An Interview with Yasmien Fadl

Explore Yasmien Fadl's 20-year journey in workplace design and her approach to creating inclusive, people-centric environments, amidst career challenges.

Design is a powerful tool for solving problems, creating more inclusive spaces and inspiring new ideas – all things the JennAir Disrupting Design Advisory Board members know well. 

Yasmien Fadl is Head of Workplace Design and Experience and for TD Enterprise Real Estate. She is a creative strategist with 20 years of multi-disciplinary interior design, thought-leadership, workplace strategy, change management and project delivery experience on the consulting and client side. 

We spoke to her about her career journey, the barriers she’s faced, and creating people-centric workplace experiences that are resonant, inclusive, responsive and meaningful. 

Tell us about your career path and how you decided on a career in design. 

I knew I wanted to do something within the built environment. I had clarity around that, mainly because I had two great mentors in high school who helped me understand my talent and potential and channel it into a career and an opportunity to do something meaningful. I also have parents who were great role models and supported my choices along the way. 

I picked interior design because I found it very compelling and full of potential. It gives you the ability to generate incredible experiences through the creative process. The scale at which you work as an interior designer is a much more personal scale. It offers this unbounding opportunity to solve complex problems and improve people's lives significantly. Of course, there’s a glitzy and glamorous part - the materiality and big ideas! But in reality, the functional part of interior design, the part that can make an experience exponentially more universal or more inclusive is the really compelling part of this career. 

What do you find rewarding about working in interior design? 

Design can be a very rewarding industry, but it's also a tough one. You take on a lot of risk on the consulting side. And hopefully, every once in a while, you get a thank you from your clients. [laughs]

Design challenges you because you're constantly recalibrating, learning and evolving. There’s so much opportunity for innovation in the physical and digital sphere. That pioneering sensibility has a domino effect on the solutions and experiences we’re providing to end users, customers, colleagues, whoever that might be. 

The most rewarding thing about my current role is that our team has the autonomy and space to cultivate universal experiences for a vast amount of people. We work with many people from different groups to get a good understanding of their sentiments, desires, hopes, vision, how they’re responding to different environments, what's working, what’s missing, and then force-rank these findings to address those needs.

Our number one priority is to reduce undue hardship. That's non-negotiable and has been our top priority since this team was created. We want people to be excited about the spaces they're in because we know that has a positive impact on their personal and professional experiences. Our work helps to unlock innovation and create a sense of community and belonging for people, and a genuine emotional connection to the people, places and experiences they encounter. 

You want to make sure that the fundamental factors that enable people of all walks of life, are factored in as a guaranteed part of the experience. Having a universal washroom on every floor is not a "nice to have."

Prayer rooms or lactation rooms for mothers who are returning from maternity leave are also not “nice to haves.” Those are investments that enable people to take care of their personal needs while in a professional environment. They also help people feel that they belong and confirm that someone cares about and understands their journey in this space. 

What are some of the barriers you've faced when cultivating your career in design? 

Its boils down to three things: inequitable hiring practices, impostor syndrome and the barriers that exist for new-to-Canada designers.

1. Inequitable hiring practices:
   It's still disappointing not to see others who look like me or have a similar background in influential positions. This industry is really good at solving real, tangible problems. But we haven’t evolved enough to ensure that we have equity in terms of the voices at the table and the amount of influence that those voices have. To be frank, we as a collective design industry haven’t even agreed that the lack of equity and opportunity for racialized design talent is a problem that should be treated with urgency – which is astounding really. We need to integrate equitable hiring, equitable opportunities and equitable outcomes into the Canadian design industry ecosystem, because it is a clear gap and opportunity that brings much benefit and value.
2. Impostor syndrome:
   Like many women, I’ve struggled with impostor syndrome. After 20 years, I'm at a stage now where I feel that I’ve mostly overcome it. I realized that this is just a lapsing feeling, a feeling that is likely a product of some negative professional experiences I’ve had along my journey. But in reality, I wasn’t the impostor! I was just overlooked. I remind myself that I’ve earned my place here, and I was doing exceptional work that was under-recognized.
   
   I'm glad I finally found my voice. It took working in a company where my effort and contributions were valued to dispel this notion and directly change my mindset about my self-worth, my abilities and the actual value of my contributions. I’ve decided I won’t work anywhere where my contributions are not recognized or valued.
   
   I'm glad I'm not at the end of my career realizing this. If I had sponsors earlier in my career, I think I would have been able to navigate some of these challenges with my eyes wide open and make sense of them more clearly. 
3. Barriers for new-to-Canada designers:
   I am from Sudan and I was born in the UAE. I grew up in Canada. I got my degree at TMU and worked as a designer in Toronto. I went overseas to Dubai for seven years and returned to Canada with great design experience. Unfortunately, I faced a lot of barriers when I returned.
   
   I don't think people understand how hard it is to set up shop in Canada if you are a racialized immigrant, despite having a very credible education. I needed a guarantor. I couldn’t rent an apartment without paying one year’s rent in full, upfront.
   
   It's a very humbling experience to immigrate to this country and try to get a job in this industry. I took a role that was significantly lower than my experience, just to get my foot in the door. I'm one of the lucky ones who was able to do that. I had to make significant compensation concessions, earning less than someone with my experience should have been paid.
   
   Let’s do the math - I have a Canadian degree from TMU, I have my NCIDQ, I had global experience, and yet I still had to make big concessions in terms of my stature, title and role just to convince my prospective employers that I had enough “valuable” experience to warrant them offering me a role. And I'm Canadian, with Canadian design experience! Imagine how much harder that would be as a racialized, immigrant designer that is a woman and newcomer to this country.
   
   I think our experiences might not be valued by some hiring managers because it's not as relatable to them. As a designer, the creative process is agnostic, regardless of where you’re from or where you’re located. You know what how to solve challenging problems and look at them with differing perspectives. That diversity of thought is a benefit to any organization, and to us as a broader design industry, because it prevents you from having tunnel vision or blind spots, and it helps you understand humanity better. A designer that immigrated to Canada has a depth of knowledge, empathy and understanding that is equivalent to the talent pool here, but there seems to be an imbalance in the perceived value of those experience.

How has mentorship shaped your career?

I had a mentor in high school. I didn't realize he was my mentor at the time. Even though he was an art teacher, he was kind of like a life coach. 

I could ask him the questions I couldn't bring back to my parents because they didn't directly relate to the creative process. I didn't have clarity in terms of what I wanted to do with my life. That decision becomes very daunting, and he took all the fear out of these decisions and helped me boil them down into simple, small steps. 

Professionally, I've tried to ensure that I have sponsors and mentors because I have a pretty clear idea of where I want to go in my career and what I want to achieve short-term, mid-term, and long-term. They can help you evaluate decisions that can help you get to your goal. With a sponsor specifically, they can speak up and advocate for you. They take more of a hands-on approach.

The thing with being a racialized designer is you're often one of the only ones in the room. You're usually in the minority. A mentor can help you cultivate that sense of self-confidence, and help you fulfill your true potential. 

I often hear mentees say that they're not being given enough opportunities to grow. This can be especially true for racialized designers. They’re not being given the platform. Many of them are not even allowed in the room to learn, to be a fly on the wall. Being in the room and having the platform is a huge part of understanding the end-to-end process of design thought, discovery and delivery. Being entrusted to take small risks and efforts to cultivate their career growth and their potential is also very valuable. It’s the least we can do to propel talent forward and maintain a high level of engagement. 

Why are you excited about the JennAir Disrupting Design program?

Sometimes programs are too big or theoretical, but this one is very tangible and specific. We're starting it at an impactful but manageable scale where we can learn so that we can do even more in the upcoming years. JennAir's found the courage to be the first with a program like this and I'm hoping that it opens up a lot more doors and directly influences the Canadian design industry to evolve towards a more inclusive talent acquisition and development approach. 

Disrupt with us

The JennAir Disrupting Design program aims to break the structural barriers for Black, Indigenous and people of colour to have better access to study and work in the design sector – because better representation of racialized Canadians in interior design will drive stronger, more diverse design work. There’s still a long way to go. Learn more about how to get involved with JennAir Disrupting Design programs.

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