Cameron Schaefer of HDR shares the challenges and lessons learned coordinating work on the electric train system at LAX.

In small architecture and engineering firms — those with fewer than 10 CAD operators, for example — it isn’t common to have a fully dedicated CAD manager on staff. The economics simply may not justify the salary in firms of that size. But someone still needs to manage those CAD users and the CAD deployment in the office. That means...