In the recent Queen’s Birthday honours we were delighted that PSA Project MD, Paul Steinfort, was recognised as a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for “significant services to the construction industry and to the community”.
Paul established PSA in 1985 and his project management work over the last 48 years has seen him complete work on numerous impressive major projects across Victoria. You only have to look at the Melbourne skyline to see some of his project planning and management, including Rialto Towers, MCG Southern and Northern stand re-developments, Crown Casino, Royal Melbourne Hospital re-development, Collins Place, 101 Collins Street and Etihad Stadium re-development, venues that are valued by millions of people every year. Over the years, he has also collaborated with major companies such as Telstra, Australia Post, ANZ, Hewlett Packard, Shell and Target.
Perhaps more tellingly, he has moulded the careers of hundreds of current and future industry leaders and helped thousands of people rebuild their lives via his charity work and post-disaster recovery programs. An important aspect of Paul’s work over the decades has been to ensure that he passes on his knowledge to future generations, in Australia and abroad. Helping steer the direction of his industry, both academically and institutionally, Paul was also Victorian President of the Australian Institute of Project Management.
As a young Project Manager, it was in Darwin, after Cyclone Tracey, where Paul’s passion for helping people rebuild their lives grew. Since then Paul has taken time out of his own hectic schedule to devote years of service to helping devastated communities re-establish after natural disaster, in most cases working pro-bono.
Much of his generous post-recovery commitment has been in foreign countries that are desperate for the expertise and insights of someone like Paul. He has played major roles in project management after catastrophic events in Darwin, Aceh, Victoria, Christchurch, Pakistan, Japan, Philippines, Nepal, and Utopia, an indigenous community in remote NT.
In the 1970s, meeting and working alongside Mother Teresa in the slums of Calcutta made a lasting impact on Paul and led him to devoting countless hours to charity and community work. He spent years volunteering at St Vincent de Paul soup van and has made significant contributions to organisations including CARE Australia, Asylum Seekers Resource Centre, Catholic Relief Services, Surfaid International and Wind of Change International.
Paul has also set up his own charitable foundations concentrating on helping communities, locally and internationally, to use project management in order to move from poverty and dependence to a sustainable, independent and self-sufficient future.
His contributions to academic excellence include being part of the development committee that helped establish the first Masters in Project Management course at RMIT in 1990, followed by over two decades of lecturing at both undergraduate and post graduate levels at RMIT.
In 2010 he was awarded a PhD in Project Management Best Practice with emphasis on aid/relief projects. The PMI (USA) subsequently published his book “What Enables Project Success”, co-authored by Professor Derek Walker.
PSA congratulates Paul on his well-deserved award, and are grateful for his expertise and experience, which he shares so generously with PSA staff.
