Our ability to make the most out of uncertainty is what creates significant potential value. Building product should not be driven by quick sales or slam dunk product specifications. In the long game, any AEC veteran where certainty ends, progress begins.

In his book Think Like A Rocket Scientist, author and former rocket scientist Ozan Varol discusses scientific studies and strategies that can apply to many facets of business and life. He discusses one of the greatest mathematical mysteries posed in the seventeenth century which was not solved for more than 300 years. Mathematician Pierre de Fermat proposed a fascinating theory but died before supplying the proof.

Fermat’s theory was that there was no solution for “an + bn = cn”  for any n greater than 2. The equation became known as Fermat’s Last Theorem. Before he died Fermat had noted in the margins of his textbook that he had a solution. However, he bit the dust before offering the answer and mathematicians would spend the next several hundred years trying to figure out the answer.

A math professor by the name of Andrew Wiles spent seven years trying to solve the mysterious theorem. Finally, Wiles announced at Cambridge University in 1993 that he had solved the three-hundred-year old equation. Wiles described solving the theorem like navigating a dark mansion. First, you start in the first room and spend months trying to find out where the light switch is and then move to the next dark room and start over.

Sometimes, scientists spend their entire lives stumbling around the dark room looking for answers about the universe. Luckily, the AEC industry is a much smaller “universe” to work within but many of the same issues and challenges apply. Sometimes we’re under the false impression that there is a straight path to that light switch, or in the world of product specifications that there is a uniform process that never changes.

There is not always one reason why your product got specified or failed to get specified. It is critical that building product reps understand who they need to contact on the design team, when to contact that person, and what type of engagement they need to integrate into their strategy.

Today’s complex construction projects involve a large number of participants. A working knowledge of each of their functions is critical for product reps to effectively market their products and to follow the project after it is issued for bidding and construction. In addition, product reps need to understand where their product fits in, as trying to approach a design professional with a product at the wrong time will prove to be a waste of time.

There is probably no wrong time to deliver an AIA webinar to an AEC firm given the opportunity. However, your efforts of getting your product specified during the wrong phase of construction may backfire. Product reps need to understand the fundamental concepts of product specification or they won’t last in the long term.  

As author and former rocket scientist Varol notes, you must know some answers before you can begin asking the right questions. The answers such as what design professional or what phase of construction does your product apply to are only the beginning. Where certainty ends, progress begins.