Keeping records is a crucial (although a little boring) element in collaborative work. It provides documented proof of what people are committed to, what people have said and is essential in resolving disputes when they arise….and when money is involved, disputes always happen!
A first hand real world example of keeping records (in the form of minutes in this case) for dispute resolution, was a council meeting for a medium density job I worked on a few years back, where council agreed to the colour schedule in a meeting (which ended up being built) but conflicted with a note on the drawings (a leftover that was not changed). When council insisted the roof be changed to match the drawing, a review of the minutes revealed they had actually agreed to the change and it was ruled the roof could stay as it was built.
In our collaborative work, documenting what has been agreed on is going to ensure we all pull our own weight and achieve the goals we have agreed on. The email below, which we all have, clearly shows us agreeing on the division of work amongst our team.
Architect Peter Aeberli says ‘what if the project is not running smoothly, or relationships break down and the architect, realising it has long since expended the contract fee and there is still work to do, makes a claim for additional fees, which the client rejects?’
‘This means the architect must provide evidence that the work for which it is claiming additional fees is extra to that for which the contract fee is payable. These records must be sufficient to refute any suggestion that the work
is not extra at all, but was part of the originally envisaged scope of work’
So well kept records are essential for maintaining a collaborative effort and are absolute in solving disputes where members of the project cannot agree on who is responsible for certain work.
References:
Good housekeeping Better records are the key to claims for additional fees
http://www.aeberli.co.uk/articles/PRACTICE.pdf - viewed on friday april 11 2008
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