The Department for Professional Employees (DPE), a coalition of U.S.-based unions, has launched a survey seeking to understand the unionization landscape in the architectural profession. The group’s 24 affiliated unions span from artists to school administrators as well as the IAM union which oversaw the recent unionizing effort at SHoP in New York City.
The survey was launched in the wake of the efforts at SHoP and is aimed at collecting views from architectural workers on current conditions in the industry. The results of the survey will also help DPE shape their plans to support future union efforts in architecture.
“We’ve heard rumblings of dissatisfaction among employees in architectural occupations and professions and want to help them organize to create a better industry,” DPE President Jennifer Dorning told Archinect. “With our survey for architectural professionals, we are hoping to get a better sense of the most important workplace issues and how we can best support architectural employees interested in unionizing.”
Questions in the survey include general working conditions, such as respondents’ job security, ability to voice concerns, and whether they would recommend a career in architecture to others. The survey also includes questions on compensation, working hours, benefits, and the respondents' firms' attitudes to diversity, equity, and inclusion.
The survey also seeks to gauge the general knowledge of union procedures and benefits in the architecture profession. In a previous 2017 survey covering non-union professionals across the U.S. economy, DPE found that although 56% of respondents would join a union if they had access to one, there remained a lack of knowledge and understanding of unions among professional workers.
“Today, professional employees are 45 percent of the labor movement, and we know that even more would join a union in their workplace given the opportunity,” Dorning continued. “However, there is a gap in knowledge when it comes to unions for professionals, which is why we have been working to get the word out about the tangible gains that can be made when employees join together.”
The DPE’s survey can be found here.
News of the initiative comes at a time of heightened pushback related to working conditions in architectural employment and education. Last week, we detailed the major controversy unfolding at SCI-Arc over labor practices which led to two faculty members being placed on leave.
Last month, meanwhile, a group of UK architects began pushing for a youth movement at the top of RIBA’s leadership by putting forward an early-career architectural worker in the next RIBA presidential election.
10 Comments
I noticed a tension between the younger and older workers in the SHoP effort. The younger workers tended to discard the older ones and try a kind of 'office coup'. Add in the DEI ethos of many new unions and the enterprise is bound to fail.
Architects need to look at the structure of the profession. Why is the AIA or credentialing necessary when architects get a small part of the construction pie? The market is telling architects that their services are not valuable--yet architecture itself is priceless. Then you realize it's not your boss that is exploiting you -- but the professional structure.
Architecture isn't priceless. It's a specifically valued commodity, same as everything else. The idea that it's some noble calling worth sacrificing for is the reason we're having these conversations.
unions may be a nice idea but i'm in a minority that likes to work all the time, so i don't think i'll fit in. i don't really want to associate with lazy ass people who think life is about lounging around.
You will be happy to know that the number of people in architecture "who think life is about lounging around" hovers around zero.
just curious, because i'm a work-a-holic white, who - even though an architect - still believes unions for architects are the right thing; are you satisfied with your unpaid labor?
labor rights are not about doing less they're about being properly compensated for what you're already doing.
now you're talking about compensation. i feel that has nothing to do with work directly. it's more about everything being expensive in highly desirable areas to live. there's no right to live in a high cost of living area. i'm all for UBI to address some of these issues.
What does that even mean?
now you're talking about compensation. i feel that has nothing to do with work directly.
this is certainty a... novel take
Glad this got bumped or I would have missed it. Filled out the survey and hoping they get a good response to it.
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