During my career we used a true accounting package designed for architects. You would think that everything worked great. You would be wrong. When it came to checking on the status of a project's budget, you rarely got an answer in the time frame that you were expecting.

Why wasn't a Project Status readily available?

• "The PM never submitted a design budget."
• "The time won't be posted until pay day. Do you want it anyway?"
• "It's going to be off because the engineers haven't sent a bill yet."

The point is that getting a timely project status was a lot of work to keep up with.

I am happy to report that bookkeeping solutions don't require all of that. 

Here's all you do...

The Municipal Courthouse project housed three courtrooms, judges’ chambers, Clerk of Courts offices, public and other ancillary spaces in 17,500 square feet on one floor. 

The structure was classified as a Mixed Use Group A-3 and B; and the Construction Type was 2C with sprinklers. 

Built in 1992. 

Notable features are the skylighted lobby and triangular light shafts at the entrance.

​Photos and drawings available below...

If you have been following along with my description of how to develop your own customized project management system using Trello, you know it's time to start implementing the idea. Implementing Trello in your firm is pretty simple.
Here are the steps I suggest. 

• Get your free Trello account.
• Check out these Trello resources.
• Decide who will manage your PM System
• Present Trello to everyone 
• Share the Trello orientation tool
• Try out Trello with a simple group project
• Set Up your master project template

We all have used Street View in Google Maps. Google has just about photographed the entire built-environment. It's kind of cool or creepy depending on your point of view.

I was preparing a post last week and wished I had a picture of the spire pictured here. I planned to go take a picture or two for the post. While I was looking up the address in Google Maps, I found that Google had taken care of the picture-taking for me - and at a much nicer time of year. 

So in half the time it would have taken to drive to the site and back, I had grabbed a few screenshots, cropped and re-sized them, and placed them in the blog post.

So far this isn't too creepy, it's just a helpful marketing tool. Especially helpful when you are working against a deadline.

​

The creepiness factor was just around the corner...