PMA Visionary Award Profile: Kevin O'Connor
The PMA Visionary Award recognizes a member who demonstrates forward-thinking insight, creativity and the ability to create and implement transformative strategies. For 2025, no one is more deserving of this honor than Kevin O'Connor, owner of O'Connor Plumbing. True to his humble nature, Kevin is quick to credit others for his success, sharing this recognition with those who have supported and inspired him: his parents Tom and Catherine O'Connor; his brother, Tommy O'Connor, and the dedicated members of the O'Connor Business Development and Career Development Teams: Sami Mustafa, Kevin Miller, Ryan Lee, Bianca Rivera, Terri Schurg, Samantha Johnston, Derrick Brewster and Mark Harvey.
O'Connor Plumbing's story began in the 1930s when George O'Connor founded what would become a fourth-generation family enterprise. In 1949, Tom O'Connor’s education began from his father who was a master plumber. As Tom gained knowledge, he instilled within the company's DNA an enduring passion for teaching and guiding team members. This foundational value evolved into a corporate mission centered on maintaining a positive work environment, fostering long-term career growth for all team members and acting with integrity and the highest level of professionalism to create quality customer experiences. These are not mere words on paper—at O'Connor Plumbing, they serve as guiding principles that shape expectations and drive performance every single day.
The family tradition runs deep at O'Connor Plumbing. While George established the company, his son Tom reportedly began his plumbing career at just nine years old. Following in their father's footsteps, Tom's sons, Tommy and Kevin, also started young, working summers during school breaks. After high school, Tommy pursued the technical path, interning and earning his Master Plumber certification like his father and grandfather before him. Kevin took a different route, earning a business degree from the University of Maryland before joining the family business.
At that time, with just four employees, O’Connor worked almost exclusively with general contractors, providing plumbing services for hospitals, apartment renovations and condominium conversions. Though the company was growing, service work represented only a small portion of the business at that time.
Everything changed when Ron Saul joined the O'Connor team in 2006. After retiring from the Washington Redskins, Ron spent years cultivating relationships within the property management industry. His introduction of O'Connor Plumbing to PMA sparked a paradigm shift in the company's strategic focus, moving away from general contractors toward property managers and owners. Kevin O'Connor recalls that 2019 marked the last year of significant involvement with general contractors. By then, 80% of the company's business had already transitioned to the property management arena, and after 2019, 100% of the business volume came from property management.
Kevin credits this successful transition to the access and opportunities provided by PMA events such as PMEXPO, Annual Golf Tournament, Lobster Bake, Maintenance Summit and PMA's former third Thursday monthly dinner meetings. This exposure enabled O'Connor Plumbing to build meaningful relationships not only with property managers but also with fellow Associate Members who became valuable referral sources, further fueling the company's growth.
O’Connor Plumbing understood that supporting this growth and achieving ambitious business goals required the ability to attract and retain best-in-class talent. In 2016, O'Connor Plumbing began partnering with the Frederick County Career and Technology Center, which provides trades training to high school students. To develop a pipeline of future team members, O'Connor offered paid internships to Technology Center students while providing resources and expertise to help give back to the Frederick community. The company's involvement in promoting career opportunities in the trades has been so well received that O'Connor representatives have been invited to speak to Frederick County Public School students, recently addressing more than five hundred high school students at Frederick Keys Stadium.
O'Connor elevated its commitment to promoting trade careers to an unprecedented level by constructing a dedicated training center at a new warehouse facility. The Tom O’Connor Training Center was the brainchild of Tommy O’Connor and named for his father. Tommy’s vision is to provide professional development for existing team members while serving as a training facility for newcomers. Continuous skill set improvement for team members represents another cornerstone of the O'Connor culture. Managers and supervisors identify training opportunities by reviewing job tickets, determining whether a team member could benefit from additional instruction in areas such as gas or heater work. Rather than relying solely on on-the-job training, the facility offers a controlled setting where team members receive focused, one-on-one training and coaching.
This commitment to training and professional development is truly distinctive. O'Connor Plumbing creates an individualized career and training path for every plumber and apprentice, setting a goal of providing 40 hours of annual training for plumbers and 80 hours for apprentices. For each employee, O'Connor identifies the competencies they need to master to reach the next career level, areas requiring improvement and skills to develop for continued advancement. With every step up the career ladder comes an increase in compensation, directly linking professional growth to financial reward.
Progress reviews occur through weekly conversations between team members and their supervisors, while quarterly discussions identify the level a team member has achieved and outline what is needed to advance further. O'Connor has even opened its training facility to property maintenance teams, teaching on-site staff to make basic repairs and reinforcing the firm's commitment to exceptional customer service and relationship building. In 2025, O’Connor Plumbing has had over 20 training sessions servicing property management maintenance and management team members. O’Connor looks forward to continuing this initiative to enhance their service to their customers.
The training center has been instrumental in attracting 40 apprentices to O'Connor Plumbing, supporting a team of more than 50 plumbers. O'Connor's vision to develop a world-class facility has proven its worth in attracting top-tier talent, matched by an unwavering commitment to train, nurture and advance team members. The company developed a unique recruitment incentive program offering existing team members the opportunity to earn a referral bonus. Understanding that growth can create anxiety about job security, O'Connor eliminated concerns by guaranteeing tenured apprentices and plumbers a minimum of forty hours of available work every week.
The leadership of O'Connor Plumbing exemplifies forward-thinking vision, creativity and strategic planning. They have created a comprehensive framework that attracts and retains talent capable of fueling significant growth while maintaining an unwavering commitment to quality, responsive and professional service—hallmarks that have defined O'Connor Plumbing for more than seventy-five years. Kevin O'Connor and his team are truly worthy recipients of the 2025 PMA Visionary Award.