A Survey of Skill Level of Architects in ICT in Various Professional

Jobs: A Case Study in Manado, Indonesia

Sangkertadi, Reny Syafriny

Architecture Dept, Engineering Faculty, Sam Ratulangi University, Manado, Indonesia

Keywords: Architect, Skill, Software

Abstract: In the era of the industrial revolution, 4.0 practitioner in architecture should have enough skill in the practice

of ICT, including mastering various types of software that commonly used in their professional work.

Softwares for practice in the field of architecture are not only for art and building design purposes but also as

an analytical tool in order to guarantee the quality of the architectural philosophical, plan and its construction.

The software is also for designing an acoustic room, lighting, structure, mechanical and electrical of buildings.

The objective of this study is to describe the level of skill in ICT practice of architects. The methodology used

is descriptive qualitative. Perceptive questionnaires were distributed to as many as 100 architects as

respondents. The questionnaire contained questions about the level of skill in operating various software. The

architects as respondents are expected to be able to assess the ability of themselves at what level in terms of

mastery of various computer programs which are commonly used in architectural projects or urban planning.

The results show that in general the architects in Manado city were quite right in recognising some software.

Even among the software, they claim very well in operating it.

1 INTRODUCTION

In the current 4.0 industrial revolution, the

development of information and communication

technology is very rapid. We are all expected to

master and be able to practice information and

communication equipment well. The development of

architecture and urban planning is inseparable from

the role of informatics experts who have developed

various creativities in information and

communication technology. Various computer

software has been developed to improve the quality

of planning, calculation, design and construction

industry as well. Many governmental organisations

have endeavoured to develop a roadmap for the

specific purpose of research and development of

information technology for the construction industry

(Hosseini et al., 2012). Building Information

Modeling (BIM), Augmented Reality (AR), Rapid

Prototyping (RP) and Virtual Reality (VR) are some

of the new technologies that can actively contribute

to the construction industry (Leal et al., 2018).

Architects, in general, are artists with additional

expertise in construction and planning. Architecture

education combines the fields of art, social and

engineering. The facts show that innovation in

information and communication technology also

plays a vital role in the development of the arts and

social fields, in addition to engineering. Therefore,

architects must adapt to sophisticated technology and

keep following the developments in the field of

information technology, so as not to miss information

on the development of current informatics

architectural practices. The jobs of architects may

cover various branches of built environment field.

Some of them focused on being a professional

practitioner in building design, urban planning,

landscape designer, interior designer, construction

industry and supervisors of construction. Besides,

some are interested in education, research or

bureaucracy. Almost all kinds of work done by

architects require good skill in information and

communication technology. The application of

information technology in the architectural field,

among others, is the use of various software as a tool

for design aid. Computer programs are needed in

solving various problems of design or planning

process rapidly and precisely. The use of software in

the area of architecture has long been developing for

decades ago. It has proven to have shown many

advantages over conventional methods (manual or

traditional drawing practices), including among

Sangkertadi, . and Syafriny, R.

A Survey of Skill Level of Architects in ICT in Various Professional Jobs.: A Case Study in Manado, Indonesia.

DOI: 10.5220/0010706200002967

In Proceedings of the 4th International Conference of Vocational Higher Education (ICVHE 2019) - Empowering Human Capital Towards Sustainable 4.0 Industry, pages 585-589

ISBN: 978-989-758-530-2; ISSN: 2184-9870

 2021 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All r ights reserved

585

others: drawing-precision, animation, budget

calculation, calculation of construction-duration, and

for compiling building technical data. Computer

programs that are generally used in the professional

practice of architects, in general, can be divided into

three parts from the viewpoint of its purposes:

1) General and office purposes: Word

processing, Spread-sheet, Report-

presentation

2) Art, design developments & technical

drawing: CAD (Computer-Aided Design),

Animation, Moviemaker

3) Scientific & Engineering design aid:

Structure, Acoustic, Thermal, Lighting,

GIS (Geographical Information System)

The level of skill in mastering information

technology then becomes a measure of the success of

someone in his work environment (Lopez-Bassols,

2020). From an employability perspective, having

ICT skills could be seen as a necessary quality in the

labour market (De Hoyos et al., 2013). Likewise,

architects who have the ability to operate various

computer programs will be beneficiary, because they

can use it as a tool to produce outputs and designs

with better quality and relatively faster (Amir, 2011).

Manado is the capital of the province of North

Sulawesi in Indonesia. The city, which has a

population of around 400 thousand people, is

currently growing, where construction of buildings

and city infrastructures are ongoing. In this city, there

are more than 500 hundreds of architects who work

in various tasks of the architectural job. Architecture

education has been carried out at universities of the

city for about 30 years. To control and accelerate city

development, we need a thoughtful and appropriate

planning and design strategy. The use of computer

programs is one of the mechanical parts of the

planning and design strategy. The process or scheme

direction that takes place in urban architectural

planning and design requires drafters, technicians,

and experts who mastery in information technology

or can operate computer programs with reasonable

skills. Professionalism in the field of architecture has

changed where the use of computer programs has

become a design tool that is commonly used. Many

people also know that by operating a computer

program, it can print pictures of buildings that are also

beautiful, precise and attractive. Through this paper,

we describe the level of competences of architects in

the city of Manado about their skills in operating

various computer programs.

2 METHODOLOGY

The methodology used in this study is descriptive

qualitative by distributing perceptive questionnaires

to as many as 100 architects who were respondents.

The questionnaire contained questions about the level

of skill in operating various software. The architects

as respondents are expected to be able to assess the

ability of themselves at what level in terms of mastery

of various computer programs which are commonly

used in architectural projects or urban planning. They

filled out or answered the questionnaire by writing

down the scale of the ability to master the software,

which is stated by the numbers from 0 (lowest) to 10

(best) (Table.1).

Table.1. Classification of scale/ level and perception of

competence in operating software

Scale Perception

Level of

Competency/

Skill

0 I Never Hear

bad/low

I Have Heard in Various

Discussions/ Meetings

I Have Little Information

from M

Own Search

I Have Tried Little and Not

Interested or Unable to

Continue

I am Pretty Interested, Have

Tried the Demo Version

not so good/

middle

I Continue to Practice and

Try to Apply for Specific

Cases

I Am Quite Mastery and

Sometimes Apply to Simple

Pro

ects

I am pretty good at it and

sometimes use it for

com

lex

ects

good &

very good

I Master Well, But Not

Always Implement it in My

Projects

I Master Well, and Always

use it in M

Pro

ects

I Master Very Well and may

Become Instructor for my

Collea

ues

excellent

Scales of mastery in information technology can be

measured in level categories. The lowest level is on

the scale of one, while the medium level scaled as

five. The highest is valued as ten (Ministr and Ntevko,

2010). In addition, according to Nur Aisyah,

Information and Communication Technology skills

ICVHE 2019 - The International Conference of Vocational Higher Education (ICVHE) “Empowering Human Capital Towards Sustainable

4.0 Industry”

586

can be measured in 5 levels, namely from the lowest

scale with the value one which belongs to the novice

category, up to a scale of 5 which signifies that is very

mastering (Nur Aisyah, 2013). The respondents were

grouped according to their professional work

experience, their level of education and their types of

professional job (Table.2 and 3). Computer programs

or software that are subject to questionnaires were

also grouped according to the functions and purpose

of use (Table.4). The investigation was carry-out in

months February and March 2019.

Table.2. Year experiences of respondents

Professional

Experiences of

Respondents

Number of Respondents with Education

Backgroun

Undergraduate/

Bachelor

Graduated/

Master

Total

than 20

years

2 8 10

5 to 20

years

18 12 30

0 To 5

years

60 0 60

Total number of respondents 100

Table 3. The professional job of respondents

Professional Jobs

Number of Respondents with

Education Backgroun

Undergradt

/Bachelor

Degree

Gradt

/Master

Degree

Total

Educator/

Researc

- 12 12

Administrative

/Government/

Bureaucrac

- 10 10

Practitioner/

Consultant/

Construction

wor

73 5 78

Total Number of Respondents

100

Table 4. Grouping of the software

Purpose Commercial name

General Office

MS-Office: Word,

PowerPoint, and Excel

Technical Drawing and

Art Graphical

Auto-CAD, Archi-Cad,

Corel Draw, Photo-shop,

Sketch Up

Animation

3D Studio Max, Movie

Make

Scientific and

Engineering

SPSS, Energy+, Velux,

Dialux, Arc-GIS, Envi-Met,

SAP2000

3 RESULTS

The results of the questionnaire are compiled in Table

5. It shows the percentage of the respondents

according to their classification of skills in operating

computer-programs. Skills or competencies in

operating software for office and administrative

purposes are generally quite satisfying, where around

50% of respondents master well excellent, except for

mastering spreadsheet program (Fig.1). Respondents

are less accustomed to using spreadsheets because the

scope of their tasks as architects is more dominated

by activities leading to art and presentations, rather

than quantitative analysis and making graphics, charts

or tables.

Respondents, according to their own perceptions,

feel that they mastery computer programs for

technical drawing with good and excellent skill-fully,

namely for AutoCAD and Sketch-Up software.

However, there are still those who feel have not

mastered computer programs for art drawing

purposes (Fig.2). In the curriculum and process of

architecture education in Indonesia, students have

been introduced to a variety of computer programs for

design tools, including Auto-CAD and Google

Sketch Up (Amir, 2011). Likewise, in Manado,

students and architect practitioners are also familiar

with both software.

Almost all respondents stated that they did not

have the skills or deficient capacity in operating

several computer programs for scientific purposes

(Fig.4). It is understandable because almost

respondents as architect-practitioners do not have the

capacity as researchers or experts who are usually

involved in the matter of construction calculations or

mathematical and physical analysis of building

performance. The scientific software that was asked

to the respondents are generally used to calculate the

structure, lighting, energy, micro-climate, and there is

also software commonly used for analysis in the

geological mapping process. Respondents who have

a master-degree education, in general, have higher

skills in using scientific software than those who still

have a bachelor’s degree. Some respondents even

claimed to have the skills in the “good & very good”

category in using some software (Fig.5).

A Survey of Skill Level of Architects in ICT in Various Professional Jobs.: A Case Study in Manado, Indonesia

587

Table.5. Percentage of ability to operate software by

respondents

Commercial

Software

Skills Classification

Low/

Bad

Not So

Good/

Middle

Good &

Very

Goo

Excellent

MS Word 0% 31% 51% 18%

MS Excel 14% 42% 40% 4%

MS Power Point 0% 31% 50% 19%

Auto CAD 8% 19% 53% 20%

Archi CAD 37% 32% 25% 6%

Sketch Up 5% 24% 61% 10%

Photo Shop 20% 22% 44% 14%

Corel Draw 40% 35% 23% 2%

3 DsMax 47% 33% 19% 1%

Movie Maker 32% 41% 25% 2%

SPSS 76% 22% 2% 0%

Energy++ 88% 12% 0% 0%

Dialux 77% 14% 9% 0%

Velux 75% 16% 9% 0%

Arc GIS 67% 21% 12% 0%

SAP2000 92% 8% 0% 0%

EnviMet 89% 11% 0% 0%

Figure1. Level of skills in operating office software

Figure 2. Level of skills in operating software for technical

and art drawing

Figure 3.Level of skills in operating software for design

animation

Figure 4. Level of skills in operating software for scientific

purposes

Figure 5. Level of skills in operating software for scientific

purposes of those who have master degree education.

4 CONCLUSION

There is a linear relationship between the

development of software and the availability of

employment for those who have higher skills in the

field of information & communication technology

(ICT). Professionalism or job in the field of

architecture cannot be separated from the level of

ICVHE 2019 - The International Conference of Vocational Higher Education (ICVHE) “Empowering Human Capital Towards Sustainable

4.0 Industry”

588

information and communication technology skills.

Mastery of various software is a way to be able to

compete in current employment. In this study, in the

city of Manado, Indonesia, from the results of the

questionnaire, the architects, in general, were quite

right in recognising some software. Even among the

software, they claim enough good in operating it.

However, they should not be easily satisfied because

they still need to develop themselves by following the

development of information technology that is very

rapid. They still have to improve their skills in

mastering various types of information technology,

software and undergo specialised training to increase

their capacity.

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