Concerns about future workloads increase among architects

Architects have become increasingly downbeat about future workloads, RIBA has found. 

The institute’s Future Trends survey for July found that the outlook for future work had deteriorated or remained neagative across all regions and sectors.

The RIBA Future Trends Workload Index, which shows how practices expect workloads to change over the next three months, dropped to -10 from +1 in June. Overall, architects expect their workloads to fall, with the lowest level of confidence since the aftermath of the Truss min-budget.

No regions had a positive outlook, and confidence had faltered among those who had been optimistic. 

The North of England’s (-3) outlook fell by 22 points, and Wales and the West (-12) fell 18 points. 

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The South of England (-28) saw the largest decrease in confidence, by 24 points. The Midlands & East Anglia (-8) rose by five points, and London (0) is the least pessimistic. 

As rising interest rates continue to curtail housing activity, the private housing sector (-13) fell by five points.

The commercial sector fell 10 points from June to sit at -7, while the outlook for the public sector (-15) fell 9 points, in its 15^th consecutive negative month. 

The community sector (-13) fell by four points. 

Adrian Malleson, RIBA head of economic research and analysis, said: “This pessimism is concentrated among smaller practices, as interest rates rises make project financing increasingly difficult to obtain. Small-scale residential work has been adversely affected by mortgages becoming more expensive and difficult to arrange.”

Over the next three months, 16% of practices expect workloads to increase, 26% expect them to decrease, and 58% expect them to stay the same.

Medium (11+ staff) and large (50+ staff) practices remain optimistic about future workloads, with a combined Workload Index figure of +20, a dip of three points compare to last month. The outlook of small practices (1-10 staff) dropped by 12 points to -15. 

However, practices have become slightly more confident about staffing levels in the past month. 

The RIBA Future Trends Permanent Staffing Index has recovered by one point to zero. This indicates practices’ commitment to retaining staff, even as they anticipate falling workloads.

Over the next three months, 11% of practices expect to employ fewer permanent staff, 11% expect to employ more, and 78% expect no change. 

Medium and large practices continue to expect an increase in permanent staff, while small practices expect a decline. 

The employment outlook in London, which briefly fell into negative territory in June, has turned to the positive, sitting at +2.