Gensler’s DC Office Creates Cross-Disciplinary Superteams
New leadership spearheading transition from 12 studios to 5 superteams

by Heather Livingston
Contributing Editor

How do you . . . position an office to mirror the cross-disciplinary work involved in design and planning projects?

Summary: Late last summer, the Washington, D.C., office of Gensler transitioned its leadership from a duo to a trio of managing directors. Bill Hooper Jr., AIA, who already was a managing director, now shoulders the mantle with Jeff Barber, AIA, LEED AP, and Jordan Goldstein, AIA. As part of their leadership transition, the team is presently embracing a new organizational approach.

Gensler’s Washington, D.C., staff of 275 previously had operated in 12 distinct studios of 20-25 people; they now are in the process of transitioning to five interdisciplinary “superteams” that focus on Work, Lifestyle, and Community, with three of the superteams devoted to Work. Taking a cue from their clients, the leadership team is working to “turbo-charge” the collaborative approach, says Goldstein. “A restructuring with integrated teams allowed us to bring richer ideas to the table,” he explains. “For example, with a client that’s looking to design a new headquarters building, the team that’s composed of interior designers, architects, and brand strategists can create a building or campus that, from a workplace, mission, and brand standpoint, speaks to everything that company is about.”

The right solution
Goldstein says that he realized the potential of the superteams when he was heading one of the studios a few years ago. “The studio was composed of architects, interior designers, graphic designers, brand strategists, and industrial designers,” he explains. “We had such success tackling all different types of projects with an interdisciplinary mindset that the next logical step was to look at where the market was going and what our clients were asking of us. We were seeing that they really wanted us to be their creative partner. To do that as an office-wide approach seemed to be the right way to go.”

The transition is currently under way, with the necessary construction work nearly complete and new office furniture in the process of delivery. As part of the change, the D.C. office has incorporated the staff of the Arlington, Va., office into their own three-floor headquarters. Goldstein says that the Northern Virginia office was created a few years ago to manage the design and construction of the U.S. Patent and Trade Office in Alexandria, Va., among other high-profile projects. “One of the things we recognized is that there are great skills there … so having all the key talent under one roof felt like the right way to go.”

Three key catalysts
Goldstein notes that there were three critical drivers that helped bring about the transition. “The first is a skilled interdisciplinary staff, so that obviously means not only the hiring that we’ve done but the hiring that we continue to do is across a broad spectrum of talent,” he says. “Technology is the second driver, with the industry and our teams moving to BIM. Building in this technology for us has been such a crucial and pivotal transformation over the last year. Building information modeling … allows us as an integrated team to layer into the model all these ideas—and they happen within one great place, versus living in a billion different file folders.” The third catalyst is the firm’s sustainability philosophy. Goldstein says that the new technology and material and energy studies that are the result of the move toward sustainability has enabled integrated teams to incorporate that information into projects more quickly.

Concern for the entire staff
In 2005, Gensler received the AIA Firm Award, in part because of the company’s commitment to its people. Goldstein says that what’s happening now in D.C. is not a top-down mandate, but rather a natural transition that everyone saw happening. “One of the things necessary when we take this super-team approach is to be mindful of the professional goals of everybody on our staff, so we met with individuals and teams to understand where they felt their skills were and where they wanted to focus them, and then set up a studio structure,” he explains. “We conduct work sessions to talk about how we’re structuring the office and then build consensus. It’s been such an open, transparent process that it feels like everyone is fully aware of where we’re going as an office. People on our staff are embracing this direction and recognize that it’s a great opportunity for them to branch out beyond the work that they’ve been doing and take their skill sets to a different level.” Although there currently are no plans for the entire firm to replicate the D.C. office’s organizational layout, Goldstein admits that at Gensler, all eyes are on them.