In this episode of Laying the Foundation, Skyler sits down with CMBA CFO Kent Lutz to explore the concept of "Design on Demand." They discuss how modern technology and AI are driving a major shift in the traditional architectural process, easing the tedious technical burden on the back end so architects can focus more heavily on early creative problem-solving. While clients increasingly expect instant, Spotify-like access to project results, Kent explains why balancing these accelerated timelines with an iterative, patient design process is still essential to creating high-quality spaces.
(Skyler): Welcome back, everybody, to another episode of the Laying the Foundation podcast. My name is Skyler, and I'm your host. Today, we have a wonderful guest joining us: Kent from our Des Moines office. Kent has done a couple of episodes with us so far, and we're incredibly excited to have him back. Kent, how are you doing today?
(Kent): I'm doing great today, Skyler. Happy to be here.
(Skyler): Awesome. We're excited to have you because today we're talking about a concept that I don't have much knowledge about outside of the notes you sent over: "Design on Demand." When it comes to architecture, what does that phrase even mean?
(Kent): To me, it represents a major shift in our architectural process. The way we worked for decades prior to the last ten years was very traditional and formal in how we produced work. Recently, there has been a significant shift that I refer to as "Design on Demand." Thanks to modern technology, we do much more of the heavy lifting upfront and a lot less on the back end. This evolution in our practice, including what we are beginning to do with artificial intelligence, allows us to focus heavily on creative and design work early on, which significantly increases our speed to market.
(Skyler): Interesting. So we're speeding up the process by focusing more on the creative and quality side, rather than worrying as much about the tedious technical production that is now integrated into the software.
(Kent): Exactly. In the past, we sometimes couldn't spend as much time truly solving the core architectural problem because tight schedules forced us to jump straight into the heavy labor of producing documents. Now that the technical burden has been eased, we get to spend more time in the design phase, which ultimately makes our work better.
(Skyler): When we hear the phrase "on demand," we usually think of streaming movies on Netflix or getting food delivered to our door in fifteen minutes. Obviously, we aren't talking that fast when it comes to designing buildings.
(Kent): Right, but it stems from that same modern expectation of instant access, like finding whatever you need on Amazon or Spotify. My children recently found a box of compact discs in the basement and thought they were fascinating, sort of how vinyl records were to us when we were kids. But they quickly realized how annoying it is to physically put a disc into a machine just to listen to an album when they are used to Spotify, where any song is available instantly. That is the expectation clients bring to us now; everyone wants information and results at their fingertips.
(Skyler): Absolutely, and that applies to our clients too. They live in a modern society where they can get what they want instantly, so when they come to us for a project, they expect a fast timeline. How do we fulfill those expectations while maintaining the integrity of our work?
(Kent): We have to temper expectations because the process isn't completely instantaneous. People sometimes think we just push a button, and the construction documents are automatically done, but it doesn't work that way. Architecture requires patience because it is inherently an iterative process. Our designs are much better when they go through multiple iterations rather than just relying on the very first idea that pops into your brain. A good design needs time to be refined, much like a recipe.
On the plus side, technology like Microsoft Teams gives us incredible access to our clients. However, the downside is that we can become too dependent on asking questions one at a time. As we discussed a few weeks ago, we want to be highly respectful of our clients' time. Speeding up the process can become counterproductive if we don't think strategically about what information we actually need and when. For example, at the very beginning of a project, I don't need to know what office chairs are going into the faculty spaces. That detail comes much later. If a client brings it up early, we just note it, store it away in the project files, and pull it out when the time is right.
(Skyler): Right, set those notes aside in the project drive and revisit them later. Outside of this modern "instant gratification" mindset, are there other industry factors driving this push for fast-track schedules and speed to market?
(Kent): The fluctuation and steady increase in material costs are huge drivers. Clients want to get their projects designed and bid before market conditions change. Another fascinating factor is the natural downtime built into education calendars. K-12 and higher education institutions have a tight three-month window over the summer. It is impressive what we can accomplish in that short timeframe, but it requires careful planning. We always suggest bidding projects in the winter, so contractors have time to procure materials and hit the ground running when summer hits. Sometimes we don't get much advance notice, which naturally pushes us into a "Design on Demand" scenario.
(Skyler): We've talked about healthcare projects on the podcast before. Hospitals don't have an off-season; they can't just shut down a department for construction. I imagine that has a massive impact on your design speed and strategy.
(Kent): It absolutely does. Healthcare projects tend to be heavily phased. I like to design the ideal long-term solution first and then work backward to figure out how to phase construction logically. It requires a lot of back-and-forth collaboration because you have to keep vital spaces, like an Emergency Department, running 24/7/365 while building around them. Speed sometimes has to be recalibrated to ensure operational safety.
(Skyler): It sounds like a very strategic approach to maintaining velocity. Let’s jump into the technological side of this. We hear a lot about BIM and cloud-based tools changing the game for collaboration and speed. What does that look like in practice?
(Kent): In the past, we would work with a large consultant team, structural, mechanical, electrical, plumbing, and civil engineers, and upload a new set of documents every Friday. We'd say, "Here is the newest version, let us know what needs to change." It worked okay, but it was incredibly asynchronous. If you forgot to tell a consultant that you moved a wall, it was very difficult for them to catch it.
Today, we all work simultaneously within the exact same building model in the cloud in real-time. This has its pros and cons. It allows us to make last-minute adjustments, but we have to remain sensitive to how those late changes impact our engineers. On the plus side, it completely revolutionizes collaboration. You can jump on a Teams call and say, "Hey Corey, I just shifted this column six inches to align with a wall," and it is instantly updated on his screen. It makes our workflow significantly faster and smoother.
(Skyler): Right, because everyone sees the changes instantly. They can offer immediate feedback or warn you if a layout adjustment conflicts with something else.
(Kent): Exactly, like catching whether a duct will fit above a ceiling before it ever gets to the job site.
(Skyler): Back when adjustments were made right before the weekend, a coordination issue could just sit there for days. It's amazing how far the technology has come.
(Kent): It really is. Early in my career back in the '90s, we worked on a project for Reiman Gardens at Iowa State University, and one of our specialty consultants was based in France. We didn't have video calls or cloud sharing; we communicated entirely by fax. Because of the time zone difference, they were awake while we were asleep, making the entire process incredibly slow and asynchronous.
(Skyler): I used to help people send faxes at a previous job, and I always wondered if industries still relied on them! I can't even imagine trying to coordinate a major architectural project that way.
(Kent): It felt like absolute magic at the time! It was a massive step up from relying entirely on regular mail or expensive long-distance phone calls, which is how things were done in the decades prior.
(Skyler): That brings us to another major technological topic: AI. There is a lot of stigma and debate surrounding it right now. How is CMBA utilizing AI tools to improve the design process without losing the human element and exceptional quality we pride ourselves on?
(Kent): Right now, AI acts strictly as an assistive technology for us. On the technical side, there are tools that can automatically dimension an entire set of drawings based on a few prompt guidelines, which is a massive time-saver. On the creative side, we use the built-in AI features within the Adobe Suite, like Photoshop. If we need to remove a tree or instantly place a dining table and chairs into a rendering, the software handles it beautifully. We could always do those things manually with our "ninja-like" Photoshop skills, but AI shaves hours off the process.
I haven't seen AI successfully generate brilliant, standalone design ideas yet, though that may come with time, but it excels at doing the monotonous tasks we don't want to do. From my perspective as CFO, it is also incredibly powerful at managing and analyzing large datasets. We are starting to look at how AI can streamline pre-design programming by processing massive amounts of client data from Excel spreadsheets. Instead of spending hours staring at lines of data, you can upload it and ask the tool to analyze relationship patterns. Over the next two to three years, you'll see us adopting it heavily for that.
(Skyler): That sounds incredibly helpful. Staring at endless spreadsheets for hours is mentally exhausting and brutal on your eyesight. Having a tool to mitigate that is a huge win. But with so many new platforms popping up, how do we evaluate which tools are actually worth investing in?
(Kent): That is a complex conversation, and we should probably bring Ryan Cameron, our Digital Practice Leader, onto a future episode to dive deep into it. Ryan serves on the National AIA Technology Board, so he has a front-row seat to emerging tech. He filters through the noise to determine what is genuinely useful. His expertise keeps CMBA on the cutting edge; while ensuring we stay away from the "bleeding edge" where unproven tech causes more problems than it solves.
(Skyler): "Cutting edge, not bleeding edge," I love that phrasing. Going back to the client experience, these advanced tools allow us to provide updates almost instantaneously. However, we are still human beings who need to log off, go home, and spend time with our families. How do we set boundaries and stay transparent with clients, so they don't expect 24/7 access to their architects?
(Kent): Fortunately, we have incredible clients who are very respectful of our time. Beyond that, it is up to us to manage our communication boundaries. Technology actually helps us manage this; for example, everyone in the firm knows I regularly snooze my Microsoft Teams notifications. You always want to be helpful and answer questions, but you have to know when to turn it off. Last night, I was at a junior high band concert, which is a perfect example of a time when I shouldn't be answering work messages.
(Skyler): Absolutely. Even during the workday, if you are focusing on a complex design challenge or sitting down with a coworker, that person deserves your full attention. The other messages can wait until you are free to give them your focus.
(Kent): Exactly.
(Skyler): We're discussing velocity and fast-tracked timelines, but CMBA is highly recognized for creative, high-quality design concepts that solve complex spatial problems. How do we strike a balance between maintaining speed and protecting that high level of design quality?
(Kent): Coming up with creative solutions to complex problems is exactly why I became an architect; it's the part of the job I get most excited about. We will never shortchange that creative process. It goes back to managing expectations early on. Even though technology allows us to work faster than ever before, we must intentionally build enough time into the schedule for deep design thinking.
Because of our firm's size and collaborative culture, I can easily bounce concepts off other partners in the office. If you ask nine different architects in our company for feedback on a design challenge, you might get eight different answers, and there is immense value in all of them.
(Skyler): That collective experience is such a huge asset. A K-12 architect facing a tricky layout problem can talk to a healthcare designer who might offer a completely fresh perspective from a different industry sector. It's amazing to have those cross-functional resources. What about once the building is occupied? How does our approach to long-term client relationships tie into this concept of "Design on Demand"?
(Kent): We have a high volume of repeat business because our mindset is "once a client, always a client." We conduct formal eleven-month warranty reviews to ensure the contractor addresses any building issues before the warranty expires. But beyond the logistics, I love checking back in to see how the spaces are actually performing. Every classroom project we design should be better than the last one.
We achieve that by asking questions of the people using the spaces every day, like the registrar's office. They might tell us a certain laminate gets dirty too quickly or is difficult to clean. Those small details are things we would never discover if we didn't maintain the relationship and follow up. Continuous learning makes our future designs more efficient and effective.
(Skyler): It builds an incredible cycle of improvement. Looking ahead, you mentioned the concept of "hybrid teams" and "predictive planning." What do those look like for the future of the industry?
(Kent): By hybrid teams, I mean leveraging our firm's regional footprint. We are spread out from Grand Island, Nebraska, to Cedar Falls, Iowa. In the past, collaboration meant everyone gathering physically around a single drafting table. Today, our digital tools make cross-office collaboration incredibly seamless, whether someone is working from home or sitting in a different city. It allows us to build project teams based on specific expertise rather than geographic proximity, ensuring we leverage a true diversity of thought.
As for predictive planning, that ties directly into the next evolution of AI. We are seeing tools that can instantly generate adjacency and functional relationship diagrams based on specific program data fed into the system. While a functional relationship diagram isn't a finished floor plan, it is an incredible tool that speeds up the initial brainstorming process exponentially, letting us transition into actual building design much faster.
(Skyler): It eliminates the tedious initial layout steps so you can dive straight into high-level creative design. It sounds incredibly exciting, but is it changing the core definition of what it means to be an architect?
(Kent): I don't think so. Human architects will always be essential. Even with the advanced technical tasks AI handles, we still have to rigorously check the output because the software still makes plenty of mistakes. As licensed professionals, our primary charge is protecting the life, safety, and welfare of the general public. We will never stamp or seal a set of documents unless we know it is 100% correct. If the day ever comes where an AI is legally sealing construction documents, then we can start to worry, but I don't see that happening anytime in the near future.
(Skyler): That makes perfect sense. Design on Demand doesn't mean bypassing the vital human checks; it just means using modern efficiency to deliver better results faster. Kent, thank you so much for joining us and sharing your insight on this topic.
(Kent): It was a pleasure, Skyler. I really enjoyed the conversation.
(Skyler): For our listeners, if you’d like to find out more about the Laying the Foundation podcast, you can subscribe on Spotify, iTunes, Google Podcasts, or any major streaming platform. You can also follow CMBA Architects on social media via Facebook, LinkedIn, X, and Instagram, or visit our website at cmbaarchitects.com. If you’re an architecture or design professional, or a student looking for an internship, please visit our careers tab to explore our current opportunities. This has been another episode of the Laying the Foundation podcast. We’ll see you next time.