Employee Spotlight: Matt O’Brien
- What brought you to work at Hoyle, Tanner?
- To be perfectly honest, it was kind of by chance. The 2008 economic crash played a big role in bringing me here. I was exploring new opportunities, and Hoyle, Tanner was the only firm hiring at the time. The fact that I would be working with aviation was also a huge plus, because it has really become my passion. I studied civil engineering in school and originally thought I’d end up doing heavy highway. This is much better, though, because the projects are bigger, more complex and require heavy machinery. I guess I share Tim Taylor’s motto fromHome Improvement: “More power!”
- What do you like most about working at here?
- I love how laidback my department is. Everyone puts in the time and gets their work done, but people don’t try to keep tabs on one another. It’s a really good atmosphere.
- How do you spend your time outside of the office? Any favorite pastimes or family activities?
- On the average night, you can find me and my wife vegging out on the couch. There’s always debate about what we want to watch (She chooses Oscar-winners, while I usually just want to see action-adventure movies likeSherlock Holmes), but since we’re getting ready for a new baby, we’re both very happy for the relaxation time. Other than that, one of my favorite things we do each year is a Labor Day camping trip with my sister-in-law and her husband. That’s always really fun.
- What is one thing you couldn’t live without and why?
- I’ve never really had a good answer to this type of question. Other than basic necessities, I feel like I could pretty much give up anything if I needed to. However, I would definitely be sad to never eat freshly-baked cookies out of the oven again. That would make me upset.
- Tell me a random fact most people don’t know about you.
- I’m kind of obsessed with compost. Part of my senior design project in college dealt with creating energy from compost, and ever since, I’ve been fascinated by it. I compost everything: yard clippings, leaves, food waste – you name it! I guess if someone didn’t know me, they may be surprised by that. Talk to me for a little while, though, and you’ll probably know more about me than you wanted to.
- Do you have a favorite quote or any words you live by?
- I enjoy fortune cookies. I’m amazed how sometimes they are so accurate. There was one that said, “He who laughs, lasts.” It pretty much says, “Be happy and you’ll live a long life,” but it plays on the saying about the last one to laugh at a joke… Pretty deep for a fortune cookie.
- Before working here, what was the most unusual or interesting job you’ve ever had?
- I worked at Hannaford as a bagger/cart collector. It really wasn’t a terrible job, but it certainly showed me that I wanted to get an education so I would never have to do it again.
- I worked as a meter reader for a power company for a while, too, and that job was pretty unique. I once had to read a meter for this massive house on Lake Sebago. It was one of those summer homes where the owners were never there. Naturally, I took the opportunity to eat lunch and go swimming on their beach [laughs]. The next house on my list was on this island that you could only reach by boat, so the company hadn’t read its meter for something like ten years. I ended up rolling up my pants and walking out to it on a sandbar, and I got a reading that really surprised my bosses… Still not sure whether they were happy or angry with me for that! Anyway, that was an unusual job.
- Would you ever want to be famous? If so, for what?
- I think I’d like to be famous to a certain extent. I would never want to be movie star famous, having people follow me around or having to do interviews. I’d more like to be known for an accomplishment, you know? I would be happy with Matt O’Brien as a household name like Bill Gates… or even being on a product like Heinz. As long as the product wasn’t something really weird, I think that would be pretty cool.
- If you could be a superhero, what would you want your superpowers to be?
- This is one I talked about a lot as a kid. Flying is obviously the best answer. It would also be really interesting to read minds, but flying would come first.
