Richard Karber
CEO, Karber Corporation (K corp)
Years in construction: 20
Years at current company: 1
Years as an ABA member: 10
Role at K corp: My primary roles are to establish the vision and strategy for K corp, build culture, hire great people and make the coffee on Tuesday.
What’s one thing everyone should know about your company?
K corp provides construction services specializing in self-performing mechanical and plumbing scopes of work on commercial projects. K corp also provides custom fabrication/manufacturing of equipment skids and modular data centers.
What are recent projects you’ve worked on in Arizona?
I’ve been fortunate in my career to be a part many significant projects that include the Phoenix Convention Center, Sky Harbor Flight Tower, Wild Horse Pass Casino, NAU Health & Wellness, IO Data Center, Cox Data Center and NRG Central Plant.
What’s on your bucket list?
My parents did a lot of cool stuff with me and my siblings growing up. My bucket list includes pretty much the same things with my family.
Why did you become a member of ABA?
K corp values the ABA for the opportunities to network with other companies in our industry; we respect the experience and innovation of many of these member firms.
What is one of the biggest obstacles that the construction industry will face in 2015?
This market is very competitive and presents many challenges. I believe that specialty contractors in our market generally do a poor job measuring the quality of the service they provide and have limited ability to measure the cost of waste and rework. I believe a great opportunity exists for specialty contractors to develop certifiable quality management plans that incorporate lean construction principles, measures performance and produces useable data for continuous improvement.
