EA028: Business Software for Small Firm Architects with Steven Burns, FAIA [Podcast]

One of the most important tasks architects should be doing to improve the success of their firms is to develop strong business systems that will allow them to quickly perform the routine everyday tasks of running a busy architecture firm. The quickest and maybe the most effective way to do this is to leverage the power of software developed to perform these tasks with ease and efficiency.

Steven Burns is an architect who saw a need for such an application. He set out to create a software package that managed most every aspect of running his own small firm. Several years later, his software became his business and that business was eventually acquired by BQE Software, where today Steven is the Chief Creative Officer.

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I've wanted to talk to Steven for a while now about, ArchiOffice, the software he developed, to learn more about how it works and how it can help us small firm Entrepreneur Architects build better businesses. I thought it would also be interesting to chat with Steven to learn how he moved from being an architect to a full time software developer and how he felt about making that move. I know there are many architects out there that have passion for something other than architecture and have too much fear or guilt to pursue their true purpose. I thank Steven for sharing his story with us and for sharing a few details about ArchiOffice.

Are you running ArchiOffice in your firm? Are you using another package to manage your business systems? I'd love to know how software is helping YOUR firm succeed. Please leave a comment below and share your thoughts.

Topics Referenced in This Episode

Financial Management for Small Firms (Entrepreneur Architect Academy Podcast Series)
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Harvard GSD
Skidmore Owens and Merrill (S.O.M.)
Burns and Beyerl Architects
Developing software for small firm architects
ArchiOffice Software
BQE Software
Connections leading to success
Decision to leave architecture for software development full time
How software can help small firm architects succeed
Transitions from manual business systems to software systems
Web-based software vs Cloud-based software
Dropbox
Evernote
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The death of the fax machine
HipChat
The future death of email