As a nonprofit, APIB provides funding for, publishes within an open exchange,
and presents evidence-based, balanced, peer-reviewed, independent-author
research and recommendations that help people in the buildings industry
understand when their individual actions, in concert with others, negatively
impact the public and how reasonable changes in their approach can improve
management of public resources and public safety. BUILDINGS.INFO
MISSION
CRUCIAL CONVERSATIONS
IN THE BUILDINGS INDUSTRY
The book Crucial Conversations [https://cruciallearning.com] teaches how to communicate
effectively when there are opposing opinions, strong
emotions and high stakes. And, the authors of the
publications we publish are trying to do just that. The
stakes are high because the impact of the buildings
industry on the public, such as through expenditure of
tax dollars or exposure of the public to dangerous
conditions, can be enormous. Emotions are strong
because citizens get angry when they see these
negative impacts whereas decision-makers in the
buildings industry are often offended when criticized.
And, opposing opinions arise from the different
perspectives of various parties. The solution comes with
proper dialogue among all interested parties, where
facts are established objectively and a clear path is
identified to a better way forward for us all. APIB seeks
to foster this dialogue for the buildings industry.
The public is obviously impacted by publicly owned buildings. The public is also impacted by privately owned buildings with examples including building safety impacts to the public that enters and works in private buildings, various public resource and public safety impacts to the communities that surround private buildings, as well as public resource and public safety impacts to the buildings industry at large.
Many citizens do not realize the large number of roles, with fragmented and often conflicting responsibilities, involved in the buildings industry. These roles are ultimately filled by individuals but these individuals often each work in the context of a greater organization, often with many people they supervise and they themselves often having many supervisors. The following is an example of just some of the roles that can be involved with larger buildings, not even counting many specialty consultants typically involved when buildings have special functions such as athletics arenas, educational, emergency operations centers, food preparation/service, governance/judicial facilities, healthcare, industrial functions, or performance venues.
- Acoustical Consultant
- Access Control Subcontractor
- Architect
- Building Envelope Consultant
- Building Owner
- Building Official
- City Inspector
- Civil Engineer
- Commissioning Agent
- Concrete Foreman
- Construction Manager
- Construction Materials Engineer
- County/Parish Governance
- Demographics Consultant
- Drywall Subcontractor
- Earthwork Subcontractor
- Electrical Engineer
- Electrical Plans Examiner
- Electrical Subcontractor
- Environmental Engineer
- Federal Governance
- Financial Advisor
- Fire Protection Engineer
- General Contractor
- Geotechnical Engineer
- Hardware Consultant
- HVAC Subcontractor
- Interior Designer
- Manufacturers
- Masonry Subcontractor
- Material Suppliers
- Materials Testing Technicians
- Mechanical Plans Examiner
- Mechanical/Plumbing Engineer
- Municipal Governance
- Owner's Project Manager
- Painting Subcontractor
- Plumbing Plans Examiner
- Plumbing Subcontractor
- Program Manager
- Public Relations Consultant
- Representatives of Trade Unions
- Technology & Security Consultant
- State Health Dept.
- State Environmental Quality Dept.
- State Transportation Dept.
- Steel Fabricator
- Steel Erector
- Structural Engineer
- Structural Plans Examiner
- Urban Planner
- Utilities Providers
All of these roles exist for valid reasons. Many of these roles specifically exist to protect the public and most people do a great job in these roles. However, it should not surprise anyone that there are sometimes systematic problems that negatively impact the public interest without any one person alone having the power to change the system. As an example of the challenges, the combinations of the specific individuals in each of these roles on each project are typically very different, which often discourages anyone from proposing a better solution and building consensus which would require investing time and legitimacy on each project. Unfortunately, proposing a change for the better also often risks loss of future work by angering self-interested parties in power that benefit from the status quo for various reasons. In many cases, the better solution is even better for those self-interested parties in power and they just don’t realize it because their ego gets in the way. These solutions often require participation from multiple parties, so they often don’t fit cleanly within the scope of traditional professional associations. APIB seeks to give individual authors a platform to soberly propose these solutions so that people can rally around them over time and changes can be adopted for the betterment of the public interest.
