That's kind of the idea. Checks and balances. The architect is the client's representative on the jobsite. In a traditional construction situation, the construction documents are a contract between the client and the contractor, and the architect ensures that those documents are executed.
In theory this is correct. Unfortunately, architecture school is taught by those who view architecture as an art, not a vocation. Most architects that we work with care very little about the construction administration portion of the job because they don't get paid very well by the owners to do it (they frontload their service fee schedule) and because it's not capital "A" Architecture. It's not sexy.
Because you bypass the competitive bidding process, you're pretty much tied to a contractor from the get-go, and you'll never know if another contractor would have been willing to do the job for less.
Being a respectable contractor, I would argue that price isn't always equal to value. The company I work for is a $100mil a month contractor and we no longer bid anything. To me, the bid process is what breeds the contempt between architects/contractors. When you're forced to bid a job, you have to assume the cheapest alternative if the plans are ambiguous or contradictory because you know everyone else will be assuming that. Then, it's a fight over money from the first day.
At least in my experience, the RFI/NTC process is almost totally abandoned which inevitably leads to a lot of he said/they said, and there's the chance that the architect and contractor will collude to take the client to the cleaners.
On the first point: both parties get what they deserve if they don't document everything. On the second: the owners we work for all have sophisticated systems in place, but we provide them with "bundle billings" that show every invoice charged to the job, all out rates, etc... Again, we're reputable so it's not a problem, but I see what you're saying with shady contractors.
But, like anything, it always comes down to money. Architects are typically paid a percentage of the final construction cost, which obviously gives them the incentive to increase the budget. Contractors usually bid a price prior to construction and thus their incentive is to keep costs lower so they can pocket extra dough. Of course, the client never wants to pay anyone.
This is the key to it. The architect that is pissing me off right now is doing so because he is not being a good steward of the clients money. He's specifying ridiculous shit that he knows they can't afford. On top of that, he's trying to slip in a bunch of performance spec's, whereby our subs have to provide the engineering for interior walls, exterior walls, roof systems, etc... This would be totally acceptable in a Design-Build situation, but as it is, the architect is getting paid his percentage just like a normal job, but he is transferring his work onto the sub and in doing so is inflating their numbers (and his own take because he gets paid on the percentage of the construction contract.)
This shit is really interesting to me, unfortunately the day to day idiocy of the jobsite gets to me more than it should. I think I'll probably end up being either an estimator or a Construction Science professor.
Josh- you obviously know a bunch about the industry. Are you attached in some capacity professionally?
