Making Better Presentations

The life of a landscape architect inevitably involves making presentations. Open Forum has a helpful blog post from Guy Kawasaki of How to Change the World. In it, he interviews Nancy Duarte, author of slide:ology: The Art and Science of Creating Great Presentations. A few tips I particularly liked were to to develop your ideas before creating your slides and to design slides to help people remember the content of the presentation and not for you to remember what to say. We have all hated listening to a presenter read their slides. Slides should only reinforce the message. In addition, she adds that you need to put yourself in your audience's shoes and understand their needs. This seems like common sense, but it is easier said than done. She offers a series of questions to ask yourself to help you better understand your audience's needs. The book looks interesting. I plan on checking it out. Between using Sitephocus' photos and this book, I hope to improve my presentations. Since incorporating beautiful photography and reducing the text, I feel my presentations have improved immensly. My hope is that this book will help fine tune the message and better meet the needs of my audiences.

More on Construction Cost

CoStar.com has an informative interview with Kenneth Simonson, Chief Economist for Associated General Contractors of America. He was not optimistic about construction cost coming down particularly because of the sustained growth in developing countries like China and India. He stated steel and asphalt are the two main materials busting commercial budgets.

Source: CoStar.com

Coping with Higher Construction Cost

A recent CoStar article titled “Building Smarter: Strategies for Brokers and Developers on Managing Spiraling Construction Cost” discussed the potential that the dip in oil and commodity prices and the stronger dollar might lower construction cost in the short term. The article concluded that we should not expect this trend to continue and will likely foresee continued volatility in the markets. The article also addressed strategies for coping with higher construction cost. They included the following:

1. Avoid project 'scope creep,' and build lighter
2. Purchase materials smarter and in bulk
3. Know where the dollars are spent
4. Change the palette of materials
5. Build green and reap the benefits
6. Integrate more revenue-generating space and features
7. Leverage the contractor as a development partner
8. Bring the builder onboard early and consider design-build as an option
9. Fast track it
10. Build smart, energy producing or self-powered projects

What surprised me was that the rise in construction cost still catches projects off guard. Pierre Cowart, Vice President Leopardo Construction, was quoted saying

Despite ample publicity about the rising price of materials and cost overruns, "these issues still fly under the radar until too late in the project on at least 30% to 40% of the projects we’re working on," Cowart said. "When we get involved later in the process, it costs more to make adjustments to the project scope."

Here is a link to Leopardo Construction's white paper titled "Smart Construction:
Economical Building Solutions to Offset Soaring Material Prices". Great Resource!

Source: CoStar.com

Construction Spending Up In July in Some Categories

Overall construction spending last month inch down 0.6%. However, while construction spending was down in residential and commercial categories, there were a few bright spots in their report . Particularly in Public and Transportation related construction. Any growth in good news. I was surprised but happy to see it. Investment News had a great summary article reporting on the news. See the following list below. See the following list below.

Construction Spending
Source: Investment News

Residential..................... -2.1% from June 2008
.......................................-27.1% from July 2007
Office..............................+2.1% from June 2008
.......................................+16.8% from July 2007
Health Care....................+0.1% from June 2008
.......................................+6.3% from July 2007
Education.......................+1.7% from June 2008
.......................................+6.3% from July 2007
Transportation...............+3.8% from June 2008
.......................................+11.5% from July 2007
Public Construction.......+1.4% from June 2008
.......................................+8.1% from July 2007

September 2008 Update: Portland

Our September's update is available. The photo update includes our final installment of Portland, Oregon. Sites include The South Waterfront District (Atwater Place, The John Ross, The Meriwether), Tom McCall Waterfront Park, 21st Avenue and Tibbetts Green Street, The Columbia River Gorge National Scenic area and many more. We now have over 19,000 images. You can see more sample Portland photos on our Flickr gallery.

Real Estate to Recover in 2011?

The bad economic news continues to pile on. Layoffs have been hitting architecture and landscape architecture firms all over the country for the past few months, particularly those that work on residential development. ASLA reports that firms have been staying busy, but over 70% of landscape architecture firms are not considering hiring this quarter. AIA predicts a downturn in non-residential construction toward the end of this year. While I remain optimistic that we will make it through these tough times, there is no denying that they are tough. I continue to hear many predications as to when real estate markets will recover. Unfortunately, most seem to be hopeful predictions versus realistic ones. I came across this article over the weekend reporting on recent economic predictions by Dr. Mark Dotzour, chief economist at the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University and Dr. Rajeev Dhawan, director of the Business Economic Forecasting Center at Georgia State University, two highly respected national economist. They predict that real estate will begin to recover in late 2010 and rise markedly by 2011. This seemed to be more realistic. However, Dr. Dotzour was kind enough to offer a ray of hope for an earlier recovery saying:

Dotzour points out a source of hope for commercial real estate investors, who would certainly welcome an unexpectedly stronger economy next year. Due to the credit crunch and economic uncertainty associated with the presidential election, Dotzour believes a number of U.S. companies and consumers have put off major decisions to spend or commit to space this year.

By March 2009, he says, businesses will have a better understanding of their financial standing and tax burdens under the new president, and may cut loose with a swath of business deals, leases and real estate purchases. “It’s possible we could have a very pleasant surprise around April.”