Based on the current situation of the lack of non-professional professional competence training in architectural teaching, this paper investigates the outstanding alumni of architectural specialty in Hefei University of Technology, aiming at clarifying what non-professional professional competence is essential for the development of architectural students. In the first stage of the investigation, 150 outstanding in-service alumni of Hefei University of Technology were selected from the alumni database and questionnaires were conducted. On the basis of the feedback data, several elements of non-professional professional competence which had a greater impact on students of architecture were extracted. In the second stage, 20 core subjects were selected from 150 outstanding alumni, and questions were designed to conduct targeted interviews, from which the key elements of architectural non-professional professional competence were extracted:personal expression and interpersonal communication ability, innovation ability, self-learning ability and career planning ability. After communicating with architectural educators, synthesizing alumni's opinions and referring to the existing educational model of architectural specialty, this paper puts forward the possible ways to cultivate non-professional vocational competence elements in school education. Finally, from the perspective of professional education, some suggestions are put forward on the current undergraduate teaching arrangement of architecture specialty and the use of alumni resources to assist the future development of architecture students.