“He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.” —Benjamin Franklin

Excuses.

There are many.

I haven’t updated my blog in many months. I want to apologize, but I don’t think I had any avid readers to disappoint. My excuse is that I took a job consulting for the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Museum of Tolerance. It’s a world-class venue being built in the heart of downtown Jerusalem. Spare time has become scarce.

I wanted to finish my thoughts on Shatz street, but failed to find inspiration. My excuse is that what I really wanted to address –the influence of Bauhaus architecture on Jerusalem construction and vis-versa – is a vast subject worthy of a doctoral degree. I simply haven’t found the right way to approach it yet in an abridged form.

Time and inspiration are hard to come by sometimes, but excuses are not. How do we change the discourse from one of blame-excuse to one of motivation and action?

President Harry S. Truman famously quipped “the buck stops here.” I have no idea what it means, literally. But figuratively, it represents taking responsibility. He knew that getting things done meant no more passing the buck.

Now visit a building site. The worker forgot to do the detail because he didn’t get the plan. The project manager blames the site architect for not getting the detail to the worker. The site architect asks the planning architect when the detail was sent out. The design architect blames the project manager for not updating the work schedule. The project manager blames the accounting officer for refusing to pay the gypsum contractor unless his work is complete. The gypsum contractor completes his work, completely ignoring the fact that the glass needs to go in first. The glass contractor destroys the gypsum work, requiring the accounting officer to re-budget and bring back the gypsum contractor. The client blames the accountant for going over budget, the accountant blames the site manager who blames the site architect who blames the design architect and so on.

This is before we even get to the weather.

In any complex system – and a building project is always complex – mistakes, delays and all sorts of other conundrums will take place. In the extreme, but sadly all too common case, loss of life may occur. So who can we blame?

My experience has taught me that once people look to blame, their cause is lost. Seeking fault creates excuses. What is an excuse? An excuse is a reason used to deflect blame. Get rid of the blame culture and you can deal with the reasons.

So yes, I haven’t written for a while because I was busy and had writer’s block. But in fact it’s because Aliens took me to Mars to consult on their latest space-port.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.