ENR Mountain States 2013 Top 20 Under 40

This year's Top 20 Under 40 winners emerged from a competition that featured more than 60 entries, the largest in the history of ENR Mountain States.

Courtesy of MHC

Jacob “Jake” Watson
Using innovation to grow engineer's Western architecture business
35, Regional Director, Architecture-Engineering-Planning
Michael Baker Jr. Inc.
Salt Lake City

Six years ago, Jake Watson joined Michael Baker Jr. Inc. as the only building engineer in the Pennsylvania-based design firm's Western operation. Since then, he has grown the firm's architectural practice, now managing 15 staffers and coordinating Western architectural service marketing. He has led structural engineering teams on more than $500 million in design-build projects. And, in conjunction with Baker's SharePoint Development Team, he led design of a custom document-control software for design-build projects.

"The accelerating rate of innovation affects every aspect of our industry," Watson says. "We must constantly innovate every facet of what we do: design approach, internal organization, project delivery models, construction techniques. People executing new approaches founded on solid fundamentals will succeed."

Darin C. Zwick
Young chief executive reinvigorates his family-owned contracting firm
35, President & CEO
Zwick Construction Co.
Salt Lake City

Growing up in and around the construction industry, Darin Zwick's natural ability to lead allowed him to rise quickly up the ranks in different organizations. Now he is the third generation at Zwick Construction, which his grandfather founded in 1969. Since rekindling the company in 2007, Zwick has overseen contracts of more than $200 million. Co-workers and peers agree that Zwick mirrors his company's values: passion, integrity and teamwork.

"We must balance new management technologies with yesterday's core constructing principles," Zwick says. "We must continually strive to mesh the two, providing our clients with design-build, BIM-generated energy models, green-building practices, more efficient management software and smarter approaches to managing risk .… Yet we must never forget the shoulders we stand on."

Mark Shaw is the former editor-in-chief of ENR Mountain States, co-editor of ENR Southwest, and the senior editor in charge of ENR's Contractor Business Strategy. He serves as ENR's Rocky Mountain bureau chief in Denver.