I would imagine this to be quite difficult, for several reasons, not least because of the inevitable compromises inherent in a project, but surely designers, as artists, wish there was something they could do better?
Do they often revisit old designs and ruminate?
Do they take note and think about critics' opinions? Members? Co-workers and other colleagues?
Travel and see other courses and realise something could have been done better on a recent job?
Weaknesses? Hmm, I'll have to think about how my fondness for chocolate affects my design.
Seriously,:
1. Not often, but I do think about what I might have done with a mulligan from time to time.....
2. Yes, including the magazine panelists, good players, women, and even Golf Club Atlas.....its a wonder I am not too confused, or have time to do anything with all the critics out there!
3. I constantly study courses I haven't seen before, including two this week. I know Tom Doak thinks that only the Scottish courses and classics can teach us something useful, but I wasn't in the neighborhood of Scotland this week, so I opted for what I could see......
It does amaze me just how often some gca's just do the same thing over and over, even when they see so much better stuff out there to emulate. One of the courses I visited this week has been characterized as a "typical course by gca "X" on a spectacular site." It did seem as if it might have been a career maker had he done something a bit more than his usual.
Based on all three above, I do think I have some over-recurring trends, if not weaknesses, that I would like to break out of - hence the desire to look at as many other courses as possible to see the variety of design ideas out there.
Overall, I tend to think of my weaknesses in terms of sales ability to get good projects and forcefulness to get the budget (or best property, etc.) to do what I need to showcase my skills and do what I know is really, really, right.