Architecture's Triple Bottom Line

AIA Georgia by William Richards for AIA National on Oct 7, 2011 with 1 comments

Putting people, planet, and profit first is about working through economic cycles.

Collaboration exists at the center of architecture’s practice from the studio to site. Over the last decade, Integrated Project Delivery (IPD), greater professional diversity, and refined sustainability standards have improved the practice of architecture. But, there’s a long way to go before the design and construction process is truly collaborative in a profitable way.

Profitability, however, is not just about dollars and cents. “Profit means the capacity, beyond basic requirements, to achieve a larger goal,” says Robert Ivy, FAIA, EVP and CEO of the American Institute of Architects who is part of delegation to the 24th World Congress of Architecture in Tokyo this week. “Profit may be a financial reckoning or a social reckoning, or it may be an infrastructural one or an urban one.”

On Monday, Ivy was joined in a session entitled “Architecture’s Triple Bottom Line” by Mary Ann Lazarus, FAIA, firm-wide director of sustainable design at HOK and co-author of the HOK Guidebook to Sustainable Design (Wiley, 2005), Rick Lincicome, AIA, Senior Vice President and Principal at AECOM Ellerbe Becket, and Katherine L. Schwennsen, FAIA, Chair of Clemson University’s School of Architecture. Each delegate presented a different component of how social, environmental, and economic sustainability can be mutually beneficial.

For the AIA delegates, promoting sustainability is about implementing an intellectual and collaborative framework for design and construction. IPD is a central concept to that framework. Thinking linearly about a project’s timeline, IPD advocates point to an early-adoption approach, with everyone working from the same core beliefs and with common tools, rather than a unilateral design concept that adds consultants as the project nears completion.

“Rethinking how we do our work, getting the right people in the room early, it’s the only way to start,” says Lazarus. “We can produce wonderful results that don’t cost more overall, have a low initial first set of costs, and perform well.”

But, working across political boundaries is a logistical challenge, to say the least. “How are projects going to affect people, their communities, and subsequent generations?” asks Ivy. “It’s a question that’s often lost in translation because, from a global perspective, it means different things to different communities.”

“We’re seeing some adoption, though,” adds Lincicome. “We’ve seen it in Canada, we’ve seen it in England with their public-private partnerships, and, although they have BIM—which affects IPD in a very precise way—we haven’t seen it in China.”

Putting people, planet, and profit (in Ivy’s expanded definition) first is also about working through economic cycles. “We’re at a critical point in global economy that we need to abandon business as usual,” says Lazarus. “We need to pursue IPD, inclusiveness, and recognizing that you’ll have better results if you have a diverse group of team members.”

“You’re going to share financial risk as well as the reward in the end,” says Lincicome “and financial transparency is crucial to the collaborative process. Everyone should share how they’re going to make money as well as share their pain points.”

“Nobody is going to be successful if someone is losing in the process,” he added.

Although “Architecture’s Triple Bottom Line” was lightly attended, the delegation has made in-roads at the general sessions and networking events. Its members walk a delicate political line, however, in pushing an agenda around collaborative without pushing people away. “There is a tremendous admiration for American skills, our educational systems, and our ability to achieve,” says Ivy. “There’s also wariness about American accomplishments.”

If architects naturally endeavor to collaborate, the AIA delegation is tasked in harnessing that skill set—not as Americans, necessarily, but as practitioners. “We have been advocating a change in standard practice,” says Lazarus. “Moving everyone forward, together, is what needs to happen.”

“We have to show that we are willing to share our expertise, but we want dearly to learn from our peers around the world and collaborate with them,” says Ivy. “This is a meeting ground and a place to share.”

William Richards is the Director of External Publishing at the AIA.

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