Any professional practice includes risk. How a firm handles that risk is critical to its profitability, and essential to its viability. According to Victor which manages the AIA Trust-sponsored CNA professional liability insurance program, four techniques are paramount to a firm to pursuing its preferred future.
Read MoreTopic: Contracts
To Have and to Hold, in Sickness and in Health: Strategies for Managing Risk on Design/Build Teams
By Jonathan C. Shoemaker, Esq. Before joining a team to submit a proposal on a design-build project, it is important to understand the risks to the design professional’s firm associated with participating on a design-build team – including risks that arise even before the design-build team is awarded the project! This paper provides a framework…
Read MoreContractor Termination Lawsuits: The Architect’s Risks and How to Manage Them
When the terminator shows up, you must be ready. Termination of the contractor on a project almost always guarantees a lawsuit, and the architect is often among the casualties. The report, Contractor Termination Lawsuits: The Architect’s Risks and How to Manage Them, addresses why the architect is often sued when a project goes wrong, and…
Read MoreUndertaking A “Fiduciary Duty”: Crucial Legal & Professional Considerations For Architects
The typical complaint against an architect starts with the plaintiff laying out his story of what happened, and then listing the laws that the conduct allegedly violated. Architects are familiar with many of them–malpractice, negligence, breach of contract, and the like. But sometimes the complaint alleges that the architect is a “fiduciary” and has breached…
Read MoreGuilty Until Proven Innocent: Claims Defense Documentation
The compelling report, Guilty Until Proven Innocent: Claims Defense Documentation, addresses documentation by the architect, centering on the presumption, “If it’s not written down, it didn’t happen.” The paper is a guideline for managing your documentation with helpful suggestions for beneficial recordkeeping and documents retention and retrieval for an effective claims response in the event…
Read MoreBulletproof Contract Administration: Managing Risk during Construction
The report, Bulletproof Contract Administration: Managing Risk during Construction, addresses documentation procedures that can be advantageous in managing risk during the construction phase. Although considered cumbersome in this often complex phase of services, the suggestions put forth can serve as valuable defense documentation in the event a claims bullet is fired. Beginning with the services…
Read MoreStrangers No More? Trends in the Architect’s No Privity Defense
One of the most important defenses in any professional liability lawsuit is that an architect is not responsible for losses of a person who has no contract with the architect such as a general contractor or sub-contractor on a project. The legal term is that the architect and the third party do not share “privity…
Read MoreCan Architects Rely on Manufacturer-Provided Information?
Recently, there have been disputes and judicial decisions addressing the responsibility of architecture firms to understand the composition, performance, and availability of specified products, materials, and systems. In most cases, absent an affirmative statement by the architecture firm that it will determine the attributes of components specified for a design, courts have not unreasonably extended…
Read MoreStatutes of Repose Can Be Vital in Limiting Exposure
It seems that during each cycle of the state legislative sessions, efforts are made either to expand or reduce the business and professional liability exposures faced by construction-related professional service firms. In some instances, under the overall rubric of “tort reform,” efforts are made to redefine exposure and channel liability. Some efforts are highly beneficial…
Read MoreCan a Design Professional Be in Absolute Compliance with the Law?
There are two kinds of clients who insist in a contract that a design professional absolutely comply with laws, regulations, codes, ordinances, standards and a plethora of other business and design constraints. First there is the client who, perhaps with strained incredulity, asks “Do you mean to tell me that you do not intend to…
Read MoreCan a Design Professional Be in Absolute Compliance with the Law?
