The Sales Pitch

It never clicked with me during architecture school how much of my job would be a sales job.  I thought clients would come seeking advice from an educated thoughtful professional and we’d do loads of beautiful work together. Yeah, naïve…

It’s pretty funny.  I’d never think second guessing my accountant, dentist, dermatologist, or lawyer.  There could be serious consequences.  They are seasoned professionals with years of training who live their subject matter every day.  If somehow I think I know more than these guys, I’m using the wrong guys.  Yeah, I ask them tough questions and make sure I understand what they’re telling me.  I make sure they have all of my information.  And, if I think they missed something, I’ll ask them to double check it, but I always default to their opinion.  I know they’re smarter about this stuff than I am.

Ok, maybe it’s because a lot of what we do is subjective.  It’s in the “eye of the beholder” and all that…maybe, but if I commission a piece of artwork, I don’t choose the colors for the painter, or tell the sculptor how to bend the metal.  That would be tinkering with their vision and compromising the artistic process.

I’m not sure what it is, but everybody has an opinion when you start designing a building.  From the layout of the rooms, to the construction materials, to the color of the paint and the fabric on the furniture, there are piles of opinions. Part of this discussion is understandable.  The client is paying for it, and ultimately, they have to live with it, so they should be part of the process.  I’m not saying we should sequester ourselves, Howard Roark style, and the client should be happy with what they get.  It would be nice, however, if there was a little trust – just a little bit more of a leap of faith.

I thought maybe it was just me.  Maybe my ideas just stink.  Maybe I don’t have enough gray hair.  Maybe every other designer had clients that joyously accepted all of their ideas and they were thrilled.  Not so.  I’ve spoken with plenty of designers who have similar issues.  All we want is a little respect.  We live this stuff.  We think about it night and day.  We can make our client’s lives easier if they simply have a little faith….Help me help you!

I’m spending as much time strategizing how to sell the idea as I am thinking of it in the first place.  How do we show it?  How do we talk about it?  Can we show where this has been done before, so it’s not so scary?  It is exhausting.  Sometimes I want to scream “Just get out of the way and you will have an awesome building!!”  But, alas, this is not the way our profession works.  Until I’m my own client, I’ll have to continue to refine the sales pitch…. ds