So you think you had covid or do you know for sure? my doctor thinks I had a “mild” case earlier last month, but I didn’t get tested because it was never bad enough for me to go to the ER. I would like the antibody test to become widely
available so I can know for sure.

Didn't get tested unfortunately but had some of the symptoms myself (while I got a flu shot earlier this season to rule that out), my girlfriend got almost all of the symptoms including obscure ones as losing smell and taste and even developed pneumonia, but no test either.

It's good that you are back, now I can ask someone my Dutch related questions. Hope your girlfriend is OK.

I think I had a mild case as well. No guarantees about immunity yet...I’m definitely going to get antibody test so I can donate plasma if I truly did have it.

thanks Rob fire away! and she's fine now.

would love that immunity test as well, can come in handy to get new work too

Thanks for this, a virus's virus

I'm being pessimistic and planning on setting up the capabilities to do contract work for other firms in the state.

I had a job come back last week, one came back this week, and have leads on several more. End of March didn't look so good but spring into summer is. Manufacturing, institutional, and heathcare related work - all with existing buildings.

do you think this will freeze up construction loans, or does that ultimately come out of a different pot?

from what i took away, definitely different pots but the issue is that there's only so much debt they can take on relative to their cash/capitalization (as a whole). it could affect their ability to take on other loans. so, for example, wells fargo said that based their balance sheet, they would only take on 10B worth of loans for this program, for which they've already processed enough applications to hit that limit and they are not taking on any additional PPP loans.

BOA seems to be doing the most of the big banks. as a whole, though, this whole thing seems both rushed (understandable) but SBA was literally changing loan terms every 12 hours. in that regard, i'm not surprised that the big banks said 'well, let's see where the final rules land and we'll formulate our response afterwards' - it could have been a huge unintentional exposure for them.

Let's all remember it was you, I and many others who bailed out the banks in 2008 - don't shed a tear for the banks -

Our little big bank Regions Bank strung us along from the first day PPP became available on April 3rd right up until funds ran out today. We actually had an appointment with a banker at 9am on 4/3 that the Regions banker didn't show up to. After that, we applied online, uploaded a slew of documents and got a bunch of emails saying basically "We're processing your loan but it's just such hard work!" Meanwhile, several little banks nearby took care of any and all applicants in 2-3 days.

I just ordered some stuff from REI during their spring sale. It arrived about a week ahead of schedule ... maybe they're only keeping people working in shipping and warehousing. Making it architecture related ... anyone think this will delay their new headquarters design? I think NBBJ has the project ...

Edit: Yes they do ... http://www.nbbj.com/news/2017/3/23/reis-new-nature-centered-headquarters-design-featured-in-the-puget-sound-business-journal/

sorry to hear that, and i'll second hoping something good comes of it. My career was definitely shaped by the 2008 recession quite a bit, but seemed to have turned out ok.

A lot of clients have decided to skip payment of invoices for work architects did in February and March. That kind of behavior puts impossible financial pressure on even the biggest practices.

Yeah it's becoming more and more apparent. It just makes me wonder why the typical architecture business model is so, for lack of a better word, dumb, when a lot of the people we work are so much better positioned financially and from a business model point of view. I guess some things are just the way they are because they came to be that way over time, but when my firm's penthouses sell for tens of millions of dollars, it makes me wonder why architects' salaries are so comparatively meager compared to the rest of the professional world.

Well, I too, worked for a major firm in SF, when the bottom fell out in 08'. It took 1 year before I got another architecture job, and another 5 years to get back to where I was in 08'. You will need to be very persistent with your career from here on. Stay on top of technology, and be the best. Be willing to work long hours and weekends forever.

this pandemic has exposed the untenable nature of this profession. while i oppose everything the code presents as a solution to the problem (the exceptional meritocracy), they are not wrong in that many will have to make these sorts of choices in order to keep paying the bills. it's going to be a rude awakening for firms when students wake up and stop paying a mortgage for a degree with such a terrible return. i wouldn't be surprised if this crisis is the beginning of the end.

I am not willing to work long hours and weekends (for free) forever. I will only do 50 plus hour weeks three times a year. I will only work two weekends a year. I'm not a partner so it's not needed unless projects aren't managed correctly. PERIOD.

I also am not willing to give my life to this profession. If it comes to the point where we can only find work if we're willing to routinely work long hours and weekends, I will simply find something else to do for a living.

We've put ourselves through school, we're all smart and capable people who have invested a lot of hard work in ourselves, and have many talents to offer. Chad is right-so many of the weekends and long hours I've had to work have been completely preventable. Why isn't overtime pay standard? I'll work; just pay me for it. The 1% squeezes so much free labor out of this profession.

I love architecture and believe in it as strongly as ever, but I don't think we should feel like we need to degrade ourselves to work in this field.

alduran you are right, it's hardly worth it for most. Chad I agree, and work similar hours. very few days past office hours, extremely rare weekends. but I worry this is the exception and not the norm. being in nyc the majority of my peers are working ridiculous hours (and envious of my situation), and many are echoing what a recent feature on this website said... to be a great worker, go the extra mile, step it up, etc etc. aka turn up the exploitation. if anything i hope this will weed out the bad firms, but my gut tells me the change needs to come also from people like alduran no t willing to put up with the bullshit anymore.

Over half of your firm got laid off? How much overhead did you guys carry? Jeez, that's definitely some irresponsible financial management.

Hmm.. just a guess based on speaking with friends in the NY area - I have a pretty good idea which firm you work for... I would imagine you're good at making cocktails and classical references?

So a couple of points for things brought up here. I left architecture to work for a contractor 2 years ago as a field engineer/superintendent. I left during the "good times" this cycle because I saw how razor thing our margins were, how much debt we had, how little our management actually knew about building things and the people who did, got laid off because they were expensive when a few jobs went away. I realized if it was that precarious during "good times" the slightest hiccup was going to take it all down. On the contractor side, while we are just as exposed, it comes down to business models. The business models are just as important as the construction where as, the art side always wins in architecture and the business model is usually ignored, with needless reclines, redesigns and "hey let's do SD in sketchup and then remodel everything in Revit for CD's and blow the budget becuase the sketchup model is nonsense. Architecture is an art, a luxury and to think you'll get a middle class salary doing
grunt work at something that is a luxury just wont ever happe.

Same with developers, business is the most important item because that's what let's you build. I'm not arguing that architecture isnt valuable, that's just reality of being an architect. It's mostly centered around an intangible item that is hard to value.

in architecture, the majority of the OVERHEAD is staff.

80 laid off out of 150. Just wanted to reiterate that percentage.

virus - staff are not overhead - staff are a resource. If your firm views staff as overhead then you're working at a shitty firm with moron 'leadership'.

Yes, when you do taxes and calculate overhead just leave staff out to be PC and make chad fell good.

People, it wasn't 80 out 0f 150. If you see my original post I noted that firm had more than 150 people. They ended up laying of roughly a little less than a third of the staff.

Ah, yes, the age old debate about why architects don't get paid shit. Repeat after every payday: "Supply and demand

jla-x - Don't be obtuse. It's not about being PC. If you treat your team like they are nothing more than a cost of doing business then as management you get what you deserve.

alduran- 1/3 would be 80/240. something about your calculations seem a bit off...

If a firm is laying off over half their staff right now, they weren’t managing things right to being with. Some layoffs/cuts are to be expects, but over half the firm? Here I was thinking less than 10% of staff plus (hopefully temporary) pay cut for all was bad...

I dont understand any business less than 500 that is laying people off. There is free money to keep

your staff through the initial shutdown. The only thing I could think of t

*okay I seriously hate that I switched to android. But you get what I was trying to say.

Yes. My firm employed closer to 300 people if that helps. I just said over 150 in my original post to not cite an exact number. Ended up laying off little less than a third of staff.

I'm sorry, alduran, I did misread your statement! So not 50% laid off, less than 30%. Thank you for clarifying!

Chad - resources are overhead - technically. but if you makes you feel better I'll explain it this way - staff are the majority of your costs, so if you don't have money you consolidate. Simple math.

example: One seat will cost you about $500 for a desk, $200 in software, and let's just throw some random misc. in to add up to $1k a month. an employee as a W2 with health benefits will run you in the range of $5k to $10k a month. So let's say the average is $7500 and an employee and $1k for the seat - That's 88% for the human and 12% for what you want to call OVERHEAD. Cut one person you can probably cover your OVERHEAD for a few months. And if you don't have any work for the person you have to lay them off....the PPP is taking way too damn long anyway. Many banks are not even doing it including some big ones.

PPP isn't going to work for the majority of firms - most firms are too small for the banks, too much risk

virus - I understand all that. Most (stupid) business owners view overhead the cost of doing business that if reduced produce more profit. While staff are technically overhead they are the resource that makes your firm money and if managed correctly, profit. Obviously if your staff have no work then they are simply an expense and no amount of great management will make them profitable.

virus- for a large firm, good luck generating any kind of revenue to cover any overhead without staff. for smaller firms principals might be able to adjust their workload and pick up the slack. for larger firms, the situation is more akin to a factory- without staff, you can't generate a product (aka the drawing set). one way to view them is simply as overhead, but it's a dumb simplification of what they actually generate, which is not costs but value.

Dang Doc beat me to it. But by your description bad_hombre, your firm knows a good martini. You'd think Bob could spare some coin to keep staff on. Such a shame.

If it is Bob, that's one of the best paid and benefit offices in the city. At 80 persons, figure they are saving $500k+ a month in salaries+benefits.

And don't forget 20% pay cuts for the best people that don't get laid off.

better than working for free as some are

That would be me! As principal, I'm not taking a salary this quarter while I wait around on client payments, PPP, EIDL, etc.

sounds like some tough decisions were made

Balkins, Actually, and in the Bay Area, residential that has a minimum of 10% Below Market is allowed to proceed in construction - The firm I work for designs BMR housing and so far so good.

It also depends on when Newsome lifts the stay home order too

that's no good.... I'm sure that behavior will be remembered when openings appear at other firms.  Hopefully things will start opening up again around the time of your next milestone.  

I'm fairly happy with the transparency of my firm, even though we've also had a 20% pay cut and 40% reduction in force.

I have to agree with shell here. Even though we’ve had layoffs and 20% paycuts, management has been pretty transparent with all of us and providing constant updates. Cooper, as soon as you can/the economy lets you...run. Don’t work for people like that.

http://architecture-lobby.org/project/t-a-l-covid-19-statement/?fbclid=IwAR29CnJtOCu3E7IQxdRn3xl6GoT1iZh2cex0kxKohyoM0me6s3yr08K1834

Also, the Architecture Lobby is taking similar data for how firms are responding:

https://docs.google.com/forms/u/0/d/e/1FAIpQLSe3nDLM4MfyUyjXPSdOKOEtyFlJ6lgh_ZYu65f9_23sVgp4FA/formResponse

Autumn - I'm so sorry you were laid off. I would hope your employer didn't make the decision lightly. I am genuinely interested to know if you think a union would have protected your job?

a union? not this dead horse argument again...

Unions provide continued support during times of crisis (pandemic, war, famine), maintaining an active and educated work force for when we make it through to the other side and projects come back fast and furious. Unions can also carry health insurance so it's not just up to the firm. In going from large firms (Gensler/VOA/HOK, etc) with big corporate buying power to small firms (Smith Gill/SCB, etc) with no leverage for health insurance packages, I can say it would be a load off my mind to have that secured. I provided health insurance for myself and my family and now what? The Architecture Lobby also supports Medicare-for-all, which would negate this argument. That said, if we cannot acheive MFA then Union provided insurance would be worth my dues, IMHO. Unionization would also ensure that firms provide adequate staffing on projects, as well as capping aggressive schedules.  It can be a struggle to accommodate a 12 week process and yet I've been tasked with 10 and 8 week processes.  What happened in '08-'10 resulted in the bare bones staffing we see now and further promotes the 'work all hours because we promised the client we'd get it done in this amount of time' approach.  When I'm not billing all my worked hours to a project because the project budget can't afford it ... that's forced servitude.

And where will you find the clients to pay for all these new union derived higher wages and benefits?

the same arguments have been made regarding minimum wage in places (in the us) that have recently raised it to $15/hr.. and low and behold the sky isn't falling; somehow employers have been able to pay the higher wages (before the current shit show)

From TAL's site, which I suggest you check out if you have more questions as to "How": The dues structure is designed to be not prohibitive, and to ensure that the financial burden of Lobby projects is shared democratically. It is also our primary source of funding, so projects are directly dependent on membership. The new member dues fee schedule is as follows: Professional Membership: two-tenths of one percent of annual salary (ex.: if your salary is $50,000 a year, you would pay $100 a year). Student/Unemployed Membership: $25.00 base membership fee

http://architecture-lobby.org/get-involved/

unions are great... worked on a hospital job several years ago. prevailing wage. 11 story mob so we had an elevator. think the guys could press the button to get to the floor they needed. no... needed a union operator for that... 3-4 guys pressing buttons on the elevator making 6 figures a year for 5 years... ton of value there. Extreme example of the inefficiency caused by the mandatory division of labor but it exists at all levels. wanna see housing costs double... make them union. Want a raise based on merit... Fuhgeddaboudit... looks good on you though.

I can read between those lines well Wurdan. Ditto here too. Had one project cycle through one union strike after another (like they planned it). Added tens of millions to the cost and nearly 6 months of delays. The elevator "operator" is my favorite one tho.

Somehow, someway, I never see you people down playing the Union when they fought to get us this;

1. Weekends Off: Massive union strikes in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries led to shorter work weeks with weekends off. This allowed Americans to be home with loved ones instead of constantly working.
    
2. Paid Vacations: With summer coming to a close, take time to thank your union for the paid vacation time that made it possible to rest and relax with your family.
    
3. Family & Medical Leave Act (FMLA): Unions spearheaded the fight that resulted in the passage of this law that gives eligible employees the right to take up to 12 weeks of job-protected unpaid leave annually for family and medical reasons.
    
4. Breaks at Work—Including Lunch: Although they are now federally mandated, breaks haven't always been an employee right. Studies have shown, breaks provide important rest periods that improve safety and productivity.
    
5. Sick Leave: Without paid sick leave, many workers couldn't afford to take the time necessary to recover from illnesses and accidents.
    
6. Paid Holidays: Labor Day is one of nine paid holidays offered by most employers in the U.S. As you spend time with family and friends this Labor Day, thank your union.
    
7. Military Leave: The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act ensures those that serve their country can keep civilian employment and benefits, and seek employment free from discrimination.
    
8. 40-hour Work Week: Americans once worked 60 hours a week or more. It wasn't until the 1950's that 40-hour work weeks and 8-hour work days became standard across America thanks to union negotiations.

https://www.unionplus.org/blog/union-made/eight-reasons-thank-unions

^ this. it's easy to cherry-pick the problems with things, but we have much to thank for unions. i have many family members and friends who are/were teachers, and thanks to their unions they are living a comfortable life in retirement with great healthcare and nice pensions, unlike me who will be working well into their 70s with my paltry 401k. the self abuse of people entrenched in this profession never ceases to amaze me. it's the select few boot-lickers who "make it" close enough to the top that feel like they have some strange obligation to protect the interests of their clients who are giving them some breadcrumbs of their wealth, instead of looking out for the interest of the profession on a whole. what's good for those at the bottom is good for everyone.

Beta, I don't ignore the historical contributions. What I do not believe in is further alienation of young graduates from the realities of the profession by claiming unions will solve all their problems. The unions serve their purpose with low-level, low-ceiling disposable staff with large market shares. Architecture is a luxury product, not a fast-food burger. Very few people are buying our services and that number will drop greatly once unions step in and get their share of the fees collected.

Unions don't solve "all" problems, but they do buy an increasingly disenfranchised architect/graduate a seat at the table. Too often firms make decisions in the best interest of "The Firm" yet no one is making decisions in the best interest of those they employ, and that in a nut shell is a reason for unionization. I'm not talking about all firms, as not all companies have union employees, only those that seek to exploit labor.

So Beta, looking at this another way, are you suggesting that in your scenario, an office with a unionized production staff pool is indicative of a badly managed workplace?

Not sure I follow, however, looking at this from your scenario; are you suggesting that high-tech skilled labor, isn't worth a pot to piss in? Put another way, I don't care - some, if not many do - what graduates don't know, that's trainable, I care about what they do know. Now, you might tell me Old Man Ford knew fuck all about cars, but Carol Shelby and Ken what's his name knew about racing, and the guy on the line knew more about fuel injection, and how to get a shit ton of horsepower out of a shitty Ford.

So you tell me; who built Ford again?

I don't know. I drive a toyota sedan. It's black if that's relevant. What I meant was that these is a limit to what you can push the private sector to do.

It would seem the "profession" is on a precipice, and not because of this event, it's been there for a good long while. They thought perhaps we'll make better architects, by demanding NAAB, NCARB, and AIA do better. More integrated studios, streamlined testing, IDP, make member firms pay for architects not in the AIA - incentivizing membership, by paying for younger member fees - but none of that is stemming the crisis they've been talking about for years; lack of people joining the profession. No. None of that is working. Promises to attract women, black architects? Nope, not working. 

What would work? More, early investment, by younger professionals, with more flexibility in schedules, WFH, more employee owned, or more non-managerial staff at the decision tables. Leaders can lead, if they allow younger staff - not all staff, we all work with completely spoon-fed wet noodles - to lead. Change needs to be mandated from the top, and let younger staff charge the hill.

A-rchitects alienated themselves when they decided they wanted to be professionals like doctors and lawyers and distanced themselves from the trades. You want to make money in this field and provide a secure future for your family, forget about the elitest design bullshit you learn in school. Get your hands dirty in the trenches and learn to provide real value. A client will always value a person more if they can tell them how much something will cost than a person who can talk in circles above their head while pontificating the differences between bifurcation and the tartan grid and how critical that will be to achieving a harmonious bathroom layout. (not saying design doesn't have a place) No amount of unionizing will elevate the value that an architect can bring to a project or project team. Thankful for unions that fought and died 100 years ago... they served their purpose... created balanced laws... now go away.

Most of the architects posting in here, don't hold their pinky extended when drinking tea, so I have zero fucking clue about what you speak. Most architects here know how to speak to their clients like human beings.

Agreed Wurdan. I personally blame the AIA. It slowly shifted the concept of architect as a ‘master builder’ who knows how buildings go together to focus on just ‘design’ thus painting a tiara on our brows as pageant queens rather than dirt under our fingernails sorts. Additionally, the AIA got busted for anti-trust trying to set how architects conduct business. So there is case law now on bargaining as architects. To complicate even more, it is difficult to unionize “professional employees”, of which architects are as licensed professionals with specialized knowledge. Unions are sort of for blue-collar non-management positions to collectively push back on management as a group. So more likely than not, any attempt to unionize would be seen as anti-trust collusion violations against the free-market.

Recent grads, area not licensed, and not professionals, they're labor. Many don't want to be architects, licensed professionals. They should be allowed to collectively bargain for their rights.

.

mighty- teachers and nurses are typically in unions, so the “blue collar” stereotype is off. you're also seeing more tech workers begin to unionize. but the push against management is correct, which is why production staff needs to organize against management which clearly, by the posts on this thread, does not value it.

archi-dude? only an idiotic trumper type would actually be decrying the field hospitals being dismantled, especially when that means, sheltering in place is working, and the curve is being flattened. you're like those idiots arguing that my governor will have something to answer for, if there aren't 50k dead in our state. as moronic as wanting to end a shut-down because people aren't dying in higher numbers, oh wait, that's the same thing.

I think empty hospital ships and empty field hospitals are enough to show your hysteria on your hysteria thread central was just that. Also, the flattening started happening on the 31st, 2 weeks after most states were still business as usual with voluntary work from home, handwashing and less handshaking. And yeah, there is something to answer for when your actions based on hysteria thrust millions into joblessness.

Meh, maths and science demonstrate you don't know what the fuck you are talking about.

https://covid19.healthdata.org/united-states-of-america

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/us-map

I don't know if "archi"-dude can read charts, but from my measure, the real start of the UP curve actually started on 3/31.

You plotted deaths. Which carry an additional lag after a positive test. The accepted lag from infection to detection was on average about 2 weeks. The slowdown started on 3/31

Regardless, doesnt really matter as the western governors and Cuomo seemed to have realized the models were way off. Switched their tune real fast this week to make it look like they are champions of opening up.

No, I plotted confirmed and deaths.

Look, I know you can't read charts, or graphs, but the first two I posted, do you see that swath of color? That swath of color, as I understand it, is because we aren't doing enough testing, so the true reality of the "projections" can never really be measured, and as new - often latent - data comes in, the graphs change. Maths, and sciences.

.

No you are arguing stats. The experts have stated "we dont know." To almost every question about spread, death rates, symptoms ect. So not math and sciences speculations. And clearly the speculations were overblown in most scenarios, not all, it's a good idea to extend controls in places that are heavily served by public transport and really high density. However full facist style lockdowns countrywide in rural, suburban and as california has shown, car centric locales, unnecessary and creating way more issues then they are solving. Also source for slowdowns, NY Times casetracker was very clear when slowdowns happened per state.

No, you make "speculations" sound if it's Tarot card readings, when every single scientist, medical professional, statistician , maths people have stated the same thing; as more data, more testing have come on line, the data changes. you, are clearly only listening to the myopic idiots running the fed.

where does the graphic say people are expendable? i see 1% saying they've started layoffs and 17% considering that or furloughs. i'm more surprised both of those aren't higher.

Greg, I worked for three weeks while the sole proprietor dilly-dalied around, waiting for the governor to tell us to stay home. He didn't believe that we could remain productive. In those three weeks I was stressing out, one for my own health, but two because someone in our office had conditions making them more likely than not to get COVID. So, in referring to the 32% that are still working on the office. The 33% are those idiots still having in person meetings. Those firms are the ones that I am referring to. These are the irresponsible firms.

@Gregory, It's a little early for the staff reductions to get going. I think a spike in layoffs and furloughs is possible in the coming 3-6 weeks as pre-COVID workload is completed, no new work comes in, and PPP and EIDL money doesn't show up soon enough.

I see it. Like my firm acts like it is doing me a huge favor by labeling me and my co-workers as ‘essential’ so we can come into the office as though nothing is going on. They paint it as we’re lucky to be working during these times. They tried rotating staff every other day teleworking for two-weeks. This morning they said ‘billings are down, quality is down, and so everyone needs to be in the office working: no more teleworking.’ My health is not their primary concern and expendable; a hit to their invoicing is not as expendable. Additionally, whether we are in the office or not, judging pandemic billings versus boom billings and blaming teleworking as the primary culprit for the difference is pretty shitty.

the way I see it either:

1) you have low cash flow and due to the virus you needed to layoff or furlough fairly quickly (possibly a young firm)

or

2) you have made a lot of profit (old firm), so you could carry the firm financially for a bit, but now see a great opportunity to trim the fat and layoff the "unwanted" employees, not necessarily expendable the "unwanted" (they may be people the firm just doesn't like).

mightyaa, are you still an independent contractor at your firm? I thought I read that at one time

to add to ancient- 2b) shed the "unwanted" employees who's wages have finally started rising, realizing at the same time the crisis is producing a graduating class of terrified potential new employees who will take whatever low-ball salary you offer them. but yeah, we don't need more worker protections.

@shell; I was with my previous gig. For the last 2 though I'm salary working for a engineering firm.

@b3ta - i'm not sure i'd read those stats the same way but i do feel for you personal situation and agree - if the boss wasn't moving to make this happen, shame on them. i will say for us, at 10 people, it took a week to get everything set up so the office could go full remote. mostly software and some hardware and a lot of coordination. but we managed.

@thisis - my personal take is it totally depends on the firm. if you're a 20-50 person firm (for example) and 40% of your projected revenue dried up in the last few weeks and you don't see how it will be replaced over the next 6 months? you're not holding people for another 3-6 weeks just to wait and see. a lot of firms did exactly that back in 08/09 and ended up in serious financial trouble (with at least a half dozen in atlanta folding up shop by 2012). i think firms are much more wary about borrowing just to hold on to staff. salary reductions can also only go so far.

to put some of the financials in perspective, let's take a 20 person firm that's middle of the road (profitability, salary, etc. wise): that firm is probably doing 4M a year in gross revenue (including all pass through income - your consultants, etc). 2 principals, 2 administrative staff, 16 architectural staff with a range of experiences. in a mid-tier city rent wise (minneapolis, houston, atlanta, etc). your net revenue is probably closer to 2.8-3M. your profitability is probably close to 20%. meaning, on that 3M, you cleared 600k in profit. that gets distributed however among the owners and staff but let's say each staff person got an average of 6k bonus. That leaves us with two sets of numbers: a potential savings of just under 500k, which (because this is likely to be an LLP or LLC) means it's been taxed as personal income in the past year with a tax rate of 25%. That leaves 370k in reserve, assuming the partners took zero bonus. On the flip side, the annual monthly expenses for the firm is approximately 200k. About 75% of this will be everyone's salaries, the balance being rent, insurance, everything else. So: our firm has to make 200k a month in net revenue to break even. If there's a 25% drop in revenue, our profitability is totally wiped out and we're 5% in the negative (actual losses). Keep adding on to the actual losses for every % the revenue drops. A 5% actual loss probably means losing 2 of the 16 people. A 10% actual loss probably means 4.

In the above - in the unlikely event the partner's took a zero bonus, they'd have (in theory) enough to cover a 25% drop in revenue, assuming they'd put it all there and keep everyone's salary whole. and, yes, you could do a 5-10% salary reduction. there's options for sure. but if you get to a point where your revenue drops 40% or more and you can't guarantee it will come back within 3 months... you're going to have to lay people off.

Very clear and concise explanation. Thank you for that.

With 2008/09 fresh in everyone's mind, I'd like to think that smart firms have been squirreling away cash during the boom we've seen the last 5 years. Financial experts tell me personally to have 3-6 months of savings on hand for my family--i'd say that's sound advice for small businesses too. So far, my firm has communicated to the staff that we can weather 3-6 months of disruption--which has been reassuring.

@gibbost - perhaps. it isn't that easy to do. and there's a real question in that: would you burn out all your savings to save all your staff for 6 months? when the work isn't there and there's no real sense of if/when it will return? if you do, that's 5 years of savings gone and you've put the firm at a real risk of being vulnerable to any further disruptions over the following 6-12 months. i just don't seem many firms making that decision.

Greg, that's the business we're in. That's the gamble we all take--as an employee and as a firm owner. It's difficult to project out more than 6 months even when the economy is good. I understand the challenges owners face and none of us have a crystal ball. But just as I would totally burn thru my own savings to keep the lights on here at home (in lieu of that vacation we all wanted to take next year)--I'm hoping that firms are doing everything they possibly can to keep their most valuable resource. What is the point of savings if not for a time like this?

The problem with Unions in Architecture is they would be at odds with firm survival in some key instances. We, most of us, need to have firms to work for no individual has the capacity to design an airport or Tesla Ventilator factory on their own. Unions make reducing staff and cutting wages and expenses in the interest of keeping the whole firm going very difficult.

i suppose this is the issue at hand. if you view this through the lens of owners, then of course you will think that it is at odds with its "survival," since it will indeed be the owners/management surviving any layoffs and reductions. on the other hand, if you view it through the lends of workers, then you tend to think that they are actually what makes the firms survival possible, hence getting the axe first seems a bit unfair. i actually favor cooperative firm ownership before unions, though; because a) most firms are small operations and b) it recognizes that architecture is a team discipline, both internally and externally, and that even if you are just "production," you deserve some stake (in some proportional way, of course) because without making what you produce (drawing sets), the firm is nothing.

No architecture is "essential", unless you are doing healthcare projects. Report your fuckhead boss.

LA or Minneapolis?

Minneapolis

Yikes, JMArch. Thanks for sharing but yes this is scary. Hang in there!

sorry to hear that. just goes to show, that while your efforts to put in extra time and energy were noble, at the end of the day the company doesn't care and will do what's "best" for the company.. which is why employees should always do what's best for them.

Just mention the name JMArch. They didnt give a shit about your extra efforts, and now you are trying to protect them? SMH

So sorry.

480 total. Monday I think that they had 1,300 across all offices. Going to be a little interesting in the coming weeks for whoever is left. 

Which firm was it?

Well the top three biggest firms in Minneapolis are Nelson, HGA, and RSP. I'd say any one or all of those firms are laying off large numbers of people right now.

You forgot one, three vowels, two consonants.

You'll have to narrow it down a bit. I've never practiced in Minneapolis and haven't lived in MN for six years.

Also I said top three, not top four.  8-)

They used to be THE firm in MPLS - Ellerbe Becket

Oh, AECOM. Haven't really followed their work.

i thought this was about DLR... i hear they've done a big layoff too.

DLR, HGA, Nelson, RSP, they are all laying off a lot of people. They tend to have the practice of hire and fire based on work load so this isn't a surprise to me.

HKS, too

Geez, I didn't think this was going to become a thing... I wasn't attempting to protect anyone - just acting with a little professional discretion. It's sucking pretty hard for all of us right now. It was DLR that pulled the trigger, not that that matters now. There are other firms in the area that did this the day that quarantine was announced. Cash has stopped flowing, projects are pushed out 3-4 months, existing fees are going uncollected (on par with the way that the profession generally operates)... backlog evaporates, current workload gets cut in half - and I apparently was mistaken that being able to self-perform projects from inception to completion + development of automation tools on the side was a marketable commodity. Oops. Time to polish the Python skills and start rebuilding my lapsed consulting career from '08 + '09.

Let me correct that, Fuck your China

Wuhan virus ruined world....WHO was propaganda parrot for China. Need a version of the CIA that spy’s on infectious disease like they do for terrorism. Need to spy on China hardcore after this shit and completely close all travel to and from until the Govt allows in inspectors (like we did with Iran and NK nuclear programs)

Also, to act super dumb like other archinecters, (insert bad hot-take here)

Media hot-take good when about trump being bad, bad when about China being bad because that’s racist because China has lots of Chinese people in it and some rich white Americans were mean to Chinese people in the 1800’s. Can I get a woke badge for that please?

Why can’t you dummies criticize the Chinese government? Are you that ideologically invested in the last hold out of communism’s success?

do you get all your news from reddit jla?

The second post up was written with a Russian accent. If you read it like that it sounds better

I’m not Russian, just sometimes think in a Russian accent.

Curt, no, it’s common sense that China lied big time. No fucking way in the devils asshole did such a highly infectious disease not spread like fire through the dense cities of China when 5 million people left Wuhan while it was spreading. No possible way. It’s well known now that they hid the truth, made some docs disappear (likely) and greatly underreported cases...but what really puzzles me is why they hid the known fact that there were a large amount of asymptotic cases....that’s what makes me wonder. If they wanted to play down the death rate, they could have included those and cut it in half....but they didn’t. They hid that important fact. Why would they want to do that? Think about that.

They also let people travel the world for at least a month while they knew about this virus and hid it. They are either malicious or responsible for great negligence. Either way, doesn’t matter. Effects are the same.

And the WHO was either ineffective, complacent, or completely ignorant. Again, doesn’t matter. Same effect.

Comments hidden. Lol. So change word China to America and I bet the comments wouldn’t be hidden. They would be celebrated.

1) China is an authoritarian nation & that culture of authoritarianism absolutely exacerbated this crisis. 

2) This criticism also applies to the US. 

3) While technically not wrong, harping on the failures of the CCP diverts energy toward punishment and sows division rather than cooperation toward a common solution. Pointing fingers will only prolong the crisis. 

4) Insisting on using a geographically-based term, while not inherently racist, fuels already rising anti-Asian sentiment in the US and elsewhere. 

5) Pretending that criticism of 3 and 4 is an endorsement of China and/or communism is transparently fallacious at best and a bad faith deflection at worst.

#4 is completely ridiculous. Lyme disease, Ebola, Zika, Hong Kong flu, Spanish flu, etc etc etc. Bullshit PR stunt by WHO and China. Not a big deal, but really highlights and helps the Chinese states PR efforts to comply with this ridiculous line of thought.

Diseases are named after places for a good reason. The conditions of their place of origin contributes to the emergence of the disease (natural or man made)

I remember very early on there was a push to rebrand the naming something that has no mention of China.

jla, better to be sarcastic around here. Thank you China for giving us all of this time at home with our loved ones and for decimating our economy. Thank you China for the bright blue skies too!

#3 figure out who cannot be trusted to avoid future problems. Figure out who’s lying to avoid making decisions based on bad data. Hold parties accountable so that they don’t do again. You do realize that authoritarian states like China, NK, Russia, only understand one thing...reward and punishment. They act out of self interest. Sanctions and economic deals is how we handle them...that’s all they understand. They don’t negotiate out of good will. They are strong arm states. Again, this all has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the Chinese people in China or abroad. Nothing at all. This is a criticism of the Chinese government’s actions that hurt the world along with the Chinese people.

same olddoctor, oh yes! Thank you China and congratulations on success of being coronavirus free. Must be a very very good system. Far superior than rest of world.

Yes of course the WHO conspired with China to absolve them of blame for this disease. Also they did it 4 1/2 years prior to the outbreak. Masterful move.

It doesn't matter if you personally are racist. By saying the things that racists also say, you give them cover and justification. I've lost count of how many times I've tried to explain this in various threads around this forum but at this point I have to assume you're deliberately misunderstanding.

Is it racist to suggest that the state department had concerns about the safety of the bio lab in Wuhan where they study bat coronavirus and the new information that bats aren’t really sold in those wet markets? I don’t understand how racism comes into play here. Are people from the town of Lyme Connecticut persecuted for Lyme disease?

what if we discover that it was actually lab made? Do we still have to not link it to China? Should we call North Korean nukes just nukes? Should we call “the Italian mafia” the “mafia equally likely to be from anywhere”?

The conditions of place lead to the emergence of particular things. Ignoring the place of origin to spare some bystanders the racial slurs from toothless hillbillies is completely asinine and dishonest.

Whether this came from a market, or a lab, it’s still “man made”. Pangolins, bats,
and humans don’t play together in nature.

Whether caused by hunting Bush meat along the Ebola river, prancing around in tall grass in the town of Lyme, or playing with bat viruses in Wuhan, these diseases are linked to specific natural, cultural, and political, conditions. Obscuring that reality does no good.

Take it up with the WHO. I've said all I care to.

if you use the ignore feature, jla-x is relegated to the echo chamber where he feels most at home.

Seems like I’ve been dampening your echo chamber.

Mission complete, RB called me an asshole.

Solution, cut Chinese travel off indefinitely until they allow a US UN convoy into their country to study and monitor infectious diseases. Not WHO.

If this was something as deadly as bird flu, it would be the end of the world.

Can’t trust their word on matters this serious.

The last 3 efforts I've done (all post Covid-19) are all what I'd consider "hustle" work, that if I were such a person, I'd moonlight on. They all exist solely because they're visible enough that a permit is needed, and they all involve a "hide these things" non-permitted construction phase. Last time I tried to whistle blow this stuff more officially, the city ignored it and I got a lot of flack for it. Now, we're in the process of becoming 3rd party inspectors, since the city won't be doing inspections.

I'm seriously wondering how it's supposed to work when we get to the part where I'm supposed to inspect something knowing what's behind that wall.  Maybe the higher ups will send someone else in the office?  If they send me, I'm definitely going to flag it... though that might be moot anyway since all we're getting is crumbs right now and I'm sure my previous history of integrity won't be looked at brightly in the coming quarters.

thisisnotmyname - where did you find this information about the PPP money running out and only 4% being paid out?

@Chad Miller: here https://www.cnbc.com/2020/04/15/these-sba-emergency-business-loans-hit-by-delays-and-funding-issues.html

Pelosi and Schumer are the reason firms smaller than 500pp are even getting anything. The GOP only wanted to bail out larger companies. Read up before bullshitting around.

Does anyone have any idea how much it would cost to fully fund PPP? Is it in the trillions? Was the program ever really practical? In hindsight, some kind of pause on all residential and commercial rent and mortgage payments along with offering food stamps to everyone in the USA may have been more effective and easier to implement as a way to facilitate waiting out the epidemic.

It is true.

Is that Gensler?

Yea, Gensler.

did that just happen? I'm working with them on a project

Gensler is a fairly distributed firm so the layoffs and furloughs have been in waves across their various offices. Usually regional decisions and I think they have 5-7 "regions" in the US with about 5 offices in each region.

Yep, 20% laid off at Gensler. About 1600 people let go worldwide. Half laid off, half furloughed, principals took pay cuts and some staff reduced hours. A billion
dollar firm dried up in 6 weeks.

"what the office did to me" - What do you mean? In how they told you?

Yea, what does this mean?

I can’t quite disclose the termination process that I went through here due to the agreement that I signed with my office. But the way they delivered the message of my termination was not humane, that’s all I can say. This company is all about money.  If you can be a corporate junkie, this is the perfect place to be, otherwise, you won’t last too long.  

Only in America do corporations hold such power that the person just terminated feels a need to protect the corporate overlord.

I suspect lot of firm owners know they can get away with all sorts of despicable actions because "professionalism" and "not burning bridges" means everybody will keep their mouth shut.

Sorry to hear as a former employee. They are brutal when it comes to letting people go when their ship is sinking. We are just cogs in the wheel no matter how much they pretend to care.

Yup, I was there too, back in 08' when I had 2 years at a big office in SF. I've been in Recession mode(putting in extra hours and work weekends) for 11 years now.

It's your first, but it won't be your last.

code - your recession mode sounds like a great way to burn out and not protect yourself from being laid off.

working more does not protect you from anything if everyone else is doing the same thing. try providing value via knowledge or skills other folks don't have. much more layoff proof.

yes- in all likelihood these decisions, even if they haven’t happened, are already made aka the bosses already have at least a mental list of who goes first. putting in more time, above and beyond, won’t change a damn thing except to risk you personal well-being

so they run on really thin margins...even the biggest and greatest don't really make money. good to know.

If it holds any meaning... I talked about the history of fee rates a while back.... https://archinect.com/blog/article/101927024/george-nelson-nailed-our-design-fee-dilemma-60-years-ago

really great post, thanks for sharing. need to read that book!

Good to hear your firm isn't shit. Also have a strong disdain for corporate america. Not sure I'm seeing the connection here unless your firm is a corporation?

last sentence is more of a cute one-liner but we have .inc at the end of our firm's name after all.

corporate america will come out of this just fine. they've probably been looking forward to a good plague to kill off the sickly competition. Shit, Lime scooters laid off 12% of its workforce in January yet somehow managed to have enough money to buy up Boosted's IP. Fuck people hard, kill them if you can, but leave just enough to make and buy our shit.

amazing. same for my office. firms that aren't able to do this have some serious soul searching to do.

I'm in a similar situation, Non. Sounds like our SBA was approved so that should help float us all for a little while. Thankfully we still have a lot of projects moving ahead. I feel lucky to work at a firm that gives a shit about the people they employ. I feel disappointed that it's not more common.

I'm thinking the profession needs to take a run at that anti-trust ruling. I mean if we can't make the internet a utility, we need to hit that.

Congrats NS. We appear to be fine over here, at least from everything that's been communicated. Who knows for the future though, maybe we need to rehash things over virtual HH.

Good to see similar approaches are out there.

Similar approach in my office south of the 49th parallel. They still expect us to be as billable and productive as we would normally be ... so that's apparently the difference between us and you commies up north (though between you and me, the office would let your hours slide a little if you had a good reason for it like kids, sickness, etc.).

We got stiff-armed on the PPP as a "multi-owner" [2 people, both owners] cuz our bank decided to run it that way. Now they are out of funding. IRS stimulus did arrive on 4/15 (minus Trump signature as direct deposit). No idea on EIDL...not a peep from SBA on that since applying 3/31

Next will be layoffs. SOM employees, make sure to back your shit up, it gets ugly up in that office.

I was trying to be optimistic... hoping it will shake up the job-market and cause the industry to take a look at business as usual. Will be interesting to see if lots of graduating students and the laid-off permanently leave architecture like they did last recession.

@peterjones - i agree there's going to be some serious churn in the market but i'm not sure salaries will be a race to the bottom. in my seat, if there's someone who's talented and a great fit, we're going to make a run for the long haul. why would we want to hire them for a little less, have them figure that out, become disgruntled, and then leave again? if you're taking advantage of people already... 

@arhanonymous - absolutely agreed. there could be another wave of people just not coming back. 

Had a discussion with a friend in marketing yesterday. This is my 2nd downturn since school, I think this one is going to be even worse than 08/09. He was annoyed that he's looking at a year without a raise while his old coworkers still in tech were booming and he's thinking he needs to head back. Here we are looking at furloughs and pay cuts and a long employment drought and used to it. If I get cut, I think I'm calling it. Side note as well. It looks like rural states are opening up sooner. Since everything I loved about California is illegal until a vaccine, questioning a move to a more simpler life anyway and giving up on the rat race entirely. What's the point of staying in a high density state if it's illegal to exist.

i posted this somewhere earlier.. but i would put money on the fact that the large cocktail oriented firm here in nyc laid off 1/3 of their staff knowing that there will be plenty of new desperate grads who will take whatever they can get in a few months.

A lot of firms will see this as an opportunity to "clean house" a lot of people have moved up in pay but not proficiency. They are going to be looking at people who's utilization rats have dropped to 75% or below

i don't think this will be as bad as 08. under that recession, the fundamental way money works got screwed up, which spread across all markets. this is targeting a few specific markets and densely populated areas.

this is a good read. maybe something good comes out of this in the end https://marker.medium.com/america-is-about-to-witness-the-biggest-labor-movement-its-seen-in-decades-3aa47f0edf52

couple that with universities going under or to virtual education fully; and me sitting here with the 3D printer making PPE and hand sanitizer with Everclear...it's going to happen.