Hansjörg Burggraf and Alexander Weber talk business

By Sabine Walter
08 Mar 2024

My clients include exciting business personalities who I like to invite for a chat. This time, Hansjörg Burggraf and Alexander Weber were on hand to answer our questions. Both are managing partners of bwp Burggraf + Weber | Consulting Engineers, based in Munich. The office ranks among the "premier league of structural engineering" in Germany.

Alexander Weber and Hansjörg Burggraf bwp - Business talk with Sabine Walter
Photo | Laura Engeser

What do you love about your job?

Alexander Weber: I have three key aspects that I particularly love: creating something new, designing creatively and working with people.

The biggest driver is the creation of something new. It fascinates me time and time again to develop unique pieces through pure intellectual effort, which can later be found on the construction site and which will characterise the cityscape after completion.

"We structural engineers create something solid by merging craftsmanship and academic knowledge"

We structural engineers don't just do purely theoretical work, we create something tangible by merging craftsmanship and academic knowledge.

And I would like to clear up a misconception right away. Even if we are good at maths, our job is by no means boring. On the contrary: we need a lot of creativity to solve all the challenges and issues surrounding a new build or the refurbishment of an existing building. One current topic that requires our expertise, for example, is sustainable construction. Because when we talk about sustainable construction, we automatically also talk about the question of how we can use less concrete or other materials to minimise CO2 to save money. At the same time, many demands on modern buildings are increasing. Solving such seemingly contradictory issues is part of our work.

Teamwork is crucial

And we never solve such tasks alone. This brings me to another aspect that I like about my job: working with people. We solve questions and problems best in dialogue with the various people involved in such a construction project: Clients, architects, other technical specialists, craftsmen, site managers ... And even if such projects can rarely be realised without conflict, everyone is working towards the same goal, namely to create something new, something positive. 

I actually wanted to study medicine after leaving school. But when I did a lot of community service looking after sick people and realised that medicine can't always help, but that people can die despite the work of a doctor, my career aspirations changed. I haven't regretted it to this day.

Hansjörg Burggraf: What do I love about my job? To answer this question, I need to expand a little. I also wanted to become a doctor, a veterinary surgeon. But when I went to the careers counsellor at the end of my school years, he didn't even consider my wish, but asked the question: "What does your father actually do?" And when I replied: "He's a civil engineer," the counsellor said: "That would be something for you." So I went into the interview as a vet and came out as a civil engineer. In this man's defence, I have to say that as I studied civil engineering, my interest in the subject grew.

"I am an entrepreneur with heart and soul"

However, I only worked as a project engineer for a short time after graduating. When I had the opportunity to take over an office with 6 employees at the time, I accepted and switched from the engineering role to the entrepreneurial role. This also changed my range of tasks. And I found what fulfils me to this day: Acquiring projects, leading and shaping. I am an entrepreneur with heart and soul. I love developing a company. I enjoy being a service provider, recognising the needs of my customers, understanding their questions and problems precisely and then solving them. I love developing people, shaping teams and giving them the framework conditions they need to deliver top work.

"We both share a desire to create and lead"

Of course, I am still a sparring partner for technical issues, but the focus is on leadership, acquisition and customer care. It is important to me that we work with our customers and cooperation partners in a spirit of trust. Because only when there is a basis of trust will our ideas and suggestions be heard and accepted. And only then can we really create.

As you can see, I've come a long way from pure civil engineering. But what Alex and I have in common is the desire to design and lead.

How has structural engineering developed in the time you have been practising the profession?

Hansjörg Burggraf: The profession has changed enormously. The reason for this is the further development of technology, the increase in computer processing power and the invention of means of communication. At the very beginning, we drew plans by hand with an ink pen on a board and exchanged documents by post, then came the fax. Now we send everything by e-mail, upload it to platforms or even work in a shared system. Compared to today, everything used to be much, much slower. 

Alexander Weber: I just remembered an episode from my studies. When the Internet was "born" in 1994, we asked the university's IT department whether we could get an e-mail address as civil engineering students. The professor in charge laughed at us and said: "There's no such thing for civil engineering students. Only computer scientists get that." And today, everyday life without e-mail or other digital communication channels is no longer conceivable. 

Technical development has had a massive impact on our profession

Hansjörg Burggraf: As technology has changed, so have the processes. We used to calculate the structural analysis in a quiet room and when we were finished, we submitted it by post. Today, it's an ongoing process: we calculate, submit, get changes back, recalculate ... 

Alexander Weber: Performance phases that used to be clearly separated are now becoming blurred. A lot of work is done in parallel because computing power has increased to such an extent that you can practically see in real time what effects which changes will have.

"We have to be careful that we don't become slaves to the computer."

Hansjörg Burggraf: Personally, I don't think that all developments are for the better, as the rapid application of computing power means that we don't always think before we calculate. We have to make sure that we don't become slaves to the computer and that the computer remains our work tool. Sensitising young colleagues to this remains both a task and a challenge. Because only if you are able to solve problems by talking or sketching can you judge whether what the calculator spits out is plausible. 

Alexander Weber: In my view, plausibilising and critically questioning what the software outputs is and remains a major challenge for many professions, if not for society as a whole. We must not simply accept what is ejected from the "black box" as a given.

We are now seeing this with AI-generated false information. Although this appears credible and plausible at first glance, it is not. It's the same with complex computer models, which even we as experts can sometimes no longer understand. This is why it is so important that young engineers learn to find solutions with sense and reason without a computer. 

What parallels are there to what we do, personality and organisational development?

Hansjörg Burggraf: For me, the parallels are obvious. I need a team that works together in a spirit of trust, I need employees who contribute with all their strengths so that we can fulfil our entrepreneurial aspirations.

I don't need a calculator or even a computer to do my job, but I do need leadership skills and the ability to develop people and teams.

Alexander Weber: I took on management responsibility 13 years ago and have since learnt how crucial it is to engage with the different personalities, to find out what suits the individual, to deploy them there and to develop them in a targeted manner.

Even if I don't know in detail what your day-to-day work looks like, Sabine, I can see the biggest parallels, except that you do this for several companies and we concentrate on our team at bwp.

When do you come up with the best ideas?

Both in unison: In dialogue.

Hansjörg Burggraf: When it comes to technical issues, dialogue is very important to me and I enjoy exchanging ideas with other experts and like-minded people. Everyone contributes their experience and perspective, ideas are developed further and ultimately lead to a resilient solution. In this way, we have developed many prestigious buildings in and outside Munich as a team.

When it comes to entrepreneurial topics, I often think about them on my own. And the ideas come to me at any time; at home, at a concert or during sport. 

The exchange of ideas within the team is one of our strengths at bwp

Alexander Weber: I completely agree with Hansjörg. We have already developed a lot of good ideas together. I would even say that this is one of our strengths at bwp. We have very good and experienced sparring partners for different areas - and we utilise them.

In contrast to the exchange, however, I also need the peace and quiet to develop ideas. I need to be able to work on a topic in a focussed way, without interruption. Then I forget everything around me and get into the flow. However, I can only achieve this state if I "lock myself away", switch off Outlook, phone and Teams and focus on the topic or question. It doesn't matter whether these questions are of a technical or business nature. The important thing is that I have peace and quiet and am not interrupted.

Sabine Walter: We have institutionalised the exchange of ideas and joint work on issues to a certain extent with "bwp 2030". And I am thrilled with the ideas that the various teams come up with on strategic and entrepreneurial issues and then implement together.

What will your profession look like in 2050?

Both in unison: If we knew that exactly.

Social issues will increasingly characterise the profession

Hansjörg Burggraf: The demands placed on us as structural engineers will change massively and technology will continue to develop. The keyword AI has already been mentioned. But the key issues of the future will be:

How do we manage to create living space for all the many people, and living space in parts of the world that will still be habitable despite climate change? How can we ensure that buildings can withstand earthquakes and extreme weather? How can we intelligently renovate existing buildings?

The challenges for the colleagues who will succeed us are great. I have great confidence that the younger generation can and will develop forward-looking solutions for the benefit of all of us. But for them to be able to do this, it is crucial that we train them well.

Alexander Weber: We have seen an exponential development in technology over the last 5 years. When I try to extrapolate this development, I can't even imagine what technology will be like in 2050.

Technology will certainly have taken over many processes that are still carried out manually today by 2050. By 2035, AI will probably be able to create reinforcement plans faster and better than draughtsmen do today.

Regardless of this, I am convinced that the profession of civil engineer will continue to exist. Let's take a look at the refurbishment or remodelling of existing buildings. In this area, we will continue to need experts who look at the buildings on site, comb through non-digitalised documents or, in the event that there are no more documents at all, create new ones.

Hansjörg Burggraf: I would like to pick up on a topic from earlier: Housing construction against the backdrop of population growth and a simultaneous reduction in buildable land. We will have to be able to create simple, cheap housing quickly for a very, very large number of people. And that won't all happen in the greater Munich area. So the question for our office is rather: "Where will we be doing our work or realising our projects in 2050?"

"We civil engineers have a social mission."

Alexander Weber: More than ever, we civil engineers have a social mandate not only to present our expertise, but also to implement it. We know how to achieve sustainable and CO2-reduced construction. We are not being listened to enough, as developers are still primarily concerned with the question: "How can I generate maximum profit?" The issue of sustainability is only a means to an end. As long as the market demands sustainability, sustainability will be taken into account to the extent that the project sells well. There is still no real interest in sustainable construction. We need to change this attitude.

We must recognise that sustainability is not a sales argument, but the basis of life for future generations.

If you could choose a favourite project from all your projects, what would it be and why?

Residenzpost in Munich

Alexander Weber: In my case, it's the Residenzpost in Munich, now the flagship store of Luis Vuitton on Maximilianstraße.

The planning for this began in 2006 and was realised from 2008 to 2011. This project had a lot of the things that make a project appealing to me. 

  • It was a highly complicated project:
    A city centre project in a prominent location in Munich. The listed facades and the listed Klenzetrakt were to be preserved. The investor also wanted to add two further basement levels below the existing basement. In addition, the underground railway ran nearby in Residenzstraße and we had to take into account the second S-Bahn tunnel that was to run under the building. We used the rare method of cover construction, which is often only used in civil engineering.
  • The team:
    I worked with the top-class architectural firm Hilmer & Sattler. And the project brought us so close together that we are still in very good contact today. Then we had a very demanding project manager who helped us all and the project to make significant progress. I had international contact with the French architects and client representatives from Louis Vuittons. We planned the flagship store with this team.
  • The result:
    The project went very well. We mastered the complexity and were able to realise all the requirements. That still makes me proud today.

Rungestraße-Brückenstraße in Berlin as entry into the "premier league of structural engineering"

Hansjörg Burggraf: My favourite project is Rungestraße-Brückenstraße in Berlin. In the mid-1990s, this project involved refurbishing the existing building and adding a new building.

The construction project was in the eastern part of Berlin and we didn't have any sector plans that showed us the route of the supply lines. But we had a very attentive excavator driver who fortunately found the 110kV line lying in the ground there. Because of this line, we had to make a decision on site and move the location of the future building by a few metres.

This project was the basis for the commissioning of the two hundred metre high Main Tower in Frankfurt and our entry into the "premier league of structural engineering".

About:

Hansjörg Burggraf and Alexander Weber are qualified civil engineers and managing partners of Company bwp Burggraf + Weber, Consulting Engineers based in Munich. bwp is an office for structural engineering. The range of services includes structural engineering, structural building construction, construction supervision and structural fire, noise and thermal insulation. 

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