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Live from IBS Rockwool "Hush Tunnel": What the Show Floor Is Really Telling Us (shhh)

Build Perspectives Podcast

Release Date: 02/26/2026

KP Reddy: Your Price Is Why the C-Suite Doesn't Know You Exist show art KP Reddy: Your Price Is Why the C-Suite Doesn't Know You Exist

Build Perspectives Podcast

In this episode of Build Perspectives, we sit down with KP Reddy. Investor, civil engineer, author, and one of the clearest thinkers in construction tech. We get into the real questions founders should be asking: What makes a problem venture-fundable? Why does pricing determine your visibility? And why do so many startups build for the wrong customer? KP started coding at 13 on an IBM PC his father handed him, funded his first startup on a Discover card, and pivoted a 1996 web-based project management tool into telecom - two people to 1,200 and an IPO in three years. Three decades later he's...

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It's Time to Be Bold: Sustainability as Business Strategy with Joe Rozza of Ryan Companies show art It's Time to Be Bold: Sustainability as Business Strategy with Joe Rozza of Ryan Companies

Build Perspectives Podcast

Joe Rozza, Chief Sustainability Officer at Ryan Companies, doesn't run a sustainability strategy. He runs a sustainability business strategy, and the difference is the whole episode. Joe spent almost half his career at Coca-Cola managing water risk across 1,000 plants in 200 countries before bringing that methodology into commercial real estate. Now he's applying it at a $5B developer-builder-owner: sustainability in the BD pipeline, decarbonization roadmaps for 23 classes of construction materials, and buildings designed to the same secondary modifiers insurers use to price flood, hail, and...

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LEED V5, Embodied Carbon, and Why 2026 Is Prep Year with Kristin Brubaker, Green Badger show art LEED V5, Embodied Carbon, and Why 2026 Is Prep Year with Kristin Brubaker, Green Badger

Build Perspectives Podcast

LEED V5 got pushed to June 30, 2027 — and if your team hears "delay" and relaxes, you're going to be underwater. In this episode we sit down with Kristin Brubaker, Head of Sustainable Construction Solutions at Green Badger, to walk the industry through what actually changes and what a smart GC, sustainability director, or building product manufacturer should be doing with the runway.   Kristin brings her environmental science background, four years at Whiting-Turner, and a front-row seat to thousands of LEED projects into a conversation that is equal parts masterclass and gut check. We...

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How EllisDon Decarbonizes Construction: Denyse Von Opbergen on Influence, Not Control show art How EllisDon Decarbonizes Construction: Denyse Von Opbergen on Influence, Not Control

Build Perspectives Podcast

We're joined by Denyse Von Opbergen, Director of Climate and Sustainability at EllisDon — one of Canada's largest general contractors — to work through what decarbonizing construction actually looks like inside a project, not on a slide. Denyse walks us through the influence-versus-control frame she uses to move the needle on scope 3 emissions a contractor can't dictate, the "no silver bullet" filter that weighs Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) against lead time, cost, and constructability, and why the transition to a decarbonized industry doesn't run brown-to-green — it runs...

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"We've More Than Cracked the Code": 90% Complete Facades Before Moduled Leaves the Factory

Build Perspectives Podcast

Recorded live at Advancing Prefabrication 2026 in Dallas, Tim walks the expo floor with James Haas, who leads modular and prefab efforts at Nichiha. (At the time of recording, Tim was also wearing a Nichiha hat. He's since moved on to a new adventure.)  The conversation everyone's having at Advancing Prefab this year? Data centers. But not the windowless boxes of yesteryear, municipalities are now mandating warmer, more inviting exteriors, and grid entropy is forcing data centers closer to urban cores where looks actually matter. That's a facade opportunity hiding in plain sight. ...

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Prefab Isn't the Future of Construction. It's the Gold Standard! (and Gen Z Just Wants to Know Prefab Isn't the Future of Construction. It's the Gold Standard! (and Gen Z Just Wants to Know "Why?")

Build Perspectives Podcast

Andrew Layman runs prefab at Enterprise Electrical, and he'll tell you prefab isn't the future of construction - it's already the gold standard. BUT, the line that stuck with us came at the end: this next generation coming into the trades isn't lazy or soft, they just want to know "why". Andrew makes the case that "respect for people" is an actual lean pillar, that the prefab shop is the best classroom we've got, and that the contractors who get both right are the ones who'll actually solve the labor problem. In this one: Why prefab stopped being "the future" and became the baseline, and...

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Smart Tag It: How Flintco Is Turning the Morning Huddle Into Safety Leadership show art Smart Tag It: How Flintco Is Turning the Morning Huddle Into Safety Leadership

Build Perspectives Podcast

Safety leadership isn't about rules. It's about seeing people who've never been seen. Recorded live at Advancing Safety Leadership in Dallas, we sit down with Shane Harris and Lane Smith of Flintco to talk about how a 115-year-old GC is using recorded morning huddles, AI-powered conversation analytics, and a deep culture-change investment to close the gap between the planning table and the frontline crew. This is what happens when you stop treating the pre-task plan as paperwork and start treating it as the tip of the spear. Key Topics Covered: Planning as the tip of the spear — why the...

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Build Perspectives and Dave @BuildingWorks show art Build Perspectives and Dave @BuildingWorks

Build Perspectives Podcast

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Your Benefits Package Includes Kindness: Your Benefits Package Includes Kindness: "I Just Need Someone to See Me Today"

Build Perspectives Podcast

When Scott Satory started his industrial roofing company 17 years ago with $10,000 and no capital for medical benefits, he made a decision. He'd pay people fairly, give them holidays and vacation from day one, and treat them like human beings. He figured he'd see how that worked out. It worked out. Debt-free. Multimillion dollars. 17 and a half years later. His wife Dr. Colleen Saringer spent that same stretch inside corporate America, consulting companies on workplace mental health and watching them not do it. In 2023 she left to keynote construction companies directly, because...

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"There Are Plenty of Platforms for Scheduling Software. We're Looking for People Actually Building Things."

Build Perspectives Podcast

What Would It Take to Actually Fix Housing? Tyler Pullen of Terner Labs & UC Berkeley on policy, prefab, and the graveyard of good ideas. Tyler Pullen doesn't traffic in buzzwords. As leader of the Building Innovation Track at Terner Labs, the nonprofit accelerator spun out of UC Berkeley's Terner Center for Housing Innovation, he's spent years separating companies actually building homes from the ones just building pitch decks. Recorded live on the expo floor in Dallas, Tyler gets candid about what it really takes to move the needle on housing affordability: 70 expert interviews in a...

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Episode Description

Sets the scene at the Hush Tunnel, calls out consolidation and the shifting talent market — enough to make someone curious without over-explaining.

3 bullets:

  • Trade show ROI — is a booth actually worth it?
  • Musical chairs is coming — talent market read
  • Big distributors, bigger stakes — the consolidation question

What We Cover

  • The Rockwool Hush Tunnel tradition: How the tunnel — and the podcast — have both evolved since 2019

  • Trade show strategy: When IBS is (and isn't) the right show for your product — and why education sessions beat booth-staffing marathons

  • IBS as a recruiting event: Tim and Carolina's read on the talent movement likely coming in 2025–2026 and the 'musical chairs' dynamic in building products

  • Supplier consolidation: Home Depot/SRS, Lowe's/FBM, QXO — what it means for manufacturers and end users

  • Fire protection products: A standout category at this year's show, including the growth of Hilti's fire tape and caulk division

  • The NIE Ha booth: New gloss panel in blue, custom color brick, and the two-piece trim that's set to save installers 15–20% on install time

  • Selling aesthetic vs. functional products: Why going from 'behind the wall' to visible finishes is easier than the reverse

  • The value of tribal knowledge: What the podcast is really for — passing on industry perspective, experience, and guest insights

 

🌲 Upcoming Event: International Mass Timber Conference (IMTC)

March 30 – April 1, 2026  |  Portland, OR

The International Mass Timber Conference is the premier gathering for the mass timber and tall wood building industry — bringing together architects, engineers, contractors, manufacturers, and developers at the forefront of one of construction's most exciting movements.

Build Perspectives listeners get an exclusive discount! Use code IMTC26_SEIMS10 to save 10% off your attendee pass at registration.

Register at: masstimberconference.com