Details
02/10/2025
Associate Planner
McKenna
Pay Range: 60,000-75,000
Associate Planner
MCKENNA
Join the talented team at McKenna, recently named one of Crain's Detroit Business' 2024 Best Places to Work in Southeast Michigan! McKenna’s planning, design, and building professionals help municipal leaders develop and maintain communities for real life. From street festivals, neighborhood parks, and storefronts, to parking spots, coffee shops, and farmers’ markets, we want your community to thrive. McKenna provides planning, zoning, building, landscape architecture, community and economic development, and urban design assistance to cities, villages, townships, counties, and regional agencies, as well as select private clients, based on skilled and effective public engagement.
ASSOCIATE PLANNER
McKenna’s Associate Planners are passionate, talented, and creative professionals who want to make a difference and see their work efforts result in tangible, inspirational outcomes. Our work is purposeful and impacts people by influencing the state of the environment; ultimately, we take pride in helping to improve quality of life in our great Midwestern communities. McKenna’s team members enjoy the benefits of our practice, from the diversity of projects in a diverse range of communities, to our fast-paced, creative, and collaborative team culture.
MCKENNA TEAM
McKenna team-members inspire those around them by displaying their positive individual approaches to solving difficult problems. Our Associate Planners work with Senior Planners and Project Managers in producing creative work products of the highest technical and graphic excellence and are responsible for demonstrating continuous professional development. McKenna Associate Planners effectively communicate work progress to McKenna Project Managers, whom they also support preparing for and during public meetings.
POSITION RESPONSIBILITIES
The Associate Planner is committed to assisting Senior Planners and Project Managers in providing on-time, on-budget planning and design work that is of the highest technical and creative quality. This position will be to support new and ongoing business in the State of Ohio. The ideal candidate will be based in Ohio, with the ability to work remotely and/or at an established office within the Columbus area.
Responsibilities include, but are not limited to:
• Serve as Associate Planner on a multitude of projects, helping to deliver creative solutions to our clients throughout the Midwest, primarily local units of government. Projects range from providing ongoing and continuing service in the areas of zoning, form-based coding, master planning, economic development, and placemaking, to special projects in planning, design, economic development, transportation, etc.
• Work on harmonious teams of other planners and designers, mapping specialists, graphic designers, and administrative staff.
• Assist Senior Planners and Project Managers in preparing for and delivering public presentations and facilitating public meetings, including in front of municipal boards and commissions, concerned and engaged stakeholder groups, and professional peer organizations in communities throughout the greater Columbus area.
• Deliver graphically rich work products, regardless of individual graphic skills (i.e. work with team).
• Begin building relationships with current and future McKenna clients to increase awareness of McKenna.
• Support night meetings with Senior Planners or Project Managers as needed as it relates to planning, development, and zoning activities within client communities
PERFORMANCE STANDARDS
Members of McKenna’s professional planning and design team are evaluated on specific performance standards, as follows:
1. Ability to effectively collaborate with clients and other McKenna professionals
2. Capability to multi-task and set priorities
3. Achievement of key measurable “vital signs”:
a. Career Development
b. Client Satisfaction
c. Giving Back
d. Innovation
e. New Work
f. Productivity
g. Project Manager Billings
h. Project Variance
REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS
Successful Associate Planners most often possess the following knowledge and skills:
1. An undergraduate in Urban Planning, Urban Design, Architecture, Landscape Architecture, or related field. A master’s degree is preferred. Candidates with equivalent experience will also be considered
2. Two (2) to three (3) years of experience in professional planning and/or design positions, whether municipal or private.
3. Ability to multi-task in ever changing, client-focused environment
4. A genuine willingness to learn
5. Public engagement experience
6. Zoning administration experience
7. Ability to respectfully function as a productive and enthusiastic member of a team, under direction of McKenna’s Leadership Team, Project Directors, and Project Managers.
HOW TO APPLY
To apply for this position, send your resume in confidence with general salary expectations to the attention of Human Resources at hr@mcka.com .
McKenna is an Equal Opportunity Employer and strives to create a dignified work environment where all team members can thrive. Candidates with non-traditional backgrounds and transferable experience are encouraged to apply.
