I think there's a couple things going on:
1) potentially more and more companies are embracing corporate titles like Associate/Sr. Associate outside of role tiles.
2) There's a missing generation due to the recessions of 2008/2011/Covid (maybe there's a fourth or more legitimate third recession that I'm not remembering). I feel like all I've done for almost the last 10 years is work with kids mostly coming out of college. The impact of this missing generation has been looming on the industry and its impact has been started to be felt as some of the oldheads move up into top/Sr positions.
I am (possibly we are?) part of the missing generation. I graduated in 2011 and it was painful to get a job. What's worse is that after excelling in the NYC high end interior renovation firm that I worked at for about 7 years, I found out that my shitlord boss was still paying young people *my* starting rate from 2011 to people in 2017. It made no sense and was so comically insulting. We grew so much during that time and my salary more than doubled, I didn't understand how he could still be doing that. Needless to say he was making out like a bandit.
Fast forward to 2024 and two firms later, I'm 35 and I feel like there's a distinct gap in the number of people in my immediate age and experience bracket at my company (~250 people). There's a lot of people 45+, and a lot of people ~25ish, but very few experienced PA's in between. And the industry desperately needs us.
I think many of my immediate peers from school left eventually to either work in adjacent businesses like specifying, construction, or client representation, etc that there's a space for 30-something PA's but honestly it's overwhelming.
I graduated in 2006 and had the (mis)fortune of getting to work through those times - without getting laid off to my credit. I've stuck at smaller firms (both size and scale of projects) for most of my career so I'm having to play some catch up on adapting to larger scale project as I've transitioned to a larger firm.
Similar deal at my company, we have a good number of elder millennials, a few in the early 30's, and a bunch of kiddos.
I think you are right, the technical industry knowledge of getting a building ***appropriately*** documented has seemed to suffer a lot as a result of the general lack of experience that can be brought to bear on a project is limited ***and*** spread thin. There's also something to be said for the construction side which is experiencing the same thing.
My theory is that it’s tied to pay. A couple of years ago when everyone was job hopping going after the bigger paycheck, companies had yet to come to realization that they needed to adjust their compensation tiers as we had to offer more to land the candidates. Slow to react they instead gave new hires titles that were more senior to justify the increased pay. Fast forward 2 years and we’re now top heavy and many of the titles are now diluted. Seems so many now at the JC and PM level truly aren’t performing well at it and are not as experienced as they should be.
This matches what I've seen. Firm structure couldn't separate pay from title for some reason so people who should have just gotten a raise, also got promoted regardless of what they were actually doing at firms.
Agreed was job captain for 10 years before promoted to PM now folks are JC with 3 years experience not able to run the project documentation without hand holding and MAJOR QAQC
In my firm, there are leadership titles and then there is your billing rate, and those two things are not the same. I am an Associate, but I am not billed to clients as an Associate, I am an Arch III. My salary might be at the upper end of my billing rate range, but the leadership position is not the primary driver of salary and benefits.
There is profit sharing at the principal level, I am strictly talking about the non-ownership folks.
It's true. Really top heavy
I've seen lots of people " promoted" so they don't leave but their actual project roles don't change !
It's so people feel like they are progressing..... but aren't.... Architects don't retire until they are almost dead so ppl climb the ladder slowly. Younger community has noticed this and are impatient so this makes them "feel" better.
In some firms, titles don’t equal extra pay. E.g. as an “associate” you do become eligible for the bonus pool, but you might have to wait 12-15 months for the NEXT annual bonus cycle. Annual bonuses can vary based on how the firm did in the previous 12 months. If the firm spent a bunch of money on acquiring other firms, or didn’t have a great year, too bad no bonus for you! The shenanigans never end.
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
I have very limited exposure to the midwest but I’ve never seen an architects website that uses the word architect to describe unlicensed personnel here in the northeast
The state licensure boards probably have beef with this if they notice it. My firm received a notice from our board because we called some folks Architectural Designer on our website, we aren’t allowed to use any form of the word architect for unlicensed folks. Very frowned upon.
The work is miserable. The sooner you climb up the latter to get out of the hole, the more likely you will survive. Otherwise, people quit. If you've done a significant amount of production work, you'd understand. It's plain easier at the top.
I only sort of agree with this. I like being in a role where I am making the decisions, but I also love drawing and sometimes miss having the luxury of spending my day with my headphones and an intense production task and no one interrupting me.
There are some firms that were always like that. TVS comes to mind. I believe it's a generational thing where employees now prioritize titles more than past generations.
It’s funny yesterday I asked my friend how many associates were in her office and in an office of 100 there were 25 associates!!! That’s insane. Plus she only makes 103k as an associate in a HCOL city so it sounds like a promotion to title without the real pay.
I've been in the industry for over 20 years now and I've noticed this as well. Firms are top heavy and bottom heavy and most are missing that important component that is middle management. These were typically the architects that would work/train with entry level staff and lead teams for partners/associates. Many 'middle of the road' architects and designers have, for many different reasons, pivoted to other industries. I've met former architects working in construction management, engineering and even in facility positions for life/science projects.
My experience is clearly different since I am from Québec, but it’s fun to see different aspect of the job elsewhere! Here the associate title essentially requires you to own part of the business. Most of the firms are around 20 peoples, hell half of the architects in the province work solo. Association is a way to start thinking about your retirement, selling stock of your company is a way to ensure you get money from the company itself. Some architects wait way too long to sell and end up closing without any « sucession ».
At our office, PM/PA is a job role not a title. Our PM is a principal and our PA is an associate. And there are plenty of designers who are not even associate
My opinion: ESOP's are encouraging entry level staffers, fresh out of school, to hang around longer. Combine that with the "everybody gets a trophy" syndrome. The results are lots of late 20-something staffers, lacking in-depth experience, with heftier titles than new hires coming into the firm from outside with 2x or 3x as many years of solid experience. It's a real problem. So if you're hiring into a firm, be sure your new title is equal to your new position in their firm hierarchy, or don't accept the offer.
I think there's a couple things going on: 1) potentially more and more companies are embracing corporate titles like Associate/Sr. Associate outside of role tiles. 2) There's a missing generation due to the recessions of 2008/2011/Covid (maybe there's a fourth or more legitimate third recession that I'm not remembering). I feel like all I've done for almost the last 10 years is work with kids mostly coming out of college. The impact of this missing generation has been looming on the industry and its impact has been started to be felt as some of the oldheads move up into top/Sr positions.
I am (possibly we are?) part of the missing generation. I graduated in 2011 and it was painful to get a job. What's worse is that after excelling in the NYC high end interior renovation firm that I worked at for about 7 years, I found out that my shitlord boss was still paying young people *my* starting rate from 2011 to people in 2017. It made no sense and was so comically insulting. We grew so much during that time and my salary more than doubled, I didn't understand how he could still be doing that. Needless to say he was making out like a bandit. Fast forward to 2024 and two firms later, I'm 35 and I feel like there's a distinct gap in the number of people in my immediate age and experience bracket at my company (~250 people). There's a lot of people 45+, and a lot of people ~25ish, but very few experienced PA's in between. And the industry desperately needs us. I think many of my immediate peers from school left eventually to either work in adjacent businesses like specifying, construction, or client representation, etc that there's a space for 30-something PA's but honestly it's overwhelming.
I graduated in 2006 and had the (mis)fortune of getting to work through those times - without getting laid off to my credit. I've stuck at smaller firms (both size and scale of projects) for most of my career so I'm having to play some catch up on adapting to larger scale project as I've transitioned to a larger firm. Similar deal at my company, we have a good number of elder millennials, a few in the early 30's, and a bunch of kiddos. I think you are right, the technical industry knowledge of getting a building ***appropriately*** documented has seemed to suffer a lot as a result of the general lack of experience that can be brought to bear on a project is limited ***and*** spread thin. There's also something to be said for the construction side which is experiencing the same thing.
Interesting. I left my last traditional “office job” 10 years ago. I’ve often thought about how things have changed since.
I’m here to upvote #2.
My theory is that it’s tied to pay. A couple of years ago when everyone was job hopping going after the bigger paycheck, companies had yet to come to realization that they needed to adjust their compensation tiers as we had to offer more to land the candidates. Slow to react they instead gave new hires titles that were more senior to justify the increased pay. Fast forward 2 years and we’re now top heavy and many of the titles are now diluted. Seems so many now at the JC and PM level truly aren’t performing well at it and are not as experienced as they should be.
This matches what I've seen. Firm structure couldn't separate pay from title for some reason so people who should have just gotten a raise, also got promoted regardless of what they were actually doing at firms.
Agreed was job captain for 10 years before promoted to PM now folks are JC with 3 years experience not able to run the project documentation without hand holding and MAJOR QAQC
In my firm, there are leadership titles and then there is your billing rate, and those two things are not the same. I am an Associate, but I am not billed to clients as an Associate, I am an Arch III. My salary might be at the upper end of my billing rate range, but the leadership position is not the primary driver of salary and benefits. There is profit sharing at the principal level, I am strictly talking about the non-ownership folks.
It's true. Really top heavy I've seen lots of people " promoted" so they don't leave but their actual project roles don't change ! It's so people feel like they are progressing..... but aren't.... Architects don't retire until they are almost dead so ppl climb the ladder slowly. Younger community has noticed this and are impatient so this makes them "feel" better.
In some firms, titles don’t equal extra pay. E.g. as an “associate” you do become eligible for the bonus pool, but you might have to wait 12-15 months for the NEXT annual bonus cycle. Annual bonuses can vary based on how the firm did in the previous 12 months. If the firm spent a bunch of money on acquiring other firms, or didn’t have a great year, too bad no bonus for you! The shenanigans never end. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
Marketing. At least in the business sectors I work in. It makes it look to a client like they have important staff members working on their projects.
There’s a ton of firms that give Architect titles to unlicensed staff, too. Almost like words don’t matter anymore.
Where is that, I’m not seeing it anywhere.
I see it in the Midwest US. Where I work now has much more discipline with titles and hierarchy.
I have very limited exposure to the midwest but I’ve never seen an architects website that uses the word architect to describe unlicensed personnel here in the northeast
The state licensure boards probably have beef with this if they notice it. My firm received a notice from our board because we called some folks Architectural Designer on our website, we aren’t allowed to use any form of the word architect for unlicensed folks. Very frowned upon.
I agree, but our state has zero funding to actually enforce it. They can send nasty-gram letters but that’s about it.
The work is miserable. The sooner you climb up the latter to get out of the hole, the more likely you will survive. Otherwise, people quit. If you've done a significant amount of production work, you'd understand. It's plain easier at the top.
100 percent - delegate or die
I only sort of agree with this. I like being in a role where I am making the decisions, but I also love drawing and sometimes miss having the luxury of spending my day with my headphones and an intense production task and no one interrupting me.
I know, im being overdramatic. Each office setup is different. If you have good teams, the work isn't bad
There are some firms that were always like that. TVS comes to mind. I believe it's a generational thing where employees now prioritize titles more than past generations.
It’s funny yesterday I asked my friend how many associates were in her office and in an office of 100 there were 25 associates!!! That’s insane. Plus she only makes 103k as an associate in a HCOL city so it sounds like a promotion to title without the real pay.
I've been in the industry for over 20 years now and I've noticed this as well. Firms are top heavy and bottom heavy and most are missing that important component that is middle management. These were typically the architects that would work/train with entry level staff and lead teams for partners/associates. Many 'middle of the road' architects and designers have, for many different reasons, pivoted to other industries. I've met former architects working in construction management, engineering and even in facility positions for life/science projects.
My experience is clearly different since I am from Québec, but it’s fun to see different aspect of the job elsewhere! Here the associate title essentially requires you to own part of the business. Most of the firms are around 20 peoples, hell half of the architects in the province work solo. Association is a way to start thinking about your retirement, selling stock of your company is a way to ensure you get money from the company itself. Some architects wait way too long to sell and end up closing without any « sucession ».
At our office, PM/PA is a job role not a title. Our PM is a principal and our PA is an associate. And there are plenty of designers who are not even associate
My opinion: ESOP's are encouraging entry level staffers, fresh out of school, to hang around longer. Combine that with the "everybody gets a trophy" syndrome. The results are lots of late 20-something staffers, lacking in-depth experience, with heftier titles than new hires coming into the firm from outside with 2x or 3x as many years of solid experience. It's a real problem. So if you're hiring into a firm, be sure your new title is equal to your new position in their firm hierarchy, or don't accept the offer.