Alternative Career Paths

Aaron, you are at a good place for some great advice–every question I have asked here has been met with very thoughtful and accurate answers.  

If you want the best advice it would help if you provided more information–if you are comfortable doing so.   For instance:  Are you personable and interested in management/sales, or more of a nuts and bolts person?  Are you comfortable or feel challenged when working on commission, or would you prefer hourly wage/salary?   Do you need to make a lot of money immediately  (can you say student loans?), or can you survive on subsistence rations in exchange for an open door? What would you like to be doing every day (active, vs. desk job)? Are you mobile, or do you need/want to stay in one local?

For example, there are two bits of advice depending on the answer to the last question:

If you want/need to stay in one place–design build or local suppliers to the industry.  If it is heavily populated, perhaps a national company who needs a rep in that area.  These would be any company who advertises in LAM, but I am guessing most of these would be commission based (see second 1 and 2 above)  

If you are mobile, and/or able to travel extensively to do the job:  private/public environmental mitigation, FEMA, NGO’s of various sorts.

Lastly–I have taken this fork before, and seen others take it.  Some took gigs which suited them better than LA and they made great careers and happy lives as something else.  Others took gigs which allowed them entrance to the profession later.  This is always a very personal decision for everyone, but can sometimes be serendipitous–be open to the answer in the years ahead.  I thank everyone here would agree that our training and talents makes us better at whatever we do.  Good luck.

How about pretty much any other field in existence.

Dont undervalue your design education. It sounds like you want to use your head, but not too particular about staying in the traditional design career path. Why is it that every graduate of a design program thinks they must relegate themselves to working in a design sweatshop??

The analytical thinking and basic background in earth sciences, engineering, and communication will serve you VERY well in a broad range of careers. What are your interests??

As far as marketing, I would simply think about tailoring your resume to ‘speak the language’ of whatever path you decide to pursue, ie if you go after a marketing position you might highlight your skills and experience learned in verbal and graphic communication, presentation skills, and interdisciplinary team work. Maybe you have some of your own ‘branding’ concepts you’ve come up with??

My point is, more grads should apply their education to a braoder range of careers and universities should encourage this. There is NO REASON you should be working a ‘survival job’ or menial labor because someone else has an MBA or whatever it may be. In five years or so academia might catch on…

Whew.. im glad i found you….

I have a BLA, and I work at a Contemporary Art Gallery  as an exhibition assistant.  I think you need to take a step back and realize what you went to school for.  You studied landscape architecutere, thus breaking that down you studied:

1. Theory/critiscim

2. culture

3. demographics

4 spatial design

5. NOT PLANTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

those things can be re-applied to many different fields.  I want to be a curator of contemporary Art (capital A).  I think that that means dealing with contempoary culture in a space with a critical eye.  hmm.. seams to hit the big ones.  What do LA’s do:  think about the culture and demographics of a space with a critical understanding of things.

a lot of people get hung up on the “plant” aspect of LA, just dump it, or leave it alone.  I hate this notion of “oh come design my back yard” no, im not some horticulturist/landscaper at the local suburban nursery.

stop worrying about “oh is this LA” or is that LA.. seriously everything can benifit from your micro to macro understanding of the world.   This helped me find my desired career path.  Im damn proud to be an LA, just not a traditional LA.  I think there needs to be more people who know about LA but are not actual LA’s 

so once again, take a step back, break down LA, and think about what it is that you like so much about it.  

Well excuse me.  I was trying to help this guy realize that maybe you dont have to design back yards just because you have a degree in LA.  Sheesh, take a chill pill.  

Designing backyards is awesome, better when the client wants to drop millions on them as some do…

Other than the non-design LA jobs (government, NGO, nonprofit):

Graphic design

App design seems to be a pretty popular alternative (and a lucrative one when done right).

Marketing

Publication

Education

TV/Movie (mostly rendering and set design)

‘natural’

i say it in quotes because i was taught never to use the word ‘natural’ because it means something different to everyone.  You’re just as mean/opinionated/aggressive as me. 

I used to admire those early guys too and assumed it was a universal type of market and that being skilled would get one “into it.” But looking back, and I prepared a lot of residential plans, the whole record was not as satisfying as I had imagined at the start. I didn’t mind that I needed bigger projects in the mix to make a living, but it was rare that the private spaces were carried out fully (although the few that were were individually satisfying). I don’t know if it was the conservatism of my region or that I didn’t know how to reach people with deeper pockets better….or the whole economy led to higher installation and material costs relative to disposable income across the spectrum. Maybe it never was realistic to think that student dream style work would engulf the whole country.