In 1979, Les Brown, future founder of Baird, Hampton & Brown, sought a way to use his mechanical engineering skills to serve others. During a Christian Missions conference, he was introduced to TECH Team Advantage (TTA), formerly known as Missionary Tech Team, an organization that would allow him to donate his expertise to Christian communities that needed new facilities. The following year, he began volunteering with TTA and has since been a vital part of their Facilities Solutions team for 44 years.
The TECH Team Advantage Mission
For over 50 years, TTA has been dedicated to serving churches, Christian schools, camps, hospitals, and other ministry groups in the United States and abroad who cannot afford to pay full price for professional services. Today, TTA offers a broad spectrum of low-cost services, including:
- Facilities Solutions: Architectural and engineering design.
- Media Solutions: Custom graphic design, print, web, video, and AV media.
- Software Solutions: Unique software and mobile app development.
- Vehicle Solutions: Safe, reliable leased vehicles for missionaries.
With projects completed in 50 countries and 42 states, TTA has a vast reach, serving a variety of organizations on diverse projects. The TTA team is comprised of support-based, self-fund-raising missionaries, volunteers, and interns, all of whom raise their own financial support to make their volunteer efforts possible.
Les’ Contributions
On top of his work at BHB in Fort Worth, Les commutes to Longview weekly to work with TTA. His 44-year dedication highlights the profound impact of using technical skills for service, embodying a mission that goes beyond financial gain to make a real difference in communities around the world.
Les plays a pivotal role in this non-profit organization as the Facilities Solutions Team Lead. In this role, he evaluates potential projects, considering both the organization’s financial needs and if their mission aligns with that of TTA, and applies his engineering expertise to ensure these projects are both practical and achievable before executing the mechanical engineering design.
Diverse Projects, Practical Solutions
The scope of projects undertaken by Les and his team is vast and varied. Their work includes everything from small restroom additions for nearby churches to large-scale new hospitals in foreign countries. Les ensures that the projects they undertake are practical and can be completed, avoiding unnecessary delays and costs for the organizations. Since the job is not complete after the design phase, he must consider construction and maintenance costs as well. Usually, the church or organization will have to raise their own funds for construction of any new facilities, and then be able to pay for maintenance and repairs in the future so one of TTA’s primary goals is to ensure that their designs are feasible, considering the financial constraints of the organization as well as local building standards, which can be especially difficult in some overseas projects. This pragmatic approach ensures that the efforts of the organizations they support are not wasted and that they can achieve their construction goals.
Of the hundreds of projects Les has worked on with TTA, one of the more memorable is the first project he worked on, which was a hospital in the jungles of Shell, Ecuador where the operating rooms were equipped only with window-unit air conditioners. While this is obviously different from most American hospitals, it is crucial for him to design systems that fit within local standards and codes, can be operated efficiently by the local people, and be maintained throughout their lifespan with necessary repairs and replacement parts.
Les and TTA also worked on the headquarters of Child Evangelism Fellowship near St. Louis, Missouri where they developed a new Digital Creative Center for filming educational videos, the Word of Life Conference Center near Port Richey, Florida that included several new buildings including an auditorium, a dining facility, and multiple hotels, and several projects for Pine Cove Christian Summer Camp, a staple of the Christian community in East Texas, near where TTA is based.
Impact Beyond Costs
The true impact of Les’s volunteer work lies not only in the cost savings he helps provide but also in the opportunities that he creates for churches and organizations that would otherwise be unable to access technical expertise with scarce resources. His work is a testament to the power of using one’s skills and training for the greater good and exemplifies how engineering expertise can be a tool for service, making a profound difference in communities around the world.