In Earlier days if you were a licensed Architect you could hang out a shingle and start getting projects to work on. Maybe you were successful at getting a good amount of projects until one day you realized that you had too much work for yourself alone, so you would usually hire a fresh out of college intern to take on some of the drafting. People would be added as time went on. Maybe a receptionist and or secretary. This was the extent of the different positions for the most part in the Firm. Today there are so many more different new positions or duties that need to be performed within the firm. There are principles still, but, now there are different levels. Technology has provided new needs, such as a Cadd Systems Coordinator, Website and Blog Maintenance, and General IT. L.E.E.D. has generated many new needs within the firm. Material Research, L.E.E.D. Compliance Coordinator and many other related positions. There are many positions that I did not mention. The days of a simplistic office model are over. Successful Architectural firms are taking on more of a corporate model out of the necessity to contain and organize all the parts of the whole. I said it once before in an earlier post Architechs that technology is increasing the complexity of our designs. At the same time it is making our business models more complex. I have heard the phrase "Architectural Evolution", I believe that is the best way to describe what I am seeing in our profession.
