Engineering Inc. - Spring 2020 - 25

GLOBAL ECONOMIC IMPACT COMPARISON OF THE "GREAT SHUTDOWN"
(real GDP growth, year-on-year percent change)
10
8
6
United States

4

Euro area

2

Japan
China
India

0
-2
-4
-6

ADAMKAZ / GETTY IMAGES

-8
-10

Great Lockdown 2020

Global Financial Crisis 2009
Source: International Monetary Fund, World Economic Outlook, April 2020

to be laid out differently to enhance distancing of customers
and offer some protection to workers; public travel may change,
which could impact how we deliver transportation services;
pedestrian movement may be altered to provide additional
spacing; and healthy spaces may become more of a focus."
Trappey is concerned about COVID-19's impact on
public markets in Louisiana. "Since the bulk of our work is
municipal/public works, we are unsure what will happen with
our state's budget and what, if any, effect it may have on the
services we provide to multiple state and local agencies. Our
private client work is almost nonexistent, and work at certain
facilities, which we cannot access at this time due to the virus,
is on hold."
However, Keen sees opportunities in the new marketplace.
"We anticipate our health, science and research, and tech
segments to grow as global supply chains diversify and flex
to be less dependent upon more traditional networks," he
says. "Infrastructure will also need governmental support to
address revenue shortfalls that occurred during the pandemic
to aid in the global recovery."

"While in the COVID-19
environment, we also
learned quickly how
to sell our work and
deliver our clients'
projects through a
more virtual environment."
DAVID OTT
CEO AND PRESIDENT
SHORT ELLIOTT HENDRICKSON

"Our broad intent
is to use this crisis
to reimagine our
business to fit the postCOVID realities and
opportunities."
DILIP CHOUDHURI
PRESIDENT AND CEO
WALTER P MOORE

Choudhuri believes all parts of Walter P Moore's business will
require reshaping to thrive in the post-COVID world. He notes
that recovery will comprise at least three phases-the current
response to a 100 percent work-from-home edict, with phase
two being the period before the world has a comprehensive set
of interventions (testing, tracing, vaccine, and drugs) readily
available to fight COVID-19, and phase three being the postvaccine phase where we learn to operate in the "next normal."
"The A/E/C industry will likely have a variable recovery
depending upon the geographical locations firms have exposure
to and also the market sectors that drive each firm's specific
economic engine," Choudhuri says.
Trappey emphasized that medical science remains the key to
allowing not only the engineering industry, but global business,
to really get back on track. "We are fighting to ensure the safety
and health of our employees and their families," she says.
"Until there is a vaccine for this virus, despite attempts to
open the economy and politicians' best efforts to get people back
to work, the world we are in will be the world we are in. Until
there is a vaccine for this virus, that has to be a priority." ■
Alan D. Crockett is ACEC's director of member communications. He
can be reached at acrockett@acec.org.

SPRING 2020

ENGINEERING INC.

25
Engineering Inc. - Spring 2020

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