Dirk’s structural engineering career started in 1981 with American Bridge Division of US Steel in Pittsburgh where he worked on the design and inspection of bridges and industrial structures.  In 1984 he moved to the metal building industry with Ceco Buildings Division in Rocky Mount, North Carolina where he completed the structural design of more than 1,000 steel buildings over the next five years.  In 1989 Dirk returned to Pittsburgh with his young family and went to work for Structural Engineering Corporation (now Atlantic Engineering Services) where he spent the next three years preparing structural designs for conventional building projects that included public schools, hospitals, commercial office buildings, and athletic facilities.  During that time, he developed skills in forensic investigations of buildings with structural damage and deterioration.  In the summer of 1991, Dirk moved to the Peter F. Loftus Division of Eichleay Engineers in Pittsburgh to lead their structural engineering department.  Over the next 5 years, he managed the structural designs for building projects at many local western Pennsylvania hospitals and Universities, the Carnegie Museum, Westinghouse, and NASA’s Lewis Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio.

In February 1996, after spending 15 years developing his engineering skills at other engineering firms, Dirk decided it was time to start his own firm, Taylor Structural Engineers, Inc.  Over the next twenty-nine years he developed what started as a one-man firm into one of the most successful mid-size structural engineering firms in southwestern Pennsylvania, preparing structural designs on more than five thousand commercial, institutional, multi-unit residential, industrial, and athletic building projects with construction costs ranging from several hundred thousand dollars up to several hundred million dollars.

In 2025 Dirk completed the sale of TSE to his younger Partners and retired from the firm.  He now focuses his engineering on preparing structural designs for single-family residential and smaller commercial construction projects as well as forensic investigations of damaged and deteriorated building structures.

Dirk earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Civil Engineering from West Virginia University in 1982 and currently maintains professional engineering licenses in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina.