Category: Work

I had a short email exchange with a young architect about planning a career and finding the elusive work-life balance in our notoriously brutal profession. Here is an edited version.

Yeah, it’s good to think about a long-term career trajectory. However, my career experienced a few twists and turns – none that I could have guessed a couple of years in advance. As such, I’ve learned that the value of planning is in doing the exercise.  Even though the final result will not match the pre-vision, a practice of regularly contemplating “next steps” has prepared me to quickly grab new opportunities and pursue new desires that come up.

And yes, you’re correct to worry about work-life balance.  My career was supercharged when I joined a corporate firm and worked two years of regular 50+ hour weeks. The more you work, the more you learn – it’s a compounding investment in yourself.

However, this textbook career path can become a long-term trap. Study hard in your off time to pass the tests quickly. Push extra hours to get promoted to associate. Once you’ve level set long hours, the team needs you to keep it up. And it doesn’t get easier once you’re principal – now you have to make payroll. 

A hard push for the first few years might be a good jumpstart for a young pro without a family, but completely devoting yourself to architecture is corrosive to your sense of self and your long-term relationships. Career success is nice, but it doesn’t necessarily translate to a better life.

So how did I avoid getting stuck on this hamster wheel? Good luck and low expectations.

1. My parents paid my way through school, so I don’t have any debt (luck). Also, my wife and I live frugally, so we have a low burn rate (expectations).  Avoiding major financial obligations has let me pursue a career as an activity of choice instead of an endeavor to maximize income.  I’m free to balance my income against the time invested to earn it.
2. Maybe I would gotten stuck in the promotion trap if I stayed in Houston, but we moved to Vegas right after I was promoted to Associate. Unlike colleagues who are still at that firm, this move broke the cycle.  This cross country move was spurred by a busted heater in our apartment, so I chalk this up to luck.
3. Now that I’ve been doing this for twenty years, I’ve seen the sacrifice required to enter and stay in the upper eschelons. Fuck it.  Aside from my two years in corporate, I’ve happily settled for a job with interesting projects, a fair hourly rate, and reasonable hours.
4. I don’t love high architecture.  I enjoy the job and my brain is wired as an “architect” for to spaceplanning and managing projects. However I’m not a capital-“A” Architect. Don’t ask me to come up with flashy designs. With this realiziation, my expectations have been muted – architecture is not going to be my primary means of self expression. Architecture is my path for good work to support a good life.
5. Similarly, I’ve tempered my expectations in government work. Sure, it would be cool to have my name engraved on a bronze plaque outside a university building. But I have zero interest in all the other headaches that my administrator has to manage. So why claw my way up this ladder?
6. Finally, I’ve got my health and my family, what more can I ask for? Why push my luck?

Have fun sorting out your career. Who knows where your career will go! Just remember that everything (good and bad) comes with an opportunity cost. Plan regularly and stay flexible.

Yup. I’m the fucking client. I’ve got nothing left to prove.

But there is always something I can do better.

This need for constant improvement should drive me.

Let’s kick ass on this job and beat it on the next one.

拔了毛的凤凰不如鸡。

A plucked phoenix is worth less than a chicken.

Chinese Proverb

Joining the government was quite magical. People started returning my phone calls. Folks from the same companies who didn’t bother sending a confirmation receipt when I previously sent them resumes inquiring about public job postings.

If I wasn’t careful, I might actually believe that I had moved up in the world. However, I always remind myself that they aren’t picking the my phone call. They are taking calls from a Project Manager 2 at the State Public Works Division. It’s about the position, not the collection of biologically animated cells that happen to identify with me.

Of course, I hope that some of the new companions from the past three years actually appreciate my company, not merely the State’s patronage. But it’s impossible to shake the nagging question, “what would happen if?”

I’ve been lucky to have stayed on an upward trajectory in my career (so far), but I wonder if a fall from grace is ultimately a more painful ride than staying stuck in the mud. Then again, a drop is the risk that comes with moving up in the world.

Increased fragility from higher prominence is the ante to play the game.

Hopefully, an over-inflated delusion about one’s intrinsic value isn’t.

I’ve been blessed to work with great architects over the past three years. I’ve really enjoyed their company and I hope our partnerships will continue for many more years at the Division!

One of the reasons I’ve enjoyed my work is that I tend to always think of my projects as a two for one deal.

For example, I am the Owner’s Project Manager for a new university building, but the real project is learning how to be an OPM on a major capital improvement construction project.

The first project gets me paid, the second project gets me excited to go to work every day.

I wonder if this has something to do with a pattern in my career where I’ve made a change every few years. Once I’ve learned the craft offered by a company, I sense a calling to move on, especially after I’ve repeated the process a few times. At that point, the hidden project of learning the firm’s specialties has lost its appeal since I am well familiar with it.

Maybe a more productive pattern would be to find deeper projects within the projects. Once I’ve got the process down and internalized the typology, I should buckle down explore other the real projects behind the project. Once I understand, I need to find a source of satisfaction in a project beyond just learning something new.

Just asking such a question is scary because it’s a question with no easy answer. But, who knows, maybe this is where the path to mastery might begin.

I’ve been toying with creating a communication protocol for my projects. I would hand it to my Architect so they would be liberated from thinking about how to communicate so they can focus on what to say.

Online

Non Urgent Items go onto an Online Taskboard (to be be discussed in a weekly one-on-one meeting between the Owner and Architect).

Yes / No quickies can be handled in Email.

Anything you send to someone that isn’t under your contract should CC: me. I’m not worried about being buried under emails. If I’m not in the salutation, I’ll scan it and file it away quietly when I get around to it.

Telephone

Use Phone Calls liberally. If an email exchange might ping-pong more than three times, then pick up the phone. Make sure to document the conversation with a follow up email.

Don’t bother with voicemail. I never check those.

If it’s really urgent, Text me. Or call my cell twice in a row.

Meetings

Videoconference preferred to save on travel time.

All Meetings should have an Agenda prepared X days in advance and Minutes distributed within Y days. (This is painful on purpose, to ensure the benefits of the meeting matches the cost).

Links

I read these four examples a year ago and haven’t referenced them, but they have been fermenting in my brain. They links are sorted by alphabetical order of the company, but do the kids say these days? Retweet is not endorsement.

Expectations (Automattic, Inc)

The Basecamp Guide to Internal Communications

The 10 Slack Agreements of Buffer

Gitlab Handbook, Communication

I started in a small office, hand drafting with a telephone, using dial-in internet. Less than twenty years later, I have a cellphone and a computer, both of which have high speed internet and instantaneous access to email and MS Teams.

When we talk about progress, its easy to forget that the world that we saw slowly changed in real time is just the basic “normal” for those who grew up after the technology became widespread. These younger folks grew up in a totally divergent communication environment, and I believe that a communication handbook may be the best way to bridge the divide, even if it seems stodgy as hell.

I am an Owner’s Project Manager and Architect for the State of Nevada Public Works Division.  We remodel, plan, and construct facilities for State Agencies for Using Agencies.  The way our system is set up, we ultimately hold the contracts with the Consultants and Contractors.

I’ve worked on projects as small as a kitchen demolition in a mental health facility to a $44M Education Academic Building for Nevada State College.  This post is based on my experience developing this process during construction administration for this major building (we are a couple months from substantial completion).

Primary Goals for a Web Taskboard + Weekly Check-in Process

1. Minimize Emails (or at least email searching).
2. Centralized hub for Tasks (and information) between the Owner and Architect. 
3. Create space for synchronizing the Owner and Architect (aligning priorities and identifying unspoken concerns)

Web Taskboard

We use the basic free package of Asana and have not found any significant limitations. 

This task board is only used for coordination between the Owner and the Architect’s PM.  The CMAR is not involved since another ad hoc communication channel could cause confusion. The Architect keeps track of their own internal tasks separately (such as typical RFI or Submittal processing), and I keep a separate things-to-do list for project tasks that don’t concern the architect.

We treat Asana as an open, free flowing space.  Tasks and Deadlines can be added or assigned to anyone.  There are only two restrictions:

1. If a new task is assigned to someone else with a deadline in less than a week, then a courtesy phone call (followed up by “manual” email) is expected.
2. Hard Deadlines are to be noted in the Title of the Task.  Otherwise, dates are merely treated as “preferable goals” to signal intent, and it is not a big deal if they are shifted.

When a task is added, relevant files (documents or key emails) are uploaded into the task.  This eliminates use of email inboxes as repositories of information.  Someone should be able to open the task in Asana and have all the relevant information to start work.

Weekly Check-in

A critical part this process is our weekly check-in.  I’ve found it typically takes an hour.  We have a standing placeholder on Monday afternoons, but we are flexible since it’s just the Architect’s PM and myself.  That said, we never skip a full week.  The call is loose and will veer into tangents, but it follows this rough Agenda:

1. Project Vibe
2. Run through the Asana List
3. Go through Recent Walk Thru Comments (due to the pandemic, I conduct my job walks alone)
4. Any other Open Items?
5. Long Term Look Ahead
6. Next Steps (this week’s priorities)

Analysis

In theory, this system could minimize ad hoc emails between me and the Architect’s PM.  Unfortunately, this doesn’t happen in practice, because there are always other parties (such as the Architect’s Principal in Charge, Contractor, Using Agency, etc.) who needs to be included in key communications.  However, this system has successfully eliminated email searching because Asana has centralized all project tasks between us.

This system has given me a much better feel for project progress, despite operating under strict quarantine (we live with our in-laws).  My relationship with the Architect’s PM was great before implementing this system, but this tool has been indispensable in maintaining tight synchronization during the usual chaos of construction administration.  Before implementing this system, I could sense slippages of miscommunication; now we are never more than a week from airing out any concerns before a misalignment could get serious. 

The weekly synchronization gives me a clear grasp of project needs and priorities.  This has empowered me to focus intensely on my immediate tasks at hand for the rest of the week (for this project or otherwise).

The system isn’t a magic bullet, we still need to execute.  For example, it would have been extra slick if I had started our FF&E purchases a month earlier than I did.  The tasks were on the list the whole time, but I did not stay on top of my responsibilities to push this part of the project forward at the perfect time.  However, the task board certainly helped me avoid the much worse event of being a month late!

This process isn’t free – it costs an hour every week.  2.5% of the time where two professionals aren’t executing direct deliverables (not to mention the separately held OAC meeting and job walks).  The best analogy is to call this practice “PMt insurance”.  I believe this regular time commitment has helped prevent small issues from becoming big emergencies.

We tried Microsoft Teams and Asana.com.  I hoped that MS Teams would integrate better with MS To Do, however that feature only works with the user whose server is hosting the Team.  So, we went back to Asana because it is very consistent in its email distribution (allowing the Architect to keep a record of all communications), and because I prefer Asana’s “List” (spreadsheet) interface.  However, I would use MS Team for internal-only project teams, and I am open to trying other systems if someone feels strongly about it.

I have Asana’s iphone app, but I don’t use it for task management. However,  I use Asana’s phone app to make “notes” during the job walk.  I then discuss these comments on the weekly call with the Architect’s Project Manager and she incorporates relevant items into her weekly field reports. 

Personal style disclaimer: I prefer one-on-one phone calls for resolving project issues since I feel decisions and gameplans are developed fastest in this manner.  This process systematizes such a preference for handling non-urgent tasks between me and the architect.  Other PM’s personal styles may differ.

Future Experiments

I plan on utilizing this process for future projects, starting at the design phase. I will request that the Architect select their preferred website (Monday, Trello, Wrike, Teams, Asana, etc.) and include any necessary premium costs into their fee.

For the design phase, I plan on extending the invite to the Using Agency and the CMAR’s Preconstruction Team.  I still do not think this will be an appropriate communication channel with the CMAR’s team during construction operations.

I wonder if this process will minimize large group design meetings, or at least streamline them, since much of the updates could be handled via the web taskboard and in the weekly check-ins, especially since we hold formal presentations (and subsequent meeting minutes) after each of the major design phase deliverables.

I’m not sure if this will be useful for smaller projects, but I’ll give it a shot on my next one.

I might try doing this for internal communications, such as a weekly check-in with my direct supervisor.

References (some links)

General Thoughts

• https://www.calnewport.com/blog/2020/08/13/dont-delegate-using-email/#comment-433165
• https://knowyourteam.com/blog/2020/05/14/the-best-way-to-hold-a-remote-one-on-one-meeting/
• https://www.quantumworkplace.com/future-of-work/check-in-meeting
• I am a fan of Cal Newport’s  Deep Questions Podcast, so I plan on picking his newly published book, A World without Email.  He is a big proponent of the web task board.

Sample Agendas

• https://www.managementcenter.org/resources/check-meetings-sample-agenda/
• https://asana.com/guide/examples/meetings/one-on-ones
• https://www.quantumworkplace.com/future-of-work/one-on-one-meeting-guide

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to Ria Lyn Smith, who was my co-conspirator in developing this process.  I initiated this system after reading about remote team weekly check-ins during the initial lockdown, after construction had started on our building.  I grateful for her willingness to add this experiment on top of all the other fires of construction administration.

Also thanks to my AIA roundtable partners – Scott Knudson, Nea May Poole, Rachel Oleinick, Heather Pierce, and Emma Tucker for the lovely conversation that spurred me to finally put this post together. Finally, thanks to Heather Holmstrom for reviewing a draft and proposing some edits for this post.