Gardner Studio LLC

HELP KEEP GOOD THINGS HAPPENING IN OUR CITY.

At Gardner Studio, we care about Oklahoma City - the buildings with stories, the neighborhoods finding new energy, and the places that bring people together. We are a commercial architecture and interior design firm, with much of our work rooted in the urban core, giving existing buildings new life and creating spaces that become part of people’s everyday routines.

We’re looking for a warm, resourceful self-starter who wants to become a lasting part of our team of architects and designers. You’ll bring a thoughtful welcome to the people who walk through our door and practical structure to the work behind the scenes. This is a chance to help shape how the role supports the studio, building useful routines and taking ownership of making everyday work run better.

This is an ongoing, part-time role for someone who wants to get to know our people, build trusted relationships, and take pride in helping the studio run well over time. If you enjoy connecting with people, bringing order to a busy day, and being part of work you can see taking shape around town, we’d love to meet you.

Get to know Gardner: Explore our studio, people and projects.

THE POSITION

Permanent, part-time • Onsite in Oklahoma City • 20 hours per week • $22-$25 per hour, depending on relevant experience.

We’ll work together to arrange a consistent 20-hour weekly schedule, primarily Monday through Thursday between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m., with the option of some Friday morning hours. School-day schedules are welcome. The exact arrangement will balance your availability with the studio’s needs. Studio leadership sets weekly priorities and resolves competing requests to fit the available time. Continuous reception coverage and after-hours monitoring are not required. Training and all time worked are paid and recorded.

HOW WE WORK

We value insight, partnership, curiosity and versatility: listening before jumping in, sharing ideas, staying open to better ways of working and adapting thoughtfully when plans change. In this role, that means paying attention to people as well as tasks. You anticipate needs, offer help thoughtfully and use good judgment about when to act and when to ask. You are professional and articulate, while staying friendly, approachable and engaged with the people around you. You do not need to be a designer to make a meaningful contribution to the studio.

WHAT YOU WILL HELP MAKE HAPPEN

• Build and improve simple, repeatable office processes, checklists and trackers. Learn what the team needs, suggest practical improvements, agree priorities with leadership and carry those improvements through.
• Create a welcoming, professional experience for clients, visitors and collaborators. Prepare meeting spaces and coordinate everyday hospitality and team-meeting needs.
• Keep calendars, meetings, brief notes and travel logistics organized. Monitor assigned inboxes during scheduled hours, route requests and maintain a clear action list with owners, next steps and due dates.
• Notice routine office needs and follow through on supplies, cleaning and facilities vendors within approved limits. Resolve what you can and bring decisions to studio leadership when needed.
• Track license, membership, software and insurance deadlines; coordinate certificate requests and flag upcoming decisions early.
• Collect receipts, employee expenses and consultant invoices; follow up on missing information and maintain a monthly billing checklist. Assemble upcoming bills and renewal information for accounting review.
• After training and access approval, prepare Monograph invoice drafts from approved inputs. Send invoices and routine payment reminders through the approved workflow, document replies and escalate discrepancies.
• Coordinate approved onboarding and offboarding checklists with payroll, benefits and IT contacts.
• Help improve everyday administrative workflows as we introduce approved technology and AI tools. Check outputs for accuracy, protect confidential information and use judgment about when a person needs to make the decision.

WHAT WILL HELP YOU SUCCEED

• Experience independently managing recurring administrative responsibilities, records and follow-up in a professional office.
• A hospitality mindset and clear, professional communication in person, by phone and in writing. You enjoy interacting with people, notice the small details that help them feel cared for and keep requests moving toward a clear next step.
• Initiative, ownership and dependable follow-through. You move work forward without waiting for every step to be assigned, turn recurring needs into clear processes and communicate early when something is blocked.
• Accuracy with invoices, receipts and other important documents, including the judgment to question missing or inconsistent information.
• Discretion with client, employee and financial records, and respect for approval boundaries.
• Practical proficiency with Outlook, Teams, Word and Excel, along with curiosity and willingness to learn new software and responsible uses of AI. Prior AI expertise is not required.
• A genuine interest in becoming a long-term member of a collaborative design studio, with an ongoing part-time schedule that works for you.

Experience in an architecture or design studio, especially a commercial practice, would be a plus. Experience in engineering, construction or another professional-services office is also helpful. A degree or design portfolio is not required.

THE SYSTEMS WE USE

Our tools include Smartsheet, Monograph, QuickBooks, Microsoft Teams and a shared file server, alongside Outlook, Word and Excel. Experience with Smartsheet, QuickBooks, Teams and organizing shared files is helpful, but you do not need to know every system. Monograph is built for architecture and engineering practices, and we can teach you the workflows you will use. What matters is being comfortable learning software, keeping information organized and helping these systems work together through clear processes and reliable handoffs.

HELP SHAPE THE ROLE. HELP BUILD THE STRUCTURE.

We are bringing together administrative responsibilities that have historically lived in different places across the studio. You will help connect those moving parts, organize information and build practical systems that make everyday work easier for our architects and designers.

You will have room to bring your strengths, suggest better approaches and shape how the role develops around the team’s needs. Working with studio leadership, you will turn recurring tasks and scattered information into clear routines, reliable handoffs and consistent follow-through, with priorities that fit the part-time schedule.

SUPPORT AND CLEAR RESPONSIBILITIES

You will work closely with studio operations leadership. Project leads provide technical information, and our accountant and payroll provider retain their specialist responsibilities. You will receive training and review before taking on assigned workflows independently.

WHAT SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE

Clients and visitors feel welcomed. The office is prepared for the day’s needs. Requests reach the right people, recurring deadlines are visible early and follow-ups are completed. Studio leadership receives a concise list of decisions needed, and the design team can rely on accurate information and thoughtful coordination.

HOW TO APPLY

Submit your resume through this posting. In a short note, tell us what interests you about supporting Gardner’s work, your weekday availability and one example of how you brought order or better follow-through to a busy team.

Gardner Studio considers qualified applicants without regard to legally protected characteristics. If you need an accommodation during the application process, please contact the studio through our website.