Brett Hautop

Biography: I welcome life as a new adventure every day. I am grateful that I get to spend most of my time imagining how to make other people's lives better through the process of design. I love to collaborate with others. I whole heartedly welcome the opportunity to build consensus where there previously was none. I believe in the transformative power of design thinking and the potential it has to improve society. I have been designing, creating and building for as long as I can remember, but I knew I specifically wanted to become an architect at the age of 16 when I designed my first house that was actually built. In order to understand how to become a better designer, I held jobs in multiple construction fields while in high school and college so that I knew what it actually took to build someone else’s ideas. At the age of 29 I started an architecture practice and real estate development firm, which we successfully operated until becoming part of Gensler and opening their office in Raleigh, NC. I was fortunate enough to work on projects across many practice areas ranging from single family residential, to cultural institutions, to large scale mixed use developments, to sports facilities, to university buildings to a wide variety of types of corporate workplace projects and office buildings both small and large. At the same time, I taught design and architecture classes at North Carolina State university as an adjunct faculty member. In 2015 I took a big personal leap to move my family cross country and leave professional practice to begin a career with the amazing team at LinkedIn, leading design and construction for all of their workplace projects globally. When I’m not flying between time zones, I very much appreciate my time at home with my amazing family, coaching their teams and exploring Northern California together. When I find a little time alone, I spend it in my workshop building furniture, prototyping ideas and constructing the ideas that my kids imagine.