Nothing spells out how disconnected the architectural profession has become more than the lunchtime CPD.
CPDs (Continuous Professional Development) are required by the RIBA ( Royal Institute for British Architects) , and in principle, they are a commendable endeavour to ensure that the profession keeps ahead of the times and that architects do not rest on their laurels. The RIBA outlines a relatively balanced array of themes for these CPDs that attempts to be exhaustive but doesn’t really hit the mark. This is exacerbated by how the profession implements them and this is why CPDs have become the bane of the architectural discipline:
On one hand, These CPDs have been used by the architectural profession today to disproportionately focus architects’ attention on matters that can be done far better by subcontractors and trade specialists like basement waterproofing or concrete mixes: Why are CPDs on finishes, materials and trends so few and far between? How come we have no CPDs on psychology where we are taught to read people and tap into their desires so we can provide them with the spaces that even they did not know they wanted? Why do we not have CPDs on communication where we learn the vernacular of our clients, whether it is developers, families, communities or pension funds? Why do we not have CPDs on branding and how our work can have a recognisable brand to it? Why do we not have CPDs on business development and networking? Financial models of architecture? Leadership and management? The list goes on.
On the other hand, these CPDs end up purloining more of our free time. In fact, there is an unhealthy obsession in the profession with colonising the time of employees. There is an undeniable pressure on architects to relinquish their time to their profession. People are expected to burn the midnight oil and spend most of their waking and not-so waking hours working. The only reprieve may be the lunch break which is sacrosanct for me. It is where I get to recharge and leave the office to go places for food, coffee and perhaps a walk. This is where the lunchtime CPD kicks in. Not satisfied with monopolising most of our waking hours, the profession, like a possessive partner, goes out of its way to try to claw even more of our time.
But what is the point really? Are we making more money or have we managed to increase our fees as a result? There is a blatant dissonance between working hours and productivity. Do all these hours spent trawling basement details and MEP service penetrations through blockwork walls translate to monetary gain? Have people in the profession stopped and questioned their working methodology or why they do what they do? No.
I am militant about my work-life balance not because I have children or obligations but because I believe it makes me a far better designer. We are an incredibly social discipline that permeates everyone’s life in some shape or form. We also belong to a larger class of creative industry. The design industry is one of the pillars of the British economy since deindustrialisation in the 1980s and yet architects insist on missing out and stunting their own role within this design industry. How can we be better architects if we do not go out to the theatre or the cinema or to restaurants, bars or cafes? I learn far more on space, narrative, lighting and technology from watching a production by Frantic Assembly than I would in a CPD on the acoustic properties of drylining. How can we keep a finger on the pulse if we are not abreast with trends around us in real estate, economy, music, fashion? How are we expected to be able communicators if we do not socialise and rub shoulders with friends and their friends and their friends who may push a project our way? People pay a premium for the services that we provide yet we refuse to embrace that and cling on to production. Knowing how to detail basement waterproofing will not win us work, yet in a profession hellbent on monopolising our time with joyless tasks which can be better done by trade specialists and sub-contractors and increasingly by AI, we are at risk of breeding a generation of socially-awkward, insular and uninspired individuals.
But hey ho, at least lunch is provided (sometimes) and a Pret sandwich is worth squandering our free time for.
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