Can
you learn to be an effective leader? Do
you have the personality to be a leader? Are you willing to take risks? Are you decisive? Last month I spoke of our profession’s
failure to lead, evidenced by the trend for our clients to hire program/project
management and construction management firms, diminishing our role.
The Right Personality - Jason Ankeny
writes in the March 2015, Entrepreneur, page 37 “A winning
personality? The center of the
personality spectrum belongs to ambiverts
– individuals with characteristics of both introverts and extroverts. Could this balance equip them (you) to be
superior business leaders? In ambiverts
you see a good balance between talking and listening.” Ankeny refers to the book The Fall of the Alphas: The new Beta Way to
Connect Collaborate, Influence—and Lead, by Dana Ardi, “which contends that
business leaders must dump traditional vertical models of hierarchy and control
(“alpha culture”) in favor of a more horizontal, inclusive approach.”
The message is to balance talking and listening, and to be inclusive.
Teamwork and
Collaboration
- Millennials get this. They have grown
up in an inclusive, participatory environment contrasting with Boomer’s top
down culture. School classrooms
encourage children to work together in teams (pods) instead of the teacher at
the front of the classroom lecturing to bored students. Today as architects we collaborate with
large, interdisciplinary design teams. We share Revit files, using clash
detection to discover conflicts. Is the
strong movement towards Design-Build, Program/ Project Management, and
Construction Management a logical result of ever-greater project complexity and
a more collaborative, team-oriented culture? Like it or not, many clients are
happy with the result.
Project Delivery - Last year, TTG’s
Edwin Najarian presented an IPD (Integrated Project Delivery) hospital
project. Armando Gonzalez, FAIA echoed
Edwin’s praise of the approach stating “IPD is where it’s going” at the final 2014
First Friday Forum. Stated simply, IPD
can be a contract between owner, architect and builder, sharing project
delivery risks. The contract encourages
stakeholders to work together towards the common goal of project success. Screw
up and the resulting cost overruns (losses) are shared by the
stakeholders. IPD is being used on
large, non-public projects. Is it
applicable to public projects and/or small projects?
Decisive Leadership – Okay, so you think
you can balance talking and listening.
You believe in teamwork. Are you willing to
take risks? President Theodore Roosevelt may have said it
best with “In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right
thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do
is nothing.”
LANCE BIRD, FAIA
