Senior Level Planner (Los Angeles)

Sasaki Associates•Los Angeles, CA

6d•$110,000 - $130,000•Onsite

About The Position

Sasaki is seeking a senior-level planner to join its Los Angeles studio. Sasaki is a planning and design firm of about 300 professionals working in the United States and internationally. The planner will manage multidisciplinary internal teams and external consultants, lead and supervise content development and deliverables for master planning projects, and collaborate with Sasaki principals on project pursuits and business development initiatives. The position calls for a positive outlook, strong project-management experience in a design-office or institutional campus-planning setting, and the ability to manage multiple planning projects simultaneously. The successful candidate will integrate and coordinate the work of planners, data analysts, architects, urban designers, landscape architects, engineers, and graphic designers. Experience in civic or urban planning and/or higher education or institutional planning is relevant. The role also involves stakeholder engagement, planning analysis, reporting and graphics, and management of project budgets, contracts, and staffing. Project-related travel is required. Sasaki supports personal growth and individual well-being through resources including in-house training, mentoring, professional association memberships, and licensing examination reimbursement.

Requirements

Curiosity and enthusiasm for master planning; campus-planning experience is a plus.
Strong organizational and management skills, with attention to detail.
Excellent interpersonal and collaboration skills.
Demonstrated ability to work on multiple projects simultaneously.
Experience managing an interdisciplinary design team in an office setting or experience working within an institutional campus-planning office.
Project-management experience, including managing budgets, timelines, internal teams, and external consultants.
Knowledge of and comfort with Adobe InDesign and Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint).
Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including for planning reports, memoranda, and day-to-day communication.
Excellent quantitative and qualitative analysis skills to support data-informed planning processes and space assessments.
Experience developing presentations and master-plan documents.
Strong presentation and layout skills, graphic communication, and storytelling, including informational graphics, layouts for presentations, reports and engagement materials, mapping, and 2D diagrams.
Ability to research and synthesize complex planning concepts.
Capacity for project-related travel.
Master’s degree in planning or a related field, or a bachelor’s degree in planning or a related field; the posting states a preference for one to two years of relevant experience with the bachelor’s-degree path.

Nice To Haves

Experience with project pursuits and business development in a design firm, including developing proposals and project scopes and participating in project interviews.
Experience in a higher-education or institutional context, or with higher-education clients.
Previous experience with academic space planning.
Knowledge of and comfort with other Adobe programs (Illustrator and Photoshop), AutoCAD, SketchUp, Rhino, and/or other design programs.
A distinctive additional skill or strength that could make an impact on campus-planning projects and practice.
A degree in architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, or another design field.

Responsibilities

Manage interdisciplinary teams and collaborate with project team members, consultants, and clients.
Manage and contribute to the development of project content and deliverables for master plans.
Work with internal and client teams to engage diverse stakeholders in planning processes.
Develop detailed planning reports and graphics.
Manage data assessment tasks.
Manage project budgets, contracts, and staffing.
Lead or collaborate on marketing and business development initiatives.