by Carolyn Rickard-Brideau, AIA

It is quite an honor to have been named one of the best places to work in the D.C. area by the Washington Business Journal. After the Little D.C. office (we’re actually in Arlington, Va.) was initially nominated—I believe by someone in our Charlotte office where Bill Little started the firm—a third-party group surveyed every employee within the office. So the recognition is both from outside our office and, most importantly, from the people here.

I am the vice president of the AIA Northern Virginia Chapter, and Beth Buffington from our office is president of the DCAIA chapter, so I am aware that, as architects, we all have our own way of working, and certainly this firm’s approach is not for everyone. That’s what makes the world interesting. That said, I will share some of our core tenets in the hope others can take and adapt them so that they carry meaning for you.

Establishing a culture of camaraderie
One of the more visible ways we develop a sense of closeness among 18 people is through informal time within our office. Professionals often spend the greatest part of their waking time working with their colleagues, so we try to break that time up a bit with lighter moments. This office runs on its stomach, and we eat lunch together on a regular basis.

We have a small pantry area where we all sit and have lunch, typically within a two-hour period, so there are always people coming and going. (In the photograph, we were taking a recent summertime ice cream break.) That’s an easy, baseline kind of a thing to do. We also have a weekly happy hour in a neighborhood place. Not everyone goes every week, but a group of us always manages to get together. It has become a tradition within our office culture, which is an important thing to develop.

There are many other things people in this office have taken on that reinforce the mission and brand of our company. We have a Virginia wine tasting every year for our clients. People here split into groups and go around to local wineries and tastings—to Charlottesville, here in Northern Virginia, and the Eastern Shore—and select the wines. We have amazing people who organize and participate in our Canstruction® effort each year, and organize other festivities like the annual holiday party, special days celebrating a particular achievement of an office member, or just a time when we can all go out together. Our great people are willing to step into the breach with ideas and suggestions so no one person has to be the source of all the energy within the office.

One of the biggest factors of building a feeling of camaraderie and a meaningful, positive workplace culture is that no executive or manager can be the source of all the energy in an office—nor should they be. The office needs to belong to everyone there, not just the leadership team.

Everyone benefits
For me, there are three indicators of a company’s health and whether they are going to be successful: people, brand, and mission. Those are what I call my compass points. If any one is out of alignment, you can certainly practice business, but it’s going to be much more difficult to maintain a balanced effort. Moreover, maintaining equilibrium among those points results in longer tenure of the people in an office.

We feel that our culture differentiates us from many other design firms and that design is informed as a reflection of the culture of the users. So the most important thing that I do is try to find the right mix of talent and personality in the people that I hire. I look for people who are passionate about serving their client, curious about the world around them, and who will collaborate with their teammates. That is why I think a large part of developing a strong office is making a strong attachment between the people within it. That’s very important to me and to the people here.

This philosophy definitely shapes our competitive edge as a company. Our brand promise is that we will deliver “results beyond architecture” to every client we serve. Also, we will create solutions that push the limits of design to meet and exceed client expectations. To do that, we all have to believe that what they’re doing is important; and we all have to be engaged with the client and our teammates. Our founder, Bill Little, has been extremely client-centered from the very beginning, and we are acutely focused on creating excellent, timeless design that serves our client as well as all the people inhabiting, using, and living near the buildings we’re creating.

We work harder because we know if we seek innovation, everyone is rewarded for it. It’s a part of our culture, it’s what we value. People seek fulfillment in their days and meaning in their lives. For me it’s the difference between giving someone a job and giving someone a career. Clients, in turn, are getting people who believe they have a long-term responsibility to them. If there is any kind of problem, and we don’t make it right, they’re going to have to face that client across the table at some point.

Everything we do emanates from and ties back to our overall mission: client value and context-driven design excellence. Keeping this in the forefront of our mind helps ensure that we’re always advancing our mission, which will differentiate us from our competitors and differentiate our clients from their competitors. People here believe that.

Little is a close-knit large firm
There are 18 people in this office and 300 Little employees across the country. Different studios specialize in different practice areas, and it’s important that people feel a sense of camaraderie within their respective office, on a studio level, and as a practice area on a national level. So people across the firm know they are a part of the intellectual integrity of their studio, their national practice area, and their office.

Our CEO, Phil Kuttner, is a restless and flexible thinker, and someone who seeks a better way to serve our clients every day. One critical concept of his is that if you get a team bigger than 10 to 12 people, they don’t feel the heat of the client. They’re not in front of the client, and that’s not good. So we try to keep things very horizontally organized with very little hierarchy—with a client-to-designer accessibility that allows everybody to participate. This smaller team size also helps create a sense of camaraderie on the team level. People feel that they belong somewhere and have a direct link to the client. So there is a positive energy that is created on its own.

Still, of course, each office has its own personality. The LA office is different from the D.C. office, which is different from the Durham office—based not only on the type of work that we do but on the individual personalities within the company.

Moreover, our national practice areas—we have four overall: workplace, retail, community, and consulting specialties—get together monthly in person and via teleconferencing to share details about ongoing projects. We also e-mail alerts on leads and new project wins so that people in the firm know what’s up and can provide useful information in a project pursuit.

We have an annual meeting at the beginning of each year for those involved in business development to review business plans and, perhaps most importantly, spend time with each other.

In multi-office situations, it is often a fact that people feel as if they are just another franchisee—part of the whole but not really related. Within Little, we make a conscious effort to try to get those pieces to relate to each other on a shared cultural level. Certainly we still encounter hiccups, but I have a very close relationship with my counterparts in the other offices, and we have deliberately changed our office structures to reinforce group rewards. The national studio principals and office presidents meet once a quarter to discuss—among other things—removing impediments that relate to our national partnerships and cultivate that camaraderie among the offices.

We have a shared culture, I would say. And that’s a good thing.

One last word: credibility
If there is a pitfall I see in any firm’s approach to trying to affect workplace culture positively—and making your clients successful while doing it—it is that you have to walk the talk.

If executive management doesn’t buy into and support the cultural attributes you’re trying to emphasize or the culture you’re trying to foster, you do way more harm than good. If you say you’re going to be a kinder, gentler company and then your practices, management style, and the way that you respond to and reward your people don’t bear that out, you undermine any credibility you may have built with the people who work in the company.

All of this goes back to who you really are, what you do, and how you do it. All the rhetoric behind all those things means nothing if your people don’t believe it, your customers don’t feel it, and your product doesn’t bear it out.

Copyright 2006 The American Institute of Architects. All rights reserved. Home Page