Comments on: 76% of Architects Practices are fewer than 10 people

By: Looking for in an Architect for your Home – What, Why and How — Just Practising

Looking for in an Architect for your Home – What, Why and How — Just Practising — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 16:21:38 +0000

[...] UK architects practices comprise between 1 and 10 people, many being in the 3-5 band. Conventionally you will have one or two fully qualified architects on [...]

By: su

su — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 10:23:09 +0000

Hi Darragh,
Thanks for commenting.
You’ve hit upon a difficult dilemma for architects in small practice. How do they maintain their professional responsibility without burning out trying to do everything?

Nevertheless, architects who manage to grow beyond 5 or 6 staff must have some way of not doing everything themselves.

In my experience success in growing your practice depends upon developing a relationship of trust with all your partners and employees. Trust which accepts that different participants each have something to offer which you might be able to do yourself, but which, with the right support, they can do better, and more efficiently, than you can.

By: Maggie Langley

Maggie Langley — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 10:20:51 +0000

“Only the actual typing can be outsourced or delegated. . .” It was not my intention to imply someone in an administrative support role should write professional industry specific communications. You say that “much of what an Architect writes” needs to be drafted by a professional. It’s worth noting that not all communications require industry specific expertise. I agree that you should draft your own correspondence, but if you don’t type 70+ words per minute, you may find it faster to dictate your professional correspondence on your smartphone and email it to a Virtual Assistant to type, return to you by email for corrections, print on letterhead and post for you.

The whole purpose of outsourcing administrative tasks is to give you more time to focus on what you’re good at and ensuring you use your professional skills as much as possible during your work day. For example, email is an enormous time eater. The constant flow of new emails can distract you from the billable work you should be concentrating on. Using IMAP, a Virtual Assistant can organise your incoming emails into folders, like ACTION TODAY, ACTION, READ, DELETE?, etc. You can then read your emails at set times during the day, starting by checking your ACTION TODAY folder, then your ACTION folder then if you have time looking in your READ folder. Maybe you’re already disciplined at managing the time you spend on emails. From my experience, most people spend far too much time each day responding to emails. Even if your Virtual Assistant only saved you 30 minutes a day, that’s an extra 2.5 extra billable hours each week to get more done.

Truth be told, some people don’t like delegating work. Outsourcing isn’t for everyone, but it can help busy professionals feel more organised and get more done.

By: Darragh

Darragh — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 18:30:16 +0000

“You mentioned that architects in small practices are often doing everything including time intensive administrative tasks like answering the phone and preparing and sending letters. It always makes me sad to hear of highly qualified and professional people wasting their time and talent completing administrative tasks. Outsource admin to a Virtual Assistant. With a Virtual Assistant helping, architects will do less paperwork and earn more money!”

much of what an Architect writes in day to day correspondence has multiple potential consequences. They must draft every word meticulously. Only the actual typing can be outsourced or delegated to those who are unaware of the potential / financial complications which may result from careless correspondence

By: Best Architecture Engineering and Construction Social Media Blog — Just Practising

Mon, 21 Feb 2011 14:06:28 +0000

[...] 76% of Architects Practices are fewer than 10 people [...]

By: UK Architects Practices increase but sizes shift – RIBA — Just Practising

UK Architects Practices increase but sizes shift – RIBA — Just Practising — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 12:46:21 +0000

[...] year I wrote about the breakdown of practice sizes recorded by the RIBA in 2008 which showed that 76% of chartered firms (about half of all UK architects practices) had fewer than [...]

By: su

su — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 12:31:04 +0000

Hi Emma, The statistics are published by the RIBA Practice Department and represent the UK's RIBA Chartered practices. I'm reproducing them here with permission. You can find out more about the RIBA Practice Department here.

By: emma

emma — Sat, 24 Apr 2010 22:01:21 +0000

hi,

just wondered where you got the statistics from?

By: Dhiran Vagdia

Dhiran Vagdia — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 06:39:45 +0000

Absolutely Su.

In the meantime, RIBA Members can check out https://members.architecture.com/login/login.asp – log in, and then access the Toolkits.

Members are also welcome to drop our Regional Office a line on 0121 233 2321, and speak to our Regional Director with specific enquiries. Help is out there! If it’s not, let me know and we’ll work on it!

By: su

su — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 12:18:53 +0000

Hi Dhiran,
Would you be willing to collaborate in putting together some links to useful RIBA resources like these? I’m happy to publish them, perhaps in a side bar widget.
Su