Actually, I don't know what being on the "design side" means. I've never worked in an office where doing the design and producing the documentation were separate.

And in my mind, figuring out how to make manifest your ideas is design.

That said, if I had to make a choice, I would specialize in the technical side, because I find restrictions more challenging and rewarding to work with. But, again, if you're doing good design, you're dealing with restrictions. So, as always, I think it's a false separation.

The circle template is always greener from the other side.

We tend to operate a firm where having a broad set of skills and interests is important to the way we do business. We try to encourage our staff to remain generalists because that gives them more versatility and allows us more flexibility in scheduling staff assignments. More importantsly, we also find that it allows more people to have more satisfying careers.

Yet, having said all of that, it's a truism that most people have one muscle that is more developed than all of the others. Some of us are just natural designers and others are just naturals at technical issues. Those predispositions always are going to show through and firms would be crazy not to reflect those tendencies in the way they deploy their human resources.

As I consider the question posed by this thread, I really encourage CMRHM to reflect on the sort of firm where he/she works - or wants to work. Some very departmental firms force developing professionals to make the choice being presented -- other firms, like ours, tend to be more concerned with having an appropriate complement of skills assigned to every team -- but the allocation of those skills among individuals can vary quite a lot. It's not always an "either / or" situation.

Consider that maybe 10% of "architecture" is thinking of the idea and intention of the design and the other 90% is making it into something feasible. But, without that 10% being at least somewhat inspiring the other 90% is going to be a drag.

That being said, design is subjective and to make a living on that alone is risky and takes a good deal of luck.

Design. That's what makes life interesting. Also, it's what client's cannot get elsewhere.

give me your dumb sketchup model and i will figure out how to make it stand up...said under breath.

Management! I aspire to be a suit with lots of minions doing my bidding and making me rich!

It'll be a formz model, but thanks, I'll give you a call! ;-)

Thanks, guys. These are great inputs. So this thread makes sense then.

quizzical have a good point here. Since I have been in managment posotion ever, so I didn't realize the versatility will really make the boss happy when they need to arrange the man powers. I used to just take it as a granted. But in the meantime, that means I wasn't very good at one specific area.

In most big firms like SOM, when you are in the certain age, people will ask you which direction you want to go. This will improves company's productiveity and individual persons will move faster than the other firms.

For my case, I felt my limitation in Technical area really limit my chance to move up either in design or technical field. So I would like to put 80% foucs on Technical area these two years.

Do you guys have some more specific examples to share? I would like to share mine later to seek your guys' opinions.

: if we're really being honest here - and you live and work in a predominently English speaking country - you're going to need to make a vast improvement in your language skills if you really want to be truly successful on either track

Strictly in terms of employment, if you have great techinical abilities - if you truly know how to put a building together and how to represent that information to whomever is building it - you'll always be able to find work.

For example, trace will hire you, because all he wants to do is design (not spanking you, trace, just using your comment as an example). Designers are everywhere (thought the GOOD ones are rare), but people who can get the serious technical work done are not.

I've been thinking about this question since it was posted yesterday. I agree with liberty bell's most recent post. At the best firms, there will be more competition for the designer roles (10% of the project) than the technical roles (90% of the project).

For large projects, one person cannot handle every aspect, and the PM needs to delegate tasks accordingly. Tasks can be divided among program (lobby, interior spaces, site design, etc.) or by architectural element (skin, MEP coordination, core, etc.). Tasks seem to be delegated by perceived strengths, so it's good to try to demonstrate your strengths before tasks are assigned.

Of course to be a truly great designer, you need to know the technical side, as stated above. There is no way you can design a building with a sophistochated curtainwall system if you don't know how it works.

Personally, when I finished my undergraduate degree, I was set on being a PM and working on the technical side. I also had worked for great PM's but less-than-great designers. It wasn't until grad school that I realized how much fun design could be.

Also on a personal note, I would not be doing construction administration right now if I didn't think it would make me a better designer in the end.

id def hedge w the technical/ design issue.

once youve worked a lot on the technical side its a lot harder to jump over to become a designer and visa versa. but this applies much more to larger offices tho. either way its better to be multi skilled than a specialist. i have a disproportionate amount of exp on the sd/dd side
and too little on cd/ca. so right now im looking to get more construction experience since its holding me back on the design end.

you can always decide to specialize later in yr career. better to balance out yr skills and have more options...

Being a designer can also be harder than other specializations.
And by that I mean being a good designer, of which I haven't met many. You not only have to do good design which requires an understanding of all sorts of issues, but you have to be a good politician and it seems to me the designer has responsability for getting the team on his side in order to have a successful project.
To make them understand why he does the things he does, not just tell them "you have to detail it this way because I said so". Occasionally you have to get a tough skin and take a client's punch and still deliver something that won't compromise either yours or their agenda.
How many designers you know that take the time to explain and justify their decisions to the team in a way that still manages to elevate the discourse of architecture in the context of real and sometimes crappy projects? yeah, right I'm asking for some level of responsability beyond blaming the client or the budget for the crap we end up with. I am not ready to respect someone as a designer until i see this kind of strategic thinking.

Technical things take a long time to master and a lot of experience, but you can learn it. Being a PM is no fun, but if you're diligent and have some leadership skills, you might even enjoy it. But to be a politician like a designer is required to be is harder to learn, in my opinion. And I'm not even going to mention talent because that's a word I deeply mistrust.

We get errr done!

Award Winning, On Budget, on Time.....ya right~

Without doing american domestic projects( I have been mostly involved with international projects), I felt it is very slow to gain CD/DD especially CA experience. One thing I am doing now is to go to AIA sponsored local job site tour as much as possible. However, it doesn't equal to the real office working experience.

If you stays in my situation, what you will do to change this?