2020 Global Salary Guide - out now!

The Bespoke Careers 2020 Global Salary Guide is out now!  

The comprehensive global salary guide (the only one of its kind in the sector) covers the architecture and design industries in London, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. As well as detailed salary guides for each location, this year it incorporates a detailed guide to example benefits packages as these become more important in attracting and retaining the best talent.

Whether you're looking to hire the best A&D staff or simply want to make sure you're being paid market rate, then check out the Global Salary Guide today or contact one of our consultants for advice.  

Global overview

The architecture and design job market has remained buoyant in the last twelve months and despite challenging political conditions in the UK and the USA and rumblings of a potential recession in Australia in the early part of last year, demand for top-quality candidates outstripped supply in all regions. As a result, we’ve seen salary increases, in some cases sharp uplifts, particularly for those with sought-after skill sets.

In London, the market remains incredibly busy with hiring requirements across a wide variety of sectors and levels. Despite the uncertainty over Brexit in the past few years the feeling among practices and job seekers seems to be that they cannot put their careers or business needs on hold any longer and it is time to move forward. Some individuals with very specific skills are seeing sharp uplifts in salaries due to the limited talent pools, but more generally salaries are increasing at a steady pace, a trend we expect to continue. Revit users with a technical leaning are particularly sought after and we predict that practices will need to continue to move fast when hiring these skills. Studios looking for individuals with commercial workplace, residential and hospitality specialisms are also likely to find they need to move quickly to secure talent. We predict that Part IIIs with 5-10 years’ post-qualification experience will continue to see lots of opportunities presented to them in the coming year and that the trend to strengthen marketing and business development teams with strong bids and communications professionals will continue. Looking forward to the year ahead, we are hopeful that the recent uplift in market confidence following the election result will continue and hopefully create some much-needed stability for all.

The market in Australia remains active, with many practices working on government-funded national health, education and infrastructure projects. Despite a slower start to last year than we’ve seen historically, demand for candidates remains strong. The cooling we saw in the property market early last year didn’t stop practices hiring but we did see some take a more rigorous approach to the process, undertaking three, sometimes four-stage interviews, before reaching an offer. We predict that there may be a shift back to a one/two-stage process in the coming year. We have continued to see a shortage of candidates with sector-specific skills and lead designers in the last twelve months and we envisage this will continue. Our strategic appointments team have been incredibly busy in the last year and all the signs point to this continuing as practices seek to expand their sector portfolio. On the support side, demand for practice managers, submissions coordinators and other operational professionals remains high as practices look to strengthen their support functions, a trend we believe is likely to continue.

In the US, the A&D markets in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco remain busy with firms optimistic and steady growth likely to continue for the foreseeable future. Talent shortages remain a common factor, with competing firms needing to differentiate themselves and also consider hiring a broader, more diverse talent pool. New York City’s commitment to taking action on climate change saw the announcement of the NYC Green New Deal last year and as a result, specialists in façade design and sustainability are likely to be in demand throughout the year to drive forward associated projects and policies. We also continue to see a real drive for improved diversity in the industry, plus a desire from candidates to improve their work/life balance, making these key focuses for businesses.

To download the 2020 Global Salary Guide, click here.