Pittsburgh Ranked Best City for Jobs
The Steel City has claimed yet another accolade to add to its growing list. USA Today recently voted Pittsburgh as the best large metro area for jobs.
The rankings were based on “the number of hiring opportunities relative to population, the area’s affordability and job satisfaction,” according to Glassdoor.com, a website which allows former and current employees to anonymously review companies and their management.
This is far from Pittsburgh’s first recognition as one of the best cities in the country. In 2018 alone, Pittsburgh was selected as the second most livable city in the United States, number one city for the most affordable rent, number 34 out of the top 100 places to live in the world, and number one city for young people to live based on job opportunities, affordability and livability.
To read the full USA Today article, click here.
Another Year, Another Lunchtime Soak for Broujos
Is there a better way to spend your lunch than watching your Managing Director get soaked for a good cause? Definitely not!
Luckily for our office, we got to witness this last Thursday, August 2nd for the second year in a row as our Managing Director and Principal, Gregg Broujos, participated in the ALS Association of Western Pennsylvania Chapter’s CEO Soak. Broujos, along with 20 other CEOs, Presidents and other upper-level managers, stood in the fountains at PPG for one minute.
“The ALS chapter in Pittsburgh does a fantastic job with this important fundraiser,” Broujos exclaimed. “It was a beautiful day and a huge crowd, which made it a brilliant event.”
While many of the participants volunteered last year for the inaugural event, there were also some new bodies that took the plunge.
“The return of several participants and the new volunteers just goes to show what big and giving hearts the people of Pittsburgh have and are willing to share,” notes Lisa Mikolay, Operations Manager for Colliers International | Pittsburgh. “However, the best part of my lunch break was watching Gregg get drenched in extremely cold water!”
The participants after being soaked.
Broujos raised over $1,500 towards direct care for individuals and families, national public policy efforts and research focused on finding treatments for ALS.
“As always, thank you to the many generous people who donated funds to help in the fight against ALS,” Broujos said.
To date, the event has raised over $49,000 towards their $60,000 goal. Donations will be accepted through August 15th. If you are interested in donating, please click here.
Kids Day at Colliers Pittsburgh
Colliers International | Pittsburgh welcomed three intelligent and creative children to the office for “Bring Your Son or Daughter to Work” day.
The day started with some tough ice breaker questions, such as: “if you could invent something for the future, what would it be?” and “if you could go anywhere on Earth where would you go?” Their vastly different, yet thought out answers was just the beginning of a wonderful work day.
Garrett, 7, wants to invent a robot suit, so that everyday people can be superheroes! He also wants to go to Florida to visit Legoland again. Ma’Noah, 8, wants to invent flying cars and go to Japan to eat sushi and meet the voices behind the Anime characters. Lizzie, 10, wants to find a way to end world hunger and dreams of going to Paris to see the Eiffel Tower.
The tables then turned when Garrett, Ma’Noah, and Lizzie got to ask the brokers and support staff questions in an office scavenger hunt. Next came a lesson in marketing from our Office Manager and mother of Lizzie, Lisa Mikolay. After discussing TV, digital and print forms of marketing, she showed the kids a brochure and asked them to draw their own versions and explain their reasoning.
After lunch several of the brokers presented their specialty in commercial real estate with the kids. Ed Lawrence, Principal, taught the kids the difference between a Tenant and a Landlord. Mamadou Balde, Vice President, walked them through the Tenant Representation process for finding a client new office space. Ray Orowetz, Vice President, discussed Industrial Brokerage and the different types of industrial product. Finally, Justin Kline, Vice President, gave pointers on how to sell a building. After each mini-presentation, the brokers quizzed the kids on their topic.
“My daughter, Lizzie has been coming to the office for Bring Your Son or Daughter to Work for the last 4 or 5 years, however this is the first year I heard her answering questions about commercial real estate,” Mikolay commented. “She seems to have been paying close attention to the brokers that took the time to sit with the kids and give a brief overview of their different disciplines of commercial real estate.”
The last activity was to finally present the buildings they created to the office. Lizzie created a gymnastics studio with the slogan “Love our price, we’re so nice!” Ma’Noah drew a skyscraper with a “Lets Go Pens” banner. He also made it known that Spiderman lives there. Garrett designed a Mindcraft building with a giant cake as the roof. On top of the building you will find a very friendly Pikachu Batman character. Creativity is definitely a strong suit for all three kids!
“My son had an awesome day last week!” Exclaimed Lillian, Mom to Ma’Noah. “Our conversation on the way home from a long day at work was generally about the tall fascinating buildings downtown. Thank you to Gregg and Colliers International for allowing my son to have the experience.”
