How to Be with Phoebe Lam

Phoebe Lam is the Director of Operations and a Project Manager at
William Duff Architects in San Francisco. Along with
managing the studio’s operations, planning, and hiring, she also
works on projects in the single-family residential and commercial
sectors. Drawing on experience creating conceptual designs and
site plans for 1,000,000 sq. ft. outdoor retail centers, as well
as multi-building and multi-block programs and parking layouts,
Phoebe also enjoys more intimate, small scale tenant improvements
and homes. She excels at managing complex projects with
large numbers of consultants and multiple decision makers, and
continually looks for new ways to apply sustainable principles
and methods in all of her projects.


In this episode Phoebe talks about how she made the transition
from project management into an operations role at her firm, and
how her life approach influences the way she views her works. We
discuss the pressures of thinking you need to act or be a certain
way in the profession or out on a job site, and how to get over
it and just focus your energy on your work instead. Phoebe also
shares some great insight into how you should embrace the fact
that your career is never static and reveals what she looks for
when hiring potential employees. Whether you’re fresh out of
school or have years of experience, she has great advice for job
seekers.