Kwame Smith, a principal with SFS, has 13 years of experience working on a wide range of projects, but the first thing he notices when walking into a building isn’t the architecture: it’s the people. His enthusiasm for communicating, listening and solving problems, whether with peers or project team members, leads to successful projects. This focus on people influences his design approach, and he takes particular pride in facilities that, like Kansas City’s Lucile H. Bluford Branch Library, have an “immediate, direct and profound impact” on the communities they serve. Kwame’s combination of creative and technical knowledge spans all phases of design and implementation, and his must-have work tool is the one that allows him to connect with others: e-mail.