Date: April 5th, 2024

Location: One Workplace, Santa Clara

Led by: Thomas Freedman, Assoc. AIA, and Tong Zou, AIA

2024 Executive Committee: Chair: Madhubala Ayyamperumal, Assoc. AIA

Graphics Advisor: Sreedevi Krishnan, Assoc. AIA

Session Sponsors: One Workplace, AIA Silicon Valley

Overview

AIA Silicon Valley’s Christopher Kelley Leadership Development Program (CKLDP) held its second session on Friday, April 5th, hosted by One Workplace Studio in Santa Clara. The scholars from the AIA’s first CLKDP cohort on the West Coast gathered for this session themed “Entrepreneurship and Management,” which focused on the challenges and opportunities involved with business ventures and understanding of what it takes to maintain a financially stable and profitable business, especially in the San Francisco Bay Area. The program started with a collaborative workshop to identify business needs and problems, followed by a brainstorming session to develop actionable strategies with unique business visions. Towards the end, these business ideas were pitched to a panel of established architects running their practices. They shared their experience establishing and running a successful architecture firm and provided feedback on how to leverage financial knowledge to make the best decisions benefiting the company’s future.

Activity 1: Collaborative Session

Creating a Business Plan

Session 2 started with some warmup exercises to get the brain juices flowing. The group was divided into two groups. One group went around the room in a clockwise direction and the other counterclockwise and at the end of a buzzer we randomly got paired with another scholar. The first task was for Scholar A to narrate Scholar B as to why they consider themselves a great entrepreneur. After the buzzer went out Scholar B had to repeat the same as if it was their idea. This exercise was followed by each scholar having to write down their vision and challenge for a business plan, all the visions and challenges were added to a bowl, and everyone was handed out another piece of paper. The said paper had an animal name written on it, each scholar made the sound of the assigned animal and found their pack/team. Each team randomly picked a vision and a challenge, and each team came up with a business idea based on the Action Priority Matrix. During this highly involved activity, the scholars learned to identify business needs and problems, brainstormed and developed actionable strategies, and created unique business visions.

Activity 2: Lecture

The Nuts and Bolts of Business Finance

Aaron Williams, CFO, VIVE Church

L Juan Ruan, President, Realtor, Kinetic Real Estate

The second activity featured two guest speakers, Aaron Williams and L Juan Ruan, both very familiar with managing a large-scale business operation in the Bay Area. The session focused on their journeys and the things they have learned and integrated into their workplace. Scholars learned more about the entrepreneurial spirit and strategies for achieving long-term financial gain.

Activity 3: Shark Tank

Pitching My Business Plan

This activity was short yet very useful, the Business Plans created during Activity 1 were pitched to three established Architects as if they were the investors. The discussion was informative, energetic, and effective in encouraging all the visions and ideas the scholars have come up with to create their Business Plans. These esteemed architects continued the conversation with a roundtable discussion.

Activity 4: Roundtable Discussion

How Architects Manage Business

The last and final activity for the day was a Roundtable Discussion. Three practicing architects having started and maintained a firm and dealt with the financial and management challenges associated with a service-oriented business model shared their experience establishing a firm, the responsibilities of an architect to his or her employees, and ways that the architect set up oneself and business to perform over a period. This session provided a comprehensive look at how entrepreneurship and management principles function hand-in hand with the daily operations of a firm to create a business that has a strong identity, can differentiate itself from other practices, and can exceed standards both in the books and in front of the clients.

Panelists:

Ana Williamson, AIA, Principal, Ana Williamson Architect

Jeremy Metz, AIA, Principal, HPC Architecture Inc.

Steve Cox, AIA, Principal, HPC Architecture Inc.