Uncategorised

I am Jeff Martin, PE, I have been using, supporting, training, and developing Bentley Civil Software (and its Intergraph precursors) for over 30 years.  I started on AutoCAD, spent 18 months on CAiCE and another six months on Civil3D. 

I have been developing training, delivering training, supporting and implementing the OpenRoads Designer software platform continuously since before its release in June 2013.  

My professional mission is to provide the unique high-level integration and extension services my 30+ years experience allows me to do: 

• Integrate: Optimizing the processes and flows of the services you already sell
• Extend: leverage and extend the capabilities of the individuals, the teams, and the organization to expand their scope of profitable service
• Develop/Share Civil Infrastructure Insight

The Civil XLr8 Mission is to Maximize the Efficiency and Excellence of your Civil Engineering Office through:

• Minimizing Software-related Risk
• Speed
• Quality
• Integration
• {tip title="add to your current services" content="Increase your Total Addressable Market by adopting 'adjacent services' capabilities" class="bg-success-subtle"}Expanding Service {/tip}
• {tip title="Fun is important" content="Fun is a metric I do not overlook.  It is a measure of quality.  Good, quality processes are fun processes." class="bg-success-subtle"}Fun{/tip}

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I have three "professional" websites, each with their own scope (with some overlap):

• CivilXLr8.com is the business/services-focused site.  
  • The {tip title="Original Site: HTML!" content="one big advantage of the old 'plain-HTML' sites is that they're extremely stable.  Twenty years with zero maintenance and they still work fine.  They're just not smart or dynamic." class="bg-success-subtle"}original site {/tip} from twenty years ago is here:  the "Legacy" site
• CivilHelp.com is OpenRoads support content.  I'll be sharing detailed tips, training and other content there.
• JeffMartinPE.com is an overly detailed history of my professional career.  It's kind of my ongoing memoir/blog.  It also hosts some thought leadership ideas like The Six-Ball Juggle

I am responsible for the content and layout of my sites.  {tip title="I would hope that I pick better words than AI at this point" content="(It looks like AI content is the next Big Disruption (I should sacrifice precision to get ahead of that revolution, but I still think expert deliberation matters)). I definitely need to proofread more (sorry)." class="bg-success-subtle"}I type every word{/tip}.  I build sites with Joomla!

My "fun" public sites include:

• GoOutLookUp.net - a guide for beginning stargazers
• UCVolley.com - My {tip content="UCVolley.com/dash"}son{/tip} played volleyball.  I enjoy photograqphy.  I am compelled to share.  30,000 pictures later...

Details

Category: Uncategorised

Civil XLr8 is (mostly) Jeff Martin, PE, who after three years of Site and Drainage Design in AutoCAD applied to Intergraph Corporation because he wanted to "go bigger".  Except for a six-month stint in 2023 using Civil 3D (and Storm & Sanitary Analysis), the following three decades included production, training development, configuration, and enterprise-wide adoption leadership for Intergraph/Bentley Civil Products.

Over the years, the XLr8 emphasis has shifted away from "speed" towards quality and from "micro" to "macro": better collaboration, better process.  Hurrying causes stress and errors.  Better systems -including smarter application of tools, platforms, learning, and communication systems - reduce hurrying, and stress, and errors. 

The primary issues organizations face now include

• improving their "routine and common" operations ("hey, we seem to be doing pretty good" - without really understanding how they can do better
• adopting better tools and technology for current workflows
• extending their capabilities with readily available and "adjacent" technology
• expanding the value and reach of their collaboration
• extending the services they can provide (and sell) to existing and new clients

There's a lot of Content available around the internet.  Context is missing, particularly personalized Context.  This is true whether you're 

• a data consumer (those you create for and their clients - anyone downstream)
• a designer wondering what tool works best
• a manager trying to decide "how big" to go or whether to use old/predictable/mediocre methods or invest in a move towards the future.
• a corporate executive trying to decide how to position your staff (and your company) for leadership into industry growth areas...

We got context.

Think BIG

Don't forget your "Bigs".

You can spend a lot of time, money, and effort on the ad-hocs, one-offs, "micros".  Unless your "macros" are working well, you're not maximizing your returns.

Internally, large, extended organizations tend not to communicate well, relying on Microsoft Teams (which good almost exclusively for live chats and live meetings) and Sharepoint (which few engineers actually know how to use).  

 

The OpenRoads Platform's Achilles Heel:

The OpenRoads Platform drawfs previous engineering software in power - AND Complexity.  It's a revolution not an evolution. Not understanding the leap opens unprecedented risk to schedule, risk to budget, risk to client's satisfaction, risk to your designers' mental health.  The Support ecosystem is not significantly better than it was in days of simpler software.   Is it worth it? {tip title="Why OpenRoads? Six Words!" content="Why OpenRoads? Six Words" class="bg-success-subtle"}Yes{/tip}, but the Support Gap is its Achille's Heel - and yours.

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My #1 Recommendation

 Get Help!  Don't go it alone.  Talk to someone who has been where you're going.  Best Advice: Use all your Support Resources

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How we XLr8 your Business

My 35+ years experience (eight years of engineering design and production (Roadway, Site, Drainage and Survey) and about twenty-seven in process optimization) give me unique capability in providing these Services:

• ORD Onboarding
• Implementation Planning and Execution - save time and money with Agile Implementation
• OpenRoads Workspace Development and Administration
• Training
• Custom Training Development
• Consulting (General, Strategic, Troubleshooting...)
• Risk Awareness and Mitigation
• Projects Managed via  Fast, Lean (but full-featured) Websites
• Training and Communications Systems Improvement

Contact Me. Let's save you some time, money, and frustration as you move forward with OpenRoads

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Why Not Better? 

Need convincing?  Here are some arguments: Why Not Better?

Can you affort to wait? 

Be Better Faster - than your competition

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Related Links - Relevant Content:

JeffMartinPE.com - new relevant content, plus a lot of history

CivilHelp.com - OpenRoads and other topic information (and training) 

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the legacy Civil XLr8 (from the early 2000s) is available at http://legacy.CivilXLr8.com