#72 Equity in Architecture with Kavitha Mathew

Kavitha Mathew is the Global Diversity Officer at KPF, and leads the firm’s diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts, as well as the development and implementation of the firm’s global Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) commitment. Mathew oversees KPF’s many internal Communities such as KPF Public, KPF Pride, and KPF+, helps guide KPF’s recruitment and resourcing, as well as its philanthropic and volunteer efforts. Leveraging her experience as an architect, Mathew’s work at KPF has a project-focused component, advising on engagement and communication with the community. Kavitha is also the Founder and President of Equity Co:LAB, and the Special Projects Director of the American Institute of the AIANY.

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#71 Pivoting from Architecture to Tech with Kat Dovjenko

Kat Dovjenko is the Senior Creative Director at Muse & Company. Inspired by the dynamic energy around architecture and urban planning, Kat believes that the more complex, ambitious, and unsolvable the problem, the better. She drives talented teams to unite and achieve outcomes they would not be able to do individually—at multiple scales and in multiple stages of the design process. She most recently worked at Google's R&D for the Built Environment where she oversaw workplace innovation projects. Kat loves navigating speculative pockets of the future and weaving together how they might impact our built spaces. She never shies away from ambiguity, and is skilled at using foresight and storytelling to propel leading edge technologies into real products for the built world and beyond.

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#67 On Pivoting from Architecture to Real Estate

Chi-Chi Lin, Danlu Li, and Yi Li all studied architecture and practiced for a few years before realizing that they wanted to do something else. After leaving the profession and getting MSRED degrees, they now all work in different areas of the real estate industry in New York City. In our conversation, Chi Chi, Danlu and Yi Li share when each of them realized they didn’t want to practice architecture anymore, how they transitioned to their new careers, what they miss about architecture, but what they love about their new work. They also give great advice for people who want to pivot from architecture to something else.

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