The Great Recession erased years of price appreciation in residential and commercial properties, but it had a little-noticed effect on the job market as well.
The downturn discouraged college students from pursuing jobs in the beaten-down development sector. Nearly a decade later, the industry is still feeling the effects, with a drought of qualified candidates competing for job openings in the architecture field.
“There’s a three- to five-year gap where all of those people who were pursuing architecture coming out of college pursued jobs elsewhere,” said Joseph Vallone, founder of a Greenwich architecture and development firm. “It’s difficult to find the person who doesn’t have 10 years’ experience.”
The high cost of living along the Connecticut coastline and the preference of recent college grads to pursue jobs in larger cities also constricts the recruiting process, industry sources say.
A recruitment specialist for a national architectural firm with local offices in New Haven County said candidates can afford to be choosy, and salary is secondary to job satisfaction and career advancement opportunities.
“There are a lot more opportunities out there, and the smart candidates are savvy about that,” he said. “They know that they need to be selective looking at the right opportunities. They aren’t looking at the (salary) numbers, they are looking at cultural fit and the types of projects they can work on: the hierarchy at the studio and how they can fit in.”
The source, who requested anonymity because of competitive considerations, said the firm has augmented traditional recruiting channels with social media channels, but campus outreach remains the primary source of entry-level candidates.
Career fair interviews, if successful, proceed to follow-ups, typically in the form of videoconference interviews for out-of-state candidates and in-person meetings for finalists. With most candidates coming from out-of-state, the firm sometimes struggles to educate them about the details of working in the region.
“It’s not a known quantity and there are a lot of questions about what it’s like to live there,” he said. “We do a fair amount of talking about New Haven as a place.”
In Greenwich, it’s still a “challenging” climate for recruiting at Douglas VanderHorn Architects, said William Malmstedt, an associate partner. Earlier this year, after several months looking to fill a junior-level opening, the firm ended up filling the position from within, Malmstedt said.
“Unless you’re able to plan well in advance, it’s still difficult to find the right people,” he said.
Part of the problem, Malmstedt said, is the high cost of housing in Fairfield County, which is a shock to candidates coming right out of college from outside the region. Most newer employees live with roommates.
“We let them know in advance what they’re getting into. It’s not like it’s just 10 percent more,” he said.
School Ties Trump Social Media Savvy
Despite the rise of social networks and online job boards, Connecticut firms still place a premium on relationships, between appearances at college job fairs and reliance on industry recommendations. Industry sites with job boards such as Archinect and Architzer are a starting point, and connections through LinkedIn, Twitter and even Craigslist yield leads. But at a firm with 13 employees, the deciding factor usually comes down to culture fit, Malmdstedt said.
“Because we’re in such a specialized profession, we’re most concerned about their ability to do the sort of work we’re looking to do,” he said. “We don’t expect them to know everything straight out of college. Everyone we’ve brought in has blended in well enough. Especially in this profession, everyone has their quirks, but you learn to live with them.”
The recruiter for the New Haven-area firm agreed that compatibility with the workplace vibe can be the single biggest factor in a hiring decision.
“We’re not a big office and there’s not a lot of places to hide, so we just need everybody to work collegially and collaboratively,” he said.
Email: sadams@thewarrengroup.com
