Design Manager - Education, Culture & Community

Cities are shaped by the strength of their institutions. Universities inspire discovery. Cultural organizations connect communities. Mission-driven organizations create opportunities for learning, innovation, and belonging. Our San Francisco Cities studio partners with clients who are advancing education, culture, research, and community impact to create places that contribute to a more vibrant, resilient, and equitable future.

We believe great design can strengthen institutions, enrich communities, and positively shape the future of our cities. As designers, thinkers, makers, and problem-solvers, we see creativity, technical rigor, sustainability, and collaboration as essential parts of the same process. The best work emerges when bold ideas, thoughtful execution, and deep human understanding come together, and we are committed to developing designers and architects who embrace all three.

Gensler's San Francisco Cities studio is seeking a Design Manager with 7-12 years of experience to join our team focused on higher education, cultural, community, and other mission-driven projects.

We are looking for a collaborative project leader who is interested in building upon a strong foundation in design and project delivery while developing deeper expertise in project leadership, client engagement, and design management.

Design Managers are active participants throughout the life of a project. They help lead projects by building trust, facilitating decisions, coordinating teams, and maintaining alignment between design ambition, technical execution, project goals, schedule, budget, and client expectations.

The ideal candidate enjoys being deeply engaged in projects, from early planning conversations and stakeholder engagement through documentation, bidding, construction administration, and occupancy. Our projects are often delivered by small, highly collaborative teams, and project leaders remain closely connected to both design and delivery throughout the process.

This role is ideal for someone who has begun managing projects or major project work streams and wants to continue developing leadership skills while remaining closely connected to design, technical quality, and client service.

• Help lead educational, cultural, and community-focused projects through all phases of design and construction.
• Build productive relationships with clients, user groups, consultants, contractors, and project teams.
• Facilitate project communication, decision-making, and coordination across all project phases.
• Collaborate with project teams to maintain alignment between design intent, project goals, schedule, budget, and quality.
• Support project planning, staffing, scheduling, consultant coordination, and project execution.
• Participate in programming, stakeholder engagement, workshops, presentations, design reviews, and client meetings.
• Coordinate multidisciplinary teams and help resolve project challenges through proactive leadership and communication.
• Monitor project scope, schedule, resources, and project performance while supporting overall project success.
• Help guide projects through permitting, bidding, construction administration, and project closeout.
• Support fee proposals, scope development, and project planning activities.
• Mentor and support emerging designers and technical staff.
• Contribute to a collaborative studio culture that values design excellence, technical rigor, mentorship, continuous learning, and shared success.

• Bachelor's or Master's degree in Architecture from an accredited program.
• 8+ years of professional experience in architecture, including experience leading projects or significant project work streams through multiple phases of design and delivery.
• Licensed…