Like many college graduates, Jim Hansen’s first job after graduating from the University of Iowa was not in his area of study. But the native of Washington, Iowa, was so fond of the type of work he was doing with an Eastern Iowa architectural engineering firm, Stanley Consultants, that he never pursued a career in accounting. Instead, Hansen started over in his education, learning the construction industry by experience, which included working on projects in far-away countries such as Kuwait and Egypt. Five years ago, Hansen joined Davenport-based Russell Construction Co., and moved to Greater Des Moines last November to help grow the company’s presence in Central Iowa. He was promoted earlier this month to vice president of Russell’s Des Moines operations.

What was your first job out of college?

I got a job right out of college as a contract administrator with Stanley Consultants, a large engineering architectural firm in Muscatine that does international work as well as domestic. I got a job with them in their construction management group, and that’s how I got my start on the construction side of the industry rather than the accounting side.

When did you realize that accounting wasn’t a good fit for you?

I decided between my junior and senior year that I didn’t want to do accounting the rest of my life. I didn’t think about the fact that maybe I could extend my college career longer and change majors, so I went ahead and finished my major.

Why did construction management seem interesting to you?

The more I got into it, the more I liked it. I enjoyed being able to see the results of your work in buildings and structures and also the interaction with people. I think that’s what I didn’t want about accounting. I didn’t want to just be sitting and crunching numbers. I wanted to be out working with the people, and that’s what I’ve really enjoyed about this business.

Did you advance quickly in the construction industry once you started on that path?

My wife, Carla, gives me a hard time because she says I’ve never gone through a box of business cards. My title keeps changing. I had a lot of different titles with Stanley. As I took on more responsibility there, my work there required a lot of travel during the 1990s.

Where did you travel?

I went on a half-dozen trips to Egypt, a couple to Yemen, one to Kuwait after the first Gulf War and then one trip to Japan. The longer trips took about six to eight weeks.

What type of building projects were these?

The ones in Egypt were water treatment plants for three cities south of Cairo. In Yemen we were doing the construction management on their college of agriculture. My trip to Kuwait was to do a master plan cost estimate to rebuild their air bases that were destroyed in the first Gulf War.

What did you learn from the experience of doing this international work?

My first trip to Egypt was definitely a culture shock for a small-town Iowa boy to see how people in other parts of the world live. When I got outside of the city of Cairo and you actually see how people are living in the country – a majority of them are living today like they maybe did 1,000 or 2,000 years ago – it really made me thankful for where I was born and it was a real eye opener for me.

Why did you leave Stanley Consultants to join Russell Construction in 2000?

I really enjoyed design-build projects, and when Stanley decided they would back off on that a little bit, I started looking for a company that I could continue to grow in that area with more construction projects. I liked Russell’s good reputation for client satisfaction.

What brought you from the Davenport headquarters to the Des Moines operations?

Last fall, Russell Construction approached me to see if I would be willing to come over to Des Moines to beef up our operations and client base over here.

What skills do you use the most in your job?

You have to be able to pay attention to detail and mainly just listen. You listen to what your client wants and listen to what the subcontractors and your people need to get the job done. The challenge of it is that you may have an owner who has a certain amount of money to spend and he wants to build a building that is much nicer than the amount of money he wants to spend. You have to work with them to help guide them in the right direction to help them get to where they can financially afford to be, while at the same time giving them an end product that will work for them.

What is the most interesting project you’ve been a part of?

They’re all a little bit different in terms of their complexity and the type of building. Right now I’m in the middle of the Von Maur project in Columbus, which is a major interior demolition. We’re taking over an old Lord & Taylor store and we’re gutting it and remodeling it, and it has an extremely intense schedule. I’m out there about once a week to review progress, meet with the site staff and make sure it’s on track in schedule and cost. That’s probably one of the more intense ones I’ve worked on for quite a while.

Has your accounting education been useful to you at all in your work?

Quite a bit, actually. When you’re building these projects, you have to keep track of cost, otherwise you’re not going to be in business long. It’s been a good background for me.