Attracting and Retaining Midcareer Women

A I'm Evelyn Lee. And I'm Janine Chastain. We're collaborating on curated conversations to explore how the industry of architecture is changing.

B Together, we'll find ways to create new solutions to current challenges while elevating the value of architects. Welcome to Practice Disrupted.

A Hello, listeners. Hello, Janine. Hi, Evelyn. Hi, disruptors. We have been following the career of today's guest as she's jumped into entrepreneurship and has been actively growing her business over the last several years. Maya Sharfi is a career and executive coach and the founder of Build Yourself. She helps women in design, tech, and innovation advance their careers on their own terms and helps companies grow and promote their rising women leaders through coaching, training, and consulting.

B Companies Maya has worked with have seen 3 times increase in the rate of women promoted, and 18% of women are more likely to recommend their companies to other women. They've seen more women owning and leading initiatives and setting boundaries that make projects more effective and grow junior staff. Maya's individual clients achieve results like moving into senior director roles and achieving $25,000 raises. Maya has trained national industry groups, like Women in Innovation and the American Institute of Architects and works with leadership and staff at global design and innovation companies such as Stantec, Gensler, and HOK.

A This episode is particularly important to me because over the years I've heard so many stories from women across practice in moments of honest and candid reflection. Women have shared with me the pain points they felt, the frustration they've experienced in trying to grow as professionals in this field. And a theme that I continue to hear is not being heard and not having their concerns taken seriously or addressed. I've known so many women who have struggled and eventually decided to leave their firms to go in search of another firm that's doing it better and looking for a firm that will actually listen to them.

B And we've obviously touched on this subject a few times in some of our past episodes, but this will be a full deep dive into exploring this conversation head on. And we want to spend time acknowledging the roadblocks and discuss the opportunities for firms that are really looking to diversify their leadership and bring women to the forefront. Maya, welcome to the show. So we have known each other, I don't know. We were saying over 15 years at this point from our days way back in public architecture. Why don't I mean, we did a very formal introduction, but is there anything you would like to add and kick us off?

C Yeah. I'll just say that, yeah, I run Build Yourself Coaching and Training Company. My specialty is working with women, but my background is actually it's I've got a dual background. So I actually have a master's in landscape architecture from Harvard. So architects are the number one, professional that I work with. I feel like I I live inside the architect's brain. And one of the interesting things about my job is that I work both with individual women doing career and executive coaching, but then I also work with their companies. So I get to hear what women are saying that companies aren't necessarily fully hearing, and I get to hear what leaders are saying that sometimes women have a hard time, like, fully hearing as well.

C And so I get to work on both sides of the equation and and help women really step into their power at work in ways that benefit their companies. And so it's just like a fascinating role to be in.

A Yeah. And I've always wondered since you kinda took the sleep into this career path, you know, with your background being in the field, what inspired you and drew you into this work?

C Yeah. So, all right. Way back when, when Evelyn and I worked together at Public Architecture, Public Architecture was a social impact design firm. And one of the values that I've held since I was a middle schooler, like, you know, railing about, you know, railing about, like, sexism was like, I've always really cared about women's advancement. You know, when I was in middle school and in high school, there even in my youth group, a lot of the boys were in leadership, and I felt like I wanted to be Also, I had something to contribute, but I felt like the model for leadership was they didn't have the terms. The model for leadership was very much kind of like loud guys, like, jumping around. And I was like, well, I don't think that I didn't have the words at the time to describe it, but I was like, I can't really do that, but I still have something I wanna contribute. And so that started a lifelong journey of, like, you know, reading books like The Feminine Mystique and trying to get you know, try doing an independent study in high school with the school nurse and gender roles and trying to to kind of crack this nut of feeling like I had something to contribute, but that I couldn't see pathways for myself.

C And then I always knew that I wanted to apply my design skills to do socially impactful work. What I didn't know was that the coaching and training that I was doing, right, so this was a build yourself as a side project for me. I was teaching, I was teaching empowerment classes first at Harvard Harvard Design School and then at the Boston Society of Architects. I didn't think they were gonna become my full time gig, but I I started build yourself in 2013. And in about 2018, I realized that there was the design consulting work I was doing, and then there was build yourself, and one of them needed to go to the grave. And and I thought it was gonna be build yourself. But when I really looked at what really drove me and when I did some of the exercises that I now do with my clients to help them figure out what drives you and how do you bake it into your work, I realized that the people side of things that I was doing, the coaching that I was doing, I loved it, and there were opportunities for me to bring the creative way that I was trained as a designer into the way that I coach. And so I've been focused on coaching primarily since at this point, gosh, what, 2018? Like, so for a number of years at this point.

B So when you started out and I've loved seeing you grow your business over time because I've I've seen you, like, take the lessons learned and build out frameworks from them, and they've been really exciting. And we've had several webinars with you over on practice of architecture. When did you make the transition kind of from the individual coaching to also working on the company side and working more broadly?

C Yeah. So I've actually been doing I've been working with companies, and I won't say the whole time, but I would say a large proportion of the time. So I've well, I've been working with one of my main corporate coaching clients for 5 years. You know, it's been incredible to kind of work with class after class of their women. And one of the things that I teach women to do and train companies I train companies on how to get women to do this is to propose bold, bold moves, right, to be bolder in what we propose, to not be the good girl or kind of wait for permission. And so that contract years ago, I felt like there was a a way that we could train women to be more proactive in their careers, to understand some of the challenges that they face, that women face in the workplace. And we could do it in a way that got women supporting other women. So a group based approach rather than kind of just individual coaching.

C And so I pitched this vision for a program, and I was like, I've never done anything like this before. But, you know, it starts with an idea, starts with taking action. And I've been working with that company for 5 years, and and we've seen incredible results for them in terms of the kinds of things that their women step up to do and just, you know, shifts in the language that they have to talk about women's advancement in their culture. So, I've been doing it all along and it's been great for me to kind of, again, be on both sides of the equation. And then I've worked with, since then I've worked with other companies, whether it's training their leadership teams on how to be how to address bias ahead of performance review and promotion season or working with their rising leaders to get them to, like, for example, a really classic issue that can happen is companies will promote people to, for example, you know, associate or senior associate and their employees, especially women, for some reasons that we can get get into, we'll say like, oh, wow, thanks for the promotion. Okay, what should I do? Right? What should I do to lead? And then company leaders are, like, wait. I promoted you because if I tell you that, then you're not leading. Right? Like, I I no.

C I don't want you to ask me what to do. I want you to be proactive. But company leaders, front leaders are busy. They're getting the next project. You know, they're, like, you know, cooling down the project that just went on fire. And so going really figuring out, okay, this person isn't, you know, a lazy millennial, gen x, gen z, gen 11, whatever gen it is. Right? Like everyone wants to call the other generation lazy. Right? They're not lazy.

C They're not not driven. They just are speaking a language that got them here, especially for women, which is getting everything done on the to do list, making sure that the client and everybody is happy. And they need to learn a new language, which is how to be proactive, how to identify what the business needs, and then put forward and start creating solutions. How this is a huge one for women, how to not do everything themselves, but how to leverage other people, right, so that they're not they're not kind of implementing it all themselves. And so, you know, what got women here won't get them there. And there's a process of unlearning and relearning, and that's what companies hire me to do.

A Yeah, and I don't wanna give all the secrets away, but maybe I think a lot of listeners might be interested to know from your perspective, having spoken with so many women from different geographic regions and companies of all walks of life, what are the patterns that you're hearing in the things that they're communicating to you? And particularly I'm interested in the psychology of it.

C Yeah. Yeah. Okay. First of all, I would like to give it all away because I think a lot of these things affect so many women, and I'd love to see women stop. I don't wanna say holding themselves back because it's not really our fault. Right? Unconscious gender bias is nobody's fault, but we all inherit it. But I'd love to see them stop being held back. So so a few of the core patterns that I see.

C Number 1 is impostor syndrome. Right? So the sense that I don't deserve this role or not even I don't deserve this role, but I'm not good enough. The way it shows up is overthinking. Did that client meeting go right? Another way that it shows up is sometimes we can struggle to to give really clear direction to the people who we manage. One of the reasons why that also happens is a second pattern, which is something that researchers call the likability competence trade off, which is the more authoritative and competent we see a woman, oftentimes, the less nice we think she is. So that's why women in leadership sometimes get labeled with that 5 letter word that starts with a b. And one of the ways that that affects women is sometimes they're not as clear or direct or giving, you know, negative or constructive criticism. And constructive criticism is such a beautiful thing because it helps people grow.

C Right? And so instead, what we see is one of the 3rd patterns, which is micromanagement, right, where I cannot tell you how many women I have worked with who do their big work at the end of the day, right? Like, after the kids are in bed, they're like, okay, now I actually have it. I have time to do the work. Right? Yeah. Okay. Evelyn, are you self self identifying?

B Yeah. No. I mean, I I think there's so many podcast episodes that I've been on recently talking about career paths where as a mom of 2 youngsters with no office in my house, like, my focus time starts at 9 PM in the evening after the house is quiet. Yeah. Absolutely.

C Yeah. And we definitely saw that, especially during the pandemic. But I think even before the pandemic, I worked with so many women who they struggled to give work to their junior staff because they were struggling with, okay, well, if the work quality isn't good enough, well, then I'm just gonna have to do it again. They struggled with really getting into the process. Right? Because it's really a it's a it's a craft of giving better feedback, giving direct feedback, helping someone improve, knowing that it takes time. And so they would feel like they were just putting out fires all day and then finally doing the work that maybe they hadn't learned to empower other people to do at night. And then I think the final pattern, which sometimes kind of ties it all together, is is perfectionism. So one of the reasons why it's hard to empower other people to do the work, especially if at least at the beginning, it's not to our standard or it's not exactly the way we would do it, is that we actually train girls.

C We raise girls to be more perfectionist than boys. Right? So teachers, there's research that shows that teachers actually, they reprimand girls more when they don't raise their hands or when they don't follow the rules. And so we train girls to be rule followers to try to do everything right. And so many of the impressive, incredible women that we have in the workplace, part of how they got to the point where they are now, where they're senior associates, where they're associate principals, is that they did everything right. Right? Like, they knew how to please the client, please the boss. Right? Do everything right. But you get to a point where you just can't sustain that anymore because there's too many balls in the air, whether that's just in work or in work and life. And it feels like it might all fall apart.

C Right? And so, for example, I coached a woman in the spring who was thinking about she was had just been promoted to lead a really complex project, but she was questioning. She was she wasn't sure whether she wanted to or could stay in architecture because it was so hard to keep it all altogether. And part of what we worked on was number 1, not being available for everybody all day. Right? Like, actually making, like, controlling her schedule so that she had her focus time during the day rather than having to do it at night. And I helped her learn how to give more direct feedback and to realize that, you know, I mean, there's formulas for women on how to give direct feedback. So you don't sound like a 5 letter word that starts with b. And I, you know, I teach people how to do that, but how to give more direct feedback and how to really stay in the process of getting someone to do better work, to show up differently on the team. Right? So and, you know, by the end of it, she felt like she actually could see staying in architecture and could actually even see her next level in architecture.

B So I think this is all a lead in to a white paper that you recently created titled attracting and retaining mid career women in architecture and planning. Yeah. And in this, you're addressing a lot of the reasons why women at a particular level, which is really associate level and above, are leaving their design firms. So before we talk about those challenges, can you because I realized that associate level and above can mean so many different things to different firms. We don't have, like, a structured career ladder across the industry. So how would you define associate level and above?

C Yeah. So, well, one of the things we did in the research because so many firms structure themselves so differently. So let let me back up and say, the research is based on surveys. Right? We surveyed about a 120 I think we had a 121 full responses. We surveyed people at the associate level and above, and we said many firms have different structures. So if you believe that your role in the firm is is equivalent, then, you know, please, we wanna hear your your input. So associate level and above, the way that I the way that firms usually think about associates is that you've you have experience. Maybe you're at the point where you're either a really, really strong individual contributor where you need minimal oversight on your work or you're potentially managing.

C You're not at the point in your career I mean, of course, in architecture, like, it's a career filled with learning. Right? You know, you're always learning something new. You're never you always have beginner's mind about something. Right? But you can run and lead a project by yourself. Right? You're usually not doing redlines. Someone's not redlining your work or if someone is. Right? And, you know, you're also redlining someone else's work. Right? You know, so you're really able to kind of lead and be independent, at least in your projects.

C So that level of, sometimes you have your license and everyone does, but that level of I've paid my dues and I know, right, I'm not green anymore in the field. Right? You know, I can actually lead things, and I can take things further without having someone double check my every step.

A So this brings us into the conversation that I think that you've identified that women are leaving companies and I've seen it and I've experienced it and I know that this is happening. How how do you know that this is happening?

C Yeah. Well, so I know this is happening because I hear it from firm leaders. Right? I know it's happening. Kermit Baker, he was quoted this summer, chief economist of the AAA, was quoted this summer as the number one challenge that they hear firms are having are recruitment and in this past year, for example, I had one woman who was a project manager, in this past year, for example, I had one woman who was a project architect come to me and say, I, you know, I'm thinking about leaving my firm. I don't know if this is the right firm. I don't even know if this is the right field. I'm a project architect, but I feel like there's nowhere for me to go in the company. There's I mean, this this is a separate issue that we can talk about, which is about career pathing, and that's definitely something that showed up in the survey.

C But, you know, project managers in my in my company have a pathway, but project architects, it's like I have something more to offer, you know where the project architects are? We can't find them. Like, you know, we're like, we're trying to you know where the project architects are? We can't find them. Like, you know, we're, like, we're trying to recruit them like crazy. Right? And so I think so, yes, we know that people are leaving because we know that we know that it's firm owners' biggest challenge. I hear that personally, but we also know it from an economic perspective. And, of course, this is in the context of being on I don't want to say the other side of the pandemic because it's still here but the other side of the major disruption of the pandemic, which affected so many professionals of all genders. And, you know, the truth is also that a lot of these roles are, they line up with people who entered the field or who were in the field during the 2008 recession. And that's when a lot of people left the field.

C Right? So those mid level people who you can rely on to run your projects, who you can rely on to be technical experts. Right? So many of them left the field in 2008, and that talent wasn't replaced.

A Yeah. Just anecdotally, I was on the AIA National Board as the student rep when that was going down, and I remember standing in the boardroom of, at that time it was like 50 people on the board, mostly men, who are really good friends of mine. And I remember saying, we've gotta do something because this recession is gonna take out another generation. And I just felt like they were like, looking at me like, yeah, but I mean, I know they were thinking we're just trying to keep our firms afloat. But the reality was, yeah, it was the beginning of knocking out an entire another group of people in our industry from being able to become architects.

C Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. And, you know, the bill always comes due. Right? So it's coming due now. Right? And it's not anyone's fault. Right? So, so this is also about what can we do with the talent that we do have? What can we do with the insight that we do have about how to run these projects and run these practices?

B And I think I think there's other obstacles outside of that. That's also going to continue to drive constraints if we think about the baby boomers that are going to be exiting, which is going to leave a big hole in leadership. But also, those that have stayed around, you know, I find myself in the sandwich generation. Right? I am dealing with end of life for my parents while raising young children, and that's going to put additional constraints on time for any caregiver, man or woman. I feel like women end up taking on more of that. But that's going to continue to drive how individuals prioritize their time and how they show up at work going forward.

C Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. There are seasons in life where we have more of a pinch on us. And, you know, but I think a lot of people wanna be at practices that that, like, you know, they stay at and they stay up for their careers. And I mean, I know firm owners want people who stay there. And I think there's an opportunity for any given employee. Sometimes there are periods in their lives when there's a pinch, but I think that those are opportunities to really support the whole career of someone and to support where can they start adding value, especially, for example, you know, like, business development is one of the big passions I have, like, getting women to help bring work into firms because I think it's a huge opportunity also for women to understand what do they wanna be known for, what do they want their expertise to be.

C Right? It's a great learning opportunity to learn how to be more proactive. Right? And so just some figures that I think kind of put this into context. So forgetting even someone's future potential at your firm, most, I think on average, you can say that a lot of that like mid level associate and above tends to be compensated somewhere around $100,000 a year. Right? Like, you know, 80 ks to maybe like 125 ks. Right? So, industry benchmarks suggest that it takes between 1 to 1.5 times someone's salary to replace them. Right? So for every person you lose at that level, right, like, conservatively, we can say that that's like a $100,000 loss. Right? Like, where does that show up? That shows up in project disruption. That shows up in the time it takes to hire someone new.

C That shows up in recruiting costs. Right? So one firm that I know, it costs them a $100,000 to a recruiter to replace someone. And that doesn't even include project disruption or training or the time it takes to interview someone. Right? So one firm that I know, like, it takes them a while to find a replacement because that career level is so hard to find. And so they end up having to train the existing someone in the firm who's already running their own projects to take on this project. Right? So they train once. They run the risk of burning out that person who's also now holding too much, who's now more likely to leave. And then if they find a person to replace it, then they have to train that person.

C Right? So, in the meantime, the project kind of yo yos from, from one person to another. Right? And so that's just the cost for today, right, which I think a lot of firm owners focus on. But then that cost in the future, right? So, you know, firm owners and different firms bring in different amounts of money per year, right? So one figure I've heard is, like, between $1,200,000 Although, I did I am in conversations with a firm whose principal is bringing close to $50,000,000 a year. Right? But, like, 1 to $2,000,000, right, it takes time to learn how to build those relationships, to, be an industry expert in a way that brings work into your firm. One figure I've seen is that it can take up to 5 years, and I think it actually can take longer to grow someone into really becoming a rainmaker. Right? And so, the people who are your mid level folks today, those are potentially your people who are going to be bringing work into your firm. They're the people who are going to be buying you out when you retire. Right? And so I think sometimes, so there's an analogy here, right? Sheryl Sandberg, for example, one of the things she tells women to think about is not just, like, at the beginning of your career, if you're having children, what's the cost of daycare versus the cost of your salary? She asked them to say, well, what are you going to be paid in the future? Right? Because it you know, when you make choices for your career and what, you know, what you want to do in terms of, you know, do you want to change careers? Do you want to leave the workforce for a while? Think about your future potential, right? And think about where you ultimately want to go because the time when your kids are young is not going to be forever.

C And I think it's kind of the same thing for firm owners, which is thinking about, you know, who are these people and what are they doing for us today? But also, what is their potential in terms of, you know, supporting the firm, our reputation, project delivery and efficiency, and business development tomorrow. Right? So I think that kind of whole picture is really important.

B Yeah. I definitely I feel like future value is one of the terminologies that you hear thrown out in business courses a lot that, like, of course, never matriculates back to to architects and how they think about how do you think the about their overall business operations. I feel like we're very much industry that operates in the present. And part of it is just because it's hard for us to to have enough brain space to even think to operate beyond, like, what is directly in front of us, and like you said, all the fires that we're we're putting out and all the project work that we have on hand, and the pipeline that we can't fulfill with the talent that we have.

A You know, my hypothesis is there's a lot of different factors that are informing the moment that we find ourselves in. We've got, you know, the recession, the impact of that losing a generation. We've got the pandemic. We've got a change in the way people practice. So I don't think it's any one cause, but I think your report starts to point to some really clear, consistent reasons why women are specifically deciding to walk away. Can you talk to us about what rose to the top?

C Yeah. Absolutely. So I think the the interesting thing, by the way, is that right. Architects talk a lot about how we're undercompensated relative to other professional services firm. Salary was not the number one reason why people leave and or would leave, and salary is is actually only number 5. Right? So the number one reasons why people leave. I I would say that there's the top four reasons I see them as being in 2 camps. Right? So number 1 and number 2 are an unmanageable workload and lack of work life balance.

C Right? So that that aligns with, for example, Monograph did research on burnout a couple of years ago. That aligns with a lot of what we hear. Right? And there's a lot of things that we can do around that, you know, flexible work arrangements, right? I work with a firm that has called SOM in Boston that has one of the most interesting flexibility and vacation policies. Right? There's definitely stuff we can do there. Right?

B Diane was on the podcast earlier.

C Okay. Yeah, she's amazing. She's totally amazing. So, there's definitely stuff we can do around that. And I know you guys have covered that. One of the things and we can bookmark this. But one of the things we can do around that is also around how to train architects and designers to use their time differently. And that's a really big thing I work on.

C Right? Helping people take back their time. But the causes number 2 sorry. Number 3 and number 4 are not feeling valued by my organization and low potential for advancement. Right? So, for example, 48% of women who we surveyed don't feel valued by their organization or their managers, right? Which is a pretty high number. Right? Like, that's almost half of the people we surveyed. Right? So, here's how I see it. Right? I think of it as, as I call this the vicious retention cycle. So, all right, architecture is intense.

C Right? We have deadlines, deadline to deadline. You know, it's grueling to get the training. You know, you have to take like 173 tests before you're, before you get your license. Right? Like, like it's a very serious profession. Right? And so I think what happens, and this especially happened during the pandemic, is that we ask people to kind of like be all in to kind of like grind through to the deadline to kind of like be there, right, to, to kind of like push it through. And, you know, that's a manageable workload and the lack of work life balance. But a lot of people love this profession and love what they do. But what starts to happen is, like, they go all in, but then they're not seeing where this is all leading because they're not seeing a future for themselves at their company.

C Right? So that's low potential for advancement, right, cause number 4, and then not feeling valued by their organization and their manager. And so the way this shows up, and I wanna share a couple quotes that we heard is is things like this. You know, without a path for growth, I feel stagnant and unfulfilled. I need more. What are measurable, the measurable goals and metrics the company and I can mutually agree on in order for advancement? It seems the criteria for being promoted to a principal is limited to bringing in new work and, A, bringing in new work and, B, mirroring look and talk like those who are already principals, right? And so things like lack of transparency around compensation and career growth within the firm. Right? And so I think what happens, and this is unique. I think this happens pathway, right, to look for the rules pathway, right, to look for the rules, right, the rules in any given situation. But the working world is, especially in architecture where you can be on a project for 7 years and you know, your whole career could be at the associate or senior associate level is people are looking for how to grow and they're looking for a clear pathway to do that.

C And like there isn't necessarily an innate clear pathway. Right? This isn't like other fields where it's like you're in this role and then you're in that role and then you're senior VP and then you're blah, blah, blah. Right? And so, I think what is really needed is, number 1, people need to have a conversation around what their growth pathways look like. And that's somewhat sometimes about that's about title, but sometimes it's actually about things beyond title. Like, what, what do you aspire to work on? What do you want to be known for as an expert in the field? What problems do you want to solve more of? What internal skills do you want to develop in terms of building the team? What business problems excite you? Right? So there's a much more robust conversation that we can have than just what the next title is. And they also need to feel recognized for what they do. And there are, there are different ways to do that, right? Kim Scott, who wrote the book Radical Candor, who I'm like a huge fangirl for, she has this concept around career growth where there are some people who are superstars and they're, like, title jumpers. And it's not I don't mean that in a bad way.

C Like, they're just people who are, like, growth driven. They like They're growing through an organization and they just they're that kind of person. But then there are people who are what she calls rock stars instead of superstars. They're craftspeople. They love their craft. They're the people who lovingly detailed the iPhone. In architecture, we have a lot of those people. And so she says that some firms, the only pathway to growth or the only recognized pathways for growth and recognition are jumping through titles.

C And as a result, the rock stars sometimes feel like, well, okay, well maybe I should become a manager, even though it actually wouldn't make them happy. And they probably wouldn't be that good at it because what they want is that feeling of growth and progression and recognition. And so I think there's a huge, huge opportunity for firm leaders to have performance and growth conversations in a really different way. Of course, like, it's important for women to get promoted and to get compensated fairly. But I think there's this much more robust conversation because what people want is to feel like they're not stagnant and they want to feel like it's going somewhere.

B So the interesting thing is, and we talk about the, the comparison to tech and practice, And I didn't actually think about this until just now. Like, it's it's one thing to have a clear path and to be able to move those titles forward on kind of a pretty regular cadence, but we need to set up career paths in architecture firms that move people forward when they're working on projects that could expand. I only completed 1 architecture project from beginning to end, you know, in my 4 year tenure at an architecture firm. And how do you account for growth when those projects take so long and what are other milestones that we can be adopting and how do you actually grow people within the scope of a project?

A Exactly. I had this thought too with a client and I couldn't figure out how to articulate it, but it's like we have these predetermined titles that we in our firms that are set up, and it's like these are the checkpoints of growth, but it's I think the opportunity is expanding that because someone who's 2 years into their career is still looking for career advancement. So you need to have some kind of metric that makes that person feel like they've moved forward in their career. And oftentimes, I see firms not wanting to promote them to these titles that are, like, historically relevant to the context of the firm, but what that communicates to that person is that they haven't well, some maybe the person's interpreting this way, but they haven't advanced or they haven't met the mark of what advancement means in that firm. And so I just think that expanding the definition and the opportunities of growth is a huge opportunity for firms.

C So I see it in 2 ways. Right? So okay. So there are some gender and equity experts who believe that the thing that we need to do is we need to make career levels clearer. Right? So, for example, there's one firm that I know of, and they have, they do a great job of saying, this is what an associate does. Right? This is what a senior associate does. This is what an associate principal does. Right? And so, you know, knowing that there are different people in different markets, right, they've been really clear about, for example, they might do things like this person is a recognized expert in the region. Right? This person independently solves problems on projects.

C Right? So those are a couple of examples of of how you can be abstract, but still be clear about what happens at those levels. I think that that's really important. And I think it's also, it's particularly important from a bias perspective because there's actually research that shows that women, when it comes to promotion decisions, women are promoted on the basis of their past accomplishments. Right? Like she's done this before. She could do something similar again. Whereas we're more willing to suspend. I don't even want to say suspend disbelief, but to give men like that extra benefit of the doubt. Right? Like, oh, I see his men are promoted on the basis of their potential.

C Right? Like, oh, yeah. He could totally lead that project. Right? So, for example, I worked with a woman who was an engineer, and she really wanted to grow from like, she was managing 1 bridge projects. And she really wanted to manage more complex projects where it was like a collection of bridges. Right? And so one of the things that we've seen in her company is that men were getting men were moving faster from the 1 bridge moment to the 6 bridge moment. And so we do see that. And bias is something that men do to women, but also women do to women. Right? Like, it's a sea we're swimming in.

C Right? So I do think structure structuring that is important so that we can have more explicit conversations about what experience does this person have? What specific things have they done that demonstrate this? Right. When we're more specific, bias hides in bigness. Right. But that said, I don't think that that's enough. And also, I think it's a mistake to try to over structure a working world that is by nature ambiguous because, you know, 3 years from now, like our clients are going to want different things. Right? The working world is constantly changing. So, trying to support everyone by treating them like children and being like, here are all the rules. Don't worry.

C We'll never depart from the rules. I just don't think it's realistic. And I also don't think it honors and honors, like, human ingenuity. So instead, what I think we need is for managers to be managers and maybe even companies, because not all managers are equally, equally talented at this, to be better trained in having conversations around how to translate someone's skills and interests into opportunities and goals in the company. So, it's very, very common for me to hear from managers. People show up to their performance reviews or like they come and they say, I want to become a blank, right? Or like, I want, I want to grow in the career, in my career. And the manager will say like, Okay, well, so how? Like, what are your ideas? And they'll be like, I don't know. You tell me.

C Right? And so they're like, oh, these people haven't done these entitled millennials, gen x, gen 74, whatever it is. Right? Like, they haven't done their homework. Right? And it isn't a manager's job to tell you what you want. But some people don't know even how to start thinking about that. So, what a manager can do without solving the problem for you can be to say, Okay, like, I'll give you a couple of examples of exercises we do in my in my coaching. Right? Write down everything you do for 3 days. All the stuff that you hate, cross it out. The stuff that makes you feel alive.

C Right? You're still gonna have to do some of that. That's that's work. Right? But the stuff that makes you feel alive, highlight it. And then let's talk about what it has in common and where you might, you know, what roles or what projects or what goals you can set for yourself or what growth areas you want to work on, you can do more of that. Right? You know, that's a really, really basic exercise that you can give someone. Right? And then for managers to be able to say, oh, you like x, y, z? Well, go talk to this person because they do a lot of that and see what pings with you. Right? So that managers, again, are not telling someone what to want, but they're setting up a framework for someone to answer their own their own career growth questions so that there's actually a process and a structure.

A Oh, I love it. Man, there's so much more I wanna talk about on this topic, but I also wanna make sure that we we finish talking about your report. Were there other challenges that you identified in some of these key buckets that you were presenting?

C Yeah. I would say one of the challenges that I think we saw, especially so one of the things we did, and we have a report on this. So if anyone wants to download it, I'll give the link now. I'm sure we all have it in your show notes. So if you go to build yourself workshop.com backslash p d, you can get the white paper. So, one of the things that we saw so what I wanted to say, we actually looked at the challenges that associates face, senior associates face, and associate principals face. And everybody struggled with workload. But one of the things that we saw with associate principals, and we started to see it a bit with senior associates, is really struggling with balancing work, like managing projects and then needing to kind of lead.

C So some of the things we saw were things like, you know, being asked to lead but being overridden. Well, this is also about authority and autonomy, right? So being asked to lead but being overridden when my decisions don't align with traditional approaches. Right? So, I think what we forget sometimes is that the skills of leading and thinking about the firm rather than the project are skills that one needs to learn and helping and that also managing projects and thinking about the firm. Right? Any firm owner knows. Right? Like, you're either working in the business or you're working on the business. Right? Like, helping people make that transition is also about helping them learn how to set up 2 different brain spaces and when to be in 1 and when to be in the other. Right? So when we work with women doing executive coaching, for example, one of the things we do is we help them organize their calendars so that they can work on the business or on leadership, but then also work in their projects. So one of my clients who actually just got promoted to associate, associate principal, which was really exciting, You know, we knew that when you get promoted, it's because you're already starting to do the job, the next level up.

C Right? So for her, that was going to be business development. And so while she was in the weeds on a lot of her projects, we carved out Tuesday mornings and we're like, this is your business development hour, right? You're going to call past clients, catch up with them, ask for referrals. You're going to call new people and introduce yourself and form connections. Right? It was like that simple. Right? But just having, like, she didn't have to control her whole schedule in order to have the time to be working on. I call it future focused work, right? Like what your future is in your career and not just your present. Right? So I think we can kind of share with people strategies around that. And for women in particular who sometimes can struggle to feel like they need to have it all figured out before they do it, I think we can expose women to more.

C Right? So if you're going to, if you're negotiating a contract, like, you know, even if you don't know if this person wants to be in senior leadership, like, hey, I think this would be a great call for you to observe. Why don't you join me? Right? If you are, and then, you know, giving giving them opportunities to do more. Hey, I think you could be great at proposals. It sounds like you're interested in x, y, z. I want to what if I go over with you? What if I, what if you I share with you how I did the scope for this proposal? Hey, next time, why don't you do a draft for the scope and especially for women making it okay to fail? I'm sure there's gonna be a lot that's wrong. That's totally okay. That's where everybody starts. And then I will give you some feedback.

C And your first one will be bad, and your next one will be slightly bad, and your third one will be bad again because, like, you know, linear learning isn't linear. And then it's gonna be slightly better. And then, you know, 2 years from now, you're gonna be writing amazing proposals. Like, that's how it goes, and I'll support you in your figuring it out. Right?

A It makes me think about some of the things that I've heard from my male mentors who express that, you know, when they were coming up in the field, they just ended up kinda getting thrown into the deep end and usually in a really challenging situation, and, you know, we're pushed into learning through having to do. And so I I really think there's a genuine disconnect of perception about, like, what you just articulated about how to actually pull someone into a conversation and make them feel like they're being intentionally brought along versus having someone just take a problem and go solve it on their own by themselves with a little bit of support. I don't know if you've figured out how to bridge that divide, but like, that is always something that is really obvious to me in some of this communication.

C Yeah. I mean, when I work with, like, senior leaders, this is what we work on. And I like to work in almost like a case study method. Right? Like, what's like, this is a really silly one, but, you know, I worked with a with a woman who was trying to get out of the weeds and stop micromanaging. And she and we one of the things in her coaching package was voicemail support. So I got a voicemail right after our coaching session where she said, hey, this, this person who works under me, who asked me all these questions, just asked me a question about, you know, a finish or what, like something to spec or decision on the project. And I said, I was thinking about our conversation and I said, what do you think? And there was this like right? As he was like thinking, typing. And he was like, x, y, z.

C And I said, I love that. I think that's a great, a great suggestion. Right? Or you can say, what are the two reasons for yes? Or what are the two reasons for no? Right? So there's, there's ways that we can guide people into independent thinking without are not proactive. This is because, you know, as girls, women got praised for doing everything right, for asking the teacher what to do and then doing it. They weren't like, oh,

B boys will be boys. They make mistakes. They get messy. They take risks.

C They like, you know, boys will be boys. They make mistakes. They get messy. They take risks. They like, you know, so like knowing that that's how women were socialized, it means that there's a little bit of extra communication that can help them take that leap that they were totally capable of, which is making failure okay. Saying, it's all right to not do this perfectly when you start. It's going to take you a while to be good at this. And that is exactly where you're supposed to be.

C Right? You know, I want you to go out like, for me, for example, I just pitched a half a $1,000,000 proposal, and I'd never pitched anything that big before. And what I said to myself was, I want to be a person who has pitched a half a $1,000,000 proposal. It wasn't, I want to get this proposal, because I know I did, but it was like, I wanna have this experience because this is gonna make me the next version of me. And that lowered the stakes. Right? And, you know, because it's kind of showing someone that growth is a process and that's okay. You don't have to be perfect when you start. That's like a superpower for releasing some of women's potential in your practice. Right? It's very simple and it's subtle, but it's really powerful.

C And it means that you're responding to the way that, you know, the kind of unconscious way that we socialize girls versus boys.

A Yeah, it's true. And it's, I don't know, I've worked in practices where it was mostly men and it's almost like, like I spoke a different language completely, and I didn't know how to translate my voice into that environment, which was extremely frustrating. And I felt like I had to go through this learning process of learning, like you said at the top of the episode, learning the language, learning how they communicate differently than I did in that moment of my life, and kinda getting more comfortable with that language and using it. I guess I wanna I wanna talk about solutions and opportunities. You started to frame some of them in the conversation, but I, you know, are there any specific recommendations that you wanna go further into for either women or firm leaders to tackle some of these challenges?

C Yeah. So I think that, like those career conversations, right, having more career conversations that start with what drives you. If you don't know how to figure it out, here's a way. Right? Like, how can we increase opportunities for you to get to practice that either in the firm or in your work? Right? As a quick example, I worked with a woman who negotiated, and she wanted to become a better negotiator. Right? So every negotiation was an opportunity to increase her negotiation skills, right? Like on behalf of the firm, right? She was negotiating contracts and prices for the firm, right? So helping someone see their opportunities to grow using those more robust career conversations. I think inviting women to step up into higher level opportunities, whether that's business development, sometimes that's in technical expertise, sometimes that's in things like, you know, things that like a managing director does, right? And just inviting them along, right? I'm inviting them along to a meeting or just sharing, hey, I wanted to share this latest proposal that I did and I want to share. And sometimes you don't have to sometimes leaders think, Okay, how do I train perfectly? I need to explain all of the logics and instead keeping it simple. Here are 3 things that, 3 strategies that went through my mind as I put together this scope.

C Right? You know, just kind of like exposing women to stuff. Being able to, to use that language around learning, and it's okay to not be good at this when you start. And in fact, you're going to not be good at this. Right? That helps deal with imposter syndrome perfectionism. And then I think finally being able to, I mean, this is actually, this is a recommendation, but it's very, very difficult for people, no matter what gender, no matter what level. But seeing where your perfectionism and your people pleasing and your time, like, mindset habits that cause you to waste time are showing up and then testing the edge of, of not doing those. And I want to talk about what that looks like in just a minute. But, and then modeling that for others, but then also encouraging others to do that.

C Like that's one of the number one ways aside

B from, you know,

C flexible work or different, you know, I'll give a couple of specific examples. These are what I like, I'm I'll give a couple of specific examples. These are what I call I call them power habits, and I teach women to do them. But, for example, overly preparing for things, right? So I had a client who was gonna stay up late, right, after the kids are in bed and prepare for her meeting the next day. She was the only architect. It was an exploratory meeting. She's like, I need to, like, do some sketches and do some thinking. And I said, I want you to set your timer for 5 minutes, and I want you to write down 5 bullet points of things you want to communicate in the meeting.

C Because you have years of experience. And if you need to do some quick thoughts or quick calculation or quick sketches, you'll do that. I want you to rely on your experience rather than your preparation, right, which is really coming out of imposter syndrome, right? So testing out what you cannot prepare for, which forces you to use your own expertise and wisdom. Sometimes I put my clients on a no diet, right? How can you say no to something every day? And I think for firm leaders, saying no to clients is really powerful. But of course, it's not just like no, right? A bit, one of my favorite coaching questions is, how is saying no in this case, actually in service of the client's ultimate needs? Right? So, saying no in a way that you're defending the project on behalf of the clients. Right? So, be able to to like even just taking note of what are all the demands that the client puts on you in like a given week. Right? And then saying, okay, if I had to say no to 25% of these, what are the ones I would say no to and why? And then starting to test that boundary because you'll never, you you'll never know how it feels until you take that risk. Right?

A Oh, I'm so glad you brought up mindset, and you're so right. Like, the boundary thing, it's super scary when you first, especially as a people pleaser, when you first start trying to set boundaries, it's intimidating. And the thing you're avoiding is that feeling that it's gonna feel

C bad. Oh, totally. And and it's also that in your mind, you're like, I can't do this. I've always like, for example, I used to do these, like, big summaries in my coaching. Right? And they were actually, I think, kind of confusing because there's too much information. I was like, well, I can't stop doing these summaries because my clients have always wanted me to. But then one day I was like, what if I test not doing the summary with this client? And it was fine. She still got great outcomes.

C Right? So once you start doing it in one place, you start thinking, okay, where else can I apply this? Right? It, you know, testing that boundary changes the way that you show up. You show up as more of an expert because you're not trying to prove that you're, you're worthy by doing all the little things that make you feel like, as one of my friends set calls a helpy helperton. Right? Oh, yes.

A Oh, man. I know exactly what you're talking about. The worthiness thing, the search for worthiness. If I do more, if I only take on this like additional thing, then maybe I'll be worthy.

C Yeah. Yeah. Our brains are really squirrelly. And when we don't feel confident or strong, we self sabotage ourselves with all these little things. We don't even realize we're doing them. You know, there's work we can do on our mindsets, but there's one of the best ways to start to change that sense is by testing those boundaries with those little experiments. Right? Like go on a no diet, say no to something 3 times a week. Right? So it helps you start to realize that your sense that that boundary was there is really just your sense.

C And, you know, sometimes you'll hit a boundary that really was real. It's like, oh, I'm not going to do that again. Right? But most of the time, even if you do that, you can still recover it. Right? Like you can still fix the problem. Like, oops, you know, and then you don't know till you test.

A Yeah, exactly. And, you know, I I kinda wanted to ask you this question, which is pretty loaded, but I get the sense that there are firm leaders out there that feel like they're they're doing what they think is enough to support women in the workplace, and yet we have women who, in candid conversations, communicate otherwise. So I was wondering if you had any thoughts about what advice you'd have you'd give to firm leaders about trying to get to more honest conversations where they can actually bridge that divide?

C Yeah. I mean, the first thing I wanna say is that being a firm leader is really hard. Right? You are keeping a lot of balls in the air. Right? I know many firm leaders who sometimes don't even pay themselves salaries during tough times while they're just trying to get their firm through. And so I think I wanna start by saying, like, I see you and I see how hard it is, and I see what you have to carry on your shoulders. Right? And that said, you know, sometimes we're so in our moment in our career that we need to pull back out and remember either what it was like or maybe it was never that way for us because we were always entrepreneurial, right? And so, we need different kinds of people in order to achieve the goals and the results of our firm. Right? And because of unconscious bias and social gender socialization, which, by the way, affects men as well as women, it just affects men differently. You are inheriting those effects in your practice.

C And that means that if you don't lead in a gender informed way, that means that you're leaving talent on the table. You may have people who leave your firm once new opportunities open up. Or you might have people who are at your firm but who are not giving it their all because they don't feel seen. They don't feel like there's a future for them. And so I guess my invitation to you would be to experiment, especially if you don't identify as a woman, right? You know, some of these dynamics that I'm sharing, you've never experienced them, or you haven't experienced them in the same gender socialized way. So that means that, like, there's a learning process for you. Right? You know, life is about learning and growth, and there's there's, you know, it all starts with the first step. And so experiment with some of these approaches.

C Maybe reach out to a woman in your practice. And there's a, there's an art to doing this without putting someone on the spot. Like, Okay, you're a woman. Speak for your gender. Right? You know, Okay, you're a whatever. Speak for your religion. Right? Like, we don't want, we don't want to do that. But we can say something like, hey, I've listened to this podcast.

C It brought up this topic. I realized that maybe I don't experience this because I've never had, I've never been in that position before. Right? For me, for example, as a white woman, right? I have never had to worry that if my kid is wearing a hoodie that they're going to be treated differently or potentially have their life at threat. Like, that is that is a privilege that I have as a white woman that I with, you know, a white child that I just don't I don't have to experience that. So I can't really understand what it feels like to be in the head of someone, you know, a black person who does have to experience that and worry about their children in that way. Right? So bringing that empathy and saying, I've never experienced that. And it made me curious about what I might be missing. You know, I'm wondering, do you see x, y, z show up for yourself or for other women? Right? And when you say for yourself or for other women, that's a way to not put one person on the spot where they have to be, you know, they, like, that gives them the out to kind of be more vague.

C But that also opens up the conversation for them to share. Right? And, you know, to say, here's what I'm thinking about experimenting. Here's what I've heard. Here's what it makes me think. But I'd love to gut check that with you. Do you think this could be a good approach, or is there something I'm missing here? Right? So there's, again, there's an art to these conversations, right, where you're leaving space for someone else in a way that also honors them and doesn't put them on the spot.

A Oh, yeah. I love it. I heard 2 things in what you just said, and I was hoping you could maybe I think they're really important points that I'd love to hear your take on. One is breaking down what it means to make people feel seen. You kinda just alluded to it, but I'd like to go a little further And the vulnerability piece, just super curious what your take is on those 2 ideas. I feel like in our industry, it's almost like, it's almost like the anti vulnerability industry where, you know, you're trying to armor up to go on to the job site to protect your project, to have really hard conversations. And I feel like vulnerability seems really challenging for a lot of people working in architecture firms. I think there that's starting to be a conversation, but it's certainly we're just barely getting to the front of that conversation.

C Yeah. I mean, I think I think what you're saying is true. Right? To a certain extent, I think the way that we're trained as designers, you know, like I went to GSD, right? Like, we're trained to have, like, one big, bold vision. And I actually think there's something really amazing about that, right, to be be able to curate your own ideas and your own perspective. But that said, I think most, I don't think, I think very few people are successful in practice if they don't know how to ask questions and to help the client feel heard. Right. And to understand what the client's looking for to translate what they say they want into, like, what the built environment implications of that are. And so it really is that same skill set, right? Asking questions, really listening, you know, being like a big thing I work on with clients is to, especially like this, this is maybe a little bit more early career, like kind of like getting from early career to, I don't know, for example, like learning how to be a project manager.

C I used to work more with women kind of at that level. But one of the things we worked on is how to not know with power, right? So for example, if a client asks you a question or it comes up on the construction site and you don't know the answer, you don't want to make it up, right? Definitely not. Right? But there's a way to not know with power. Right? And so you say, I don't know, but I'm going to find out. Or I don't know, but here's what I'm going to look at. I'm going to get to you. And if I have any issues, I'll reach out. Right? You know, there's a way to kind of own the not knowing or even, I don't know.

C But the question that it brings up for me is x, y, z. So what is that for you? Right? So not knowing is, not knowing is really powerful because you can ask the right questions that get you to the right answer, right, and answers that work, right? So that's the way that I would kind of see it is like it's a tool of curiosity and growth.

A Mhmm. Absolutely. And the second idea, the making people feel seen, I feel like this is just a skill that, like, it comes inherently to some people and some people have to learn it. And I just thought maybe you could articulate it for the people that are learning it.

C Yeah. Well, I have to say that I think any skill can be learned. I'm a big believer in that. Right? I think some just a quick aside. Right? In one of my corporate coaching engagements, originally, the company wanted to have company leaders nominate people to be in the program. And I fought really hard for people to self nominate because I think sometimes we have people who become like the leaders or like the growth track people. Right? And then there are other people in the firm who feel like they're not the golden children. They're not chosen.

C And, you know, they're like, oh, maybe this person doesn't like me. Maybe I don't remind them of themselves. And I think it's, I think it's really important as firm owners to believe that anybody can grow in any way that they want to and to not write them off. Right? Of course, like, there's talent and proclivities, but, you know, you just never know what one day someone wakes up and wants to change their life. Right? So, like, you always have to keep that door open for them. I agree. So to that and anything can be learned. Right? Any I mean, I've learned some things that were really hard for me to learn, and I'm still learning things that are really hard for me to learn.

C And that's where persistence and trying over and over happens. So the easiest way in, I think, sometimes is to borrow someone's language. Right? So specifically, how did someone say it? And then to practice that, right? To practice that, maybe practice that with your partner. Right? Like, hey, I'm going to, I want to try to have this career conversation in a different way tomorrow. Like, can we, like, you know, just do, you know, like the women who I work with when they're negotiating salaries or applying for jobs, like, have a mock negotiation, have a mock interview, even if it's like 3 questions. Same thing, right? Test out new language, see how how it works, and then try it in the office. Right? And that's a way in because you will be perceived differently when you're speaking when you're using different language. Right? So, So, for example, some of the things that I shared that I said, right, like, try that out.

C Right? Humans grow through seeing what's possible in other people and then mimicking them. Right? Like, we're amazing mimics because we're socially wired. So instead of, like, go be vulnerable, like, use some of this language, try that out, and then see what happens. Right?

A Is there anything else that we haven't touched on in the research that you wanted to share with our audience?

C No, I think, you know, I think we covered it. I think it's really helpful for like, I would recommend that not only firm leaders check it out, but also women themselves. One of the things I do is I I'd work not just with companies, but I work with women who are trying to become principals or partners at their firm. And one of the best things that you can do is to really, as much as possible, put your brain in how firm leaders think. Because once you start reading that stuff, acting as if you are a firm owner, you'll be asking different questions. You'll operate be operating in a different way. So we actually do have a white paper specifically we've we've a white paper for firm leadership, and then we also have a white paper for professionals at that level. But one of the things I would invite professionals at the associate to associate principal level to do is to read the firm white paper so that you, especially if you want to advance in your career, so that you can be thinking about the problem from the top down.

A Got it. And I think you said you have an opt in for us and for our listeners.

C Yeah. So if you want to access the white paper, go to build yourself .com/pd, and you can check out the white paper and check out the recommendations. If you're if you're a firm owner and you're interested in how to attract and retain women and specifically also how to promote and grow your women, how to get them to be more independent, more business thinking, more visible in the field, You know, check that out, see if it speaks to you, and then reach out to me. And if you're a woman who's trying to grow into principal or partner, or you're already in one of those roles, but you wanna really own your leadership, then I'd also invite you to reach out to me, and start a conversation about what we could do together to help you help you grow and show up in the way that you wanna show up.

A Yeah, it is awesome. I think that the work that you're doing is amazing. Our industry needs it. And honestly, as a entrepreneur, watching your career grow, as you've been building your business has been amazing. It is. It's so impressive. And I'm just really inspired by what you're doing and the, the reach that you've been able to have on helping so many women. We encourage you all to go to Maya's website, build yourself, check out her white papers, get in touch with her.

A She's a speaker and she can come to you and maybe join you for a speaking engagement or you can get involved in some of her professional work that she's offering. And we will link her website and white papers down in the show notes. So thank you, Maya. We really loved having you on the show today, and thank you for sharing all this great research.

C My pleasure. Thanks for having me, Janine and Evelyn.

A Hi, disruptors. If you like the content from today's show, you can find all of our past episodes over on practiceofarchitecturedot com/podcast.

B Be a part of the conversation by joining us, our speakers, and others in the community at practiceof architecture.com/community.

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B Thank you for joining us on practice disrupted, a podcast by the practice of architecture. Tune in next week for a new conversation on change in the profession.