We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Rachael Aziz a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Rachael, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear your thoughts about making remote work effective.

My business partner, Marisa Schulz, and I started All Together in the early days of COVID. We worked remotely mostly out of necessity but made time to work together in person every other week or so. As our team has grown, we have stayed remote for two main reasons. First, as part of our commitment to work-life balance and prioritizing flexibility. Marisa has three kids and is regularly navigating car-pool schedules alongside being the energizing force behind our business. But even our employees without kids benefit from the flexibility of taking doctor appointments during the day, being able to work out and shower at lunchtime, etc. Our other main reason for staying remote is that we never had the cost burden of a commercial lease, and it feels like an unnecessary expense at this point!

This is not to say that remote work has no drawbacks, or that we don’t ever get together. We make a point to plan an in-person day at a co-working space or even each other’s houses every week or so. Our team also regularly facilitates in-person public events or travels for projects–so that gives us more time together. When we are remote, we use the full suite of Google Workspace tools to stay connected. We talk regularly throughout the day on Chat, pop on a Meets call to discuss ideas and questions, and use our calendars to let each other know what we’re working on and when we have personal conflicts.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

All Together is a place-based creative studio. Our team is a combination of urban planners and graphic designers, and we focus on the intersection of urban planning and marketing/communications. We are a certified WBE (women-owned business) passionate about designing places for people, by people. Our core work areas are community engagement, community branding, and placemaking.

Most of our clients are municipalities or place-based organizations, and we are often part of a larger team of architects, engineers, and planners working to create a vision and strategy for a particular place. What sets All Together apart from other planning and design firms is our focus on accessible and fun public engagement–communicating how a particular project impacts your community, and designing a process for public input that makes people proud of where they live.

Some of our most exciting projects are placemaking and branding projects. We work closely with local stakeholders to understand the history and character of a corridor, neighborhood, or community. Once we have that background in place, we design temporary and permanent installations that celebrate that character and create a brand and aesthetic for the community that makes future investments and communications feel intentional and cohesive.

One value that sets our designs apart is that we create things that are colorful and fun. We are strong believers in the power of color in public spaces to change your experience in that place, and even your mood and outlook. The book Joyful by Ingrid Fettell Lee has been a major inspiration to embrace playfulness in our work!

How’d you meet your business partner?

Marisa and I met while working at DePaul University’s Chaddick Institute for Metropolitan Development. We had both recently moved from Austin, Texas and immediately realized the power of our partnership. After our time at DePaul, I followed Marisa to a local landscape architecture firm, where we worked together closely for another 5 years. As soon as we started working together, we joked about how we needed to get into business together. At some point, the jokes started to become a dream, which eventually became a reality!

While we might both be described as Type-A, our strengths complement each other. Marisa is a terrific writer and storyteller, while I am a visual storyteller and designer. She thrives on connecting with people and business development, and I am happy to manage our business internally (and avoid unnecessary meetings at all costs!) When we bid on a project, she estimates high, and I estimate low, and the right number is usually right in the middle.

Has your business ever had a near-death moment? Would you mind sharing the story?

One of the main struggles we have as a business is that a large share of our client base is government, and we are typically a subcontractor to a prime contractor. This means the payment timelines are long– 60-90 days is normal–and even longer isn’t unheard of. Due to the typical contracts we work under, we are required to bill work as it is completed, which means we need to have the staff capacity in place to deliver work that we know we won’t be paid for until months later. It has made staffing up a challenge, and we often need to rely on a line of credit to keep the ship afloat. While our client base means we are confident all our invoices will be collected, we are constantly frustrated by the fact that municipalities put an emphasis on working with small women and minority-owned businesses, and then operate in a manner that makes running such a business and working with municipalities so difficult.

Our other main gripe is that at least 50% of our invoices are paid by paper check! It is so antiquated, and mail service isn’t always timely. We are currently planning a Valentine’s Day love letter to ACH payments to send to our clients to help nudge them into the 21st century.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.alltogetherstudio.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alltogetherstudio/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/alltogetherdesignstudio
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachaelkelsey/

Image Credits
Alisha Segal, Becca Heuer, Carole Lynn, Molly Hebda