Service Award

Engelke leaves a legacy of friendship

By Jennifer Pfaff

Steven Engelke Former senior vice president of Aon Risk Services Inc. of Wisconsin, Milwaukee

It’s been said that success is all about who you know.

The friends and co-workers of Steven Engelke, who died at the age of 57 on Feb. 19 of a heart attack, tell a different story. They say success is all about how you treat the people you know, and they say they saw that model firsthand in Engelke.

“Steve had one of the most charming, engaging personalities you’d ever want to meet,” said Chris Kondrick, a close friend of Engelke and his partner in starting up a construction division in the Milwaukee market for Aon Risk Services Inc. of Wisconsin. “When you looked into his eyes and shook his hand, you felt you’d known him for years. He’d remember little things about people — and the weird thing is he would do something about it.”

Engelke sold sureties within the local construction market, helping clients gain the financial backing to guarantee to project owners that the job would get done to specifications.

He wasn’t just a salesman but a friend to his clients, Kondrick said. He would send female clients flowers on their birthdays or run out to buy the latest book from clients’ favorite authors and mail them a copy — just to make them happy.

And he used his position, both as senior vice president of Aon and as an active member of the Associated General Contractors, to help people in every aspect of the building trades connect with each other and form positive business relations. He was the kind of guy who would hear a builder say he needed a good electrician and volunteer the name of just such an individual or firm, Kondrick said.

“Steve was really good at being a bridge builder,” he said. “He’d take people from different parts of the industry and hook them together.”

Part of his legacy is having created a stronger construction industry in Wisconsin. And for that, Wisconsin Builder is honoring Engelke with a Service Award.

Through his job, Engelke helped companies do business. Through his professional associations, he helped them network. And along the way, he created many personal friendships.

He belonged to numerous organizations, including the Tri-County Contractors Association, Mechanical Contractors Association, Wisconsin Underground Contractors Association, American Subcontractors Association and the AGC, often serving on boards and committees.

But for all of his work in the industry, perhaps what friends associate first with Engelke is his avid passion for golf. He played an A game, said friend John Cliffe, director of operations in the Milwaukee office of J.H. Findorff & Son Inc.

Cliffe said he considers it a high honor that for five years Engelke invited Cliffe to join a group of friends, mostly people in the building trades, for 10 days of golf in Ireland. He said that together the men would play at amazingly beautiful golf courses, relax over drinks and do their utmost to enjoy every moment to the fullest.

It was on one of those trips that Cliffe came to realize what a devoted person Engelke was.

“We were playing Tralee; it was my first trip to Ireland — I wasn’t quite ready for Ireland,” he said. “The mist was horizontal. I was dressed for Wisconsin golf — nylon wind pants and a nylon jacket. That doesn’t work in Ireland.”

After about 16 holes, Cliffe was soaked through, tired and miserable.

“I picked up my clubs and walked off the course,” he said. “And Steve walked with me. He didn’t have to. He was dressed for it, but it was my first trip. It was an amazing gesture. That was Steve.”