Design+Dialogue

How Architects Get Paid More.  It is a very important question as the industry enters 2025 and out of its current slow period.  If you’ve been in the architecture and design industry for any length of time, you’ve learned one truth: architects are paid less than they are worth.  As [...]

How to Attract Top Talent to Your Firm?  Every architecture and interior design firm wants to attract star talent, but how do you attract them? What are they looking for? These stars need to see that your firm has what they want. Here are some tips for better understanding high-quality [...]

How To Clarify a Gap in Your Resume?  Many job seekers in architecture and interior design have gap years in their resumes. For example, you spent a year traveling and studying international architecture. While taking a year off can lead to life-affirming experiences, they can also damage your resume if [...]

How to Attract top talent?  As firms start to rebuild or grow, the battle for talent is resuming. It is often a knee-jerk reaction to think that money is the key to finding the right talent. This is part of it.  But many factors will attract top talent to your firm.  [...]

Exploring Innovation: DBI Visits the Boxabl Factory Recently, the team at DBI had the exciting opportunity to visit the Boxabl factory. Based here in Las Vegas, Boxabl is a groundbreaking take on revolutionizing affordable housing. Our visit not only provided insights into the manufacturing process of their unique foldable homes [...]

5 Ways to Stay Positive When Job Hunting can help many of you looking for work at this time.   I have talked with many job hunters and have heard time and time again that searching for a job is much harder than the work itself.  It can feel that way.  [...]

5 things you should never say to your boss.  Of course, there are more than five but the five listed below are egregious. No, you don’t have to be best friends with your boss to have a successful architectural career. With that said, your boss is a key figure in [...]

Improve workplace cohesion.  It can seem like a daunting request.  From political opinions to differences in how to respond publicly to the pandemic, division seems to be growing in our nation. Yet, this isn’t the first time that our country has experienced significant differences. With such a wide range of [...]

Use these 4 trends to hire top design talent and your firm will add outstanding architects and interior designers to your team. With the industry evolving rapidly, architecture leaders must stay up-to-date on the latest trends in hiring and interviewing. In this article, we’ll explore four key trends shaping the [...]

What four common portfolio mistakes have you made?  Here are the four common portfolio mistakes that we at DBI see the most often.  You might be surprised with the last one. Ah, the portfolio.  Dreaded, loved, maligned.  Whatever your feelings about the portfolio, it is a critical and important part [...]

How to get the best out of a recruiting firm?  Architecture and recruiting firms support each other in ways not always clear.  With summer winds down and kids returning to school, many firms are looking at their overall business strategies for the rest of the year.  And what a year [...]

The Best Architecture Recruiting Agencies, Headhunters, and Executive Search Firms can be hard to find.  Architecture and Interior Design firms have unique challenges when building a team.  Regardless of size, location, or project type, these firm’s success depends entirely on the teams they build. Finding that right talent in the [...]

How to work abroad as an Architect?  Working abroad is a great way to grow your architecture career. Experience with design in other countries has many positives. From improving empathy skills and broadening your mind to diversifying your portfolio and expanding your professional network, working abroad can be a bold [...]

Being a recent transplant from the cool and wet climate of Seattle to the hot and dry climate of Las Vegas, the Architizer article by Ema Bakalova caught my attention.  In her article, she writes about the challenges and the solutions for designing in the desert. The Desert Climate: The [...]

Career growth in architecture is about skill, experience, and timing. In today’s market, moving your career forward is not as much about paying your dues and showing your loyalty, now you have to demonstrate value to your firm. Here are some tips on how to move your career forward in [...]

Chicago in January.  If we have not experienced it we must all at least understand how bone-chilling cold it must be.  We rush in from the street and a hit with a warm wall of air, it is the most wonderful thing in the world at that moment. But how [...]

Hiring the right people can be challenging during rapid company growth. The firm feels pressured to meet all sorts of other demands during this time. Breaking the hiring habits that have worked for decades can be difficult, but the truth is that hiring processes are doomed to fail when they [...]

I recently read an article published in Architizer called “6 Way Residential Architecture Can Impact Your Health”.  It is a fascinating architect about how architects and designers can create with health and wellness as their north star. But what about the rest of us already nested in our homes of [...]

I read a recent article in Fast Company (Architects Started Caring About What Their Buildings are Made From. That’s a Good Thing) and was excited to hear a voice talking about the importance of the architect’s influence beyond design. The current model* of the general architectural process is design (technical [...]