With so many of us out of work, and about 300 applicants/job that translates into 1/300 or .003 chance of anyone getting hired. Firms only hire the top 003%. Many are just not at this level for numerous reasons: pehaps then some of us should be asking the hard questions, set pride aside and do some serious questioning - maybe, just maybe, some of us should find something else to do.
If people really want to stay in architecture it may be necessary for some of us to redevelop/reinvent ourselves, go back to school - but do what it takes - make no excuses and engage in a forceful self improvement program to be what it takes or face long term or permanent exclusion from architecture. After a year of unemployment I need to consider going back to school.
i've heard a lot of "yeah, we've gotten 250 applicants, you were one of 10 we chose to talk to." i've heard that at least three times. a 10% chance still isn't exactly great odds. i've received a lot of compliments on my app's, so i'm doing something right.
1/300 for a job doesn't mean the same top .003 % of architects would be the person the firm wants to hire.
out of work does not equal no architectural future. esp. the people just out of college... with most firms only hiring people with several years experience it's impossible these days.
but i do agree..
if you're not very good at architecture because you just kind of settled for it then of course you should be rethinking your path
if you love architecture then you're spending all this free time to enter competitions you wouldn't have time to do with a 60 hour work week.
Graphic design is on its way out. I mean you can do internet design but it has a steep learning curve when it comes to coding. Otherwise, the print world is dead unless you want to work for publications that pander to the lowest common denominator.
ID is pretty tight these days. With retailers trimming stock from their shelves and purchasing being rather low, it will be a while before companies start punching out new products.
That being said, job opportunities in ID are geographically limited and to get a career off the ground... you need visibility from competitions, press and having a school around certain doesn't hurt.
Set Design has had a trend of being thinned because of CG over the years anyways in the movie world.
I honestly don't know the overall financial health of the theatre world but several sources suggest that had been struggling financially for years and the current recession isn't helping at all.
That being said, I'd imagine set design isn't really something you can get into without a lack of visibility.
Video game design is doing great. But I'd imagine like web-based graphic design has a very steep curve to it.
With all that being said, I have found really good success right now in helping investors and business types draft proposals.
The government is pressuring creditors and investors to seriously consider opening up the doors to entrepreneurs. And local governments are hungry to get just about anything going.
A lot of business proposals lack a lot of "oomphf!" and it seems natural that people with graphic, architectural and planning skills can make some scratch adding to and shaping business proposals.
Business consultants, while very knowledgeable, don't know the all the intricacies when it comes to the physical construct of a business.
If your out of work you should not pursue a masters degree in architecture if your serious about working for yourself. Your dollars would be best spent in a business school program. Cause in Architecture School they don't teach yahoo about business.
I just waded through 150 job applications for an intern architect position. I immediately tossed about 100 of them. Then I carefully reviewed 50 and called 30 and narrowed it down to 10. I cannot tell you how many stupid mistakes college educated people make with resumes. Honestly, if they just took a little care, their resumes would have been one of the 10 I interviewed. So how do you make your resume rise to the top:
If the person asks for a cover letter and a resume, actually send a cover letter and resume. A one line email does not count as a cover letter. I want to see if you can write a basic letter and find out a little bit more about why you want the position: that is why I request a cover letter. If the ad says "no phone calls" don't call and leave me a voice mail telling me you want to find out more about the position before you bother to submit a resume.
Seriously, check for typos. And if you are editing a letter that you sent before, remember to change the name to MY name, and my company name.
Out of the 150 resume, only about 15 indicated they had done basic research on my company, like google it or look at the web page. That gave them an advantage. I want someone who is inquisitive and will take the first step.
No offense, but at this point in the economy, the goal of an intern with no or little experience should be to get a paying job that will give them experience. Don't go on and on about wanting a job that will offer you opportunities to work on exciting cutting edge projects while appreciating your skill and challenge your creativity. At this point in your career, you need to be a little humble. A job that gives you experience in return for your hard work would be good.
Remember to bring your portfolio to the interview. (Yes, one of the top 10 actually forgot to bring anything! He had a jump drive, and I had to look at his portfolio on an office laptop. It was a short interview. )
Think carefully about the work you bring to show. Bring your BEST design work. Bring samples of anything you did during a summer job. Bring technical drawings. Bring things that show me your breadth of skills. One person told me in the interview that as a senior project, his school required they completely document a project with pretty much a full set of construction documents, and it was one of the things he was most proud of. When I asked why he did not bring it to the interview, he looked stunned.
Resumes tend to start to look very much the same. The cover letter can be your best "sell". Tell me why you want the job, what makes you unique, etc.
Actually carefully read the ad for the job, and tailor your resume and letter to that ad. If I say that I want someone who is organized and detail oriented, be prepared to give me an example of something that shows you are indeed detail oriented. And organize your portfolio.
Practice answering interview questions. Sometimes the answers I get are kind of funny, but you can take honesty too far. If I ask you how your friends would describe you, don't say "They think I'm lazy, but are impressed that I can stay up all night to get things done at the last minute. "
I might call you about your resume and for a short interview before I bring you in for a longer interview. Your cell phone message should not say something like "hey, I'm probably asleep. Don't bother me before 2 PM."
Your email address should not be something cute like "partygirl12@...."
During an interview, you will most likely be asked if you have any questions for the interviewer. Prepare a few professional questions about the firm. Do not ask about benefits or salary yet. They will tell you if they are interested in you. Two of the sillier questions I have heard are "How old are you?" and "Would it hurt my chances of getting the job if I shaved my head?" Although, believe it or not, I hired both of those people- they were both students who were applying for part time work and at least they made me laugh.
Thank you, archie. I just successfully switched jobs in the middle of the recession and I'm only now realizing that I did many of the things you list by complete accident. After talking to both my current and previous employer about their current resume nightmares I might add-
IMO the best advice above is about including information about the firm in their cover letter. Take a look at their work. Are there any projects that remind you of something you did in school? How does their apparent design ethos and methodology compare to yours?
Many firms start by weeding out the ugly cover letters and resumes - a little time spent in design can't hurt. Including your cover letter as part of an emailed resume pdf in addition to the email itself is a good idea. The best way to get attention is to have your letter, resume, and portfolio look professional at first glance, and have interesting content upon further examination.
The purpose of a job application portfolio is to show your work clearly and concisely. Don't go so out of the box with your portfolio that the interviewer can't really see the work, or it is hard to talk about the work in an interview. It's a good idea to edit your portfolio down to a few pages of your best work to email and bring to the interview, and then have a second, fuller document to reference if they ask more specific question. Full drawing sets in some interviews can be a trump card.
If the employer doesn't ask you not to call, by all means follow up. Once.
Be honest and noncombative in your interview. Treat the interviewer like a colleague, not an interrogator.
The statute of limitations on sending a new portfolio is probably like 3-4 months. Not weeks. I've gotten calls a half year later for stuff I've submitted.
Be honest in an interview with your wage expectations. You might get lucky. If you need the job say add that you are flexible. Asking for a living wage will not get you dismissed out of hand, and you don't want to start a job bitter.
Here is my beef with the "write a different cover letter for every job you apply for" advice. Honestly who has time to do that? It would be one thing if there were more jobs than available employees and I could actively pursue a small selection of offices I am interested in with top notch applications.
But let's face it, every posted job that even looks like it will at a minimum offer me an ok salary and consistent work I am going to send an application to ASAP and already know that 300+ people just did the same thing. At one point I was sending out 10-20 applications a day to any office I could find listed even if they were not advertising for a job. Within a month I applied for over 100 jobs. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
Did the method work? No, but I did get several interviews. Given the discussions I had with a few receptionists they had received so many applications they didn't even make it through the whole stack. One office told me point blank they only advertised to see fair but really unless I was referred to them from someone they knew I wasn't even going to get an interview, let alone a job.
If anything I feel like what has worked best with me is to make sure the resume and cover letter do have a designed element to them but restrained enough to be professional. Really look into information design and type selection so that it is easy and clear to read but also shows you put a little effort into it.
Also I send a small .pdf with work samples regardless if the advertisement asks for it or not. This way the office can see right away and first hand what my skill set and design sensibilities are.
i think the advice is sound, and people should follow it. however, i think the frustration we all feel stems from the fact that, even if you had received 150 amazing applications, you still only had one position. there is always going to be some criteria that allows you to get to 10 "finalists." no amount of advice is going to change the fact that 149 people aren't going to get a job, no matter how good they are. maybe i've just grown cynical, but i suspect that the reason i don't have a job (in architecture) has to do with more than my inability to write a cover letter or my ugly resume. the problem is not a dearth of qualified or talented applicants, there just aren't any jobs. on the one hand, i wouldn't want anyone to ignore your advice. on the other, i have to question its utility if it wouldn't have changed anything about your scenario.
You don't need to write an entirely different cover letter. Just address it properly and add 1 or 2 lines that are job-specific. I had time to do this, and I was working a full time job and helping my (working) wife raise our twin one year olds. Applying to 300 jobs scattershot is not as helpful as picking the 30 that are actually a good match and making a more serious effort. Then again, I'm one of those "4-7 years experience" people who have an easier time of it, so maybe I should just shut my mouth.
^ also a 4-7 year experience person. Took 6 months to find a job which was only because I moved home and went to work for the office I worked for before grad. school. Job lasted 6 months and I've been unemployed since.
I usually do the 1-2 line method. Previous posts as well as other places make it seem like an entirely new process for each and that is what I was alluding to.
"Graphic design is on its way out. I mean you can do internet design but it has a steep learning curve when it comes to coding. Otherwise, the print world is dead unless you want to work for publications that pander to the lowest common denominator."
Nice. Now explain how this is different from from the majority of architectural work in the u.s.
i don't write a different cover letter everytime. what i have is a generic cover letter that covers the bases in terms of why i am writing them, what my strengths are, and why they should hire me. i change who it is addressed to everytime, and usually customize the introductory paragraph. this is usually pretty sufficient in my mind.
if you plan to look into exhibit design/engineering(cd's), you MUST have shop experience and know how to BUILD and CONSTRUCT projects. you have to understand different types of joints and methods of production and assembly. remember that these project have to be assembled/disassembled many times and shipped in crates. it's a bit more involved than doing cd's for an arch firm.
I am in the same boat as just about everyone here. I really appreciate the advice from archie. Most of it seems obvious but some of it is easy to overlook.
But I have to say that I really don't agree with Orochi's advice. If you are interested in Graphic design, get started! Like video games? Maybe the 'learning curve' isn't the issue. The best thing you can do if you can't do architecture is develop your skills. It doesn't take much to download Maya and poke around.
The worst advice I ever got was when I was 8 and someone told me there was no money in 'art' so it wasn't worth pursuing. The skills I would have at this point would have served me well in architecture or perhaps as an industrial designer or concept artist. So don't be discouraged by Orochi!
FWIW I know a few people in game design, and while a working knowledge of Maya et al is helpful, really what they're looking for is very strong drawing and (physical) modeling skills. For first person games there is a strong divide between character design and environmental design, and the latter has a further split between the layout (which has a lot to do with the physics of the game) and the finer aspects of the design, which is more about textures and prop design. So if you're strong in these areas, and know a lot about gaming, I'd go for it.
In the Midwest, I am not finding 300 students competing for the same available job, but rather something closer to 10:1 or maybe 20:1.
In light of this, if I were currently in my last year of Arch school, I would rise to this competitive challenge and make sure that everything about myself (whether it be the tightness of a portfolio, or precision of communication) were top-shelf. All it takes is for one mis-step to be discounted and forgotten.
I also find novice / amateur mistakes being made by hopeful students, and am in disbelief of the distance between their preliminary professionalism and their larger life goals. Distinctive design firms operate with a certain level of thoroughness and rigor that can be found in their visualizations, physical models, legibility of drawing sets, and even quality of formal correspondence to clients or consultants. Hopefully this thread can begin to connect the dots for some of you.
My best advice is to be relentless in all aspects of your schoolwork, have no regrets, and make sure that the design / communication materials you produce for yourselves enjoy a certain level of exactness so that others can forecast your future level of performance and regard for quality.
20:1? Wow! That's the best odds I have heard of finding a job in a long time. Where exactly are you referring to? Maybe it's time to pack the moving truck (again) and try my luck somewhere else.
we just got an application unsolicited that had fairly nice work but with such a poorly written cover letter (in e-mail format) that we decided to toss in the bin. Easy as that. For us it is a clear signal that the person is not focused and doesn't care what they are doing. So, even though the work itself is fine by the looks of the portfolio, it took us less than a minute to decide against the person.
Criteria are different for all offices and jobs, but quality of work (which includes your cover letter) is not generally a negotiable in this market.
in the last year we looked at probably a hundred cvs. we kept 3. i would love to hire one of those 3 right now because that person is ridiculously amazing. another just walked in door last week and we were impressed. nice work and letter actually made sense and it seemed like knew what we were about and what we were up to. that makes a big difference. generic letters we almost 100% chuck in the recycle bin.
I am an unemployed member of the intern masses. I graduated a little less than a year ago with a Masters of Architecture. I also hold a Bachelors of Architecture from Kent State University. Prior to attending Kent State I spent 4 years as a drafter for a small firm in Columbus, Ohio. I went the way of many of our historical heroes, and made sure this career was what I wanted. I could have stayed a drafter and probably still have a job today, but in those 4 years architecture became everything to me. I will never let a recession or an economic downturn keep me from becoming the architect that I have worked so hard to become. I have spent 12 years getting to this point. I am choosing to not become a part of a lost decade or generation.
I have a generic cover letter that changes a little with each application. I spent a great deal of time designing my resume as well as writing what I feel is a powerful cover letter. I have also designed a postcard that displays 12 images from my portfolio as well as an abbreviated version of my resume. It has not yielded me anything yet, but I know it will in due time.
To be honest, if you fell into this career field because you thought it would be cool or good for your social status, or if you chose it for some monetary purpose, please consider finding another career option. I, among many of my unemployed friends, bleed graphite and plotter ink, and we do not need you clogging up Inboxes and HR mailboxes.
I am keeping myself financially stable by working in a hotel. Something I never thought I would do, but I have learned a great deal about how the hospitality business works. It has also provided me with a continuous level of customer relations practice as well as what works and does not work in hotel architecture. I am working on a few competitions to keep the design juices flowing as well as reading many of the books that I never seemed to have time to read while I was in architecture school. I have my down days where I question everything, but I have more good days.
We will all get through this. Some of us may have to find other paths, but those who are passionate and stick with it will find our way into a firm or studio, and we will succeed. More than likely this won't be the last recession any of us will have to go through either. You are just more practiced now.
Customize the focus of BOTH the cover letter and resume. If the job posting is for model makers, don't include lots of details about doing CA last summer, focus on how amazing a model maker you are.
a shot gun approaches will always fail, it's your connections that will get you in the door. If you're in school, start collecting business cards from all the guest jurors and asking professors who they know at firms/recent graduates you'd love to work for. Try to meet some of these folks for coffee and ask them about their firm several months before you start applying for jobs.
Linkedin and facebook are good ways of finding folks.
Also if the advert doesn't include a name (and says 'no calls'), you can still call the receptionist and ask who to address the cover letter to.
there is a a series of archinect features describing the do's and don'ts of job searching...
Could not agree more with archie's recommendations to all the architectural job seekers out there. If you are sending out resumes, go back and re-read this post several times, print it out, paste it on your wall, memorize it.
I just waded through over 200 resumes which netted 6 interviews for two positions - the remainder were deleted after reading no more than the first one-and-a-half “sentences” of the cover letters. I've heard the same story repeated countless times by colleagues over the past few months.
The following is sadly typical of responses for a Project Architect position which requires significant and specific experience in high-end custom residential design:
Dear Employer,
My name is ----- and I am interested in the position of interior designer I am well suited for this position because I am organized, hard working and willing to go that extra mile. I ‘m Advance in AutoCAD 2010, 2009,2008,2007,2006,and knowledgeable in Microsoft office suites for Apple and Windows. I also know google sketch up pro7. I was captain of my high school basketball team that won 3 tittles and was also featured in a sports magazine as being one of the top basketball players in the country. I feel that if you want to achieve great things, you have to be a step above the crowd and have strong will to succeed. I am currently employed at ------ and looking to further my skills in the design field.
Thank you for taking the time to read my letter. I will follow up with you in two weeks.
Sincerely,
Others ponderously submit two page letters “To whom it may concern” with mesmerizing explanations of how 3 years experience working on water and waste treatment plants in Dubai and the Middle-East has prepared them to contribute “award-winning” American house designs to my firm - at least they astutely acknowledged the residential experience requirement.
I could go on but I am monitoring for the follow-up so I can talk ball sports.
Andreasv,
I feel your pain. It is very difficult to see others out of work. I especially feel for the newly graduated students who deserve a good start to their careers, but no jobs are available. I have a child who is a senior in college who will be in the same boat in a few months.
It was very difficult to make a decision between our top candidates. It hurt to write them letters telling them we hired someone else. It also hurts to see young people blow their chances at a job because they made a spelling error or some other "minor" thing. My point though, is that I am going to give the job to someone who goes the extra mile, and makes sure their submission is perfect. They are more likely to be the person who will go the extra mile when they work here too.
Good luck in your job search. Having been around for a zillion years, it WILL change, and in a few years, architecture firms will be fighting over you.
the other thing I'd add is get your face out there and meet people (AIA meetings, conferences, gallery openings, lectures, by chatting up the contractor who is doing work down your street, meet with your local neighborhood planning group) - make a calling card you can hand to people who either are someone or know someone...
when I moved to a new city many years ago, I would attend all of the lectures at the local universities. I got several interviews out of just striking up conversations with people.
__|_|_ |',__|_, by lowest common denominator, I essentially mean rags that pander to a few key demographics.
Mostly publications that are making money are geared toward a much older crowd who "reads." Like the crowd who probably has seen Billie Holiday live in concert.
Not out version of reading-- which is chugging down some Joose, listening to Crystal Castles and going through 200 blog, twitter and facebook updates.
There's various extremes that do incredibly well. But the only real parallel between architecture and publishing is that architecture is like the fashion publication market.
And that is a market I would love to pander too. I, mean, I think the only ethical dilemma I have with the fashion world is the use of Palm Oil. But I would love to show up to work every day at Conde Nast in 5,000 plaid suit, work for three hours and spend the rest of the day terrifying the interns, assistants and clerks.
But the correlation that I am trying to draw here is that no one needs fashion... just like no one really needs architecture. Architecture is shallow and pedantic. So is fashion. That's what I think more architects need to accept is that they are the lipstick on the pig.
You cater to the wealthy and monied, you build temples to their wealth and you put up with that trashy noveau-riche tripe that most of them have. Architecture is so new money it makes me vomit. That should kind of be a warning to architects right there.
That there is still a market and a growing profit margin on bananas-price historic homes. Not just like 100 year old historic, but like centuries old homes. Might say something that someone would rather spend a 100 million dollars on a house infested with rats and no air conditioning rather than building something new.
So, just like publishing, there is a high-road and a low-road way of going about things. Maybe architects should look towards fashion in realizing that criticizing every newly rich joe around you and actually increase the attitude tenfold.
"Gurrllll, look at dat triflin' hoe... her va-jay-jay is munchin on her spanx, she got lipstick on her teeth and she lives in a home by Gropius."
"Gropius?!? Damn, bitch must be giving trouser trolley rides to any homeboy with a life insurance policy."
On thing that I think would be more helpful to both employers and job applicants would be for employers to be very specific about what they are looking for when they post ads to job boards. So often I see post on AIA job boards or even something like Careerbuilder or Monster that will only say:
'Architectural designer, 1-5 years experience, AutoCAD experience, degree required'
or
'Architectural CAD Tech, degree required'
or
'Architectural Intern, 3+ years experience'
Its pretty confusing for job applicants and it probably causes a lot of people to go into generic cover letter mode since they dont really have a clear idea of what the job is and what kind of skills the firm is looking for. I know some of the confusion is probably caused by the general vagueness of 'titles' in the arch profession, but when I see really generic ads like that it makes me think that the firm isnt really necessarily looking for an individual with specific skills or design aesthetic to ad to the firm-they just need a worker bee.
I also cant help but wonder if the firm is just casting a really big net and they hope/know that they will get applications from architects with the 5 years experience and masters degrees who are willing to work for the salary of a cad tech with 1 year of experience and an associates degree. Or they want a graduate architect with a professional degree that is almost licensed willing to work for the salary of a student thats still in school or recent grad with no IDP experience.
If firms are more clear that they are looking for they might find that they get more candidates that are qualified for that specific job and less generic mass email type applications. I know if I know more about a position I try to tweak my resume and cover letter to reflect what the employer is looking for and have a better idea of what an interview might be like and can go into it without feeling like I'm wasting my time or theirs. There are some things that you can learn from looking the firm up online and checking out their website, but the more technical stuff probably isnt going to be on a website that is mainly used as a marketing tool.
----
I wonder if some people who are actually hiring right now (or are expecting to soon) could answer a question that I have been worrying over the last year since I was laid off? When you are looking to hire how much do you care about whether they are currently employed at an architecture firm? If you have two people who both have a years worth of experience and similar
educational backgrounds, but one is currently working and the other is currently unemployed and has been for like 6 months, is that going to have a big impact on who you decide to interview and ultimately hire? What if they have a job but its not in architecture?
^ I'll second that. I also just love when the job advertisement only list the description and qualifications, but no office name. This is especially true on Craigslist but several firms have taken the 'anonymous' route here as well. As an applicant I'd like to be able to do a prescreening of my own and see what kind of work are you doing, what is your design sensibility, what kind of clients do you work with... at the very least where your office is located. I'd rather know these things before I waste both of our time showing up to an interview to find out that there is no way the two of us are going to work out.
We have been giving preference to local architects versus people from out of town: last two of the three we have hired in the last three months were local. The third person had very specific experience in a certain market that fit our needs, and moved here on one weeks notice.
We have also been giving preference to people who do not have a job. There are a lot of excellent skilled hires out there, and there is no need to "rock the boat" with another firm when you can find someone who is out of work. Two of the last three we hired were laid off, and one was just starting out with only summer experience.
I want to repeat & ask about something that morse code said above :
Also I send a small .pdf with work samples regardless if the advertisement asks for it or not. This way the office can see right away and first hand what my skill set and design sensibilities are.
I've wondered a lot about this -- it's my preferred M.O. as well, for the same exact reason, and also because I've preferred to see work samples immediately when I've been on the interviewing end.
HOWEVER, I have seen some job posts that say things like "please send resume and cover letter only to such-and-such email address..."
What to do in this case? Is this only out of fear that people will attempt to send entire portfolios? Does this mean I will get tossed in the bin if I send a page or two of samples (with reasonable file size)? Employers on this thread -- any thoughts?
manta - it precisely because people will send their whole portfolios. and that they'll forget to optimize it before sending. clogs up everything very quickly...
^ understandable. I always felt that as long as the file was under 5mb then it's ok. My packet is cover letter, resume and about 5 work samples that are 2 pages each.
OK ---- Archie has a point. When applying for a position you should show yourself at your best. But what about employers? What's good for the goose is good for the Gander. I invite readers of this forum to post preposterous employment ads. I snipped this gem from the NY State Labor Dept job service:
"Knowledge of the structure and content of a foreign (non-English) language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition and grammar, and pronunciation.
Knowledge of materials, methods, and the tools involved in the construction or repair of houses, buildings, or other structures such as highways and roads.
Knowledge of administrative and clerical procedures and systems such as word processing, managing files and records, stenography and transcription, designing forms, and other office procedures and terminology."
I am an architect, not a professor of Linguistics. I don't do highways and roads. Civil Engineers do. Stenography??????? My Gregg shorthand** is sadly deficient. Haven't you discovered voice recognition?
BTW, I don't make coffee for you or anybody else, either.
mike, that doesnt strike me as unreasonal. They say 'knowledge of' not 'expert in' and they say 'construction or repair of houses, buildings, or other structures such as highways and roads'
You can't be the liaison/communicator/generalist between specialist disciplines such as civil engineer, urban planning and cost estimator, without having a clue what each one's agenda and constraints are. In short, you can't do your job, you cant BE AN ARCHITECT, without having cursory knowledge of a wide range of specialist professions. I don't think the employer here is asking you to author dynamic moment calculations for highway overpasses, but they are asking you to be able to talk to the civil engineer intelligently. Is that too much?
JPL you have a point. I have worked with many of the major civil engineers. I understand what they do, but leave the details to them.
I think a more concise job description might have been "works with consulting engineers". After all, there's structural, MEP, acoustical, landscape, etc etc, not just civil. I wonder what this ad is getting at. Is it a residential subdivision developer? That might explain the combination of houses and roads. Or am I up a cul-de-sac?
What I dont like about the ad is that it's actually too general. It's almost as if it's trying to SEEM specific, without actually stating what the actual job description is. IE Having linguistic, critical writing, and representation skills, and being able to liaise with clients is kind of a general description of the archtect in any firm.
What they've posted is far different than:
''We need someone who can speak and write in French and can design cores for a high rise with a high amount of ADA issues.''
What that firm has written is just a recipe for inundation by job seekers sending out general application packs.
As an archinecter with extensive experience writing job ads, screening resumes and interviewing candidates, I can tell you that it doesn't seem to matter what we put in job ads ... whether we're very general or very specific, 90% of the inquiries we receive are not responsive to the words we use. Most candidates see an ad and send a resume, hoping they might get lucky.
I've gravitated to the position where I prepare a general job ad that outlines the basic job as we see it and then just review what comes in ... you may think this callous and a waste of your time, but having spent a tremendous amount of my own time in the past crafting very definitive job ads, those ads never seemed to make any difference whatsoever with respect to the number, or the quality, of the resumes we received.
At some point, I began to feel that conserving my own time was at least as important as conserving the time of the very few candidates who really might be discerning enough to respond only to ads for which they were qualified. Everybody else was going to submit a resume no matter what I wrote.
file-I am sure it is probably frustrating for you when you get hundreds of resumes where only a few are actually qualified candidates. I know I have been guilty of applying to ads for jobs I was not in any way qualified for, but I have also landed interviews, and once even a contract job offer, from some of those resumes. And, I have applied for jobs and gotten a polite email telling me I wasnt qualified for the job, but then gotten a call three or six months later from the firm because they were now looking for someone at my level and they remembered my resume/portfolio and wanted to see if I was still available.
Though, usually what happens is that I apply for jobs where I have every single one of the skills they asked for, and my experience matched what they were working on, and I never even got an email confirming that the firm received my resume. And, when I try to call or email the firm, if I even get to talk to someone, its not the person making the hiring decisions so they cant give me any information about the process and they dont have time to talk to me anyway.
Like I said before, I usually try to be really careful to tweak my resume/cover letter to fit what the firm is looking for, and if I am responding to an ad on an independent job site I always take the time to check out the firms website and look at the kind of work they do and talk about what they do and why I am interested in it in my cover letter, especially if it is for a job that I am probably not completely qualified for. But, a thoughtfully written cover letter doesnt help me much if no one bothers to read it-I seriously got an email back from a firm once saying that there had been so many replies to the ad that they had decided to only look at the the first resumes the received and were not even looking at the other ones, and I was not one of the first resumes (I applied for the job the same day the ad went up).
dot made a good point-both sides should try to be a little more considerate. Applicants should realize that the people making the hiring decisions are probably already over-worked and may just not have time to give each candidate, but firms should also try to take into consideration how much time and effort it takes to actually write personalized cover letters.
:)
A lot of people out there are too quick to criticize your resume and cover letter. Opinions are like *****,everybody has one and they all... Show your resume to 20 people and all those 20 people will say something different about what is wrong with it and will give you "tips" on how to improve it. If it takes more than a day to write your resume,I say you're trying too much! The font type you use,or how many spaces you leave between the lines won't affect your job success. Personally, I use the KISS method when it comes to my resume: Keep it simple stupid. The reality is some employers out there don't have the capacity to understand your eloquent sentences.The only purpose of a resume is to get you the interview and an average employer won't look at it for more than 10 seconds.
Don't you know 97% of the companies in the United States are consisted of small to mid-size firms which have somewhere between 5-100 employees and most of those 97% of those companies are managed by professionals but these professionals are not professional hirerers. Most of them have almost no clue on how to read resumes,how to interview or how to hire! They are not professional resume readers,they are there to get clients,manage projects and bring in revenue that's it. Most of them are highly unrealistic, highly ignorant and grossly disorganized. You know 8 software packages,can operate windows,mac,linux and the fancy pants in the office doesn't even know how to use the photocopy machine.Please raise your hands if you think you are more intelligent and more skilled than your boss.Yet he/she is the one in charge and not you.
Now let's look at the hiring realities.This is my favorite part. :)
Do you really think that people get hired because they had the best skills and knowledge? Well think again. I told you that most employers out there are not professional hirerers.The most qualified candidate is not always the one who gets hired.So what affects the hiring decisions? Here are some of them:
-They were of a minority and the employer though there were too many white people in the office so hiring a minority would help them reach a broader audience.
-They were tall and the employer thought tall people would be more confident and handle people better.
-They were short and the employer thought short people would try harder to prove themselves.
-They were ugly females so that the males in the workplace wouldn't get distracted.
-They were pretty females so that they would look better in the clients' eyes.
-They were old so the employer thought they would be more dependable and knowledgeable.
-They were young so the employer thought they would have more energy.
Don't laugh,this is the reality.Also add the boardroom politics to those hiring factors please.
In the past 4 months I went to 2 interviews.One of them was an architect who did high-end residential work.He was looking for a drafter who could work 10 hours a week. He also had lots of freelancers working for him because his office space was so tiny there wasn't even enough room to put a second computer. After the interview he told me he liked my qualifications and that he had a couple(not dozens) of other people he was going to interview. I drove 40 minutes for the interview.Next day I sent him a thank you note. He never called back.
The other employer was a lighting designer.I responded to her ad on Craigslist and after 3 weeks of following up(because she was busy) I finally arranged an interview. She was looking for a person with nice follow up and sales skills.I traveled 40 miles to talk to her. I wasn't nervous and had a nice interview. She told me she would call me next week. The next day I sent her a thank you note and re-emphasized my background and skills and explained why the job was be suitable for me. It's been 3 weeks and I've heard nothing from her.She was looking for a person with good follow up skills because apparently she lacks those skills.
I'm officially done with responding to advertised ads. Too many applicants,too much competition. My new plan: Cold calling! There are too many people looking for work and 95.6% of them are answering advertised jobs. I believe the advertised positions only make up the half of the potential openings out there and the other half is filled via word out mouth,networking and internal candidates.
I honestly don't know where to start and who to call because I'm not planning to go after architecture or construction firms because I think it is too risky. Let's say I got a job at an architecture firm but they get like 1-2 projects and hire lots of people then the projects run dry and they let everybody go and I as a student and most inexperienced person am the first one to get the pink slip.
I'll have my 4 year Bachelor of Science in Architectural Technology in December.I did a stupid thing by not raising my GPA to go for the 5 year but what's done is done and can't be reversed..I neither have the financial means nor the time to go to a graduate school for architecture. I feel my chances are slim to none when it comes to getting an architectural position because now we have all these people with 5 year degrees plus masters degrees. I feel I'll jump the ship this early to switch to another field,probably a design field such as product design/industrial design or whatever because I'm passionate about design and I still have those silly desire to improve human living by design products but I can't keep up with the educational demands of the industry. The education of an architect is a very expensive one which tells me only people with money should pursue architecture. If I had the chance to go to a graduate school for a degree I'd definitely choose business/marketing but I'll try to educate myself in that area by reading and probably attending seminars and talking to people.
I said I was going to do cold calling.I'll go to Yellow Pages and start finding businesses where I can utilize my skills.If you have any ideas on what kind of businesses I should go after(including sales related positions) please advise.
Also take time to think about this: One of the reasons you chose architecture was because you wanted to be self-employed and open your own business at some point.I mean that's why I chose it and what happens when you have your own business? You find leads and go after clients.You network to reach more people to bring projects so think of your job search as the same. You're going after potential clients who, in this case are employers. Where do you start? How do you reach them? Make a plan and a strategy.
Now I have to go study for my restaurant exam.I got a job as a waitress,it is only part-time though so I'm looking forward to graduating so that I can work 60 hours a week to make ends meet.
Good luck to us all.
I don't personally get very excited over the topic of "personalized cover letters" ... I"m mostly interested in the resume and any sort of portfolio materials being provided. Whatever transmittal document accompanies the resume and images is valuable to me only to the extent it does - or does not - convey the ability to write decent prose, accomplish appropriate punctuation and use spellcheck. I rarely see a customized cover letter that doesn't seem highly contrived - usually they're pretty silly.
What I really despise is receiving an e-mail addressed to me, and every other firm in town with a 10 word cryptic note asking me to review a resume and set up an interview.
For the record, I still respond to every single resume I receive -- usually the day it arrives and always within a week. And, we haven't hired anybody here at our firm since August 2008.
What disappoints me most on this and several other recent employment-related archinect discussions is the strident stupidity. Yes, it really sucks out there and I believe that the profession is going to bump along at about 60% employment levels beyond the foreseeable future. That means if you are serious about seeking architectural employment in what is the most competitive environment in 30 years, you need to stand out like a shiny nickel in the barnyard. But, whenever experienced and sincere resume advice is offered, particularly from an employer, it is generally met with brilliant cynicism. So if you really have a secret wish to sell fries with that, don't adjust, stay bitter and cynical, and keep sending out those irrelevant resumes - it a great time saver to just click delete.
it's been awhile since i've had the need to look for a job, but i've always had good success writing personalized cover letters. my approach was a simple three points:
1-offer a compliment to the firm you are applying to about something that you sincerely like about them (& if you can't find anything that you like then don't bother applying)
2-highlight something about yourself or your experience that would appear to complement the firm (especially good if it dovetails with point #1 above)
3-suggest that you meet to discuss further opportunities and that in the meantime your resume just so happens to be attached for their review.
keep it succinct, less is more. and once you get the hang of it, you can write several of these very quickly.
"dot made a good point - both sides should try to be a little more considerate."
As fair warning, I suppose my comments below may be seen by some as falling into the "what goes round, comes round" category.
Memories tend to be very short in this profession. As recently as the spring of 2008, there still was a fairly severe shortage of architectural labor in some areas of the country. While some cracks clearly were starting to appear in the economy, most firms were busy, most wages were high and most people didn't move from one firm to another without there being some serious economic motivation.
During the mid-2006 through mid-2008 period, there was an arrogance evident in many of the candidates who presented credentials to our office -- a frequent demeanor that clearly gave off a "take it or leave it" signal. For the most part, our firm let those people move on to the next opportunity. In 1 or 2 cases we did make the hire after strenuous negotiations, but those folks were gone during the first round of staff reductions in 2008 because their value came nowhere near their cost.
While I still approach all candidates with respect and courtesy, given the strains and abuses that took place during that period, it's not at all surprising to me that perhaps some employers today simply aren't willing to suck up to the labor pool as much as they once did -- they simply don't need to in this labor market.
Time to face facts
With so many of us out of work, and about 300 applicants/job that translates into 1/300 or .003 chance of anyone getting hired. Firms only hire the top 003%. Many are just not at this level for numerous reasons: pehaps then some of us should be asking the hard questions, set pride aside and do some serious questioning - maybe, just maybe, some of us should find something else to do.
when i first read this...i had a powerful urge to go to Lincoln College for some reason.
anyway...pretty lame to tell someone to give up on architecture.
yes please increase my chances.
If people really want to stay in architecture it may be necessary for some of us to redevelop/reinvent ourselves, go back to school - but do what it takes - make no excuses and engage in a forceful self improvement program to be what it takes or face long term or permanent exclusion from architecture. After a year of unemployment I need to consider going back to school.
i've heard a lot of "yeah, we've gotten 250 applicants, you were one of 10 we chose to talk to." i've heard that at least three times. a 10% chance still isn't exactly great odds. i've received a lot of compliments on my app's, so i'm doing something right.
Greendale Community College anyone? Go human beings!
alright this is flawed logic
1/300 for a job doesn't mean the same top .003 % of architects would be the person the firm wants to hire.
out of work does not equal no architectural future. esp. the people just out of college... with most firms only hiring people with several years experience it's impossible these days.
but i do agree..
if you're not very good at architecture because you just kind of settled for it then of course you should be rethinking your path
if you love architecture then you're spending all this free time to enter competitions you wouldn't have time to do with a 60 hour work week.
don't panic people.
ugh also it's .3% why did i repeat that.
has anyone heard of anyone having luck finding jobs in related fields like graphic design, industrial design, set design, or video game design?
Graphic design is on its way out. I mean you can do internet design but it has a steep learning curve when it comes to coding. Otherwise, the print world is dead unless you want to work for publications that pander to the lowest common denominator.
ID is pretty tight these days. With retailers trimming stock from their shelves and purchasing being rather low, it will be a while before companies start punching out new products.
That being said, job opportunities in ID are geographically limited and to get a career off the ground... you need visibility from competitions, press and having a school around certain doesn't hurt.
Set Design has had a trend of being thinned because of CG over the years anyways in the movie world.
I honestly don't know the overall financial health of the theatre world but several sources suggest that had been struggling financially for years and the current recession isn't helping at all.
That being said, I'd imagine set design isn't really something you can get into without a lack of visibility.
Video game design is doing great. But I'd imagine like web-based graphic design has a very steep curve to it.
With all that being said, I have found really good success right now in helping investors and business types draft proposals.
The government is pressuring creditors and investors to seriously consider opening up the doors to entrepreneurs. And local governments are hungry to get just about anything going.
A lot of business proposals lack a lot of "oomphf!" and it seems natural that people with graphic, architectural and planning skills can make some scratch adding to and shaping business proposals.
Business consultants, while very knowledgeable, don't know the all the intricacies when it comes to the physical construct of a business.
If your out of work you should not pursue a masters degree in architecture if your serious about working for yourself. Your dollars would be best spent in a business school program. Cause in Architecture School they don't teach yahoo about business.
I just waded through 150 job applications for an intern architect position. I immediately tossed about 100 of them. Then I carefully reviewed 50 and called 30 and narrowed it down to 10. I cannot tell you how many stupid mistakes college educated people make with resumes. Honestly, if they just took a little care, their resumes would have been one of the 10 I interviewed. So how do you make your resume rise to the top:
If the person asks for a cover letter and a resume, actually send a cover letter and resume. A one line email does not count as a cover letter. I want to see if you can write a basic letter and find out a little bit more about why you want the position: that is why I request a cover letter. If the ad says "no phone calls" don't call and leave me a voice mail telling me you want to find out more about the position before you bother to submit a resume.
Seriously, check for typos. And if you are editing a letter that you sent before, remember to change the name to MY name, and my company name.
Out of the 150 resume, only about 15 indicated they had done basic research on my company, like google it or look at the web page. That gave them an advantage. I want someone who is inquisitive and will take the first step.
No offense, but at this point in the economy, the goal of an intern with no or little experience should be to get a paying job that will give them experience. Don't go on and on about wanting a job that will offer you opportunities to work on exciting cutting edge projects while appreciating your skill and challenge your creativity. At this point in your career, you need to be a little humble. A job that gives you experience in return for your hard work would be good.
Remember to bring your portfolio to the interview. (Yes, one of the top 10 actually forgot to bring anything! He had a jump drive, and I had to look at his portfolio on an office laptop. It was a short interview. )
Think carefully about the work you bring to show. Bring your BEST design work. Bring samples of anything you did during a summer job. Bring technical drawings. Bring things that show me your breadth of skills. One person told me in the interview that as a senior project, his school required they completely document a project with pretty much a full set of construction documents, and it was one of the things he was most proud of. When I asked why he did not bring it to the interview, he looked stunned.
Resumes tend to start to look very much the same. The cover letter can be your best "sell". Tell me why you want the job, what makes you unique, etc.
Actually carefully read the ad for the job, and tailor your resume and letter to that ad. If I say that I want someone who is organized and detail oriented, be prepared to give me an example of something that shows you are indeed detail oriented. And organize your portfolio.
Practice answering interview questions. Sometimes the answers I get are kind of funny, but you can take honesty too far. If I ask you how your friends would describe you, don't say "They think I'm lazy, but are impressed that I can stay up all night to get things done at the last minute. "
I might call you about your resume and for a short interview before I bring you in for a longer interview. Your cell phone message should not say something like "hey, I'm probably asleep. Don't bother me before 2 PM."
Your email address should not be something cute like "partygirl12@...."
During an interview, you will most likely be asked if you have any questions for the interviewer. Prepare a few professional questions about the firm. Do not ask about benefits or salary yet. They will tell you if they are interested in you. Two of the sillier questions I have heard are "How old are you?" and "Would it hurt my chances of getting the job if I shaved my head?" Although, believe it or not, I hired both of those people- they were both students who were applying for part time work and at least they made me laugh.
Thank you, archie. I just successfully switched jobs in the middle of the recession and I'm only now realizing that I did many of the things you list by complete accident. After talking to both my current and previous employer about their current resume nightmares I might add-
IMO the best advice above is about including information about the firm in their cover letter. Take a look at their work. Are there any projects that remind you of something you did in school? How does their apparent design ethos and methodology compare to yours?
Many firms start by weeding out the ugly cover letters and resumes - a little time spent in design can't hurt. Including your cover letter as part of an emailed resume pdf in addition to the email itself is a good idea. The best way to get attention is to have your letter, resume, and portfolio look professional at first glance, and have interesting content upon further examination.
The purpose of a job application portfolio is to show your work clearly and concisely. Don't go so out of the box with your portfolio that the interviewer can't really see the work, or it is hard to talk about the work in an interview. It's a good idea to edit your portfolio down to a few pages of your best work to email and bring to the interview, and then have a second, fuller document to reference if they ask more specific question. Full drawing sets in some interviews can be a trump card.
If the employer doesn't ask you not to call, by all means follow up. Once.
Be honest and noncombative in your interview. Treat the interviewer like a colleague, not an interrogator.
The statute of limitations on sending a new portfolio is probably like 3-4 months. Not weeks. I've gotten calls a half year later for stuff I've submitted.
Be honest in an interview with your wage expectations. You might get lucky. If you need the job say add that you are flexible. Asking for a living wage will not get you dismissed out of hand, and you don't want to start a job bitter.
Here is my beef with the "write a different cover letter for every job you apply for" advice. Honestly who has time to do that? It would be one thing if there were more jobs than available employees and I could actively pursue a small selection of offices I am interested in with top notch applications.
But let's face it, every posted job that even looks like it will at a minimum offer me an ok salary and consistent work I am going to send an application to ASAP and already know that 300+ people just did the same thing. At one point I was sending out 10-20 applications a day to any office I could find listed even if they were not advertising for a job. Within a month I applied for over 100 jobs. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
Did the method work? No, but I did get several interviews. Given the discussions I had with a few receptionists they had received so many applications they didn't even make it through the whole stack. One office told me point blank they only advertised to see fair but really unless I was referred to them from someone they knew I wasn't even going to get an interview, let alone a job.
If anything I feel like what has worked best with me is to make sure the resume and cover letter do have a designed element to them but restrained enough to be professional. Really look into information design and type selection so that it is easy and clear to read but also shows you put a little effort into it.
Also I send a small .pdf with work samples regardless if the advertisement asks for it or not. This way the office can see right away and first hand what my skill set and design sensibilities are.
to archie:
i think the advice is sound, and people should follow it. however, i think the frustration we all feel stems from the fact that, even if you had received 150 amazing applications, you still only had one position. there is always going to be some criteria that allows you to get to 10 "finalists." no amount of advice is going to change the fact that 149 people aren't going to get a job, no matter how good they are. maybe i've just grown cynical, but i suspect that the reason i don't have a job (in architecture) has to do with more than my inability to write a cover letter or my ugly resume. the problem is not a dearth of qualified or talented applicants, there just aren't any jobs. on the one hand, i wouldn't want anyone to ignore your advice. on the other, i have to question its utility if it wouldn't have changed anything about your scenario.
You don't need to write an entirely different cover letter. Just address it properly and add 1 or 2 lines that are job-specific. I had time to do this, and I was working a full time job and helping my (working) wife raise our twin one year olds. Applying to 300 jobs scattershot is not as helpful as picking the 30 that are actually a good match and making a more serious effort. Then again, I'm one of those "4-7 years experience" people who have an easier time of it, so maybe I should just shut my mouth.
^ also a 4-7 year experience person. Took 6 months to find a job which was only because I moved home and went to work for the office I worked for before grad. school. Job lasted 6 months and I've been unemployed since.
I usually do the 1-2 line method. Previous posts as well as other places make it seem like an entirely new process for each and that is what I was alluding to.
"Graphic design is on its way out. I mean you can do internet design but it has a steep learning curve when it comes to coding. Otherwise, the print world is dead unless you want to work for publications that pander to the lowest common denominator."
Nice. Now explain how this is different from from the majority of architectural work in the u.s.
i don't write a different cover letter everytime. what i have is a generic cover letter that covers the bases in terms of why i am writing them, what my strengths are, and why they should hire me. i change who it is addressed to everytime, and usually customize the introductory paragraph. this is usually pretty sufficient in my mind.
if you plan to look into exhibit design/engineering(cd's), you MUST have shop experience and know how to BUILD and CONSTRUCT projects. you have to understand different types of joints and methods of production and assembly. remember that these project have to be assembled/disassembled many times and shipped in crates. it's a bit more involved than doing cd's for an arch firm.
I am in the same boat as just about everyone here. I really appreciate the advice from archie. Most of it seems obvious but some of it is easy to overlook.
But I have to say that I really don't agree with Orochi's advice. If you are interested in Graphic design, get started! Like video games? Maybe the 'learning curve' isn't the issue. The best thing you can do if you can't do architecture is develop your skills. It doesn't take much to download Maya and poke around.
The worst advice I ever got was when I was 8 and someone told me there was no money in 'art' so it wasn't worth pursuing. The skills I would have at this point would have served me well in architecture or perhaps as an industrial designer or concept artist. So don't be discouraged by Orochi!
FWIW I know a few people in game design, and while a working knowledge of Maya et al is helpful, really what they're looking for is very strong drawing and (physical) modeling skills. For first person games there is a strong divide between character design and environmental design, and the latter has a further split between the layout (which has a lot to do with the physics of the game) and the finer aspects of the design, which is more about textures and prop design. So if you're strong in these areas, and know a lot about gaming, I'd go for it.
This is an excellent thread!
In the Midwest, I am not finding 300 students competing for the same available job, but rather something closer to 10:1 or maybe 20:1.
In light of this, if I were currently in my last year of Arch school, I would rise to this competitive challenge and make sure that everything about myself (whether it be the tightness of a portfolio, or precision of communication) were top-shelf. All it takes is for one mis-step to be discounted and forgotten.
I also find novice / amateur mistakes being made by hopeful students, and am in disbelief of the distance between their preliminary professionalism and their larger life goals. Distinctive design firms operate with a certain level of thoroughness and rigor that can be found in their visualizations, physical models, legibility of drawing sets, and even quality of formal correspondence to clients or consultants. Hopefully this thread can begin to connect the dots for some of you.
My best advice is to be relentless in all aspects of your schoolwork, have no regrets, and make sure that the design / communication materials you produce for yourselves enjoy a certain level of exactness so that others can forecast your future level of performance and regard for quality.
Let's keep this going...
20:1? Wow! That's the best odds I have heard of finding a job in a long time. Where exactly are you referring to? Maybe it's time to pack the moving truck (again) and try my luck somewhere else.
what archie says makes sense to me.
we just got an application unsolicited that had fairly nice work but with such a poorly written cover letter (in e-mail format) that we decided to toss in the bin. Easy as that. For us it is a clear signal that the person is not focused and doesn't care what they are doing. So, even though the work itself is fine by the looks of the portfolio, it took us less than a minute to decide against the person.
Criteria are different for all offices and jobs, but quality of work (which includes your cover letter) is not generally a negotiable in this market.
in the last year we looked at probably a hundred cvs. we kept 3. i would love to hire one of those 3 right now because that person is ridiculously amazing. another just walked in door last week and we were impressed. nice work and letter actually made sense and it seemed like knew what we were about and what we were up to. that makes a big difference. generic letters we almost 100% chuck in the recycle bin.
I am an unemployed member of the intern masses. I graduated a little less than a year ago with a Masters of Architecture. I also hold a Bachelors of Architecture from Kent State University. Prior to attending Kent State I spent 4 years as a drafter for a small firm in Columbus, Ohio. I went the way of many of our historical heroes, and made sure this career was what I wanted. I could have stayed a drafter and probably still have a job today, but in those 4 years architecture became everything to me. I will never let a recession or an economic downturn keep me from becoming the architect that I have worked so hard to become. I have spent 12 years getting to this point. I am choosing to not become a part of a lost decade or generation.
I have a generic cover letter that changes a little with each application. I spent a great deal of time designing my resume as well as writing what I feel is a powerful cover letter. I have also designed a postcard that displays 12 images from my portfolio as well as an abbreviated version of my resume. It has not yielded me anything yet, but I know it will in due time.
To be honest, if you fell into this career field because you thought it would be cool or good for your social status, or if you chose it for some monetary purpose, please consider finding another career option. I, among many of my unemployed friends, bleed graphite and plotter ink, and we do not need you clogging up Inboxes and HR mailboxes.
I am keeping myself financially stable by working in a hotel. Something I never thought I would do, but I have learned a great deal about how the hospitality business works. It has also provided me with a continuous level of customer relations practice as well as what works and does not work in hotel architecture. I am working on a few competitions to keep the design juices flowing as well as reading many of the books that I never seemed to have time to read while I was in architecture school. I have my down days where I question everything, but I have more good days.
We will all get through this. Some of us may have to find other paths, but those who are passionate and stick with it will find our way into a firm or studio, and we will succeed. More than likely this won't be the last recession any of us will have to go through either. You are just more practiced now.
Customize the focus of BOTH the cover letter and resume. If the job posting is for model makers, don't include lots of details about doing CA last summer, focus on how amazing a model maker you are.
a shot gun approaches will always fail, it's your connections that will get you in the door. If you're in school, start collecting business cards from all the guest jurors and asking professors who they know at firms/recent graduates you'd love to work for. Try to meet some of these folks for coffee and ask them about their firm several months before you start applying for jobs.
Linkedin and facebook are good ways of finding folks.
Also if the advert doesn't include a name (and says 'no calls'), you can still call the receptionist and ask who to address the cover letter to.
there is a a series of archinect features describing the do's and don'ts of job searching...
Could not agree more with archie's recommendations to all the architectural job seekers out there. If you are sending out resumes, go back and re-read this post several times, print it out, paste it on your wall, memorize it.
I just waded through over 200 resumes which netted 6 interviews for two positions - the remainder were deleted after reading no more than the first one-and-a-half “sentences” of the cover letters. I've heard the same story repeated countless times by colleagues over the past few months.
The following is sadly typical of responses for a Project Architect position which requires significant and specific experience in high-end custom residential design:
Dear Employer,
My name is ----- and I am interested in the position of interior designer I am well suited for this position because I am organized, hard working and willing to go that extra mile. I ‘m Advance in AutoCAD 2010, 2009,2008,2007,2006,and knowledgeable in Microsoft office suites for Apple and Windows. I also know google sketch up pro7. I was captain of my high school basketball team that won 3 tittles and was also featured in a sports magazine as being one of the top basketball players in the country. I feel that if you want to achieve great things, you have to be a step above the crowd and have strong will to succeed. I am currently employed at ------ and looking to further my skills in the design field.
Thank you for taking the time to read my letter. I will follow up with you in two weeks.
Sincerely,
Others ponderously submit two page letters “To whom it may concern” with mesmerizing explanations of how 3 years experience working on water and waste treatment plants in Dubai and the Middle-East has prepared them to contribute “award-winning” American house designs to my firm - at least they astutely acknowledged the residential experience requirement.
I could go on but I am monitoring for the follow-up so I can talk ball sports.
Andreasv,
I feel your pain. It is very difficult to see others out of work. I especially feel for the newly graduated students who deserve a good start to their careers, but no jobs are available. I have a child who is a senior in college who will be in the same boat in a few months.
It was very difficult to make a decision between our top candidates. It hurt to write them letters telling them we hired someone else. It also hurts to see young people blow their chances at a job because they made a spelling error or some other "minor" thing. My point though, is that I am going to give the job to someone who goes the extra mile, and makes sure their submission is perfect. They are more likely to be the person who will go the extra mile when they work here too.
Good luck in your job search. Having been around for a zillion years, it WILL change, and in a few years, architecture firms will be fighting over you.
the other thing I'd add is get your face out there and meet people (AIA meetings, conferences, gallery openings, lectures, by chatting up the contractor who is doing work down your street, meet with your local neighborhood planning group) - make a calling card you can hand to people who either are someone or know someone...
when I moved to a new city many years ago, I would attend all of the lectures at the local universities. I got several interviews out of just striking up conversations with people.
__|_|_ |',__|_, by lowest common denominator, I essentially mean rags that pander to a few key demographics.
Mostly publications that are making money are geared toward a much older crowd who "reads." Like the crowd who probably has seen Billie Holiday live in concert.
Not out version of reading-- which is chugging down some Joose, listening to Crystal Castles and going through 200 blog, twitter and facebook updates.
There's various extremes that do incredibly well. But the only real parallel between architecture and publishing is that architecture is like the fashion publication market.
And that is a market I would love to pander too. I, mean, I think the only ethical dilemma I have with the fashion world is the use of Palm Oil. But I would love to show up to work every day at Conde Nast in 5,000 plaid suit, work for three hours and spend the rest of the day terrifying the interns, assistants and clerks.
But the correlation that I am trying to draw here is that no one needs fashion... just like no one really needs architecture. Architecture is shallow and pedantic. So is fashion. That's what I think more architects need to accept is that they are the lipstick on the pig.
You cater to the wealthy and monied, you build temples to their wealth and you put up with that trashy noveau-riche tripe that most of them have. Architecture is so new money it makes me vomit. That should kind of be a warning to architects right there.
That there is still a market and a growing profit margin on bananas-price historic homes. Not just like 100 year old historic, but like centuries old homes. Might say something that someone would rather spend a 100 million dollars on a house infested with rats and no air conditioning rather than building something new.
So, just like publishing, there is a high-road and a low-road way of going about things. Maybe architects should look towards fashion in realizing that criticizing every newly rich joe around you and actually increase the attitude tenfold.
"Gurrllll, look at dat triflin' hoe... her va-jay-jay is munchin on her spanx, she got lipstick on her teeth and she lives in a home by Gropius."
"Gropius?!? Damn, bitch must be giving trouser trolley rides to any homeboy with a life insurance policy."
This shit is bananas, b-a-n-a-n-a-s!!!!
I think I only continue to read/respond to archinect because of Orochi.
On thing that I think would be more helpful to both employers and job applicants would be for employers to be very specific about what they are looking for when they post ads to job boards. So often I see post on AIA job boards or even something like Careerbuilder or Monster that will only say:
'Architectural designer, 1-5 years experience, AutoCAD experience, degree required'
or
'Architectural CAD Tech, degree required'
or
'Architectural Intern, 3+ years experience'
Its pretty confusing for job applicants and it probably causes a lot of people to go into generic cover letter mode since they dont really have a clear idea of what the job is and what kind of skills the firm is looking for. I know some of the confusion is probably caused by the general vagueness of 'titles' in the arch profession, but when I see really generic ads like that it makes me think that the firm isnt really necessarily looking for an individual with specific skills or design aesthetic to ad to the firm-they just need a worker bee.
I also cant help but wonder if the firm is just casting a really big net and they hope/know that they will get applications from architects with the 5 years experience and masters degrees who are willing to work for the salary of a cad tech with 1 year of experience and an associates degree. Or they want a graduate architect with a professional degree that is almost licensed willing to work for the salary of a student thats still in school or recent grad with no IDP experience.
If firms are more clear that they are looking for they might find that they get more candidates that are qualified for that specific job and less generic mass email type applications. I know if I know more about a position I try to tweak my resume and cover letter to reflect what the employer is looking for and have a better idea of what an interview might be like and can go into it without feeling like I'm wasting my time or theirs. There are some things that you can learn from looking the firm up online and checking out their website, but the more technical stuff probably isnt going to be on a website that is mainly used as a marketing tool.
----
I wonder if some people who are actually hiring right now (or are expecting to soon) could answer a question that I have been worrying over the last year since I was laid off? When you are looking to hire how much do you care about whether they are currently employed at an architecture firm? If you have two people who both have a years worth of experience and similar
educational backgrounds, but one is currently working and the other is currently unemployed and has been for like 6 months, is that going to have a big impact on who you decide to interview and ultimately hire? What if they have a job but its not in architecture?
^ I'll second that. I also just love when the job advertisement only list the description and qualifications, but no office name. This is especially true on Craigslist but several firms have taken the 'anonymous' route here as well. As an applicant I'd like to be able to do a prescreening of my own and see what kind of work are you doing, what is your design sensibility, what kind of clients do you work with... at the very least where your office is located. I'd rather know these things before I waste both of our time showing up to an interview to find out that there is no way the two of us are going to work out.
We have been giving preference to local architects versus people from out of town: last two of the three we have hired in the last three months were local. The third person had very specific experience in a certain market that fit our needs, and moved here on one weeks notice.
We have also been giving preference to people who do not have a job. There are a lot of excellent skilled hires out there, and there is no need to "rock the boat" with another firm when you can find someone who is out of work. Two of the last three we hired were laid off, and one was just starting out with only summer experience.
Orochi,
Thanks.
I make a drunken off the cuff post and I get . . . your response.
Cheers!
I want to repeat & ask about something that morse code said above :
Also I send a small .pdf with work samples regardless if the advertisement asks for it or not. This way the office can see right away and first hand what my skill set and design sensibilities are.
I've wondered a lot about this -- it's my preferred M.O. as well, for the same exact reason, and also because I've preferred to see work samples immediately when I've been on the interviewing end.
HOWEVER, I have seen some job posts that say things like "please send resume and cover letter only to such-and-such email address..."
What to do in this case? Is this only out of fear that people will attempt to send entire portfolios? Does this mean I will get tossed in the bin if I send a page or two of samples (with reasonable file size)? Employers on this thread -- any thoughts?
manta - it precisely because people will send their whole portfolios. and that they'll forget to optimize it before sending. clogs up everything very quickly...
^ understandable. I always felt that as long as the file was under 5mb then it's ok. My packet is cover letter, resume and about 5 work samples that are 2 pages each.
i'll just say during a recession, both sides should show more etiquette and be more understanding.
OK ---- Archie has a point. When applying for a position you should show yourself at your best. But what about employers? What's good for the goose is good for the Gander. I invite readers of this forum to post preposterous employment ads. I snipped this gem from the NY State Labor Dept job service:
"Knowledge of the structure and content of a foreign (non-English) language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition and grammar, and pronunciation.
Knowledge of materials, methods, and the tools involved in the construction or repair of houses, buildings, or other structures such as highways and roads.
Knowledge of administrative and clerical procedures and systems such as word processing, managing files and records, stenography and transcription, designing forms, and other office procedures and terminology."
I am an architect, not a professor of Linguistics. I don't do highways and roads. Civil Engineers do. Stenography??????? My Gregg shorthand** is sadly deficient. Haven't you discovered voice recognition?
BTW, I don't make coffee for you or anybody else, either.
** [f u cn rd ths u cn gt a gd jb]
mike, that doesnt strike me as unreasonal. They say 'knowledge of' not 'expert in' and they say 'construction or repair of houses, buildings, or other structures such as highways and roads'
You can't be the liaison/communicator/generalist between specialist disciplines such as civil engineer, urban planning and cost estimator, without having a clue what each one's agenda and constraints are. In short, you can't do your job, you cant BE AN ARCHITECT, without having cursory knowledge of a wide range of specialist professions. I don't think the employer here is asking you to author dynamic moment calculations for highway overpasses, but they are asking you to be able to talk to the civil engineer intelligently. Is that too much?
JPL you have a point. I have worked with many of the major civil engineers. I understand what they do, but leave the details to them.
I think a more concise job description might have been "works with consulting engineers". After all, there's structural, MEP, acoustical, landscape, etc etc, not just civil. I wonder what this ad is getting at. Is it a residential subdivision developer? That might explain the combination of houses and roads. Or am I up a cul-de-sac?
Yes, I totally agree on that point.
What I dont like about the ad is that it's actually too general. It's almost as if it's trying to SEEM specific, without actually stating what the actual job description is. IE Having linguistic, critical writing, and representation skills, and being able to liaise with clients is kind of a general description of the archtect in any firm.
What they've posted is far different than:
''We need someone who can speak and write in French and can design cores for a high rise with a high amount of ADA issues.''
What that firm has written is just a recipe for inundation by job seekers sending out general application packs.
As an archinecter with extensive experience writing job ads, screening resumes and interviewing candidates, I can tell you that it doesn't seem to matter what we put in job ads ... whether we're very general or very specific, 90% of the inquiries we receive are not responsive to the words we use. Most candidates see an ad and send a resume, hoping they might get lucky.
I've gravitated to the position where I prepare a general job ad that outlines the basic job as we see it and then just review what comes in ... you may think this callous and a waste of your time, but having spent a tremendous amount of my own time in the past crafting very definitive job ads, those ads never seemed to make any difference whatsoever with respect to the number, or the quality, of the resumes we received.
At some point, I began to feel that conserving my own time was at least as important as conserving the time of the very few candidates who really might be discerning enough to respond only to ads for which they were qualified. Everybody else was going to submit a resume no matter what I wrote.
file-I am sure it is probably frustrating for you when you get hundreds of resumes where only a few are actually qualified candidates. I know I have been guilty of applying to ads for jobs I was not in any way qualified for, but I have also landed interviews, and once even a contract job offer, from some of those resumes. And, I have applied for jobs and gotten a polite email telling me I wasnt qualified for the job, but then gotten a call three or six months later from the firm because they were now looking for someone at my level and they remembered my resume/portfolio and wanted to see if I was still available.
Though, usually what happens is that I apply for jobs where I have every single one of the skills they asked for, and my experience matched what they were working on, and I never even got an email confirming that the firm received my resume. And, when I try to call or email the firm, if I even get to talk to someone, its not the person making the hiring decisions so they cant give me any information about the process and they dont have time to talk to me anyway.
Like I said before, I usually try to be really careful to tweak my resume/cover letter to fit what the firm is looking for, and if I am responding to an ad on an independent job site I always take the time to check out the firms website and look at the kind of work they do and talk about what they do and why I am interested in it in my cover letter, especially if it is for a job that I am probably not completely qualified for. But, a thoughtfully written cover letter doesnt help me much if no one bothers to read it-I seriously got an email back from a firm once saying that there had been so many replies to the ad that they had decided to only look at the the first resumes the received and were not even looking at the other ones, and I was not one of the first resumes (I applied for the job the same day the ad went up).
dot made a good point-both sides should try to be a little more considerate. Applicants should realize that the people making the hiring decisions are probably already over-worked and may just not have time to give each candidate, but firms should also try to take into consideration how much time and effort it takes to actually write personalized cover letters.
:)
A lot of people out there are too quick to criticize your resume and cover letter. Opinions are like *****,everybody has one and they all... Show your resume to 20 people and all those 20 people will say something different about what is wrong with it and will give you "tips" on how to improve it. If it takes more than a day to write your resume,I say you're trying too much! The font type you use,or how many spaces you leave between the lines won't affect your job success. Personally, I use the KISS method when it comes to my resume: Keep it simple stupid. The reality is some employers out there don't have the capacity to understand your eloquent sentences.The only purpose of a resume is to get you the interview and an average employer won't look at it for more than 10 seconds.
Don't you know 97% of the companies in the United States are consisted of small to mid-size firms which have somewhere between 5-100 employees and most of those 97% of those companies are managed by professionals but these professionals are not professional hirerers. Most of them have almost no clue on how to read resumes,how to interview or how to hire! They are not professional resume readers,they are there to get clients,manage projects and bring in revenue that's it. Most of them are highly unrealistic, highly ignorant and grossly disorganized. You know 8 software packages,can operate windows,mac,linux and the fancy pants in the office doesn't even know how to use the photocopy machine.Please raise your hands if you think you are more intelligent and more skilled than your boss.Yet he/she is the one in charge and not you.
Now let's look at the hiring realities.This is my favorite part. :)
Do you really think that people get hired because they had the best skills and knowledge? Well think again. I told you that most employers out there are not professional hirerers.The most qualified candidate is not always the one who gets hired.So what affects the hiring decisions? Here are some of them:
-They were of a minority and the employer though there were too many white people in the office so hiring a minority would help them reach a broader audience.
-They were tall and the employer thought tall people would be more confident and handle people better.
-They were short and the employer thought short people would try harder to prove themselves.
-They were ugly females so that the males in the workplace wouldn't get distracted.
-They were pretty females so that they would look better in the clients' eyes.
-They were old so the employer thought they would be more dependable and knowledgeable.
-They were young so the employer thought they would have more energy.
Don't laugh,this is the reality.Also add the boardroom politics to those hiring factors please.
In the past 4 months I went to 2 interviews.One of them was an architect who did high-end residential work.He was looking for a drafter who could work 10 hours a week. He also had lots of freelancers working for him because his office space was so tiny there wasn't even enough room to put a second computer. After the interview he told me he liked my qualifications and that he had a couple(not dozens) of other people he was going to interview. I drove 40 minutes for the interview.Next day I sent him a thank you note. He never called back.
The other employer was a lighting designer.I responded to her ad on Craigslist and after 3 weeks of following up(because she was busy) I finally arranged an interview. She was looking for a person with nice follow up and sales skills.I traveled 40 miles to talk to her. I wasn't nervous and had a nice interview. She told me she would call me next week. The next day I sent her a thank you note and re-emphasized my background and skills and explained why the job was be suitable for me. It's been 3 weeks and I've heard nothing from her.She was looking for a person with good follow up skills because apparently she lacks those skills.
I'm officially done with responding to advertised ads. Too many applicants,too much competition. My new plan: Cold calling! There are too many people looking for work and 95.6% of them are answering advertised jobs. I believe the advertised positions only make up the half of the potential openings out there and the other half is filled via word out mouth,networking and internal candidates.
I honestly don't know where to start and who to call because I'm not planning to go after architecture or construction firms because I think it is too risky. Let's say I got a job at an architecture firm but they get like 1-2 projects and hire lots of people then the projects run dry and they let everybody go and I as a student and most inexperienced person am the first one to get the pink slip.
I'll have my 4 year Bachelor of Science in Architectural Technology in December.I did a stupid thing by not raising my GPA to go for the 5 year but what's done is done and can't be reversed..I neither have the financial means nor the time to go to a graduate school for architecture. I feel my chances are slim to none when it comes to getting an architectural position because now we have all these people with 5 year degrees plus masters degrees. I feel I'll jump the ship this early to switch to another field,probably a design field such as product design/industrial design or whatever because I'm passionate about design and I still have those silly desire to improve human living by design products but I can't keep up with the educational demands of the industry. The education of an architect is a very expensive one which tells me only people with money should pursue architecture. If I had the chance to go to a graduate school for a degree I'd definitely choose business/marketing but I'll try to educate myself in that area by reading and probably attending seminars and talking to people.
I said I was going to do cold calling.I'll go to Yellow Pages and start finding businesses where I can utilize my skills.If you have any ideas on what kind of businesses I should go after(including sales related positions) please advise.
Also take time to think about this: One of the reasons you chose architecture was because you wanted to be self-employed and open your own business at some point.I mean that's why I chose it and what happens when you have your own business? You find leads and go after clients.You network to reach more people to bring projects so think of your job search as the same. You're going after potential clients who, in this case are employers. Where do you start? How do you reach them? Make a plan and a strategy.
Now I have to go study for my restaurant exam.I got a job as a waitress,it is only part-time though so I'm looking forward to graduating so that I can work 60 hours a week to make ends meet.
Good luck to us all.
I don't personally get very excited over the topic of "personalized cover letters" ... I"m mostly interested in the resume and any sort of portfolio materials being provided. Whatever transmittal document accompanies the resume and images is valuable to me only to the extent it does - or does not - convey the ability to write decent prose, accomplish appropriate punctuation and use spellcheck. I rarely see a customized cover letter that doesn't seem highly contrived - usually they're pretty silly.
What I really despise is receiving an e-mail addressed to me, and every other firm in town with a 10 word cryptic note asking me to review a resume and set up an interview.
For the record, I still respond to every single resume I receive -- usually the day it arrives and always within a week. And, we haven't hired anybody here at our firm since August 2008.
What disappoints me most on this and several other recent employment-related archinect discussions is the strident stupidity. Yes, it really sucks out there and I believe that the profession is going to bump along at about 60% employment levels beyond the foreseeable future. That means if you are serious about seeking architectural employment in what is the most competitive environment in 30 years, you need to stand out like a shiny nickel in the barnyard. But, whenever experienced and sincere resume advice is offered, particularly from an employer, it is generally met with brilliant cynicism. So if you really have a secret wish to sell fries with that, don't adjust, stay bitter and cynical, and keep sending out those irrelevant resumes - it a great time saver to just click delete.
"strident stupidity"...word to that
it's been awhile since i've had the need to look for a job, but i've always had good success writing personalized cover letters. my approach was a simple three points:
1-offer a compliment to the firm you are applying to about something that you sincerely like about them (& if you can't find anything that you like then don't bother applying)
2-highlight something about yourself or your experience that would appear to complement the firm (especially good if it dovetails with point #1 above)
3-suggest that you meet to discuss further opportunities and that in the meantime your resume just so happens to be attached for their review.
keep it succinct, less is more. and once you get the hang of it, you can write several of these very quickly.
As fair warning, I suppose my comments below may be seen by some as falling into the "what goes round, comes round" category.
Memories tend to be very short in this profession. As recently as the spring of 2008, there still was a fairly severe shortage of architectural labor in some areas of the country. While some cracks clearly were starting to appear in the economy, most firms were busy, most wages were high and most people didn't move from one firm to another without there being some serious economic motivation.
During the mid-2006 through mid-2008 period, there was an arrogance evident in many of the candidates who presented credentials to our office -- a frequent demeanor that clearly gave off a "take it or leave it" signal. For the most part, our firm let those people move on to the next opportunity. In 1 or 2 cases we did make the hire after strenuous negotiations, but those folks were gone during the first round of staff reductions in 2008 because their value came nowhere near their cost.
While I still approach all candidates with respect and courtesy, given the strains and abuses that took place during that period, it's not at all surprising to me that perhaps some employers today simply aren't willing to suck up to the labor pool as much as they once did -- they simply don't need to in this labor market.
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