Practice Disrupted and the Practice of Architecture

A Welcome to Practice Disrupted, a podcast where we find ways to create new solutions to current challenges while elevating the value of architects. I'm your host, Evelyn Lee, an architect who spans tech as an angel investor, start up advisor, and founder of Practice of Architecture. Whether you're a seasoned architect or just starting in the field, this Hello, disruptors. Hello, Janine.

B Hi, disruptors. Hi, Evelyn. Oh, my gosh. Surprise.

A So does this mean you're coming back?

B Oh, man. I'm I'm here right now. That's what that means. And freshly off of AIA 2024. So, yeah, it's been quite some time since we've talked. I mean, there's just been a lot going on. I don't even know where to start. This is the last episode of season 8? 8.

B Yeah. So we've we've officially

A we've officially passed a 150 episode mark. So that was a big deal, so I probably would have celebrated more if you'd been around.

B If I'd been here. Well, I guess I should ask. I mean, I feel like maybe I should ask how has this been for you over the past several episodes recording solo. How's that gone for you?

A I think it's gone it's gone well. I I miss having I mean, honestly, and I'm sure our listeners will agree, I miss having our different perspectives because we bring a different generational perspective to each. Right? And I think we all we both have our our own personal strengths and weaknesses. The only thing that I've kind of appreciated more, or the only thing that has been a little bit more flexible for me on my end is just it's one less person to schedule around, right, when it comes to coordinating calendars. But that's really the only, really, if there is any upside to to not having having you here. And then I think, consequently, a lot of this past season has gone a little bit more heavily into AI and technology than we probably otherwise would've if you brought some of your your guests on. So as a part of that, I think in season 9, I am looking to bring on a few practitioners here and there and talk about what they are doing differently within just a a firm context. I ran into some great individuals at AIA 24 that I wanna share what they're doing within their practices, including and this is actually from from a CKLDP presentation that I made in Kentucky.

A There is a CEO of an architecture firm who is not an architect, who actually comes from a, a marketing background, which you I think you would be interested in. But the company decided to make him CEO and not an architect or engineer, so we're gonna talk about why.

B That's cool. Yeah. Well, there's a lot to talk about just within what you said, but first of all, hello to our listeners. It's so good to be with you again, and I definitely miss you all, but I have been, working on building upostry, which has been really necessary. It was, like, necessary thing that I had to do to kind of get my feet under myself a little bit more and that has paid off well. Of course, I miss this. I miss recording. I have a 1,000 ideas per usual that I want to execute on, but right now haven't been able to.

B And it was also, like, there was definitely, like, a grieving process. There was, like, I think in January, I was pretty sad and bummed out because I was like, man,

A you know. Good thing you didn't. I don't think we talked too much during January because I probably would have pulled that thread as hard as I could.

B I know y'all have. I know. That's why I didn't I didn't tell you. I was going through this. But I came out on the other side and actually so the time away was really good mentally for me. I needed it. I needed the break from the show. I did see you had several guests on that I was, like, totally bummed out.

B I missed the interviews, Beth, Andy, Mercedes. Oh, man. I like, all of that, I was like, man, I wish I could've been in those conversations, and I still need to go listen to those episodes because they are ones that I'm super interested to hear what they had to say. What was your favorite episode you did this season, by the way?

A Andy and Merer actually knocked my episode in a completely different direction because I wanted to figure out what Slantus was doing around AI integrations since we last talked to them. And they have this whole series that they've been doing. And they actually went out to Harvard GSD to talk about this, about how innovation and technology really is fully dependent upon how culturally ready a firm is to embrace that innovation. And it doesn't matter all of the innovation that's happening around us, unless a firm's culture is, like, ready to prototype and accept and experiment and fail to do all the necessary things that I feel like everyone else in other industries are doing now to figure out how to work with it. So that's kind of been where they are, which has been an interesting evolution. So we're also looking for ways to to partner from an employee experience standpoint on that front.

B Mhmm. I mean, just coming back from the conference and seeing so many faces, people that have come on the show previously, people who have yet to come on the show. I mean, there's just a lot of people to talk to out there about all the change that's happening in the industry and I think what's exciting is there's so many different ways to look at it based on who you talk to. There's people thinking about it from the lens of technology. There's people working inside of firms to work on it through the lens of operations and architecture. There's a lot going on simultaneously. And so I think that what's been great about the show is it's been a platform for people to kind of share their story in different, you know, all of those different what we talked about the end of last season, all those different layers of change that are happening simultaneously. Right.

A And then I was reminded as as all the awards were being presented to you, this second half of the year will also feature Gold Medal Award winners, the Whitney Young Junior Award winners, and in the firm of the year. I'm working with Pointe Evans to do a similar story that we did with last year's firms where it's not the firm leadership who were the ones on stage. Right? But literally, like, what does this mean for the next generation of the firm coming up?

B Yeah. Exciting stuff ahead. And I guess today's conversation, it's your season finale. I wanted to help you talk about some of the innovation and exploration that you've been doing as you've stepped into a new chapter of your career. It's not one that recently unfolded. It's been kind of in progress for a while, which is you launching into business ownership. Maybe we should rewind to help listeners understand, you know, practice of architecture kind of came about several years ago. And I think what I've watched as you've been building it is just that it's been iterative, and it has been a few things at a few different points in time.

B So what was it when you initially started?

A When I initially I saw I actually started it while I was in business school, and it was initially literally just curating content that I was reading in business school that I thought architects should be reading what what can we learn from this case study even though it's from another industry that ties back to ours? And I think you've experienced this a lot, Janine, but we, as architects, tend to like to think we are so different and unique that we can't learn from other industries. And as business school kind of unfolded in front of me, I was like, but we have so much to learn from other industries if we just allow that to happen. Mhmm. And that when from a consulting, a professional services provider standpoint, we really aren't as different as we make ourselves out to be.

B And then how did it evolve over the last several years?

A It started to evolve when really practically when John Czarnecki so I used to write for practically when John Czarnecki so I used to write for Inhabitat a lot, and I used to actually do a lot more on social media, frankly, than I do right now. I was just playing around with it as a medium. In hindsight, I probably should've cut, like, kept that up. I'm you know, to reach certain influencer status, but I never did. But because of all of that work that I did writing my own pieces, like, ever since undergrad, John Czarnecki and I had been trying to find a way to work together. So he was at Wiley, and he's like, why don't you write a book on social media? And I sat down with him and I was like, you know, as soon as I write a book, everything's gonna be out of date. But it was a touchpoint where we, like, decided that we wanted to try to keep finding a way to work with one another. So eventually, he became editor of contract magazine, and he needed somebody to write, like, about the business, or he wanted somebody to write about the business of design for him.

A So then it was a realization that I am a writer, I've been fighting for Habitat for a while, that I've been going to business school, So, you know, can I find my own voice in this space? And I think John Czarnecki really opened that door for me when it came to giving me a column in a printed magazine at the time. So it went from being a curated space to something that I actually felt I could own as my own voice within practice. What writing does and what putting yourself out there does for, for anyone, and I encourage anyone to do this, is it shares a little bit about your unique perspective. And you ultimately, if your voice gets big enough, other people find you. So, you know, Mark and I found one another through Entre Architect. You know, I asked him about podcasting, which led to us and Practice Disrupted. And then I started talking to Ryan seriously, and this was all going on when Slack was being acquired by Salesforce and me thoroughly considering what my next move is, and whether or not I wanna take on practice of architecture full time. And it was a it's a it was a long, hard conversation.

A The golden handcuffs are real. There's an impact on the business. We talked about the impact on the business if I run for AIA because that's time away from the business as a solo practitioner to build the business. And there's all these things happening in tech, that I was working with my manager to say, what type of severance package can I get here? And the odd thing about technology, and the odd thing about working in a large enterprise is that that in itself was, like, almost a year long journey to get to leave Salesforce and Slack with a severance package, but it also gave me a runway to build practice of architecture that I was a lot more comfortable with. It was just an interesting time because I wasn't doing a lot for Salesforce and Slack. I wasn't building the business because I didn't feel like I could commit enough time to the business. And meanwhile, I was trying to find a way to negotiate my way out of Salesforce and Slack. And the problem that I've never heard about any architecture firm having, right, is in large enterprise businesses, sometimes you get under these, what we call empire builders.

A So they want to have as much headcount under them because that, in their head, that means they're more important, or that, like, depending on your role, then you're entitled, quote unquote entitled to have more headcount under you. And our leadership was transitioning so often, like we had one point in time where I think in the course of 4 months, we had 3 different leaders. So depending on whether or not I ended up under an empire builder, and the whole point of me getting severance is saying, there there's no longer a business need for Evelyn to be, like, present in this company. We don't need this headcount in our group. So that was just, like, what I was battling on that side.

B I mean, I don't know how much you wanna talk about this, and I think that you leaving Slack to when Salesforce acquired Slack, I think that changed things fundamentally. Like, you at Slack made sense. I think when you went to Salesforce, it it's a different organization entirely.

A It's a different piece. But also,

B you know, when we were working together on the podcast in the kinda early years, like, you were working on building out the business. So the first, let's talk about the things that came first. It was the podcast in the POA lab. Right?

A Yeah. So the practice community and lab. I think it, you know, it was this idea that, like, I was we were we were hearing from the podcast that we're not alone in this. Mhmm. So for me, it was partly, like, is there a community is there a place where all of these people that are listening to us that are like, hey. I believe in what they're saying on Praxis Disrupted could come and talk and, like, feel like they're a part of something bigger. Mhmm. Right? Like, where where all of our disruptors can come and hang together and share business ideas or share ideas of how to be on like like intrepreneurs.

A And in all honesty, I haven't been able to nurture that community as much as I wanted to because I had 2 jobs.

B But we still we all would come together. I Yeah. I mean, I was on a bunch of those calls, and that was really nice because that was kinda during the pandemic.

A Yeah. We

B were meeting on a regular basis. It was kinda like our own little, I don't know, I felt like it was a nice little place when I needed community to go to hang out.

A Right. And some incredible friendships, honestly, have come out of that community. Like, I don't I would never would have known Adam Gayle if he had have signed up for the community, and now he's running for president of AIA Florida. He was past convention chair and asked me to go speak at AIA, Florida. You know, he participates in ACE Lab a lot, which I'm an advisor of. So, like, I I would like to believe that everybody is getting a lot of mutual benefit out of being a part of the community.

B Oh, yeah. And let's talk about ACE Lab because they were another partner, and so you have expanded you have, like, a webinar going right now. Right? Right.

A Right. So I have a designing for success. They brought me on to run monthly webinars the second Tuesday of every month called it's a designing for success series. I'm an adviser to a handful of technology firms. There it's it's been interesting because when I go and I talk to a lot of architects, or when I'm asked to talk at a lot of conferences, they they want me to give, like, what is my perspective? What is the outside perspective of what's going on within the industry? And I think people are often surprised about how much both not only venture capitalism, but private equity funding is being spent in the AEC industry. And because I've been talking about that more, there's a number of startups in the industry that have reached out to me to become an advisor. And for those of you who don't know, a lot of these startups that have VC funding are eventually looking for an exit. So as an advisor, there's an equity play where I'm not paid for my hours advising them.

A But if they do find an exit, then I get equity in the firm when they make that sale, and then and then there's an opportunity for me to get paid. But AceLab was one of those people that approached me for an adviser, and they wanted to also they they asked the question, how can we get more people over to the lab and over to practice of architecture? So that's also kind of been mutually beneficial.

B Mhmm. And then Kanoa?

A Kanoa, same thing. Kanoa Circle, a circle advisor is what they call us. So it's been interesting to and that came out of Federico coming on the podcast. Mhmm. Right? And he ultimately, he wanted to begin to connect with more architects. And it's been interesting to see the evolution of Kanoa because at first, they were going after enterprise clients. So enterprise clients being like the Googles, the Facebooks, the Amazons of the world, and now they've pivoted. And now their main focus, and I was like, I could I could help them when I was in in workplace in Slack and Salesforce.

A But then my my help became if they stayed on that path, my help would have been a lot less. But now they pivoted back to individual designers. So it's really connecting individual designers with with Kanoa. If you love what Miro and Mural do from a brainstorming standpoint, think about being able to drop in plans, your Pinterest board, and get pricing on furniture to scale and, like, order all on one platform. It's been really amazing to see their evolution.

B I have a friend in New York City who is in on design of that scale commercial design, and she's, like, obsessed. She thinks it's the coolest thing and was at their huge event up in New York, I think, last month, and, she was there with them hanging out. And I think it's gonna do a lot for the interior design world, interior architecture world.

A I think it will, and I think there's an opportunity to actually expand into other markets. And and the other thing that they do, because Federico is so interested in sustainability, really is, like, any of their pieces that are in their catalog, the offices become the next showroom. Right? When you're ready to change out chairs, you just put it on their marketplace.

B So my friends, Brent and Megan, they actually had a product featured on Kanoe and their company is called medium small and it was a chair that they designed and fabricated and that got featured in their product list.

A Yeah. And I think that's the other thing that they're doing. They're making connections with, of course, the big manufacturers, but they're also really centered on what are smaller manufacturers doing amazing things and finding new ways to highlight those designers and manufacturers to

B Mhmm.

A Architects. So that's like it's a whole system. Everything in the system, I think, as we know

B Yes. As we know.

A When it comes to these things.

B So tell me about what is gumption? I don't know that's new to me.

A This might rub architects the wrong way a little bit, but here's where technology is headed. So gumption just came out of stealth, somebody who has a long history of doing corporate interiors is one of the cofounders on the architectural side, but it's essentially helping DIYers schedule and, like, source materials and schedule out their projects. So it's gonna be like, I want to redo my kitchen. So, okay, scan your kitchen with your phone. And then from that scan, it can tell you like how much materials you want to order. It can give you I don't know if they're quite there yet. I might be like going down the road map, but it can essentially showcase, like, tell you how many materials you should you should order and then what order you should do things in. And then it'll essentially say, like, okay, when do you want your projects to be completed? Then then it'll help you build out a project scheduler.

A This is mostly for DIYers. And then it'll remind you kind of when you need to order the next materials so it's there in time for your next piece of the project.

B So it sounds like I think that the tech startup advisor piece makes a lot of sense to me coming off of your role with Slack and all that you've been learning through the tech side. A really important piece of this that I wanna talk about is your work with women defining AI because I think that has emerged as the hot topic and you seem to be you seem to have your finger on the pulse there. Tell us about women defining AI.

A I'm so not technical, which is, like, funny. When it comes to what everyone else in women defining AI knows, I feel like there's like a much deeper learning curve Mhmm. For me. And I've started to build out a glossary, which will be available free by the time this go, like, is released, but it's, like, essentially an AI glossary for architects that helps you with the alphabet soup of all the acronyms related to AI or even the language that our people are using. Right? Including it is shocking to me having learned the terminology that architects aren't talking more about human in the loop related to AI work processes. Because, like, that's that's our touch point, but that's that's not a part of our vocabulary, but it should be. But just understanding, for instance, what is LLM? What are their various different LLMs, what are their different use cases. But the truth about AI is that the learning curve and the opportunity is actually steep for everyone, even if you're deep in technology.

A So women defining AI, their mission, their vision, and their founders were on this past season. Helen, who is a coworker or previous alumni of me at Slack, and and Nicole were talking about, like, really women defining AI as a community is meant to help increase this technology gap between men and women that exist in the technology sector by helping uptrain more women around AI. And part of what they're doing and part of what they've rolled out in the community is these courses. So they have right now they have 3 modules where it's actually, I would say 5 to 10 minute little videos that you watch and that give you an exercise to do. And then you do the exercise and you kind of share it out to whoever's going through the same cohort at the time. And Helen and one other individual within Women Defining AI who is can't leave her full time job right now, so I'm not gonna name that individual, spun it off into another company called Almost Technical, and they've begun running these modules for different corporations. So they've done it in house at Slack. But it's it's even, like, for people on the the g and a side of the business, like the for the non developers and nonengineers to think about how do I start how do I know enough about this technology to start leveraging it in my everyday use? How can I use AI to help me with a spreadsheet better? And it's really if you think about where people, like, get so disillusioned by AI, it's because one person might say, oh, I did this amazing thing with chatgpt, And then somebody and then their to their friend, and their friend goes and tries it.

A And the stuff that they get back is garbage. And that's kind of the end of their AI experience. Right? But we wanna get them over that hump and help them understand, like, how do you properly prompt things to get out of it what you desire and and set the mindset that this is very experimental. It's still in development. So that's what Almost technical is doing. And right now, I just talked with them, and we're gonna be working in partnership with Practice of Architecture to begin to build out an almost technical series that is industry specific. So we're going to start with architecture and roll that out first within the practice community plus lab, but then as firms so we're looking at getting cohorts of, I would say, ultimately 15 to 20 people. But if it if there's any firms that are interested in then having anybody, But it's really looking at how AI affects everything you're doing from emails to if you think if you can think about, like, or RFIs or, you know, even scanning your last specification books and then using a chatbot to kind of access the resources and and the spec book on a current project that you're working on.

A But beginning to get individuals to think about how they can implement AI that that way and case studies that are specific to architecture, that's what we're gonna be rolling out q 3 of this year.

B Yeah. And you were telling me you felt like there's a lot of discussion about AI related to design, but you're kinda considering how it could show up in other areas. Right?

A Right. So business operations, marketing, communications, but also indirectly supporting the the construction administration or or project from from an non design standpoint. Mhmm. So one of the conversations we actually had in the community that I don't think Elise has had the opportunity to try was we had I built my first chatbot just by uploading all of my contract design magazine articles, and it was interesting, like, the responses I was get getting, but I I could see where they were pulling from my information. So Elise had this idea of what if I take the cover sheet of every single one of my projects my firm has ever done, and then I can say, how many projects have we done in this area? Or how many corporate interiors of this size have we done? You know, all those things that you, even from your marketing experience at Perkins and Wills and other places, that you probably would have to, like, switch like, do a ton of research. To, like, pull those facts and figures into, like, a database.

B Clients kept coming up with new ways to torture the marketing department. They would say, we need to know how many change orders you had on this project and we'd be like, we don't know because they didn't document that. So it's just like, you know, pulling all this data after the fact when it's not something that you're tracking in real time like it becomes super difficult.

A Yeah, so that's like, even from helping from a marketing standpoint, like, of course, I think there's plenty of use cases of how you use AI to write a social media post, but not specifically how do you use AI and every single one of your RFPs historically to inform new RFP responses going forward. Right? Mhmm.

B So if I was talking to your chatbot, what would I learn from your chatbot on Contract Magazine? Was that talking to Evelyn or talking to Contract Magazine? It's interesting. No.

A Because I think well, all of those articles were written in my voice. Right? So so I was more happy with the responses that I was getting out of my own chatbot than I was getting out of generic chat GPT because it kind of adopted adopted my voice. Right? Mhmm. You know, I asked it several questions that were related to my contract magazine articles about better health mental health and wellness, about being the first at Affirm to kinda create the company's maternity and paternity leave policies and look like what does that look like? But then I did turn the model on so it could access additional information outside of what I uploaded it. So then it also, like, supplemented it with additional source, like, resources. So it it has hallucinations as they call them. Nothing's perfect. But it was just it was just fun to know that I, like, it took me all of, I don't know, it took me less than 4 minutes to create a chatbot from data that I had on-site.

B That's insane. That's really crazy. And and it doesn't surprise me that you would be someone that would create your own chatbot. So basically and this taps into something else that you'd been offering through of architecture, which was training, essentially. You've been and I think we worked on a couple of things together, but you had a couple of different online programs that people could sign up for to learn.

A Yeah. And I I think that'll that'll continue and that'll grow when I have more time. I've kind of limited, like, the online webinars to what I'm doing with ACELab, But what I am encouraging more people to do within the community is that we have this channel, and I'm probably doing more of it honestly than anyone else, but it's this whole idea of designing in public within the safe realm of the community. So we have in there a lot of community members that are actually interested in developing their own courses and getting feedback. And designing a public channel is meant for people to be able to bounce ideas off of them. You know, if this does resonate with you, is this is this kind of viable, what recommendations do you have. So, you know, and through that even, we will be running the 1st WDAI, almost technical module through this whole idea of designing in public and refining it before we go out to other firms. So really, the community for me is how it's meant to be at an affordable level where most people can join, but I would hope that people get out so much more of the community than, than the monthly costs, including finding other products and services that they can deliver that builds their own value and and and wealth as architects.

B I don't wanna put words in your mouth because I definitely wanna hear what you your, like, vision for your company is. But I I mean, at least with the lab, I always saw it as kind of a little mini incubator within the industry. It's like for all the misfits who are interested in these kind of topics that don't squarely fit into architecture capital a, This is a place where we can come together and share ideas and kinda support each other and have dialogue about other possibilities around the industry. But, I guess, what is your vision?

A Now I think that's ultimately the vision for the lab, and I don't want to put the cart before the horse either, but I think when I was when I was building out practice of architecture in business school and I was learning about all of these accelerator programs that were coming out. And I was like, how do I create, like, an accelerator within the AEC industry? So Larry Fabroni is going to be joining the of architecture. He's finishing his MBA up at Chicago Booth, and he's actually been really immersed in both learning the ins and outs of, venture capitalism and private equity and how to to seek investment, but also, you know, how do you really grow tests and grow products and services in in new ways? So I'm waiting for him to graduate. I'm waiting for him to graduate and get more time on his plate, but we'll we will be launching a series of courses and we're we're looking at partnering actually with a number of universities from a certificate program on entrepreneurialism and architect, And we have we've already designed, like, 3 or 4 modules. And I think I can get to practice of architecture being an accelerator program within 2025. I might be a little bit busy next year, but I would hope to launch. No. Honestly, I hope to launch kind of our 1st accelerator cohort in 2025 with with Larry at the the helm, and we're already looking at how we would how we would fund that.

B I'm not laughing at you doing this. I know you will do it because I know you. I'm laughing that you said I might be kinda busy.

A Yes. But that was a realization that I, like, I always thought I would have to self fund because, I mean, you have been through business school as well, and I didn't I I took the track that didn't pay attention to any of that VC and PE stuff, so so I didn't know my way around that, like, world. Right? But Larry has kind of invested his time in his MBA program and learning about that that world, and he's like, well, let's let's let's do this thing. So the hope would actually be that we could take somebody idea from idea to company by, 1, going through all of these entrepreneurial modules that we create that then becomes kind of like a an incubator to the accelerator, if you will. Like Do you

B feel like this is gonna be geared into tech or, like, do you feel like it's gonna be strictly product based or do you feel like I mean, because okay. Here's the breakdown that I always see. From the realm of architecture, we're talking about professional services, but a lot of the VC world is talking about basically a product. You're selling some level product. So, I guess, how are you thinking about split, and what does that look like? Or maybe you don't know. I don't know.

A Well, I mean, I think we're I I mean, honestly, I think we're we're keeping it open. And there there is a crossover. Right? So, like, a for instance, and I'm gonna say this because I know she doesn't listen to this podcast, but it's okay, but a for instance is there is a friend of mine or a colleague of mine who I went to MBA school who lives, like, 2 blocks away from me, and she started this company, her husband in particular, her partner in this particular, started a company called Honey Homes. You pay a monthly flat rate, and they have a designated handyman for you that makes sure that your home is, like that you change the filters when you need to change the filters, but also are available seasonally, like, when you need to hang Christmas lights and stuff. But, essentially, it's a monthly subscription service that maintains the and the upkeep of a building. So there's so many things that those type of things that can be developed that architects can actually be a part of, and it's not a new idea, like, right? I don't know how many conversations we've had about what if we actually got into the upkeep or our building or, like, how do we stay involved after occupancy? Mhmm. So so, like, a for instance, like, that would be like a a for instance type of type of thing that that touches like, that leverages technology so you receive these updates and says, you know, schedule with your handyman, whatever, but is also helping you better manage a physical asset. So there's there's those type of crossovers.

A Right? And the type of things that we built out at MK Think, you know, were entire databases for real estate portfolios for school districts, where frankly, that has been offered as a software as a service to school districts, but it it makes us the keeper of all of the data they need to make at the time, you know, or MK Think the keeper of all the data that the school district needs to make decisions about how, how they use their capital around funding and maintenance for for their own buildings. So so there's there's definitely software as a service solutions that architects could be relying on. And what right now, what Larry and I are seeing is that there's a ton of money coming into the AEC industry from private equity and VC funding, but it's primarily focused on the C part of it. So Construction. How can we shift more of that to to the a part of it to raise the value of architects?

B Right. Yeah. And I think it's fair to say we don't know what will come of it. I mean, to be honest, place for this level of experimentation is rare. I mean, there might be a few groups that are thinking about this, but it hasn't been available. I always think about, like, man, what if we had, like, an entire design studio that allowed people to think about things like this? What level of creativity could we come up with? There would be so much that could come out of it that we don't even we haven't even tapped into in our industry. There's so much creativity, and just to allow for that exercise could yield such great results. So I think it's cool that you and Larry are gonna kind of champion this in our space.

B I guess and then I really wanna know, like, you've been okay. So you've been

A full time since January. Right? January 26 was my last day.

B Okay. Yeah. So now I've been kind of excited to talk to you about this because when we were working on the podcast and I was full time working on my business, you were still you still had a job, so you kind of had that.

A There's security. Security.

B And now you've been in my shoes for the last 5 months walking without a paycheck. So I I guess I wanna know how's that experience been for you? What are you learning? I feel like there's a lot we could talk about that we haven't.

A Right. Absolutely. I I mean, I'm I'm feeling all of the pressure of being an entrepreneur. And and I have to, like, I have to part time very, very part time, but I'm paying them individuals supporting me both in the in the community and helping with social media on the podcast as as we have always had done. But it's been tough. And then there were there were some bumps along the way that kind of, I I think, happen with every business where you plan on getting some income from one source, and then it falls through. I think everyone, every entrepreneur can relate to that. And I am hopeful that that that income source will come back when it when it can, but but it is it was just, you know, it was just some some things that are definitely unforeseen.

A And then, of course, there's the on the the flip side of that, like, it's taking so much longer to to build in the income that I wanted to build. And then I think a lot of new entrepreneurs also struggle with how do I schedule my day to make sure that I'm getting everything accomplished that I need to in my business. Mhmm. And I think both you and I can suffer, and I'm sure there's suffer from there's so many things that we wanna do. Like, how do how do we decide to focus on just 1?

B Oh, yeah. I have that problem.

A Right? Like, as you said, like, just, like, listing kind of all the things that I I am doing right now to make sure that we actually move one thing forward. And then it it's also kind of a very lonely process. Like, thank thankfully, I have the WDAI and I have my Slack groups, but it's just not it's not the same of, like, having the ability to reach out to a coworker Mhmm. And just, like, talk to them about what's going on.

B I think that's why the podcast was so important for me because I felt really isolated. And I I mean, you go also through this process where you have all these learning moments that you you just have to I mean, because it's just you and you're dependent on making money based on your own action, you, like, fall through learning moments constantly. And one in retrospect is that I didn't ask for help enough early on. I was a little I think because of the pandemic, I was going through so much uncertainty that I was a little nervous and maybe insecure in some ways, and I don't think I asked for enough help. But because of you, Evelyn, I was able to get through a lot as a new entrepreneur because I had you and that was like a I mean, I think just showing up and being able to record the podcast was with you which was like this anchor point in my life during such a weird time trying to start this business. I was like, well, at least I have that. And I had you consistently for that whole period of time to say, oh, yeah, I'm not alone in this. I've got this person out there that is making me feel like my ideas are valid and it's really hard.

B I mean, the thing that I would say that people don't understand is when you're building it from scratch like you are, it's a very hard process. It takes a lot of time and energy and you can only move forward a little bit at a time because you're putting down every single decision and everything for the first time.

A So And it's never as fast as you want it to be.

B It's never as fast as you want and you can have a grand idea in your head about how it's gonna go, but then there's the reality of the constraints that you face, which is time, money, physical and mental energy, resources.

A And then things entirely out of your control.

B And things yeah. Out of your control. Totally.

A So the one amazing thing about the podcast is that it commits me to getting something done every Thursday. Like, I can let everything else in the world slip. But to keep this going on a regular basis, like, I can't I can't let it slip.

B That was my Right? That was part of my struggle with it was, like, oh, me on this thing. Like, every Thursday, I was like running into the issue of, like, I have to drop everything and go do the podcast. But I think we also approached it really differently. And I think without having to schedule around me to your point, like, you've been able to, like, charge forward a little bit faster than you would otherwise been able to do in past seasons, whereas I would slow you down a little bit.

A You also had your reasons for wanting to schedule when we did. Admittedly, I am trying to batch record ahead as as much as I can because because my my own time constraints, like my schedule is not gonna be my own frankly

B Right.

A Next year. Although I did tell Ryan that he has first right of refusal Yeah. To any of my travel dates, and I'm committed to the kids and really for my own mental health to get home, to to not spend too many weekends away.

B Right. Yeah. That's tough. So the other question I wanted to ask you about because I'm doing consulting and you decided not to do consulting, maybe we can talk just briefly about that because I think when we were creating the podcast, you were interested in doing this, I don't know what you wanna call it, passive income strategy. And I was like, no. I wanna do all the effort and I want all of my time to be required for me to get paid. And we there was, like, a tension point about that. I guess, why not consulting? Why don't you tell our audience why not consulting?

A Why not? Well, so there's a few things that have happened because I've been doing like, I've been on the consulting side of workplace strategy for, you know, school. So that's like 10 years of consulting where you don't always get to be an implementer. But, like, one thing I found with because, like, at in the beginning, you're like, oh, I'm making all these changes and the organizations are so different and the clients are so wonderful. But I was doing this exact same thing. I got tired of the same process over and over again. And I feel like, like ultimately any good consultant builds out a process that then they apply in their own unique way to every single consulting engagement that they had. So the process in itself became the grind for me. You know, it's like the, here we go again, asking all these companies for data, and we know the 10 different reasons that we're going to say we can't give you that, and then we'll have that same old conversation that we have and sit down and tell them why we need like, it just got very mundane to me.

A So so the repetitive process of that. But, like, more importantly, I think my vision is that in order for the architecture industry to survive, it needs to undergo some systemic change. Mhmm. And and I can't do that helping or working one firm at a time. Mhmm. I would rather say like, 1, find the like minded people that are interested in similar things and give them the tools to do it themselves. But I just also think that it scales so much better. The other thing with consulting is the only way that I can increase what I'm doing is by charging more, which means it eventually I price out all those people that could probably help me move the profession forward, that given where they're they are in their life, Or I spend even more hours a day nose to the grindstone supporting organizations 1 on 1.

A So I was really interested in what is this like, how does this scale in a way where I can lean into everything that I talk about health, mental health, and wellness, and be able to step away from the business and say it's gonna be fine for a month without me. And everyone that I brought in and I are gonna be fine because it's a machine and it's working, and people can leave and come back, and we can continue to grow, and we can continue to scale, and we can continue to make an impact. Like that's, I wanna be able to do that as an entrepreneur. And I don't feel like I could do that as a consultant, because you're always like, it doesn't matter if you tell your clients if you're going on vacation. I'm all about setting boundaries, but inevitably you have that one client that's just gonna drop an email or forget that, you know, or, or that believe that what they're doing is more important than like what you've prioritized. So I, I was just tired of having those conversations.

B Yeah. And and just for audience, maybe it's entertaining, but, like, there were so many discussions behind the scene between Helen and I as we were building.

A There there was a little bit of tension there. I was like, jeez, what are you doing?

B Yeah. You were trying to get me to come in and work on the passive income strategy. You're like webinars. Yeah. It's where it's at. We're gonna do webinars. We're gonna have the POA lab. And I was like, no, Evelyn, I really gotta do this consulting thing.

B But I'm glad that we've kind of found our lanes.

A We found our lanes, but I think more importantly, I'm glad that you kind of stuck to your guns on it because it's ultimately what you want it. Like, the bottom line is ultimately what you wanna do and how you wanna approach things. So if that's what's gonna make you most happy, then you need to do what's gonna make you most happy.

B No. I think we had a really good talk about it in DC. I think it was because I never got that experience, like, what you're describing where you were doing it in your career that I was like, no. I just wanna be completely immersed in what this is and test it out. I mean, there could be point where I change. I don't know. We'll see. I'm like you.

B I have a 1,000,000 ideas, and I don't have enough time to execute them all, but I see the possibilities and I'm like, there is so much potential for industry if people could just invest their time and resources and money in it.

A You could look at the glass half full perspective. Right? It's like there's so much opportunity. The glass half empty is that there's not enough opportunity is that there's not enough architects out there that are willing to create the change that we need to create to actually move the industry

B forward. No. I I think there are. They just might not be practicing anymore.

A Well, yeah. They they may have left, But that for me, that means, like, I only have to move the industry a tiny bit to make a big impact, which both talks about how little we've done in the industry to move the needle, but also, again, talks about the great opportunity that we have ahead of us if we are willing to take the chance. Mhmm.

B Absolutely. The last thing I'll say on that is just that I think one of the things that keeps me on the firm side is having worked in practice, And my husband's an architect and, like, I see what he goes through. And so it's like a daily reminder of the like, every time I think I'm like, oh, what I'm what am I doing? This is weird. What am I doing? And then I he comes home and I, like, am reminded the burden that the architects are carrying and that I'm just like, gosh, we gotta fix this because it's it's about change. It's about leading in new ways that would allow our profession and our people to be in a better place. Okay. The last thing I wanna talk about, which is one of the most exciting well, I mean, I think everything you're doing is exciting, Evelyn, but this might be the most exciting thing you're doing is that you have been, pointed to an outside board member position. Why don't you tell our audience about that?

A So this was completely unexpected. And so I am an outside board member for Shepley Bulfinch. They just reorganized how they run their board, and they have 3 outside directors that each serve a 3 year term and rotate like, one person rotates off every year. And I'm really excited about it because I've had this, like, oddly unique connection through Carol Wedge with Sheffley Bulfinch for a really long time. And then one of the senior strategists at MK Think came from Shelly Bulfinch. I was gifted a Shelly Bulfinch poster. They used to do these yearly posters, these gorgeous yearly posters of their then blueprints, their actual blueprints, they they created posters out of them. And I you know, Marjorie and Pearson gifted me one of the old Sheply Bulfinch posters.

A And I think so there's just there's just been this synergy around Shepley for whatever reason. So for me to find an opportunity to to work with them, I think, as an outside board member, has been amazing. And it's it's open. I am open to other outside board positions with approval from from Sheply, but it is an interesting opportunity that I didn't realize existed for me even a year ago. Mhmm. So that's that's interesting, and I think it really ties me back to the profession in a very meaningful way, as I pursue this, all of this growth with practice of architecture too, saying that such a large firm is excited to have my perspective, my strategic voice in the mix with their executive committee as they figure out how to grow and and take their firm into new directions as well.

B Yeah. I think you're gonna be getting some great insight, and they, in return, will also be benefiting tremendously by having you. You're doing a lot. I mean, for 5 months, I mean, I know you've been building this out before now, but, like, this is a lot for you just getting off the ground. I had no doubt. You, like, are like a road runner. I I think of you like a rocket ship and both a road runner.

A Well, the other thing is and you and I talked about this very briefly, but not deeply, is that I think because of how we put ourselves out there in the world that people automatically assume. And I just talked about a lot of stuff, though, right, about a lot of different ways to potentially, quote, unquote, make money. But I will say, like, in all honesty, I haven't seen the return on any of that yet. So, yeah, I don't know. But you and I touched a little bit briefly about how people make the assumption that we're doing better off than sometimes we actually are, And in doing so, then they're like, oh, you're too busy. We don't want to bother you for your help. And I'm like, but I, one, I'm not as busy as you think I am, and 2, I would love to help you. So I think that, you know, my only ask there is that Janine and I, both in our very different ways, are interested in moving the profession forward.

A And if you're ever listening to Practice Disrupted or reading, you know, a Prostrophy Consultants newsletter and thinking to yourself, they're too busy, or they're doing too much, or they're, I don't know, something ridiculous, like they're too high up the leadership chain to even care about my little firm.

B Yeah. Yeah. I I find it amazing when people are saying, oh, you're doing great. You're doing so well. It's nice to hear that. Thank you. But on a day to day, the life of an entrepreneur is I don't know. It doesn't I'm like, the this is it's tough.

B It's really tough. Takes a lot of discipline and it is you gotta really want it. I can tell you that. You wanna be

A an entrepreneur. Wanted it to stay to stay in it. It's not an easy road. You're never fully in it until you, like, pull the cord. Mhmm. Like, I could never fully understand your perspective until I stopped taking a regular paycheck.

B Secretly, I was hoping that that was gonna be an epiphany that you would have. I just wanted you to understand. I you get it. Now you get it. Now you get

A it. Well, I mean, the the like, yeah. But I think that's the that's true of everything. Right? Like, I I wanted to feel I wanted to believe I was empathetic towards mothers until I became A mother. A mother and then reached a whole another level

B of empathy because of it. Why don't you tell me okay. So you're you're you're 5 months in, but I wanna know also about where you see yourself going. I mean, you've got you're gonna have this year. When you hit that end of that 1st year, that'll be a big milestone and then you've got many years ahead to keep running. So what are you thinking? What is the goal? Or do you know?

A The goal. What is the goal? My so I do actually have a personal financial goal of between all of the different things, which, by the way, when people talk talk about building portfolio careers and having multiple streams of of revenue, there's reason to do that from a sustainability perspective. Right? That means as, you know, I I get paid to be on the Shuffleboard. So in 3 years, that runs out. I may or may not get renewed. But that doesn't mean that because that happens, like, hopefully, I've grown the community at that time, or I'm doing more webinars, or I'm supplementing my income in other ways. So it's done with intention that I'm not relying on a single source of income as I grow. But I've also kind of put a set a goal of myself to, by the end of 2026, to have met or exceeded what I was making when I left Salesforce.

A January 26th.

B Yeah.

A So so for me, that is a personal goal. But when I I mean, the ultimate goal is to kind of see what I've been doing out in the world, to see new wonderful firms that come out looking a lot more like some architects who just had their 10 year anniversary or a lot more like for a where we are a huge both huge fans of and you're even you even have as a client. But to to see to see more of those type of firms out in the world are celebrating that, not only the work that they're doing, but the communities that they're changing because of the work they're doing and doing it in a way that the people that work for them are really, are living a life outside of of architecture, which is what I feel is the primary ask of of generation z. There's no ending, and I don't think there's ever gonna be, like, a really hard ending. It's why I didn't call it, like, Evelyn Lee Consulting. Right? I hope that what I build in practice of architecture will continue to be a source of innovation in the industry long after I've decided.

B Oh, yeah. No doubt. Oh, I think, Evelyn, throughout your career, I've seen you pivot, and I think that will be true for the remainder of your career. You will you will continue to shape this as you see it needs to evolve because you are someone who's paying attention to market changes and trends, and I don't think you are not someone that would keep something static. So I'm imagining it will change over time, and you will take on additional things because you're very ambitious. Like, you run towards things that I am like, wow, okay. And it's really entertaining to watch you do it and then go, like, crush your goals. So,

A Entertaining is a a dressing word to be using there.

B Well, it is. I mean I mean, I don't know a lot of people that that have the tenacity that you do. And so I think that you are gonna you're gonna accomplish great things through this, so I I wish you luck. I guess that concludes kind of this episode. Anything you wanna say about next season? You kinda mentioned some architects are coming up next season.

A The next season is entirely planned already. Yeah. So we're gonna be focused on a little bit more on the back going back to the roots of of architecture. I've been talking with Architects Workers United, and it might not be next season, but the season after, we're actually gonna talk to a few of the architects that did unionize and see what came from that. So those conversations are always, like, ongoing and, yeah, well, stay tuned to great things ahead. We'll take a little break, and we will be back on August 1st with the first episode of season 9. Hi, disruptors. Thank you for joining us today on an episode of practice disrupted.

A If you like the content for today's show, you can find all of our past episodes over on practice of architecture.com/podcast. Be a part of the conversation by joining me, our speakers, and other disruptors in our community at practice of architecture.com/community. Our social media handle is practice of arch. That's practice of a r c h. We'd love to hear from you, so feel free to drop us a DM and say hello. Tune in next week for a new conversation on change in the profession.