Elliot G. Dennis FMP

Atlanta, Georgia

Elliot G. Dennis, FMP

Critical infrastructure, facility systems,
engineering & operations

Nearly ten years of keeping buildings honest — theaters, a stadium, an aquarium, a performing arts centre and a university campus. If it makes the building work, it has probably been my problem at some point: electrical, plumbing, HVAC, envelope, automation, fire & life safety, security, access control, elevators and the emergency phone nobody thinks about until it rings.

Get in touch Résumé PDF LinkedIn
Studio headshot of Elliot Dennis in a navy suit and gold tie, giving a thumbs up.

01

Buildings I've been responsible for

Seven venues, one through-line: the systems have to work before anyone else's night, game, exhibit or semester can.

Kennesaw State University Current

  • Plant Operations, Engineering & Renewal Director Aug 2026 – present
  • Plant Operations Mechanical/Electrical Engineer Jan 2024 – Jul 2026

Runs the capital renewal program for the campus: roughly $5,000,000 a year of Major Repair & Rehabilitation work across institutional and state funds, plus the engineering backbone underneath it.

  • Owns the MRR program — scoping, budgeting and project management for building capital renewal.
  • Engineering and technical support, training and mentorship for in-house trades staff and interns.
  • Custodian of campus critical infrastructure: KSU-owned gas, water and electric, emergency power generation and monitoring, security alarms and emergency phones.
  • Works across Planning/Design/Construction, EH&S, IT, University Police and Event Management to hold codes and standards on every project.
Elliot in a black KSU polo with a radio and tool pouch, walking a campus concourse past Owls banners on an event day.
KSU, October 2021 — event and conversion operations, back when the radio and the pouch were the whole job.

Mercedes-Benz Stadium Atlanta

  • Operations Systems Engineer Nov 2023 – Jan 2024
  • Chief Engineer Aug 2022 – Nov 2023

Every building system in a major-league venue, on an event calendar that does not move. Ten mechanical, electrical and plumbing technicians reporting in.

  • Led ten in-house MEP technicians — daily work coordination, event operations, technical training.
  • Accountable for MEP, fire & life safety, lighting control, building automation, the retractable roof control system, the energy & data analytics portal, emergency power, key cabinet and EV charging.
  • Ran the CMMS and document control to record-by-record accuracy: closeout drawings, submittals, O&M manuals, locations, assets, parts, inventory and PMs.
  • Partnered with Housekeeping, Projects, Sustainability & Conversion, IT, Security, Events and F&B to keep systems tuned for the teams actually using them.
Elliot on the roof of Mercedes-Benz Stadium in a black work polo, tools and radio on his belt, the downtown Atlanta skyline spread out behind him.
On the stadium roof, January 2024 — his last month in the building, with most of downtown Atlanta behind him.

Georgia Aquarium Overnights

  • Maintenance Technician II — overnight Feb 2020 – Aug 2021

Overnight custody of 550,000+ square feet that never actually closes — 2.5 million guests a year, and animals on life support 24/7/365.

  • Walked and checked every mechanical, electrical, plumbing, fire/life safety and pump/motor system through the night, repairing what was found.
  • Onboarded, trained and mentored the overnight technicians on procedure and complex repairs.
  • Coordinated contractors and project activity overnight for construction and infrastructure work.
  • Locksmith services — door repair, closers, panic and mortise hardware, cores and cylinders.
Elliot in a work polo and cap standing beside a brightly lit aquarium habitat pool at night, the gallery empty behind him.
Georgia Aquarium, 21:25 on 28 August 2021 — his last month of overnights, in a building that is only ever empty of people.

The Fox Theatre Where it started

  • Facilities Maintenance Technician I Nov 2017 – Jan 2019

A 1929 movie palace on Peachtree Street, held together by a four-person maintenance department and a great deal of care.

  • Stood in as lead for events and daily operations, covering technical, scheduling, contractor coordination and admin for the department.
  • Coordinated daily contractor work for the building expansion project and its turnover to the team.
  • Kept fire/life safety, HVAC, electrical, lighting, power, door hardware, seating and plumbing to venue standard, event by event.
  • Built out facility documentation — panels, utility disconnects, procedures, fire & life safety equipment, SDS files, operating permits and the work order system.
A younger Elliot on a step ladder adjusting a door closer above the ornate gilded doors of the Fox Theatre, keys and radio on his belt.
Adjusting a closer on the Fox Theatre doors. Gold leaf on one side of the ladder, a screwdriver on the other.

Oglethorpe University

  • Maintenance Supervisor Jan 2022 – Aug 2022

The whole campus plant with a five-person crew — locksmith, electrical, plumbing, carpentry and HVAC shops, plus the utility distribution system.

  • Led and mentored a five-person staff across every shop, working alongside them and training in each area.
  • Administered the campus technical systems: building automation for lighting and HVAC, SALTO access control, the bell tower controller, key tracking, cameras and fire safety.
  • Coordinated campus projects and contract work from scope through closeout.
  • Balanced residents, events, film shoots and academics — often in the same week.

Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre

  • Utility Engineer Jan 2019 – Feb 2020

Power drops, data drops, ballroom lighting and HVAC conditions — whatever the event needed, on the schedule the event kept.

  • Coordinated and executed power and data drops, ballroom lighting, HVAC conditions and ongoing building projects with event coordinators.
  • Maintained doors and walls, lighting, restroom fixtures, HVAC equipment, building controls, irrigation and plumbing distribution to guest-experience standard.
  • Repaired fire, life safety and security systems, and troubleshot door, lock and hardware issues throughout the venue.
A large performing arts theatre photographed from the stage: three tiers of empty red seats and a sculpted acoustic canopy overhead, with Elliot standing alone in the middle of the house.
January 2020 — the house from the stage, empty and fully lit. Somebody has to stand in it and check that everything works first.

The Paideia School First job

  • Maintenance Assistant Aug 2013 – Aug 2017

Four years of theater rigging, gym setups and a team of three student assistants. The start of all of it.

  • Guided a team of three student assistants through basic facility maintenance and event setup.
  • Maintained the theater — seats, curtains, choral risers, shells, AV, dimmer rack, projector, stage, grid, stage lighting and control boards.
  • Kept gym setups running: basketball goals, volleyball nets, bleachers and equipment moves.
  • Coordinated contractors for summer construction — trash removal, FF&E deliveries and inspections.
A teenage Elliot in a "Fiddler on the Roof" t-shirt with one hand on a red commercial fire alarm control panel, grinning at the camera.
A Fiddler on the Roof shirt and a fire alarm panel. The two halves of the résumé, in one photograph.

02

Systems & platforms

The specific things on the other end of the laptop, the ladder or the phone call.

Building automation & controls

  • Johnson Controls Metasys
  • Tridium Niagara
  • Schneider EcoStruxure
  • Delta Controls
  • Automated Logic
  • VTScada

Fire & life safety

  • Notifier
  • EST
  • Honeywell
  • Silent Knight

Security & access control

  • Genetec
  • SALTO
  • Honeywell Vista
  • MorseWatchmans
  • Motorola
  • Locksmithing

Emergency power

  • Caterpillar
  • Cummins
  • Kohler
  • ASCO

Lighting control

  • Acuity nLight
  • Hubbell

Elevators

  • KONE
  • Schindler
  • TK Elevator
  • Otis
  • GAL

Emergency phones

  • RATH
  • MosaicOne
  • Kings III
  • Ooma

CMMS & asset management

  • ServiceNow
  • Nuvolo
  • Brightly
  • IBM TRIRIGA

Project delivery

  • Procore
  • Autodesk
  • Multivista
  • Helix
  • CxAlloy
  • Georgia 811

Drawing & GIS

  • AutoCAD
  • ArcGIS

03

Education & certification

Degrees

  • Master of Science

    Construction Management

    Kennesaw State University2026 – present

  • Bachelor of Science

    Electrical Engineering

    Kennesaw State University2017 – 2021

Certifications

  • Infrastructure Protection

    Texas A&M Engineering Extension Service2026

  • Facility Management Professional (FMP)

    International Facility Management Association2019

Off the clock

He also leaves the building

Elliot travels — properly, frequently, and usually with people he likes. Dates and places below are pulled straight off the photographs.

Elliot kneeling with four friends on a mesh viewing platform beneath a sign reading "Top of Tyrol 3,210 m", snow-streaked peaks and clouds behind them.
Top of Tyrol — 3,210 m Stubai Glacier, Austria · July 2026 Five people, one metal walkway and about a mile of vertical air. The sign does the bragging.
Selfie of Elliot in a cap with two friends on a wooden alpine balcony, mountains and a village street below.
Innsbruck Tyrol, Austria · 17 July 2026 Balcony, three of us, the Nordkette doing the heavy lifting in the background.
Elliot in a light blue hiking shirt standing in a narrow desert canyon, a waterfall running down travertine rock behind him.
Northwest Arizona 27 July 2025 A waterfall coming through a slot in the rock, and a shirt chosen entirely for the walk out.
Elliot on an airport rooftop wearing a red visitor badge, with taxiways, runways and a maintenance hangar spread out behind him.
Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International 12 September 2025 Visitor badge, rooftop, and every runway in the busiest airport in the world laid out below. Some people get a view. He gets the whole plant.
Elliot in a dark suit and patterned tie raising a glass in front of a vast blue coral reef aquarium window.
Georgia Aquarium Atlanta · 18 September 2026 Back in the building in a suit instead of a tool belt, on the good side of the glass.
Elliot holding a large colourful heart-shaped prop beside a FIFA World Cup 26 Atlanta trophy sculpture.
World Cup 26 comes to Atlanta Atlanta · 12 December 2025 The city he spent two years keeping switched on is hosting the World Cup. He went and had his picture taken with the sign.
Elliot at a restaurant table with two friends, all three raising glasses of white wine toward the camera.
Richmond, Virginia 12 September 2026 Dinner, a bottle, and the kind of table you stay at too long.
Elliot raising a pink cocktail in a dim restaurant lit red, lanterns and hanging greenery around him.
Atlanta 17 July 2025 Whatever this was, it was pink, and it came in a very serious glass.

Say hello

Got a building with a problem?

Always glad to talk shop — infrastructure, renewal programs, controls, or where to eat in Atlanta.

Headshot of Elliot Dennis in a teal shirt, smiling at the camera.
The one without the thumbs up.