I spoke with a guy from Chicago last night I realized there is severe nation-wide shortage of specifiers. Those of us that are specifiers are getting older and retiring or dying. The ratio of architects to specifiers in most firms is huge.
Since CSI has dropped the ball, what can we do to help promote our profession? How can we get young professionals interested in specs as a career?
Also, it seems many specifiers are old white guys. How can we get more women and minorities involved?
Maybe after all of us old specifiers die out, the rest of the Architects will again have to write their own specs, and then they will begin to appreciate the work we did for them.
Specification writing used to be, and must again become, an integral part of the practice of Architecture. Only after specification writing regains its rightful position alongside picture drawing and self-promotion in the mainstream Architecture curriculum and practice, will it again become attractive to those with the aptitude to specialize in it.
And how is it, exactly, that CSI has “dropped the ball”? What about all of the education and certification programs offered from Institute to chapter level?
I’ve seen complaints about what CSI has or has not done for a long time, but those who complain usually don’t suggest things that might improve the organization. And what have they done themselves?
One complaint is that things aren’t as good as they were in the “good old days”. If you look at what happened then, it was individuals who made things happen. The executive board (if there was one) or the staff didn’t tell the members, “Get busy and create a manual of practice, a way to organize specifications, a way to organize information within a section, and a way to put things on paper.”
There is nothing that prevents members from taking initiative and doing things on their own. If you want to recruit specifiers, go ahead. If you have an idea that works, tell the rest of the members. If it’s too big to handle, ask for help from your region.
As far as getting young professionals interested, it’s a tough job. The fact is that it’s hard to become a specifier until you know what’s going on, and that takes experience. It’s good to encourage young people to consider specifying as a career, but until the schools at least recognize that specifications are a part of the business, it will be hard to find interested people. Those who go to school to become architects want to be designers. Most of them will become glorified drafters, but at least they can pretend.
In the immortal words from the defunct comic strip, Pogo, “We have met the enemy and he is us!”
I agree with Sheldon’s assessment. But I have to remind myself that the inadequacies of architects and engineers are why independent specifications writers exist and, as far as I can tell, are generally prospering. Architects and engineers who care about their documents hire qualified specifiers, whether in-house or as consultants (independent contractors).
I believe that the key to CSI’s future is for the Institute to promote the value of well-prepared construction documents. Design professionals, facility owners, construction managers, installers, suppliers, quality control agencies, code authorities and financers … everyone except those who leech a living off construction defects and claims … have a common interest in well-prepared documents.
So much of the discussion and debate can be clarified if put up against the concept of well-prepared documents. Putting the highest priority on well-prepared documents … documents that are logically and consistently organized, documents that are clear, correct and concise, documents that say it once and in the most appropriate location, documents that are coordinated, and documents that are readily usable … will do much to benefit the entire construction industry.
I don’t think it’s a matter so much of young design professionals being disinterested as it is being ignorant. The issue, then, is how to overcome the ignorance.
There must be motivation for architects and engineers to learn and apply the well-founded principles and practices of construction specifications production. It ain’t rocket science. It can be learned. Apparently, the threat of construction claims is not sufficient motivation. I think the key is for those who are now in charge of the project team to demand quality in construction documents … and be willing to pay for it.
It’s the facility owners and the construction managers who in position to require quality in construction documents and to demand that drawings and specifications be produced in compliance with the recognized formats and practices of The Construction Specifications Institute.
I’m not very encouraged that this will happen unless the first order of business is for the leaders of CSI, from the Chapter level up to the Institute level, to understand and appreciate the value of well-prepared construction documents and to shape CSI activities to support this prime purpose for the organization.
Going back to the quote from Pogo, we who are members of CSI are responsible for the current state of CSI and it’s follies and grand accomplishements. Personally, it means teaching an 8-week CDT exam preparation class and taking time to mentor project team members to better provide information and decisions and to use the construction documents we all work so hard to produce. It means speaking out on issues about construction documents.
Those who are passive about all these matters risk finding themselves in the middle of a swamp, like the Pogo characters, with themselves to blame for the situation.
It is up to those whose livelihood is dependent upon CSI’s well-being to be involved at the various levels of the organization and to encourage, suggest, demand and throw hissy-fits when appropriate
The people in a position to direct an improvement in the quality of construction documents are architectural and engineering firm managers. Love of neatness and precision aside, the best argument for producing quality documents is greater profit. That argument can be made with good support.
Most architecture firms lose money during the contract administration phase of their projects, due to time spent on huge numbers of Requests for Information from the field, to time spent on inappropriately handled submittals, and to time spent on claims and disputes. Present a solution to these drains on architecture firm resources, and the management should be all ears. It takes years of work to upgrade staff skills and practices, but it can be done.
The Manual of Practice and the National CAD Standard are two powerful tools with which we can accomplish this document quality upgrade. We need to keep a realistic eye on those efforts that will result in profitable projects and, hopefully, better compensation for staff.
Yes, Phil, thank you. I’d like to point out as well that contractors consistantly recognize quaility documents and appreciate them. Contractors also consistantly consider poor quailty documents one of their biggest problems. This must translate into higher construction costs, or at least more frequent claims.
Another general trend in the delivery of services of all types (not just design and construction) is increasing specialization. Some architecture firms are slowly accepting this as a model for success, rather than assuming that each architect they hire must be good at all aspects of this profession.
The movement toward specialization is a strong one, and for architecture firms, it is driven by our clients. They are seeking architects who have already done projects similar to their own. They don’t hire architects to be creative generalists; they want to reduce their risks.
Specifiers are one of the most identifiable specialist groups within architecture. Our portion of architectural practice requires years of concentration to do well - I always figure at least five more years than I have.
Back to David’s original questions:
Of our specifiers’ roundtable members in Charlotte, half are women. Half of our CSI chapter board are women. In both cases, I believe the people involved are involved because they saw an opportunity for advancement and security.
My two colleague specifiers at LS3P are non-architect women who saw that specializing in specifications provided a path to a good, secure professional position. While our work is not glamorous, it is respected and well compensated. Our design teams and our clients appreciate our efforts. They know about our efforts because we tell them about it. We market ourselves internally and externally - all the time. Sitting quietly in the corner and typing isn’t enough.
I think there are a couple of things here: first of all, we are sort of a pallid “specialty” in architecture – not particularly promoted in the schools, or often in the firms either. We’re not the glamorous part of the profession. And, there are counterparts in all the professions – I can’t name them, but we all know that medicine, law and teaching all have their odd specialty groups.
However, (and I made this argument to Karl Borgstrom when he was here for Tech Comm in November, CSI doesn’t really promote specifiers as a group. (how it promotes itself is a whole other issue that I won’t get into here.) 20 years after the “CCS” exam was started, there is very little recognition among building owners, facility planners, governmental agencies or architecture firms about the meaning behind those letters. I think building owners have more idea about a “Certified Building Manager” than what we do; or half a dozen of those other building specialty things that we see signified in letters after someone’s name.
This recognition problem is a CSI problem – I, or Phil, or David, cannot realistically start a one or two person “hire a certified specifier” advertising campaign, but CSI can do this, and they haven’t really done that. I don’t even think that AIA really recognizes what specifiers do… and I’m certain the designers in my office have only a vague idea what I’m talking about.
We hired a new young woman earlier this summer, and when she heard what I did, not only did she start laughing, but she sort of looked at me like I was that icky stuff on the bottom on your shoe. And she came out of a GOOD architecture program.
I think the internal/external marketing that Phil mentions is absolutely critical.. and is too easily ignored.
I’ve been pretty lucky, in that most of the people in our office appreciate the work I do.
I recently had one of our interior design interns ask me to make a presentation in her senior documents class about specifications and what we specifiers do. She also told me that she’d never work in an office without a “Ron.”
I agree that we need to “improve the image,” and I think this is why having a chapter academic liaison is important. Working with local colleges and universities is a way of getting the message to young architects, designers, etc.
Ron - I have to admit I never thought of the chapter academic liason in quite that way, and plan to get to work on that because of your comment. We’re most likely to improve the long-range perception of the role we play by selling the incoming generation on the value we add. Good point!
Anne’s tale about the architect intern happens all too often. Academic architects have little interest in what we do - 2 course descriptions out of 160 at Cornell’s Architecture School include the word “specifications,” and only 5 include the word “construction.” Don’t know what they’re studying these days, but it doesn’t have much to do with buildings. Advanced Theory of the Requisite Weirdness du Jour, no doubt.
When I was in school, I think the word “specifications” might have been mentioned once in “Professional Practice”, but I don’t recall that it was defined. Like so many other useful things, the attitude was “you can learn that on the job.”
Instead of “clear, complete, concise, and correct” the credo of the architect is “an ounce of presentation is worth a pound of design”. Small wonder they have no idea what we do.
An interesting point about AIA’s take on specifiers as well. I recently completed a construction administration manual for our office’s practice, and found very little in AIA’s Architect’s Handbook of Professional Practice. (I consider contract administration and specification writing “comrades” – they’re both architecture “specialties,” and those doing CA are usually the ones who appreciate specs most.) In fact, the current 987 page AIA Handbook has a mere seven pages on specifications (although to their credit, the do say that the Manual of Practice is the primary guide for specs) and 22 pages on construction administration, including bidding. This is not to say that the information the do have is not useful – just the relative importance of specifications.
The problem as I see it [from 40 years of teaching and practice] is that there is a mystic about architecture what it is-- really?; and how it is achieved? There are a series of disconnects that need to be resolved, colest and resolved, for the forward movement [and rise???] of the profession. The needs revolve around getting the ACSA [or other authoritative representative of the schools, the NCARB, the NAAB, the AIA, the SRA, the SPIC, and other authoritative representatives of the profession as a whole, in one room, with locked door, until they come to agreement on how one takes a person from entry level student to registered professional, fully capable of producing work in correct and proper aesthetics and construction.
A heady task, no doubt— daunting, and more than likely will never happen. But until it does, we will continue to have the diversity of opinions [and utter silliness!!!]on what, truly, a well-prepared architectural graduate should look liketechnically.
Right now, unfortunately, each of these groups hase its own perspective and agenda; their own idea on what an architectural graduate should be. BUY they dont match and where one is highly conceptual, the other is highly technical, one correct legally, the other so theoretical as to be out of touch legally; one pushing design, signature architects, publication-- the other realistic, producing thousands of good, valid and satisfactory projects, year in and year out without any PR, etc.
What is the true motive or charge to the profession? May be we need to re-examine that in terms of what we teach, and what we expect. May be we need to understand that all architects do not practice as onewe practice by personal choice in our niches, doing work we enjoy and are quire proficient at. We need to address ALL the issues of practice at some time in the process of teaching student and developing graduates. Schools pooh-pooh the idea of preparing graduate for the examyet it is the exam which provides the basis for future registration and career enhancement. But the exam has been diverted to far less than realistic measures, and really tests academic and professional skills. The states have abdicated their purview over TECHNICAL aspect of practice [vis–vis the registration laws] and have allowed NCARB to become an errant, misdirected investigatory agency to preclude registration in lieu of assisting or facilitating registration. A technically proficient architect will more than likely be a community leader, but the depth of the involvement is NOT something that necessitates examination by NCARB. It is to test practical profession competence not community schmussing.
Further, the NAAB needs to move to assist in the development of a minimum, mandatory basic curriculum that ALL registration applicants must successfully complete. Without this, those people are NOT proven to be able to produce satisfactory projects meeting all proper design, and regulatory parameters.
The AIA needs to forego WashingtonDCism, and get going on a truly helpful grass-roots program supporting encouraging and assisting local efforts and schools to move with the profession. And the locals need to be players in all that also. Architecture does NOT start and end in DCits on Main Street, and in a vacant field, and in a new high-tech facility, and in better [not necessarily higher-cost, or more glitzy, gadgets filled] housing.
Hey! We got a lot of work to do. And oh, yes, the specifications must be a necessary part in their correct position and perspective in all of this. Writing specs is neither criminal nor, sinful; neither is it unnecessary!
I’d be interested in seeing statistics comapring the number of female/minority architects to “white male architects” and the number of female/minority specifiers to “white male specifiers”. Would the proportions be the same?
Just like you can’t be a good project architect or project manager right out of school, neither can you be a good specifier. As it was said above, it needs experience and you get experience by getting older. It would help the situation if the schools recognized specifying as one aspect of the profession of architecture. And that is the sort of thing that can be accomplished on a chapter level - with the help of an academic liaison. I’ve found the students to be receptive; it’s the academics we struggle with. (the school I graduated from is a design school, and dealt very poorly with any sort of reality - like codes and specs!)
As CSI members, we can mentor young professionals; we can become involved in school activities beginning with grade school; we can volunteer to speak to classes on “career day”; and generally do things ourselves to gain recognition. We don’t need to wait for someone else to do it. It is something that can be done on a person-to-person basis. I’ve participated in a Saturday career day for girls in middle school, had a great time and was encouraged by the diversity of opportunities that the young girls were interested in.
We’ve talked about CSI being a “grass-roots” organization - well, get off your grass and move your roots! It’s up to all of us.
The National Associates Committee of AIA just published a survey that has some interesting statistics regarding gender and the profession. It doesn’t touch on specifiers, but does address “non-traditional paths”. It is worth looking at…
http://www.aia.org/nac/2003survey.asp
I disagree with the premise that “older is better”. Older is just older.
I had back surgery a few weeks ago. I met with the surgeon and after reviewing my chart, the doctor told me that he was my age (41). The Doctor then asked me if his age was a problem and that many people prefer an older doctor. I said, “Hell no. If anything you are up on the latest technology.” The same applies to specifiers.
There are some younger specifiers that are up on the latest materials, technology, and LEED characteristics.
Now don’t get me wrong. Old is not bad. Older architects/specifiers can provide a lot of experience. Many times older professionals have advise us to not do something because they got burned way back when.