Rebuilding after a rift, and paving the way for NextGens

A lot has changed at 70-year-old McAnany Construction since the first generation was in charge — not least of which is its approach to succession planning.

Around 2015, McAnany Construction President Eric Vossman had an “aha” moment. His paving and site development company was working with a subcontractor to apply ultrathin bonded asphalt surface (UBAS) for large roads in Lenexa, Kan., when the city's project manager suggested he find a way to use the technology on residential streets.

That had never been done before. The product required huge machines that couldn't be used on narrow, curved streets with overhanging trees. Plus, it couldn't be worked by hand.

But a lightbulb went off for Eric. He bought specialized equipment and figured out a solution. Once he patented his system, his third-generation family business had an advantage over competitors. UBAS can be used to resurface a road in just a day, doesn't require removing a large portion of the existing road and doesn't result in dangerous loose chips. Plus, it's very cost-effective. 

“That brought us something in the market that nobody else could do,” Eric says.

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New opportunities emerged. Until now, the company had mainly worked on projects within a 50-mile radius of Kansas City. With UBAS, the company expanded its reach and began work for multiple jurisdictions in Nebraska. McAnany Construction has since grown to 130 employees, and annual revenue has climbed to between $65 million and $85 million—a triumph for a company that was once nearly derailed by family conflict.

“It’s still a family business, but it’s definitely a large corporation that is making moves,” says Vice President Ben McAnany.

A Can-Do Attitude

Eric and Ben's grandfather, Dick, and Dick's brother, John, founded the company in Merriam, Kan., in 1954. There weren't enough asphalt roads at the time to keep up with post-World War II growth, and the two men realized there was a need for a company to do road work.

They got started out of a gas station. Dick sold the yellow Mustang he'd bought his wife when they married and used the proceeds to get his first dump truck.

According to Ben, the first generation's approach to work was simple: get dirty and get it done. He's seen video footage from the earliest days of the company, which showed workers smoking and drinking on the job. Some were shirtless and/or wearing shorts. Some were even wearing flip-flops.

“It's wild to think of the things that they were doing while they were out there paving roads and building roads, but that was just a different time,” Ben says.

Apparently, employees carried on that freewheeling spirit after they left work. Some men would take their paycheck on Friday afternoon and gamble it away at a poker tournament down the street. Then the office would get calls from the wives, asking why their husbands hadn't been paid. In the end, the company moved payroll from Fridays to Tuesdays.

The business eventually grew up under Dick and John's leadership. In 1971, it moved to the current office in Shawnee. Dick rose to prominence in the community, serving at various times as mayor, state representative and president of Optimist International.

“Anything he got involved in, he was pretty soon president,” says Roger Vossman, Dick's son-in-law and Eric’s father. He says Dick mostly led by example rather than dictating what to do.

Business was humming along, but McAnany Construction struggled to scale. It didn't help that the business lacked a grading division.

By the '80s, the second generation was getting involved in the company. John's son Ted worked there, as did Dick's sons Larry, Pat, Tim and Phil. Roger married Dick's daughter Betsy and gave up his job selling pharmaceuticals to work in the McAnany Construction shop, where he was responsible for maintaining about 20 trucks and 30 to 50 pieces of equipment.

A Difficult Transition

Around the late '80s, Dick and John wanted to hand off the company to their children. The transition was marked by contention and hard feelings.

“It was actually pretty brutal,” Ben says. “Going from the first generation to the second generation almost bankrupted the company.”

Dick and John couldn't agree on who would take over which shares, given that Dick had four sons plus a son-in-law working there, while John had only Ted. The dispute became rancorous, and John walked away to start a new company. Ted also left and became the majority owner of Asphalt Sales, a supplier that some of Dick’s sons and grandchildren hold an interest in.

Now Larry was at the helm. Growth was taking off, thanks in part to McAnany Construction's purchase of Shamrock Excavating. McAnany could do its own grading, and the company grew from a workforce of 15 to between 25 and 35 almost overnight.

Roger, who didn't especially enjoy working in the shop, found a new role through serendipity. McAnany Construction scored a huge project building a racetrack complex, and Larry acted as superintendent. That meant someone was needed to check on the subdivision and city jobs, and Roger stepped up. He learned more about the bidding process and did estimating work, helping to fill the place of the previous estimator who'd exited to work for a subcontractor.

In the early '90s, Larry left the company to pursue a career as an artist. Pat was next in line to lead the business.

“Larry was definitely the one that was kind of in shape to become the next president, but he had a change of heart,” Ben says. “And so that fell onto the lap of my dad. I don’t think that he had any intention of taking it over. I fully think that at some point he thought his brother was going to be running it — he’d be in the office doing some different things, but that’s just the way the cards landed. He took full responsibility.”

“He’s lucky that he had Roger with him to kind of go along and build the company the way they were able to build it,” Ben adds.

Now Pat was president and Roger was executive vice president. Together with Phil and Tim, they ran the business as a cordial team.

By then, Dick was spending a large portion of the year in Arizona and, when he did come around, he didn't try to micromanage, Roger says.

Through the 1990s and 2000s, the company took on larger jobs and worked on higher-quality roads. The workforce grew to 40 to 45 employees. Annual revenues rose from $8 million – $10 million to $20 million -$30 million .

Still, they held onto the culture of a close-knit family business. Company parties were held twice a year — a summer cookout with volleyball or softball and a Christmas party. “We usually had pretty good attendance, and they were always fun,” Roger says.

A Harmonious Handoff

Pat and Roger brought their young sons along to see them work.

When they were older, they started picking up short-term work, helping out on a concrete or asphalt crew.

But after they went off to college, they spent their summers participating in internships in their chosen fields. Eric became an architect, and Ben went into financial planning. Neither intended to have a career in the family business.

By 2009, it was time for McAnany Construction to recruit its next generation of leadership. The family needed to avoid the succession mistakes of the past, which had left a lasting rift in the family. “Today there are still family members from that second generation that don't speak with each other, which is tragic,” Ben says. They were determined to plan better and do things right this time.

Roger and Pat reached out to Roger’s son Eric first. “My dad and my uncle Pat called me out of the blue and said, ‘Hey, we want you to come back here and be our superintendent.' And I was kind of like, ‘Well, that’s really not what I'm thinking about doing,'” Eric says.

But Eric realized he was bored as the slowdown following the financial crisis hit the architectural sector, and he was ready for a new challenge. Plus, his then-fiancée (now wife) wanted to move back closer to home. He said yes.

Then in 2014, Ben told his father that he was thinking of moving to a smaller employer in finance. Pat asked him if he'd consider a career at McAnany Construction. That wasn't what Ben had in mind, but further conversations with his father gave him a new perspective.

“We talked about what he does in the office, and how he runs the company and how he looks at things,” Ben recalls. “And he said, ‘Running a business is basically how you would run people's financials. You've got to look at the full picture. You have to understand the insurance, you have to understand the taxes, you have to understand the schedules that people are on, what the needs are.' And he goes, ‘You already know the work in the field. You've already done it. So that's not an issue.'”

Eric and Ben each worked out separate agreements with their fathers to buy out their shares. In 2020, they wrote Tim a check and bought him out, too. And they've got an agreement in place to make payments to Phil through 2026. Now Eric has 53.5% equity, and Ben has 46.5%.

They also arranged for the second-generation leaders to go off the company's insurance when they turn 65, and today three out of the four are on their own insurance.

Navigating Relationships

When Ben came on board, he reached out to Eric. “I said, ‘Hey, if it’s going to be you and me long-term, these are my expectations. This is just kind of what I think.' And I wanted to know his. We were on the same page, which is great,” he says.

They both credit their friendly working relationship to open communication. If they ever have a difference of opinion, they immediately get it out in the open and talk it through. They never resort to passive aggressiveness or hostility.

Their personalities also complement each other well. Ben is vivacious and outgoing, while Eric tells slightly bashful dad jokes and is more reserved. “I just find that it makes sense in my position to be a little more in the gray. Never get too excited, never get too upset, and just kind of be the steady one in the group,” Eric says.

It was important to Pat that the third-generation leaders knew he trusted them, so when he retired, he walked away. “He packed up his things out of his office, we transitioned him out, and that was it,” Ben says.

“And he was still around. He still wanted to see the financials every once in a while, making sure that Eric and I weren't there to mess it up. But at the same time, he basically said, ‘I'm done.'”

Pat told them they could always talk to him if they had questions. While there is no formal family governance in place, they still sometimes reach out individually to Pat or the other members of the second generation for advice.

One of the challenges Eric and Ben faced was deciding which of the remaining family members should remain with McAnany Construction. They decided to fire two cousins.

“They were not living up to that standard that we wanted them to live up to, and it was hurting the company,” Ben explains. “And there were some upset words, there were some upset people, but they have both come to the realization that it was for the best.”

Ben adds that two other cousins eventually ended up quitting for separate reasons — one because he wanted to pursue other things “ and the other because he didn’t think that he was getting his fair share even though he wasn't really earning it.”

Pursuing Sustainable Growth

Eric's outlook for McAnany Construction is one of cautious optimism. He wants the third generation to make capital investments carefully to protect what their parents and grandfather built. “We’re not going to drive this business so fast and so hard that we can’t sustain it. We don’t want to have peaks and valleys,” Eric says.

Allowing for employees' work-life balance is one of their top priorities. Recent hires have said they became disheartened when their previous employers required them to work long hours every night—some had barely seen their families for months.

McAnany Construction's approach is different. “One of my estimators last night, it was 3:30 and it was his daughter's last dance recital practice. He left at 3:30 as opposed to 4:00. No problem. Have fun. She's 3. You'll never get that memory back,” Ben says.

“I’m a firm believer that the men and women that work with us, they’re professionals; they do a professional job. And if we treat them like that, they will in turn value the company that they work with and take care of our customers,” Eric adds.

So, will there be a fourth generation? Eric is indifferent to whether his young kids run McAnany Construction one day. He's content for them to choose their own careers.

Still, you get the feeling this family isn't going to part with their business any time soon. Eric has received some offers, but he believes that accepting one would be abandoning everyone who's worked for the company long-term. “The hardest thing for me wouldn’t be selling it. It’d be leaving the people behind,” Eric says.

About the Author(s)

Sarah Brodsky

Sarah Brodsky is a freelance writer based in St. Louis. She has written for a variety of publications and outlets, including U.S. News & World Report, Buy Side from WSJ, CNET, CompanyWeek and Credit Karma.


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