Jack Jiang
Transport Planner, Auckland
Looking back, the team at AECOM helped to me, an architect, to get to where I am today in the transport sector.
I studied Architecture at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. My career is now a mixture of research, architecture, urban design and transport planning.
I joined the architecture team at AECOM in 2013 with the three-year goal of transferring to the Transport Advisory team. This aim shaped my time at AECOM as I made efforts to get to know the team outside of my immediate discipline; I started to demonstrate my value within the transport sector.
The idea of transferring from architecture to transport advisory was an unusual one. I approached the directors in both disciplines and formed a transition plan through the course of nine months in 2015. I had the good fortune to write my own job description and demonstrate the value I thought I could add to the advisory team. As part of the transition plan, I requested to “watch and learn” for the first six months which ensured I had a smooth transition into the Transport Advisory team.
It has been 18 months that I have been working in transport advisory now. I went from designing apartments and commercial buildings to working as a cycling specialist on some of the biggest projects in the transport space; I was able to have open conversations at the highest level and ultimately agreed to grasp an opportunity that we can both benefit from.