Nick Tanner Summer 2011 Arch 6710 Construction Management Assignment #1
Guest Lecture – Richard Gordon – 16 May 2011
Mr. Richard Gordon presented on his experience of being a developer and shared a valuable list of principles that deal with developing a project from initial selection through the planning and execution phases. He also shared ideas for working with the various team members and each of their roles and capabilities. He used a charismatic presentation method that included a healthy dose of humor that captured my attention. Sometimes the best way to learn something is to fail at doing it and he said, “Good judgment comes from experience. And experience—well, that comes from poor judgment” The first subject in his presentation was Selecting your Project. A few concepts he shared were: if someone doesn’t want to sell/buy then ask for a referral, when you want to initiate a project be sure to “create something of value”, the critical nature of the location of a project, and lastly a caveat, “not everything that glimmers is gold.” The second subject Mr. Gordon shared related to Planning your Project. In this part of the discussion he spoke about the need to take a unique talent that we each have and let that determine what we choose to do for a project. A very important point related to how we learn and acquire skills. He suggested letting the rich guys teach you. This is important because it shows the value an employer sees in continuing education and training. It is easier and wiser to follow someone who knows how to do something well and successfully than to spend lots of time and money to try and figure it out on your own. When assembling a team, he suggested finding someone who can give real honest, critical and analytical feedback on your ideas. This is important because often we only see the implications from our point of view and may be missing something entirely. Other concepts that stood out were the importance of doing the right project at the right time, and the suggestion to get someone other than you to manage the day‐to‐day business needs. The third idea related to Executing your Plan. He suggested not assuming something is done right, instead asking questions to figure it out. Other points in this part of the presentation were: “if you are wrong, admit it and then adapt quickly”, expect for the project to take twice as long and cost three times as much. The final theme was Working with your Team. In this phase of his presentation he mentioned how if you don’t have a good architect you are S.O.L. He expressed this idea by saying, “You don’t want the best deal on a Brain Surgeon.” Three concepts that I found valuable from this lecture were: Let someone else teach you, get good honest feedback, and lastly ask questions!