Founder Insights: Morgan Chawaga - Architect & Wellness Coach - The Healthy Architect

Firm & Founder:

Morgan Chawaga is a licensed architect who has spent the last 2 years building The Healthy Architect, a wellness hub for architects and other design professionals to improve mental and physical health.

Her work focuses on many aspects including stress management, one-on-one & group coaching, increasing salary and reducing working hours with case studies to support all her work.

She previously worked as an architect and intern for over 10 years since graduating with her B.arch in 2014 and M.arch in 2016.

Morgan brings a fresh perspective to starting a business that isn’t directly a design practice or associated with design but still focuses on design professionals. Morgan and others taking on similar ventures are important and in some cases essential for design professions as a whole as they show the possibility of working for the industry but on the outside supporting it.

Key Takeaways:

• Morgan transitioned from a traditional architectural career to creating a consulting agency after experiencing multiple burnouts. This led to a focus on helping architects manage stress and build healthier relationships with their careers.

• The agency provides workshops and one-on-one coaching for architects and design professionals on stress management and burnout prevention. It also runs a virtual wellness hub offering micro-stress management classes like journaling, breathwork, and desk yoga.

• Despite feelings of imposter syndrome and insecurity, the founder embraced the challenge of starting the business. Persistence and consistency are key driving forces in maintaining the business’s mission.

• Outreach and marketing take about four hours daily, with the remaining time dedicated to coaching and workshops.

• Different marketing funnels target architecture firms (via LinkedIn) and individual architects (via Instagram and Facebook). Content is repurposed across multiple platforms, ensuring maximum reach from a single post.

• The decision to niche down to architects was driven by frustration over the lack of action regarding mental health in the architecture industry. The founder uses personal experience as an architect to effectively communicate with and motivate peers in the field.

• Workshops, priced at $2,000, are the primary revenue source, though they are priced below industry standards. Many workshops are given for free as part of the business’s outreach and funnel strategy.

• Virtual workshops are preferred due to wider reach and efficiency, though some firms initially request in-person sessions before opting for virtual due to cost and logistics.

• The founder contracts professionals like a burnout coach and yoga instructor for specific services. A business coach, grant specialist, and podcast editor also support the business.

• The founder believes the architecture profession’s culture of overwork and lack of business education contributes to widespread burnout. There's a need for architects to embrace skills outside of traditional architectural tasks, like business and marketing, to thrive.

Website & Content:

In Morgan’s case, for her business it is essential to build rapport as soon as possible and as often as possible, hence a detailed bout page outlining who she is and why she started her business. A simple form that highlights a few services.

Q&A with Morgan:

What were the driving factors that led to the career transition into founding a consultant agency for architects trying to live healthier lives?

I got licensed shortly after graduating and began climbing the corporate ladder and basically that led to burning out multiple times. I've got a podcast about it. It's a healthy architect podcast, and so after the last time of burning out. I thought, There's got to be a different way. There's got I there's got to be a better way to create impactful architecture, but also enjoy my life again and love my life again. So I started, like any type a individual, I started delving into stress management, and what is stress management, and there's different types of stress management, and how to implement it as a busy architect and as a busy mom.

So now I went out on my own. I think the healthy architect's been around a little over a year now, and we help other architects design and build a healthier relationship with their career. So we not only work with architecture firms, we provide workshops, so stress management workshops and burnout prevention workshops. I one on one coach with architects and design professionals as well.

And then I have the well, we have the wellness hub for architects and design professionals. So that's a virtual, online studio of stress management classes. They're all from three minutes to 15 minutes. So they're micro so the thought is that you can take them during your work day.

So for instance, we have journaling for architects, we have breath work for architects, we have desk yoga that you can sit at your desk.

Did you feel prepared and ready to go into this world on your own or was there still lots of figuring out to do and you sort of threw yourself at it?

It's a little bit of both, to be honest with you, but I would lean on the side of, I never feel like, ever in my life, I never feel like I'm good enough, or, you know, that I'm 100% ready. And that's a part of it is, you know, feeling those feelings of insecurity or imposter syndrome, and allowing yourself to feel that and then to do it anyways.

I have to tell myself every day, just keep going. You know, I've got a mission. I've got something to accomplish, and it's not a straight line. It's it's going to be ups, it's going to be downs, but the consistency is where it's at. Just continue doing it every single day.

What does a day in the life look like?

Every day is different, to be honest with you. I mean, what's consistent is my self care. So I go to every morning at 5am. The class starts at five. I walk. I take micro snack walks every single day, multiple times a day, every time that I would say. So my self care within working is consistent and my outreach is consistent. So I try to spend, give or take four hours a day outreach with outreach. So that might mean social media posts, that might be emails, that might mean applying for a conference, just getting the word out there of the healthy architect, yeah. And then between that, it's actually doing the work, right? So that's like the marketing part of it and the self care of it. And then the other four hours are actually like coaching and doing the actual tool itself.

Do you have sort of, like a sales kind of process and pipeline? Is there, like, a funnel?

So I do have a funnel for Instagram and Facebook, and then I have a separate funnel for LinkedIn. So LinkedIn, I'm marketing more to the architecture firms, per se, and on Instagram and Facebook, I'm more marketing to the individual architect or design professional. So I give information, I give value, value, value, and then I go in for the Okay, here's your solution, right? So like, value is stress management. Here are the five different types of stress. Here are, you know what you should look out for, and stress with your colleagues, your coworkers, etc. And here's the solution, which is a stress management workshop with a healthy architect.

And then something else that I do is when I create content, I make sure that I squeeze every drop out of it that I can. So in the mornings, I create a post, whatever it is. I put it on Instagram, which automatically goes to Facebook. I reword it for LinkedIn sometimes, and then I also reword it for my email list as well. So I try to get every single drop out of that content. Yeah, I'm not having to rework everything 10 times.

What do you think is like advantage and disadvantage to be niched down just towards architects, because the wellness and spaces always can kind of help and stress management under all under that whole umbrella is, uh, it's fairly kind of like common, and it's a big kind of industry already.

I have multiple answers to that. Number one, I went for the architecture niche because it was very frustrating. I'll be very honest with you everybody was talking about mental health. Everybody was talking about how stressful our community is and our industry is, that they weren't doing anything about it, and that was really frustrating to me. And so I decided, Okay, I'm gonna actually do something about it, because I don't feel like anybody else really is, really is dedicating their career to do something about it, to take action and not just sit behind the scenes and talk about our industry that its stressful and that it's just architecture. Well I don't believe that, I dont believe that this is what architecture should be like. And because I know architects, I am an architect, I know exactly how to speak to architects to get them motivated and encouraged to work on their mental health and their physical health and their stress.

I can communicate to architects because I am one. So that's the primary reason I niche down to architecture, but also something that I don't talk about online. I still do it with other people. I'm doing corporate workshops, meditation workshops in Louisville, and actually virtual for individuals that are not architects. So I still do wellness outside of the architecture profession. I just don't market it virtually.

What is one short term goal for The Healthy Architect?

Trying to create as much impact as possible within the architecture community. So, you know, over the next year or so, I'd be like, I'd like to be doing four workshops a month. Let's say, Okay, right now, I'm probably doing two workshops a month.

So four to eight workshops a month. I would like to be chugging workshops left and right. I would like to, every other day, have a workshop planned, or, you know, going towards that, I'm speaking at two conferences, one in October and one in November. I guess that's my long term goal. Is just chug, chug, workshops in and out all day long.

What brings in the majority of income for your business?

The workshops are the more expensive options. So right now they are $2,000 which is low, which is very low for market standards.

The industry standard is probably six out five, $6,000 per workshop. And that's a an hour and a half. And right now I've got mine at 2000 because I'm still figuring out the market right now, and brand awareness and name recognition, all of those other things. I'm also giving a lot of away, a lot of workshops for free. So AIA, I give those workshops away for free, the one on one in the wellness hub for architects those so that's more of like a funnel, right? So when I present my workshops, at the end of them, I say, here's how you can continue working with me with other than a workshop, right? And so then I funneled those individuals into the wellness hub for architects.

Do you have a preference for the way to run and operate workshops and other things?

I like virtual, not because it makes me more comfortable, not because of all these things you think it would. The reason I like it is because my outreach is bigger. So I can work with firms that need my help quickly in Portland, and I don't have to plan around my children. Fly out there, spend money, come back. You know, I like doing those every so often, flying like I'm going to Nashville in October, and I think Hershey Pennsylvania in November. So yeah, I love the variety. I like them both, but I prefer virtual because I can get more done quicker. Another thing I've noticed and learned is some of the firms I work with are like, No, we want you in person. Then when they see that price tag, they're like, virtual is fine. So most of the time we go for virtual because of both their budget, and then also some firms, and a lot of firms have hybrid locations, so it's actually easier for them to do it virtually, for all of their employees who do it virtually.

How's your team formatted? Because I saw on your website, you also have four kind of members that that work with you. Are they? Are they on contract? And how's that set up? When do they help out? Do you work with any other kind of external contractors?

Yeah, they are on contract. I basically sell their services, schedule, and coordinate them, and then I offer them to architecture firms. So for instance, the burnout coach, she does a certain specific workshop, and I market that to architecture firms. The desk yoga. Kelly gabbitt, she teaches in the wellness hub. She teaches classes. We record them for architects, and then we offer her, her services to architecture firms as well.

I have a business coach, I have an individual that I know who helps me with grants. Then I have a podcast editor.

What's the biggest challenge for your business?

I mean, architects are stressed, right? They're extremely busy. They're too busy. They're stressed. And the last thing that they're going to stop to listen to is somebody calling them that is not a direct line to help. Just having architects go around with the stress that they're living in, day in and day out, is the hardest part. Showing and telling them that it can be easier if you know how to manage your stress, that you're actually going to be more profitable as an architecture firm, if you manage your stress, your employees are not going to burn out, and you're not going to have as much turnover. Telling them that is one thing and showing them is another. So just having architects pause and slow down for a moment is a challenge.

What do you think is one flaw in the architecture business and why that may lead to burnout?

I think it's the biggest thing is that architects were not taught to own a business, one and then two, all these things are so normalized, like the working for shift money and working 24/7, it's almost like a cult and brainwash, being brainwashed that we think we as architects, not myself, but we as architects believe that if you are, if you do anything else, if you focus on anything else other than architecture, such as business or marketing or content creation or podcast or problem solving elsewhere other than like a door, then look down upon and that's a normalized within our community and our culture, and that is exactly why, in my opinion, why some architects and architecture firms are not doing well right now. I learned a lot from people outside of architecture and that's what we should be doing, learning from people outside of architecture.

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