Amen, David.
Now if we can only get spec users to give us positive/negative feedback on a regular basis, it would be a nice world.
“Show me the money.”
One of the reasons for the specifier shortage is of course that firms have been routinely offering positions that pay what they call a “competitive salary.” (No offense intended, Susan.) The reality is, the salaries offered to specifiers in the past have not been truly competitive in the bigger picture. What the phrase has meant is “We’re offering just enough salary to attract someone while not offending the design staff” or being “consistent with our interpretation of the AIA salary survey.”
Recently it has started to occur to firms that a specifier position commands a premium in the marketplace. However, the realization came along too late to lay a foundation of upcoming technical expertise in design firms, and we’re now playing catchup.
It is a common trope in corporate and human resources management that ““they” want recognition and cool projects and blue jean Fridays more than they want money.” This self-serving belief obviously hasn’t resulted in an increase in specifiers. Once the kids stop being kids and have kids, they learn that titles and blue jeans and cool don’t pay for soccer uniforms and class trips and braces.
A known premium on salaries over a long period of time does help generate interest in certain demanding fields. It’s not everything, but it is certainly something. And young people looking for how to get ahead in a world with a lowering standard of living and widening wealth gap pay attention to compensation. They get tired of sharing apartments or commuting two hours a day and extending their student loans. So show them the money, and they’ll show up at your desk one day asking “How do you learn to do this stuff?”
From my experience, “specifications writer” is equated for salary purposes with “senior architect”. That is, since a specifications writer does not have managerial responsibilities nor specific project design responsibilities, the salary is diminished in order to keep the pecking order in a firm consistent with a perceived hierarchy rising from drafter to job captain (senior architect) to project architect to project manager (responsible for simultaneous projects) to principal (architect-of-record).
In fact the specifications writer typically does not fit into this hierarchy because the specifications writer is not merely a technical writer but is also a technical and design resource person, a mentor, and an embodiment of the firm’s corporate memory. The specifications writer is involved throughout the office, on multiple projects at various stages of design development and document production. This means there is a quality assurance value in what a specifications writer does.
The independent or outsourced specifier may have an easier time getting to be recognized as a resource. Coming and going from the office of the client architect, the outsourced specifier’s activities are less visible and a perception of expertise seems to develops about the specifications writer. That is, the principles and staff of the client architect don’t see the specifications writer at work, keyboarding and printing documents, and looking a lot like a clerical person. (I’ve known several in-house specifications writers who have chafed mightly over this issue.) Being perceived as someone who does “clerical” work holds the specifications writer’s salary down.
I know many specifications writers, both in-house and outsourced, who diligently work at being resources and mentors. It’s what breaks them out out of the “clerical” image and into being perceived as a valued member of the design team.
First, I apologize for the anonymous posting but, in case I write something that is too personal, I hope not to insult any more sensibilities than need be.
I know this thread is about “growing specifications writers” (notice I did not use the term "spec writers) and I think Phil Kabza and John Regener both bring up a tremendously relevant point about the specification writer’s compensation and position in most firms.
Who would want to do the extra work required to be a truly effective and valued resource to a firm if his or her work was not valued accordingly. Phils third paragraph especially rings true to me. Self-serving is not a term I would associate with any of the excellent specification writers that I know and I know a few. In fact, they are the most generous and giving of their time and knowledge among all the people with whom I am acquainted.
Several years ago my wife received a raise after being with her employer for only a short while. She is not an architect or engineer. The raise was substantial (about 15%) and was made more or less across the board to all the professionals because the company had been experiencing a significant incidence of talent harvesting by its competitors. A market adjustment needed to be made and it was.
As an amusing aside, she told me shortly after that she was worried she might be getting paid too much. At the time she may have thought herself an unproven entity to her employer and ripe for being let go if things tightened up. That never happened. At the time I placed one hand on each of her shoulders, looked her squarely in the eye and said, with a stern voice, Dont ever worry that an employer will pay you one cent more than he believes your work is worth.
More recently, and after the latest grass-roots salary survey came out on 4specs Discussion Forum so I had a good data resource, I was offered a position with a firm at a compensation level I knew I would probably never achieve with my then employer nor most other similar firms in the region.
I took the offer because I thought the work would be interesting (it has been), I have children who are about to start college (one against his will) and I did not want them starting off with tens of thousands of dollars of education debt, and I believed that the level of respect and value placed on the work I would be doing would be reflected by the compensation I was being offered. I was correct on that count as well.
Again, I ask the question: How much can your work be valued if it is available cheap and what is to keep younger professionals from seeing this and having it influence the path they take as they develop their careers?
I would like to point out that I make an effort always to write or say things like value of ones work to his employer instead of what he is worth. The value of a persons humanity should in no way be predicated on what he contributes to the economic bottom line.
As an epilog Ill add that my last employer asked me what it would take to have me stay. I made a proposal but he shook his head and said that the companys fee structure just would not permit that for the position I held and that, if he did consent to it, morale in the office would suffer because a specification writer was making so much more than the project managers. I said that information would certainly not come from my mouth but he correctly replied that it would come from somewhere. All in all it is a sad commentary on our profession. Most project managers should probably be better compensated as well.
So, to bring the discussion about value and compensation back to the primary point that started this thread, in my opinion it takes wanting to be a construction specifier in order to want to train to be one. That’s an obvious statement but I think it is essential that a person identify with being a construction specifier and then proceed to be one.
I think the motivation to becoming a construction specifier is closely tied to one’s identity. And that identity is influenced greatly by positive role models who make being a construction specifier honorable, gratifying and maybe even sufficient to make a living.
Reinforcing or clarifying identity is helped by the gathering together of construction specifiers. Personally, it is why I enjoy meeting with other specifiers at the annual SCIP meeting and also CSI region conferences where there are “Specifier Forums” open to all specifiers to attend. These are opportunities for specifiers to discover that we specifiers are not weird ducks but swans. It’s where the idiosynchrocies of being a specifications writer don’t feel out of place.
How do you grow or train a specifier? Invite, encourage and welcome those who express any interest in being a construction specifier to get to know those who have chosen to be identified and work as a spec writer.
There’s a very thoughtful article by Jeremy Edmunds in the current AIA National Associates Journal that addresses the general issue of compensation in the profession - it gives some context to the more particular issues in this thread related to attracting young people to the speciality of specification writing:
http://www.aia.org/nwsltr_nacq.cfm?pagename=nacq_a_0708_pc_edmunds
Susan, where is your office located?
Atlanta, GA, and yes, we require physical presence in the office. Contact info at www.bsdsoftlink.com.
By the way, guys, you all really got off the track. The question is not how to incentivise someone to want to become a specification writer. It’s how to teach – really teach – and what to teach – someone who already has the motivation, no matter what the motivation is. So, you have a willing and presumably able person – what do you teach? Subject matter? Skills? Don’t just tell me he/she learns by doing – not only can I not do it that way, but most firms couldn’t afford to let such trainees lose on real projects to learn by trial-and-mostly-error.
Susan,
I’m a single person shop, but if I had to “raise” some specifiers I believe I’d go about it as follows:
There are 3 skills/qualities that are necessary in the specifer candidate before you try to teach him/her specifications.
First is a good handle on written language (in our case here, English). Whether journalistic prose or technical English doesn’t matter as long as they can communicate clearly in writing with structured ideas and conclusions.
Second is curiosity about how things work. The kid that takes clocks apart to figure them out is a good example.
Third being a self starter and being reasonably organized in keeping track of information gathered.
These things in place in the candidate, start them with SectionFormat, Chapter 5 of the PRM, and reading/reviewing other specification sections comparing the written sections to the SectionFormat to see where the information conveyed logically fits into the SectionFormat outline and why.
If the person does not understand how to read working drawings, a “blue print reading” course would not be out of line. There is (or should be)a logic to the location of information conveyed on the drawings also. It’s also paramount that a specifier understand how the building and it’s pieces/parts go together in order to give the correct information in the specifications.
After the person(s) are comfortable with an understanding of how the construction information is logically organized, set up a team to produce a Project Manual. A senior specfier heading it up and dealing with Div 01, and the “intern” specifers working on the research and writing of various sections with review by the Senior Specifier.
As the intern specifier gains skill in specification writing, they can take on more material, work with the Sr. Specifier on Div 01 to learn the legal ramifications and how a project works in the field. (doing some CA work helps with this.)
I realize this would take some effort, but to teach there needs to be a mentor of some sort. I was fortunate in having a mentor in my boss, who unfortunately was not a specifer, but got me Hans Meier’s Specifications Handbook. Between the two, a whole world opened for me.
I hope this is a help.
Margaret
Susan:
The material in CSI’s CDT, CCS and CCCA programs is the basic content of a construction specifier’s knowledge base. The CDT/CCS/CCCA material provides the standardized principles and procedures for specifications writing. I believe the traditional way for this material to be learned is through local CSI Chapter-sponsored CDT exam preparation classes and through CCS/CCCA study groups established by several certification candidates who wish to study together. CSI’s exam preparation materials are helpful. CSI’s materials are based on the Project Resource Manual - CSI Manual of Practice. My book, Construction Specifications Writing: Principles and Procedures is focused on the practice of specifications writing and, with the major revisions in the 5th edition, is consistent with the CSI Manual of Practice. Phil Kabza’s (SpecGuy’s) CDT and CCCA exam preparation programs are also very helpful.
Regarding how a specifier learns construction technology in order to make the specifications suitable for bidding and “resulting” the work under the contract, that’s a huge matter. It would be helpful, I believe, for someone to create a bibliography of resources for learning construction technology, including publications and education programs. This bibliography would be a task beyond the means of an individual to produce. Perhaps a new discussion thread should be started to identify construction technology resources for specifiers that could serve as a start for developing the list of resources.
Perhaps a page on 4specs could be dedicated to construction industry references/links/resources - best if we could all make postings there, but would need it to remain organized by division/section#'s - or some sort of wikipedia like environment. MASTERSPEC Supporting Documents come very close to doing this already, in the references/links section of each of the “evaluations”
I don’t agree that the CDT/CCS programs etc are training programs – they are verification that someone has learned the stuff the CSI way. I have conducted CCS workshops for CSI chapters and exam preparation materials don’t constitute instructional materials. It’s a much longer process. Margaret’s description is closer to what would happen in real life. I guess I’m being a pest, but what I’m looking for is specification topics that transcend construction materials and technology. Subjects like submittals and how you deal with them, substitutions and all their different ramifications, actual techniques for coordinating the documents, and other issues that most of us learned the hard way, by making mistakes. Concise explanations of these things would be very valuable to novices. In another thread, Colin proposes to develop a wiki for specs – this sort of thing could go in that as well.
Here Here. I agree with Susan, I like the CDT/CCS/CCCA class(es) but they DO NOT teach you to be a spec writer. In fact they teach almost NOTHING about WRITING specs. they teach: administration of the contract, the roles of the players AND, some information on type and process. - not how to do it.
I agree also about the partial irrelevance of the CDT/etc classes. the content of those classes is the framework, but they don’t teach you anything about how to research something; how to determine what is fair about a change order request; what the contractor’s concerns are; or anything else that actually happens on a job site. You can’t learn this job from a book or a class; you have to work on projects. You have to either do CA or really talk to the people who do CA — every day. You have to approve change orders, figure out where your documents didn’t work and then get up and do it again the next day.
I think Ann just elucidated the “secret of life” when she wrote, “You have to . . . figure out where [it] didn’t work and then get up and do it again the next day.” In every profession, every craft, indeed in every task, no matter what the extent of prior preparation, one only truly learns by doing.
Indivdual preparation is important but we must still involve ourselves in the “profess” part of our profession and be effective mentors to those with less experience.
I know I am preaching to the choir here but I offer these words as encouragement to many of you to keep up the good work. It will bear fruit. Not so long ago all I knew and thought about specifications was that they were thicker than a large city’s phone book and not as interesting. My knowledge and thinking has changed radically thanks to some excellent mentors.