AEBL Interview with TAYLOR CEO Randy Regier

At www.aebl.org, Randy Regier discusses his firm's business approach and AEBL's value.

An excerpt:

AEBL: What differentiates Taylor from the competition?

RR: One thing that differentiates us is our culture. It has a lot to do with our mission – “promoting wellness through architecture.” The people in this firm really get behind that. In health care, you can see how your work really changes people’s lives. Everybody here rallies around that as a benefit on a much bigger scale. The work we do can make the difference between someone going home in four days or six days. They can recover faster in an environment more conducive to healing. Perhaps more important, we are in the position to be able to create environments for wellness rather than just environments for curing sickness.

AEBL: How does AEBL fit into the picture for TAYLOR?

RR: The great benefit of AEBL is that it’s a non-competitive place where the barriers are let down. At the CEO Roundtables, every person who attends comes in with an open mind and a willingness to assist a colleague, even if they’re technically a competitor. It’s a benefit to the industry as a whole and it makes the industry better. If you hoard your ideas and your experiences, that does nothing for the industry. With AEBL, everyone is trying to make a collectively better industry. You don’t necessarily get that in some other organizations, where it can be more competitive. AEBL is neutral territory. It’s like Switzerland.

AEBL: What has AEBL meant to you in your career?

RR: As a newly minted CEO, being able to attend those CEO roundtables gave me the confidence to come back to my own organization and speak and lead with confidence. That was about five years ago, and though I may have eventually gotten there on my own, being able to sit side-by-side with CEOs that had been doing it for anywhere from five to forty years was invaluable. I can’t say enough about how beneficial that was for me. I gained way more insight into the role and it helped me formulate my vision and ideas. It gave me the conviction to know that maybe my ideas weren’t so batty after all.