Real-world knowledge we don’t always get from degrees, certifications, or licensing, taught by professionals actively doing the work. 

Beyond budgets and schedules, we focus on an essential part of project management that traditional training has often overlooked: people and relationships. How you communicate, treat people, build trust, and handle stressful situations can directly affect whether a project keeps moving.

An inspection failed—do you know the inspector or someone who has worked with them to call to understand why? A permit was denied—have you built clear communication skills to ask the right questions, understand the corrections, and prevent more delays? A supplier is backed up—do you have a trusted contact who can help you explore options? A contractor is upset with site management, can you step in to help resolve this? How you react, respond, and proceed matters.

PMs work across different personalities, work styles, and deadlines every day. Leadership, communication, problem-solving, relationships, and your professional network are not extras—they are key project management tools for getting projects across the finish line.

Our Construction Project Management + Real Estate Essentials learning connect real-world experience with practical instruction across the project lifecycle—from site selection, due diligence, permitting and entitlements to budgeting, acquisition and construction financing, contractor selection and coordination, digital tools, Certificate of Occupancy, sale, or lease. We cover small commercial new construction and residential projects as well as the infrastructure, maintenance, and improvements communities depend on. Training can be tailored to specific learning requests or general industry knowledge.

Project Management from the Field

We facilitate practical training and share the resources we wish we had when getting started. We designed this PM course for the people doing the work that keeps neighborhoods thriving—and for those who want to learn how to be part of it. We want to help people enter the industry, grow their skills and businesses, step into leadership or ownership, and feel more confident navigating projects.

It’s not only about new construction. Someone has to manage the repairs, upgrades, renovations, and everyday needs communities depend on. Improving roads, buildings, and wet and dry infrastructure to adapt to changing climate conditions.

The class is designed to make the industry more approachable and help Hispanic, Latine and women participants understand how projects go from dirt to occupancy—whether you’re exploring a new career, advancing in their current role, growing a business, or working toward developing and investing in projects of your own.

Because we’re also project managers actively working in the industry, we only offer a limited number of public classes each year. Classes are offered in English or Spanish, online and in person. Come learn with us, meet others in the industry, ask questions, and build practical skills and connections you can take back to your work, business, or next opportunity.

Interested in the next class? Contact us to share your interest, and we’ll notify you when the next class opens.

Instructors, Guest Speakers & Collaborators

Our programs include instructors and invited professionals who are actively working in the topics we cover, including professionals from AEC firms, municipalities, banks and lending, and workforce organizations.

They bring current industry knowledge, case studies, and lessons learned, sharing practical guidance, market resources, real-world experience, and opportunities to help participants understand financing, access capital, navigate project surprises, strengthen their businesses, and connect with career and contracting opportunities.

Instructors & collaborators include:

Ari Paz is a Project Manager at Construye Dallas, her path into PM was not a straight line, which is part of why she enjoys helping others see the different ways they can enter and grow in the industry. She began in an administrative role supporting a woman PM at a national retail development firm, later moving into a project coordinator role. She then entered commercial real estate to help Spanish speaking businesses find properties, obtain permits, coordinate contractors, and complete improvements. Eventually, she combined her construction and real estate experience to work as an independent PM, recognizing a need for bilingual professionals who could support both areas.

While building her construction career, she completed a Master of Public Administration and Leadership. She has served on education and workforce leadership groups, supporting industry training in schools, and hosting student interns who earned academic credit. As a high-volume permit contractor, she was invited to provide feedback during a City of Dallas permitting improvement initiative, sharing firsthand experience navigating the system for contractors and property owners. Similarly, she worked in Tulsa, OK to build capacity for Hispanic contractors and businesses, along with helping address city permitting challenges.

Coming from a Mexican family and having lived and worked, and traveled in different cities and countries has also shaped how she approaches the industry. She began an Executive Doctorate in Business Administration with an interest in publishing work on the economic impact and ties between migration, the construction workforce, and entrepreneurship.

Her approach to teaching is to share what is not often talked about or covered in a textbook— the lessons learned, encouraging open conversations, and building confidence leading projects and teams.

Dr. Alejandra Mielke of Alejandra Mielke Coaching & Consulting is a leadership and executive coach based in Austin, TX. She has worked directly with construction, engineering, manufacturing, and corporate firms, including Colliers Engineering & Design, Neucor Construction, and Turner Construction. Her focus is to help people gain the skills that technical training alone does not teach, bridging the gap between technical and people skills. She holds a PhD in Education from UT Austin and the following credentials that bring practical leadership, communication, conflict management, and team-building skills into PM training.

Everything DiSC® Facilitator — understanding work styles (Dominant, Influential, Steady, Conscientious) to coordinate teams and stakeholders while managing conflict and strengthening collaboration.

Energy Leadership Index (ELI) Master Practitioner — equipping others with the leadership and self-awareness to respond to pressure, workplace challenges, make decisions, and lead teams through changing project conditions.

International Coaching Federation (ICF) Certified Coach — professional coaching that supports leadership development, goal setting, accountability, and helping individuals recognize strengths and work through professional challenges.

Together, we have taught successful courses, including for the Hispanic American Contractor Industry Association (HACIA), where coursework supported PMP certification pathways. Dr. Mielke also leads workshops through the Austin Safety Council. Our shared approach recognizes that great PMs don’t just manage tasks—they manage people, relationships, communication, and challenges— skills that are essential for project completion. Dr. Mielke is from Monterrey, MX, and has hosted Women’s Leadership Seminars in Oaxaca. She often highlights research on the economic impact of Latinos in the US and globally.

We invite back professionals we’ve had the opportunity to train, including Elsy Guzman of She Builds TX, who we first trained as a Project Coordinator intern while she was completing her undergraduate studies in Finance, and continued working with her as she grew into a PM role.

Today, she manages a regional general contractor firm, leading commercial projects across rural and urban parts of Texas—from Dallas to Austin. Her work includes reviewing plan sets for estimating, coordinating subcontractors, tracking budgets and schedules, managing construction loan draws, addressing concerns with site superintendents, overseeing safety, pre-inspections walkthroughs, and traveling to project locations to keep work moving. Her role combines both office-based project management and hands-on work in the field.

Elsy’s experience includes multifamily and townhome communities, McDonald’s locations, other retail, and hospitality, giving her hands-on experience across different project types, teams, and capacities. We continue to learn from her, working together on projects, which is part of what we hope to build through our course—a space where people continue to exchange knowledge & resources. Together, Elsy and Ari have managed over 9 million square feet of water & wastewater pipeline projects supporting new residential and small scale commercial units across TX. Elsy is from New York and has Mexican and Salvadoran roots. She has worked on short-term rentals in El Salvador and property transfer in Puebla.

Guest speakers include: lenders, city staff, architects, engineers, surveyors, insurance and bond/surety agents, CPA’s, book keepers, GC’s, and trade professionals.

Interested in becoming a guest speaker, sharing resources, or supporting one of our programs? Contact us to get involved!

What You’ll Learn

How projects move from an opportunity to construction, closeout, and what comes next. With continuous examples from projects, contractors, cities, and job sites.

• Finding + Evaluating Opportunities — properties, projects, bids, site selection & due diligence
• Plans + Pre-construction — reading plan sets, scope, estimates, budgets and schedules
• Permits + City Processes — zoning, permitting, inspections & communicating with municipalities
• Managing Construction — rfi’s, contractors, vendors, materials, field coordination & problem-solving
• Money + Project Financials — bids, change orders, invoices, construction loans, draws & getting paid
• Leadership + Communication — managing different personalities, difficult conversations, clients, crews & project teams
• Digital PM Tools — organizing documents, tracking projects, spreadsheets, & affordable software
• Real Estate + land Development — surveying, plating, utilities, & entitlements
• Closing the Project — final inspections, CO’s, affidavits, closeout, sale/lease & preparing for the next opportunity
• Growing Beyond PM — using PM experience to lead larger projects or new geographies, grow a contracting business or explore project ownership’

The class is a place to ask questions, work through real situations, meet others in the industry, and learn from professionals actively managing project challenges.

We don’t only labor and build, we also design, engineer, own, manage and lead.

Presentation slide of the speakers during the L.AEC event on 9.24.24.

In this meetup, we discussed land plating and improving vacant lots in underdeveloped areas- working 
with surveyors, city engineering dept's, and preparing for zoning or council meetings; owning and 
managing rental homes, including using special financing; building and maintaining our own homes; 
and remodel projects/additions, including permitting for homes near flood areas.