Stop Being Just Designers and Be Problem Solvers

The 2003 revenue of the ENR Top 500 Design Firms paints a picture of an industry that is going through a slow period. In the U.S., the numbers were down nearly 5%. Firms are concerned and are looking for a turnaround. But some are more worried about the longer-term underlying trends than a year or two of sluggish revenue.

They see corporate clients being squeezed to get more for less and public agencies scrambling to make the most out of often-constrained budgets. As a result, design firms—from those doing big-ticket, engineer-procure-construct projects with few competitors, to those elbowing through the crowd to bid on a school or a small office park—are worried about the commoditization of the design profession.

Coffee is a commodity. Steel is a commodity. Pork bellies are a commodity. But engineering and architectural design? This is not an inevitable result of current business conditions. It is a manageable business problem and innovative design firms are dealing with it. The problem is that many designers are allowing their customers to define their service as a commodity where the lowest price rules.

Design firms should keep looking for new market niches that look promising and hunting for cities where the grass is greener, but they must also examine what an engineer or architect can offer a client. It’s not simply the ability to produce a pretty design or an elegant solution. Designers are, in essence, problem solvers with training and experience in managing complex systems.

There are many firms in the industry that are beginning to understand their actual and potential role. They are not content to simply wait for a client to identify its own needs and then hope to get an RFP. Instead, they are able to go to a potential client and say: ‘I know your business, I know the problems you are facing and I can help you solve them.’ This applies to everything from developing an integrated multi-agency program to upgrade a city’s infrastructure, to analyzing a corporate distribution system to determine what facilities are needed for efficiency, to assisting an underdeveloped nation in planning a national transportation program.

It is time for design firms to break out of the mold they’ve made and redefine themselves not simply as engineers or architects but as problem solvers or solution finders. To do otherwise risks being lumped in with the rest of the commodities on the auction block.

Some firms would rather stay in their boats and ride out the storm of soft markets and shrinking margins, hoping for another boom. They rely on President John F. Kennedy’s aphorism that “a rising tide raises all boats.” But we would add the comment: “except for those boats that leak.” That is the downward drift of commodities.