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2/1/2017

It is hard to believe it has almost been 9 months since my last post. Last year was my best year since starting my firm in 1987. Things are booming for me. I have worked long and hard to get the clientele I have and I am in a position now where I get calls from referrals from past clients. Repeat old clients and new referred clients equals a very busy one man office.

You have to make hay while the sun shines, but making hay all the time isn't good. What do they say "Anything to excess is not good". I can't say working this much is good or fun, but since I love what I do it is tolerable. I don't get cabin fever, I just get tired of being here. I did turn work away last year,but only because I just didn't have any more hours in the day to get them done. If I can't give someone great service, then there is no reason to take on the project. I take on the projects because they are typically great repeat clients and I don't want to disappoint them.

I can't tell you the last time I went home at 5 PM, ate diner and watched some TV. I can tell you it has been so ling that I no longer am familiar with current TV shows on the tube now a days. I can tell you all about Spotify and Youtube.

We all need money, but time is a precious thing. I am very fortunate that my wife puts up with me, but she also understands this is how I pay the bills to have the nice things we have (house).

Enjoy the time you have to relax and spend with friends and family. While I am not fond of working these crazy hours, I have been on the other side with no work and this isn't anywhere as bad. The stress of wondering where your money is coming from to pay your mortgage is far worse that working all nighters.

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Living the Dream.

5/31/2016

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I'm stressed. I'm overworked. I am in control of my own destiny. I have been turning down jobs. I am a one man office and trying to get everything done is difficult. Business is booming and I don't look forward to the next email or phone call asking me if I can take on a new project. I need to take care of the ones I have. I am not afraid nor intimidated by my clients. My expectation will not let me give than my best.

Joe Diffie - "Ships That Don't Come In"

He said it's only life's illusions
That bring us to this bar
To pick up these old crutches
And compare each other's scars
'Cuz the things we're calling heartache
Hell, they're hardly worth our time
We bitch about a dollar
When there's those without a dime.

And as he ordered one last round
He said I guess we can't complain
God made life a gamble
And we're still in the game.

So here's to all the soldiers
Who have ever died in vain
The insane locked up in themselves
The homeless down on Main
To those who stand on empty shores
And spit against the wind
And those who wait forever
For ships that don't come in.

So when I get stressed out I take a step back and ask myself "Isn't this what you wanted?". I didn't have aspirations to be a famous Architect. I never had dreams of being self employed. I just wanted to play in the game. I have been fortunate to do enough good work that I keep getting more. I control how much I take on and at least they are asking. Beats the alternative. I am lucky, as my ship did come in.

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The quality of my service doesn't change with the quality of my client

2/16/2016

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I'll try to make this short and sweet.

I think this sounds a bit arrogant, but it is not meant to be that way.
I say "I work to my standards, not my client's standards". I am always worried that I haven't done enough work or my work should be a bit better, but my clients, most of the time, seem extremely happy about where we are and what we have. So apparently my self induced stress is because of what I expect from myself.

I was brought into a project by one of my engineers. We did the building addition and all went well. I got paid and the client seemed happy. I did additional projects for this client and somewhere down the road, he seem to forget what I had done, because he no longer need the drawings and then disputed what he owed me. We eventually had a big face to face meeting where no one walked away completely happy.

Normally I would walk away from a client like this, but he was involved in a project with one of my consulting engineers, who I like very much, so I didn't burn any bridges because I knew we would have to work together down the road.

I was asked to work on a site plan project with this client. I told him I didn't do site plans. I work with the building inspections department, which is sometimes hard enough, and I didn't deal with the planning department. I told him he needed to hire a civil engineer. We agreed he would do all the interaction with the planning department and I would do the drawings. Everything was fine until the very last invoice. I was told I would not be paid for my "mistakes" and then was told I exceeded my budget and would be reported to the Board of Architecture. I had never set a budget and only told him I would work hourly. I know they are blowing smoke and have no idea why they went off the rails and wrote this nasty email? I still don't, but I don't let it bother me either.

Several days after the nasty email from the client, I got a review comment from the inspections department about the building part of this project. I could have not responded. I could have sent the email to the client and told them that after their last email they needed to take care of this project from now on, but I didn't.

I started the project and I will finish the project. My standards won't allow me to quit midstream. I know what professional services are about and therefore will take care of what I consider to be my professional obligations. I provided a new sketch to the plan reviewer to address his comment and sent it back to him and CCed the "not so nice" client, with no comments, just the sketch.

No matter how bad I get treated I will fulfill my obligations. I work to my standard, not the clients.

Let me clarify that I had been paid for the architectural work, so that is why I respond to the plan reviewers comments. If I am not paid, no I will not complete a project. I will provide the work for which I am being paid. To prevent not getting paid, I typically ask for a deposit up front and the balance at the time I deliver the drawings. I get it 95% of the time. Let me also clarify that I do mostly commercial work and drawings for permits, so when I deliver the drawings the only thing I have to address is review comments, so the permit will be issued. Most of my clients are contractors or developer and that is all they want.

On last thing - Will I ever work for that nasty client again? No.

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My Typical Week

2/8/2016

1 Comment

For what it's worth I decided to take quick videos of each day last week. There is no post processing here, just put them all together.

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Field Verification

1/28/2016

1 Comment

Learning (Playing) with the Canon N100

1/12/2016

1 Comment

It's all relative.

1/7/2016

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My Two Cents: 01/07/16
I always seem to worry about my fees. I’m not worried that the client might not like it, I worry about whether it is a fair fee. I as most architects probably underestimate the amount of time we will have in a project. After 27 years, I am still basically basing my estimated hours off of how much time I will be sitting at the computer drafting. As you know a project encompasses so much more. So I am typically cutting myself short. Things I think should take me two hours takes 6 - 8 hours. When I think about billing for the 6 - 8 hours, I feel guilty as if I didn’t work efficiently enough for the client.

Then one day it kinda hit me. I had taken my car to my mechanic, a guy I have been going to for over 30 years. I drop my car off and tell him what I need him to check or do and then pick it up when it is ready. I never say a word about his fee. As a business owner I understand you have to set your fees so you can stay in business. I trust this guy, so sometimes when the bill is higher than I expected, I just gulp and write the check. So one day after paying a bill much higher than I expected I thought if I have to pay a couple hundred dollars for something I think is fairly simple automotively, why am I so concerned about my charges when someone ask me to perform an architectural service for them.

Example, I write a letter for a client. I think to myself it may only take me 30 mins to write the letter. I see the letter as the object being paid for and we all know the long discussions we have had with clients that we provide a service, not a product (the drawings). When I add up my time the letter may be in the $200 - $250 range, which seem steep to me for a letter, but based on the time it may be extremely fair.

So when I take my car into the mechanics and ask him to replace some burnt out dash lights and check on something else, not do any work, but check, and in my mind I am expecting a bill of about $125 - $150 and get an bill for $274 - $325, it is sort of a reality check. Like I said, I have know this guy for a long, long time and consider him a friend, but apparently he doesn’t worry about my bill, so why am I so concerned about mine?

I do not send invoices for time spent or work done prior to discussing it with the client. The responsibility of agreeing to a fee before I start falls on me. I’ve said it many times, if I can look a client in the eye and regardless of his reaction, not blush, then I have set , in my mind, a fair fee. Let me clarify that scenario has nothing to do with the client, it has to do with me. Nothing the client could say that would make me blush if I felt like I was fair and had done the right thing. The client may have a different expectation of what he should get for how much. My attitude is , you don’t tell me how to run my architectural business and I won’t tell you how to run your business.

So now I just figure out a more realistic time estimate, charge accordingly and if the client doesn’t like it I thank him for the opportunity and move on. I could tell him to go get his dashboard lamps replaced if he thinks I charge a lot ……..

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I'm baaaaack!

10/30/2015

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I have decided to post again. It has been one hell of a summer. I was so busy I missed it. Good in one respect (less financial worries), bad it others (no sleep and no family time). I am not going to try to post on a fixed day or with a fixed size. I will post based on my real world experiences when they inspire me to, which seems weekly. So we'll see what pops up next.

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Another day / night at the office!

8/28/2015

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If it weren't for bad luck, ......

6/30/2015

3 Comments

They say you should back up your data three different ways and have it in three different locations, but that doesn't always work either.

On Saturday the 20th of June, I came into the office. I have two machines at my desk. One I consider my work machine / CAD machine and the other is my general purpose machine. I had been checking emails and reading through my headers on Feedly, when I decided to turn around and get some work done. On my CAD machine I use an extra 1 TB drive (Drive K) to store all my data. When I looked I saw no "K" on my windows explorer so I rebooed.

Click click, click was all I heard from where the K drive was located and no K drive designation. I knew I had a problem.

I "thought" I was backing up multiple ways, which apparently wasn't true. I have a 128 GB jump drive that I carry on my key chain. I manually back up to this with "Free File Sync" on a fairly regular basis, or so I thought. I have an external 1 TB drive that I was using a third party back up software program to back up to, or so I thought. Then I back up to the cloud with Carbonite, or so I thought.

Business has been crazy for the last 6 to 8 weeks, so I had not back up my jump drive since the end of May. My external hard drive was only backing up C drive not K drive and apparently when I started folder "Projects2015" in January, but I did not add it to the folders to be backed up with Carbonite. A mess for sure, but not insurmountable.

Fortunate for me I had been emailing .dwgs and .pdfs like crazy and I did manage to recover a lot of files off of my "sent" Gmails.
It should take me about two week to recover fully. I was functional and about 90% back in about two days, very long days.

Any time we do things manually we are open for error. Automatic backups are a must! What have I done since the crash? Here is how I am approaching my backups for the future.

1) I still back up to my jump drive. I will try to remember to do it every Friday and I may forget, but I like having my drawings on my person.

2) I took the 1 TB external drive and manually back up to that drive with Free File Sync every night before I walk out of the office. I don't know if the limitation is me or the software, but I think some programs would not let me select multiple folders to back up, so it was a pain in the ass to have to back them up one by one. When I installed the new 1 TB internal drive, the new K drive, I made a master folder - Barch_Main, then I put all my project folders under the main folder. So now when I select the one main folder it backs up all the sub-folders, which are all my project folders.

3) I purchased a new 3 TB external hard drive. I didn't need one that big, but it was the best bang for the buck so I got it. I used the backup software that came with the drive, which is something I had never done before. I have no Idea why! So now I am using the WD backup software. It backs up C drive every night at 3 AM, but it is backing up K drive continuously.

4) I reconfigured Carbonite to back up the Barch_Main folder, so now it is getting all my current files and when I created Projects2016 under Barch_Main, I will not have to worry about whether I added it to Carbonite.

5) One last method I have added, but I don't think I have ever read about. Being able to go back to my emails and download the attachments I had sent other people was a life saver. So I have implemented a new policy. I made a new email account for my backups. Every time I email a client with final PDFs, I email my backup email account with the .dwg files. This way I can always go retrieve them like I did this time. It is basically poor man's cloud backup storage. Eventually I will have to buy additional Google drive space as you only get about 15 GB of free storage.

I am fortunate that I can recover drawings if they were plotted to PDFs. It is not 100% recovery, but enough that I can edit the drawings if necessary. It is till better to have .dwgs. So now I have 5 methods of backing up. Two automatice and three manual. Next time I hope I am more prepared.

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Time...

Living the Dream.

The quality of my service doesn't change with the quality of my client

My Typical Week

Field Verification

Learning (Playing) with the Canon N100

It's all relative.

I'm baaaaack!

Another day / night at the office!

If it weren't for bad luck, ......

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