Here, we consider urban planners not as actors in the entrepreneurial city, but as entrepreneurial subjects:
How is the daily work of agencies organized, particularly in terms of the time allocated to conducting studies compared to prospecting, communication, and responding to calls for tenders? How is the entrepreneurial ethos of agencies reflected?
How do the multiple constraints faced by agencies (search for new markets, limited time and funding for studies, competition) influence working methods and the quality of deliverables? The case of commercial urban planning consultancies is a special one in this respect: the clientele of these consultancies consists of both public authorities or institutions and commercial enterprises (retail groups, brands, shopping center operators).
How do they negotiate, internally, the contradictions and divergences of interest between their different clients?
Are urban planners becoming precarious workers/entrepreneurs? The vertical disintegration of production in the "creative" industries (in the audiovisual and publishing sectors, for example) has contributed to the increasing precariousness of working conditions and the emergence of the figure of the precarious worker/entrepreneur or precarious entrepreneur. Several recent studies highlight how these working conditions, in addition to the daily difficulties they entail, can be counterproductive to the expression of personal creativity and the development of professional skills (with the logic of a portfolio of references taking precedence over the promotion of professional skills) (see the work of A. McRobbie, for example).
Is the increasing outsourcing of urban planning studies in a competitive market contributing to the weakening of the professional status of urban planners? How does this affect professional skills and the evolution of the profession?