#382 - AI, Meetings, and the Architecture Grind

Summary

Archispeak Podcast #382

Title: AI, Meetings, and the Architecture Grind
Date: December 1, 2025
Hosts: Evan Troxel & Cormac Phalen

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Episode Overview

Evan Troxel and Cormac Phalen candidly tackle the modern realities and frustrations of practicing architecture: from the relentless grind of meetings (virtual and otherwise), the clash of digital productivity tools, and the rise of AI in daily workflow, to the deeper purpose, joys, and difficulties of design mentorship, iteration, and professional life. Sharing both pain points and hard-won optimism, they explore how tech both helps and hinders, the struggle to shield genuine creativity from endless busyness, and the continual challenge of inspiring students while keeping themselves motivated in a field notorious for its demands.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Relentless Pace and Meeting Culture

• Feeling Overwhelmed After Time Off

  • Even short absences from work result in massive catchup and inbox overload—sometimes more than seems logical.
  • “It feels like I’m behind three months.” (00:15, Cormac)

• Virtual Meetings and the Myth of Efficiency

  • No commute or hallway small talk, yet calendars are more packed than ever.

  • The expectation is both 8 hours of meetings and 8 hours of "real work."

  • “There’s not even time to work.” (01:25, Evan)

  • Social media reels joke about how meetings leave no time for actual tasks, reflecting a real pain point.

• AI Bots as Meeting Replacements

  • Rise of AI note-takers and companions in meetings, sometimes to the point that the only human is the host.

  • “They were the only actual person there. Everything else was an AI note taker.” (02:15, Evan)

  • Concern over what junior staff lose if AI does all note-taking—traditionally a key learning task.

  • “It teaches you how to be present in the meeting... Which is difficult when you’re writing or typing.” (03:18, Evan)

• Gratitude vs. Anxiety about AI

  • AI allows better engagement and presence in meetings, but also fosters disengagement and can hollow out the learning process.
  • “I am so 100% thankful for the AI companion... It now offers me the ability to actually be present in the conversation.” (03:52, Cormac)

2. Battles of the Productivity Platforms: Teams vs. Zoom

• Deep Preferences (“Religious Wars”) Between Platforms

  • Zoom is preferred for direct, sketch-based collaboration; Teams is seen as unwieldy and buggy.

  • Common problems: inability to smoothly share screens, persistent compatibility issues, even on Microsoft hardware.

  • “You don’t need... bots to take the notes. But what good is an intern if you have an AI taking notes for you?” (03:17, Cormac)

  • “Teams is a piece of hot trash.” (07:20, Evan)

  • "The client will chime in and say, you don’t know what you’re asking for. You’re just like, great, now I’m the butt of a joke." (08:39, Cormac)

• Larger Reflection: Tech That Should Help But Doesn’t

  • Tools supposed to increase productivity often add friction, especially when not implemented intelligently.
  • “Some of the productivity tools are anti-productivity tools because they’re not implemented correctly.” (10:35, Cormac)

3. The Avalanche of Communication & Information

• Impossible Expectations of Availability

  • “Out of office” barriers are routinely ignored, especially for leaders and PMs.
  • “There’s an expectation by everybody that you’re on call. You’re just on call all the time. You’re fully connected.” (15:23, Evan)

• Everyone’s Inbox (and Head) Exploding

  • Much vital knowledge is unmanageably scattered: mailboxes, calendars, Zoom, Revit, Bluebeam, and especially in people’s heads.
  • The “seven layer dip” of communication layers leads to redundancy and confusion.

• Tech Makes Everything Amplified

  • The volume of information multiplies exponentially, and the sheer noise often impedes actual productivity and clarity.
  • “The amount of information that a firm produces every year... it’s a magnitude more, probably... The challenge is getting more difficult to deal with.” (19:12, Evan)

4. The Case for Analog: Sketching & Conversation

• Tech Failures Can Be Opportunities

  • When digital tools go down, real conversation and analog sketching fill the gap and can be more productive.

• Pedagogical Value of Drawing

  • Analog tools foster richer communication and creative thinking, especially in design education.
  • “There was more conversation, there was more interaction, there was more sharing of knowledge and ideas with just the simple stroke of a pen.” (20:19, Cormac)
  • Quoting Foster/Renzo: the "connection between your brain and your hand" makes thought more tangible.

5. Design Process: The Importance of Iteration

• Digital Tools Can Short-circuit Process Thinking

  • Modern modeling software (Revit, Rhino, SketchUp) can tempt students (and professionals) to lock in ideas too early, skipping essential iterations.
  • “You’re committing so quickly to an idea without iterating that idea... That seems too permanent.” (33:29, Cormac)

• Iteration Defended

  • Showing design process and versions isn't "wasteful," but strategic—vital for communication with clients and for discovering better outcomes.

  • “Why do you show all these different iterations... Well, think about if you’re having a conversation with an owner and you present your idea and they’re like, did you think about this?” (28:16, Cormac)

  • “Your first idea is usually not the best;... you have to actually try to break your ideas with new ideas.” (37:07, Evan)

• Emotional Attachment vs. Creative Rigor

  • Students often treat initial ideas as 'precious', resistant to “breaking” them for the sake of better solutions.
  • Value in rigorous, even sometimes painful, self-critique and experimentation.
  • “Don’t treat ideas so precious because clients aren’t going to treat your ideas precious.” (36:36, Cormac)

6. Realities of the Architecture Profession

• The Grind vs. The Joy

  • There’s pride and romance in the impact architects have, but also long stretches of “slog” and routine.
  • “You want people to be excited about this profession, but there’s a lot of times that the profession’s not that exciting.” (44:47, Cormac)
  • Small moments of joy must be savored—“the times that you get those bed of roses and then the rest of the time when you’re getting the thorns, it’s worth it.” (45:00, Cormac)
  • “What really kicks you is the fact that you got to do it in the first damn place.” (47:14, Cormac)

• Architecture (Still) as a Privilege

  • The reminder that to participate in shaping environments for others—affecting lives and memories you’ll never see—is a powerful motivator.
  • “Think about what we really get to do and how many lives we affect that we never know.” (48:35, Cormac)

• Preparing (and Warning) Students

  • Academic box-checking vs. professional passion—joy is an essential ingredient for enduring and excelling long term.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "If I could get [AI] to just attend the meetings... that would be awesome." —Cormac, 02:00
• "There's an expectation by everybody that you're on call. You're just on call all the time." —Evan, 15:23
• “The amount of information that a firm produces every year... it’s a magnitude more, probably. So what's that, 10? It's a lot more every year. And so the challenge is getting more difficult to deal with.” —Evan, 19:12
• "I preach... the importance of sketching, even if you're not that good at sketching... to capture a moment in time when you're having a free flow conversation." —Cormac, 22:46
• "What really kicks you is the fact that you got to do it in the first damn place." —Cormac, 47:14
• "It's very much like you have to actually try to break your ideas with new ideas and see if they work." —Evan, 37:07

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:15 – Catching up after time away; the never-empty inbox
• 01:43 – Jokes and pain of idea that “AI could just do the work”
• 03:02 – AI note-takers, loss of internship learning opportunities
• 05:52 – Team vs. Zoom "religion" and hands-on sketching collaboration
• 08:39 – Frustrations with digital meetings; Microsoft hardware fails
• 10:35 – The productivity tool “dance” and its frustrations
• 14:27 – Firm culture: urgency, availability, and the “architectural emergency” myth
• 19:12 – Communication overload and information management challenges
• 20:19 – Analog communication: value of hand-sketched discussion
• 28:16 – Iteration and versioning: showing the design process is vital
• 33:29 – Iteration loss: modern tools leading to premature design commitment
• 36:36 – Students’ emotional attachment to first ideas
• 44:47 – The grind and the joy of “the architecture life”
• 47:14 – The privilege of architectural influence
• 50:03 – Inspiring students, joy vs. box-checking

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Closing Tone

Direct, honest, and sometimes sardonic, Evan and Cormac offer both comic relief and sobering reality. They don’t shy away from the profession’s grind or technology’s overload but remind listeners of the enduring privilege, creative joy, and duty to inspire—both for students of architecture and for themselves.

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Final Words:
"Have hope, have belief, have faith. You chose this for a reason." —Cormac (51:39)

Transcript

[A]

I think you need to start out with an apology. That's what you should do. Yeah, all the things.

[B]

All the things. Excellent. Well, here's the funny thing. An apology is like how when you go away sages for three days and you come back to the office and it feels like you're behind. Not three days, you are. You are not necessarily three weeks. It feels like I'm behind three months.

[A]

Yeah. I don't even go into a, quote, office, and I feel like that, so.

[B]

Well, yeah, I mean, yeah, I. I no longer do either and yet still work in an office.

[A]

It's funny because, like, you don't. You don't have that commute time. You don't have to walk to those meetings and go sit and have the chat before the meeting and have the chat after the meeting. You actually get to leave the virtual meeting and there's still no time.

[B]

Like, you still. Yeah, I was talking with somebody today, and they're like, man, I've been so swamped. And so I pulled up and I showed them my calendar and they're like, okay, I thought I was swamped, but what is that mess? This is everybody's mess. I know.

[A]

There's not even time to work.

[B]

Have you seen, like, those reels and stuff where they're just like, okay, so you have eight hours of meetings now. You have to have, like, the eight hours of, like, actual work time. It's like, what.

[A]

Where do those come from? That's what AI is for. That's. That's the answer. Can it redline those drawings for you? Can it mark up that proposal for you? I mean, AI wrote the proposal. The RFP was written by AI. They're just basically talking to each other at this point.

[B]

So there you go. What's the point?

[A]

What's the point?

[B]

I mean, if. If I could get that to be the case, that would be awesome. If I could get them to do the red lines, that would be awesome. Honestly, if I could get them to just attend the meetings, actually, when I was. Well, that's what they do.

[A]

That's what the AI. That. That's what. Well, how many bots do you need to join your Zoom meeting now? Somebody told me that they. I don't remember it was them personally or a friend of theirs, but they showed up to a meeting and it. They were the only actual person there. Everything else was an AI note taker.

[B]

So how exactly is that.

[A]

Or pki, where is the.

[B]

Where's the conversation then? Where's, like, the actual. Like, Right.

[A]

Well, obviously.

[B]

How do you have a meeting if you're, like, the only live person there.

[A]

Yeah. The meeting obviously must have been just a presentation, I guess. I mean, one person has to speak. Everybody else gets the summary.

[B]

That's crazy. See, because. So now I will go to a meeting, and I will have my AI companion from Zoom.

[A]

They could just talk.

[B]

They will have their AI companion, and they'll be on and we'll be talking, and then. And then what's funny is then we share notes at the end of the meeting, and each of them are pretty much the exact same thing.

[A]

Oh, yeah, Right.

[B]

Can't just one, like, you don't need. Although this could probably piss some people off. But what good is an intern if you have an AI taking the notes for you? That's going to be you. How to listen. It teaches you how to pay attention. It teaches you how to be present.

[A]

In the meeting, which is difficult when you're writing or typing.

[B]

That was the word.

[A]

While listening. It's you. You. You're typing something, and you can't be listening at the same. I couldn't be listening at the same time. Yeah.

[B]

I'm not a stenographer.

[A]

Right.

[B]

I am so 100% thankful for the AI companion, because normally I do like to take notes, and sometimes I will pull out the old, like, little notepad, and you could sort of see some notes on here. I. I take a lot of notes and stuff. Right. But if you notice, they're all, like, short, little, like, crib notes more than anything else, because I can't sit down and, like, write out exactly what I'm hearing to do that. Where I was going with that, is that it. It now offers me the ability to actually, like, be present in the conversation, talk or lead the conversation as. As necessary, and then.

[A]

Go back and.

[B]

Say, oh, is that what I said?

[A]

Yeah, exactly. Well. And those are actually the best kind of meetings when you can really talk about things that you didn't plan on talking about. Of course, that back and forth is useful. And a lot of times a prompt that is on a slide or in your agenda is going to be useful. But it's the real thought that's the whole purpose of the meeting right there, is to figure things out. And that happens in real time. And that isn't necessarily something that you can recall later because it's work.

[B]

Right. And even. And the good thing is that at least, like the Zoom AI companion, when you are sketching, you know, it's taking both video and audio of, or it's transcribing but it's also taking video, so.

[A]

Recording it.

[B]

Yeah, recording it and things like that. And so you can do that. And then periodically, if you like, actually need to, like, screenshot what you're doing, you can do that, too. But. So we had this ongoing debate between people who are power users of Microsoft Teams versus power users of Zoom, which one, which one is better and why.

[A]

That sounds religious.

[B]

It's funny enough, it feels that way sometimes. It's just like, you know, you got the Zoom Evangelist, you've got the Teams evangelist, you've got the whatever other prototype.

[A]

Don't you guys have both?

[B]

We have both. I unfortunately, am forced to use Teams for one project, and if I have the choice to, like, establish a meeting, it's always Zoom. And the reason being why is that? Because I sketch. I sketch. No, it's not even a whiteboard. So if somebody is sharing the screen and they're sharing, like, say, a floor plan or whatever, okay, you can annotate right on the screen while you're talking. And yeah, you know, you don't have to, like, Wait, wait, let me. Let me do a little screen capture. Okay, hold on now. I'm going to bring. Bring that up and we're going to draw over the top of that. Like, let's just. It's. It's part.

[A]

So you. You're part of this. You're part of the Zoom religion.

[B]

That's what I'm hearing. Part of the Zoom religion is what you're hearing?

[A]

Yes. Oh, please.

[B]

The Zoom God. I wish, and I wish I had the forethought to invest in that during COVID.

[A]

Unfortunately. I mean, not unfortunately. I agree. I agree with you. I do agree with you. Unfortunately, Teams is highly embedded in corporate America and probably corporate everywhere, but especially architecture firms, because they're running Microsoft networks and they've got everything else Microsoft. Everyone's running Outlook and they're running Windows operating systems and all those things. And I totally agree with you, though. Teams is a piece of hot trash.

[B]

So let me go one step further. I'm on a teams call, right? Somebody makes the mistake of saying, hey, Cormac, can you share your screen? Sure, I can share the screen. You see the one screen that I bring up initially?

[A]

I think. I think you've told me about this. You have. And you have a Microsoft laptop. You actually have a Microsoft branded laptop.

[B]

And you can't see it.

[A]

You have to unshare and reshare for.

[B]

Every single slide you want to go to. Every time I move. And if they say, well, if you look at my cursor and I'm trying to poison. They're like, I don't see your cursor. Hold on. And then you literally only get like. It's like, man, how is it that I have a teams. Hardware or Microsoft hardware? Microsoft software. And they don't work together.

[A]

Your. Your laptop's old, though, right? It's.

[B]

No, no, no. Do you know how many people. Well, it's funny that you say that. It's not that old. You should know, because I was gonna.

[A]

Say it's like six months old.

[B]

I don't know how old, but it's. Do you know how many people actually have that problem? I finally. Somebody else was on some of the similar meetings, and this is for my Saudi Arabian project. And somebody was just like, so the. The client already knows. And somebody says, corman, can you share the screen? The client will chime in and say, you don't know what you're asking for. You're just like, great, Now I'm the butt of a joke. Which is awesome.

[A]

Well known. Your. Your problems are well known.

[B]

Yes. So. So then they share their screen and does the exact same thing. I'm like, oh, it's contagious. I was like. I was like, see? He was like. To the client, I was like, see, it's not just me. And he's just like, well. And then kind of says, okay, I accept that it's an inherent flaw. With this big mega company.

[A]

You would think that these tools would be better. This is an issue with.

[B]

It's a tool, all right?

[A]

It's a tool.

[B]

It is completely 100% a tool.

[A]

This is the same with our production tools, though, I have to say, you know, it's just like, really, it's still like this. Or really, it doesn't do that. Or really, it doesn't work with this type of. Oh, my God. It's just over and over. It is maddening. And it's funny because you said. You basically outlined that you have to do the teams dance when you have to use teams. But there's a podcast I recorded recently, and it was like, what do you see the future of architecture and AI? And it was like, oh, you're going to have to learn how to dance, because things are changing and you have to be agile and you have to be on your toes, and this technology is keeping you on your toes. And it's. It's not an uncomfortable. It's not a comfortable place to be, for sure.

[B]

I mean, you get to a point where I guess it Just beco. I mean like everything else, everything that we were fearful of when it was coming to take your job or, or make your life easier, it. You get used to it and it just becomes, it becomes a. A pencil, right? Or a, or a stylus. You know, I mean. Yeah, it just becomes an extension of like your day to day. And I like some of the productivity tools are anti productivity tools because they're not implemented correctly. I was just having, having a conversation about. I'm not going to say the, the product name, but a productivity tool that is widely used by architecture firms, especially large architecture firms that seem so counterintuitive to everything that you think about how it's supposed to be done. This does it just the opposite. And you know, it's just I, I don't want to get off on a tangent because I don't want to lose my train of thought, but it was.

[A]

Well, we haven't even started this episode yet.

[B]

That's true.

[A]

You said you, you said you had a way into this conversation. This, this was not it.

[B]

I said I have a. I can kick us off by basically just saying why is it that when you try to take time off, even the shortest time off turns out that it puts you so far behind? Like I purposely, the day, the night before I left for just a little mini vacation to go to a Formula one race with my daughter. All I wanted to do was to have some fun and not check any email. Emptied out my. Emptied out all of my emails, personal school, office. All of it was like zero when I clicked off thousands and I kidnot thousands of emails. You're like, really? Either am I that important or B, do you really have that much to say? It just, it was amazing how much.

[A]

Is what you came back to.

[B]

And it's so funny. It's like you, you put that out of office reply in, right? And they say, hey Cormac, I know that you're. You're out of office right now, but could. Would you mind taking a look at like you're talking to an.

[A]

Have you trained them previously?

[B]

Ignoring you.

[A]

Have you taught. Have you. Have you taught them previously that you were available even when you weren't?

[B]

Do you know that answer?

[A]

Yes, I do.

[B]

I was going to say I believe you know that answer.

[A]

We have talked about this before. This is not a new.

[B]

But remember what I told you. Like turning over a new leaf. And that leaf has actually been pretty well turned over. Like I, when I step away from.

[A]

Can we take it to the next level and we need to take this to the next level. Like, why do you do so much? Why are you responsible to do so much? Even when you need to take three little days off like you're. Describe your position, what's your role? Do you lead teams or are you.

[B]

I lead teams.

[A]

And how effective are you at this job?

[B]

Wow, that hurts.

[A]

Ouch.

[B]

Let me hold on.

[A]

Well, I mean it's, it's rough to be in those position of, of being responsible. And there's so much to do. There's obviously more to do than your team can get done in the amount of time they have to get it done in.

[B]

True, true. And in the nature of things. And this. Cause you've been in the rat race of the firm life and higher ed and all of this other stuff where people and we've had this. Remember, we've had this conversation numerous times about there's no such thing as a architectural emergency except for how do you tell that to the people who think that everything that you're not saying immediately is not an emergency?

[A]

Yeah, well. And that, that it's just like every. Well and man, this goes way beyond the subject that we're talking about right now. It's just like everything's amplified. Everything is to the max. Everything is urgent and super important. And it's like not everything can live in that quadrant of the Eisenhower matrix. Not everything is important. Most things aren't. And not everything is urgent. Actually, most things aren't. But everything gets treated that way. And there's an expectation by everybody that you're on call. You're just on call all the time. You're fully connected.

[B]

Think about because you got this, because you've got the computer, because you've got whatever else that you should be readily available. So like, hey, Evan, it's 10 o' clock at night. I just had this really great idea. Hit send. Why isn't Evan responding to me?

[A]

Because it was top of mind and you're. And you're afraid you're going to forget to even send that message.

[B]

But I mean it's. And it's just like. Well, I'm expecting you to respond as quickly as I sent you that message. You're like, wait, no boundaries.

[A]

Yeah. I can't believe we're having this conversation again. But. But it show. It's not.

[B]

I don't know if it's. Again, it's. It has become still.

[A]

Yeah, it never stopped.

[B]

Yeah. Still the more and more we advance, the more and more we advance in communication, in productivity, tools and everything else. It's. It's still this con, this constant battle with ourselves to say, well, I could. This will help me just get it done as quickly as I can. Or, or I could turn this around pretty quickly. Do you need to. Do you need to really turn it around quickly? Maybe there are some things that you should stew a little.

[A]

One of the issues I think, that leaders have and that more senior staff has, is there is so much information, knowledge, wisdom. There's different categories of this kind of thing. It's just locked in your head. It literally is locked in your head. Like, some of it might be in the mailbox, some of it might be in the calendar, some of it might be in the zoom chat, some of it might be in the revit model, some of it might be in the bluebeam session, but most of it's in your head. And that's why they're going to you, right? Because, oh, where do I even look for that? Where's the latest. Where's the most current information? We don't have a good way to track that because it's in so many places. And a lot of times you'll get conflicting information or overlapping information in various places. And then you, you look at it and you're not quite sure if it's even the thing I need because it's not the latest version.

[B]

My favorite thing that I deal with, and Obviously that's pure 100% sarcasm, is when somebody says, hey, can you send me this sheet? You're like, you mean the sheet that you already have, that it's already been distributed to? Yeah, yeah, but, but you can send it to me quicker. Quicker than maybe clicking in the files that you have on your computer that could pull it up just as quickly.

[A]

You can find it faster than I can. Yeah, yeah. They're outsourcing that task to you.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

Which.

[B]

And then it's, of course, you think to yourself, well, it's client service or a consultant, team player or whatever it is that you. However you want to define it. Yeah, I get got. I mean, get given or whatever. Yeah.

[A]

Yeah. But anyway, I don't know the answer, man. This is something that you think that, that, that actually technology could help solve, but it's actually just making it worse when it. Because there's. So there's. This is the seven layer dip version of communication. It's like it's got everything. It's everywhere, everywhere, all at once. Everything, everywhere, all at once. It's just not helpful. And it's like, I don't know what the chart is, but the amount of information that a firm produces every year. I want to say doubles. Let's say it quadruples. I don't know what it is, but it's a magnitude more, probably. So what's that, 10? It's a lot more every year. And so the challenge is getting more difficult to deal with.

[B]

I don't know. This was a weird side thought that I had when you were just talking, and it kind of popped up in my head. It's like, think about if we were still drawing or still printing things out. I feel like we generate so much more information. Informational noise now because it's so easy to generate that noise. Instead.

[A]

It looks busy. It looks like you're busy.

[B]

It looks busy.

[A]

Yeah, I totally get what you're saying, man. It's a. It's a real thing. Yeah, More for more's sake.

[B]

Yeah. I was. I was looking. It was talking to some students, and they finally are printing things out instead.

[A]

Of, like, just looking at it on screen.

[B]

Just looking at it on a screen.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And we had a much better conversation when I had a pen in my hand and they had paper for us to talk about, and we could sketch over things and do things like that. And there was a more. And this is a complete divergence, but there was. There was more conversation, there was more interaction. There was more like just sharing of knowledge and ideas and things like that with just the simple stroke of a pen than there was in anything that they were showing me on their screens.

[A]

Can I read you the description of what I think was our last episode that we published?

[B]

Oh, no, probably the same thing.

[A]

In this episode, we discuss how taking a step back from work leads to better architecture. We talk about concrete ways to break free from constant busyness, when to pause instead of charging ahead, and how technology can both help and hurt creative solutions.

[B]

A few. Few weeks later, and it still hasn't changed.

[A]

It just. Yeah, it's kind of. Kind of crushing. It's. It's interesting that this. I mean, this is the season for what you're talking about. It sounds like to me, I mean, this is like, oh, you are. You are in this and you are living it. And it is not.

[B]

Like, I think.

[A]

Right now, strategically, this needs to be addressed at so many firms is just this. Because there's somebody in leadership who's like, oh, it's taking care of this, or the project manager's taking care of this, or whoever it is. Oh, they've got this. And it's like, actually, we don't have this.

[B]

Think about this. So we had a class. I came into class and they were just like, hey, Cormac, you use Revit, right? Like, yeah. Do you know that, you know the Revit servers are down and they're like, oh, canvas is down. Oh, this is down. Oh, that is down. Do you, do you recall that just like couple, couple days ago, like, yeah, there was.

[A]

Yeah, Amazon Web Services went down.

[B]

Yeah, Amazon Web Services went down. And it was just like, everybody was like, dead in the water. You're like, not really. Let's, let's have a conversation. Let's talk a little bit. Let's take that step back. Let's go back to the olden times. Light, turn it off.

[A]

Turn it, turn off the machine and have a real conversation with real writing implements.

[B]

So I, I sit there and I kind of preach. And whether it's. Listen, whether it's understood or, or just shoved off, what I try to tell them is that the importance of sketching, even if you're not that good at sketching, even if you, it is to capture a moment in time when you're having a free flow conversation with someone, when you're in that moment, you're, you're, the ideas are flowing and it's just this. They look down at the sketches that we were doing as we were talking, and a couple of them were like, what the hell is even that? Or what am I looking at? Like, you're looking at ideas, you're looking at a thought, you know, and, and so I was just like, look harder and you'll see what you created. And they're like, okay, I understand now. And it's like, I don't know if they were taught early in their student career, were taught like that, that kind of like, who is. Which architect was I watching some video on? I think it was Norman Foster who was just basically waxing poetic about the, the connection, or it could have even been Renzo. But it was just like this, the connection between your brain and your hand. And it's like that, that slow transition from your brain to your hand has given your thought enough time to kind of like, I don't know if digest is a good word, percolate, whatever, but it becomes an idea that then reveals itself on the paper. And he was waxing quite poetically and, and of course, me being of the old school was eating it up like, yeah, listen to, listen to him. But it was more about when I saw in their eyes, when we were talking just the couple of days ago in them kind of understanding. I was just like, does Any of this. And we're looking down at like the, the, the paper with all these scribbles all over it and stuff. I was like, does any of this make sense? They're like, yeah, it makes perfect sense. It's completely clear exactly what we're talking about.

[A]

What's interesting is how the transformation. Remember how we went through the early digital days of Save as? Do you remember that? So Save as was like save your butt kind of a thing, because you always did a save as when you. Obviously hardware was in a different place and software was in a very different place and things were buggy and they crashed all the time. And Save as was your savior when things went wrong. And it was like, well, when's the last time you saved this file? Because a lot of times a crash led to a file corruption, and so we had to go back to the last version and then rebuild whatever that time period was of changes. And so, I mean, what's interesting about what you're talking about with the paper on the desk is you get to see the whole process, especially if you're like layering trace upon trace upon trace.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And using different colored pens for different reasons. And you see the whole thing. And I think what's interesting there's. It's super interesting how that informs how you think and it informs the process of design and the outcome of design. Whereas modern technology, and I'm a technologist, like you could say that, I guess.

[B]

It'S like.

[A]

We don't even get to do that anymore. Like the file is the file and there's not. There are milestones, files archived for contract purposes, but nobody like really goes back and look at those. Every once in a while something goes wrong and yeah, we gotta go pull the archive and to grab something out of it, whatever, or something really bad happens. And yeah, we do have to go back to, you know, the cause. Firms do like these major backups and stuff. Right. So, yes, that still happens, but for the most part it's just a living document nowadays. Right. It's just right. This thing just keeps building and changing and getting bigger and more cruft and more crap and build up. But also like it's, it is the model. Like there's the model. And I think that's super interesting because what you were talking about with your students is like, when you look at that paper, you can see the process. You can see the, the thought process from where we started to where we. And you can actually peel it back depending on how you did it with layers or not maybe you can peel it back and say, this is where we started. This is where we got to. And do you also remember when we were in school? I always remember on my final boards, my professors wanted to see design process. They wanted to see versions, as we might call them today on. In little vignettes on the board.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So that you could. I mean, that was a tool, as a presenter, as the project owner, to say, well, I thought about that back here and here's why I decided not to do that, or here's where this led me. And you can see that right here.

[B]

So a lot of the, A lot of the questions that I get from them is like, why do you show the process? Or why do you show all these different iterations and stuff in the conversation? Always kind of like, it was like, well, think about if you're having a conversation with an owner and you present your idea and they're like, well, did you think about this? You can show them. Yeah, I did think about that. And here is why I kind of moved away from that. Or here was what I thought was good about that, but then had a different idea that I kind of wanted to evolve. And that's what this is. And it's, you know, because you were the, the. The beauty and joy of sitting down with the client and talking about design, talking about that are their ideas and trying to bring their ideas to life. Is this. This kind of symbiotic relationship of like their thoughts, their ideas, their wishes, their hopes, and your ability to be able to create it and bring it to life? Right. And, and so I was trying to explain to them that, you know, in, in. Or even like the mundane things is just like, hey, did you look at putting the plumbing, the, the wet wall on this side instead of this side? And it's like, well, here, here was how I showed. Thought of that. And it's just like the simple little things of, like the process of, of doing these things. It's like, oh, I put this. This was the, the process the other day was, you know, they had an idea. And I'm like, okay, well why did you put that there? And they're like, well, I thought it was. It was because of this or this. I'm like, well, but you gave up valuable real estate on the facade of your building to basically to a windowless room. Why would you do that? And I'm like, look, I'm not telling you that it's right, wrong or indifferent. You are going to be questioned about the why so many different times. Why did you do this? Why did you do that? In the iteration process, this iterative process of like, just drawing and sketching and thinking and going through this whole thing, that whole thing just is. Is a way for you to answer the questions before you get asked them, right?

[A]

Yeah. And we used to do this in early 3D modeling. I don't know if people still do that. I think they do if they're using SketchUp or Rhino or something like that, where it's like, okay, here's a model. There's a model right next to it. There's another model. There's another model. At some point you might take one and copy and paste it into a new file and do that again. But tools like Revit, Database driven BIM tools don't let you do that. You can't. You just literally can't do that. It. It would be way too much to manage. Like you have a model of a building. So, again, this kind of. What's interesting is, is the tools have evolved alongside the, the analog days, right? Or from the analog days. And they. It's interesting to kind of see this progression and, and it just seems like the zoom white, the, the. The. What do you call it? Markup. Zoom markup or whiteboarding tools like Miro, they still do. You have this idea of this infinite canvas right, where you can, right. You can like, go work over here and mess with something and then bring it back over. And I still think there's. That's a digital version of, of a totally analog thing which was. I have a giant desk and I have a roll of trace and I've got modeling pieces and different Legos or whatever it is, and I'm going to build a thing and I'm going to do another version right next to it. Or I'm going to move. I'm actually just going to move the trace over and draw another one right next to it. That was. That's a very useful tool set in an architect's toolbox.

[B]

Honestly, I started moving towards, okay, I'm not going to keep walking around with a roll of trace, but I started using Morpholio and on my iPad. And so, like, I sit down with them and I'll have my iPad, my pencil, and I'll just. They'll start talking about ideas and stuff, and I'll sketch up that idea and show them kind of like what, what I'm hearing they're saying. And they were like, yeah, yeah, that's what I'm thinking. And like, well, this is what this is. Do you See the value behind, like, in a way, I'm sort of showing them by doing what they, what I'm trying to get them to do, the value of that as a communication device. And, and it's really, it's purely, it's, it's that, it's the communication device. You're going to be asked so many times what you know from the owner, why you did this, why you did that, what did, did you think about this? Did you think about that? And it is so much faster, so much easier to just be able to like, whip out a pencil and sketch it up. I, I, I know that I sound like a broken record when I say this, and I apologize to anybody who hears me say this over and over and over again, but the value of an architect is the way, whatever is to be able to converse and connect ideas.

[A]

Right. Communicate them.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, communicate them.

[A]

Right.

[B]

I'm too tired.

[A]

You are, you are, you are. You're getting cheers from the audience of.

[B]

Olds and yeah, I'd like to get cheers from, I'd like to get cheers from the audience of news only so that they understand that, like, not everything has to be. So here's another problem that I'm, I'm seeing is when we use the 3D modeling tools, whether it's Rhino, whether it's Revit, whether it's Sketchup, whatever, you're committing so quickly to an idea without iterating that idea to, to like, just exhaust all sorts of different possibilities before you actually start committing it to something like that seems too permanent. I, I see them working on, I, on these, like, we had them planning, doing some programming and adjacency diagrams and things like that. And so they're like, blocking them out and creating like, floor plans and then creating, like, elevations from them. And I'm like, this is too early. This is, this isn't what, you know, one, this isn't what we asked. But two, you're, what you're doing is you've committed to one idea and you've, like, you started committing, you know, massing and elevations and everything to one idea. Well, what if that one ideas wrong? Or maybe not the right good way of going about it? Or, or not the best, you know, not, not the best. And usually your first one, I mean, unless you're, yeah, usually.

[A]

It depends. It depends. Sometimes you go, there have been, we, you know, we used to do five versions and be like, oh, version one actually was on the right track. I should, yeah, I, but it was still worth seeing these other ones to Actually understand that number one was the right one. Exactly. That happened.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah. I remember using these, these tools though that you're talking about and doing exactly what you're talking about. You totally can do it in 3D modeling tools. But, but you're right, like you can't. You have to fully know that like this is going to get most likely thrown away and, and you have to treat them non preciously. And I think what you're saying is like there's this, there's this, there's this thing that they're just latching onto this idea too early and saying like this, I'm committing to this one without doing all that experimentation.

[B]

So that, that's actually, you've articulated it far better than I did. That that's where I was going is like every, they're treating that first idea is the precious idea, the, the final idea and not giving it a chance to grow and germinate and develop other ideas from that. That. And even sometimes when you're talking to them and you see the look in their, their eyes when you say well maybe have you thought about doing this or, or what about that?

[A]

Have you see the emotional attachment?

[B]

You can see the emotional attachment almost like deflating and then you sort of have to like reel it back a little bit and say look, I'm not saying that what you're doing is wrong. I'm just saying did you give it a chance to be something else? And they're just, they don't really fully understand that that's a thing. Like don't treat ideas so precious because client's not going to treat your ideas precious. They're going to say all right, okay, yeah, that looks good. How much is it going to cost? You know?

[A]

Well, and I think they're.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And, and it's important to distinguish between precious and fragile. Like I, I believe like ideas are fragile and it's not worth being too harsh on ideas early.

[B]

Oh, it's like absolutely not though.

[A]

I just want to make sure we, we're clear about that because, and I, I guess when I said earlier like these, these ideas are likely going to get thrown away. Like that might be true and it might not be true. I guess obviously there, you can't put everything under these blanket statements, but it's, it's very much like you have to actually try to break your ideas with new ideas and see if they work. I, you have to be rigorous about that process as you go through it to achieve the best ideas.

[B]

So. And this is again, you're Right. And this is where I'm going, is that because of the way that they produce the idea, they think that that's like the one and done. This is good enough without the multiple opportunities for iterations and exploration and idea ideating and optioneering and all of these other things and just following the path to something else to just see where it leads you and if it leads you right back around to where you started, great. But give yourself that opportunity. And I think that so many people get so locked into that. I've spent so much time making a model, why do I have to come up with another idea? Or I've spent so much time like laying this out in this software, why do I need to do it again? And I literally have had this conversation, it's like, well, isn't this good enough? Why aren't you asking yourself that? Like, why aren't you asking yourself.

[A]

So I'm curious, are you seeing. Because I think as a parent, I'll just put it that way, that I've seen a lack of creative endeavor from. I'm not going to assign it to a generation for sure, but definitely individuals. And I'm just curious what you are kind of seeing trend wise. Because to me, like, there's an insatiable curiosity about really digging into a design project and really digging into that design exploration and iteration. And there's an excitement and like it's fueling. Right. And I'm just curious, like, do you see that spark? Or it's not across the board? It's going to be, I'm sure, a spectrum within a class, but it's definitely.

[B]

A spectrum within class. I mean there's some that are just like, okay, it always has been. I've met the assignment and I've done the minimum code.

[A]

Minimum.

[B]

Yeah. I think we've sat there and we've told them, it was like, this is the fun part. This is when you get to just create ideas and see them come alive. And they're like, yeah, but the assignment says that I need to come up with three plans. And I came up with three plans. So can we call it a stun minimum? Like, no, no, no. Three is. Three is what you need to come up with. 300 is what you should be just.

[A]

Wanting down to three.

[B]

Yeah. Like why would you want to stop, like just playing around, having fun, doing something, like making something out of nothing and then seeing how you can make that nothing something else and something else and something else and so on it. And ultimately there is a point when you say, okay, I'VE got to stop. Stop designing. And that's usually what, around like 95% CDs, but, but you know, construction. Exactly. Oh, so you've, you've dealt with some of my clients.

[A]

No, it's not just limited to you.

[B]

Yeah, I know. I mean, I mean, no, but it's just like how, like the, the just what I'm, I'm trying to get to that. This is the fun stuff. This is the, like we're trying to encourage them.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

When you have this opportunity to just explore your ideas and obviously in school there is literally no budget. So it's just like we, let's do something crazy or let's do something conservative or let's do something in between or let's do whatever. Not just say, okay, I've met the bri. I've met the project brief. Can't call it done. It's like, if you've got like six weeks of concept design, why not six week concept design your mass off? Like, why not like have fun for those six weeks? Then you're going to start slowly but surely rein it in. You're going to go to schematic design. What's going to, it's. But then you're going to get to see like this, to become to this, to become to this. It's just like, then becomes something else. But you can see when it's in CDs, you can see. Hopefully you can see here's where the concept was and like all the strings that got you to that one. But you're like, what. It still kind of kept that essence of that. And it's because you had so much fun and you like found what was like precious to you that you then brought through to like construction documents and CDs and, and DDS and all this other stuff. So it's like trying to convey to them that like, get excited about this.

[A]

Because when you get into the real world, you're not going to even get to do this. You don't get how many people actually get to do that kind of thing in architecture. It's a very small number compared to how many people are doing it in school.

[B]

True, like, everybody's doing it in school. But are you gonna, is everybody gonna be doing it in the real world?

[A]

No. The answer is no. Just letting everybody know the answer is no. Ouch. Why are you, why are you trying.

[B]

To break everybody's heart so early on?

[A]

Why aren't you telling them the truth?

[B]

No, I, I actually try, I, I try to, I try to tell Everyone, the truth, whether or not they're ready and willing to listen to it, it's a different story. The biggest challenge, honestly, is staying positive about it because, I mean, there's sometimes that just the profession beats down and you want to encourage. Like, for me.

[A]

I don't even know.

[B]

If I want to start down this, this line of conversation, but it's just like, for me, there's always something fun about it, even in the slog of things. But it's not that way for everybody. And it's not that way 99% of the time. Right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And. And so.

[A]

I don't. I don't. Oh, I don't feel I. I know exactly what you're talking about. And I think that is a very valid and interesting thing for you to like. I, obviously it takes some vulnerability to even, like, open up a little bit about that. And I think that that's the kind of thing that actually is necessary because, yeah, it's, it is a. It's a difficult conversation. It's a difficult reality. Right.

[B]

You want people to be excited about this profession, but that there's a lot of times that the profession's not that exciting. And you. But you gotta teach them, tell them, show them that. Okay, so maybe not every day is a bed of roses, but the times that you get those bed of roses and then all. Then the rest of the time when you're getting the thorns, it's worth it. And it. And sometimes it's really, really hard to convey that without sounding so overly negative about it. And so there's a lot of times, like, we've, We've talked a little bit and I've tried to like, mask, like, saying things when we talk in on the podcast, saying things that I'm pretending they're hypotheticals with their, like, the reality that I'm living that it's just like, wow, that sounds really shitty. Why would we be doing that? But then he was like, okay, but think about this. All of the pain and suffering that we've gone through for this. Think about what we've done. Think about what we've accomplished. Think about what we've created. Yes, it sucked to get here, but look where we are. And that's the thing that sometimes we don't stop to, to, to appreciate that. And I guess that's even like the, the nostalgia that we talk about when we talk about the, the joy of, like, sketching with a paper and pencil isn't necessarily about this, like, way versus new way kind of thing. It's more Just about the joy of creation. And that's the thing that I hope that when we talk. I hope when I talk in class, I hope when I talk in the. Just with clients and with colleagues and stuff like that, that that's what is conveyed, is that, look, you're gonna get. You're gonna get kicked in places you don't want to get kicked. But at the end of the day, like, what really kicks you? Here's where I get all shabby. What really kicks you is the fact that you got to do it in the first damn place.

[A]

Super privilege. Yep. Yeah.

[B]

Yeah. And.

[A]

And it just. I. I don't know that other things are that different. I mean, think about professional athletes or. Yeah, F1 drivers. You went to the F1 race. How much time is actually spent winning. One person gets to win a race for a moment at the end of all of that hard work. Right. And okay, next race. But it's kind of like that in architecture too. When you're on the architecture side, it's like, project, project. There's. There's phases and tasks and all these things. You get to the end and it's built like, man, awesome architect doesn't get congratulated at the ceremony. All that. All that stuff.

[B]

Right? But.

[A]

But then photographs and awards and what. Okay. And next project. And it's this interesting cycle that everything goes through. And it's. It's actually, there's a lot of things that are comparable as far as, like, how much fun versus hard work versus payoff. And then privilege is all part of that. And I'm. By privilege, I just mean, like. Like that pride in the privilege to get to do pretty incredible stuff to. To create the built environment for people on this planet. Right?

[B]

Yeah. I mean, I was telling my A students, and I think I probably said it here as well, is that. Just think about the opportunities that architects have is. Think about, like. And I know you're probably gonna say, yeah, yeah, we talked about this, but think about, like, what we really get to do and how many lives we affect that we never know how many, like, emotions you get to be had in a place that we've created that we'll never know about. Memories that will be created by people we will never know. And if you can't, like, romanticize about the profession that way, and you just think that it's kind of like a. A slog in a. In a. If you look at it as just a job, maybe this isn't what you should be doing.

[A]

So I hope you're weeding those people out of school right now, Kermic.

[B]

No, I'm, I'm hope, I. To be quite honest with you, I hope we, the professors, are hoping to inspire them to just find a simple joy in what they're doing. Because if you don't bring that, if you do not bring that joy to the stuff that you're doing, is it really going to be that good?

[A]

I think it's important for you to show that potential, and you get to show that potential through real world experience and see that potential in these students that they don't know that they have and figure out a way to get it out in front of their future, their, for their own future.

[B]

They make them stop thinking that it's just a bunch of box checking for an assignment. And unfortunately, though, systems, academia, profession, whatever.

[A]

License, licensing, anything, there's many parts. It's all about CES and some. Going to be my world here in a minute.

[B]

The box checking. Yes. I don't have to worry about that. I know you don't have to worry about that.

[A]

If you could pass me some under the table.

[B]

You know what? I don't know why you, why can't you share CES with someone else? Because that would be great if I could pass you along, because I could use them.

[A]

Oh, man.

[B]

Pretty sure I'm over.

[A]

You're good for three years. Probably in, in a year, maybe more.

[B]

I don't even know how many I have right now. I mean, I know I'm good. I, I know I'm good, but.

[A]

Yeah, for sure. All right. Well, I don't know. Was this an uplifting conversation? Was this a. Where do we, how do you, how do you rate this one?

[B]

Yeah, I, I.

[A]

Great.

[B]

It is, is just have hope, have belief, have faith. You chose this for a reason.

[A]

Right. And also the realities of the profession.

[B]

Yeah, there's the realities of the profession. Yeah. Oh, 48.5.

[A]

48 and a half Cs. Jeez, it's a lot of hours.

[B]

And you. And you only need 18.

[A]

Well, I need, I need 24 for Oregon and 10 for California.

[B]

Well, so AIA national, you need 18, 22. Well, 24 for Florida and 24 for Maryland, and I have them all.

[A]

Yes, you do. You have all, all the Cs.

[B]

I have all the C. And I'm pretty sure I. Ooh, you know what my last one was? Advanced bird friendly glass design.

[A]

Oh, that, that sounds good. I think the birds would like that one. Yeah.

[B]

Yeah. And actually, what was it, what was interesting is as, as they were showing. And this is innovative. And this is the new innovation. And I'm thinking to myself, you mean new innovation. I did that like eight years ago. That same exact thing. I think that. You sure that's not my project? Because that's what I did.

[A]

Kudos to you.

[B]

See? Finding joy. Clearly it's finding joy in what you do, right?

[A]

Yeah. Because you were made for this.

[B]

You got 48.5 day CEU's. I don't need them.

[A]

All right. Until next time.

[B]

Yeah, let's go.