I think that the main difference between an activity being merely a industry as opposed to a profession is that members of a profession won't enthusiastically organize the race to the bottom that industries driven entirely by market economics are proud to run. Every day lower prices! Buy one and get one free!
Kent McMillan, post: 387006, member: 3 wrote: ...Every day lower prices! Buy one and get one free!
Oh c'mon Kent. We all know what you really want is to outlaw surveying companies with names other than human beings...
Kent McMillan, post: 387006, member: 3 wrote: I think that the main difference between an activity being merely a industry as opposed to a profession is that members of a profession won't enthusiastically organize the race to the bottom that industries driven entirely by market economics are proud to run. Every day lower prices! Buy one and get one free!
Is dentistry an industry or a profession? I use my current dentist because he advertises free sedation/laughing gas and the other guys don't. Are surveyors above using such marketing campaigns?
Not at all Brandon. I'd be happy to offer my clients free laughing gas. Unfortunately, Forestry Suppliers and Berntsen don't sell that product.
Peter Lothian - MA ME, post: 387010, member: 4512 wrote: Not at all Brandon. I'd be happy to offer my clients free laughing gas. Unfortunately, Forestry Suppliers and Berntsen don't sell that product.
Check with your local leica dealer.
paden cash, post: 387008, member: 20 wrote: Oh c'mon Kent. We all know what you really want is to outlaw surveying companies with names other than human beings...
Yes, if only all land surveyors were to practice under fakey corporate-sounding names to lure the internet shopper in with blue light specials and discount coupons!
Kent McMillan, post: 387006, member: 3 wrote: Every day lower prices! Buy one and get one free!
[USER=3]@Kent McMillan[/USER]
Can you help me out here, with a hypothetical? Or maybe this has happened to you, and you could advise other surveyors as to how to handle it;
Client Smith calls you and says: you come highly recommended, I live at 123 XYZ Rd, how much to survey my property. You quote him an estimate and he hires you under your terms.
The next day, he calls back and says; my neighbor, Mr. Jones, 125 XYZ Rd wants his property surveyed too.
What is your response?
IMWTK
Best Regards,
Douglas Casement, PLS Puyallup WA
RADAR, post: 387016, member: 413 wrote: The next day, he calls back and says; my neighbor, Mr. Jones, 125 XYZ Rd wants his property surveyed too.
What is your response?
No brainer. I'd say "I'd be glad to talk to them, but I find that it usually works better to serve one client at a time." No reason to mention the potential conflict of interest issues that are inherent in that situation.
[USER=11837]@BrandonA[/USER] You say you are making good money as a surveyor in Texas. Can I make the assumption you work in a big city? Or at least for a large firm? I would bet over 60% of the calls that come into my office have the words "But, (insert another firm here) said they could do the job for half that price" in the conversation. Yet I know we charge no more than the time and supplies we have in the job. Yet somehow, the "guy down the street" can do the job without research, without checking adjoiners and without quality control, and get by.I certainly don't see $90k a year. I view land surveying, at least Texas land surveying (all I am really familiar with) as an art. As mentioned elsewhere in t his thread, I don't feel as a college degree between two guys should allow them to go out and produce a survey. There is so much more to a proper survey than the mathematics of a boundary closure. But it takes mentors to teach that. Not professors. And in this day and age, no one wants to pay for an artists work when a computer can spit out a reprint that looks hand painted.
Kent McMillan, post: 386985, member: 3 wrote: Well, isn't the obvious answer one of regulating corporate activities instead of expecting land surveyors to somehow fight them off?
So who is going to decide on how "corporate activities" are to be regulated? I understand that a company increases revenue by taking a niche or special skill and turning it into a commodity. Yes this is not good for the profession or the public. I do not believe the government can come up with a good solution when there are so many opinions in our own community about how we should proceed. Please note that the Professions from the previous posts are much more self-regulated. I don't disagree with any of the points you raised as having a negative affect on our Profession. Our Profession will have to be the agents of any positive change. State Licensing Boards will always be subject to politics, bureaucracy, and funding issues. A simple enforced Board Rule or Law stating that the field work for a boundary survey must be performed with a R.L.S. present or at least making a field visit during the course of the survey would help some of these issues. Under the supervision of a licensed surveyor should mean more than they are being paid by the same company as the surveyor of record.
BrandonA, post: 387004, member: 11837 wrote: I concede... please substitute the word "industry" in my previous statements with profession. No way we could refer to surveying as an industry, or a medical industry, or law industry. Since the use of that word has so much to do with the state of surveying which everyone on this thread seems to think is in terrible condition and I seem to think otherwise. You know there used to be a time when doctor's did not advertise, now I hear ads run all day for the local walk in clinics, does that make it a medical industry or is it still a profession?
Yes, to be fair, all professions have been industrialized to one extent or another. Law online, HMO's, Television preachers... And all of those also provide substandard service while enriching those other than the professional (except maybe the last). Hmmm, I'm suddenly wondering how many people I can convince I'm the only one who can determine their proper earthly religious boundary. I'm going to need a holy book with a better name than "The manual of Instructions".
Monte, post: 387045, member: 11913 wrote: [USER=11837]@BrandonA[/USER] You say you are making good money as a surveyor in Texas. Can I make the assumption you work in a big city? Or at least for a large firm? I would bet over 60% of the calls that come into my office have the words "But, (insert another firm here) said they could do the job for half that price" in the conversation. Yet I know we charge no more than the time and supplies we have in the job. Yet somehow, the "guy down the street" can do the job without research, without checking adjoiners and without quality control, and get by.I certainly don't see $90k a year. I view land surveying, at least Texas land surveying (all I am really familiar with) as an art. As mentioned elsewhere in t his thread, I don't feel as a college degree between two guys should allow them to go out and produce a survey. There is so much more to a proper survey than the mathematics of a boundary closure. But it takes mentors to teach that. Not professors. And in this day and age, no one wants to pay for an artists work when a computer can spit out a reprint that looks hand painted.
I work in a town right at half the size of Abilene. We get very similar calls, just the other day a "potential" client asked if we could do a payment plan for marking his corners, which I quoted at $400... so I know exactly what you are talking about. The firm I work for is considered small, about 60 employees total, with only 20-25 or so of those doing survey work. We do however charge what we are worth, same as you, time and material in every job.
It seems we have different views of what makes up a small firm. :confused: It would take a pretty good salary and the ability to do most of my work in the field for me to be employed by a firm that had 60 employees. We will work with clients on payments also, but I can't afford to send a truck out of the yard for $400. We have more in research, copies, and time into the job than that before we head to the jobsite.
Monte, post: 387084, member: 11913 wrote: It seems we have different views of what makes up a small firm. :confused: It would take a pretty good salary and the ability to do most of my work in the field for me to be employed by a firm that had 60 employees. We will work with clients on payments also, but I can't afford to send a truck out of the yard for $400. We have more in research, copies, and time into the job than that before we head to the jobsite.
This was a small lot in a subdivision, we had done work nearby previously, and it was about 10 minutes from the office. 1 hour of field time searching and tying monumentation, 1 hour of someone checking it in the office and finding the plat, and maybe another hour to set anything additional. I don't know what other research work you could possibly do to mark 4 corners on a Lot/Block, no drawing necessary.
As for you needing a good salary and the ability to do your own field work, well no, the field work part will not happen if you want a high salary at most firms.
BrandonA, post: 387094, member: 11837 wrote: As for you needing a good salary and the ability to do your own field work, well no, the field work part will not happen if you want a high salary at most firms
I'm hoping this goes along well enough with the original post that we aren't seen as hijacking anything, but here is where I have a disagreement with how surveying is being handled today. Your post makes me think that you are meaning the RPLS stays in the office, and sends a crew to the field to collect data. I counter with how can the RPLS really know what his crew is doing if he never leaves the office? If he trained the crew, and they have been with him for years, I get that. But that goes into something brought up in another thread, the lack of mentoring, the lack of teaching the how's and whys, passing down the small tips and tricks that an RPLS used to pass to his crews. He used this time to observe the job, to take mental notes of the layout, etc. Now the RPLS is a guy who sits at a desk, has techs do his research, his measuring, his drafting, maybe even his calculations. Surveying has gone from a skilled trade that required the practitioner to wear many hats to being a profession that is so technical that practicality has almost disappeared..
lmbrls, post: 387069, member: 6823 wrote: So who is going to decide on how "corporate activities" are to be regulated? I understand that a company increases revenue by taking a niche or special skill and turning it into a commodity. Yes this is not good for the profession or the public. I do not believe the government can come up with a good solution when there are so many opinions in our own community about how we should proceed. Please note that the Professions from the previous posts are much more self-regulated. I don't disagree with any of the points you raised as having a negative affect on our Profession. Our Profession will have to be the agents of any positive change. State Licensing Boards will always be subject to politics, bureaucracy, and funding issues. A simple enforced Board Rule or Law stating that the field work for a boundary survey must be performed with a R.L.S. present or at least making a field visit during the course of the survey would help some of these issues. Under the supervision of a licensed surveyor should mean more than they are being paid by the same company as the surveyor of record.
Well, vigorous enforcement of anti-trust and consumer protection laws would be a start that would limit the abuses of the monopolistic power of many large corporations. In the surveying profession, I'd :
- require all corporations offering surveying services to the public to be entirely owned by registered professional land surveyors (and their unlicensed spouses, Texas being a community property state),
- have the licensing board establish maximum supervision ratios (non-licensed employees to licensed) that, if exceeded, would be considered prima facie evidence of incompetent practice,
- have the licensing board establish minimum standards for documentation of survey work, both research and field work, and consider the absence of which would be considered prima facie evidence of incompetent practice,
BrandonA, post: 386999, member: 11837 wrote: Semantics.
Its not semantics at all - its a fact!
I also am worried about our newest bunch of RPLS that come straight from university. They know the mathematics. They know how a GPS signal works. But I am meeting too many that do not know how to set up a tripod. They don't understand that a shovel is the most important tool on the truck. In my mind, a person who cannot use the tools of an occupation is kind of stretching it when they identify themselves as a professional of that occupation.
Monte, post: 387101, member: 11913 wrote: I'm hoping this goes along well enough with the original post that we aren't seen as hijacking anything, but here is where I have a disagreement with how surveying is being handled today. Your post makes me think that you are meaning the RPLS stays in the office, and sends a crew to the field to collect data. I counter with how can the RPLS really know what his crew is doing if he never leaves the office? If he trained the crew, and they have been with him for years, I get that. But that goes into something brought up in another thread, the lack of mentoring, the lack of teaching the how's and whys, passing down the small tips and tricks that an RPLS used to pass to his crews. He used this time to observe the job, to take mental notes of the layout, etc. Now the RPLS is a guy who sits at a desk, has techs do his research, his measuring, his drafting, maybe even his calculations. Surveying has gone from a skilled trade that required the practitioner to wear many hats to being a profession that is so technical that practicality has almost disappeared..
That was the model that I saw working in large cities in Texas, as recently as four years ago. RPLS in the office. He/she supervises the techs who conduct research and prepare the field packages, maybe talks with the crews in the mornings to make sure they understand the scope of work. Occasionally takes a look at the data, but usually just lets the techs (sometimes LSIT, oftentimes not) process and draft everything. Review the final product for gross errors, run closure checks, and look for any major problems concerning easement placement/title exception notes/etc. Redlines go back to tech, corrections made, out the door.
I like the idea of mandated maximum supervision ratios. Here in Alaska, if you are on a DOT project, you are required to have a licensed individual physically in the field, directing the fieldwork. Unless you are a DOT crew, in which case you don't have to follow your own regs.
Monte, post: 387113, member: 11913 wrote: I also am worried about our newest bunch of RPLS that come straight from university. They know the mathematics. They know how a GPS signal works. But I am meeting too many that do not know how to set up a tripod. They don't understand that a shovel is the most important tool on the truck. In my mind, a person who cannot use the tools of an occupation is kind of stretching it when they identify themselves as a professional of that occupation.
I completely agree, field work is something that has been lost. I was fortunate to spend some time in the field as an intern while in college and had an RPLS put me in situations to learn things. By the same token, RPLS that never went to college and refuse to learn the ever changing technology are just as big of a problem. We have an RPLS that refuses to use email or learn about GPS equipment, I think that is just as bad.
