Iraj Ghaemi, C.E., P.E., CCM
Iraj Ghaemi,
Iraj Ghaemi is the Managing Director of iConnectEngineers®, providing executive program management advisory services for the aviation and transportation capital development programs throughout the project life cycle.
Before joining iConnectEngineers®, Mr. Ghaemi served as the Vice President, Aviation Sector Manager, North America, at SNC-Lavalin Atkins. He joined Atkins in 2018, where he was responsible for directing and overseeing the Atkins Aviation Sector in the United States. His main concentration was to provide leadership, direction, and guidance to project directors and managers within the aviation sector to ensure proper execution of the programs and projects. He has over 38 years of experience managing successful programs and directing diverse teams of professionals to deliver over $6 billion in various projects.
Mr. Ghaemi is the National Board of Directors’ Executive Director for the Construction Management Association of America (CMAA). Also, Mr. Ghaemi was the past Chair for CMAA (2019-2020). CMAA, with more than 17,000 members and 30 regional chapters, includes individual professionals, professional service companies, construction owners in the public and private sectors, and academic and associate members.
In his prior position as the Director of Facilities Development at the San Diego Regional Airport Authority, he was responsible for the leadership, planning, and comprehensive implementation of the Capital Improvement Program (CIP), worth over $1 billion. His responsibilities included effectively managing workforce planning, including extensive program management and staff augmentation, funding allocation, contractor interaction, project management control system, program schedule, and performing quality control. Before being named director in 2005, he worked as Deputy Director of Facilities Development for two years.
Before holding these positions, Iraj was the Assistant Director of Engineering at Port of San Diego. He managed a staff of 38 professionals and a $6.8 million annual operating budget while acquiring and deploying funding for the Capital Improvement Program (CIP) and Major Maintenance Program (MMP). On average, the CIP program encompassed 50 projects per year, with an average budget of $200 million per year.
Mr. Ghaemi is the past Chair of the San Diego County Regional Construction Procurement Committee (RCPC). RCPC was created in 2006 and provides close working relationships among regional agencies (over 25 members including SANDAG, Caltrans, County of San Diego, City of San Diego, Transit Authority, Navy, UCSD, etc.). The RCPC fosters an environment that encourages a collaborative effort to understand regional issues and provides a framework to coordinate a collective effort to resolve them.
Initial 16 years of industry experience before joining the public sector were in the private sector, including being the Senior Associate, Regional Manager, for a multidiscipline international consulting firm—involved diverse programs for large projects in transportation, water resources, structures, aviation, and infrastructure.
Iraj received his Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering from Brigham Young University and is a licensed and registered civil engineer in California and Arizona. Iraj is also a Certified Construction Manager (CCM).
iConnectEngineers® provides Executive Program Project Management Advisory and full-service digital marketing services with a primary focus to empower our clients to make important strategic and operational decisions quickly and translate those decisions into actions. Learn more by visiting www.iconnectengineers.com.