Will Design For Food: The Intern Survival Guide to Unemployment

“We’re going to have to let you go”

A short sentence that no intern wants to hear. Unfortunately, from Dublin to Melbourne, architectural firms are making serious cutbacks to stay afloat in the current economy.

The repercussions of the worldwide economic slowdown have started to hit Vancouver, with layoffs in firms around the city. Affected architectural interns, often the first ones on the chopping block, are left to hunt for employment in a sluggish market.

‘When things become difficult, you may be competing with those who have 20 years experience’ advises an AIBC mentor. ‘Interns will need something to catch an employer's eye’.

To proactively build up employment appeal, there are a few ideas to consider while pounding the pavement.

1. Call Your Mentor
In times of uncertainty, your mentor can be a beacon of light in the mist of the storm. A lot of AIBC mentors have survived a recession and can offer perspective from their own experience.

2. Invest in Education
Whether a LEED accreditation, a Project Management degree, self-taught 3D modeling skills or a certificate in Historic Conservation, added education can give you an edge over the rest of the competition. It can open doors to specialized firms that may be lesser affected by the economic conditions and broaden your employment options.

3. Tackle those Exams
Juggling a job, overtime and the ARE is a struggle that many interns find overwhelming. Put on optimistic glasses and look at unemployment downtime as an opportunity to tackle a few exams.

4. Give Back, Improve Karma
Learning opportunities come in all shapes and sizes, and volunteering for a program such as Habitat for Humanity can allow you to both lend a hand to a struggling community and gain hands-on experience.

5. Keep Practicing the Craft
Temporary unemployment shouldn’t stop the further development of your design skills. Competitions are a great way to generate new material for your portfolio and keep your design muscles flexing.

6. Get Off the Beaten Path
The art of architecture is in itself a hotpot of science, history, fashion, economics... Downtime can be the opportunity to take a break from the conventional path and explore new alleys. To quote Frank Lloyd Wright, “a great architect is not made by way of a brain nearly so much as he is made by way of a cultivated, enriched heart”. A kink in the road is not always a detour.

Job security certainly wasn’t listed as a selling point of our chosen career at the architecture school open house. However, it’s worth keeping in mind that economic conditions are historically cyclical; a dip now will equate in a peak later. We just have to hang on until projects pick up again, preferably sooner rather than later.

Like Frank Ghery advises, ‘you've got to bumble forward into the unknown’.

Contributed by Ariane Truong IA.AIBC