How Lionakis Built a Distributed Network of Design Technology Change Agents

October 22, 2025 Christopher Parsons

The design technology landscape has fundamentally changed. What was once a manageable stack of tools has become a sprawling ecosystem—and the questions coming with it are no longer just about what the tools can do, but how they work right now, in this specific project context, under these particular constraints. Meanwhile, technical knowledge itself has a shorter shelf life than ever before.

This creates an impossible burden for centralized DT teams. No matter how talented or dedicated, they eventually hit the same breaking point: there's simply too much surface area to cover. Knowledge can't travel fast enough through a hub-and-spoke model when every market sector, project type, and team operates differently.

In this issue of Smarter by Design, we explore how Lionakis has approached this problem by making a fundamentally different organizational design choice. Rather than growing their central team, they distributed expertise into project teams—creating a network of 30 embedded change agents who bring design technology support directly to where the work is happening.

What makes their Design Technology Support Specialist (DTSS) program so compelling isn't just that it works—it's how it works. It scales support without scaling headcount. It builds resilience into the organization. And it transforms how knowledge moves through the firm—from hub-and-spoke to peer-to-peer, from reactive to proactive, from bottleneck to network.

But this distributed organizational design also does something else: it creates the foundation for AI-powered learning tools to amplify the network even further. By externalizing expertise from the core DT team's heads into structured digital learning content, Lionakis is making that knowledge accessible not just to humans, but to AI search and knowledge agents that can surface the right answer at the right moment. The human network and the digital infrastructure work together—each making the other more powerful.

This is a story about what happens when you stop trying to be everywhere at once and instead design conditions under which expertise can live close to the work. It's about the shift from instructor to architect, from delivering answers to building systems that help people find them. And it is a glimpse into the future of what the AEC learning organizations of the future will look like.

Aligning AI with Firm Values | KM 3.0 Podcast Series - Episode 5

October 9, 2025 Christopher Parsons

In this episode of Welcome to KM 3.0, we sit down with Kate Grimes, Director of Knowledge at Snøhetta, for a wide-ranging conversation about how one of architecture’s most respected design studios is navigating the AI era—without losing what makes its culture special.

Since joining the firm in 2012, Kate has helped Snøhetta build its first knowledge management program from the ground up. She shares what it’s taken to build momentum with AI in a firm that prizes technological experimentation and innovation—while still prioritizing human connection.

We explore the tensions between speed and thoughtfulness, innovation and risk, structure and improvisation. From developing AI strategies that honor studio culture to reimagining learning and development through modular content, Kate shares a vision of KM that’s as much about people and values as it is about tools and data.

You’ll hear stories about how Snøhetta is using AI to augment its design process, bridge gaps in custom coding, and connect team members to the right knowledge at the right time. We also talk about how on-demand learning can create space for deeper human connection, and why being thoughtful about when and how to use AI might be the most important design decision of all.

Kate’s insights are thoughtful, pragmatic, and grounded in real-world practice. If you’re thinking about the future of knowledge, culture, or learning in your AEC firm, this conversation will give you a lot to think about.

I hope you enjoy it.

Best,
Chris

Automating AEC L&D: Possibilities and Limitations

October 7, 2025 Christopher Parsons

For as long as I’ve been thinking about learning and development in AEC, the guiding ambition has been clear — deliver the right knowledge to the right person at the right time. It sounds simple, but anyone who’s managed L&D in a design firm knows how complicated that really is.

When people have timely access to the right resources, they are better prepared for the projects in front of them, more confident in their roles, and more likely to grow into future leaders. But timing matters. If knowledge arrives too early—before there’s a chance to apply it on a real project—it often doesn’t stick. If it comes too late, you can miss a golden learning opportunity.

That’s why the topic of automation drew so much energy in our recent conversations with private beta cohorts about Synthesis LMS. Could technology finally solve the “right person, right time” problem? What if assignments, reminders, and learning paths could run on autopilot?

It’s an exciting vision. But as we talked it through, a more nuanced picture emerged. Automation will help—sometimes enormously. However, you can’t automate all delivery of learning content. Just as we’ve learned with AI, automation without a human in the loop can quickly go off in wild directions. The real challenge isn’t simply automating more, but deciding when and how to keep humans close to the process—ensuring assignments come with judgment, empathy, and context.

PODCAST | Knowledge Is Power: How AEC Firms Are Leveraging Data to Win Smarter

October 2, 2025 Knowledge Architecture

Christopher Parsons, our Founder and CEO, recently Katie Cash from Smartegies on the AEC Marketing for Principals podcast to talk about how knowledge management is evolving in the AI era. The episode is called “Knowledge is Power: How AEC Firms Are Leveraging Data to Win Smarter.”

They discussed how the upside of AI for AEC marketing is enormous: faster research, better positioning, richer storytelling, and time saved on repetitive work. But that those gains depend on high-quality firmwide knowledge. Marketers are discovering that AI doesn’t magically retrieve the right information from existing systems and network drives — it only accelerates what has been made accurate, structured, and accessible.

Christopher and Katie also explored why marketing teams are increasingly becoming the builders and stewards of their firms’ knowledge foundation.

Enjoy!

Listen or Read:

🎧 Spotify
🎧 Apple Podcasts
📖 Full Transcript

KA Connect 2025: Talks Are Up!

September 23, 2025 Christopher Parsons

All of the talks from KA Connect 2025 are now available.

For folks who are new to our community, KA Connect is our annual knowledge and learning management conference for the AEC industry.

We had a great time sharing knowledge, building connections, and getting smarter together as a community around the theme of "Unlocking the Promise of Knowledge Management with AI” in the fresh mountain air of Sundance, Utah.

Please feel free to share these talks with your friends and colleagues.

Enjoy!

Leveling Up as Learning Organizations

September 21, 2025 Christopher Parsons

We’re about ten weeks into the private beta for Synthesis LMS and the biggest lessons we’ve learned so far aren’t really about technology at all.

At first, there was a flurry of activity in the LMS. Firms jumped in, created content, uploaded videos, and built out their first courses. It was exciting to watch. But what happened next was just as important. Across both beta cohorts, people paused and said, “Oh, I see — if we really want to take advantage of this new technology, if we really want to maximize the opportunity here, it’s going to take more than just building content. We’re going to need to level up as learning organizations.”

And by that I don’t mean throwing away what firms have already been doing. Quite the opposite. These are some of the smartest firms in our community, and they’ve been investing in knowledge sharing and informal learning for years. They have lunch & learns, peer-to-peer mentoring, recorded talks from subject-matter experts, even entire libraries with hundreds of videos.

Those are strengths, and they’ve served firms well. But what we’re realizing together is this moment calls for something more. It’s not just about uploading content into a new tool. It’s about taking the next step, rising to the next level, and moving toward becoming modern AEC learning organizations.

That means going beyond volunteer-driven knowledge sharing into something more curated, something built around adult learning principles and intentional knowledge transfer. Because while serendipitous learning is valuable, firms are starting to recognize that it won’t be enough — not on its own — to prepare people for the challenges in front of them.

RECORDING | Moody Nolan's Approach to Putting Knowledge in the Flow of Work with Synthesis and Guardian Inbox Summary

September 9, 2025 Christopher Parsons

On September 9th, Christopher Parsons joined Chris Shafer of Guardian and Nick Bower and Bryan Payne of Moody Nolan to explore how Moody Nolan integrates Synthesis and Guardian to foster a culture of continuous learning and excellence.

During the live session, Moody Nolan showcased how their commitment to education and training comes to life through innovative technology integration — empowering their team, elevating project quality, and driving consistent success.

They explored:

The Synthesis LMS
Using Guardian for real-time training in Revit
How Moody Nolan uses Synthesis and Guardian together

Enjoy!

Talking Knowledge Strategy on the Bold Brand Show

September 5, 2025 Christopher Parsons

I recently joined Josh Miles on the Bold Brand Show for an episode called The Secrets to Unlocking Your Firm’s Knowledge.

In our conversation, we explored how AEC firms can use knowledge strategy not just to organize information, but to win work, grow stronger, and future-proof their business. We talked about how smarter collaboration, better content, and emerging tools like AI are helping firms tackle real challenges today while building long-term advantage for tomorrow.

Here’s a guide to the conversation:

4:18 – What does knowledge management look like in an AEC firm?
9:21 – How KM solves the real problems AEC firms care about
11:54 – What every AEC firm should know about critical knowledge transfer
16:14 – How AI agents are becoming part of the AEC workforce
19:04 – How AEC firms know it’s time to invest in knowledge management
24:00 – What AEC firms should expect when implementing a Synthesis intranet
26:56 – Why intranet projects in AEC are really about change management
32:27 – Do AEC firms still need to organize information in the AI era?
47:30 – Why video is supercharging knowledge management in AEC firms
52:41 – Why AEC firms “built to sell” are just better firms—even if you never sell

I hope you enjoy it!

Best,
Chris

▶ Watch or Listen:

📺 YouTube
🎧 Spotify
🎧 Apple Podcasts

Knowledge Management is Everyone's Job | KM 3.0 Podcast Series - Episode 4

August 30, 2025 Christopher Parsons

In my view, Katie Robinson, Chief Marketing Officer at LS3P, has built one of the most inspiring knowledge management programs in the AEC industry. What began as a creative solution to gather project data for proposals over a decade ago has grown into a firmwide practice where knowledge management truly is everybody’s job.

Today, Katie leads a small but mighty KM team—while also orchestrating the contributions of over 120 LS3P employees who capture and share project data as part of the firm’s Data Manager program. It’s a remarkable model for scaling KM beyond a single department.

In this episode of Welcome to KM 3.0, Katie shares how LS3P’s Data Manager program empowers emerging professionals to make project data collection both sustainable and developmental, giving them mentorship opportunities while providing the firm with reliable information.

She also describes how Expert Hours—casual, live, recorded conversations with subject-matter experts—have become a powerful way to transform everyday storytelling into searchable knowledge that fuels marketing, mentorship, and practice alike.

Along the way, we explore how LS3P is driving business value with AI, preparing to fold learning and development into their KM program, and experimenting with innovative new ways to capture and expand project data. Katie’s story is full of practical wisdom on how to start small, solve real problems, and build momentum for KM in AEC.

I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did.

Best,
Chris

Essential Content Reviews: Keeping Firmwide Knowledge Fresh and Relevant at AKF Group

August 27, 2025 Christopher Parsons

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about the relationship between AI and firmwide knowledge—not just how AEC firms use knowledge to power AI, but how AI is pushing them to care for their knowledge more intentionally.

When employees use AI-powered tools like Synthesis AI Search to ask questions, they’re finding useful answers from knowledge distributed across content silos and content types, including video. But these benefits are also revealing something else: the quality of those answers depends entirely on the quality of the content behind them.

Outdated content leads to outdated answers. Gaps in documentation mean missed opportunities. Conflicting versions create confusion.

As a response, AEC firms are becoming much more attuned to the importance of maintaining high-quality, up-to-date knowledge across the business. They’re not just investing in AI. They’re investing in the knowledge powering the AI—acquiring it, updating it, and retiring it when it no longer serves the firm.

This raises an old but important question:

How do you keep a large intranet from decaying over time?

Instead of treating a new intranet launch as a one-time project, it may be more helpful to think of it like painting the Golden Gate Bridge. Crews begin at one end, make their way across, and by the time they reach the other side, it’s time to start again. The goal isn’t to finish, but to stay in motion—a continuous cycle of proactive care. And the earlier you can establish that rhythm, the healthier your knowledge base will remain.

That’s why I want to revisit a story from the KA community that feels even more relevant today than when it was first shared at KA Connect back in 2019. It’s the story of how AKF Group, at the time a 500-person multidisciplinary engineering firm with nine offices in the U.S. and two in Mexico, built a simple but powerful process for keeping their knowledge fresh—and how that process became the foundation for what we now call Essential Content Reviews.

You can read more about the Essential Content Review Framework on our website, under Intranet Best Practices. But what I want to share here is the origin story—how one firm, led by a thoughtful and practical knowledge manager named Shannon Kaplan, created a rhythm of content care that’s still shaping how our community maintains knowledge today.

Company Wide Teams: How AEI Turns Lessons Learned Into Firmwide Knowledge

August 6, 2025 Christopher Parsons

Every day, on every project, lessons are happening inside AEC firms. But without the right infrastructure, those insights often remain tucked away in meeting notes or siloed with project teams—making it likely that future teams will repeat the same mistakes on their projects.

It doesn’t have to be this way. With the right infrastructure in place, AEC firms can learn faster than one project at a time and turn individual insights into organizational knowledge.

At Affiliated Engineers, Inc. (AEI), Company Wide Teams (CWTs) provide that infrastructure. For more than 25 years, these peer-led, cross-office teams have served as the scaffolding for firmwide learning, continuous improvement, and leadership development. The idea is simple but powerful: Don’t just share lessons, learn from them—and not just as a project team, as an organization.

The structure is clear and repeatable. Project lessons are identified and prioritized during monthly CWT meetings. From there, lessons are shared across the firm through a variety of lightweight formats: curated presentations, short-form write-ups, and open technical forums. When a lesson points to a deeper need, it’s operationalized—transformed into templates, toolkits, or shared guidelines—improving how the whole firm works.

Of course, none of that happens without trust. AEI has also invested deeply in building a culture where people feel safe naming their mistakes, confident their insights will help others grow.

What follows is a look at one of the most durable and dynamic knowledge-sharing programs in the AEC industry—what it looks like in action, and what other firms can learn from it.

Unlocking Sustainability with AI-Powered Knowledge Management | KM 3.0 Podcast Series - Episode 3

July 30, 2025 Christopher Parsons

Years ago, Corey Squire told me he believed that knowledge management was the secret to unlocking sustainability in architectural practice. At the time, that insight struck me as bold and prescient. Now, after watching Corey apply that philosophy across his roles at Lake Flato, through his consulting work, and most recently as Director of Sustainability at Bora Architecture & Interiors, I believe it’s something much more: a model.

In this episode, Corey walks us through how Bora is transforming sustainability from a siloed department into a shared operating system—powered by a thoughtful culture, a living knowledge base, and now, AI Search. He shares how their Synthesis intranet (Chaco) helps capture institutional knowledge from experts and make it accessible to the entire firm, freeing up time for deeper innovation and mentorship. We talk about the importance of pairing sustainable knowledge with a supportive culture, and the flywheel effect that happens when you give people not just facts, but context and clarity about why design choices matter.

Corey’s insights are grounded, generous, and deeply practical—shaped by his own experience building firmwide programs, writing the AIA Framework for Design Excellence, and publishing People, Planet, Design, a book that blends design philosophy, actionable strategies, and an entire chapter on knowledge management as the foundation for sustainable practice.

Whether you're trying to scale sustainability, upskill your teams, or figure out how AI fits into your firm’s future, this is a conversation full of takeaways you can borrow, adapt, and implement.

Enjoy!

INTRANET TOUR | Refabricating DSX: How Diamond Schmitt Is Evolving Its Knowledge Platform for AI Search + Learning

July 24, 2025 Knowledge Architecture

Featured Guests

Jeanette Parker, Director of Knowledge Management
Wendy Gomoll, Manager, Knowledge Management
Sam Horton, Learning and Development Manager

Webinar Summary

In this webinar, you’ll see how Diamond Schmitt is strategically evolving their knowledge platform to capitalize on emerging capabilities in AI-powered search and learning management.

How Leading AEC Knowledge Management Teams Are Evolving to Thrive in the AI Era | 12 Trends

July 23, 2025 Christopher Parsons

Over the past year, much of the conversation around AI and knowledge management in AEC has rightly focused on technology. Generative AI platforms, AI search offering, and emerging capabilities like AI agents are transforming how firms surface and share what they know.

We’ve also spent a lot of time exploring the benefits: how AI can support emerging professionals, elevate subject matter experts, improve onboarding, streamline marketing, and accelerate learning and development, to name a few.

But one deceptively simple question from the Q&A session at the end of our KM 3.0: Connecting People to Knowledge and Expertise in the Flow of Work webinar has stayed with me:

“How is the work of AEC knowledge management teams changing because of AI?”

In many ways, that question became the organizing impulse for this issue—because KM 3.0, this new era of AI-powered knowledge management, isn’t just about technology. KM 3.0 is also about people, process, and culture, and how AI is reshaping the work of knowledge management teams.

Over the past few months, I’ve spoken with some of the most thoughtful and forward-thinking KM leaders in our community—members of Knowledge Architecture’s Research Council and others leading mature programs across firms of all sizes.

And to be clear, not everyone doing this work has “knowledge” in their title. Across the AEC industry, we see knowledge management being led by a diverse mix of roles—knowledge managers, design technology leaders, operations directors, IT leaders, marketing and communications professionals, learning and development leads, innovation strategists, practice leaders, quality assurance directors, and even CEOs.

Regardless of their title or department, what they share is a deep investment in how knowledge flows across the firm and a commitment to making it more usable, accessible, and strategic.

What follows is a synthesis of 12 key trends—emergent patterns in how the smartest KM teams are evolving their work to thrive in this new era of AI-powered knowledge management.

Introducing Stock Icons 2.0

July 11, 2025 Knowledge Architecture

We are excited to introduce Stock Icons 2.0, our latest update to the stock icon feature in Synthesis.

This new feature allows users to:

Filter Stock Icon Results by Style – Use the new style and weight filters to adjust the look of your stock icons for visually consistent results.
Set the Default Stock Icon Style – Set sitewide defaults in the branding settings to maintain a cohesive look across your intranet site.
Show or Hide Stock Icon Filter in the UI – Choose whether contributors see style filters in the stock icon interface—or hide them to preserve consistency.

Stock Icons 2.0 makes it easier to stay on brand and quickly find the icons you need.

We’ll release this update after the close of business on Friday, July 18th to all Knowledge Architecture clients.

Enjoy!

Inside Shive-Hattery’s Plus One Program: How a Simple Practice Engages Employees and Builds Future Leaders

July 9, 2025 Christopher Parsons

The idea behind Shive-Hattery’s Plus One program is disarmingly simple: when you’re heading into a client meeting, proposal interview, or project kickoff, don’t go alone. Bring someone with you. Someone earlier in their career. Someone who wouldn’t normally be in the room. Have them observe. Encourage them to ask questions. Invite them to lead a small part of the meeting.

That’s it.

But inside that simple idea lives something incredibly powerful.

Shive-Hattery is a 600-person architecture and engineering consulting firm based in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, with roots dating back to 1895.

Plus One is both a knowledge strategy and an employee engagement strategy. It helps the firm transfer wisdom from senior staff, build client continuity, and develop future leaders in real time. At the same time, it helps early-career professionals feel seen, valued, and included in the real work of the firm, years before they might otherwise have had the chance.

It’s one of those rare practices that builds both business resilience and human connection.

In fact, I’d argue that’s part of why it works so well. It sits at the intersection of what firms need and what people want. Firms need succession planning, leadership development, and client coverage. People want mentorship, growth, and visibility. Plus One delivers both, and it’s exactly the kind of habit that helps a firm become a learning organization.

And because it’s lightweight, repeatable, and aligned with the natural rhythms of project work, it scales easily.

CEO as Knowledge Architect | KM 3.0 Podcast Series - Episode 2

July 6, 2025 Christopher Parsons

I’m excited to share the second episode in our Welcome to KM 3.0 podcast series, a collaboration between Knowledge Architecture and the TRXL Podcast.

This week’s guest is Ellen Bensky, CEO of Turner Fleischer Architects.

We titled this episode “CEO as Knowledge Architect” because that’s exactly what Ellen models in practice. Over the past decade, she’s helped Turner Fleischer grow from 60 to 250 people—not just by adding headcount, but by connecting people, process, technology, and culture in ways that support smarter, more sustainable growth.

In short, she’s doing the work of knowledge management—or KM—but from the CEO’s chair.

Ellen shares how KM became a strategic priority at Turner Fleischer, how her team embedded it into roles and workflows, and why AI is now playing a central role in simplifying and scaling the firm’s institutional knowledge. From employee onboarding to digital practice, project management to culture building, she shows how KM, done well, can become both an operational advantage and a leadership philosophy.

It’s one of the clearest, most thoughtful conversations on modern KM in AEC that I’ve ever been part of and we’re so happy to share it with you.

Enjoy!

Why Epistemic Humility Might Be the Most Important Skill for the AI Era

June 25, 2025 Christopher Parsons

Nine months ago we released Synthesis AI Search for AEC Firms to our client community. Since then, we’ve seen some remarkable things.

Firms are surfacing knowledge that was previously buried across intranets and databases. They’re connecting employees with internal experts more easily, helping marketing teams find project precedents and draft communication, and using AI Search to support digital design practices, scale expert knowledge, upskill emerging professionals, and make onboarding more effective.

Our clients are making significant improvements to how their firms work and learn.

And yet, alongside all this momentum, I’ve also heard a growing concern:

“I’m worried that our employees are going to accept whatever AI tells them at face value and run with it.”

This concern isn’t new. We’ve long tried to teach people to question what they read online, to check sources, to verify claims. But something about this moment—maybe it’s the polish, maybe it’s the speed, maybe it’s the aura of intelligence that clings to anything branded AI—feels different.

Which brings me to a word I didn’t learn until later in my career, but which now feels central to this moment: epistemology, and its practical counterpart, epistemic humility.

What is Epistemology?

If you’ve never heard the word epistemology, you’re not alone. I didn’t encounter it until around 2017, when I met Larry Prusak, a mentor and pioneer in the knowledge management field.

Epistemology is the study of knowledge: how we know what we know, how knowledge is formed and validated, how it evolves or gets distorted over time. It’s a field that touches everything from philosophy to science to journalism, and increasingly, AI.

Larry introduced me to a related concept that’s stuck with me ever since: epistemic humility. The idea that we should be humble about what we know, cautious about what we claim, and curious enough to keep questioning even our most cherished assumptions as well as the assertions of others.

It’s one of those phrases that’s quietly shaped how I lead, how we build products at KA, and how I think about the future of knowledge work.