What does a specifier do?

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Author Message Anonymous   Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 02:28 pm:    When asked by someone what you do for a living, how do you answer them? How do you explain to the general public what a specifier or specifications writer does? Edward R. Heinen, CSI, CCS, LEED AP Advanced Member Username: edwardheinen Post Number: 5 Registered: 04-2006 Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 02:38 pm:    The best approach I have found is to relate specifications to their understanding of the drawings. Most people would associate architects with drawings, which is not incorrect. So: whenever a building project is designed, there is a set of drawings and a set of specifications. Specifications contain requirements about products, standards, and procedures. Buildings are far too complex nowadays to develop with only drawings in mind. Drawings and specifications go together as part of the construction contract documents. It's very similar to what I tell architects, actually. Ronald L. Geren, AIA, CSI, CCS, CCCA, SCIP Senior Member Username: specman Post Number: 560 Registered: 03-2003 Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 02:45 pm:    I write the big book the contractor uses to prop open his office door. ;-) Margaret G. Chewning FCSI CCS Senior Member Username: presbspec Post Number: 143 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 02:47 pm:    I say something similar, in stating that a construction project requires specific documents to be built, graphic part which is on the drawings and the qualitative or written part of the documents called a Project Manual. As a specifier I write and compile the Project Manual for the construction project. Most seem to understand without too much of the eyes glazing over. Kenneth C. Crocco Senior Member Username: kcrocco Post Number: 116 Registered: 04-2003 Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 02:50 pm:    This is both a simple question and a complex question. It depends how you expect your "public" to understand your answer. They may want to know how I spend my day, or they may be highly curious about the field of architecture (as it really is). It's simple to state that I write, but mostly edit, technical documents to describe the work results (defined term) including products, materials and systems for architectural projects. I could also list a series of procedures taken to accomplish this including research, drawing reviews, evaluations, etc. and the tools we use, computers, internet, etc. But, as an architect specializing in design accomplishes the design work primarily by some form of drawing, and I don't describe design in drafting or drawing terms, even for the general public, nor do I don't describe my work in terms of technical writing. I tell people, meaning general public, I'm an architect who specializes in technical consulting to other architects. I rarely mention specifications until a persistent person wants more information. Richard Baxter, AIA, CSI Senior Member Username: rbaxter Post Number: 62 Registered: 12-2004 Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 03:05 pm:    I just tell them I provide written descriptions of all the products used on the building and I provide all the information needed to make sure the building is built right. Ralph Liebing, RA, CSI Senior Member Username: rliebing Post Number: 735 Registered: 02-2003 Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 03:08 pm:    I rule the roost and make demands of all around me-- no, no no-- in fact many there pay no attention to me at all!!! In addition to the above, I would explain that on those occasions when the contractor does pick up the book ;-) I create, that what he/she will find is a lot of information, all of which is necessary and important to the project, but cannot be located on the drawings; most is virtually impossible to portray graphically. And in addition it includes a lot of information that adds to, or further explains what is on the drawings. As noted, I'd emphasize the thought that BOTH drawings AND specifications are required to build the project. D. Marshall Fryer Senior Member Username: dmfryer Post Number: 59 Registered: 09-2003 Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 04:29 pm:    I tell them the Architect's drawings are the where, and my project manual is the who, what, when, and how. Kenneth C. Crocco Senior Member Username: kcrocco Post Number: 117 Registered: 04-2003 Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 04:37 pm:    It's interesting to see a focus on products of service. Most other professions would not describe themselves through the products of their services: teachers, doctors, lawyers, would say inspire, heal, defend respectively. We make drawings and specs. hmmm. I wonder what anon's motivation was in asking this question? Just need to tell future father in law what you do? or something more interesting? Lynn Javoroski CSI CCS LEED™ AP SCIP Affiliate Senior Member Username: lynn_javoroski Post Number: 669 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Friday, October 26, 2007 - 05:20 pm:    I explain that I get to tell the contractor what they can use and when and how they can use or install it - and they can't argue with me! (The architect can tell them where to go with it) Y. Lynn Jolley AIA CSI CCS CCCA Senior Member Username: lynn_jolley Post Number: 21 Registered: 10-2005 Posted on Saturday, October 27, 2007 - 06:05 am:    "I basically work as a consultant to other architects doing research and technical writing about products and procedures for constructing buildings they design." Steven Bruneel, AIA, CSI-CDT, LEED-AP Senior Member Username: redseca2 Post Number: 78 Registered: 12-2006 Posted on Saturday, October 27, 2007 - 05:00 pm:    Work on Saturday. Wayne Yancey Senior Member Username: wyancey Post Number: 388 Registered: 05-2005 Posted on Monday, October 29, 2007 - 10:20 am:    My Microsoft buddy calls me a "Technical Writer" which is a fair generic term for the unitiated to describe what we do. Jonathan M. Miller, FCSI, CCS, CCCA (Unregistered Guest) Unregistered guest Posted on Sunday, November 04, 2007 - 09:10 am:    I wrote an article for the Feb 07 CSI Leader that is available to all at http://www.csinet.org/s_csi/docs/14100/14002.pdf under 'Membership' titled "The Importance of Specifications" that gives a more lengthy but still imcomplete description of what we do. Check it out. Jo Drummond Senior Member Username: jo_drummond_fcsi Post Number: 10 Registered: 06-2007 Posted on Sunday, November 04, 2007 - 07:11 pm:    When I drew unemployment following a layoff, many years ago, "technical writer" was the closest the bureaucrats had to what I did. Now, I tell architecturally uninformed people that "I write the book that goes along with the drawings, which says what to build the project of, and how to do it to be acceptable to the owner". Vivian Volz, RA, CSI, CCS Senior Member Username: vivianvolz Post Number: 97 Registered: 06-2004 Posted on Friday, November 16, 2007 - 02:16 pm:    I tell non-construction adults that I'm an architect, but that I'm in charge of the written part of the design documents. I tell kids that I write the instructions that go with the drawings. Kids who build models or use Easy-Bake Ovens know exactly what I mean. And I tell construction professionals of various sorts some variant on what the rest of you have said, usually something like "the specs control the quality and the process, things that are hard to represent in drawings." Marc C Chavez Senior Member Username: mchavez Post Number: 251 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Friday, November 16, 2007 - 02:20 pm:    Actually, I tell the architects that the spec is like the instructions to an Easy Bake Oven too, most of them seem to understand that. Talking about process and quality confuses them. You should hear the conversation when I try to tell them where babies come from. "When a mommy loves a daddy VERY much...." Anonymous   Posted on Friday, November 16, 2007 - 02:47 pm:    I like this article in Archi Tech magazine about specifying and cost-estimating with BIM: http://www.architechmag.com/articles/detail.aspx?contentID=3624 Is this what specifiers can do, or will soon be doing? Sheldon Wolfe Senior Member Username: sheldon_wolfe Post Number: 288 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Friday, November 16, 2007 - 05:02 pm:    I saw that article, too. Interesting, but I disagree with the conclusion that a single program won't be able to do the modeling, generate specifications, and prepare estimates. Marc C Chavez Senior Member Username: mchavez Post Number: 252 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Friday, November 16, 2007 - 05:16 pm:    I saw susan's presentation of basically the same information. As one who has dealt with Large Revit files I believe the interoperablility is much preferable. AND Revit is not made to deal with text not to metion the spreadsheets for estimates. Sheldon Wolfe Senior Member Username: sheldon_wolfe Post Number: 289 Registered: 01-2003 Posted on Saturday, November 17, 2007 - 02:37 pm:    Oh, ye of little faith! I recall my first computer, which needed instructions to do everything, and would run only one program at a time. My first word processor wouldn't handle italic fonts, let alone graphics. Current word processors do more than a combination of a word processor and a desktop publishing program did a few years ago. Early CAD programs were entirely two-dimensional, allowed only one view at a time, and had only minimal text capabilities. Revit allows you to work in two or three dimensions, does tables, handle text far better than its predecessors, and is able to store vast amounts of information about the entities it shows. Not being a gamer, I can't say much other than that there is no comparison between Pong and the text-only games offered by my first computer, and Call of Duty 2. Despite the history of computers, we continue to underestimate their potential. Marc C Chavez Senior Member Username: mchavez Post Number: 253 Registered: 07-2002 Posted on Monday, November 19, 2007 - 11:51 am:    Not my point. It's not that at some point we'll have computers that you can stuff everything into... but should you? You can use Word to combine picture and words but a program made for it is better (Indesign) You can manipulate photographs with many programs but photoshop is better. SO...add the photos from photoshop and the words from Word into In-design for a completed work. We either need a link engine per Susan and Rob, OR a program that combines all of the data generated from other sources. If Revit is that product, it needs to add whole subsets of data management (for all the words, cutsheets etc) Secondly, unlike most programs BIMs will be generated by teams of people separated by distance and time (yet need to be working on the same information at the same time) a Good (all inclusive) BIM would, using current technology, be web based as well. PS Autodesk just bought Navisworks (another BIM) which prided it'sself upon being a product that could translate all other BIMs into itself. (that's the overgeneralized story)