[Mike_Young]

If Architects are anything like Superintendents there are far more bad ones out there than good ones. Unfortunately our association is more interested in promoting professionalism than growing good grass. If the ASGCA is anything like the GCSAA then it is a pretty useless organization. Over the years I have learned far more from my peers than I could ever learn from our overpriced conventions.

Donnie,
I can't speak for ASGCA because they are a society and not an association.  They are also subjective as to membership whereas GCSAA, PGA, CMAA NGCOA are all objective groups.  But you have hit the nail on the head for GCSAA .....I have been thinking this for years but it is hard to find a supt that will say what you said....Golf itself has too many associations and most are working for the association and not the members.....CMAA has really hurt the PGA.....JMO

[Jeff_Brauer]

Donnie,

There are supers who supplement their income with consulting visits, and I know of a few who have really ripped the super during such visits without him being able to defend himself, his practices, etc.  Of course the green chairman wouldn't call in another consultant unless he wanted ammo to fire the existing super, so I can see where this comes from.

I have become aware of a few situations in GCSAA that have causes big flaps. I think the association rules state that another superintendent cannot be on a course without the home superintendents knowledge.

 

[Yannick Pilon]

Ian, and all of you guys,

(By the way, this is a great subject! Keep it going!)

I don’t see anything wrong with an architect criticizing the work of another architect.  However, I feel it should be done in a professional and courteous way.  Otherwise, it can quickly be interpreted as a way of trying to get above the competition by bringing others down.

Also, what does a harsh critic do when it is made without explaining the reasons behind this harsh critic.  How is someone supposed to get any better if all he hears is that his designs suck or that he has simply done the worst job ever?  Lots of people on this site do not seem to care about this, but hey, that’s fine too.  Everybody is entitled to his or her opinions.  But, IMHO, if you decided to be a golf course architect, you have to be able to take criticism, whether it comes from another architect, or from someone who has never played a single hole in his life.

I feel, however, that architects should be thorough in their criticism, to help each other become better architects.  I know this sounds pretty idealistic, given the heavy competition you can find in this industry, but wouldn’t the industry and the golfers in general gain a lot if more and more good courses were built, of if more great courses were restored properly to their past glory?

Also, I think architects should be prudent in their criticism simply because they should know themselves how tough it can be to deal with clients, budgets, environmental restrictions, etc.  All of these things can have serious impacts on the quality of the job…. That does not mean I am trying to use this as an excuse to defend the questionable work that some architects can do, I am simply saying this because I feel that someone should play a couple of an architect’s courses before starting to spread some generalizations about that said architect in public.

I know I would sure like to have the stuff I do be criticized by other architects.  I hold a lot of the architects out there in pretty high esteem, and I feel I could probably gain a lot of experience or knowledge if any of them would give me their thoughts on what I have done.  Sure, I would probably hate some of the comments, even be frustrated for a while, but I am absolutely sure they would make me grow somehow, as an architect.  Or maybe I could help out another architect if we got in a serious discussion about an issue where I could convince him or her that I did the right thing for such and such reasons….  Who knows?

I just feel criticism and discussions make us grow as architects.  Comparing what we do with the best out there is probably the best way to learn but criticism, even if it might be tougher, can also help a great deal too.

One last thing.  Architects who receive a lot of criticism on this site have, sometimes, been in business for many years and have done many, many courses.  While that does not necessarily make them any better than others, you got to wonder what brought them there in the first place.  They must be doing something right for a good portion of the golfing public, otherwise, they would have been ripped apart on the first course they did and we would have never heard from them again.  Somewhere, somehow, golfers love their courses, and that’s why they get to do more of them.  

That being said, I know I am, without any doubt, my toughest critique out there.  I feel there is always something to improve in any new course or renovation job, and having another architect point out something I am questioning myself about would surely help me do better work in the future.

So anybody out there who happens to stumble upon something I did, please let me know if you like it or not.  But most importantly: please tell me why, so I can do something about it if need be.

 

[Ian Andrew]

I just wanted to say how much I appreciated the participation in this discussion. I read every response tonight, but there is too much to try and respond to.

The conversation I have with other architects and friends interested in architecture are usually brutally frank, but very productive in sorting out what is good and what is a complete miss. I find the more frank the conversation, or at least one without fear of offending someone, the more opportunity to break down what worked or what doesn’t. I find this an easier environment to learn sometimes. The advantage of the conversations is that no architect ever has to hear the criticism.

When you transfer this into either discussing or writing about architecture, often a lot of information is dumbed down to avoid offending anyone. It’s better to find something positive to write on than talk about something that went wrong. Yet we need to learn from mistakes as much as we need to learn from the things that work best. I've always been a “say what I think” type of person for better or worse, but since I have begun actively writing this year I have found myself being occasionally taken to task about critical comments I've made. This has left me wondering if I “must” write only about the good things in golf to avoid offending anyone and to never have my motives challenged.

There is a lot of merit in what someone said about there being no possible good from being critical of others, but does this effect the overall learning curve too?

[Tom_Doak]

Ian:

I have one friend who is an architect, whom I will not name for this discussion.  Nicest guy on the planet [next to Bill Coore, I'm not talking about Bill], never has a bad word to say about anybody, never has a bad word to say about any golf course.

But you know what?  He's not the most creative architect I know.  I always figured it was because he wasn't picky enough between good and indifferent ideas.

You may be right that, for the critic, no good comes out of picking on others' work publicly.  But I certainly agree that it's good for you to look at other work and sort out what works and what doesn't, and it's certainly good for you to hear what others like and don't like about your work.  And, I think it's even probably a good thing for someone to critique everybody's courses for a general audience, even if it is bound to ruffle some feathers.

BTW, thanks for freeing me up a bit.  Just over the weekend I have managed to make small pointed critiques about the work of several architects, which I might otherwise have avoided.

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