Making smart choices for your career in placemaking

Whatever sector you’re in, this economy is getting more and more difficult for urban planners and placemakers.  Government cutbacks are eliminating public sector jobs and consulting contracts that support private sector planners.  Nonprofit organizations are seeing more competition for grant money.

If you’re in a difficult situation, or are simply unhappy with your job, analyze your career – and yourself – with the same rigor you would put into a placemaking project.  The work you put in to yourself can help you find the place and job that’s a good fit for you.  Here’s how: 

1.  Choose your role in the placemaking field.  Do you prefer to be a neutral analyst, a change agent, or an advocate for an issue or community?  The 'neutral public servant' will probably be happier in a public sector position, while the change agent might find things more comfortable in a nonprofit community development organization.  For more on the different roles urban planners play in society, read John Levy's Contemporary Urban Planning.
   
2.  Understand the differences among sectors.  Working in the public sector traditionally has been more stable than in the private sector.  But public sectors can be more rule-bound and slower to change.  The nonprofit sector can be a welcoming alternative, but working there can mean having less direct influence on development, and nonprofit jobs tend to be sensitive to funding trends.
   
3.  Know yourself and your career anchors.  What is more important to you now?  Stability? Lifestyle? Service? Independence?    One of the best tools to help you learn more about what you want in a job is Career Anchors Online, by management guru Edgar Schein.
   
4.  Understand institutional cultures.   In general, larger organizations tend to be more rule-oriented than smaller ones.  Transportation planning and civil engineering organizations tend to take fewer risks than community development organizations.  To learn about specific organizations, ask for informational interviews.  Be aware that people may not be aware of their own institutional cultures, so you might have to ask questions about this topic in different ways.
   
5. Choose your trade-offs. What are you willing to give up to  get what you want? What opportunities might you lose if you take the one in front of you?  In almost any job, there are things you might not like about it.  Are those important enough to give up what you do like about the job? 
   
6. Build your capacity for success.  Keep up with trends in the placemaking industry (At a minimum, you should subscribe to free sources of information, such as Planetizen.)  If you’re oriented towards technical analysis, build your skill set in emotional intelligence, leadership and cultural competency.  If you’re more of a “people person,” get smarter about technology.  You don’t have to become a technician, but you should know how to use the right technology to get things done faster and better.   Become more knowledgeable in the  economic development and environmental science.   Those are two of the things your clients or elected officials are probably thinking about.  Build professional development into your career.  If you wait until you need it, somebody else may get that job you want.
   
7. Remember this:  Anything you can do from your desktop can be done by someone else around the world, and probably for less money

This essay was adapted from “Making Smart Choices for Your Career in Planning,” a presentation PDI Director Leonardo Vazquez gave to the Regional Student Forum at the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission in March.  To get a free copy of the presentation, please contact Leo at vazquezl@rutgers.edu.  To get the presentation, you must either subscribe to the Professional Development Institute newsletter or agree to receive emails from PDI.

--Leonardo Vazquez, AICP/PP