Relationships Matter: P1 Las Vegas Lands Large Southern Hills Hospital Project

Senior Project Manager Brian Maginness has had a good working relationship with JE Dunn Construction for many years.

The relationship dates back 25+ years to Brian’s time in Kansas City, when he worked with JE Dunn on many construction projects like North Kansas City Hospital, Liberty Hospital, Saint Luke’s and many others.

That P1/JE Dunn relationship followed P1 out west, and a successful bid from the P1 Las Vegas leadership and estimating teams gave Brian another chance to work with a premier P1 trade partner in the Las Vegas market.

Although hospital construction work has been more prominent for P1’s Kansas City-area offices, it has been less of a mainstay for the P1 Las Vegas team.

“Historically, P1 Las Vegas hasn’t had as much hospital work, especially something like Southern Hills which involves adding floors and is heavier on the construction side,” Brian said.

When the opportunity to do the mechanical scope for the Southern Hills Hospital project came along, it was a great opportunity for the team to expand its healthcare resume.

“I believe the relationship P1 has built with JE Dunn in Kansas City helped us get this project,” Brian said.

Initially, the project scope was to add one patient floor to the hospital, with upgrades and revisions to the powerhouse chiller and boilers.

But the project came with an unusual - and unexpected - advantage.

A series of change orders have added significantly to the project, adding another floor as shell space along with booster pump change (original to the hospital) and new medical air and vacuum equipment.

The new medical air/vacuum change was done live with no interruption to the hospital.

Those change orders added up.

“What started as a $6M+ job turned into a nearly $11M job,” Brian said. “It worked out well for us, because we were able to add the floor on before the job was completed.”

“The booster pump and med gas equipment were things the hospital needed changed,” Brian explained. “They had the confidence in JE Dunn and P1 enough to ask us to complete those scopes as well, even though they were not part of the original project.”

Brian says keeping relationships positive across all aspects of the project has helped P1 build a good reputation and good rapport with owner, GC, and other subcontractors alike.

“Not only has our field team developed a good reputation with JE Dunn, we have done the same with the hospital itself and the other trades,” Brian said. “We have strong collaboration among our own trades – plumbing, pipefitting, and sheet metal – and have kept that same spirit of teamwork with the GC and other subcontracted trades like sheet rock, fire/sprinkler, and electrical.”

Those relationships have paid off with good attitudes in the field, as well as a foundation of trust P1 has built with all parties involved – a foundation that will almost certainly pave the way for more opportunity.

“In addition to the change orders on this project, our small projects team has been selected to complete additional items directly for hospital as well,” Brian said.

“We can see the efforts paying off,” Brian added. “We certainly appreciate the positive feedback we’ve gotten from JE Dunn during this project, both in project meetings and in communication with our executive team.”

Brian says it is a nice change of pace, not only being able to work on a large hospital project, but to do it  with JE Dunn – an old friend that has withstood the test of time and distance.

It should be noted that the author of this great feedback from JE Dunn is Jobsite Superintendent Cody Chancellor. Cody is the very same person Brian worked with at Saint Luke’s East nearly two decades ago!

“I wanted to share with everyone what a great job P1 has done at Southern Hills in the last 12 weeks. The 5th fl. is completely occupied with post-surgical patients and we had to get into every room to install plumbing, and most rooms for new duct - all serving the new 6th fl. addition.

The original phasing was shown to be done in 15 phases over 24+ weeks. Together we produced a plan to perform this work in only 4 phases and in 12 weeks.

The work was completed exactly on schedule with no unplanned impacts to patients, no safety issues, and no quality concerns. This was a huge win not only for all of us on the construction side but also the least impactful plan to the patients and staff. We received several compliments from the 5th fl. nurse manager and the infection Control manager on the work being done and the professionalism of the workers. Thank you from JE Dunn on this too.

Jason, Chris, and Travern with P1 did an outstanding job. The schedule was aggressive, and all three guys did whatever it took to achieve our common goal.

I expect P1 to continue this great track record but wanted to share what a great job the P1 team performed.”

–Cody Chancellor, Jobsite Superintendent