Introduction Post

It’s a sobering moment when a member of the baby boomer generation like myself crosses an imaginary boundary and joins the social networking set.  In fact, in reporting to my teenage daughters that I had decided to start this blog, more incredulous looks than usual were shot across the dinner table.  Nonetheless, it seems that the traditional mechanisms of communication that I know and love---books, magazine articles, presentations to small audiences, even the occasional press interview—are insufficient in the modern age.  Not just because communication has transferred from “the old media” to newer forms, but because the nature of the work that AEC professionals are engaged is evolving rapidly, and ideas need quick airing and response.   Innovations in technology (like BIM), project delivery (IPD, Lean) and even design approach (digital fabrication, sustainability) are interacting in unpredictable ways that bear examination.  And from my unusual perch as a technologist, practitioner and educator many of those issues cross my path.

 So in this spot you’ll find my periodic musings on many of those kinds of ideas, well-formed or otherwise.  A few times a month as time allows I’ll try to intermix thoughts on key issues, interviews with interesting colleagues, and whatever else might provoke a conversation about the questions at hand.  As my realm at Autodesk (and in academia) is strategy and practice, you’ll find little product information or speculation on this blog, and there are plenty of spots out there where such conversations are better had and with folks with far more knowledgeable than I.  But I hope that we’ll find here a place where the key strategic issues facing the building industry can be considered, critiqued and expanded.

I read recently that Albert Einstein said “I never think of the future.  It comes soon enough.”  That may the case for the rapid expansion of technology in building, but I don’t think we collectively have that luxury.  Before the future arrives, soon enough, I’m looking forward to this particular and unique opportunity to think about it.

Comments

[Alyssa Bernstein]

I will add you to my "RSS feed." Don't forget to keep twitting on twitter. - your doting eldest