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Diane Hoskins led Gensler, the world's largest architecture firm, for twenty years as co-CEO and co-Global Chair – but she herself would describe her career path as anything but predictable.
In a commencement address at MIT's School of Architecture and Planning on Thursday, Hoskins told graduates and graduate students about her career off the track. After graduating from the school with a degree in architecture in 1979, she dabbled in a variety of fields, from architecture to design to business to real estate – before returning to architecture.
This “off-the-beaten-track” journey led her to serve as Gensler’s Co-CEO from 2005 to 2023 and current Global Co-Chair, overseeing Gensler’s global platform and day-to-day operations with 6,000 employees in 55 offices in more than 100 countries.
Diane Hoskins. Photographer: Mark Kauzlarich/Bloomberg via Getty Images
“There was probably no point in my career where anyone would have said I was on track or on a predictable career path,” Hoskins said in the speech. “Most of the time I was completely off course.”
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After completing his bachelor's degree, Hoskins initially worked in a small architectural firm in New York, which should have been a “dream job.”
The problem was that she didn't like it.
“I was dissatisfied and unfulfilled,” Hoskins said.
She moved back in with her parents and took a job at the perfume counter in a department store during the summer holidays. A fellow student saw her at work and told her about a large architectural firm that was looking for employees.
Hoskins applied and got the job.
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After working in architectural firms in Los Angeles and New York, Hoskins decided to switch to interior design. She later attended business school at UCLA, where she became interested in real estate. After earning her MBA, Hoskins worked for a real estate firm for three years, then returned to architecture and eventually joined Gensler.
“Moving from architecture to design, then to business, to real estate and back to architecture was quite risky,” Hoskins said.
She gained an advantage from her self-described “unconventional, off-the-beaten-track” career: “I became an integrator of ideas,” Hoskins noted.
Hoskins said her experience showed her how design and architecture relate to the real world, and that was why she ultimately became CEO of Gensler.
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Hoskins urged MIT graduates to “build influential careers” rather than worrying about whether they were “on the right track.”
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