Chicago’s McHugh Construction made four promotions and added a new project engineer. The moves reflect the company’s continued growth, and its commitment to developing and retaining top talent.
The newly promoted team members include:
- Jeanne Bartels: An 18-year veteran of McHugh, Bartels has been promoted to project executive from senior project manager in recognition of her leadership skills, technical expertise and commitment to building strong client and subcontractor relationships. She is currently overseeing preconstruction of 1325 West Fulton Street, the first of three towers in a full-block mixed-use development in Chicago’s West Loop. Bartels has managed a long list of ground-up Chicago projects for McHugh, including Howard Brown Health Halsted, a five-story clinic in the Lakeview neighborhood; Platform 4611, a nine-story mixed-use apartment building in the Uptown neighborhood; and The Sinclair, a 35-story, 390-unit luxury apartment building on the city’s Near North side. She also oversaw a series of renovations at East Bank Club, Chicago’s premier health club. Bartels has a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the University of California in Santa Barbara.
- Kyle Jennings: An assistant project manager since he joined the firm in 2022, Jennings has been elevated to project manager. He has worked on a number of high-profile entertainment and sports-related projects in Chicago while at McHugh, including Flyover at Navy Pier; Leinenkugel’s Craft Lodge at Guaranteed Rate Field; and the expansion of Fifth Third Arena, which will add two ice rinks, including a 1,500-seat Championship Rink, increasing the total to four rinks and creating a larger community hockey and event space. He joined the construction industry in 2015 and has a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Bradley University in Peoria, Ill.
- Michael Sinickas: Beginning as an intern at McHugh in 2018, Sinickas has steadily risen from project engineer to assistant project manager to his most recent promotion to project manager. He is currently working on Wacker Place, an office-to-residential conversion project at 65 E. Wacker Drive in Chicago. Previously, he worked on projects such as Renelle on the River, an 18-story luxury condominium building overlooking the Chicago River; and the Dr. Conrad Worrill Track and Field Center at Gately Park on Chicago’s South Side. Sinickas has a bachelor’s degree in finance from the University of Dayton.
- Kasey Bethea: A seven-year construction industry veteran, Bethea has been promoted from project engineer to assistant superintendent and is currently working on the Fifth Third Arena expansion project. Bethea was also part of the award-winning McHugh team at 1000M, a 74-story, 738-unit apartment tower on Chicago’s famed Michigan Avenue with numerous amenities, including an acoustic engineered music performance room, a yoga room and a golf simulator. Since joining the industry in 2018, Bethea has held project engineering roles for large construction firms and also supervised track inspections at Norfolk Southern Corporation. He has a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from Temple University in Philadelphia.
In addition to these four promotions, McHugh also recently hired Chelsea Hoff as a project engineer, currently assigned to the Wacker Place adaptive reuse project. She has six years of experience and was most recently a project engineer at Power Construction. She has a bachelor’s degree in architectural engineering from the University of Cincinnati.
