To the President of the Hong Kong Institute of Architects (HKIA)
It is a pity to see your members working themselves to death for just
stupid
reasons. But it does not matter and I don't really care. What really
matter
is that your members are compelling the construction teams to work to
death
due to such stupidity. Let me outline very briefly here what your members
do
during the design of buildings. They first prepare their draft design or a
number of alternative designs and send them to their engineers. At this
stage, the engineers carry out the relevant calculations and some detailed
design and make recommendations with respect to the alternatives to the
architects. In most cases, the architects need to amend their drawings and
send them to the engineers again for further amendments or redesign. Such
iterative process goes on until a "satisfactory" solution is reached. If
the
architects are lucky enough, such process may not take long. However, in
some cases, the architects are not that lucky and they have to redesign
their buildings many many times. This is one of the main reasons for your
architects overexerting themselves. I believe that such unfortunate
situation can be improved only if your members are willing to learn and
have
sufficient understanding about building construction so that the time for
such iterative process can be shortened, as the "abortive draft design"
can
be minimized. If your members still insist that they can lead the
construction teams, I would strongly recommend that they should spend some
years in building engineering schools first in order to enable them to
have
a strong grasp of what they need to know about modern construction
science,
technology and management. Generally speaking, as the quality of your
members is low, they would need to take more time to learn such than the
average engineering students. Anyway, it is worthwhile to do so, because
your members need not overexert themselves for the rest of their life for
stupid reasons. Your members do not know how to expend their energy
effectively.
Recently, there is a bit more construction science modules in the
architectural schools. However, these are only cosmetic. The main thing is
the mentality of the Architects. Generally speaking, they do not deal with
problems from scientific point of view. They can only deal with problems
with intuition or common sense or, even worse, they just care about
aesthetics. Sometimes intuition or common sense may lead to reasonable
solution, but it may also lead to incorrect conclusion. Therefore,
intuition
or common sense must be used with great care. Indeed, more space would be
required for better and more detailed discussion about intuition or common
sense, but I would not delve into it here.
The goalpost is moving forward and there are people who can move with it
swiftly, while your members are unable to do so simply because the
training
of your members in engineering is very very weak and their quality is low.
Your members are just outdated and shameless creatures, which use the
existing legal framework to protect their own interests and to seize jobs
which they are not capable to deal with, trick those competent personnel
and
waste their time unnecessarily using dirty means. It is just like gorillas
ruling the world. Generally speaking, the legal framework is not good
enough
and indeed some of our problems in the construction industry are due to
bad
contract do***ents or contractual procedures. Under the pressure of time
and
insufficient manpower during the ˇ§peakˇ¨ period of construction projects,
your members either naively or knowingly compel the site personnel to
carry
out unnecessary or trivial things, while such time and manpower should be
deployed in the more critical issues.
Your members deceive the public and the law drafters to make them believe
that they are competent for managing, monitoring and controlling
construction projects, as the latter are laymen. You must admit that there
are other people, who are more competent for managing construction
projects,
but the architects just simply use their authority under the law to oust
competent personnel lest the latter would over****ne them. This is unfair
to
these personnel who make a lot of effort for the construction projects,
but
whose credits are taken away by your members. This is also unfair to the
taxpayers who pay for the education for such personnel, as their skills
cannot be used in the most advantageous way under the "leader****p" of your
members.
In view of such, I propose the law drafters to consider making necessary
changes of the law to limit the authority of the architects and vest more
authority to the more competent personnel with respect to construction
project management. A panel including competent professionals in
engineering, science and construction management and the public should be
set up to review the competence of your members and set new standards
under
law with respect to construction project management. I have strong grounds
for such propositions as follows:
1. The problems in our construction industry have not been satisfactorily
resolved or minimized for decades. Complaints from end users are not
uncommon. As your members act as the construction team leaders and such
problems cannot be resolved for such a long time, can your members say
that
they have no responsibility for such problems? Those who have carried out
demolition works would know that the qualities of some existing buildings
were/are below acceptable standards. I have discussed such problems with
some engineers and we share similar views. We think that we would not
approve the works if those projects were supervised by us. It appears that
some engineers in the past knowingly approved sub-standard works. One
possible reason was corruption. However, there is another reason. These
engineers were/are working under the pressure of the greedy developers and
architects and they fear that they would lose their jobs if they do not
approve the sub-standard works. I think some engineers would deny such
fact
publicly simply because they would be offending the "senior" engineers by
telling the truth. Of course, supervision of the works by incompetent
supervisors and Clerk of Works is also one of the reasons for the
sub-standard works.
2. Your members fail to explain to the law drafters that property
development companies and construction companies can only be operated and
controlled by people with proper academic qualifications and your members
allow people without proper academic training to run and control
construction companies. Your members clearly do not have sufficient
capabilities to *****s the capabilities of the personnel of the
construction
industry. But, as far as I know, your member is adopting some grading
system, the validity of which is very questionable, for government jobs,
directly allowing and authenticating people without sufficient academic
qualifications to run and control construction companies. Your members
knowingly allow the construction companies to let their relatives, who do
not have sufficient academic qualifications, to assume positions like
directors, project managers or site agents etc. to control the operations
of
the construction projects. Your members know well that these people cannot
even communicate in formal technical English! (Also, there are Chartered
Engineers in Hong Kong who cannot do so!!) Clearly, they are not qualified
for running construction companies. This is a disregard of the quality of
works, the safety of the public and professionalism. Thanks to the
lenience
and ignorance of your members, these directors, project managers and site
agents never feel ashamed of not having sufficient understanding of the
relevant structural theories, which are crucial in any construction
projects! (Mediocre will raise their defense that structures are only
structural engineersˇ¦ job to hide their ignorance and incompetence.
Mediocre, who do not have the brainpower to study proper theories for
building construction, may raise their defense that their families have
been
being in the construction industries for two generations. These people do
not understand building construction, but they have money to hire people
who
do.) It is a sin to run a construction company without having sufficient
understanding about structural theories or authenticate someone to do so.
Would God punish these people who made/make use of the loopholes of the
law
to make a living or even make fortunes? Your members wishes (or may be
forced) to let the unqualified people to monopolize the construction
industry to oust the good & competent personnel with appropriate academic
qualifications. Your members' first priority is to protect their own
interests. As such, your members are happy with that the construction
teams
are of low academic standard.
3. The strongest ground for my proposal is that the profession of building
construction is heavily dependent on knowledge of science, technology and
management. Some of your members may pretend to understand or to be
interested in science and technology. However, they cannot deceive the
more
able people who would have a little time to understand what architects
really are. Anyone who is really interested in science and technology
would
be very interested in advanced mathematics, as they would realize that
they
cannot go far enough without the use of advanced mathematics. Any high
school students who have a glimpse of advanced mathematics would realize
its
power and I have no doubt that the best and most able students would like
to
pursue further studies closely related to such subjects unless the market
in
such fields is not good. Indeed, advanced mathematics can be applied to
any
field fruitfully, but mediocre are just unable to learn and apply such
knowledge in their relevant field. It would be hypocritical to claim
oneself
to have good understanding of science, technology and management without
some understanding of advanced mathematics. Many law drafters who have no
background in advanced mathematics cannot realize how im****tant it is in
science & technology and therefore have long been being deceived by the
architects.
If your goodself is a reasonable, fair and conscientious man, you should
propose the same to the law drafters and explain to them clearly the
weakness of your members. Please do not play misleading words games.
Just not to render your members jobless. Your members may still be useful
in
user requirements, assisting the construction team to submit the relevant
applications to the government departments and to produce draft and
finalized general plans, providing advice on aesthetics, checking the
dimensions of the buildings to ensure they comply with the relevant
building
codes and ..emˇKˇK.. prevention of mosquito breeding in construction sites
(Not kidding. This is crucial.) etc.. But with respect to construction
project management, please leave it to other competent professionals.
Your members may claim to be ˇ§professionalsˇ¨ under law or pose
themselves
as ˇ§professionalsˇ¨ on radio or TV, saying some superficial things, but
they cannot claim to be professionals with respect to their knowledge in
science, technology and management.
Law of men can be wrong, but law of nature can never be wrong, unless God
changes it as and when he "thinks fit".
I wish you would post your comment with respect to this message to the
newsgroups, to which it is posted.
Please also read the following message, which I downloaded from the
newsgroup.
One of the biggest problems relating to quality of constructions works in
Hong Kong is the quality of the Clerk of Works (COW) on site. (Clerk of
Works are not "office clerks" who
carry out routine clerical duties). They are supposed to be the
representative of the Authorized Persons, most of whom are Architects,
controlling the quality & safety of works and monitoring progress of works
etc.. First, their academic qualifications are totally unacceptably low.
For
example, they are unable (or
unwilling) to inspect structural works on site except, maybe, dimension of
formworks etc.. The big problem is that these COWs consider themselves to
be
"the biggest man on site" while they do not really have the ability to be
so. In order to pose themselves as "the biggest
man on site", they always give "advice", which are beyond their ambit, to
the contractors, which may have personnel who are much better qualified.
For
example, some COWs may like to talk about steelworks while they do not
even
know how much weld is required for a steel connection. Once, an Architect
came to site
and asked the COW when the shoring and propping for certain floor slabs
can
be removed and the COW say that they can be removed after 7 days. Of
course,
the COW
has given the wrong answer and he should first consult the
building/structural engineers or the contractor who submit the relevant
method statement (of
course, after it is approved). The correct answer is 14 days for that
particular case. The Architect asked the wrong guy the right question
because of his lack of knowledge about engineering. This is a vivid
example
showing that experiences alone is far from sufficient and, indeed, can be
disastrous.
Then, how can we resolve the problem? We may set higher standard for the
qualifications of the COWs. But it may not be easy because high quality
personnel may
not like to work directly under idiots like Architects. The real problem
is
that it is difficult to have good quality people on site if the
construction
team is to be
led by incompetent "so-called" professionals or, even worse, by people
without sufficient relevant academic qualifications.
In view of their very limited abilities, these COWs are overpaid as their
level of knowledge is just a bit better than the site foremen.
Unless the COWs have at least degree qualifications plus some years of
relevant experiences in building contractors after they have obtained
their
degrees, the reasonable salaries for Assistant Clerk of Works, ACOW,
should
be less than HK$15,000.00 per month and that for COW less than
HK$18,000.00
per month.
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