Practice and accounts

An architecture pursuit needs a practice entity and a counterparty before anyone can interpret its value. The practice entity identifies which firm owns the work. The client account identifies the organization the team is pursuing, with a named contact, address and eligibility note. A fee opportunity links both contexts through its organization and counterparty references. When several staff members discuss the same commission, that common record keeps the team looking at the same client.

The practice also maintains team members. Each member belongs to an organization and points to a platform user. The member record carries the staff name, active state, role name and time zone. The opportunity names one member as owner; a reviewer decision and uploaded attachment each name their own acting member. Those references help a principal distinguish who owns the relationship from who made a review decision or added evidence.

• Firm scope. Start with the organization that owns the account, the opportunity and any related design RFP.
• Client identity. Give each account a name, code, contact name and address that the pursuit team can recognize.
• Staff attribution. Link the opportunity owner, reviewer and uploader to team member records so handoffs have a named person.

Agree which practice entity owns a pursuit when the firm has more than one organization. Decide how client and partner accounts are named and coded. Decide who confirms whether an account is active and what belongs in its eligibility note. Map active staff to their users before assigning opportunities; a name alone is a poor substitute for a reliable owner. Set access so business development can maintain account details while Admin maintains organization and staff identity records.

A principal hears about a civic library commission. The business development lead checks whether the city agency already has an account, updates its contact name and eligibility note, then opens a pursuit against that account. The opportunity points to the practice entity and to the lead who will own the relationship. The proposal coordinator can now attach a design RFP to the same pursuit without copying the account address into a second client record. When another team member uploads a site brief, the file keeps that uploader’s identity.

Before the team sends a proposal, the principal checks the counterparty and practice entity. If the commission is being pursued by a different office, Admin corrects the organization mapping and the lead confirms the opportunity’s ownership. The account remains the shared client reference for later pursuits.

• Client accounts — Client and partner organizations with contact and eligibility details.
• Open pursuit pipeline — Active opportunities with their named owners and client counterparties.

Account to qualified pursuit shows how the client record becomes active pipeline work. Review access before the first assignment.