CDA HOLIDAY 2022
As we come to the close of 2022, we wanted to take time to reflect on all that our team has accomplished over the past year. That includes supporting our clients in the opening of hundreds of incredible projects throughout
the country, lauding our team members’ accomplishments and sharing the thought leadership and trendspotting inspiration for which CDA is known. In this digital world, we hope that you enjoy this tactile celebration of all things
Chipman. Thank you for your ongoing partnership and cheers to 2023!
—Lauren Chipman
After the death of George Floyd and the protests that ensued, Brookfield Properties sales leader Michelle Isabel was feeling what a lot of people were feeling: scared, angry, and anxious for the future. Michelle took all of that emotion, bundled it up with her professional expertise and a sense of needing to do something tangible, and created the Partner to Empower program.
PTE creates opportunity for minority entrepreneurship through both monetary funding and business education with volunteers from across industries, including leadership team members from Chipman Design.
Lauren Chipman: Michelle, thank you for taking the time to talk with us today. A lot of people love you, but I feel like I’m president of the Michelle Isabel fan club here. I feel so honored that we’ve gotten to meet and work together.
Michelle Isabel: I have never even thought of the possibility of there being a Michelle Isabel fan club. So, Lauren, you are definitely the president because you’re the first one who has ever said anything like that to me. I’m flattered you’ve asked me to be here.
LC: You have such an interesting career and journey. Can you tell us a little bit about where you started?
MI: I’ve been with Brookfield Properties for over 20 years, working with our team that manages mixed use properties: residential, office, and shopping centers worldwide. I’ve been leading a sales region most of my career in this industry and my teams have been all over our portfolio. And I had the opportunity, unfortunately, with the murder of George Floyd to think about what could we be doing to help break down systemic racism. What more should I be doing as a Black woman in this industry, in this country, who has experienced racism in my life. What is it that we can contribute to help break down systemic racism? And so here we are today.
LC: And that’s really what we’re here to talk about: this incredible program that you have started at Brookfield called Partner to Empower. How did Partner to Empower start?
MI: I had not thought about it prior to 2020. I was focused on leading sales teams. I’ve had a very successful career with Brookfield and my focus was delivering the goods, delivering what I’ve promised to deliver every year. After the murder of George Floyd-- that event impacted me in a way that I’ve never been impacted. As a Black person in this country, you learn to deal with it and keep
going and keep growing. But, for some reason, I just could not get past the murder of George Floyd and the events after that. I needed to take these tears, and this anxiety and in some cases, anger, and do something about it. And that’s what started me on this journey with Partner to Empower. And Lauren, I have to tell you, it was the best decision I’ve ever made.
LC: That’s extraordinary. And since the program’s inception two years ago, your full-time role is now managing and overseeing this program. Could you tell us a little bit about it?
MI: Partner to Empower is a program dedicated to providing monetary and expertise support to Black and minority business owners including one-on-one business planning and guidance, funding dedicated to store construction expenses and a four-week, intensive Retail Workshop. We started our first cohort in 2021 focusing on six states: North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and Louisiana. When we started this, I had this grand plan of starting nationwide but you gotta learn how to crawl before you walk. We started in...
seeing nursing homes. This is not what we’re working on. This is not what Senior Living is. It’s very different than the past.
The Boomer generation is, well, booming — into their third act. As of the third quarter of 2021, 50.3% of U.S. adults 55 and older said they were out of the labor force due to retirement. As one of the biggest populations begin the sunset chapter of their lives, increased demand for senior living facilities are carving out their moment in the architecture and design world. Today’s retiree doesn’t look anything like older populations in previous generations, and their robust needs and desires are offering architects the opportunity to take a fresh look at previously ignored space.
CDA CEO, Lauren Chipman, sat down with Senior Design Manager, Meg Stevens, to discuss the rising demand for a new approach to Senior Living.
Lauren Chipman: Could you define what is Senior Living? That sector has really changed dramatically in the last few decades.
Meg Stevens: They are residential communities that are equipped with amenities, social activities, healthcare. The goal is making people feel good and as comfortable as possible where they are during the last chapter of their life.
We’re trying to change what people think of when it comes to Senior Living. My mom worked in a nursing home for many years as a social worker, so I have that firsthand experience of
LC: Such a key piece of why your team is so successful is that they design with the guiding principle of considering these properties as a person’s home. It is very much relying on those residential and hospitality design backgrounds. Do you work on projects just within the Chicagoland area or are you working nationally?
MS: We work throughout the country.
LC: I have to imagine these communities that you’re designing for look different if they’re in Chicago versus Florida or California. What does your process look like for that?
MS: We’re really lucky to work with a client who believes strongly that each community should feel specific and special to that region. As designers it’s very fulfilling to be able to conceptualize a new design with every project. For example, a community in Chicago might feel polished or urban. A community in Tampa, Florida is going to feel vastly different. We also design a lot of communities in the Midwest and Colorado as well which immediately conjure up these ideas of
prairies or mountains. We lean into that because that’s truly what resonates with the residents. We start off each project conceptually; we’ll look at the region and study that area so that we can put in little touches here and there that the residents can relate to and are drawn to.
LC: That sounds so creatively fulfilling! So, outside of just the residential component it sounds like there’s a lot of community gathering space. What are some of the amenities you’re seeing both traditionally, and some of the new ones that are being introduced?
MS: Traditionally, we program arts and crafts areas, lots of lounges for gathering with soft seating, activity rooms that can serve as multi-purpose rooms for different activities, meetings, etc. We’re also trying to push the envelope and look at different amenity spaces. We just installed a music area that we’re getting, really good feedback on. It has guitars, pianos, tambourines and even a record player so residents can bring their records and have listening parties. This has become a really hot area at the community! Other new programming includes...
One of Chipman Design’s guiding values is the commitment to support each and every team member. We want to make sure they have all the tools and support needed for both personal growth and professional development. In order to accomplish this, CDA has developed a highly successful mentorship program. Recently, Lauren met with CDA Senior Managing Director Nelly Augustyn, to discuss the development of the CDA Mentor Program, and how mentorship has supported and propelled Nelly’s career through the years, and how a one-on-one relationship can be more beneficial than a one size fits all program.
Lauren Chipman: Hello Nelly. Thanks so much for joining us today.
Nelly Augustyn: Lauren. I’m so excited to be here. Thank you so much for having me.
LC: I was so thrilled when you wanted to have a discussion about something that is near and dear to both of our hearts: mentoring and how it can really change a company culture. Could you talk a bit about the CDA Mentor program? How did it come about?
NA: When I talk about the CDA Mentor Program, I like to first address the word “program” because we want to acknowledge that this is a private personal relationship between two people, the mentor and the mentee. And, in using the word program, we don’t want to give the misconception that this is either written or there’s a curriculum associated with it.
CDA in terms of the leaders that put this pro-
gram together, do not track the conversations between the mentor and mentees. This is really. To help facilitate the communication between two individuals that are focused on their career growth, one the mentor, and two the mentees. I love to say that first because this isn’t a track that we put someone on with the expectation that at the end of it, there will be some sort of, let’s call it a certificate, right?
So in that sense, this isn’t a program, but rather CDA acknowledging the importance of focus on an individual’s career. We want our team members to take time out of their busy days and take time to focus on their careers. Much of the day is spent on client support and drawing production, but we also want them to take the time to look into the future and to focus on any questions they may be having about where this career is taking them.
“Where am I headed? Am I on the right track? What is my path looking?” It’s very important for all of us to take time out of our days to focus on
that. So therein is how the program came about:we simply had people asking for that help, asking for that direction. And as most programs come about, a few of us were already naturally doing this with our younger staff.
As leadership at CDA started to learn about these organic conversations and regular checkins that were happening between specific people, we thought, Wow, let’s dive a little deeper. Let’s figure out how these connections came about and let’s help facilitate those professional relationships. To that end,I think one of the hardest things to do at the onset of a mentor and mentee relationship is to find the mentor. It can be very intimidating walking up to a senior person at your firm and simply ask, “Will you be my mentor? So our first goal was to facilitate that connection and get that mentee in contact with somebody that we feel can help them with the things that they want to focus on their career path.
LC: You make a really good point. It is a little bit awkward at first, and, I’ve been so thrilled to see these relationships and friendships that you and Kate, our CHRO, and Bree, our HR associate have put together because they are deliberate.
It’s matching someone’s career goals with someone outside of their team that they don’t work with on a daily basis. And I think that’s where you can really see a lot...
WELL building standard is a newer performance-based system that is used to measure, certify and monitor the most significant aspects of the built environment that impact human health and wellbeing.
Many of the principles of WELL line up with how we think about the physical environment at Chipman Design, specifically our hospitality and senior living projects. So, our CEO, Lauren Chipman, who is WELL Certified sat down with CDA Project Designer Emily Hoeven who is working toward her WELL Certification. They discussed how WELL certification is being utilized today to improve peoples’ lives and what it means for the future of the built environment.
Lauren Chipman: Emily, thank you so much for joining me today. So, we first found out about WELL Certification when a potential client came to us and asked if anyone at the firm was WELL Certified. We had to say no, and they worked
with another firm for the project. So, I said, “Well, that can never happen again. And I signed up to get certified that week.” I put out an open invitation to our team to see if anyone wanted to be my study buddy and go through this certification with me. And, I was so thrilled that you said, “Yeah, let’s do it!”
Emily Hoeven: Yes, absolutely. Chipman also reimburses employees for professional certifications, which is a great incentive. I ended up pushing my test until the summer but it was great to share resources with each other.
LC: It’s great. It also holds you accountable, right? To a certain degree.
EH: For sure!
LC: A lot of people in our industry are familiar with LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design). What is WELL and how is it different from LEED?
EH: LEED is the most widely used green building rating system in the world. It provides a framework for energy efficient and cost-saving green buildings — but, where LEED is focused on environmental health, WELL is focused on human health.
WELL Building Standard is a performancebased system for measuring, certifying, and monitoring features of the built environment that impact human health and wellbeing. So yeah, both are very important, but they do have some crossover. Another key difference is that LEED
isn’t as flexible and once you’re certified, you’re done. One of the things I love about WELL is how much it’s evolving and how flexible it is. The WELL Building Standard adapts as we get new scientific research. So, you have to get recertified every few years to make sure you’re up-to-date.
LC: Absolutely. When we think about LEED, it’s really focused on the building and the benefits to humans are kind of secondary. Yes, making the building more environmentally friendly benefits humans – but indirectly. It’s almost the opposite for WELL. The focus is on nourishing the human experience. That does make the building nicer, but the building itself is secondary.
EH: Right. It’s more of a holistic approach to health and wellness. There are 11 concepts WELL focuses on: air, water, nourishment, light, movement, thermal comfort...
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