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Archinect's 2023 (100% anonymous) Mental Health Survey

2023-09-27T08:08:00-04:00

It's been a little over three years since we last surveyed the architecture community about our collective mental health. In preparation for World Mental Health Day on October 10, the Archinect team seeks to check in with our audience and learn more about how our community is doing. For this special news article, we're reaching out and asking our readers to share their input and comment on how the last several years have impacted issues on mental health.

We've discussed mental health and workplace issues extensively in the past, and as we slowly reach the last quarter of 2023, we want to check the pulse of our community. Our survey asks questions that aim to help our team learn more about how architects, design professionals, students, and educators have handled and are handling the stressors related to the architecture industry.

Previously on Archinect: Mental Health in Architecture (October 2022)

Our overall goal is to use the information gathered to help guide and inform upcoming...

Mental Health in Architecture

2022-10-10T16:28:00-04:00

Burnout. Fatigue. Anxiety. Mental health. These words have become integrated into the everyday lives of architects, especially since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, looming economic crises, and socio-political injustices taking place globally the state of mental health among individuals has suffered greatly.

Mental health impacts people in many different ways. While discussions of well-being have become more common among family and friends, workplaces and schools have made it a point to address the issues and struggles employees, teams, students, and faculty face.

It's clear that everyone isn't always "okay" and that the increased awareness of mental health support and resources has grown, for the better. While October 10 is recognized as World Mental Health Day, its observance shouldn't be restricted to a single moment.

In 2020, it was important for the Archinect te...

A group of UK architects is pushing for youth movement at the top of RIBA’s leadership

2022-03-24T15:11:00-04:00

Petitioners in the UK are bidding to have an early-career architectural worker elected as the next RIBA president as a change of direction for the 188-year-old organization which they charge as “losing touch with architects, students, and the next generation of talent.”

In an open letter obtained by AJ, the group of signatories, led by Future Architects Network founder Simeon Shtebunaev, the architecture union UVW-SAW, and the Future Architects’ Front, which has been a vocal critic of RIBA’s inability to tackle the industry’s “culture of exploitation” since its inception last year.

“As student loans increase and the length of architecture courses stay the same, people are asking if the unethical working conditions merit the payoff,” RIBA’s VP for students and associates Maryam Al-Irhayim, who is also a co-signer of the letter, told the publication. “There is a lack of job security, too, as seen in the pandemic where most young people were first to be let go.”

Related on Archinect: A...

As burnout soars during the pandemic, one expert offers advice

2022-02-02T13:41:00-05:00

Architects are no strangers to burnout. In recent years, our editorial has explored the genesis of burnout in architectural circles by examining the impact of college studio culture as well as burnout and fatigue in the professional architectural workplace.

While burnout existed long before the COVID-19 pandemic, there is evidence that the upheaval of the past two years has further exacerbated an already fragile mental health landscape in the profession. In 2020, an Archinect survey of our community found that 43% of respondents were suffering from new mental health issues that they had not experienced before the pandemic, particularly anxiety, depression, and ADD.

Findings from Archinect’s COVID-19 Mental Health Survey

Heightened anxiety in the workplace is a common symptom of burnout, according to neuroscientist and author Dean Burnett. In his new piece for the BBC’s Science Focus magazine, Burnett explores the onset of burnout during the pandemic, with similar findings to thos...

Archinect's COVID-19 and Mental health survey

2020-05-29T13:47:00-04:00

With the COVID-19 quarantine period entering its third month in the United States, Archinect is seeking input from the design community regarding how the crisis has impacted issues of mental health.

Archinect has covered mental and workplace health issues extensively in the past and would like to see how this focus can incorporate the new pressures and changes brought on by the pandemic.

The survey below asks questions that attempt to grasp how the Archinect community is handling the crisis with the goal of using information gathered to guide and inform forthcoming editorial initiatives.

The responses collected may be shared in some of these new initiatives, though all names, contact, and identifying information will be kept confidentially.

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When work keeps you up at night, what do you do?

2020-02-24T18:58:00-05:00

Losing sleep can be a drag. Especially, since we know sleep deprivation drastically impacts the cognitive functions so crucial to work in architecture. Things like judgment, critical thinking, problem solving, planning, and organization, are but a few of the influenced aspects of our mental health, writes Rebecca Zucker in her Harvard Business Review essay entitled How to Stop Thinking About Work at 3am. In the piece, Zucker offers some strategies to combat one of the causes of sleep deprivation — thinking about work when we should be sleeping. Here are 3 of her pointers:

Make a to-do list: According to research by Baylor University and Emory University, makings a to-do list for the following day helps us fall asleep faster, writes Zucker. Many times, our preoccupations with work at home are due to uncompleted tasks. Writing them down acknowledges them, putting them out of the mind.
Engage in physical activity: Exercise and overall physical fitness help in our mental performance. Whe...

Are you working too hard?

2020-01-07T15:57:00-05:00

In a recent Harvard Business Review essay, Rebecca Zucker, an executive leadership coach, dove into a discussion on workaholism and over work. In the piece, she identifies 5 key signs that a professional is overworking themselves:

1. You aren't taking time off.

Zucker writes that those who consistently put off vacations, regularly work all weekend, or dismiss the idea of an occasional day off are on a path to burnout. She advocates that even smaller, more frequent breaks, like taking the weekend to regroup or allotting personal time in the evenings can be helpful in keeping energy levels sustainable.

2. You deprioritize personal relationships.

Social relationships, Zucker writes, are directly related to our health and our overall lifespan. When we put our social relationships on the back-burner to make more time for work, we are inadvertently effecting our health and wellness. Zucker cites research that suggests a lack of social relationships has the same effect as smoking 15 cigare...

2 questions to ask yourself before pulling an all-nighter

2019-10-11T12:30:00-04:00

The all-nighter is a common occurrence in architecture today, especially in school. We briefly explored the reasons for this growing phenomenon in The Architecture Student's Guide to Studio, but let's dive a little deeper into the issue. Here are 2 things you should ask yourself before you decide to pull an all-nighter:

Would I be better off getting rest and returning to the work?

Tiredness is one of the primary factors in decreased performance, both mentally and physically. We think we are "sticking it out" and "working hard" by staying awake for 48 plus hours with no sleep. We even brag about it to each other. During school, I'd always show up to studio early in the morning and one day, a colleague who had been up for around two and half days came up to me visibly exhausted and told me she kept hallucinating and having "visions." After she told me this she walked back to her desk and continued working.

I've done this before too (not to the extreme of my colleague). I stay late, tr...

Architecture: Professional calling or exploitative trap?

2019-08-19T18:30:00-04:00

The myth of the calling obscures the role of architectural support staff and encourages architects to surrender their workers’ rights. It stands in the way of solidarity between all architectural workers.

Writing in Failed Architecture, Marisa Cortright unpacks how the sense of unwavering duty implied by the architecture profession’s persistent reliance on hero myths and the idea of architecture as a calling undermines both the individual and collective interests of architectural workers, including those of non-architects like the administrative, finance, legal, public relations and business development professionals often employed by architecture firms.

Can the 4-Day Workweek Become a Thing?

2019-08-05T20:24:00-04:00

In organizations in which a shorter workweek has been implemented, nearly two-thirds (64%) of leaders reported increases in staff productivity and work quality due to a reduction of sick days and overall increased well-being. Another benefit to well-being, respondents noted, was the reduction of commutes. One less day at work helps make the weekly commute more bearable.

Alternative work schedules have been a topic of discussion for quite some time now, especially in European countries. Could this model work well in the architecture industry? Looking to other industries may provide some insights.

"In organizations in which a shorter workweek has been implemented, nearly two-thirds (64%) of leaders reported increases in staff productivity and work quality due to a reduction of sick days and overall increased well-being. Another benefit to well-being...was the reduction of commutes," write Ben Laker and Thomas Roulet, both organizational business leaders.

While the benefits are broad, the setbacks are also. Leaders have brought up concerns with this new approach with aspects like, "regulations regarding work contracts, and the associated bureaucracy to implement the four-day week, as well as challenges around staffing." This coupled with the fact that some workers expressed concern "regarding the way they will be seen by their peers and superiors" fo...

Do New Graduates Want More Money or More Time?

2019-07-26T15:48:00-04:00

Every summer, a new cohort of graduates enter the workforce. Eager to learn and grow, many will get their first taste of professional life. It is an exciting new chapter for many of them. But what are these emerging practitioners looking for in their new careers? As firms struggle with retention and talent acquisition, an understanding of what new graduates look for in an office can be a valuable investigation. What is it that they value most? Money over time? Or vice versa? And does one have to be had at the expense of the other?

Professor Ashley Whillans has a take. Her research shows a mix of values amongst students, some valued money more so than time and others time more so than money. This comes from many factors, such as the upbringing of the individual. "People who grew up in households that fought about money also are more likely to focus on money (versus time) as adults, even if they have a lot of money in the present," Whillans writes.

The professor discovered that over ...