HCD Rising Star: Nathan Jeffries, project manager, Skanska
In the five years since joining Skanska’s San Francisco office, Nathan Jeffries has advanced from project engineer to project manager by taking opportunities to gain experience across the full lifecycle of a project.
This initiative toward professional development was demonstrated early during multiple internships at Skanska while he was studying at the University of California, Berkeley, where he graduated in 2021 with a degree in conservation and resource studies with a minor in structural engineering. He joined the firm’s healthcare construction team full time in 2021, where he has exhibited a talent for detailed planning as well as a sharp understanding of team dynamics and accountability that has led to streamlined operations and project timelines.
As a senior project engineer on the Sutter Health Samaritan Court Ambulatory Care and Surgery Center in San Jose, Calif., completed in August 2023, Jeffries worked closely with design and trade partners during preconstruction to create a plan to ensure schedule reliability through construction. He implemented tools to coordinate workflows for each phase of the project and developed a detailed schedule, which had to be adjusted only twice over the project’s two-year timeline. Additionally, he collaborated with a robotics firm to integrate virtual design construction to create a combined systems layout of mechanical, electrical, plumbing, framing, and fire sprinkler systems that was printed onto the facility floor to streamline installation—an effort that led to the project being completed three months ahead of schedule and $3 million under budget.
In addition to his project roles, he’s led training for project teams on planning tools to mitigate schedule risks and coordinate complex scopes of work and has piloted test use cases for technology from 3-D imaging tools to robotics.
By embracing the unique challenges of the healthcare design sector and worked diligently to streamline processes to improve cost, quality, and schedule efficiency, Jeffries is playing a meaningful role in elevating construction and engineering processes in the industry.
Path to healthcare design: Healthcare called to me after I was able to see the impact on the community that each new facility, no matter how big or small, made. The ripple effects are felt constantly. Years later, I’m approached by individuals about something I had a hand in building and how it helped them, their families, and their friends. It could be as simple as a new primary care location close to home or as drastic as a surgery center that provided life-changing services to a loved one.
Describe your design approach: Design and build with empathy and compassion.
On your desk now: Currently I am working on several healthcare tenant improvements within the San Francisco Bay Area, including an ambulatory surgical center and specialty clinics for imaging, orthopedics, and optometry.
Most rewarding project to date: My first project in healthcare, a 70,000-square-foot tenant improvement for a new surgery center and clinic. Beyond learning an immense amount throughout the project, the culture of the project team that was crafted on that project has been the foundation of all other projects I have had the pleasure of being part of.
What success means to you: Walking away from a challenge or project having learned and improved on the things that did not go perfectly, while celebrating the things that went well. Mistakes, miscommunications, and afterthoughts are bound to happen but if a lesson was learned and the mistake is prevented from happening again, that’s success in my book.
Industry challenge on your radar: While the human element is absolutely needed for space planning, is there a way we can run multiple scenarios through leveraging the emergence of artificial intelligence tools? There are times early on in design where the space layout just doesn’t quite work out and to continue reviewing more options can result in a schedule delay, a squeezed detailed design period, or a floor plan that doesn’t quite meet what the client is asking for.
Find updates and additional information on the 2025 HCD Conference + Expo here.
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