As a coda to our recent stories about Weld Coxe and SMPS, let us all celebrate the tremendous evolution that has occurred within our professional over the past four decades. In a 1973 survey of more than half of ENR’s Top 200 firms, only six companies reported having full-time marketers on staff. Today, SMPS is the network for more than 7,000 marketing and business development professionals representing 3,250 firms in the architecture, engineering, planning, interior design, construction, and specialty consulting business throughout the USA and Canada.

As part of #WomensHistoryMonth, I’m shining a spotlight on a constellation of women in leadership roles in architecture and design. Kudos to Alan Chimacoff and his photograph, Light Game 7.

In 2016, I received a call from Krueck+Sexton about their interest in hiring a marketing manager. It was the beginning of an evolution in which the leaders crafted the future of their firm — evolving from a renowned founder’s studio to a significant professional practice. They have been punching above their weight for years, growing from 20 people to more than 50, and this year, from four partners to eight.

In December 2018, in the New York Times Opinion Section, Allison Arieff asked, “Where Are All the Female Architects?” In The Architect’s Newspaper, Julia Gamolina said, “We’re right here.”

As Gloria Steinem said, "Without leaps of imagination or dreaming, we lose the excitement of possibilities. Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning." We plan to use this space to scheme and dream, to give voice to our thoughts, and to share new ideas. We welcome your voice, too. Please let us know what you think. (A comments section will be added soon.)

My father, Clyde V. L. Pearson, would have been 100 years old in 2012. He was born on February 1, 1912, and unfortunately, he passed away in 1977, at the age of 65. He was a huge influence in my life and career. This is his story, and mine, too.

When I first started working in the office of the Joint Venture Architects for the Bank of America Headquarters Building in San Francisco, I found myself in the midst of 50 architects and interior designers, located in an office on the 20th Floor of the still-under-construction high-rise.

In 2011, I was honored when Randy Pollock, the Managing Editor of Marketer — the Journal of the Society for Marketing Professional Services — asked me to curate a very special tribute to Weld Coxe for the August issue.

In September 2011, I was honored to curate a special tribute to Weld Coxe for the August issue of Marketer — the journal of the Society for Marketing Professional Services. But I thought that I should tell one more story about how Weld changed my life.

Harvard wasn’t on my radar when I was growing up in San Francisco.