Building a Business, Management, Branding & Vision, Tech Stack, Resources, & Updated Thinking

Happy 2025! As we close another year and enter into a new one, I want to share some of the insights, resources, and lessons I’ve gained—both personally and as part of our team and company. This year has been a journey of challenges and growth, offering a deeper understanding of the evolving vision that continues to guide our path and mission.

You can check out the extended version on the Building Culture Podcast.

The Evolution of Building Culture

Building Culture has always been about more than construction. When I first started back in 2015, our focus was on durability and structural masonry—a tangible expression of long-term thinking. Over time, that focus has expanded into something much broader: cultivating human flourishing through thoughtful architecture and community building. Durability and structural integrity remain central, but they’re now part of a larger mission.

The last few years have forced us—and the entire industry—to adapt. Economic shifts, particularly the pandemic’s ripple effects on material costs and supply chains, have inflated construction costs by roughly 40%. These realities required us to make pragmatic adjustments while staying true to our core values. We’ve always championed the philosophy of building “smaller but better.” But there’s a limit to what markets can bear and what people can afford.

This led me to rethink how Building Culture can express its values within the constraints of today’s world. One of those shifts has been embracing conventional wood-frame construction where it makes sense. It’s not a compromise of vision but a strategy to ensure we can keep moving forward. I’ve had to remind myself not to let perfection become the enemy of progress. While I’m constantly driven by visions of “what could be,” achieving those dreams requires balancing idealism with pragmatism.

This adaptability hasn’t watered down our vision—it’s clarified it. I still believe the U.S. needs to move toward a more resilient, masonry-based construction system in maturing places across most climates. Not every building should be masonry—wood-framed construction absolutely has its place—but without creating multi-century, resilient buildings, we won’t solve the intertwined crises of housing and sustainability. Nor will we achieve generational human flourishing. It’s a long road, but a necessary one.

The evolution of Building Culture has given me a clearer picture of where we’re headed. While our strategies may adapt, our mission remains steadfast: to create spaces and places that stand the test of time and nurture life-giving human experiences. As I often say, “architecture is the human habitat.” We are composers, translating music into physical places, crafting spaces that delight, comfort, protect, connect, and serve people.

Humans don’t exist in social isolation—we live within communities, in relation to one another. We are also deeply physical beings, living not in a purely digital or spiritual world, but in the tangible one we shape. Our habitat, the world we build around ourselves, is profoundly important. And unlike any other creature, we design and construct our own environment, for better or worse.

I’ve never been more convinced of the critical importance of the built world—and of its need for restoration. Working with my team to build a more beautiful world, in every sense of the word, is one of the most meaningful endeavors I could imagine.

Lessons Learned in Business

This year has been a deep dive in business growth and leadership for me. From hiring an executive assistant to experimenting with new tools like EOS (Entrepreneurial Operating System), I’m learning a lot about scaling a business. Here are a few key takeaways:

• Delegation: Hiring an executive assistant was transformative. Delegating tasks has allowed me to focus my time and spend it on what’s most important in order to lead and grow the company. It also helps me push forward a lot of small-but-important tasks that were getting neglected, so that I am more consistently working on the business, and not just in it.

• Feedback and Communication: We’ve started holding 30-minute, bi-weekly one-on-one meetings with team members. These sessions have been invaluable for fostering open communication and continuous improvement.

• Defining Success: I’ve been working with Matt on clearly defining roles, responsibilities, and KPIs for the team. This has been essential for aligning everyone and achieving our goals. It’s a work in progress, but it’s already paying off. This is something I heard numerous times this year from some very accomplished business leaders and entrepreneurs: defining success. And then measuring it! It’s actually quite hard. But I can already see why it’s so worthwhile.

Tech Tools That Changed the Game

Efficiency and intentionality have been crucial this year. Some of the tools we’ve adopted have made a significant difference:

• Superhuman: This email management app has been a game-changer for productivity. Trust me. If you deal with a lot of email….GET. THIS. APP. 

• HubSpot: We’ve started using this for CRM and relationship management as we deal with hundreds of people throughout the year.

• AppFolio: This investor management tool is awesome. It streamlines all the logistics of raising money, receiving that money, investor communications, distributions, taxes, etc. If you are doing things manually, I highly recommend!

• Ressio: This is a new construction project management software we are trying. We just never liked Builder Trend, though that’s what we used for years.  Jury is still out, and certainly needs some more features (it’s new), but overall, we like it more than Builder Trend.

Books that Made a Real Impact on my Actions and my Thinking

• Traction by Gino Wickman: This book on implementing EOS has been very helpful in solidifying business operations. We have a lot to do here, but we’ve started implementing it and it’s already making a difference.

• The Bitcoin Standard by Saifedean Ammous: No, this book isn’t about Bitcoin. He doesn’t even talk about Bitcoin until the last few chapters. Rather, it’s about the idea of money: what it is and what it’s supposed to do. If that sounds boring, I promise you it’s not. One of the most interesting books I’ve read in a long time that has shifted my thinking substantially.

• Make Something Wonderful: A collection of Steve Jobs’ speeches, interviews and correspondence. I loved this book. It’s free online. I found it immensely inspiring and timely. Steve’s unwavering belief that you have to start with the user experience, and then back into the hardware, is something I think every industry can learn from. But especially architecture and real estate.

• Raising Capital for Real Estate by Hunter Thompson: If you are thinking about raising money for a business venture, real estate or something else, I highly recommend Hunter’s book. There is an old-school way to raise money, but technology has enabled new possibilities that I think a lot of people could find helpful and exciting.

Ideas and People who Inspired me and Shaped my Vision and Philosophy

• Moses Kagan’s philosophy of “indefinite hold”: Moses is a successful real estate developer who shares a ton of knowledge on X, and I highly recommend giving him a follow if you’re in the game. His approach to long-term stewardship of assets resonated deeply with me: Our strategy is simply to do what smart families have always done: acquire great assets in supply-constrained markets, leverage them conservatively, steward them well, refinance them opportunistically to return capital tax-efficiently, and hold them indefinitely. 

• Rick Ruben on Andrew Huberman: Excellent episode on the creative endeavor, being an artist, finding meaning and creating.

• Huberman on Dopamine: Wow. So helpful to understand how our motivation system actually works chemically in our bodies. There are no shortcuts. I’ve found this episode very helpful in driving new behavior and mental models.

• Brian Chesky on Lenny’s Podcast: Brian is the CEO of AirBnB. You may have heard whispers of his “Founder Mode” talk at Y Combinator last year. Paul Graham wrote on essay on it. I found this talk extremely helpful about how to think about scaling a business while keeping everyone moving in the same direction. Also, he encourages CEO’s to stay in the details, which is the opposite of most “management advice”. I happen to agree with him—you can’t manage people or processes you don’t know anything about. I believe product-oriented CEO’s tend to build the greatest companies—and it’s how I plan to run Building Culture even as we grow. This stands in contrast to EOS, mentioned above. But we are adapting what works for us and leaving the rest.

Personal Reflections and Growth

This year has brought personal challenges that profoundly reshaped my view of life, as anyone following along likely knows. After two more foot surgeries this year that unfortunately have not worked out very well, and constant pain in every step, I’ve had to redefine what happiness and fulfillment mean to me. Despite the pain and hardship, this year has been the most meaningful of my life.

I’ve come to realize that the fundamental reality of life is suffering. While American culture often avoids this truth, life is undeniably hard. And pursuing comfort or happiness, as I used to think, isn’t the antidote. 

Rather, it’s in the pursuit of meaning that we find something substantial to pit against life’s difficulties. Orienting ourselves toward the highest possible vision, striving to become all that we can be—and, in many ways, embracing the death of our old selves so that something new can be born—is where real resilience and fulfillment lie. 

This perspective has only reinforced my commitment to Building Culture’s mission. By focusing on becoming all that we can be and serving others, I believe we can transcend personal struggles and contribute to a brighter, more enduring future. And in the end, find real happiness.

Looking Ahead

As we step into the new year, I’m thrilled about what lies ahead for Building Culture. We’re master-planning neighborhoods ranging from five acres to two-hundred acres. Closer to home, Townsend—our infill development of townhomes and boutique commercial spaces—will soon break ground.

Through it all, we’re continuing to refine our guiding star: creating spaces that enable human flourishing.

To everyone who has been part of this journey, thank you. Your support truly means a lot. Let’s keep building a better world together in the year ahead.

Here’s to a Happy New Year and a purposeful 2025 for us all!

Warmly,
Austin