The little guy would rather spend the CAD test money to pay off his yacht, than some employee's personal growth. The way they see it, why invest money into someone who's just gonna leave once they find something better?

The way around it for them, is to just hire foreigners dying for the HB1 Visa, because they know they're locked in.

Just my .02., or at least that's how it is at Macondo.

Oops, I meant ARE Test Money. My Bad!

wow. that sounds awful chicarchitect.

i work at a firm of 13, where at least 4 of us are looking at testing in the next year. we've been told that the company will NOT pay for study materials, but will reimburse us for each portion of the test that we pass.

where i work the employer DOES care about our personal growth because it essentially is growth for the firm. I guess i'm lucky to work for someone who is still interested in fostering young architects.

dityfleur - it's rather pointless to ask about "standard practice" in smallish firms - it's only relevant to know what your employer's policy might be. save yourself a lot of agony - just go and ask.

if you don't like the answer you receive, ask yourself why they adopt that position. i'm guessing small firm's don't make these investments because a) they can't afford the cost, or b) they see no return on the investment. if you can't offer some solution to those concerns, you better get prepared to cover these expenses yourself.

many employers take the view that your license is your responsibility, just like your education. after all, once obtained, you have both for your whole career - you're not likely to stay with your current firm anywhere near that long.

I guess the other big question here is if your firm does pay for all the exams and you pass, how long do you feel obligated to stick around after passing?

Most firms, regardless of size, offer some type of incentive for passing the ARE. I have left firms that would not either A.) pay for exams passed or B.) not offer any raise/bonus upon completion. If they weren't willing to show any commitment towards me, why should I have any towards them??

If your employer refuses to do either for you I'd leave. With the minimal cost that the ARE is I find firm size quite irrelevant. If that is an expense that would bankrupt the firm you don't want to be working there anyway. More often than not it's just the firm principal/owner being cheap, that is unless you are extremely well paid.

dity,

my first firm was small, and though I was a long way off, a couple others in the firm were taking exams. We were 8-10 people, and the benefits for licensing were good. They paid for the passed exams. And for the older guy (30-32), they were making him take half days on friday and paying for him to study. And I was told that they would expect a raise after getting the license. The reason I think they took this position, is because they wanted to grow. They wanted to have more stamps in the office and market themselves to more clients. The gentleman who they really wanted to get his liscence was already like an extra principal.

it could be the case where the firm doesn't want to grow, doesn't need to grow, or the architects are very egocentric and need to review/approve every design decision in the office.

2 yen

let me share a story that may explain why some firms - especially smaller firms - may not warm up to this idea.

about 7-8 years ago I worked at a firm that paid for ARE study materials and reimbursed exam expenses upon licensure, and gave raises upon licensure. we had a really great intern who we had been giving GREAT work experience while he was going through the ARE process - we gave him lots of support, encouragement and mentoring.

so, this guy passes the exam, submits his expense report, receives his reimbursement, gets his pay raise - and then quits the next week to take another job.

you can't have this happen to you many times before you start taking a WTF attitude.

bryan asked a question that has been on my mind lately...

how long do you feel obligated to stick around after they pay for your exams?



I will begin taking the exams sometime within the next 18-24 months. I also work for a small firm, a firm that I do not expect to be with for much longer. (I have been here for 5+ yrs and have outgrown the place)

If for some reason I am still here when it comes time for the ARE's I will refuse their reimbursement for the test fee's for exactly the reason bryan brought up.

I have been told numerous times that test fee's and study material will be paid for by the firm, but I just dont want to deal with the hassle and the guilt trips when I decide it is time to leave...

pay for them yourself = tax write off, incl. study mat.



But to address your question dityfleur, it could be that your employer may be nervous of you leaving the firm immediately after you pass.

If you can seriously see yourself staying with this firm for many years after you pass the exam, maybe you should sit down with your boss and work out some sort of agreement? (be carefull)

I think that if you work for a small firm, you should expect to stick around for awhile with that firm if you also expect them to contribute financially to your exams & preparation.

I work for a small firm and they do not have any policy for supplying the fees and study materials for the ARE. Like mentioned by a previous poster, they see the examination as something that is for my own benefit, and do not offer any rewards once I am licensed. I think the partners are a bit paranoid and assume anyone with any greater credentials would be out the door in a heartbeat.

The small firm I work for already has the too-many-chiefs and not-enough-indians problem happening, so more people getting licensed actually only hurts them.

i have seen the situation that babs mentioned above happen MANY MANY times... i think that is the main reason that smallish firms don't like to pay for test fees...

its really a catch 22 for the firm...

most people expect some sort of raise when they get licensed... but really, what makes you more valuable the day after you get your seal than the day before? when people don't get a substantial raise when they get licensed the only way to get a bump in salary is to go elsewhere...

i'm in a similar situation to cln1... i haven't asked my employer to reimburse me for the testing fees... i do take advantage of a full paid day off on the day that i take the test... they've also offered to let me take a paid day off for studying for each section of the exam, but i haven't taken them up on that...

i think that it is really a case by case basis... if you are well thought of by your firm and they want you to stick around, and you make it known that you plan on sticking around, then i think that they should pick up the tab... either way, its really not that expensive since you can (and pretty everybody does) spread it out over a 9-12 month period (or much more)...

this is going to start a fight, but why do employers think they are doing you a favor by giving you great work experience? Isn't it a mutual relationship? I mean, I don't think I'm doing you a favor by working really hard...

My last employer was such a martyr and preached repeatedly how "...we were getting the experience of someone that has been working for 10-15 years", but I had less than a years experience. So what was really happening is that she was getting cheap disposable labor and we were running around like chicken w/ our heads cut off, with no direction, and working 80+ hour weeks.

I totally understand being timid to pay for this stuff w/out an employee commitment. maybe a solution is to offer to pay for the exams 6 months after completion (or whatever makes sense financially). Just remember, as many "great" opportunities you are "giving" your employees, I'm assuming they are giving you great work or you wouldn't keep them around, right?

I see your points babs and architphil. I would also compare that to women on maternity leave and leaving afterwards for "greener grass." That I've seen quite a lot of.

While I agree that passing an exam doesn't make you a better architect, I do feel firms should show an interest in the growth of their employees, and paid ARE exams is ground zero. No matter the size of the firm employer loyalty to their employees is equally as important to employee loyalty. Additionally, buying the latest Kaplan study guides and paying for the exams is only slightly over $2k total. Even a small firm should be able to manage that expense.

Regarding the employees jumping ship right after they get their ARE benefit. Well, why did they leave? My guess is with their new credentials they were able to get a good raise. Perhaps they weren't being paid market rate. If that employee truly was a value to the firm it's gonna cost far more to hire and train a new employee than to cough up more salary. It amazes me how many employers will not consider matching pay of an offer across town. Meanwhile on Archinect there is banter on a weekly basis with everyone agreeing the only way to raise your salary is firm hop.

Now I'm sure some people leave for reasons other than money. I cannot fault someone for leaving a firm over family or personal reasons. If they are going on because they are tired or have "outgrown" the firm there is another reason to question management. Why is this employee fed up with this place? Perhaps they desire more responsibility. Perhaps it's something that can be solved within and save that employee. Another reason to have semi-annual reviews with employees. Get this out in the open before you lose a valuable part of your firm.

All this said, I still go back to the cheap cost of the ARE and the study guides. If said employee leaves, so what, it was a small extra cost. Or you could only staff your firm with registered architects. I'm sure that would far exceed the cost of losing some newly registered employees. Regardless, I find it quite insulting for firms to offer zero assistance for this professional step-up.

j --- that statement assumes the firm bills for all of your hours --- in our firm, fewer that 3% of our projects are invoiced hourly.

while we do give our architects a raise upon licensure, that fact is that a) they're not more productive the next day, and b) once they obtain their license, they cost us more for each hour they spend on a project.

-- damn right -- this is going to start a fight.

There is constant bitching in the forum about firms not providing interns with enough job enrichment - of just thinking of them as "cad monkeys"

yet, when a firm really does make an effort to provide serious job content and a chance to stretch one's abilitites, we get pounced on there too and don't get credit.

the fact is - we saw this guys potential, we made a genuine effort to provide him a strong work experienced, we paid him very, very well for his efforts and we went way out of our way to help him get his license and cover the costs of doing so.

then, he fucked us.

if you can't see how abusive that is, then fuck you!

whoa babs... calm down...

actually j, the higher billable rate usually ends up hurting the firm since, as quizzical alluded to, very few projects are billed on an hourly rate... so if one day you're an intern costing $85 an hour and the next day you're still doing the same work but costing $115 an hour, you're actually hurting the firm's bottom line...

anyways, i definitely think that firms should be paying for everything... i view it as giving back to the profession even if the person leaves shortly after passing the exams... i also think that firms should pay for AIA dues and other stuff to... that's just the way that professions should work... however, as mentioned above, a lot of firms get shafted by employees that take advantage of them... so i can see the other side of the story too...

yeah, you don't sound abusive at all. wow. would you mind posting your company name so I can be sure to never apply there?

did you ever think he may have left because he didn't enjoy working in a hostile work environment? Your generalizations are as pathetic as your choice of language. I won't stoop to that level.

To clarify:
I didn't say anything about it being or not being abusive. In fact, I said "I totally understand being timid to pay for this stuff w/out an employee commitment." and offered what I thought was a fair solution/ compromise. You obviously feel victimized by this industry and I feel sorry for you.




Btw, I like being a cad monkey and don't complain about it.

<----last comment was obviously to babs, not phil.

I think the complaining on both sides illustrates that it's a balancing act between what the firm gives the employee and the employee gives the firm. A lot of people feel that they give more to firms than they get back, whether because of low pay or bad treatment or uninteresting projects. Occasionally, as babs indicates, the firm will feel like they gave an employee good pay and great working conditions and projects, and have every right to feel hurt when the employee leaves. It's a two-way street, neither side is universally right in every situation.

I will get reimbursed for the ones I pass, if I stick around for 1 year. Since we have potentially 6 people to be licensed in the next couple of years, I convinced the office to buy study materials, so we have a GREAT set of study materials. The principals donated their educational stipend to buy the materials. I also have a verbal committment to a 5k a year raise upon licensure.

Still, we have two mid-to-late 30 year-old PMs (15ish years experience each) who refuse to take the exams, which is ridiculous to me. I would demote them or fire them if I was their boss simply based on that.

despite what you may think here, we don't run an abusive work environment and never have -- this guy was treated royally. he deliberately took advantage of our largesse, knowing all the while that he was headed off somewhere else. that is unprofessional and irresponsible and such behavior by one bad apple does, as they say, spoil the whole barrel for all the others.

i apologize for my bad behavior above -- but your comments really struck a raw nerve. when you have the daily responsiblity to make payroll and keep your people employed, you take that sort of "i want something for nothing" behavior very personal -- it takes away, in a very material way, from what you can provide those employees who do act responsibly.

babs, you sound like one of my ex-employers. They provided me descent enough job enrichment and always said they saw my potential and were comitted to me as an employee. However, they also thought I was being paid "very well" for an intern with my years of experience. When I left I told them it was all about the $$, which it clearly was.

In the 1st year after leaving that place I earned over $20k more. Clearly there are employers that are out of touch with current wages in this business. I'd like to know what your example person got after leaving. My bets are on big hefty raise.

I confess, he did get a big raise and a great opportunity - but, he was not underpaid at our firm (by any objective standard) and we continually had worked with him prior to his departure to address his income expectations - he had moved very far, very fast and was starting to cause internal salary administration difficulties because not all of his peers believed he was contributing at the level we felt he was contributing.

I really don't fault the guy for leaving -- the offer he received was awesome. My heartburn is over his deliberate decision to scrape up all of the benefits and support we provided and then simply take a "slam bam, thank you ma'm" attitude with the firm that had helped him build the credentials that got him the new job.

you may find it interesting to learn that he failed miserably at that new position and was terminated after about 9-months. we didn't make an effort to bring him back.

Yeah, it's a two-way street, but in situations like this, the company pays a much bigger price than the employee when it comes to finding a replacement. So if Babs is bitter, it's understandable, and it's reasonable that a small firm wouldn't want to go down that road. It's not just the cost of the exams and materials, it's the time needed to go through the hiring process again, training, project information, etc.

our firm (12 people) pays for each section once. you don't pass, it's on you.

The firm I was in at the time did not pay for the exam but did pay you for the hours out of the office while taking the exam.

My firm does give full support towards licensure: exams, study guides, time off, etc. Thus, they do expect employees to remain with the firm for a set amount of time after exams are complete. If not, we have to reimburse them.

our firm does exactly as described by here's your sign above -- our "partial reimbursement if you leave before ___ months" policy was instituted only after we had an unhappy experience almost exactly like the one babs describes above. babs, i feel your pain.

fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

I don't get any time off for my exams, which to sucks as I get 10 vacation days in a year, and there are 9 exams...

My office has paid for half of all passed sections of ARE as well as LEED. Time off to take the exams themselves is also paid. That seems equitable and reasonable.

I disagree with architphil's idea that "the higher billable rate usually ends up hurting the firm since, as quizzical alluded to, very few projects are billed on an hourly rate... so if one day you're an intern costing $85 an hour and the next day you're still doing the same work but costing $115 an hour, you're actually hurting the firm's bottom line..."

If the work is not being billed hourly, the impact to the bottom line is not really $30 an hour, unless you are getting a raise of $30/hour when you get your license (in which case I want to come work where you are when I pass my remaining ARE sections).

Yeah, there are some costs that change when someone gets licensed and gets a raise, but those should not be seen solely in a "we can charge more for your services now so we'll pass a bit of it along to you" fashion.

I think its got to be a philosophical choice from the firm. If you want to grow and get bigger then nuturing the growth of staff and get some loyalty from them I would think paying for exams etc and giving the a raise is probably somehting they should consider. However if you are young and just going to leave I wouldn't considering paying your exam fees. Probaby somewhere in the middle for us. I don't want to be bigger necesssarily but I do want the staff to grow and learn ie LEED / Bldg Code / etc. and if they do pass and advance their skills then naturally they are rewarded with an increase in renumeration. I also am pretty good with taking off time to study as I found that to be the hardest thing when I wrote my exams.