by Douglas L Steidl, FAIA
AIA President

“Collaboration should start when the project is conceived. Let the owner regard the builder as he does his architect—a coequal adviser who has valuable knowledge of ways and means and the costs thereof—who has pride and joy in accomplishment and whose concern is not to see how much he can make, but how well it can be done. Here we have the true professional basis and the foundation of all the great economies of construction.”

The gender bias and the length of the sentences give away the age of this quotation. It appeared in the November 1927 issue of Architecture. Its author was W.A. Starrett, a deservedly well-known builder of the time.

What hasn’t aged is the truth of his insight: Design excellence is the product of collaborative, give-and-take teamwork between the architect and the contractor, teamwork that begins not in the middle of a project, but right at the inception. Sadly, although nearly eight decades have passed since Starrett wrote these words, progress toward true collaboration by all the partners has been uneven.

What has been the consequence? Once again Starrett was right on the money when he wrote:

“How often do we all see those completed drawings all crisscrossed with changes, and addenda representing a belated collaboration between architect and contractor, when, through the eleventh hour of business closing, the project is cut and slashed and emasculated to bring it within a financial budget . . . .”

Sound familiar?

All of a piece
Last month, at the AIA/AAF Accent on Architecture Gala in Washington, D.C., I was privileged to bestow the AIA Firm Award on the Chicago firm Murphy/Jahn, Inc., and the AIA Gold Medal on Santiago Calatrava, FAIA. As different as the work of each is, it occurred to me they share a common strength: Within their firms and permeating the way they work is a creative and energizing spirit of collaboration.

There are no boundaries, no silos. Engineering is seamless with architecture, and architecture seamless with construction. It’s all of a piece, each respects the other, and the client is well served.

Standing in our own way?
Make no mistake: I’m not talking about the extraordinary projects coming out of both offices. That’s another subject, one well worth celebrating. Instead, I’m focusing here on a value that should guide the way every member of the design team should work: in the office, on the job, and, for that matter, in our communities.

Not many of us will be privileged to work on star-quality projects of the magnitude turned out by Calatrava or Murphy/Jahn. But what’s standing in our way, except ourselves, from better serving our clients and one another by respecting what each of us has to offer? What’s in our way from being truly collaborative in sharing information and ideas?

As Starrett wrote: “Architects of considerable standing and experience recognize these things, and in recognizing them they lay the foundation for the most effective and fruitful collaboration. Cooperation becomes synonymous with it, and the outcome is the rich reward of a fine accomplishment.”

Collaborative value
Too often, the players on the design team, or construction team, or both, do not choose to collaborate fully. The reasons are no doubt complex, but the price is almost always the same: costly for all participants—owner, architect, engineers, and contractor.

Of course, for collaboration truly to work, the “collaborative value” must be practiced by all participants. This is not only the right way to go, it’s smart. Tomorrow’s winners will be those firms able to eliminate the divisions among architect, engineer, and contractor.

How will we know when we have succeeded? When the owner finds it difficult to distinguish the architect’s hand from that of the engineer and contractor. It will be, as Starett put it, a “fine accomplishment.”

History suggests that Starrett was as good as his word. It’s one thing to talk about collaboration. But what did Starrett’s team do when the bottom dropped out in the Depression and times got tough? They built the Empire State Building—certainly a very fine accomplishment. I can’t think of a more emphatic mark of punctuation to make his point.

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