List of Contributions

Mr. David Urena, P.E.

City of Charlotte

Contact Details

City of Charlotte
Contact information, job title, education, and license are populated by the ASCE Membership database. You can edit your account here. Please allow 12 hours for the changes to appear in ASCE Collaborate. 

Mr. David Urena, P.E.


City of Charlotte

My Content

1 to 20 of 23 total

RE: Working from Home vs. Working under Direct supervision (Early Career Stage)

Posted By David Urena 01-09-2020 08:07 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey Justin, If I were in your shoes, just starting out with no professional experience, I would choose Option 2. Don't get me wrong, Option 1 is more enjoyable but learning and growth happens faster in the conventional office setting than from the comfort of your home. Here's my advice on moving ...

RE: What technological tools do you use to manage your priorities?

Posted By David Urena 01-05-2020 01:09 PM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey Matthew, Ajera was, by far, my favorite when it came to running a timekeeping/billing software for a medium or large company. Since I'm a solo practitioner and I'm only accountable to myself, I use a powerful timekeeping software called Clockify which costs less than Ajera and is more user-friendly ...

RE: Testing/Monitoring Flow in a Closed Pipe System

Posted By David Urena 11-21-2019 07:58 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey Matthew, Purchase a "Field's wheel" at the website below. It's a circular slide rule for gravity flow in pipes. I think there's a similar one for pressurized flow in pipes but I forgot the name of it. https://sites.google.com/site/feildwheel/ Cheers, Dave Ureña, P.E. Banneker, ...

Attn: Land Dev. Engrs - Urban vs. Suburban Projects

Posted By David Urena 11-18-2019 08:56 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
I've been practicing land development engineering for 10 years now and I've seen a healthy mix of urban infill and urban sprawl projects. Since I started my own business in January, the ratio has been roughly 50/50. I have found that greenfield development lends itself to more creative license since ...

RE: Exploring careers with Civil PhD outside of academia

Posted By David Urena 10-25-2019 10:10 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hi Gail, I've seen engineers with advanced degrees valued more in the public regulatory field than in the private consulting field. Very rarely do I see a PhD in private consulting. If I do, the company they're with usually doesn't value their advanced degree enough. In fact, I've found that administration ...

RE: Internships - Your Experience?

Posted By David Urena 08-13-2019 01:56 PM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
I found that it really doesn't matter. I had a friend intern with a surveying company for a few years and that helped him land his first civil engineering job out of college. ------------------------------ Dave Ureña, P.E. Banneker, LLC 3104 N. Armenia Ave Suite 2 Tampa, FL 33607 813.415.7872 ...

RE: Internships - Your Experience?

Posted By David Urena 08-05-2019 08:35 PM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey Paul, I've been out of college 7 years now and the same holds true today as it did then: if you plan on going into the workforce after college and you want an employer to take you seriously, intern, intern, intern. That is all. ------------------------------ Dave Ureña, P.E. Banneker, ...

RE: The Self-Employed Engineer

Posted By David Urena 08-05-2019 08:34 PM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey Natalya, Is it difficult to find projects that are beyond what I've already done and allow for my professional growth? Not really. I've had the pleasure of working for a handful of firms after graduation. The range of site design experience was pretty vast in terms of difficulty and size and often ...

RE: Rate of Return on Big Schools vs Small Schools

Posted By David Urena 08-05-2019 10:12 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey Luis, You bring up a very good point because, the way I see it, quality vs. price for an engineering education is not always linear. One example I like to use in this regard is comparing Harvard University's engineering program to that of the University of Florida's. Harvard is one of the most ...

RE: What technological tools do you use to manage your priorities?

Posted By David Urena 07-09-2019 10:04 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey James, One last thing: I've worked at two companies that have used Ajera for timesheet and billing software. Cheers, Dave Ureña, P.E. Banneker, LLC 3104 N. Armenia Ave Suite 2 Tampa, FL 33607 813.415.7872 [email protected]

RE: What technological tools do you use to manage your priorities?

Posted By David Urena 07-09-2019 10:03 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey James, A good friend of mine who went on his own as I did really likes Asana for managing tasks that he delegates out. Unlike me, he aspires to hire employees soon and is already experimenting with different project and task management software and has found that Asana is the best of the ...

RE: Negative Emotions on Your Project Team

Posted By David Urena 06-27-2019 09:56 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Good insight, Luis. Also, good on you for mentioning our inner circle as a map for how we're likely to behave. Thanks a lot for your valuable input! ------------------------------ Dave Ureña, P.E. Banneker, LLC 3104 N. Armenia Ave Suite 2 Tampa, FL 33607 813.415.7872 [email protected] ------ ...

RE: Negative Emotions on Your Project Team

Posted By David Urena 06-25-2019 01:15 PM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Very interesting perspective, Chad. Thanks for your input. Blowing off steam in private is always the best practice so sending a negative person home is ideal for fieldwork circumstances. Very rarely would an officemate be sent home to deal with negative emotions but temporary separation from the ...

RE: The Self-Employed Engineer

Posted By David Urena 06-24-2019 12:29 PM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey Natalya, I've heard it said that the self-employed life lends itself to the "work all the time, play all the time" culture. With regular employment, breaks to chat with your officemates are common so with self-employment, taking many short breaks is critical to a good and healthy workflow. ...

Negative Emotions on Your Project Team

Posted By David Urena 06-24-2019 11:01 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
An important underlying quality of working on a project team is the sense of morale, whether it is good or bad and how strong that sense is. It's generally believed that having a positive morale creates higher productivity within the group and leads to wholesome working relationships rooted in respect ...

The Self-Employed Engineer

Posted By David Urena 06-20-2019 08:17 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Good Morning Friends, Six months ago I embarked on the most exciting journey I've ever taken in my career: becoming a self-employed engineer. At the time, it seemed like a terrifying undertaking but it's been paying off in several different ways. Just to name a few: Work/life balance on my ...

RE: Balancing Work, Health, and Family

Posted By David Urena 05-28-2019 10:00 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Luis, Glad to hear your having an amazing week. Keep up the good work. Your Question: How do you balance your work with other aspects of your life like family, health, and spiritual well-being? My Answers: Routine – Time is our most precious and limited resource. Carve out a daily routine ...

RE: Holding engineering managers accountable: creating a feedback system to identify areas of improvement.

Posted By David Urena 05-17-2019 08:43 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey Anthony, I've been at many companies in my career before going out on my own and found anonymous managerial surveys all too common. I'm a strong believer in that, although engineers are highly analytical, they're just ordinary people which are about half and half analytical and emotional. ...

RE: CAD Certification

Posted By David Urena 05-17-2019 08:42 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hey Anand, I'm a 33 year old self-employed civil engineer in Tampa, FL who's been operating AutoCAD since I was 16 years old. The main distinction I have with my competitors is not only doing my own drafting, but being highly proficient at it and paying attention to detail when it comes to preparing ...

RE: Transitioning from Engineering Student to Real World Engineer

Posted By David Urena 05-16-2019 07:46 AM
Found In Egroup: Career By Design \ view thread
Hi Luis, The advice I have is: Listen. Every boss appreciates a good listener. Learn. Everything you can as fast as you can (even if you have to teach yourself). Never stop learning. Love. The engineering profession is highly esteemed. You may not know that now ...