Facility Rockstars

Stay Curious, Stay Useful: Tim Reynolds on Learning, Leading, and the Facilities Life

In this episode, Jay Culbert sits down with Tim Reynolds, a facilities manager at a growing manufacturing business who has built one of the more unconventional careers in the industry. Tim's background spans painting, computer information sciences, a bachelor's in classics and political science, special education teaching (including a master's degree and administrative licensure), and ultimately a full return to the trades. Now managing 52,000 square feet solo as both facilities manager and EHS officer, Tim brings a grounded, curious, and self-aware perspective to everything he does. At the core of his philosophy is something deceptively simple: keep asking questions, actually listen to the answers, and never stop learning. From sourcing vendors through word of mouth to navigating safety in a machine shop environment, Tim covers real challenges with refreshing honesty. He also gives listeners a peek behind the curtain at some of his personal passions, including hand-carved wooden spoons and a Viking shield maiden costume he made for his dog. Takeaways: * Lifelong learning is a practice, not a personality type. Tim credits a genuine curiosity about how things work and why people do what they do as the engine behind his career. Whether it's a textbook, a YouTube video, a 20-year-old equipment manual he found on Google, or just a conversation with someone next to him, learning is always on the table. * Ask for help — and mean it. Tim returns to this idea multiple times throughout the conversation. In facilities, there's never enough time in the day. Asking for help when you need it isn't a weakness; it's one of the most practical tools available. Most people are genuinely willing to assist if you're willing to ask. * Face-to-face communication beats everything else. Tim uses email where it fits, but when something needs to be resolved, he walks directly to the person. Clarity, tone, and relationship all improve when you show up in person. * Word of mouth is the best vendor sourcing tool you're not paying for. Tim inherited an outdated vendor list when he took his current role and has had to build parts of his network from scratch. His method: ask other vendors for referrals, lean on trusted relationships, and keep looking until you find the right fit. * Safety requires designing for inattention. As EHS officer, Tim knows that people focused on getting work done aren't always thinking about safety in the moment. The job is to build systems and environments that protect people even when their attention is elsewhere. A personal injury early in his career, cutting a tendon in his thumb with a putty knife, drives this point home. * Saying yes first is often the right move. Tim's career has been defined in part by accepting opportunities before he knew exactly how to execute them. His approach: say yes, then figure it out. He notes that at this point in his career, the only regrets he carries are the times he didn't say yes. * The diversity of your background is an asset. Tim's path through painting, tech, the classics, special education, and now facilities management might look scattered from the outside. But each chapter gave him something: patience, communication skills, problem-solving instincts, and technical knowledge, which make him better at his job today. Quote of the Show: *  "Ask. Ask. And then more importantly, and I think this is the thing a lot of people forget, listen." Links: * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/timothy-reynolds-99905b13b/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/timothy-reynolds-99905b13b/] * IFMA Boston https://ifmaboston.org/ [https://ifmaboston.org/]

Stay Current, Stay Honest: Colby Fillippelli on the Art of Facilities Leadership

In this episode, Jay Culbert sits down with Colby Fillippelli, Senior Vice President of Facilities at JLL and incoming President of the Boston chapter of IFMA. Colby brings over 25 years of facilities management experience, having led operations for major organizations including Dunkin' Brands, Hasbro, and Novartis. Throughout the conversation, Colby shares how his career evolved from an HVAC technician responding to work orders to a seasoned executive overseeing national real estate portfolios, and what he learned along the way. At the heart of his philosophy is a simple but powerful belief: facilities is a people business that just happens to involve buildings. From handling a middle-of-the-night fire at a client site while snowboarding at Loon Mountain to using metrics to shift his team from reactive to proactive, Colby offers hard-won insight into what it really takes to thrive in this industry. He emphasizes the power of consistent communication, the importance of staying current, and why paying it forward to the next generation of facilities professionals is one of his greatest priorities. His energy, honesty, and no-nonsense approach make for a conversation that is equal parts practical and inspiring.   Takeaways: * Be honest and ask questions constantly. Admitting what you don't know and asking for help isn't weakness — it's how you grow. The most effective facilities professionals don't fake it; they ask, learn, and communicate openly at every stage of their career. * Shift from reactive to proactive using metrics. Tracking patterns in your work orders and recurring issues isn't just good practice — it drives cost savings, reduces risk, and transforms how your team operates. If you're not measuring it, you can't improve it. * Communicate early, even without all the answers. Don't wait until you have perfect information to update your team or clients. Timely, honest communication — especially during a crisis — builds credibility and keeps everyone moving in the right direction. * Your vendor relationships are your lifeline. Know your vendors personally before you sign a contract. When something goes wrong at 10 PM, those relationships are what keep operations from falling apart. Invest in them the same way you invest in your team. * Know when to defer maintenance — and when you absolutely can't. Deferring critical infrastructure like HVAC PMs, arc flash updates, or major MEP work is a risk not worth taking. A seasoned facilities leader knows how to make the case for doing it right the first time. * Pay it forward to the next generation. The industry is losing decades of institutional knowledge as Baby Boomers retire. Those with experience have a responsibility to mentor, educate, and actively invest in emerging professionals — both inside their organizations and through groups like IFMA. * Mindset and attitude are as important as technical skills. Showing up with energy, professionalism, and a team-first mentality isn't optional — it's what makes everything else work. As Colby puts it: you're not curing cancer, so bring some levity to the work. Quote of the Show: *  "Follow-through matters more than intent, and your reputation compounds over time." Links: * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/colby-fillippelli-cfm-8591097/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/colby-fillippelli-cfm-8591097/]  * Company Website: https://www.jll.com/en-us/ [https://www.jll.com/en-us/]  * IFMA Boston Website: https://ifmaboston.org/ [https://ifmaboston.org/]

People First: How Matt Greenfield Turned Scientific Roots into Operational Leadership

In this episode, Matt Greenfield, Executive Director of Laboratory Operations and Facilities at Verve Therapeutics, a wholly owned subsidiary of Eli Lilly, shares a fascinating career trajectory that began at the scientific bench and evolved into executive operational leadership. With over 25 years in the pharmaceutical industry, Matt has led the design, construction, and move-in of more than 100,000 square feet of lab space, all while championing a culture built on partnership, data-driven decision-making, and genuine kindness. He opens with a disarmingly simple but powerful lesson: be a nice person, and then goes on to show exactly how that principle plays out across every facet of his leadership. A central theme throughout the conversation is collaboration, not as a buzzword, but as the practical engine that drives results. From interviewing every scientist before starting a new role to building a safety program that eliminates excuses by giving people the tools and resources they need upfront, Matt demonstrates what it looks like to lead with empathy while still holding people to the highest standards. He also reflects on the greatest challenge of his career, relocating an entire operating pharmaceutical company, and what he'd do differently, offering candid, actionable advice for anyone facing a similar transition.   Takeaways: * Be a nice person first. It sounds simple, but Matt credits this as his single biggest lesson learned. People want to work with you, partner with you, and go to bat for you when you treat them well. Kindness is a leadership strategy. * Demand to contribute — from yourself and others. Push past discomfort and put your ideas on the table. Growth comes from being willing to be a little vulnerable. And hold others to that same standard by creating space for their voices too. * Use data to drive decisions and resolve conflict. Whether it was proving a lab was too warm by citing equipment specifications or convincing leadership to make a key hire, Matt consistently turns to data to make an airtight case. Vague complaints don't move people — numbers do. * Don't just do the work. Communicate that you did it. Operations teams often work quietly in the background and assume results speak for themselves. Matt learned the hard way that completing a task isn't enough — you have to tell people what you did and how to use it. * Build safety programs that eliminate excuses. Rather than policing behavior, Matt's team invested in giving employees every resource they needed — prescription eyewear services, vendor demo days, and creative events like a "Safety Olympics" — so when standards weren't met, there was nothing to point to but personal accountability. * Reach out to others who've already solved your problem. Your challenges are not unique to you. Matt encourages leaning on your network, especially during complex transitions. Someone has already been through it — find them and ask. * Be proactive, not reactive. In a startup environment, reactive becomes a habit. Matt's ongoing goal is to make earlier, more decisive calls — and he advises anyone managing a facility move to get ahead of issues before they linger. Quote of the Show: * "I love the people. That's what drives me every day. It's solving problems, collaborating to come up with solutions that I know are gonna drive things forward." Links: * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthew-greenfield-833a3277/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthew-greenfield-833a3277/]  * Website: https://www.lilly.com/ [https://www.lilly.com/]

Compliance, Culture, and Clean Rooms: Inside Pharma & Life Sciences Facilities

In this special compilation episode of Facility Rockstars, host Jay Culbert brings together eight seasoned facilities and EHS professionals from the pharma and life sciences world — Bob Mack, Mike Rich, Harvey Handy, Dave Vansteenburgh, Tony Burke, Jeff Kaminski, Dan O'Connell, and Gabriel Budds — for a deep and practical conversation on what it really takes to manage facilities in one of the most regulated industries on the planet. From navigating FDA inspections and wastewater compliance to building comprehensive asset lists and managing lab buildouts, the guests pull back the curtain on the unique challenges that define life sciences facility management. A consistent theme throughout: the stakes are extraordinarily high, and failure simply is not an option when the work being done supports treatments for Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, schizophrenia, and other serious conditions. The conversation covers everything from hiring the right team members (including a memorable story about spotting a future facilities tech across the street while heading out one day) to maintaining audit-ready environments year-round. The guests also explore the critical relationship between facilities and EHS, the value of cross-functional professional networks, proactive lifecycle and budget planning through CMMS systems, and why a "never say no" mindset is the foundation of a long and successful career in life sciences facilities. Whether you work in research, process science, or full GMP manufacturing, this episode is packed with practical wisdom you can put to work immediately. Takeaways: * Never say no — be a problem solver first. In life sciences facilities, your job description is always expanding. Approaching every challenge with a "we'll figure it out" mindset makes you indispensable and builds trust with the scientists and teams you support. * Build your team before you build anything else. The right internal team — including lab ops, safety, and operations — is the foundation of any successful facility. Identify your core people early, establish your internal team, and let them be the filter between scientists' wants and actual project needs. * Stay audit-ready every single day. Whether it's an FDA visit, a wastewater inspection, or a building code review, the best preparation is treating compliance as an ongoing practice, not a sprint before an inspection. Monthly PM checks, updated logs, and organized documentation eliminate last-minute scrambles. * Asset lists and CMMS aren't optional — they're your financial crystal ball. Knowing what equipment you have, its lifecycle status, and when it will need to be replaced allows for capital planning, proactive budgeting, and avoiding the chaos of a break-fix mentality. * The facilities-EHS relationship is your most important internal partnership. In regulated environments, facilities and EHS leaders are effectively co-signers on compliance. Building that relationship before a regulator walks through the door is non-negotiable — you need to be able to present a unified, confident front together. * Dry runs save reputations. Practicing for regulatory inspections — ideally with a third party who can stress-test your team — is one of the most underutilized tools in facilities management. The more realistic the simulation, the more prepared you'll be when it counts. * Invest early in people who want to learn. Some of the best facilities professionals don't come with the perfect resume — they come with curiosity, drive, and a willingness to adapt. Finding and developing those people (like the story of Nico, who went from lab tech at 18 to Facilities Operations Manager in seven years) is what sustains great teams over time. Quote of the Show: * "At the end of the day, safety comes down to just caring about the person who's working for you and making sure that they are going home to their families the same way they came in." — Dan O'Connell Links: * Bob Mack * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bobmack9/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/bobmack9/]   * Website: https://www.korrobio.com/ [https://www.korrobio.com/]   * Mike Rich * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-rich-cfm-00b06b19a [https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-rich-cfm-00b06b19a]   * Company website: https://www.cerevel.com [https://www.cerevel.com]   * Harvey Handy * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvey-handy-100b5b28/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvey-handy-100b5b28/]   * Email: h.handy@outlook.com [h.handy@outlook.com]   * David Vansteenburgh  * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-vansteenburgh-a17ba821a/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-vansteenburgh-a17ba821a/]   * Email: david.vansteenburgh522015@gmail.com [david.vansteenburgh522015@gmail.com]   * Tony Burke * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony-burke-1ba8a768/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony-burke-1ba8a768/]   * Email: aburke213@gmail.com [aburke213@gmail.com]   * Jeff Kaminski  * LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrkaminski/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jrkaminski/]   * Website: https://eyepointpharma.com/ [https://eyepointpharma.com/]   * Dan O'Connell * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dano495 [https://www.linkedin.com/in/dano495]   * Website: https://www.alnylam.com [https://www.alnylam.com]  * Gabe Budds * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabrielbudds [https://www.linkedin.com/in/gabrielbudds]   * Fluor Corporation (Website): https://www.fluor.com [https://www.fluor.com]

The Hidden Hazards: Vanessa Brady on Industrial Hygiene and Prevention Through Design

In this episode, Vanessa Brady, Director of Global EHS and Sustainability at Charles River Laboratories, brings over two decades of experience across industries, including aerospace, life sciences, cosmetics, biotechnology, and oil and gas. A certified industrial hygienist and newly re-elected Secretary Elect of the American Industrial Hygiene Association (AIHA), Vanessa shares hard-won lessons on building EHS programs that are embedded, not isolated, within organizations. She emphasizes that success in safety and compliance almost always comes down to one thing: getting the right people in the room early. Vanessa walks through some of the most persistent challenges she's encountered across her career, from management of change to contractor vetting, and explains why the US lags behind many European countries in EHS rigor. She makes a compelling case for prevention through design, the idea that the best safety solution is often to eliminate the hazard altogether, and explains how industrial hygiene, which deals with invisible, long-term exposures, is one of the most underappreciated yet critical disciplines in the field. Whether you're an EHS professional, a facilities leader, or someone who simply cares about workplace safety, this episode is packed with practical, experience-backed guidance.   Takeaways: * Don't let EHS work in a silo: Safety and compliance initiatives fail when EHS tries to drive change alone. Engage stakeholders from HR, legal, procurement, and other departments early in the process. When they're involved from the start, they become advocates — not obstacles. * Relationship building unlocks everything: Before you can push an initiative forward, you need to know the people you're working with. Learn about their roles, their challenges, and what matters to them. When the time comes to ask for support, those relationships make all the difference. * Management of change is a universal vulnerability: Every organization Vanessa has worked with struggles with it. When new equipment, chemicals, or systems are introduced without a structured review process, hazards slip through the cracks. A cross-functional team approach before any major change can prevent costly — and dangerous — oversights. * Prevention through design saves time, money, and lives: Rather than layering controls on top of hazards, ask whether the hazard can be eliminated entirely. Redesigning a confined space so it no longer meets the legal definition, or repositioning equipment to avoid roof access, can eliminate compliance burdens while protecting workers more effectively. * Industrial hygiene is about what you can't see: A cut is visible; a chemical exposure that causes illness 30 years later is not. A robust industrial hygiene program — including baseline exposure assessments and repeat monitoring — is essential for truly protecting workers, not just checking compliance boxes. * The answers are often already on the floor: Frontline employees frequently know exactly what the safety problems are — and how to fix them. EHS leaders who walk the floor, ask questions, and listen will find solutions faster than those who work only from the top down. * Volunteer, mentor, and give back: For experienced EHS professionals, Vanessa's advice is clear: get involved with organizations like AIHA, ASSP, or the National Safety Council. Mentoring the next generation strengthens the entire profession. Quote of the Show: * “Don't allow environment, health, and safety to become isolated. Make sure that it becomes embedded with other departments.” Links: * LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vanessa-a-brady-ms-cih-csp-0096316/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/vanessa-a-brady-ms-cih-csp-0096316/]  * Charles River Laboratories Website: https://www.criver.com/ [https://www.criver.com/]  * American Industrial Hygiene Association: https://www.aiha.org [https://www.aiha.org]