Multidisciplinary Teaching-Changing Collaboration During Building Design

Traditionally the design phase was carried out by one single person – the master builder. Industrialization and technical development led to a split of the role of the design master into two: the architect and the engineer. Today, demands on functionality such as energy and cost efficiency led to an increasing need of functioning collaboration in large teams during the design phase; as well as a need of new work methods within the process.

This calls for employees who are experienced in collaborating in interdisciplinary teams. To fulfill this demand a multidisciplinary course in “Advanced building design” has been developed at the Technical University of Denmark. The goal of the course is to provide training in teamwork at the final stage of the engineering education.

The course has been carried out twice. It was held by a multidisciplinary team of professors in periods 2008/09 and 2009/10. The team of professors and the student teams had similar working conditions. These teams were subject of a questionnaire investigation on collaboration and team work. The study has the following findings.

Collaboration can be learned and improves in time. It is shown that the team leader is not necessarily to be found within on specific profession. The team-structure was generally flat and decisions were mostly made in consensus. It is worthwhile to offer a multidisciplinary course and give engineering students experience in collaboration methods.