Consumer Direct Care Network to move 235 workers into massive new headquarters – The Missoulian

The term employee-friendly building is something that Bruce Kramer, the vice chairman of Consumer Direct Care Network, likes to use to describe the companys shiny new 72,000-square-foot headquarters in Missoula.

With no administrative offices in the corners of the four-story building so that more people can enjoy natural light, a huge second-story rooftop deck, and a special Liquid Planet coffee/snack lounge, the $23 million project was designed with the input of the companys 235 workers who will begin calling it home in April.

Weve made a lot of investment in employee-centered spaces, Kramer explained on a recent tour of the new facility, which has been under construction for 19 months.

Weve had a program of communication since we started on this, he continued. We started involving employees two years ago and the excitement has been building.

Right now, Consumer Directs Missoula employees are spread over five different locations across town.

Thats the genesis of, Why should we have a new building? Well, so we can get together and work more efficiently and work with our other teams and then also have facilities that we werent able to have when we were all spread out, Kramer said.

Consumer Direct Care Network was founded in Missoula in 1990 to provide in-home nursing care. Since then, its range of services has expanded in both scope and size to include a broad spectrum of services in 13 states and the District of Columbia.

We are an in-home care service provider primarily, but we also do behavioral counseling and hospice and other services, Kramer said. Primarily, our business is caregivers going into homes and helping support people with ADL, active daily living. The idea is to keep people in their homes versus going to an assisted living nursing home. Their home is the least costly environment and also the environment that people tend to want to live in, anyway.

The ground floor of the new headquarters will include a reception area and spaces for behavioral specialists, nurses, hospice workers and caregivers. The second through fourth floors will house employees who support the Montana offices and other offices across the country. They specialize in quality improvement, billing, administrative, development, marketing and accounts receivable.

The company provides services to 16,000 individuals across the United States, and employs more than 25,000 direct support professionals. The Missoula offices support more than 300 employees total, although not all of them have actual desks in the office.

The new building is located at 100 Consumer Direct Way, and is one of the first anchor businesses in the North Reserve/Scott Street Urban Renewal District.

Kramer says the companys bankers used to joke with him that the graph of the number of the companys employees on payroll is always a straight diagonal line going up meaning the employee numbers steadily grow every year.

Weve been a growing business and continue to be a growing business, he said. So weve built a little larger than we are obviously so we have some room to expand.

In fact, the companys state director Katie Spaid pointed out that the new reception area has three dedicated spaces for potential hires to fill out job applications.

Were always looking for good people to hire, she said. Nurses, she added, are in high demand, along with a variety of other positions for qualified applicants.

Marie Wilson of In2itive Architecture in Missoula designed the building. She said it is one of the largest projects shes ever been involved with, besides some new additions on the Montana State University campus.

The clients definitely wanted to create some interesting and flexible workspaces within the building, she said. We achieved that (with) both inside and outside seating areas. We have one of the largest outdoor rooftop decks, right now, in the state.

Wilson said employees actually had a say in how the building looks and feels.

The outside went through two completely different concepts, she said. One that was very modern and one that was very traditional, that would have fit in in Vail or Boulder or somewhere like that pretty comfortably. And these guys, Consumer Direct, polled a large portion of their staff not just for the spaces they were going to be using but also for where did they want to come to work every day? I dont know if it was the majority but definitely they landed on the modern side. So thats the direction we took and had a little bit of fun with it.

Kramer is especially proud of the fact that, unlike in many corporate office buildings, the administrators didnt get all the choice corner space.

We have no offices in the corner, he said. We intentionally did that with the design to try to have an employee-friendly building with lots of light coming in to the center core.

The building features a raised floor system that allows for low-pressure air circulation and easy access to electrical and plumbing structures.

There will be a grand opening this spring, Kramer added. The company has been giving tours to employees, and the first few will move in the first week of April.

People are excited, he said.

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Consumer Direct Care Network to move 235 workers into massive new headquarters - The Missoulian