Spotlight On: Ryan Doherty, Principal, Practice Leader, Progressive Companies
August 2024 — In an interview with Invest:, Ryan Doherty, principal and practice leader of Progressive Companies, talked about several key milestones in the past year including their rebranding effort and expansion into new office spaces. Their sports and entertainment sector has grown significantly, and sustainability is emphasized through all the projects they work on. Looking ahead, their focus includes national expansion and growth in rapidly growing sectors.
What have been some of the significant milestones or achievements for you over the last 12 months?
The most notable is our rebrand. We started in 1962 as Progressive Engineering Consultants. In the 1980s we brought in architecture, and in 1995 changed our name to Progressive AE. As we have continued to grow we feel that name doesn’t capture the full experience and capabilities that we offer today, including Universal Design consulting, urban design and planning, change management, sustainability leadership, controlled environments, program management, and capital planning. Progressive Companies now offer us greater flexibility as the firm diversifies beyond architecture and engineering. We are also continuing to expand our national footprint with new office spaces in Detroit, Michigan and Charlotte’s Camp North End, and growing our employee base.
We recently brought on a new leader for our sports and entertainment market, and we have seen substantial growth in that area with projects we are currently working on like the Acrisure Amphitheater, the downtown soccer stadium in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and the Sullenberger Aviation Museum here in Charlotte. We have also had some recent wins with design competitions that we are proud of. The Reimagining Vintage Office Spaces contest in Charlotte challenged participants to bring life and energy back to the center city through repurposing space that used to be for office, returning them back to the community with other uses. It was an exciting project and opportunity to work with a lot of community partners. We also won a recent design competition in Detroit for a zero-waste education center, providing a space for Detroit families to learn about benefits of waste reduction.
How do you incorporate sustainability into your projects?
Sustainability is a core value within the company. Three years ago we adopted the AIA 2030 challenge, committing all new buildings and renovations to be carbon neutral by 2030. We incorporate sustainability best practices into every project, through innovative design strategies such as renewable energy sources, high-performing building envelopes, and thoughtful material selection. It’s an important topic to our clients and across the industry, so we have recently hired a sustainability lead who is elevating our organization to the next level. By committing to the AIA 2030 Challenge and investing in sustainability leadership, Progressive Companies has brought a common language across our architecture and engineering disciplines that positions us to guide clients to combat climate change and make long-term business decisions impacting their facilities. We feel this is important, and our duty as designers, in striving for environmental leadership within our industry.
What are examples of how technology is transforming the work you do?
Right now the buzz word is AI, and it is about the ability to harness and use data in a way that is more efficient and cost effective. This can help us focus our true efforts on providing thought leadership and a level of design that cannot be provided by AI. At present, we use AI with tasks ranging from editing copy to actual design inspiration and generation. We can create a model or design for a building conceptually and run it through the AI program with prompts to help us generate ideas quickly that we can manipulate further into a final concept — taking that workstream from a week to a day.
How do you ensure you are promoting engagement and connectivity within the community?
That is what everyone is striving for and is probably the biggest trend in design right now, especially post pandemic as people are seeking out new ways to experience spaces and connect with others. Designing spaces that engage communities, that are inclusive and promote diversity is a focus of ours and we do that by bringing together a team that is experienced in bespoke placemaking and creating authentic immersive experiences through our multiple design disciplines. Anyone can create an attractive building, but what’s important are the spaces between them around and above them, how these buildings interact with one another and the unique mix of uses that bring them together. We are experts in Universal Design, which is about creating spaces for people of all abilities that are usable to the most diverse range of people possible — making everyone feel welcome and that they belong. We strive to provide this through our collective of placemaking experts.
What are some of the unique characteristics of Charlotte?
Charlotte is booming, it is a fantastic place to live, work and play. I’ve been here for over 20 years now and just love the region. This year Charlotte ranked as the third fastest-growing city in the country after Dallas and San Antonio. Raleigh came in at nine as well so two cities in the top 10 within the state is incredible. And the state of NC as a whole has also been ranked at the #1 state to do business in for both 2022 and 2023 by CNBC. We dropped to No. 2 this year in 2024, but hope to reclaim our No. 1 spot next year.
The Carolinas region offers opportunities for industry, with a fantastic airport in Charlotte and the Port in Charleston that attracts business and manufacturing to the region. Population growth is driven by businesses wanting to be here and they want to be here because we are a great state that entices industry. The city offers excellent healthcare, science, and tech, creating a perfect storm for growth and a great business environment that further fuels the growth of the region.
What are the current market challenges you are facing?
It has been a great year and we have seen a lot of success but like many, we are still struggling with interest rates and the availability of capital for some project types. While some of our markets are strong others have slowed down. For us, we have focused on diversifying our service offerings and have focused on community, civic projects, workplace, science and industry, and higher education to provide a good balance.
Sectors that I would say are still struggling are multi-family housing and retail as they rely heavily on external investment, which is challenging due to high construction costs making margins much tighter. These challenges might persist in the near term, but things will level out and we expect interest rates will come down a bit more over the coming year or so. The age old saying of the “retail apocalypse” is not true, but instead retail is shifting and changing. The same goes for multi-family housing. But in this region of Charlotte we are somewhat insulated from these issues due to the growth being experienced.
What are some of your top priorities for the next two to three years?
We are focused on continuing to expand nationally. We have a lot going on in the Midwest region and are working on projects throughout the county, but the Carolinas remains a focus with all the growth happening here. We just signed a new lease to move into Camp North End, in a new office space that will allow us to double our size here in Charlotte. We’re committed to this region and anticipate seeing further growth focusing on projects within the higher education, civic and municipal, health and wellness, and science and industry markets.
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