SEMESTER #8
SELF-APPRAISAL REPORT
KARTIK SHARMA
A/2930/2016
SCHOOL OF PLANNING AND ARCHITECTURE, NEW DELHI
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\\OFFICE HISTORY AND ORGANIZATION
Gensler is a global architecture, design, and planning firm with 50 locations and more than 6,000 professionals networked across Asia, Europe, Australia, the Middle East, and the Americas. Founded in 1965, the firm serves more than 3,500 active clients in virtually every industry. Gensler designers strive to make the places people live, work, and play more inspiring, more resilient, and more impactful. + IDEOLOGY
“At Gensler, we are one community. Our community is focused on improving the human experience, guided by a vision that’s committed to making a better world and realized through the positive changes we make in people’s lives. When we move forward together, that impact is real.” + RECENT ACCOLADES • • • • • • • •
Fast Company “Most Innovative Companies 2019” Glassdoor “Best Places to Work 2019” Forbes “America’s Best Midsize Employers” in 2019 Architectural Record 2019 Top 300, #1 Architecture Firm Interior Design 2018, Most Admired Firm Building Design 2018 World Architecture 100 Rankings, #1 Overall Firm, #1 Most Admired U.S. Firm, #3 Most Admired Global Firm Building Design + Construction 2017 Giants 300, #1 Architecture Firm For the 36th consecutive year, Gensler tops Interior Design Magazine’s “Top 100 Giants” List
+ REVENUE
Gensler’s worldwide revenues for fiscal year 2019 were $1.405 billion. + EXPERTISE
Gensler is organized to support clients at every stage of the design cycle, from initial strategy and design planning through implementation and management. Unique among design firms, Gensler’s integrated network serves a cross-section of the global economy through the practice areas such as design for Community, Lifestyle, Work and Workplace. + LOCATIONS
Gensler has a network of 50 locations around the globe in the Americas, Europe, Middle East, Greater China and the Asia Pacific Regions.
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\\OFFICE SYSTEMS, PRACTICES, ATMOSPHERICS AND PEOPLE
+ THE WORKPLACE
Under the Asia Pacific Region, the Bangalore office is headed by Ar. Sanjay Gulati and Ar. Anupama Sharma as the managing directors. It handles the projects-based in India with having a number of projects in major cities like Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and others. Located in the neighbourhood of Indiranagar, the office boasts a strength of around one-hundred employees while handling not only projects in India, but also abroad, sometimes in collaboration with other regional Gensler offices. The office is broadly divided into two studios – Work Flex and Lifestyle Flex with the first handling corporate-office projects of all scales while the latter handling projects of more diverse fields. The office overall followed a truly minimal and open design while doing away with cabins and inspiring an environment of collaboration with designated work spaces, open collaborative corners and even designated hot desking areas. The simple idea of everyone working together in one space as a single team is a powerful one. The office is spread over two floors with a pantry on each floor which is not the only breather one can take from work to de-stress themselves, but there are also carrom boards and a lounge area where one can sit to relax or can go to the park across the road from the office for a nice refreshing promenade in the pleasant Bangalore weather. There is a strong office culture in place that promotes balance. The official office timings are 9am – 6pm but the office remains open 24/7 as there are deadlines being worked on alongside on-going international collaborations. While the office definitely requires hard work and precision, there are weekly, monthly and yearly programs planned by in-office committees which help in maintaining the balance. Gensler being a well-established name in the industry is also invited to various conferences, design expositions and product launch events where while learning about the various innovations in the field, one can also enjoy a break from the daily routine.
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+ THE PEOPLE
Gensler efficiently functions as a “One-Firm Firm”. This essentially means that every individual at Gensler is virtually a co-worker irrespective of where they are geographically. All offices and individuals at Gensler are connected via the internet and the Gensler server. In a firm where there are over 6,000 individuals involved, the practice of communication and collaboration is the key for efficient and quality work. This spirit is truly upheld in the offices where everyone is as warm, professional and approachable as they can be. There is a sense of mutual respect.
\\THE INTERNSHIP FEEDBACK
I officially joined the Gensler Bangalore team as an intern on 2nd January 2020 as part of my 8th Semester Internship training. I was one of eleven interns at the office out of which eight of us had joined the team as the new intern batch and the rest were on the verge of completion of their respective internship periods. Having interned at other offices during previous years’ summer breaks and talking to seniors about internships, there was still the feeling of ‘new’ that I knew would take some time to adapt to but being exposed to the culture at Gensler, that feeling was forgotten a lot quicker than I could’ve ever fathomed. The general office atmosphere felt nurturing and everyone had a certain warmth which made them approachable. While having given the opportunity to work with the industry leaders, I had also set certain goals at the very beginning of the internship such as to increase my knowledge on the topic of sustainable practices in architecture and understanding what made a big firm like Gensler successful. Alongside achieving the goals, I set out to achieve, the COVID-19 outbreak and eventual pandemic altered the process of achieving them. + BEING MENTORED
Out of the two studios at Gensler, I was chosen to be a part of the Work Flex Studio which majorly designs and deals with corporate clients’ needs of office spaces and campus designs to name a few. As part of my internship requirements, I had to be assigned a trainer under whom I would predominantly be learning and who would oversee my work and growth through my internship. For me, it was Ar. Naseera Razzak who was also the studio director of the Work Flex Studio.
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This concept of a single mentor did not exactly apply as working with and under different people, each of them had guided me and taught me different aspects of what I have come to learn during my time at Gensler.
\\THE INTERNSHIP ACTIVITIES AND PREFACE TO THE PORTFOLIO
The first few days of the office were about learning the ways of the firm. There were orientations, basic software introduction trainings and introductions with the people at the office and the project teams who we would be working with. Following this, I was assigned to the team working on the project with the scope area of about a Million Square Feet (about 93000 sq. m) being developed in Hyderabad for a Confidential Tech Client. The project was a collaboration between firms. One firm handled the architecture scope of the project and a local architecture firm handled the construction aspect. The client appointed a project management firm and there were also landscape and lighting consultants involved. Gensler’s role in this project was more inclined to interior design and detailing while also to provide the underlying design intent while coordinating with the consultants and other firms involved to ensure a quality design output towards the end. There were also site visits that took place which eventually had to stop all together due to the COVID-19 outbreak. Being a major collaboration, the majority of the work was done on Autodesk Revit BIM 360 as it offered a platform for immediate collaboration and making convenient design changes. The team appointed for this project at Gensler was multidisciplinary team with architects with a background in interior design, furniture design and technical design. Alongside this core team, there was also the team of Graphic Designers at Gensler who designed the interior graphics and signages. The core team consisted of: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.
Ar. Raj Pillai – Technical Director Ar. Subhashish Mandal – Design Director Ar. Ruchi Gupta – Design Manager Mr. Thomas K.T. – Technical Designer/ Design Manager Ar. Srikanth Sri – Technical Designer Ar. Tuli Bhattacharjee – Technical Designer/ Former Intern Ms. Sarah Almeida – Intern
The Program has Four Towers following the themes of Nature, namely Earth, Water, Wind and Fire - captured through the use of materials,
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finishes and design. These towers are interconnected at Three Floors using Bridges which form linked networks between the towers at the given floors (Third, Fourth & Fifth Floors) whilst framing the Central Courtyard which sits on the Podium. A major emphasis of this project has been the quality of both the work and social spaces in order to strike a refreshing balance between the two while maintaining the aesthetic and professional value of the corporate campus. I was briefed on the project by Ms. Tuli and Ms. Sarah as they had a good grasp of the underlying design concept and spaces having worked on the project during their respective internships. I was then informed that they would be transitioning out of the project to another on-going project and that I would have to take on the responsibilities of making design drawings and models, coordinating with consultants and eventually assisting in presentation to clients and site visits. Being an office campus project of such a massive scale, organization and coordination were the key to success. Hence, I was suggested by the team to listen to client calls, inter-office coordination calls and practice presentation and coordination skills. Other than this, the Gensler Standards were explained and taught to me by Mr. Srikanth. Time and again, Mr. Srikanth used to make me recall that it is this level of professionalism and systematic approach to all work in the office – Standard organization of work files on the server, standard communication ethics for file sharing, internal standards for architecture drawings, sheets, presentations et cetera – that makes Gensler a global leader. This enables a smooth coordination and easy collaboration between the various Gensler offices irrespective of their geographic locations and hence, results in a dedicating more time towards developing a quality design. + JANUARY 2020
During my first month of working on the project, I had worked on interior elevation drawings, floor layout drawings, reflected ceiling drawings, views and presentation decks. There was a major compilation (1281 pages) that had to be sent by the end of the month to the site, the client and the local architects’ offices which contained the latest design drawings, updates and inputs. This compilation became an initial learning curve for understanding the project. Site visits took place to the project site in Hyderabad where I had to coordinate from the office time and again with the site team and then incorporate the design changes from the design mock ups made on site to the existing design. Revit and BIM 360
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made this comparatively easier as it ensured real-time updates. By the end of January, Ms. Tuli and Ms. Sarah had almost moved on and assigned to other projects and I had successfully taken up their role. The Gensler Premier League – the Annual Cricket League for the entire office to take part in also took place on 25th January 2020. The office was divided in 4 teams and a cricket ground was booked for the day where all the matched took place. The teams and rules were made such that there is no gender bias and everyone could enjoy the day. The team I was the part of came as the runner-up but it was overall an exhilarating experience and a refreshing retreat where everyone had fun irrespective of winning or losing. My personal highlight of this day would be where I was praised by my trainer and other teammates for maintaining calm under pressure and eventually taking our team to victory twice when the odds were stacked against us.
+ FEBRUARY 2020
Apart from the late nights preceding any submission, I sometimes got scolded by Mr. Thomas to “Stop working and go home.” as at times I liked to stay back and read various articles from the rich Gensler archive of research and collaboration. This interest of reading payed off when I learnt about the innovative projects involving sustainable practices at the firm that have always invoked my interest. I have personally been interested in innovative sustainability-oriented projects. Gensler being a true ‘OneFirm Firm’, I was easily able to get in touch with the Principle Architect of the Toronto office, Canada – Ar. Steven Paynter. Their office had been exploring the use of Engineered Timber construction by constantly pushing its boundaries. The project that caught my eye was a Highrise project that was proposed by them for the city of Toronto, designed entirely in Engineered Timber. Having done a similar project in college, I was able to strike a conversation over a series of emails where I exhibited my passion for sustainability to Mr. Steven. This is how I was informed and suggested to collaborate with Ar. Erik Barth and team from the Boston and other Gensler offices for the Gensler Grant Proposal which explored the concept of Embodied Energy of projects. The Gensler Grant proposal is an annual, year-long company funded research program pursuing the most relevant research proposal from the submitted proposals from across the firm, chosen by an internal jury.
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This year’s winning proposal was for another research, based on climate change, embodied energy and developing a standard for real world application similar to ours. Despite not winning the grant, our team will be supporting the research undertaken for the winning proposal as it dealt with similar themes. Overall, it was a great experience getting to work on such a different tangent with a team of international professionals. My journey of pursuing sustainability does not stop here. Gensler being a member of USGBC was invited to attend the Annual Greenbuild conference happening in Bangalore this year for which I was cleared to go having displayed my drive for sustainability to the entire office. In fact, my Gensler Grant Proposal collaboration was thoroughly appreciated during the bi-weekly studio meetings by everyone later on. The conference took place on 6th – 7th February 2020 at ITC Gardenia, Bangalore and was presided by the President and CEO of USGBC and GBCI - Mr. Mahesh Ramanujan. This conference was attended not only by professionals of Architecture background, but even Engineering, Interior Design, Business and Educational backgrounds. A choice of eighteen lectures was given to be attended over two days with three lectures taking place simultaneously i.e., one had to choose one of three lectures per session. Being alone from the office attending this conference, my experience and learnings were documented and given as an internal presentation during one of the Studio Meetings. The entire experience of the conference was something entirely new and the chance to interact with the speakers and other attendees was truly invigorating and helped further expand my horizons and even make new contacts. Other than striving to make the most of these extremely virtuous opportunities, there was no break from the Hyderabad Project. Test-fits, Three-Dimensional Modelling, Rendering, Regular Coordination et cetera took place continuously during the month of February. The majority of the spaces designed and focused on at this time were the Social Spaces schemes on each floor of all the towers. A total of twelve typical floor, nine bridge floor and a couple more of atypical floor schemes were designed, detailed, presented and finally revised countless times going further. Clearly, time management was a significant skill that enabled me to strike a meaningful balance of work. This is also when I got the opportunity to work with Mr. Subhashish. During this duration, various themes of tactility, colour, balance, simplicity and
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even the effect of the seemingly insignificant details were explored and their effect on the perceivable experience was observed and learnt of. The clients at times referred Gensler Bangalore’s services to others by being impressed by Mr. Subhashish’s interior design works. Therefore, getting to work with him from this point on till the very end of the internship was again a great learning experience.
+ MARCH 2020
The month of March came with the task of majorly dealing with furniture and millwork elements – more test-fits, choosing furniture from vendors as per the design schemes, creating presentation decks and attending client meetings regarding the same and eventually making revisions. This experience of identifying and creating an interior landscape comprising of an interplay of vastly different or similar elements of furniture as per the design intent helped in shaping a new perspective of how the architecture design of a space can be perceived as and successfully responded to. This in-turn helped to strike an understanding of the space at a more intimate level and how architecture could affect this degree of intimacy. Along with working on the furniture, the partition screen design and detailing were also taken up by me under the guidance of Mr. Thomas. Different partition screens were designed and developed as per the design schemes of each Tower and their respective floors.
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The first week of March also saw the bi-annual event of ‘Interntainment’ which is essentially a collective performance we called “Gensler’s Got Talent”, prepared and put on by all of us interns for the office during one of the weekly ‘Happy Hours’ which takes place usually every Friday from 5pm – 6pm as a way of ending the work week at a high with snacks and drinks sponsored by the office. This exercise I felt mostly helped in team building skills amongst other skills and was definitely a very fun experience.
+ APRIL, MAY 2020 (POST PANDEMIC DECLARATION)
By end of March, the COVID-19 pandemic had been declared and site visits had been stopped entirely and mandatory Work from Home Practice was in place. The work went on as usual with decreasing site coordination as site work had also shut down. But despite the pandemic, the design work did not seem to slow down at all on this project. Just before the nationwide lockdown, I managed to fly back home to Delhi from Bangalore where I continued to work from home till the end of the internship. This further made me appreciate the importance of Gensler standards as taught to me by Mr. Srikanth with whom I continued to work with extensively. Despite this, the pandemic and the lockdown eventually did end up affecting my internship. Due to decreased workload, other projects in the firm came to more or less a halt. There weren’t any active projects that I could effectively move onto. Hence, I had to carry on working on one single project through the entirety of my internship. The pandemic also resulted in Gensler terminating all internships by the end of May, a month early as previously signed on for. Hence, the pandemic did end up having some rather drastic effects on my goals and work in the latter part of my internship which had to be adapted to. While this new shift had its restrictions, it also had its benefits – flexible working hours and being able to work from the comfort of home to name a few. While extending my stay on the project, it benefitted me by letting me have the opportunity to be better involved in the design of some spaces – The Social Staircase, The Garage Areas and the Executive Business Centre.
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Around this time, major coordination and collaboration with lighting consultants was taking place in the form of designing and reviewing lighting layouts as per intent. Also, the end of May saw partial reopening of sites and hence reviews of construction drawings took place. All these reviews were conducted with the oversight of Mr. Srikanth. This exercise further helped me improve my eye for detail, precision and technical and practical knowledge. Alongside all of this, there were also continuous updates being tended to and incorporated in floor layouts, ceiling layouts, flooring design, material specifications, area calculations and environmental graphic design. During the lockdown, as part of internship training, I was also encouraged to attend Webinars hosted by BuildEd where I learnt about various topics such as Professional communication, Importance of a Client Brief and Need for Effective Project Management. Before the Pandemic was declared, there also took place various vendor events and product launches where new design products were unveiled. I got an opportunity to attend all three which happened around this time to which Gensler was invited. This platform for interactive learning helped further expand the design vocabulary as a designer.
\\THE LEARNING
Spanning the duration of five months, my internship at Gensler helped me round up a ton of experiences, knowledge, skills and even exposure to a refined design culture. While deeply explored in the previous section (via the underlined texts), some of the more basic and condensed learnings can be identified from the table below –
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One of the major learnings that will stick with me after the internship is what I had read about and even observed in practice during my internship at Gensler, which was the embodiment of this quote from the founder himself, Ar. Art Gensler –
"Architecture is an art form, but it is also a business. Designers need to be trained to solve their clients' problems through design while leading their own firms "large or small" to become sustainable practices."
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KARTIK SHARMA | A/2930/2016
SCHOOL OF PLANNING AND ARCHITECTURE, NEW DELHI