspen, but also my favorite!
-Jason Ailiff
