Where Do Projects Come From?

At some point in everyone’s life, a parent or parental figure sat you down to explain where babies come from. It might have been an informative talk, or murky and euphemistic, or just deeply awkward, but… it happened. And it usually comes up again in health class in middle- or high school, where you turn red and sink lower down in your seat, listening closely while trying desperately to look like you’re not listening at all. And we turn to books, to the internet, to our more informed friends with older siblings, etc. etc. And thanks to all this information gathering, most of us head into our young adulthood with a relatively accurate sense of things.

So why am I writing about this? Well, firstly, I’d like to express my gratitude to my Danish mother, whose commitment to candor and earlier career as a nurse meant that I learned a lot of this stuff before I even knew that perhaps it was embarrassing. (Tak, Mor!)

But mainly I’m writing this because throughout my career in business development for the A/E/C industry, I am often struck by how rare a very important and analogous topic is discussed.?

Just as we learned where babies come from, architects need to learn where projects come from. We need to be having these conversations early and often–starting in architecture school, continuing through the first days of internships, into when one becomes a project leader, then a firm leader.?

Let me explain why. To start (and this is perhaps obvious but requires stating): architecture is a client-driven business. While there are always interesting examples of self-initiated projects, 99% of your work comes from an engagement with a client. We cannot and should not pretend otherwise. (This is why my architecture-website pet peeve is firms not listing their clients on the project pages. As I remember Bjarke Ingels used to say around the office: “It’s not our project; it’s our client’s project.”)

Weird things happen when architects don’t know where projects come from Sometimes it’s just funny, like when an architect was adamant that a client picked their firm (a large, multinational firm) solely based on a particular Instagram post. Other times, it’s frustrating for a marketing team, because an architect “found an RFQ” that’s due in two days, requires a complex consultant team, and is with a client with whom they’ve had zero contact, and yet… “we really should go after this.” And sometimes, it’s truly detrimental, like when architects jump off to start their own firm–only to realize that they hadn’t ever gained experience in (or even exposure to!) actually winning work. Yikes.

I recently asked my dad, who used to be a lawyer, what it was like in the practice of law. He had a clear memory from his first job at a large firm, sitting with a group of other young associates and hearing a partner tell them “it’s rough out there; we need to win more work.” This partner was unusual in this regard, because this type of information could obviously be very unsettling to young staff members. But it was something that my dad never forgot. In time, it also became very obvious that the lawyers who made partner were the ones who brought in work and maintained strong client connections. (Perhaps unsurprisingly, my dad eventually left to start his own firm, and then eventually left the practice of law to move into business and investing.) His observations underscored two essential pieces of the puzzle: the power of transparency and the intersection between individual success and firm success.

So, how do we break this strange silence in our industry? How do we have these conversations early and often?

If you’re a firm leader, be open. Talk about business development. Encourage others to partake in your weekly marketing meetings. Ask them their opinions. Don’t make go/no-go decisions in private; instead, discuss openly what factors are important and invite other opinions. Invite someone to come along to a lunch where you’re meeting your clients. Ensure that business development is present in the role responsibilities of your senior team members and make it clear what the expectations are. Treat your Marketing & Business Development team with respect and insist that others do, too. When you announce a new project, share a bit about how it was won. Encourage a culture of curiosity where there are no dumb questions. Model the behavior that you want to see.?

If you’re a mid-career professional, get engaged. Make sure that you’re contributing to business development in a way that aligns your abilities and interests with your firm’s needs. Ask for clarity on what the expectations are, and make sure that you also are given the time to do it. (Business development should not be an extracurricular.) Lean into your peers for support, for advice, and for accountability. Play an active role in the discussions of what your firm is pursuing and in creating the strategy for how to win. Put your ego aside and ask what might feel like a dumb question. (Others around you surely have the same one!) Build strong relationships with your Marketing & Business Development Team, and be a reliable and creative collaborator with them.?

If you’re a student or just starting your career, get curious. Pay attention in your Pro Practice class. Ask about a firm’s approach to business development in job interviews. (If they don’t want to answer the question, that’s telling you something.) See if you can do some work with the Marketing & Business Development Team during your internship. Ask firm leaders how they got to where they are now and what advice they would give someone starting out.?

“Knowing where projects come from” should be table stakes in our industry, but it’s not. Once we change this, we can do so many other fun, stimulating, original, exciting things with business development. (I promise, it can be fun!) So let’s start talking about it!

A special note: My personal "where do projects come from" journey could not have happened without a few key people that deserve special thanks: (in order of appearance in my life) Bill Bain, Ed Weinstein , Lesley Bain , Kelly Rodriguez and Kai-Uwe Bergmann, FAIA .