From AI to retrofit: how RIBA’s Future Business of Architecture programme is helping practices navigate change

RIBA has a responsibility to support and advance the practice of architecture, it’s written in our charter, and implicit in this is the overriding responsibility to ensure members are as well informed as possible about all aspects of the profession, including the commercial and economic context in which they operate.

Architecture practices and sole practitioners have always faced financial challenges, but what seems unique right now is how the challenges seem increasingly to compete for attention. The current downward pressures on fees and upward drivers on costs have made it hard for many to turn a profit.

Along with the challenges, there are also opportunities, such as the demand for sustainability expertise, the growth of refurbishment and retrofit, and the innovation technology sectors – whether it is data centres or biotech. The global export of professional design services by UK architects is also increasing year on year.

What is abundantly clear is that practices need to be financially resilient and well informed about the overall direction of travel for the industry so they can continue to thrive, delivering high-quality design in a rapidly evolving market.

RIBA’s The Future Business of Architecture programme is designed to equip architects with the skills and knowledge needed to meet future challenges – providing solutions through scenarios, that they can use to inform their own practice’s approaches. These scenarios imagine what the industry could be like a decade from now, while providing a focus for debate and discussion. They’re an important means of charting a course through the next few years of the profession.

The programme has been developed with members and other experts to cover some of the profession’s most pressing current issues and themes of concern. These include:

• how practices prepare for and shape coming change?
• what is the financial future for architects and architecture?
• where will future work come from?
• what will architectural practice look like in the future?

As well as this extensive quantitative and qualitative member research, we have also drawn on RIBA’s own source of rich historic data to look ahead.

At a time of great change with the onset of AI, potentially disrupting the established model of professional services, the profession needs to pool the significant experience and expertise of RIBA members, and complement it with research-led insight.

This programme is an important opportunity to engage architects, widening the conversation and that’s why we’ve made interactive sessions integral to the programming for the Future Business of Architecture Global Conference on 8^th October. We are also publishing a series of articles which will be drawing on architects’ insights.

At the core of the programme is a series of white papers, the first, What are tomorrow’s work types has just been published. It explores which sectors might grow or contract over the next decade and the incremental growth of refurbishment versus new build. It also points to a future in which London will remain a significant architectural hub and how the exporting of design services to very different regions of the world will remain an important driver of growth.

It’s an exciting time for architecture. Architects have shown that they are resourceful and willing to embrace change, as evidenced by the surge in AI usage among practices that we saw between RIBA’s first and second AI Report.

The quantitative research demonstrates that architects, despite the present headwinds, are positive about the future. The Future Business of Architecture builds on architects’ optimism by igniting a wider discussion in the UK and internationally about how they can shape their practices to meet shifting and often complex demands in the decade ahead.