In Black America; Michael Williams, (3I Construction); Part 2

From the University of Texas at Austin, KUT Radio, this is in Black America. It's the same thing in construction. You got construction management, you got general construction, you got subcontracting, you got project controls, you got design and bill, you got all these different areas. Construction is an industry, you can go vertical, you can go flat and do streets and with baroque being in the office, that's one of the reasons we started the concrete division. So it's all of these different opportunities for not only, like you said, blacks and minorities, but the none, the minority has been doing it for a long time. It's the reason why they're there, because it's a lot of money over there, so that's one of the things that we're going to do here, it takes money to start programs that's going to give back to the community to have mentor protégé program, it takes money. So that's one of the reasons why my goal was not to build $10 million a year company,

not to build $50, to be $100 million. Michael D Williams, founder and president of Three Eye Construction, located in Dallas, Texas. What do you do after 11 years as a professional athlete? Well, if you Williams, just start your own construction company. As a member of the NBA World Champions Detroit Pistons in 1989, he knows firsthand what it takes to be a winner. He applies to principles of teamwork and reliability, perfected as a professional basketball player in Detroit, Minneapolis and Indiana. There were many opportunities available to Williams, who was an all-American at Baylor University after he retired from the NBA. He wanted to build his own company in order to demonstrate success in another arena and to serve as a role model to youth in the Dallas Fort Worth area. Founded in 2001, Three Eye Construction started as a drywall and finished out company. In 2005, Williams Company, in partnership with J.E. Dunn Construction of Kansas City, won the construction contract to build the new $650 million Dallas Cowboys stadium in

all of Houston, Texas. I'm Johnny Enhancing Jr. and welcome to another edition of In Black America. On this week's program, Three Eye Construction with President and CEO, Michael D. Williams, part two in Black America. And we've learned a tremendous amount now. The eyes of another stadium are going to be built in the state of Texas with Houston, maybe San Antonio, but that experience is really going to take me to the next level with the NBA. Now I want to take my knowledge of building big humongous buildings like that and take it to the relationships in the NBA. I'm already targeting Oklahoma because Seattle moved us and they got to build a new stadium. So that's going to be my high-hanging fruit, but I'm still going to definitely go after that target. During this professional sports career, Williams always thought about his future after his playing days were over. Also he understood the importance of developing relationships. That led him to take non-paying jobs during the off season.

Born and raised in Dallas, Texas, Williams attended Dallas Carter High School where he led to Cowboys to the state playoffs twice and set the state record for 63 points in one regional game. He graduated from Baylor University with a degree in finance at Baylor and Carter High School. He earned all American honors. In 1980 Detroit Piston with the 48th pick of the NBA draft selected Williams. In 1989, he was a member of the World Champion Motor City Bad Boys Detroit Pistons. Williams played 11 seasons in the NBA. He currently holds the record for the most consecutive free throws. Today Williams is founder and president of Three Eye Construction in Dallas, Texas. His career in sports has helped him build a solid foundation for his company. As the chief executive, he sees his role to that of a team owner, emphasizing that selecting the right people and key positions is what ensures his company's success. On today's program, we continue our conversation with Michael D. Williams.

Reggie Miller, Dallas Shrimp, and Rick Smith, that had to touch the ball. So I'm trying to figure out, how am I going to ever double figures? And that's when I start taking free throws seriously. I shot 66% from the free throw line in my rookie year with Detroit. And then going to my third year, I shot 85% at an 89% and 80% at an 80% and you know, you hold the record. But I think it's like anything else, it's practicing, but you got to practice the right technique. A lot of times, even on a golf shot, you see guys that play golf a lot, but they never have the right fundamentals, but since they play a lot, they're shooting the 80s, but they don't have the right fundamentals, so if they take two weeks off, they're going to shoot in 100s. When you learn the right techniques of anything, you can always walk away from it and come back and that's how I look at free throws. Right now, today, if I had to go make 10 free throws where I could do it, and I hadn't shot a free throw in two years. What was it like winning that championship, particularly winning the championship, but then the following season, first night out, or receiving the ring?

Oh, man, that's a dream. A dream come true. I remember Finis Dimbo and I looking at each other. We said, man, if we don't win this championship this year, it's been a rough year, going back to give it a hard time because we were rookies, but to walk out of a baler, coming out of Texas, getting drafted, not in the first round in the second round, and being on the championship team your first year. It's a dream come true. The first thing I did was got on my knees and thank God for just the blessing because there are so many times that you see players that have played 9, 10, 11, even 15 years. They still have no championship, and it still helps me in business today because anytime I really want to get that contract, a slap on that ring, and I make sure, you know, I flash it a little bit, so it really helps. My basketball coach is real Robinson, passed away last year, and I'm quite sure you had some interaction with him with the piston. Well, Will was probably one of the smartest basketball minds in that organization, probably even in the league.

He's one of those old school guys. He's looking at not only the talent, but he's looking at what's inside that person. And that's what I see what's going on in the league today. You see these guys that can fly, can jump, can dribble behind the back, twin legs, and all that. But at crunch time, what do you have? That's what make Kobe Bryant so great. That's what makes, you know, a LeBron's James potentially to be great. That's what made that whole group of Detroit pistons when they beat the Lakers, made them great because they had a lot of players that dug deep inside, you know. That's what they're really hurting with a chance they built, not being there. It's the little bit of things, and Will could recognize that in players. And that's why every year, they will survive with the weather when they win the old Coliseum. They were always competitive. So he's a great guy and a great leader, you know, that organization has missed him. You're currently president and founder of 3I, a construction company here in Dallas. One first question is, what does the 3I stand for?

Integrity, innovation, and information. When I start thinking about, you know, opening a company here, everybody said, be Williams construction, be 97-bit of road construction. I said, no, no, we're not going to do that. But what we're going to do is really have what I really stand for, what I really want to do to be called was integrity, integrity, integrity, that just didn't catch. But we really inform our clients. And we haven't really hit the innovation part because it's going to take a certain amount of dollars to do that. But we're going to have video animation for our potential design and build. And integrity is what I stand for, you know, in business there's so many opportunities for you to be unethical, you know, whether you're taking a job because you're black and as a pass through, those opportunities have come my way and I've turned them down every time. And it hurts because you need the money of the young company. But I believe in just, you know, standing by your name, we have a really good name here and being patient. And over time, you know, we might even be doing a job in Detroit one day. One does not just go into the construction business on a whim.

What preparation did you take to position yourself in founding this company? That's a great question. Again, going back to what I mentioned earlier, while I was playing, I always said still the knowledge. You know, I was, I made the out of defensive team going against John Stockton every year who was going to get the most steals. I was not only still in the balls on the floor, I wanted to make sure I still the knowledge while I was playing. So when I was in Indiana, I worked at a company called Logo 7, doing the outseason. And that company arrived with Fruit of the Moon and Starter. They did all of the sporting uniforms for the NCAA. And a guy named Tom Shine was running that company and he said, I said, yeah, I really want to work there. He said, okay, Mike, I give you $22,000, $22,000, $24,000 a summer, I said, nope, you don't have to pay me anything, longer than I work with you every day. Because I wanted to learn what it takes to hire the right people, what it takes when you're running at the top of that pyramid in an organization. You don't type that.

You're only talking about two months before you have to go back to getting into, you know, ask about shape. I did that in Indiana and when I went to Minnesota, I worked at a company called New Mechanical, which is in the construction industry. I worked right alongside Ron Pearson, who was a president CEO. And I never forget him telling me one day, he said, Mike, I've been watching you for the last two summers. I said, yeah, he said, you really want to learn this business. Yeah. I said, I could be doing a lot of other things. He said, Mike, let me, let's just face it. You have some money, I have money. Let's go make some more money. I'm sitting here puzzling, I said, what do you mean? He said, Mike, in the construction industry is very free African-American owned companies that can really bring value. Now, all this was new to me, this is Minnesota. And I said, okay, he said, you're serious about this business, I said, yeah. He said, I want you to look to open a company here. And at that time, I don't know if you remember my career, but you had nerve damage in my foot. And he said, Mike, if you retire and open your construction company here, you're doing $11 million your first year.

I went, really? He said, yeah, because it's not a lot of qualified African-American owned company. I never forget one day I was watching my face and I looked in the mirror, because the temper was off of me, the TV job. And I had the opportunity to construction and I said, I asked myself, who am I? Do I just give up on my body? Because one day, I'll be asking myself, could I have come back? And I turned down that opportunity and they hired someone else or they partnered with someone else and a plan maybe two more games the next year. But I found out what it takes to come in and provide a service and it's not really about black, white, Hispanic, it's about providing a service and that's why I started it. You remember that first project? Oh, man, the very first project we did, it was a subcontracting project for the hospital over here, Parkland Hospital. It was a small project and that was about $50,000, three hours, we started out doing drywall in the Coast School ceiling and there were so many people because I have a good name here.

Dallas wanted me to go into construction management because it's so subjective and it's about who you know and the relationship you have. And I wanted to start it at the grassroots level of learning what it takes to be a subcontractor. I always, my aspiration and desire was to build GC, but I wanted to be patient with it. So I started out doing drywall in the Coast School ceiling and then the next year we started doing a small interior finish out. We did all interior finish out in the building that I'm in here and then we started doing incaps like subways, we started doing smoothie factories and smoothie kings and then when I moved into which was four years ago, I moved into ground up but I said, well, if I'm going to do a ground up, I'm going to do it, find me a joint venture with a company that's been around for 80 years and give with those guys and say, how do you really do it and how do you really get into the market of doing a five or six million dollar project because it will be competitive. So that means you've got to lower your fees. That means your efficiency is how to be, how to be that much better. So that's how I kind of migrated into doing what we do and I'm really proud to say that we became minority construction company the year for the City of Dallas in 2008.

So you know, it's been a good progression. You tell me you're working on the new stadium in Arlington, how did you pull off that? Five years ago, the Jesse Owen Stadium was going out for bed and some friends of mine said it was a good project. It was 30 million. I didn't have the bond in other reputation and man had an arena that built reliance arena and they did build a stadium across the country. I went out to the president, John Dixon and I had maybe four employees but they had really like good experience in the construction industry and I said, hey, let's go out to this project together. He said, why did you choose me? Because they weren't doing a lot of DISD work. I said because of your history in stadiums. So he got an opportunity to meet my estimator, my project manager and superintendent, got an opportunity to work with me every day. Three years passed and the cowboy stadium came about and all these people using the political relationships and the religious relationships, I just called John Dixon up.

I said, John, you remember my company four years ago? And I like for you to come and interview to people on my team now and see what we've grown. Because at this time, we hadn't worked together since that time. By the way, we didn't win that project either but it got an opportunity to work with me. I said, I like for you to interview my people without me. I said, I'm looking for a long-term relationship with you. I said, if you feel that we bring you value, hire us. If not, I'll continue to do the small projects that I'm on. He said, Mike, that's all you want? I said, yeah. I'm not asking. The politician to call you, I'm not asking to preach to call you. I said, I want you to interview my people. If we bring you value, hire us. He said, Mike, I appreciate it. And two weeks passed, he said, Mike, I got about four companies. I got to get out of the way but I want to work with you. So does I? I did it. And when did you start in that construction project? And I assume it has to be completed by August of this year 2009. Yeah.

Well, you know, actually, the project is a head of schedule. The project is head of schedule. And it's always a bonus when you're working with a company like my head. They know what they're doing. And we've learned a tremendous amount. Now, the eyes of another stadium going to be built in the state of Texas with Houston, maybe San Antonio. But that experience is really going to take me to the next level with the NBA. See, I want to take my knowledge of building big, humongous buildings like that and take it to the relationships in the NBA. I'm already targeting Oklahoma. Because Seattle moved us and they got to build a new stadium. So that's going to be my high-hanging fruit. But I'm still going to definitely go after that target. You mentioned the bonding process. Why is that necessary in the construction business? Well, because at the end of the day, you have a four to a $50 to $100 million risk for the owner. The problem that you have in the industry is not really the bonding or can you perform. It's those insurance companies believing

that an African-American owned company can build the building. You all know about insurance. Insurance says that I'm going to insure your house. If you have a water leak, you've got to pay me $1,000 or do it yourself. Oh, and by the way, if your house burned down, you can't get insurance. That's the same in construction. If you have a good track record of building buildings without having any risk, any casualties, or any failures, they'll continue to give you more bonding. And we have that track record now. You mentioned putting together a competent staff. Who makes up the staff at three-hour construction? Believe it or not, his last name is FAC. And Tom Fag is my construction, VP of construction. We have Eric Crom, who's a senior estimator. And both of these guys have over 60 years' experience. We met White El Smith along with Icelena Bird, who is the business development. We have 20 people in the field. We have Felicia Andrews along with Julie

that runs our accounting department. This year, we started two separate, two other divisions, which is the concrete division that was ran by Yomo Fuller. And then we also have a special project division that is ran by David Ford. And David Ford has been with the company for four years. And I've been watching him for a long time. And he has a tremendous opportunity to really grow at a high level. So he's running his first specialty project division. Those are projects that are under half a million dollars. At this point, we are doing a renovation on McDonald's. They're competing with not smoothie, but with Starbucks on the specialty coffees and those are about $50,000. And we're doing each one of those. We're doing two of those a week. So in five days, we're knocking out two of those in a week in Davaco with the parent company. They want to give us a minute, we want. Our concrete division will do between $4 and $5 million this year. And we do projects for a DFW airport, Dart, the City of Dallas, and that division.

And like we were talking about early, three orchestructures, more of the parent company and the general construction company. We've been doing Bank of America's Capital Ones before Washington, Michigan. We were doing those. We built the first municipal project for the City of Hutchins, which is a fire station. We did the first lead project for the Allen Group coming out of San Diego. That was a 200,000 square foot warehouse. And we did the jail. We've been doing projects and we're ripping and running. What about the project in Las Vegas? The project in Las Vegas was something that that was two years back. And there was more, let's say, a renovation project. The City of Las Vegas wanted me to move that. And actually, the fees are better in Las Vegas. But I really believe that that's what happens with a lot of companies. When you start chasing the money, instead of chasing your vision, my vision is to have a company that can do $100 million worth of work in a given year. But you got to have a solid base. So that was one of the reasons why we went out

to the project and Vegas was only one time thing. They say if you don't have a plan, then you plan the fail. And if you don't see it, you can't think it. How important is for you to go out and give this perspective to young people, regardless of the ethnicity, that this is a worthwhile industry and a career that one could pursue? Well, most people think, include myself to a certain extent, thanks that construction about building buildings. There are so many different facets of construction. There's almost like planned a professional basketball. They say, professional basketball's NBA. No, you got overseas, you got the CBA. You got all these different areas of basketball you can go into to earn yourself a living. It's the same thing in construction. You got construction management, you got general construction, you got subcontracting, you got project controls, you got design and build. You got all these different areas. Construction is an industry. You can go vertical.

You can go flat and do streets. And with Baroque being in office, that's one of the reasons we started a concrete division. So it's all of these different opportunities for not only, like you said, blacks and minorities, but the non-minor has been doing it for a long time. It's the reason why they're there, because it's a lot of money over there. So that's one of the things that we're going to do here. It takes money to start programs that's going to give back to the community to have mentor protégé program. It takes money. So that's one of the reasons why my goal is not to build $10 million a year company. It's not to be a 50. It's to be $100 million. And what happens when we reach that goal? But what we do know is going to happen. When you're doing $100 million, it's a lot of surplus plus money that you can put aside to develop young minorities to get into this industry. You start looking at the state of Texas, Florida, even California. One thing that people don't really pay attention to as the numbers, Texas is a predominantly minority now. We all know about Detroit, predominantly minority.

So when you start talking about municipal dollars, city dollars, state dollars, university dollars, if you look at the minority goals, it has gone from a may good 15% to a mandatory 15% to a may good 25% to a mandatory. They're pushing the minority goals to 40%. So if you want to get into this industry, and you want to earn a good living for yourself, and you're dealing with efficiencies and structuring that kind of stuff, you can be successful in it. And any given year, what is the number of projects that you all could conceivably do? At this point, buy ourselves one of the things that everything's about is about having a good reputation. So we get asked by a lot of $2 and $3 billion of your companies to partner with them. So I'm gonna give you that answer in two different phases. One, on our own, with our bonding capacity, we can do five to 15 in a given year.

That's the size of the projects. And preferably, I like to do $25 million in two projects in a great, in a perfect world, but our bonding capacity doesn't give us that lecturing. Now when you're talking about the joint ventures, we're in a joint venture right now. We're on a $40 million project with J.E. Dunn. We did N.D.I.S.D. last bond program. We did $94 million together in that joint venture. I like those, but we build, I build this organization where we can stand on our own. So we'll like to do about this year, we'll do seven A projects. You're a member of the 2007 class of the Tess' Black Sports Hall of Fame. What was it like that night in December, a couple of years ago, being inducted? Well, to say a lot of the guys, you really look up to Hollywood Henderson. And I made even a comment saying that, of all the people getting inducted,

Hollywood got the most money when it went in lottery. But to see these guys that you really, when you're six and seven years old, couldn't wait to get their autograph to be inducted. And to be considered one of the better players that came out of one of the largest states, it's a great feeling. And it really motivated me because there are so many people that were great athletes, whether in high school and college, they stopped growing. And you see people talking about what they did in high school, that was my night to talk about that, what they used to do. And it really motivated me for what we're gonna do here with three I. There's a lot of other things that I'm gonna do. We will start a Mike Williams Assistful Life Foundation that's gonna give back to those athletes that may not be the best athletes on the floor, but they're very good athletes, but make an exceptional grades. And those will receive scholarship from the Mike Williams Assistful Life Foundation.

During that ceremony and your presentation, you mentioned your dad and family. Why was that important for you to acknowledge him, particularly, and your family? Well, I know it. And I got a lot of grief from my mom. They were mad at me. I'm like, why are you, we're talking about sport. Because my father has always, I think, well, I don't think he may not admit that, I know he lived, lived vicariously through me, you know. But he was one of those ones that when it got tough for me, then I could always turn to. He was that guy that when, you know, you're seven, eight years old, and you're supposed to be playing with the seven, eight-year-olds. He put me with the 10, 11-year-old. See, as a kid, you don't know what he's doing. He was getting me prepared to go to another level. So when I went to high school and played against kids, my own age, it was easy. So I looked back and I got a little choked up because I was so appreciative for what he's done. I remember going through my last semester, Baylor,

and he got really, really tough in Europe, echelon classes, and I said, Dad, man, you know, my gang going down. And my dad has got to graduate from S.M. You believe in education, all my brothers and sisters, they got their degrees. And he said, Mike, well, take in, please. I said, it, please. He said, Mike, it's only one semester. You got one shot to make the NBA. And that's when I focused on my gang got better and I was able to go back. But it's those little bitty things that a parent or a leader, that someone that's your mentor can tell a young person that can really change their lives. So that was one of the reasons, one of the reasons I mentioned, the other reason I love him so much, and that's one of my best friends. Colorful question, your favorite color and why? When it construction, my favorite color is gray. I think my favorite color is blue. And you can see that our logo has a lot of blue in it, and because it's a color of power to me, but it's a color of power with a calmness. You can go with red, that's a fire.

But blue is something that's saying, we're going to get it. We're in the room, but it's calm. We're not going to be too loud, but we're going to make it happen. Favorite food? Man, I tell you, chicken, fried, baked, sauteed, lemon pepper, and it don't matter. Chicken. And favorite vacation spot when you have a chance to go on vacation. Oh, man. That's a tough one, because I've traveled so many different places. I really love spending time in Spain. Scotty Pippin and I did a camp over there, and we were there for two weeks in Spain and then I did the coast of Spain and Malik. I really liked that, but that's a long trip to get no next to some water. I like Cancun. I mean, I've just been all over the place. I like to be next to some water, but I like the opportunity to get there pretty quickly, without having to go 15 hours to get there. So, you know, it's kind of like that.

Final comments, Mr. Williams? We're on our way. We're on our way. I've been blessed beyond my wildest imagination. I'm a believer in God and Christ. I put Him first in my life, and we're going to continue to move forward. Michael D. Williams, founder and president of Three Eye Construction. If you have questions, comments, or suggestions ask your future in Black America programs, write us. Also, let us know what radio station you heard us over. The views and opinions expressed on this program are not necessarily those of this station or of the University of Texas at Austin. You can hear previous programs online at kut.org. Until we have the opportunity again for technical producers, David Alvarez and Cliff Hoggrove. I'm John L. Hanson, Jr. Thank you for joining us today. Please join us again next week. CD copies of this program are available and may be purchased by writing in Black America CDs, KUT Radio,

One University Station, Austin, Texas, 78712. That's in Black America CDs, KUT Radio, One University Station, Austin, Texas, 78712. This has been a production of KUT Radio.