there should be no mistake other than those made by Principals and project managers of firms. i say this because everybody else should have a network and suport structure in the office that would check the work being produced. if not, then that still is a mistake by the principal for not having a verifyable check system in a profession that is highly litigious, technically challenging and bearing great amounts of risk. I say only Principals and project managers (they might even be off this list) only because generally they're only accountable to themselves and the firm and nobody really checks their work.
i screwed up head heights on stairs in one of our townhomes. oops. don't know how much it cost but people weren't happy!
oh well the are done and selling!!
d-dog...that is really only true in a large firm. i personally love working in a small firm and i am responsible for the project. my boss "looks" at it about one every2-4 wks. the way i figure it we should be responsible for our own work...look over it, check it, etc... one thing i have learned about the profession in my 12 yrs...there are a system of checks and balances but NO ONE really uses them. contractors are supposed to check our work when the bid it...they don't, then each sub should ask questions regarding issues they see...but now in this litigious society the only person with something on paper is US!!!
hence the most important part of our insurance...O&E! (omissions and errors)
loosen up...you have made mistakes and so has EVERY ONE ELSE.
there is no safety net in real life! just hope it doesn't hurt too bad when you fall!
Even in firms with very regimented, multi-step checking systems things still get through. Have you ever had friends proofread your resume or portfolio and still realized later that there are a few typos? I have, and I've experienced a similar, larger scale phenomenon with the quality control processes in architecture firms. Some things will always get through, no matter how many checklists and how many pairs of eyes are utilized to try to prevent it...
To date the biggest mistakes for which I am personally responsible - at least those I'm aware of - have been things like grab bars of the wrong lengths and incorrect door clearances due to differences in various state code addendums (I've moved from place to place a bit too often I guess.)
But I've seen lots of much more major stuff get through even in large firms with dedicated quality control staff and sometimes even when outside consultants are used to check and verfity plans.
not my mistake but i worked in a firm doing a 51-story hi-rise and there was a large structural beam going horizontally right through the fire stairs. i guess the structural engineers made the mistake and the project architect in our firm didn't catch it...don't know what they did about that...
i've so far managed to avoid dollar value type mistakes for 3 years.
but i did manage a god-awful printing error last week that awarded me the distinction of "the worst set ever".
and no, principals can't be responsible fr everything. if that were true, there would be an unbridgable gap between principals/project managers and the people below them. it's your responsibility to get someone to check your work if you're unsure of it.
i still stand by my original statement. principals are ultimately responsible for work going out of the office. you'll only get fired if you screw up. they won't sue you because the flashing leg on a window detail wasn't long enough and wind driven rain soaked the wall.
i've worked in both large and small firms and have always been 'responsible' for my work. i check it very diligently. currently i'm the one checking the documents first, then i ask a more senior 'technical' guy to do a QAQC before sending out. even still, if i mess up, they just fire me, the principal (and ultimately the firm) is responsible for the quality of the set.
That's true. As an employee you'll never get sued unless you did something illegal and/or malicious.
But if you get "just fired" over a big enough mistake, at a stage in your career at which you had a major amount of responsibility for this mistake, there may be lasting damage to your career. I worked with a guy who made a fairly high profile, costly mistake as lead designer for a so-called "starchitect." That guy found himself unhirable at any comparable firm doing the kind of work he'd been doing before.
i want to know how responsible are you if your boss told you to do something, i have few responsabilities, but annoying is to be yield for something you were ordered to do, or because one of your bosses didnt explain something,
i have done small mistakes, i gave the dwg set to late to the contractor, he started the dwg with and old one, or a mistake partially mine with the building dept , almost stop the project......
funga: if you're working for someone else, and you're not registered, there's no way you personally would have any liability legally UNLESS you did something deliberately and knowingly wrong. But the perception within your firm and/or with the client and others involved in the project may or may not be that you are to blame. This would really depend on the specifics of the situation and on how your employer handles it.
Clearly if you did exactly what your boss told you to do and it turned out to be wrong this is his fault. Whether anybody ends up thinking it was your fault would depend entirely on whether your boss decides to shoulder the blame or wrongfully pass it off onto you.
If you're being blamed for something that wasn't explained clearly to you then there may be different perceptions of blame there - for instance your supervisors may feel (right or wrong though they may be) that you should have a clear understanding of whatever the issue was by this point in your career, or they may feel that you didn't listen carefully...
These sorts of differences of opinions and perceptions happen all the time - especially in the heat of a deadline - and you probably shouldn't dwell on them too much unless issues of fault and blame are a constant problem in your firm - in which case you might want to consider whether the problem is due to unrealistic expectations and poor communication on your supervisors' part or whether there is anything you can do to help to prevent these mistakes on your end.
Problems that "almost" stop the project will usually be forgotten pretty quickly as long as they're not tremendously expensive for the firm.
I blew a budget pretty badly on a custom very-designerly interior of a boutique, but the client wanted it and did it exactly as I designed it anyways. I don't know if that makes it a mistake or not.
I tend to always be "increasing scope" but I don't call them mistakes as the client and principal architects have been behind me every time. Maybe that means I'm convincing? Conniving? Perhaps increasing scope is a mistake on my part... I don't know.
if you are working on a project and say you are the designer, you work on the CD's but you have someone else in your office work on the spec's, ALWAYS, ALWAYS check the spec's to make sure they (the spec's) and your CD's are building the same building. We have had little bust here and there on a few projects that call for clear anodized curtain wall systems, and you really intended it to be some color, or a standing seam metal roof (if you are doomed to use it) and the spec's call for standard colors and you need (or want a) premium color (because not everyone wants a friggin' green roof). it is the little things that add up on the contingencies.
i will second Aluminate's sentimate on the liability factor, if your name isn't on it you are legally not responsible, however if it is a big screw up and the boss needs to save face with the client, kiss your job goodbye.
Right out of college I was told to design the railing system for the balcony seating over a competition swimming pool. The owner told me they wanted a cable rail. The project arch wasn't of much help so I did the research and drew up some plans. Being as green as I was I failed to specify guage of the stainless post members. Nobody caught the flaws in shop drawings and the whole railing failed when they put tension on the cables. Cost the firm about $10k and the project arch and proj. mgr both got a good yelling for not checking my work closely. Technically my fault but the checking system should've caught that.
A good epoilouge is that the code didn't allow the cable rail in the first place. No railing that could be climbed. We scrapped the whole thing for a tempered glass railing.
I worked on an outdoor pool In Vancouver BC. Canada where I was the project Arch. The client was a total prick and known to bust the ass of all his consultants and contractors. The whole Winter shut down system was scraped in lieu of a simple "drain plug" to drain the whole pool. The grades didn't really work to the storm without a whole big run of pipe so we brought it to the client and Mech consultant. The mech. consultant said we'll just use a pump but never indicated anything to client and drawings or specs on the winter shut down.
So it was thought to be a freedraing system but the physical design didn't fully drain. That winter it went to -15 C which is cold for Vancouver the pool slab completely cracked. Big screw up, nearly quit the profession over the intense battle with the client and consultants, finally resolved that it had been the Mech. Consultants fault and their drawings showed the errors in grading and we backed it up with some faxes that had directed them to make the changes but they never occured.
Worst profession experience but also the best as I now document everthing and make sure I have a paper trail on all projects for all significant comments, changes and decisions.
Little things here are there...I guess the biggest mistake was with a storefront walled server room. Upon review of shop drawigs I missed that the "sliding doors" had a 5" sill which would prevent the 1200lb server racks from being rolled in. Contractor said the cost would be about 10g to fix. I sat down with the client/boss and admitted to the mistake...I believe my exact words were "I fucked up!" which shut the client up..."there is a simple/inexpensive solution for this and I'm going to find it" sure enough, I got a small storefront co. to put in another set of doors w/out the sill for less than 1g...go figure.
Launching a few dozen whole hams over a fence and into an apartment complex swimming pool, after they were found in the deepest depths of a meat department freezer, 9 months past their expiration and HARD AS A ROCK.
What did it cost the company? Well, they forgot the hams were there for who knows how long so they of course lost money on them. Wasn't my fault though, but I sure enjoyed shot-putting them over a 12' fence.
I have sent e-mails to the wrong person before, in which I talked about the person (not in a bad way, but still) that happend to recieve it. Medium sized oops, no money involved, but wierd.
mistakes happen. just the other day 3 double casement clear alum. milgard windows were delivered to the site along with more windows. now in los angeles there are egress requirements for bedroom windows, that a casement window must have min. 20"w 41ht clear opened area. the units in question were 4' x 5'. well, with center post and frames, i was worrying for awhile for the windows might not make the egress req. from the bedroom. even though i know about this req. while we were placing the order it got lost among other issues. anyway, i just checked with milgard and those windows do have 20" clear opened width. but hey, it could easily be 19"if my size intiution failed and i would be liable to some of the replacement costs and delays. i heard, in last couple days, some architect friends burned from this problem. i made many mistakes but i do less now.
* ps; milgard makes nice aluminum windows in all configurations. prices are very competetive and widely available.
Jun 30, 05 1:01 pm ·
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biggest mistake
what has been your bigest mistake at work, how much it cost the company???
there should be no mistake other than those made by Principals and project managers of firms. i say this because everybody else should have a network and suport structure in the office that would check the work being produced. if not, then that still is a mistake by the principal for not having a verifyable check system in a profession that is highly litigious, technically challenging and bearing great amounts of risk. I say only Principals and project managers (they might even be off this list) only because generally they're only accountable to themselves and the firm and nobody really checks their work.
i screwed up head heights on stairs in one of our townhomes. oops. don't know how much it cost but people weren't happy!
oh well the are done and selling!!
d-dog...that is really only true in a large firm. i personally love working in a small firm and i am responsible for the project. my boss "looks" at it about one every2-4 wks. the way i figure it we should be responsible for our own work...look over it, check it, etc... one thing i have learned about the profession in my 12 yrs...there are a system of checks and balances but NO ONE really uses them. contractors are supposed to check our work when the bid it...they don't, then each sub should ask questions regarding issues they see...but now in this litigious society the only person with something on paper is US!!!
hence the most important part of our insurance...O&E! (omissions and errors)
loosen up...you have made mistakes and so has EVERY ONE ELSE.
there is no safety net in real life! just hope it doesn't hurt too bad when you fall!
Even in firms with very regimented, multi-step checking systems things still get through. Have you ever had friends proofread your resume or portfolio and still realized later that there are a few typos? I have, and I've experienced a similar, larger scale phenomenon with the quality control processes in architecture firms. Some things will always get through, no matter how many checklists and how many pairs of eyes are utilized to try to prevent it...
To date the biggest mistakes for which I am personally responsible - at least those I'm aware of - have been things like grab bars of the wrong lengths and incorrect door clearances due to differences in various state code addendums (I've moved from place to place a bit too often I guess.)
But I've seen lots of much more major stuff get through even in large firms with dedicated quality control staff and sometimes even when outside consultants are used to check and verfity plans.
not my mistake but i worked in a firm doing a 51-story hi-rise and there was a large structural beam going horizontally right through the fire stairs. i guess the structural engineers made the mistake and the project architect in our firm didn't catch it...don't know what they did about that...
what I did is nothing compared to what others did
posting a topic on archinect last month titled "A Pissing Contest (sort of)" which was immediately taken down by the archinect censors
i've so far managed to avoid dollar value type mistakes for 3 years.
but i did manage a god-awful printing error last week that awarded me the distinction of "the worst set ever".
and no, principals can't be responsible fr everything. if that were true, there would be an unbridgable gap between principals/project managers and the people below them. it's your responsibility to get someone to check your work if you're unsure of it.
i still stand by my original statement. principals are ultimately responsible for work going out of the office. you'll only get fired if you screw up. they won't sue you because the flashing leg on a window detail wasn't long enough and wind driven rain soaked the wall.
i've worked in both large and small firms and have always been 'responsible' for my work. i check it very diligently. currently i'm the one checking the documents first, then i ask a more senior 'technical' guy to do a QAQC before sending out. even still, if i mess up, they just fire me, the principal (and ultimately the firm) is responsible for the quality of the set.
That's true. As an employee you'll never get sued unless you did something illegal and/or malicious.
But if you get "just fired" over a big enough mistake, at a stage in your career at which you had a major amount of responsibility for this mistake, there may be lasting damage to your career. I worked with a guy who made a fairly high profile, costly mistake as lead designer for a so-called "starchitect." That guy found himself unhirable at any comparable firm doing the kind of work he'd been doing before.
i want to know how responsible are you if your boss told you to do something, i have few responsabilities, but annoying is to be yield for something you were ordered to do, or because one of your bosses didnt explain something,
i have done small mistakes, i gave the dwg set to late to the contractor, he started the dwg with and old one, or a mistake partially mine with the building dept , almost stop the project......
funga: if you're working for someone else, and you're not registered, there's no way you personally would have any liability legally UNLESS you did something deliberately and knowingly wrong. But the perception within your firm and/or with the client and others involved in the project may or may not be that you are to blame. This would really depend on the specifics of the situation and on how your employer handles it.
Clearly if you did exactly what your boss told you to do and it turned out to be wrong this is his fault. Whether anybody ends up thinking it was your fault would depend entirely on whether your boss decides to shoulder the blame or wrongfully pass it off onto you.
If you're being blamed for something that wasn't explained clearly to you then there may be different perceptions of blame there - for instance your supervisors may feel (right or wrong though they may be) that you should have a clear understanding of whatever the issue was by this point in your career, or they may feel that you didn't listen carefully...
These sorts of differences of opinions and perceptions happen all the time - especially in the heat of a deadline - and you probably shouldn't dwell on them too much unless issues of fault and blame are a constant problem in your firm - in which case you might want to consider whether the problem is due to unrealistic expectations and poor communication on your supervisors' part or whether there is anything you can do to help to prevent these mistakes on your end.
Problems that "almost" stop the project will usually be forgotten pretty quickly as long as they're not tremendously expensive for the firm.
I blew a budget pretty badly on a custom very-designerly interior of a boutique, but the client wanted it and did it exactly as I designed it anyways. I don't know if that makes it a mistake or not.
I tend to always be "increasing scope" but I don't call them mistakes as the client and principal architects have been behind me every time. Maybe that means I'm convincing? Conniving? Perhaps increasing scope is a mistake on my part... I don't know.
if you are working on a project and say you are the designer, you work on the CD's but you have someone else in your office work on the spec's, ALWAYS, ALWAYS check the spec's to make sure they (the spec's) and your CD's are building the same building. We have had little bust here and there on a few projects that call for clear anodized curtain wall systems, and you really intended it to be some color, or a standing seam metal roof (if you are doomed to use it) and the spec's call for standard colors and you need (or want a) premium color (because not everyone wants a friggin' green roof). it is the little things that add up on the contingencies.
i will second Aluminate's sentimate on the liability factor, if your name isn't on it you are legally not responsible, however if it is a big screw up and the boss needs to save face with the client, kiss your job goodbye.
Right out of college I was told to design the railing system for the balcony seating over a competition swimming pool. The owner told me they wanted a cable rail. The project arch wasn't of much help so I did the research and drew up some plans. Being as green as I was I failed to specify guage of the stainless post members. Nobody caught the flaws in shop drawings and the whole railing failed when they put tension on the cables. Cost the firm about $10k and the project arch and proj. mgr both got a good yelling for not checking my work closely. Technically my fault but the checking system should've caught that.
A good epoilouge is that the code didn't allow the cable rail in the first place. No railing that could be climbed. We scrapped the whole thing for a tempered glass railing.
I worked on an outdoor pool In Vancouver BC. Canada where I was the project Arch. The client was a total prick and known to bust the ass of all his consultants and contractors. The whole Winter shut down system was scraped in lieu of a simple "drain plug" to drain the whole pool. The grades didn't really work to the storm without a whole big run of pipe so we brought it to the client and Mech consultant. The mech. consultant said we'll just use a pump but never indicated anything to client and drawings or specs on the winter shut down.
So it was thought to be a freedraing system but the physical design didn't fully drain. That winter it went to -15 C which is cold for Vancouver the pool slab completely cracked. Big screw up, nearly quit the profession over the intense battle with the client and consultants, finally resolved that it had been the Mech. Consultants fault and their drawings showed the errors in grading and we backed it up with some faxes that had directed them to make the changes but they never occured.
Worst profession experience but also the best as I now document everthing and make sure I have a paper trail on all projects for all significant comments, changes and decisions.
i havent made it yet. but its coming.
hey devil i agree that they have the legal responsiblity but if you screw the pooch on something and god knows i have, they can still can yer ass.
Little things here are there...I guess the biggest mistake was with a storefront walled server room. Upon review of shop drawigs I missed that the "sliding doors" had a 5" sill which would prevent the 1200lb server racks from being rolled in. Contractor said the cost would be about 10g to fix. I sat down with the client/boss and admitted to the mistake...I believe my exact words were "I fucked up!" which shut the client up..."there is a simple/inexpensive solution for this and I'm going to find it" sure enough, I got a small storefront co. to put in another set of doors w/out the sill for less than 1g...go figure.
Launching a few dozen whole hams over a fence and into an apartment complex swimming pool, after they were found in the deepest depths of a meat department freezer, 9 months past their expiration and HARD AS A ROCK.
What did it cost the company? Well, they forgot the hams were there for who knows how long so they of course lost money on them. Wasn't my fault though, but I sure enjoyed shot-putting them over a 12' fence.
I have sent e-mails to the wrong person before, in which I talked about the person (not in a bad way, but still) that happend to recieve it. Medium sized oops, no money involved, but wierd.
mistakes happen. just the other day 3 double casement clear alum. milgard windows were delivered to the site along with more windows. now in los angeles there are egress requirements for bedroom windows, that a casement window must have min. 20"w 41ht clear opened area. the units in question were 4' x 5'. well, with center post and frames, i was worrying for awhile for the windows might not make the egress req. from the bedroom. even though i know about this req. while we were placing the order it got lost among other issues. anyway, i just checked with milgard and those windows do have 20" clear opened width. but hey, it could easily be 19"if my size intiution failed and i would be liable to some of the replacement costs and delays. i heard, in last couple days, some architect friends burned from this problem. i made many mistakes but i do less now.
* ps; milgard makes nice aluminum windows in all configurations. prices are very competetive and widely available.
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