The focus of this blog is construction-related topics. The purpose is discussion, so please feel free to comment! See Specific thoughts for thoughts from the daily life of a specifier.

17 August 2015

Tell me again, part 1

I’m sure you’ve heard the Army way of presenting information: Tell them what you’re going to tell them; tell them; tell them what you told them.

While that may be a practical way of doing some things, it has no place in construction documents. For those, we have a different rule: Say it once in the right place. I think it’s safe to say that specifiers believe this rule, though convincing those who create the drawings is difficult; the result often is that the specifications may state things but once, while it’s common for drawings to repeat things many times, and it’s also common for drawing notes to repeat what is stated in the specifications.

So what’s the big deal? Why not repeat things?