When embarking on a new project, it’s common to work with unfamiliar team members, especially if you’re new to a firm. As a project architect, I’ve learned that it’s crucial to get to know the newer employees or young professionals right from the start. Younger staff will have less overall experience, are still learning a lot and may need more time to work through tasks, ask questions, learn the reasons behind what we are doing and so on. While other newer staff that have work experience still need time to become familiar with your company’s standards. Both types of newer employees are more likely to make mistakes due to their limited experience.
However, in larger firms where collaboration spans across multiple offices, it can be even more challenging to uncover potential issues. In this article, I’ll share my experiences and provide valuable insights on optimizing team collaboration for successful project outcomes.
Knowing Your Team
In smaller firms, it’s relatively easy to familiarize yourself with every team member. However, in larger firms with multiple locations, it becomes more challenging for new hires to stand out or for project leads to learn about their backgrounds. Unfortunately, I overlooked this aspect on a recent project, which led to several assumptions about meeting deadlines, completing tasks, and ensuring the quality of their work. This issue is further compounded when the office is exceptionally busy, leaving little time for personal introductions and relationship building.
It is important to get to know everyone on your project. This includes other disciplines and consultants. This will not only help you build relationships with others, but also trust and empathy. We don’t need to know every detail in someone’s life to be a good leader and supporter. Newer tasks naturally take more time so making sure someone has time to investigate, learn, fail, fix, and grow is important. This relationship building can also help immensely when in high pressure situations such as a large project deadline, a quick turnaround deliverable for the client, or an issue on the job site. It also gives the team the ability to understand and work through challenges such as burn out, stress, sickness, parenting, etc.
For your next project, take some early steps to set expectations, learn your role of the project team, and learn about the INDIVIDUALS.
Reflecting on My Mistakes
Looking back, I realize that I neglected to learn about the experience and background of each team member, regardless of their discipline. It may not be your job to do another discipline’s work, but we are a team so sometimes that means helping teach and mentor others outside our discipline. This lack of understanding resulted in issues not being caught until construction required change orders.
This also led to more time needed during the quality review stage to review the documents but since everyone was so busy so disciplines didn’t get as thorough of a review. Quality reviews can be tricky to work on any project because you want time to finish the work ahead of the review, time to review, and time to pick up comments. Something I will do different next time particularly for less experience staff/disciplines is having more mini, deep dive reviews throughout the project so it creates more opportunities for learning in less stressful times so that the work can be more accurate and complete for the final quality review. Right before a deadline is not the time to learn something new.
The Importance of Communication
It’s worth noting that when I joined the firm as a newer hire, I actively sought advice from my more experienced counterparts to ensure I met the company’s standards. It never hurts to ask the question! You may even learn a new way to complete the same task faster when you collaborate in the manner.
If you find yourself to be a young professional or new hire. I encourage you to be vocal about your experience. This will help others learn where you currently are in your career, what areas you do know, what you are passionate about, and what you are still learning. You should seek regular reviews of your work and reviews of partial work.
For instance, instead of doing a task for a full floor plan, try doing a particular section of the work that you can review with a more seasoned team member. That way there is a small scope for them to review and you can get more direct feedback in a quicker timeframe. Lastly, never hesitate to ask questions. We learn something new every day, no matter what our experience level. So, get used to asking questions. This proactive approach will not only help you improve but also foster better collaboration within your team.
In conclusion, recognizing the significance of getting to know your team members, regardless of the size of your firm, is essential for successful project execution. By understanding each individual’s experience level and providing adequate guidance, project leads can minimize errors, enhance coordination, and avoid costly mistakes. Effective communication and collaboration are key to achieving project success, so don’t hesitate to invest time and effort into building strong relationships with your team members.
Written by
Katelyn Rossier, AIA, NCARB, LSSBB
