Design Technology Management & Training

A I'm Evelyn Lee. And I'm Janine Chastain. We're collaborating on curated conversations to explore how the industry of architecture is changing.

B Together, we'll find ways to create new solutions to current challenges while elevating the value of architects.

A Welcome to Practice Disrupted.

B Hello, listeners. Hello, Janine.

A Hey, Evelyn. Hey, disruptors. Today, we're welcoming James Hanley and Christina Diego onto the show to help us dive further into a conversation at the intersection of technology, mentorship, and practice. With enhanced dependency on technology, what is an architecture firm's responsibility and role in educating staff on various digital skills? James and Christina are gonna join us from Grey Pucksand, an Australian based architecture firm, and will help us kind of unpack and discuss the realities at play in practice.

B As a digital technologist and strategist in the AEC industry, James leads digital transformation and champions cultural change within architectural practices in the face of a technological shift.

A And Christina graduated in the middle of COVID after earning her bachelor of interior design. She's part of their interior design team at Greypox and is going to help us understand the learning curve and experience that new graduates face once joining a practice. So we're gonna jump into it. James and Christina, welcome to the show, and let's start by having you both tell us a little bit about who you are and your role at the firm.

C Sure. Thank you so much for having us. So my name is James Hanley. My role at Great Park Sand is essentially the digital practice manager. So we work across the 4 or I work across 4 studios, basically leading their strategy in terms of technology, implementation across, the company. So that's across all 4 studios. And when we talk about technology, that is anything from IT, servers, SharePoint, online, cloud, right back down through to how do we get a conceptual mass from SketchUp to Revit. So it's sort of across maybe 20, 30 tools that our designers would use all the way through to the infrastructure those tools run on, as well as the hardware.

C So ordering laptops, make sure they're they're spec'd properly for virtual reality headsets. It's also looking down the track as well. So there's a lot of talk lately about the metaverse. How does that fit into architectural practices? There are big firms out there that are diving into that area. Is that something we need to be ahead of? There's a lot of talk lately, and it's been popping up ever on Twitter and LinkedIn around platforms like Midjourney, and what does artificial intelligence sort of have, or or how does that fit into into Awesome.

D Awesome. I wish my intro was that long, but I'm Christina. I, am a graduate interior designer with Greypucks End. I started about, October last year. And since then, I've just kind of been diving in different projects with education, workplace, commercial, and yeah. Happy to be here. Thanks for having us, guys.

B Yeah. Thank you for joining us, especially so early in the morning. So what should our listeners know about Greypucksand from James, you mentioned there are 4 studios, but why don't you tell us how much staff is across all the studios? What makes you unique? And Christina, being so relatively new to the profession, I would even say what attracted you to Greypock Sand as kind of your first full time role coming out of school?

C Sure. I'll I'll jump in. So as I mentioned, we we've got the 4th year. So we're down the East Coast of Australia. So, Brisbane or Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, and Canberra as well. So Canberra, we were in a a fortunate position to open a new studio at the height of COVID. That's how busy the the industry is down here. We have sort of really grown quite quite quickly, over the last few years.

C So we're sitting around about that 140 mark at the moment in terms of staff, and we specialize in sectors such as education, commercial, and workspace, as well as sort of pushing into that health and science and health sector as well. So I kinda like to say that we're a big small company. I I am very fortunate to be able to sort of travel around to all these years, and it just feels like 1 big family. There's no no 1 sitting off in a corner in an office. Like, you can get along with everyone from your managing director right back to your graduates as well, which is really cool. So and I think it's a really supportive practice. We we really support people that come in and say, hey. I I actually haven't got a lot of site experience.

C I wanna spend more time on-site, or actually, I wanna learn more about computational design. If you put your hand up, it's the 1 practice that I really feel like you get support for what your passion is, and they help you sort of weave that into your day job, which I think is amazing.

D I couldn't agree more. When I graduated, I was looking into a ton of different firms, and I really was afraid to go for a bigger company just because I was scared to get, like, cookie cutter into, like, 1 specific thing. When I found that Grapeoxin was hiring, I did a bunch of research into the company, and I I realized that, yeah, there it's, like, small enough where you can, you you know, show your interest in something, and they will work towards you wanting to do what you wanna do. But at the same time, it's I feel like our clients love us, and it's just a growing thing where they're just happy to pop us onto more projects. So, yeah, I'm just happy. I'm I love this job. I love great content.

B Earlier in the show, you kind of man you kind of talked to us about all of the things that your role as a digital practice manager touches. Mhmm.

D Did you

B wanna can we dig a little bit more into that? Maybe what is what is your day to day really look like, and how do you how do you begin to even think about managing all of that?

C Yeah. True. I've looked at a lot of coffee, first and foremost. A lot of coffee and a lot of exercise just to balance out your, your your life. Look. I I suppose that the big thing is is strategy. Right? We we never wanna be, and and I say we, the global we, never wanna be so sort of short sighted or blinkered to say, like, we just need to focus on getting stuff out this week. We need to be thinking much bigger.

C And, look, there there's people that, are really good at that. Some people, that's a challenge to to sort of think that far ahead. We don't wanna think too far ahead, but we need to sort of plan for success in the near term future. So we always sort of go with a 3 year strategy. So for me, and it's really timely, we're sort of preparing that now. It's sitting down and looking at, well, there's been a lot of talk about AI and it's sort of come and gone and peaked and troughed, but it seems like it's having a bit of a second wind at the moment. And how does that really how is that really gonna convert and maybe affect, the the design industry? Automation is just an ever increasing tool that is gonna make an impact. Day to day, I suppose my my role is almost making sure that we don't scare people with those sorts of things.

C It's really interesting. A lot of people say, oh my god. Like, I, I actually had a partner the other day. We need to get rid of you before you get rid of us. And we sort of had a bit of a laugh about it, but it's making sure that you take every single person, whether they are the managing partner or a graduate or an architect or an interior designer on that same journey and sort of cater for their different learning speed. So day to day, it is working with IT to make sure that our hardware is up and running and it's efficient and we've got laptops on order and all these sorts of things during a laptop crisis worldwide or a hardware crisis. It's also then making sure that on the flip side with our projects, hey, we have a really big data deliverable on this project. Are the design technology team across that? Are they sort of managing that? So it's sort of I spend a lot of time jumping between those 2 camps.

C And also, I suppose the 3rd sort of camp I like to say is just that people camp as well. You wanna make sure that you're still tapping into people's emotions and not just driving them with technology. I think technology really makes people tired at times. Even myself, I find sometimes when I leave the office and get on the bus, I just I can't look at my phone or I just I can't look at another screen for a few minutes. So make sure that we just don't overload people with too much. It's just a balancing act.

A I think that's a good point. And I and I feel like a bit of the subplot on this is really exploring the idea of, you know, having a focused group and a leader around technology. It's not something that firms needed, you know, not too long ago. But now I feel like there's

C kind

A of a really serious demand on everybody's, work operations that requires that. So whether it's being outsourced or it's something that you build in house, you need people who are leading and thinking about the technology of the practice.

C Definitely. Yeah. I look, III mean, I that's where I work, so I wholeheartedly agree. I'm a little bit biased. But no, look, I I do agree. I think that there's so like, when I look at a project in any 1 of our studios, it's it's using and let's speak really broadly. It's it's probably using 20 to 30 different softwares to deliver that, and that might be Adobe through to Revit, through to Rhino, SketchUp, like a OneDrive or whatever it might be to transfer information. Who's managing all of that? Who's educating people on that? Who's supporting those platforms? And also who's strategizing where those platforms are in 12 months, 24 months time? And I think you're right.

C I think once upon a time, it didn't need you didn't need to have that role. It was sort of you you sort of turn up and and and use your computer and and sort of the IT guys take care of it. But even from design technology and IT, that those 2 strategies need to talk to each other simultaneously to really get the most out of or the most benefit for a practice.

A I also wanna talk about the scale because you're doing it at a pretty large scale. You're looking at a team of you said it's, it's a 150, and you guys are off across multiple locations. So that adds to the complexity. What does that look like in terms of that reach?

C Look. It it's really tricky. So we I would say Melbourne's a bigger studio. So Victoria, there's about, I would say, sort of 70 design based staff down there. I'm based in New South Wales, so it's tricky sometimes to get the support down there. We're actually looking for a design technology specialist in that studio. Because what happens is with with no visible leadership in terms of training support, whatever it might be for technology, and because with the industry is so busy and and your design deadlines never stop. Right? It's sort of sometimes you will find projects just fall back into that, hey.

C Just do whatever you need to do to get it done, and we will get out of here at 4 o'clock for for a Friday afternoon drink or or whatever it might be. And before you know it, those shortcuts become, in inverted commas, efficiencies. And then before you know it, you're sort of maybe negatively impacting a project, deliverable. So there's definitely complexity, in terms of that scale. In terms of having team members in every studio, I I've come to learn in my sort of short 15 year career, personality is key. You can teach anyone software skills and technology skills, but in a technology role as a trainer, you've got to have that right personality to be able to have have someone come to you at 4:55 on a Friday afternoon. Absolutely, almost on on the verge of tears, and you've got to be able to talk them down and calm them down and say, hey. We will we'll we'll fix it.

C We'll get your deadline sorted. It's okay. So soft skills, I think, in in a technology environment are just absolutely paramount.

B I think a lot of people would find that last sentence pretty interesting with the shift to soft skills. Yeah. Especially on the technology side. I it's it's not something that I mean, it's something that you often talk about from a people management side, but, the technology later and the soft skills is is really interesting.

C You look it it took me a long time at the start of my career to to

E understand that soft skills side. I was like, what do you mean soft skills? Like, I this is what I

C interact with with every person you you come across. Right? And how what's the lasting with with every person you you come across. Right? And how what's the lasting impression you leave with them, when you've you've sort of helped them along their way in terms of what they were needing to do? I I think yeah. III fell into that trap early on where I was like, oh, soft skills, no. That that don't really matter. Whereas, I suppose, coming out of COVID, there's been such a focus on mental health, soft skills. I've I've completely I'm converted. Soft skills are everything.

B So moving on over back over to Christina and as an you know, a younger person in the field who is a lot a lot of people would say, you know, still has a lot to learn.

D That's an understatement.

B So what are important areas or what are areas that you feel that you need the most support? Especially if you think back to the first, you know, 2, 3 months that you had at Greypucksand.

D Mhmm. When it comes to being a grad, like, reality is you do get a lot of the documentation side of the job. So I am very much lucky to, you know, work at GP where, you know, we have a really good team to help support us in that. But just in general, like, I feel like as a grad, your your abilities to adapt to from, like, what you've learned at uni as opposed to act in an actual legitimate firm is, like, vastly different. So I think, like, coming from university where, you know, you're able to, I don't know, do assignments and do certain things that are, like, according to your design, like, your own thinking, whatever that may be, coming into a firm where you have a legitimate client and things change and they want deadlines now and certain things like that. So coming into a firm, you're just yeah. You're just kind of in a environment where you are meant to adapt and learn really, really quickly, in, yeah, in most of your projects.

A Yeah. I was curious, and both of you can chime in on this, but what are some of the typical areas that you are often seeing your team coming for support, especially related to technology?

C It's an interesting 1. I think it's normally around the software that we're using to deliver projects. So it's really funny. We've been talking or I've been talking with with a few colleagues and just people in the industry around digital natives versus digital immigrants, And we're getting these guys and girls coming in from yeah. I know. That sounds really like basically, it's people that grew up in analog era versus Spotify era. Right? And it's funny, like, even even some of these guys and girls that are coming in from from universities and colleges and education sort of institutes, they can do amazing things with with technology, but some of the basic underlying principles are not taught. So I think where we're seeing at the moment is they've got this really good design knowledge, and they've been taught design principles really well.

C But in terms of actually getting that sort of maybe out of their head onto paper or onto a into a software, that's probably where it's falling down a little bit. And I think that's probably just a symptom of the industry's move so far with major platforms like your Revit or your Sketchups or whatever they might be. That they've got in house practices, best industry user guidelines, and all these different ways of doing things. You can't possibly expect a graduate to learn every which way, and and every platform before they they enter the industry.

A I totally agree. It's interesting because we just interviewed Slantus, which, they're a technology company that is very focused on similar conversations around skill building and and using Revit and documentation. And we had a similar discussion about this learning gap that happens when you come out and you start your career and it clashes with the demand of the industry really dramatically. Like, the the idea of the practitioner is that we've got a deadline. We gotta get it done. It needs to be accurate. We'll try to teach you, but we also need you to run with us while we

C Yeah.

A Try to deliver this project.

C Yep.

A And I think for the new graduate or even people who may have left practicing and are coming back to it, there might be a learning curve that you have to go through. And so I wanted to talk to you both about how do you address that learning curve? And, and Christina, maybe you can start by telling us so far, like from your experience, what have been helpful things that have happened that have helped you kinda address that learning curve?

D Well, I feel like for me, I'm I'm quite lucky in terms of I I went to a design college that was actually quite progressive. They they changed their curriculum quite a lot to adapt to, just industry standards. Like, I know a lot of I have a lot of friends who did architecture at quite, like, I would say, like, well renowned, like, universities in Australia, and none of them really had the skill that I had once I graduated because my college was so, they they just considered that a priority to adapt and to teach us the industry standards at the moment. So I think coming into Affirm, even though I would say I learned a little bit more than the average, you know, architect leaving, I don't know, like, University of Sydney or whatnot, it's still, like, I feel like everyone, you come into Affirm, everyone's running towards a deadline, and I'm merely learning how to walk. Do you know what I mean? So it's kinda like it's kinda like you just get this shock, and you're they they pop you onto a project, and everyone's still, like, working towards this thing. And you're just like, what is going on? I'm genuinely confused. But, again, like, the support that you have from people around you is what helps you move forward. And, yeah, for sure, that's kind of my experience in the last couple months.

C And I definitely see that as well. Like, I I think I've been thinking about this sort of term, like, productively curious, and I feel like you get these grads that turn up starry eyed into a practice, and it's like running into a brick wall at 20 kilometers an hour. It's like, no. We don't need your curiosity. We need you to deliver. And I think that's that's I I kinda think that's a bit unfair because it's sort of like all these skills that you've amassed and that you're starting to learn right at the side of your career, and then it's sort of like, no. No. No.

C We need you to just jump in here and just churn, churn, churn. Like, I I think that's if you if we start going off track, I think that's what starts to lead towards, like, a brain drain out of the industry and why you get people leaving to go to to prop tech companies and to start ups and and things like that. I I think we really need to show a bit more care for people entering the industry or reentering the industry as well, that might have been out. We we recently had someone that came back after sort of a 10 year breakout, and I I think we don't show enough I'm not caution is the wrong word. Care around these people and say, hey. Things have actually changed a fair bit while you've been studying or while you've been away, and we wanna support you, getting up to speed. I think I think more often than not and I think, Christina, you you might be able to sort of chime in here as well. I think when we have new starters, for example, I sit down with them and give them a a pretty in-depth induction around our systems and our platforms and so on.

C And then straightaway, they put onto a project, and it's like, see you later. You're off and running. And it's like, hang on. Like, what's the project? What's the value? How much fee have we got for this stage? Like, there's no it's just straight into it. And I I think that that elevates the stress and sort of takes the shine off. It, yeah, pulls the rose tinted glasses off fairly early.

D A 100%.

A But it seems like, in your studio that James is someone you guys can go to to ask questions. Have you tapped into using him as a resource?

D Oh, all the time. I, I would just randomly call James and be like, hey. I don't know how to do this. Can you help me? And, yeah, we know that he'll always be there, and there is a team behind him as well. Like, I feel like there's always someone that we can call out to if 1 person is busy, because I assume James is on a ton of different meetings and also trying to everyone else is trying to contact him as well. So, yeah, it's it's very much helpful to have a team behind him.

B Yeah. What's interesting to me about this conversation is for me, almost and this is a little bit off topic, but it almost goes back to this business model of we need people to fill billable hours, and the pipeline is so full and we're busy. And then somewhere in there, everyone's like, oh, but architects, we run off an apprenticeship model of, like, teaching and learning. And those 2 things just don't don't work in in the contemporary context anymore. So I don't know. I'm almost wondering to myself out loud, you know, when you onboard a new person, you should, you know, set aside at least an x percentage amount of their time to overhead to just to actually help make them more successful at the end of their 1st year by setting them up successfully and taking that time rather than just throwing them in.

C Agreed. I I think there's there's still a mind shift or a mindset shift that needs to take place there because it's straight away you're absolutely right. As soon as you get in the door, bang, you're billable hours. And and I think that's where we sort of the industry falls down a little bit is we've got to accept a little bit of overhead to make people feel more comfortable in the environment, feel ready to tackle a project with a certain software or whatever it might be. And I think again as well, even having that sort of having a team where it's like we we've got people that will put their hand up. As I was saying sort of earlier, if you put your hand up and you wanna you wanna help out on something, we're incredibly supportive. We need people to build content and and build furniture for for some of our renders. And people would put their hands up and they're like and the sometimes the practice will be like, oh, but that's where does that time go? I'm like, stop, guys.

C We need to not have this conversation. Like, that chair will be used 50 more times afterwards or or a 100 more times afterwards. Just give me an hour of non billable for it now. It's that that mind shift is is so deeply ingrained in our industry that it's it's build wells or bust, and I think it really needs to shift away from that.

A So I wanted to dive into that more and ask you, James, like, what's your vision for how the architecture firm can fill that role in terms of providing education to people and in order to help the project actually be more successful, not just as a drain on non billable time.

C Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Exact yeah. So non billable time, it's and everything I I try to do, I try to be as efficient as possible. So what we do and and as Christina pointed out, we might have I might have people turn up to my desk and ask me a question or give me a call on Teams if I I'm sort of not in the studio. But what we do is we make sure that we have several platforms and a bunch of information around the practice available at the click of a button, essentially. So we much like sort of any other practice, we have sort of a central intranet, where there is a ton of every training recording I've ever run, how to use OneDrive, how to start a new project in Revit, how to link Rhino to Revit.

C All those sorts of things are recorded and put up there, and people can watch them in their own time wherever they might be. We have a bunch of documents as well. So I think going back to that sort of soft skill conversation, use you have to understand how to or you have to understand that people learn differently in different ways and at different speeds. So whilst 1 person might love to sit there and read a step by step instructional guide with images, Someone else just wants to jump onto a video and be able to fast forward and backtrack and go forwards and whatever it is. So having all of those different mediums there, there might be online courses. Like we've built courses based off YouTube channels or LinkedIn Learning, all these different platforms. You've got to cater to everyone. I mean, there's there's a mountain of work there, but once you put that foundation in, you can sort of point people to the right direction and say, hey.

C Go check out this video or go read this guide, and at the end of it, come back and and ask me a question if you you still need support. You never want to take the personal side out of it. As much as we I love to talk about technology. You still like to be a person and be able to say, hey. Come and talk to me. Don't just go off into the ether. You wanna make sure that people still feel they've got your support as a person and you're not just gonna direct them to a YouTube channel every time they they have a question.

D What do

A you think is most challenging about teaching technology skills to architects and designers?

C For me, it's probably the breadth of content that we have to teach, how much we have to teach it, and just the this the audience size. Right? Whenever I work with design technology specialists on my team, I always sort of remind them, you are gonna have to train on this 1 topic 50 times, and you're gonna have to repeat and repeat and repeat and repeat all with a smile on your face because it's not gonna be relevant to everyone at the same time. Like, Christina might be working on on, like, a computational script for a facade earlier in the year in January, but another person in another studio might be doing the same thing in December, 12 months later. You're gonna have to support both of those people on exactly the same workflow, but just months apart. And you might tap into Christine or someone that's done in the past and say, hey, can I link you up with this person? They're going through a similar sort of issue. But I think what sort of maybe keeps me awake at night is just I would love a breather. I would love, like, all of these technology companies to be like, we're gonna take a year off so everyone can catch up and all the software developers to just stop, because there there's just I mean, learning never stops. You will learn whether you're a graduate coming into the practice this week or whether you are returning to industry after a 10 year break or 20 year break.

C There's always something to learn and I suppose it's just how do you keep that momentum, but also how do you not hit saturation point? That's also something I'm really, really critical of. I always cringe when I have to send like an old company email because I'm just like, oh god, I'm sure that's just going straight to someone's trash and they're not going to read it. And, like, rightly so sometimes. It's just like, I just we want to stop. We don't want to hear any more about technology, but I don't know. How do you keep that education going, but at a healthy healthy level, it's tricky.

B So what I'm hearing you say, James, is you don't like the fact that all these companies moved to SaaS model, and you want them back on DVDs that you download. Or your, like, CDs that you get, like, every once a year.

C No. No. Don't worry. III love I love Sass. I love I love the Sass model, but it's just yeah. When when, as we touched on earlier, when you're when you're using 20 or 30 different softwares to deliver over the life of a project, and that might be sort of like different script packages in Grasshopper or different add ins in in Revit. There's a there's just so much training content that goes into that and so much support. And I think that's probably where I've I've had discussions in the past with firms I've worked for and even Great Park soon.

C Like, you could easily employ someone 5 days a week just purely on training. Purely on training, nothing else. But I mean, that that that overhead conversation again rears its head. So it's, yeah, it's incredibly tricky to balance. And then I suppose with all those software companies that do release product updates, 4 or 5 updates a year, like it's yeah. It's never ending. It's fun, but it's never ending.

B Christina, is there anything so, obviously, you said you had a very kind of you were happy with with uni and where it led you to, but is there anything that you wish uni would have prepared you better for?

D I feel like well, I know for me, my experience at uni was quite good. I think there's definitely with with I have a lot of friends who did architecture and interior design and stuff, and they haven't had the best experience themselves. But a lot of that is genuinely because they feel like they are not prepared. Because, like, I I feel like uni is really good at preparing you to think conceptually, the design thinking, everything that you you feel like you're gonna do on the job. But reality is when you when you job when you work, it's different. So, yeah, I think uni in preparing us to, like, have that technical knowledge, I I know a lot of unis that still use Rhino and use SketchUp just to to get that knowledge going technically, but, yeah, when when we were doing, like, Revit at uni, that was definitely very, very helpful. Even, like because when I was at Billy Blue, we were doing, like, Enscape. So things that people are using in the industry is very much, what I enjoyed the most.

D And, yeah, I think it's just, like, the reality of uni and then coming into a firm for sure is something that I think is important.

A I have a question for both of you, but like kind of different for both of your perspectives in the firm. So James, I'm curious, what recommendations would you have to architects and designers who are facing that continuous technology learning wall, or curve or whatever? I don't know what metaphor comes to mind for you and how to manage that in addition to their deadlines. And then, Christina, what advice would you give to people who are managing people at your level in terms of helping to improve their learning experience in the firm as they're on these really tough deadlines?

C I would just urge people to be productively curious. Right? Not everyone wants to be involved in knowing the latest technology trends and and all these sorts of things. Like, some people just love design, and and that's perfectly okay. Some people love interiors. Some people love architecture. Some people love technology. But I think it's coming together and understanding the different perspectives of those groups. So I think instead of just having your your technology team just sort of saying, hey.

C You need to do this. You need to do this. You need to do this. Be a little bit more curious and say, well, actually, you know what? Like, what can I do differently on my next project that might be a bit more efficient? I I don't think I've just trying to think. I don't think I've ever really seen, like, a lessons learned sort of scenario ever work really well. I I feel like we're we're and I'd say again, the general we are sort of really bad at looking back and saying, well, actually, what didn't didn't work well on that project. I feel like we sort of, are too busy. There's another deadline, and we're onto another project, and there's no time to really take stock and say, hey.

C How can we actually deliver that more effectively, or how can we use a different software to be more efficient or whatever it might be? So I think, yeah, just invest in your in yourself, invest in your your own learning as well. There's always, there'll always be a team of of people there to support you, and I I suppose 1 of the mantras I try to live by is try not to like, I don't ever wanna be the smartest person in the room because otherwise I'm not learning anything. So make sure you reach out to those people around you that know way more than you do and just soak it up in in whatever time you have.

D Yeah. I agree. I feel like with with grads, I think, I feel like I'm speaking for all the grads in the world right now. But, generally, like, if if a manager or or someone above us is just patient, I think that's the most important thing. We were talking about like, earlier, we were talking about, like, a grad coming in and it's like everyone else is running. The the fact is that a thing for a grad would usually take a little bit longer than it would for a mid level or even a junior. So I think just patience for from us. Mhmm.

D We're all still learning. I think it's also a thing for a grad to do is to just be adaptable to everything. People will come up to you and you know that they're being legitimate, they're being supportive, and sometimes the harsh words are actually a good thing. I actually had a mentor here at GP kind of be like, look. I know you came into the firm thinking you're gonna design everything, but reality is we need you on schedules. So, yeah, that's just something that you feel like it's something that you come into a firm, you're like, okay, I have to adapt. Everyone here is really nice and I know they they want what's best for me and their patience actually helps me move forward instead of freak out and burn out from all the things that I learned in my 1st week.

C Yeah. Yeah. I do think, yeah, practice I think practices really have to nurture that mentality and nurture those those grads to help them grow. And not just grads, nurture anyone. Everyone is learning no matter whether you've been in a practice for 1 week or 10 years. I I think practices really have to think about what is their approach to learning and development. Because more often than not, I think when, I don't know, when push comes to shove, maybe those sorts of budgets are the first things to maybe get cut or maybe go on hold or, especially when people when there are big projects that come in or deadlines, of course, learning and development goes on hold. But I I think that's a really for me, personally, I that's a really important part of a culture and probably that's what attracted me 3 years ago to to Great Park Sand.

C They're focused on learning and development and, hey, if you put your hand up, we will absolutely support you, in in what you wanna learn.

A James, I feel like you and I had some really good conversations offline about the future of practice, and I just wanna tap into any additional thoughts that you wanted to share with us about things that you're getting excited about? What are you what are you trying to work towards?

C Yeah. How much time have you got? It's yeah, like, there's I don't know. I I feel like there's there's so much out there. We have to be sort of very targeted in in what we're approaching. I mean, look, personally, I'm I'm really excited about the the artificial intelligence, stuff that's happening. I feel like that's gathering momentum again. I'm really interested to see how architects start adapting towards that. Look, generative design gets gets a bit of a bashing in the media, in terms of, like, sort of how it works and and what it's actually putting forward.

C We've I've seen these studies where they're just like, oh, look. We took a park bench and and applied generative design, and it just looks crazy. And it looks like it's using 10 times more material than what it actually needs. So I'm interested to see where that goes over the next few years. I know there's a lot of lot of work out there in terms of just how they're sort of placing buildings on-site and maximizing constraints and and automating those sorts of things. So I think probably the biggest thing I'm excited about is the AI. But in terms of calling it artificial intelligence, I'd probably step back and call it augmented intelligence because I really am excited about seeing designers work with computers and technology more to get much more efficiency out of their projects. That look.

C Automation is always exciting. I I feel I I feel like if we can make any of the processes if if we can remove 5 mouse clicks from a process for our for our designers on projects, that's that's a huge win. I and I think automation will continue to be a focus just as as fees and margins stay low and as there's sort of shortages and and things on-site, yeah, I think automation and AI would be the 2 big things that I'm excited about and that we're we're sort of looking towards as a practice and how that's gonna impact us. I'd rather be ahead of it than trying to trying to catch up. And I think, actually, the other 1 would be sustainability. I think even Christina and I were talking about that the the other day. Like, are we even I I think I mentioned embodied carbon, to someone in in the office the other day, and they were like, what's that? And that just sort of, in a nutshell, sort of just rounded out my thinking of, like, well, like, are we are we talking about this enough? Like, material selection, is that even sort of a discussion around embodied carbon and and sustainability at a at a education level, right through to practice. How how are we really equipping our businesses today to make sure there's an industry tomorrow to work in? They they that's something that I'm excited about and working for.

B I wanna twist the question a little bit, but then throw it back out to Christina to say, you know, what what are you most excited about in terms of the future of your career in this profession?

D I mean, I'm happy with any project that gets thrown at me, but, I think just seeing how the industry is, like, constantly changing. And, again, like, well that I feel like I could learn and, well everyone could really learn about and I think the industry is definitely going in that direction. So, yeah, that's definitely 1 of the most exciting things about the firm, like, sorry, the firm, the, industry that I really wanna learn more about, get to know, like, again, the materials, how we can adapt our design to be more sustainable for the world and all that kind of stuff. I think as a grad, you just you just want to be part of it. So I think just putting my hand up and and, again, like, James, what were you saying? It's, like, productive

C Productively curious.

D Productively curious. I want to be productively curious, in anything that I do. So yeah.

A I guess I'm also wondering just like any recommendations on the technology front. I mean, there's so many different tools and resources out there. Is there a technology stack that you're really excited about, or are you do you not have, like, bias against different technology?

C No. Look. IIII mean, look. We we are I I try to position ourselves or myself as platform agnostic. So I I try to, yeah, treat everything equally. I mean, that that's part of r and d and bringing new technology in. Right? It I might have a favorite, but I I always try to step back and be like, right. There's 3 here.

C We need to evaluate all of these. So look. There's right now, there's nothing I'm sort of really looking at in terms of bringing in, but there's a lot happening out there. There's, I mean, there's rumblings on Twitter about Revit replacements and all this crazy sort of talk, and I'm like, don't get excited. Don't get excited. Don't get excited. So I you just I don't know. Sometimes it's it's I I sort of am in 1 of those little sit back moments where I'm just sitting back to see what happens because I feel like the next maybe 24 months, there could be some really big shifts, start to take place.

C So I'm just sort of, yeah, keeping an eye out and seeing what's happening and making sure we're ready to jump when we need to.

A Interesting. Yeah. Revit replacement. That that triggers a lot of thoughts.

C Oh, I'm sure it will. Yeah. I it's it's an interesting concept. IIII personally don't know how that will what what will happen there, how it will happen if it will happen, But there seems to be there's talk out there. There's I mean, I suppose that comes back to automation and and things like that. There's a lot of platforms out there that are really pushing into different sectors or different parts of your design process. I don't think necessarily there'll be a Revit replacement, but I feel and this is probably where the stress comes back in. I feel there will be more softwares for for designers to use to deliver in a process.

A Yeah. I agree.

B I mean, on that front, to me, I I rare and we talked about this earlier in the season. I've rarely met an architecture firm who fully utilizes the full capability of Revit. Yeah. So I do feel like there's a lot of inverse happening where there's actually people coming out with, like, lighter weight versions that architects need. So Yeah. That aren't as expensive as the entire suite. But then, again, we're not using the entire, the power of of of the software itself.

C Yeah. And look, I I suppose that comes back to the whole this whole conversation around training and education. We we have some people that are phenomenal in SketchUp and Rhino, and some people that are phenomenal in massing in Revit. So some of our projects are Revit from day 1 to to day end. Some other projects actually go through that sort of multi software approach or multi platform approach. So I I suppose it's yeah. It's a tricky 1. I I've I don't know.

C I'm just really interested to see what happens in the next few years because I I feel like some and rightly so, I feel like some people hit sort of just technology exhaustion when it comes to to what do you mean I've gotta use another software to do this 1 task? Like, why can't I do it in in this software, or what do you mean I've gotta do it for this project? It's you can sort of understand how it gets a bit a bit frustrating for for the industry to to have to pick up and and multi tool. I mean, there is no 1 tool that does it all, but when you keep throwing tools at designers and there's another thing to learn, yeah, that saturation point for education becomes a critical factor.

A Yeah. I definitely I feel that all the time. I guess to close out the conversation, I wanted to come back to any final thoughts you guys either of you have about best practices for elevating conversations on technology and mentorship and practice. I think 1 other last thought that we haven't really covered is this kind of push pull between individual career growth and the project delivery. And I'm, I'm just wondering if there are any ideas that come to mind on how to kind of balance those 2 needs.

C Look. I think for for building out support, I I think in my mind, it's sort of twofold. I think it's it's incredibly important. Once your practice reaches a certain size and there are those conversations that start around having specific roles for design technology support, I I think that's really important. And I think, look, I think the biggest 1 and and we sort of touched on it before is that I think practices really need to come into the conversation and and support not only support embedding design technology teams into practices, but support, their use and their how they work with designers. They've got to support designers in terms of their career growth. In terms of how you balance project delivery and and career growth, I I suppose that's the the never ending struggle. Right? It's yeah.

C There's only so many hours in a day, and you always wanna sort of take care of yourself learning, but there's also your work to do as well. It's I I don't know. I think it's, that's that's life balance. Right? Yeah. I just think you've got a balance. I I don't know. Personally, I try to have 1 day a week where I just sort of put a few hours aside to do my own learning and development, and then the rest of the time is sort of spent supporting other people's learning and development. I just I I feel like I feel like if you don't carve out your own time, it'll get carved out for you on a project or on something else.

C So I I think you've you've gotta take care of the me to take care of the we.

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