The Design and Technical Pathway.

From Designer to Practice Director

4 modules · 16 lessons · about 2 hours · free, with a certificate at the end

What this pathway teaches.

Sixteen lessons across four modules, each closed out with a ten question exam. Pass at 80% to unlock the next module. Complete all four to earn your certificate.

Four modules, taken in order. A 10-question exam closes each one; you need 8 out of 10 to pass, retakes are unlimited, and the next module unlocks when you do. Finish all four and your certificate is issued in your name.

The modules

01

The Toolkit, Reframed

The designer's toolkit reframed as leadership training: drawings as instructions with consequences, design risk owned rather than inherited, and the RIBA stages read as commercial as well as technical.

  1. The Drawing as Instruction · about 7 minutes
  2. The RIBA Plan of Work as a Commercial Document · about 6 minutes
  3. Coordination Without Authority · about 7 minutes
  4. Buildability, Cost and the Paper Trail · about 7 minutes

Module exam: 10 questions, about 5 minutes.

02

The Business of a Practice

How a consultancy actually makes money: chargeable time and net fee income per head, a fee proposal that reflects the work rather than the hope, duty of care under the standard UK appointments, and where risk moves through warranties, contribution clauses and novation.

  1. The Numbers a Practice Lives By · about 7 minutes
  2. The Fee Proposal and the Scope That Was Never There · about 7 minutes
  3. The Appointment and the Duty It Sets · about 6 minutes
  4. Where Your Duty Actually Goes, and the Roles You Now Carry · about 7 minutes

Module exam: 10 questions, about 5 minutes.

03

Leading Designers

The step from producing work to being responsible for other people's: delegating without losing control of quality, resourcing and developing people under pressure, the split between project and technical leadership, and the conversations technical excellence never prepared you for.

  1. Delegating Without Losing Control · about 7 minutes
  2. Resourcing and Developing People Under Pressure · about 7 minutes
  3. Project Leadership and Technical Leadership Are Not the Same Job · about 7 minutes
  4. The Conversations Nobody Trains You For · about 6 minutes

Module exam: 10 questions, about 5 minutes.

04

Getting There

The route to associate, associate director, director and partner: what a practice actually promotes for, chartership as the credibility floor rather than the differentiator, the real difference between a salaried directorship and equity, and where the role goes from there.

  1. What a Practice Actually Promotes For · about 6 minutes
  2. Chartership and the Reputation That Travels · about 7 minutes
  3. Taking the Job: Equity, Salary and the First Ninety Days · about 7 minutes
  4. How It Goes Wrong, and Where It Goes From Here · about 7 minutes

Module exam: 10 questions, about 5 minutes.

16 lessons between you and the next title.

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