September 2014 -

As my quest to obtain reimbursement of not insignificant travel expenses owed to me by the European Commission enters its seventh month, a couple of things have occurred to me: not only are governments of all descriptions and flavours completely out of touch with small business, but they undoubtedly also get the quality of expert advice that they pay for.

Back in the early part of the year I gave up two and a half days, unpaid, to attend a European Commission Science and Technology foresight workshop in Brussels, organised by Anne Glover, the EC Chief Scientific Advisor. The aim of the workshop was to scope the potential impacts of disruptive technologies so that European funding could focus on areas that would create the greatest benefits for European society. This was surely a worthy aim, but I believe that the execution reveals a fundamental flaw at the heart of such policy consultations.

At least I got to travel on lovely Brussels trams, even if the EC hasn’t made good on its promise to pay expenses.

Originally I was invited to address the gathering on developments in smart and sustainable cities, which was to be a short scene setting piece along with contributions from other experts from a wide variety of fields. In the end however, the workshop format was changed and I ended up, along with the other invited experts, merely contributing to discussion groups where we were outnumbered about 6 to 1 by euro-apparatchiks of one form or another.

This was a moment of revelation for me: The people who advise governments through such consultations are either from other institutions or from large businesses, not the people who really know about the issues; the pioneering small businesses. The average small business leader generally has more pressing concerns, such as ensuring continuing revenue and the ability to pay staff, to participate in unrelated, unpaid activity. Thus, unless policymakers are prepared to pay for the time of experts, the vast majority of people that they hear from will be those either paid to push a particular agenda or otherwise seeking influence.

This issue becomes increasingly problematic when it comes to trying to anticipate the impacts of new and potentially disruptive technologies. Disruption occurs when innovation leads to a revolutionary way of doing things, replacing the current business, social or policy paradigm. Disruption is impossible to predict from the viewpoint of the current paradigm which is embodied in current policy and established business practice. What I noticed in particular during the foresight workshop, was that many participants were simply regurgitating received wisdom, but the real insights came from the independently thinking small businesspeople, often from alternative fields.

The UK Technology Strategy Board (now rebranding as Innovate UK) does pay experts to help in seeking out innovation, at least through evaluating bids for public funding. The pay rates offered don’t actually cover the opportunity cost of the time commitment, but at least they allow us to convince ourselves that participation is not to the entire detriment of our businesses. The fact that we are paid experts also, I believe, engenders goodwill when it comes to our giving pro-bono support to help scope future competitions and contribute to the organisation’s wider aims.

On another tack, UK Government is regularly heard to lament the lack of innovation in publicly procured projects. It often blames this on the failure of SMEs to engage in public procurement, whilst continuing to set barriers to entry that preclude many SMEs based on finances and size of business. Looking at this picture as a whole, is it any wonder that so many small businesspeople are entirely disengaged from the public sector?

So, my message to governments and other policy organisations is that, if you want to receive meaningful advice and support from the expert small business community then you need to engage meaningfully with us, rather than simply expecting to be able to exploit us when it suits you and ignore us otherwise.

Maybe one day the European Commission will finally cough up my travel expenses and I’ll be so grateful for small mercies that I will be flooded afresh with goodwill towards governmental institutions. On the other hand, maybe the offhand way in which they have repeatedly dismissed my concerns mean that I might just continue to feel that my goodwill has been callously exploited.

Last week I was happy to join several teams of architects in a site visit to Fall Hill Quarry in Derbyshire, the location for the first project to be imagined by Curating Place. Old, abandoned industrial sites such as quarries always make me feel somber, mainly for the loss of the skills and productivity that they represent. I am also desolated by the impact we have made on the natural landscape and invigorated by the restorative power of nature in about equal measure. I believe that channelling such emotional responses will be key to the success of any development at Fall Hill.

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All architecture is designed to be experienced, but it seems to me that in commercial architecture this is so often reduced to a narrow palette of visual appliqué. Yet we all know what it is to be moved by truly great architecture.

I often refer to architecture as requiring a ‘business plan’. By this I don’t mean a bald accounting of rental income versus construction cost. Instead, I mean designers must understand and empathise with their public to create an offering that will be genuinely attractive. To do this the design must expand beyond the simple physical stuff of building and engage with social and humanistic issues to deliver both service and a truly meaningful experience. Only this rounded approach will lead to the architecture enduring. Vitruvius had it right all along, we just seem to have forgotten it in the rush to simple commodity.

People will pay handsomely to create memories that will last them a lifetime. Think about your own experiences and what you are prepared to pay. It could be enduring a night in the rain and mud to hear your favourite band, or a month’s salary for a meal in a Michelin starred restaurant. On the other hand, no-one would consider MacDonald’s or Burger King as providing a great experience and so they are reduced to competing with each other over price. If our creations fail to provide memorable experiences they will simply become commodities to be traded at lowest cost, but otherwise ignored.

The reality is that all buildings need a purpose and, more often than not, a large part of that purpose is to generate revenue. True, there are examples of grand 18th Century follies, which apparently have no purpose, but that is of course far from the truth. Follies were built with the specific purpose of creating experiences. If the conjunction of architecture and business in the modern world can offer experiences that exceed expectation then customers will not only return in the future, they will tell their friends, thus ensuring the success of the business and the architecture.

I have come across many developers and developments that labour under the misapprehension ‘build it and they will come’. This is a disastrous fallacy, as has been demonstrated by numerous Millennium Commission funded projects from the National Centre for Popular Music to the Millennium Dome. No, we must only build what we know will prove to be attractive and enduring. This actually requires some long, hard thinking about the people who will use our designs, what they need, what they want and what might surprise and delight them. Once you have identified and designed the means to delight your customers then you will have developed a ‘business plan’ that will sustain your architecture.

Monthly Archives: September 2014

Governments Get The Advice They Pay For

Curating Place 2 – Reflections