IRVINE, Calif. (October 1, 2024) – Ware Malcomb, an award-winning international design firm, today announced Nick Watkins has joined the firm as Director, Workplace Strategy. In this role, Watkins will lead Ware Malcomb’s Strategy and Change Management services for clients, in multiple practice areas, across the firm.
“Nick’s unique experience and abilities make him a perfect fit for partnering with our firmwide leaders to develop scalable and effective research-based strategy solutions that provide valuable business insights for our clients,” said Jinger Tapia, Vice President, Design. “We look forward to his contributions to our team.”
Watkins will lead Ware Malcomb’s Workplace Strategy team in integrating mixed research methods, including advanced statistical analyses, AI, and machine learning, to inform the delivery of strategy and design. In addition, he will partner with firm leadership to develop scalable solutions to provide valuable business insights into portfolio management, space utilization, workforce or user experience, real estate metrics, and other financial return-on-investment outcomes.
Watkins brings more than 18 years of experience in research leadership positions at large AE firms to his new role at Ware Malcomb. His experience includes workplace, healthcare, and life sciences design research, supporting the needs of the firm’s clients, practice groups, and corporate accounts. He has collaborated on various healthcare, education, and public placemaking projects, delivering human-centered, experience-based work environments.
Watkins holds a Ph.D. in Environmental Psychology from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and studied AI and Machine Learning at Michigan State University. He has also served as Chair of the Environmental Design Research Association (EDRA) and co-founded the esteemed EDRA CORE program, which bridges the design industry with the environmental design research community by recognizing the quality and impact of research on client projects.
Ware Malcomb’s strategy solutions deliver a competitive advantage to clients by providing data-driven insights to help transform employee experience, enhance company culture, support business objectives, and maximize performance. The Workplace Strategy and Design teams at Ware Malcomb partner in the research process to seamlessly integrate strategy concepts into the planning and design phases of a project, delivering a high-performance environment invested in people and productivity.
About Ware Malcomb (waremalcomb.com)
Established in 1972, Ware Malcomb is a contemporary and expanding full-service design firm providing professional architecture, planning, interior design, civil engineering, branding and building measurement services to corporate, commercial/residential developer and public/institutional clients throughout the world. With office locations throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico and Brazil, the firm specializes in the design of office, industrial, science & technology, healthcare, multifamily, retail, and public/institutional projects. The firm is also ranked among the top 15 architecture/engineering firms in Engineering News-Record’s Top 500 Design Firms and the top 30 interior design firms in Interior Design magazine’s Top 100 Giants. For more information, visit waremalcomb.com.
# # #
Ware Malcomb Irvine HQ
10 Edelman
Irvine, CA 92618
949.660.9128
Ware Malcomb Oak Brook
1315 22nd St #410
Oak Brook, IL 60523
630.218.0063
