RISK, SATISFACTION, CHOICE, AND COST

We don’t understand our client’s brain.  Yet we should.  We should understand the mental landscape of how design decisions are made.  This requires an understanding of risk, satisfaction, choice and cost.

One of the fun things about a blog like Transparent Drawing is that it can be taken in unexpected directions. Or to put it another way, this sort of blog is like analogue drawing; when you start, you do not know where you will end up.

One of our sub-themes is our client’s state of mind.  I simply wish to make a mid stream observation that some of my recent pages are centered around trying to get some sort of understanding on exactly what the heck is happening in the minds of those who pay us.

Some of these pages include:

–Prospect Theory, in which we discuss the very human tendency to select the sure thing rather than risk greater gains. This is why clients make conservative decisions.

–Utility Theory, in which psychologist’s efforts to quantify satisfaction is broached.

–Endowment Effect, in which we understand the psychological cost to each of us when we give up something that we own. This applies to the minds of clients and also to the minds of designers.

Some of you may be saying, what does the psychology of the designer / client interface have to do with making pretty transparent drawings of buildings and objects? The answer is that one of the byproducts of thinking with a transparent mindset is the desire to understand the mental interdependencies of design decisions. It simply seems that if designers were taught more about our understanding of risk, satisfaction, choice and cost as they apply to design decisions, it would increase our effectiveness.

It seems to me that a great use of someone’s time would be to provide a comprehensive summary of these factors as they apply to the designer / client interface.  And more research is not a bad idea either.

I truly want to see people make choices which maximize the potential of the boxes that they spend time in and spend vast sums of money for. And possibly, as a matter of course, if designers understand the variables of risk, satisfaction, choice and cost, our client interface method will improve. Which might mean that we end up with a higher quantity of good enclosures, happier clients and last but not least, satisfied architects.