At Baker Group, innovation didn’t start with a new tool. It started with capacity.
As project demand surged, the contractor had to rapidly expand its ability to deliver. Fabrication space more than doubled. Off-site manufacturing output increased. Logistics between shops and jobsites were tightened. Production steps were automated. New material handling methods were introduced. Formal quality controls, including ISO 9000 standards, were put in place.
The company wasn’t experimenting. It was scaling.
Helping lead that effort was Rob Cross, who spearheaded the operational transformation and was recognized this year as the MCAA’s Innovator of the Year at the MEP Innovation Conference in Austin.
Colleagues say Cross’s impact comes less from pushing technology and more from empowering people to use it. As his nomination declared, “Rob champions everyone under him to be great stewards of tech and innovation. He doesn’t stand in the way. He lets his talented team drive the innovation.”
Cross credits his collogues as well. “I have been fortunate enough to work for Baker Group who has given us the flexibility to try new things and when the great team behind us come up with ideas, they run with it,” he said. “When we fail, we learn from the mistakes. We continue to make improvements along the way. Being an innovator is not done in a vacuum. It is working with a great team of people that are all trying to move our industry forward.”
The results show up in throughput, coordination, and predictability. In a market defined by larger, faster, and more complex projects, Baker Group has built the operational capacity to keep pace. Cross’s recognition reflects that work.
