ANDY CROWE ● BILL YATES ● NICK WALKER ● BRAD JACOBS
NICK WALKER: Welcome to Manage This, the podcast by project managers for project managers. This is our every-other-week time to meet up and talk about what matters to you in the diverse and energetic world of project management. Whether you’re new to the field or a veteran PM, whether you have questions about becoming certified or want to just hear some real-life stories about other folks in your shoes, we’re here to help you along the way with ideas and principles that will hit home no matter where you are.
I’m your host, Nick Walker. And with me are the brains of the outfit, Andy Crowe and Bill Yates. And Andy, we have a guest in the studio today who’s in charge of a project that no doubt will make a lot of people envious because he gets to surround himself with others who just want people to play.
ANDY CROWE: You know, it’s going to be a fun episode today, Nick. I’m looking forward to this. And I always enjoy talking with people on infrastructure projects, too. It requires a different orientation, a little bit of a different discipline than maybe some of the software projects I’ve been involved with and some of the other things that require fewer materials.
NICK WALKER: I think it will be fun. So let’s introduce him. Brad Jacobs is the senior project manager with Gude Management Group. His current project is the LakePoint Sporting Community, on track to be one of the nation’s largest and most unique amateur sports destinations. His background is in owner representation, real estate development, construction management, as well as design and engineering. Brad, welcome to Manage This.
BRAD JACOBS: Thanks a lot for having me.
NICK WALKER: So Brad, right off the bat – see what I did there? Right off the bat? Okay. Tell us about LakePoint Sporting Community. What is it?
BRAD JACOBS: Well, for those that don’t know, LakePoint is a sports-oriented development. It’s actually a sports vacation destination. It’s geared towards middle school and high school age athletes that come for tournaments. It primarily started as baseball, but it’s expanded over into there’s soccer, and there’s flag football. And now we have an indoor facility that does basketball and volleyball.
So when they have these tournaments, the goal is to have people come to stay. Instead of just coming to a tournament for a short period, the goal is to get them to stay. There’s entertainment facilities onsite, hotels, restaurants. And so people come and stay for a three- or four-day tournament, rather than just showing up to a field for one single day.
NICK WALKER: Obviously, this is a huge project. How far along is it?
BRAD JACOBS: The master plan of LakePoint is actually about 900 acres. That’s the entire planned development. Right now we’re in the initial phases. The first rollout of the project is what we call the South Campus. It’s about a hundred acres of property that we’ve developed so far. It’s all – there’s baseball fields. There’s about eight baseball fields right now. There is a 180,000 square foot indoor facility. We’ve done roads, infrastructure, some entertainment facilities. And that’s just the first phase of this project. The next phase is going to be about another 800 acres, which we’re about ready to undertake.
NICK WALKER: So people can go there now? Or is that...
BRAD JACOBS: Yes. LakePoint has actually been open for about three years. This is their third season for baseball. Every summer, actually right about now they’re gearing up to have the baseball tournaments. And when the baseball tournaments start at LakePoint, it floods the entire area. Thousands of people walk, I mean, I think they have around a million visitors per season.
NICK WALKER: Wow.
BRAD JACOBS: Yeah. And we’re in the third season, so that’s about ready to gear up.
NICK WALKER: Where do you fit in with all of this?
