#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. She studied
Finance in Vancouver, Canada, before earning her Masters in
Architecture from the University of Toronto.


In this episode we talk about:


Kat’s role as Senior Creative Director at Muse & Company

Her career journey and pivoting from architecture to tech

Advice and resources for people who want to work in tech

Kat’s experience working at Google

How switching careers can often feel like burning off a piece
of your identity

Why architecture as a profession has such a grip on people’s
identities

On not tying your identity and self worth to your job

The biggest challenges facing the world, and how the
architecture profession needs to evolve in order to address them

Kat’s predictions for where the future of the architecture
profession should head

Why we need to make the built world more like manufacturing

How architecture tools need a revamp



Resources Kat mentions:


The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron

Architechie Slack channel

On Deck Fellowship

Teal HQ

Lambda School

Turning School

Google UX Design Professional Certificate



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