Melbourne-based recruitment agency Bespoke Careers has released a new report, revealing global trends among designers and architects who are leaving firms that fail to live up to their sustainability promises.

Bespoke Careers has published its ‘State of Sustainability in Architecture and Design 2025’ report, an international survey that charts how sustainability measures are shaping career paths across the industry. 

The report’s findings were taken from a survey of 350 designers and architects based in the US, the UK and Australia, and further informed by the valuable insights of six sustainability pioneers.

Collecting insights from designers all over the world, the new report is the first of its kind in the industry.

An industry seeking change

The key takeaway revealed the architecture industry as one shaped by the high expectations of its practitioners, with a new generation determined to do better. Sustainability measures, the report found, were decisive factors in practice hiring and retention. 

Candidates were increasingly choosing to work with organisations that practised their environmentally conscious values without compromise, with the disconnection between companies’ public commitments and the reality of their actions pushing architects out of their current firms. 

Of the total 350 surveyed respondents, Bespoke Careers reported an overwhelming majority – 95 percent – said the sustainability ethos of a design practice would influence their individual career decisions. Alarmingly, one in three respondents admitted that they presently compromised their values at work on either a weekly or daily basis.

The report’s editor, and Architects’ Journal editor, Hattie Hartman.

Among the report’s core findings was the revelation that more than a quarter of respondents (26 percent) had already left or declined a job offer due to sustainability concerns. Another 34 percent of respondents said they were considering leaving their current role due to the same concerns. 

“The fact that a quarter of respondents have left or declined a job over sustainability is phenomenal,” Architects’ Journal sustainability editor and editor of the report Hattie Hartman said. “And I couldn’t believe 70 percent would accept lower pay to work at a sustainable practice. I thought that the report was an interesting idea, but it’s gone way beyond what I expected.”

The report’s wider findings underlined glaring sustainability failings within the architecture industry – nearly 80 percent of practice hiring managers observed that candidates were more passionate today about sustainability than five years ago. 

Hattie Hartman in conversation with Bespoke Careers Podcast host Chris Simmons. View their full conversation here.

As Lake Flato director of design performance Heather Holdridge says of the concerning statistics: “Candidates want evidence, not statements. Real projects and measurable outcomes are the new currency of credibility.” 

Internal changes on a practical basis

The growing interest in meeting sustainability requirements is also driving change in operational standards across the industry, with 36.7 percent of practices with more than 11 employees now opting to employ a full-time sustainability lead.  

Despite this, only 20 percent of industry leaders said sustainability was a core element of their design philosophy. This is a current trend challenged by Waugh Thistleton Architects’ founding director Andrew Waugh, who says, “If there’s compromise around sustainability and design, it’s because the architect doesn’t yet see it as a metric of success.” 

Included within the report are two handbooks designed for use at both ends of the job interview table: an Employer Guide, for appointing sustainability leads and positioning measurable outcomes in job postings; and a Candidate Guide, exploring how up-and-coming professionals can boost their employability and showcase evidence-based design choices in their portfolios. 

Imagery supplied.

Read the full report on Bespoke Careers’ website.