Conflict

Conflict is a state of discord or clash in areas of interests, or fights between individuals, groups or organizations. Leadership and control sharing across organizations and individuals in and between communities are common sources of conflict. Such conflict often leads to breakdowns in collaboration. Good teams need to go beyond basic team building to become aware of team dynamics while working in order to foster a good collaboration system.

In our project there is no obvious human conflict as we have divided our work accordingly and we have agreed to a leader to go to where he will make the final decisions when conflict arises. Conflict resolution becomes usable when resolving conflict. Successful conflict resolution not only occurs by listening to and providing opportunities to meet the needs of others, but it also addresses interests so that each one in the group is satisfied with the outcome.

Other ways of conflict resolution include:-

- try hard to understand other person/s points of view

- listen reflectively to what they are saying

- look for common grounds of vision

- acknowledge their expertise

- focus on interests rather than positions

- separate people from the problem

However there are some sorts of conflict that we experienced with using UT3 as well as the setting of our overall timeframe. I think the conflict becomes that when we stop and think about what we have done, we could have organized shortcuts in doing things. For instance we could have built the entire model in UT3 but we chose to build it in 3Dmax to import it as we initially thought it would be easier to use a program that we are familiar with rather than one that we cannot use. But it turns out that when we import the model into UT3 we had to separate all the parts which becomes a struggle. Our chosen path yet divides our work in a more equal way, having each of us doing different parts, rather than to have each of us spending time find out how UT3 works at the beginning.

REFERENCE

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict

Remuneration

Remuneration defines compensation or reward that is given for a particular task or service. It usually describes monetary payment or related entitlement that is paid by employers in return for work of employees. Remuneration can be in form of sustenance, accommodation, airfare, or medical insurance service as well. For large companies like Virgin Blue, they keep themselves apprised of the latest developments, policies and trends to remuneration matters which affect the markets in which the group does business. While that non-monetary remuneration includes anything like free parking, legal advice or flexible working hours.

In architectural terms, remuneration includes any payment made under a contract for services. Protection of minimum remuneration enables the pursuit of economic efficiency and better service quality, furthermore it becomes an incentive to provide high quality services and deprives the trading counterparts of the power to request for better architectural design. Planning and remuneration connects in the sense that for a project to run smoothly, associates need to be told of their reward according to what they have done in a contractual project. Without these disputes may arise when the end reward does not equal to what was contracted. Besides having to provide remuneration incentives, there should also be equity of remuneration because unequal rewards would contribute to disputes as well. People need to feel that a knowledge marketplace is not only fulfilling the organization’s goals, it is fulfilling theirs. They need to feel that their reward from collaborating on teams and projects, which may be run from the other side of the world, is equitable and aligned with their contribution.

In this course remuneration is paid in non-monetary form and it relates to the grades and verbal advice that we get for all the work that we have done. Within the group itself remuneration is a form of team responsibility.

REFERENCE

http://www.workplaceinfo.com.au/nocookie/subjects/PayandConditions/remuneration/articles/remuneration.htm

http://www.hrinz.org.nz/Site/HR_Info/glossaries/Glossary_of_HR_terms.aspx

Planning

Le Corbusier was an architect and artist who was famous for his contributions to what now is called modernist architecture. During the international modernism movement the plan was given preference. As a pioneer of theoretical thinking, In his book “Towards a New Architecture” he boldly states that “the plan is the generator…Without plan there can be neither grandeur of aim and expression, nor rhythm, nor mass, nor coherence…A plan calls for the most active imagination. It calls for the most severe discipline also. The plan is what determines everything; it is the decisive moment”, which summed up interior design and planning quite accurately implying that planning is everything. As a designer, everything should begin with the floor plan with all its implications of rational relationships, rather than impose some sort of artistic vision on a building as priority. With influence of digital modeling software nowadays, the section becomes the new option given that it is perhaps the best drawing and representational technique for understanding form and space.
Our goal was to create an environment in UT3 that bettered the half life 2 model. In doing so we assigned specific roles to each person in the group and we run the weeks as planned in the schedule. Essentially our digital project converts a materialized model made from max into UT3 where all the lighting and landscape are done.
The spatial planning of our unbuilt building involves an atrium space at the bottom level where the character can move into a huge interiorlized courtroom and up onto the stairs onto the second and above levels. Our chosen building is rather spacious which we intended for the user to experience the space. Urban planning is not just concerned with the making of plans but also with the management of development to ensure that it accords with the objectives of the plan and is developed to the benefit of the general public. Statutory planning, or otherwise known as town planning, development control or development management, refers to this part of the planning process that is concerned with the regulation and management of changes to land use and development. Usually, a developer is required to lodge a planning application with the government body, usually a local council, for approval. That application is assessed by the statutory planner to see if it complies with the relevant planning objectives, controls, standards, policies and provisions and decided for approval or rejection. The aim of having statuary planning is to improve quality of life for residents ensuring that the land use requirements of the community for housing, employment, retail, leisure, community facilities, waste, minerals and transport are met in a sustainable way, and to conserve and enhance the best features of the natural and built environment.

REFERENCE
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statutory_planning

Context

Generally architecture students have to have an ability to solve a problem in an appropriate design context. Our task is to place a computer generated model into the UT3 program which I think becomes the context to our problem having to design for internal and external architectural environments. We have to consider the space in which it will reside, the lighting, other surrounding organic or inorganic objects and the surrounding landscape. We are to construct and display knowledge and learning experience using contextual learning resources and tutorials in the 3D virtual environment. Context and experience closely relate to one another, and structures cannot be perceived as independent aesthetic entities but rather they must harmonize with their built and natural surroundings as part of the virtual building environment.

Context becomes important in the architectural field as architects are not only responsible for the buildings and structures they design, but also for the environment.

Paralleling to the relationships between building construction and architectural form and space, there should be a relationship drawn between architecture and its cultural context as well, where buildings are not isolated objects, but are anchored in and shaped by their physical and cultural contexts.

Hierarchy

Hierarchy is a system that helps to simplify a design process by allowing functional role of subassemblies to be articulated in a meaningful way as to their contribution to the function of the whole. In collaborative environment both hierarchy and democracy have to be brought together to form some kind of leadership role. However the power given in a hierarchy should not be abused but rather needs to be redeemed and understood. Having power distributed equally among members in a group tend to create excessive expectation of other people’s abilities and their willingness to shoulder responsibility. Overemphasis on equality in group-work an lead to a lack of motivation for developing individual potential as members receive no greater rewards for demonstrating their abilities. Therefore it becomes essential to have a balanced hierarchy, to have a leader that would evaluate others’ commitment to the group more objectively as well as their skills and their potential leadership abilities. In every group there is always a hierarchy of ability present which needs to be recognized in order to allow people to manifest their full potential. Hierarchy not only acknowledges current abilities but it also values leadership, purpose, direction, vision, accountability and efficiency. In a working field hierarchy can offer mentoring for those who are younger or less experienced and thus can learn to become more advanced in certain areas. Simon is our leader and his role is to initiate new things that influence other people, and I think he does quite a good job appraising people for what they have done. He gives encouragement as well as listening to everyone else to develop good relations with all members of the group. Enlightened leadership is educative rather than directive by drawing out the best in others having to assume that people already have the potential wisdom and creativity within them.

Conventional building delivery is structured hierachically in terms of control and linear in time. Digital tools are providing a catalyst for rethinking the structures of project delivery, presenting opportunities for firms to expand their roles, offer new services and change the sequencing of how and when design information is developed and consumed.

In the unbuilt work that we are doing there is a strong sense of hierarchy conceived. The building is a courthouse itself which symbolizes a sense of power and hierarchy. The building’s form is very tense to highlight this aspect, i.e. the building is structured like a heavy block supported by columns on the side. When you walk into the building the public areas are on the main floor, whereas the judges’ office and private areas are on second floor and above which makes a statement saying that private uses are above and unreachable.

REFERENCE

http://www.visionarylead.org/articles/hierarchy_democracy.htm

http://polaris.gseis.ucla.edu/pagre/simon.html

http://www.design.upenn.edu/workworkwork/files/SheldenArchitecturalDesign.v76.pdf

INTENT

Intent relates to the intended meaning of a communication. It is the attempt to get someone to share your thoughts by having intellectual arrangements of features and dimensions of design. Design intent tends to govern the relationship between features in part and parts in assemblies. This means that for a design to work as a solution there has to be intent of each component to answer the design problem.

Within a presentation we try to use body language which tends to provide clues to the meaning and intent of communication from others that we get from gesture, facial expression, posture and everything else that is non-verbal. Non-verbal communication amounts to a second source of human communication that is often more reliable or essential to understanding what is really going on than the words themselves. While verbally when we talk to someone it is essential to bare in mind that others share the same sphere of experience would understand the content of a presentation. In the architecture environment there needs to be a high-level framework that can be used to develop unified communications environments that can provide significant productivity and cost benefits. Intelligent presenters should be able to communicate with each other using an extensible, expressive language.

REFERENCE

http://hbswk.hbs.edu/archive/3123.html

KNOWLEDGE

Architectural knowledge enables architects to create humane environments that emerges from and responds to societal, cultural and environmental needs. The humane environment is all about reason, emotion and intuition where architects have to resolve with the ability and knowledge to conceptualize, coordinate, and execute the idea of building. Like any other distinctive branches of education in design, architecture requires the development of creative capabilities to produce three dimensional spaces and form that accommodates for related human activities.

Knowledge in architecture can be regarded as a prerequisite to knowledge sharing within an infrastructure that combines people, content and technology all together.

Knowledge sharing often requires people to do a proper job in the case of assig ning job content to the right people to make sure that information flows to the right departments at the right time. This can be done by assigning people authority and responsibility for specific kinds of knowledge content and knowledge delivery. This avoids departments to become territorial in a typical organization fighting over budget or over the control of sensitive processes, and ensures departments to be cooperative and ready to share knowledge. The necessary knowledge transfer between people and technology involves capturing implied knowledge from experts, storing it in knowledge base, and making it available to people for solving complex problems.

Design studios are directed to practical ends and that knowledge cannot substitute for architectural imagination yet inadequate knowledge would handicap the general level of design. The architectural design process is knowledge intensive which requires a sequence of design decisions to be made. In our team it is expected that every one of us are at the same knowledge level with computer skills so it becomes easy to communicate to one another without much explanation.

REFERENCE

www.humiliationstudies.org/documents/SalamaICHH-05.pdf

http://www.ds.arch.tue.nl/Research/publications/henri/am97ha.htm

http://turing.une.edu.au/~comp292/Lectures/HEADER_KM_2004_LEC_NOTES/node17.html