NXTLVL Experience Design

NXTLVL Experience Design will bring you daring and different dialogues about “DATA: Design, Architecture, Technology and the Arts.” You’ll hear from provocateurs for whom disruption and transformation are a way of engaging in work and play everyday. My guests will include thought leaders who are driven by a passion to create the ‘new possible’ and promote new paradigms of experience into the mainstream. Designers from all disciplines. Architects who are changing the landscape of the built world. Techno-philes – visionaries who make deeply sensory-based but digitally-mediated experiences. And I’ll explore the transformative process of creativity with artists of all sorts.

Latest episodes

Jan 4, 2023 • 1h 13min

The Rituals of Home and Body Cosmetics with Richard Lems - Director Format and Design, Rituals Cosmetics

ABOUT RICHARD LEMS:Richard’s LinkedInProfile: linkedin.com/in/richard-lems-4235082aWebsite: rituals.com (Company)Email: richard.lems@rituals.comSHOW INTROAbout 12 years ago, I was visiting Amsterdam and spent days wandering the city, eating stroop waffles, pancakes, drinking coffee and shopping along the Kalverstraat. The Kalverstraat is one of the main shopping streets in the city center of Amsterdam. It’s more like an outdoor pedestrian mall jammed with the retail stores of well-known international and home-grown Dutch brands as well as independent retailers.My preferred approach to exploring an unknown city is generally given to wander about, sometimes down alleys, looking through fences or over walls into hidden courtyards. It’s mostly about discovery. Looking for things that other tourists may not find and connecting to the local nature of a place.I remember coming to a corner and an open door invited me into a store I was unfamiliar with. Crossing the threshold, I stepped away from the rush of the crowd and entered into to another world. It looked homey. Warm and cozy.Perimeter wall units were illuminated with colorful frames, each identifying a specific category of merchandise. And…it smelled great!I didn’t know the Rituals brand but my first experience, 12 plus years ago, is easy to recall with a vivid sensory-based memory.I liked the store’s name, since I have had a fascination with the idea of rituals, what they mean, how they are enacted, whether participating directly in them versus being an observer had any effect on their relevance. I spent the next half hour sampling fragrances, learning about ancient rituals upon which the products were based, the products’ ingredients and how they had an effect on our body and mind.And of course, I bought bags of products home. The smell of spray bottles that stayed in a bathroom drawer for a while after they were emptied, brought me back to the street corner, the city of Amsterdam, the food and the friends I met while there. From a neuroscientific point to view, scent is deeply connected to memories. Scents can quickly affect mood. That’s why realtors suggest that baking cookies or bread when you are about to show your home is a good thing; because it activates emotions and nostalgic memories that make people feel more relaxed and draw a connection to a sense of comfort and security. These are all good feelings to engender when trying to sell your home. It’s an interesting connection – the body and the home. More interesting still that a company like Rituals has made the connection between the body, the home and cosmetics. And in doing so, they have tapped into the basic idea that good retailing isn’t just about the products, or services, but in the end about emotions.“If you can get to the emotions,” says Richard Lems, the Director of Format and Design for Rituals, you create fans rather than just customers. While everyone else was following the ‘pile ‘em high and watch ‘em fly’ mentality to retailing years ago, Rituals was working to sell emotion. Engendering feelings that were attached to ancient stories, the practices of ayruveda, or a hammam, or the rituals of Sakura have become the experiential foundation for Rituals stores. Behind every product there is a deeper meaning, a deeper story based on ancient traditions and they are made contemporary with Western technologies. For Lems, there is no disconnect between the home and the body. You know that expression ‘Home is where your heart is”? Well, for Rituals, home, body, heart, soul are all connected. They are in a reciprocal feedback loop, interconnected and interdependent. One influences the other.Like with my strategy of discovering a city, Rituals believes that the discovery process leads customer experiences in their stores. It may start from the street, lead to a cup of tea and hand washing to exploring their assortment. Richard Lems explains that Rituals “innovation is on a very high level.” They are constantly innovating with new products and experiences like meditation chambers in their new flagship store in Amsterdam - built 100 meters away from the store I stumbled upon years ago.And while the Rituals brand has a robust social platform on on-line store that fulfills orders all over the world, Lems believes that the only way to really feel them, smell them, and touch them is in store. The Rituals store is the nexus of ancient stories and practices, products and people. It is the physical touchpoint where product presentation and the hospitality of store associates brings the narratives to life. ABOUT DAVID KEPRON:LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/david-kepron-9a1582bWebsites: https://www.davidkepron.com (personal website)vmsd.com/taxonomy/term/8645 (Blog)Email: david.kepron@NXTLVLexperiencedesign.comTwitter: DavidKepronPersonal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidkepron/NXTLVL Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nxtlvl_experience_design/Bio:David Kepron is a multifaceted creative professional with a deep curiosity to understand ‘why’, ‘what’s now’ and ‘what’s next’. He brings together his background as an architect, artist, educator, author, podcast host and builder to the making of meaningful and empathically-focused, community-centric customer connections at brand experience places around the globe. David is a former VP - Global Design Strategies at Marriott International. While at Marriott, his focus was on the creation of compelling customer experiences within Marriott’s “Premium Distinctive” segment which included: Westin, Renaissance, Le Meridien, Autograph Collection, Tribute Portfolio, Design Hotels and Gaylord hotels. In 2020 Kepron founded NXTLVL Experience Design, a strategy and design consultancy, where he combines his multidisciplinary approach to the creation of relevant brand engagements with his passion for social and cultural anthropology, neuroscience and emerging digital technologies. As a frequently requested international speaker at corporate events and international conferences focusing on CX, digital transformation, retail, hospitality, emerging technology, David shares his expertise on subjects ranging from consumer behaviors and trends, brain science and buying behavior, store design and visual merchandising, hotel design and strategy as well as creativity and innovation. In his talks, David shares visionary ideas on how brand strategy, brain science and emerging technologies are changing guest expectations about relationships they want to have with brands and how companies can remain relevant in a digitally enabled marketplace. David currently shares his experience and insight on various industry boards including: VMSD magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the Interactive Customer Experience Association, Sign Research Foundation’s Program Committee as well as the Center For Retail Transformation at George Mason University.He has held teaching positions at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.), the Department of Architecture & Interior Design of Drexel University in Philadelphia, the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (L.I.M.) in New York, the International Academy of Merchandising and Design in Montreal and he served as the Director of the Visual Merchandising Department at LaSalle International Fashion School (L.I.F.S.) in Singapore. In 2014 Kepron published his first book titled: “Retail (r)Evolution: Why Creating Right-Brain Stores Will Shape the Future of Shopping in a Digitally Driven World” and he is currently working on his second book to be published soon. David also writes a popular blog called “Brain Food” which is published monthly on vmsd.com. ************************************************************************************************************************************The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too. The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too.

Dec 22, 2022 • 1h 22min

Ep.47 The Synchronicity Architect and The Art Of Being There with Justin Bolognino, Founder & CEO of META

ABOUT JUSTIN BOLOGNINO:Justin "JB"’s LinkedIn Profilelinkedin.com/in/jbologninoWebsiteslinktr.ee/metajb (Company)metajb.com (Company)meta.is (Personal)Links:Flatland: https://www.metajb.com/flatland-a-romance-of-manyUnreality: https://www.metajb.com/unreality-1 The Map of Realities: https://medium.com/@jbolognino/the-map-of-realities-4dc12875adbc TwitterjbologninoJustin Bologninos' Bio:Justin Bolognino is the original META.His ground-breaking endeavors are threaded by technology, real-time design and evolutionary immersive experiences focused on revealing hidden human connections. The “Synchronicity Architect" is founder and CEO of META, an immersive experience studio that specializes in “The Art of Being There.” A new META spinoff, launching publicly in early 2022, Unreality is set to be the definitive professional ecosystem for the global “Immersive Media industry.” Taking their skills and touch to nature, Bolognino and wife Elizabeth founded Silent G Farms in North Branch, NY, a retreat compound designed for nourishing creativity and consciousness. JB also helped to develop and launch of Brooklyn Bowl (2009), serving as Creative and Media Director, as well as Arcadia Earth (2019) in NYC, the first artist-driven immersive experience dedicated to sustainability, where he also designed two of the installations.With brand clients like Spotify, Twitter, HP, Samsung, Google, Vimeo, and artistic collaborations with St. Vincent, Dubfire, Skrillex, Phish, Porter Robinson, Troye Sivan, Tiesto and many more, META creates live, multi-sensory experiences that use technology, design and storytelling to ignite the human spirit. META was born originally as “the Meta Agency” in 2009 under Bolognino’s philosophy that the artists creating cutting-edge digital event designs and high-tech performance elements should be recognized, much like the celebrities and brands they create for. An industry visionary, Bolognino is extremely forward-thinking when it comes to technology’s role in immersive experiences. Over the last 15 years, Bolognino has helped make Brooklyn Bowl a celebrated institution, redefined the SXSW experience through #FEED, produced multiple documentaries, led marketing campaigns, and created interactive art and live music for the sake of creation through his first company, Learned Evolution. His role as designer and curator of The Lab at Panorama, and Director of The Antarctic dome show at Coachella, “FLATLAND: A Romance of Many Dimensions”, has played an essential part in the evolution of the festival experience. Bolognino currently lives at Silent G Farms with wife Elizabeth, daughters Chloe and Francesca, son Just, and puppy Billie Holiday.SHOW INTRO:For some time now I have been interested in the merging of design, AI, technology, neuroscience, and art. They all seem to be coalescing into the creation of a new form of place-making.I like most others have been calling it 'immersive experiences' And while the places that are now being created to provide them are proliferating, I think that we are often seeing them only as spectacle. We pay a few dollars, get immersed in data paintings and surround sound, sometimes get corralled into a gift shop, and we’re done. My guess is that we don’t often look beyond the use of light and data as building materials – which on it’s own is a fantastic and transformational tool in our designers tool box – to consider things like the interrelationship of the design of our environment and consciousness.I’m a big advocate of ontological design, which in its most basic description can be frames as - the things we design design us back. Our brain/body/mind is in a reciprocal feedback loop in which the things we design and put into the world in turn influence our neuro-biochemistry and neuro-physiology so that we are literally made in the image of the environments we inhabit.If we venture down the path of consciousness, we need to consider then that we are not singular entities in this world but that we are part of an integrated and interdependent rhythmic whole. Nicola Tesla wrote an article for Colliers Magazine in 1926 where he penned …“When wireless is perfectly applied, the whole earth will be converted to a huge brain, which in fact it is. All things being particles of a real and rhythmic whole…” He went on to explain that ‘the devices with which we would do this would fit in our breast packet and we would communicate with each other independent of geography…’1926!While written almost a hundred years ago Tesla was envisioning a future of digital communication where we would share information, enabled by software and hardware, and in doing so, we would augment our mindware.Dr. Dan Siegal has a definition of mind that seems to work from me.He explains the mind this way: The Mind is an “emergent, self-organizing, embodied, and relational process that regulates the flow of energy and information.”Our minds are in constant reciprocal feedback loop with the environment including the people in it. We are not independent of it. Each of us as a constituent of a larger whole.The environments we inhabit change us as do the other people that we share those environments with. While we participate in our environments, digitally immersive or otherwise, our perceptions are our realities. This too invites us to consider the various types of realities we now engage in. We are growing beyond what we would have only considered as the reality of immediate experience. The ‘as lived’ in ‘real-time’ reality of every day. We now have Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality. But it doesn’t stop there.This is where Justin Bolognino helps created a framework for how we are coming to experience the world around us.Justin’s ground-breaking endeavors are threaded by technology, real-time design and evolutionary immersive experiences that focus on revealing hidden human connections. For Justin, our world of experiences include a number of realities can be mapped. Between the Universe – the analog realities and the Metaverse – the digital realities, he defines 6 realities including sonic, IRL, conscious, augmented, virtual and on-line realities.All of these are interrelated and influence the others as well as how we create experiences. Justin’s Map of realities is complex and layered with an acute awareness of where each plays a role in our lives creating context meaning and levels of consciousness.He calls himself a “Synchronicity Architect", which is a whole other realm of discussion that we get to in our conversation, and is the founder and CEO of META, an immersive experience studio that specializes in “The Art of Being There.” His company was founded originally as “the Meta Agency” in 2009 under Bolognino’s philosophy that the artists creating cutting-edge digital event designs and high-tech performance elements should be recognized, much like the celebrities and brands they create for. Bolognino is extremely forward-thinking when it comes to technology’s role in immersive experiences. Over the last 15 years, Bolognino has helped make Brooklyn Bowl a celebrated institution, redefined the SXSW experience through #FEED, produced multiple documentaries, led marketing campaigns, and created interactive art and live music for the sake of creation through his first company, Learned Evolution.He is a jazz musician and our conversation was woven with music theory, neuro and social science, digital media making, consciousness, branding, the influence of social networks on culture and more. There’s a lot to Justin Bolognino, much more than I could ever hope to unpack in one podcast.Furthermore, I got the deep impression that the simple auditory format of the show would not do justice to Justin.I nevertheless take that limitation as a given and encourage all to visit his website and dive into his multilayered creative framework for creating live, multi-sensory experiences that use technology, design and storytelling to ignite the human spirit. ABOUT DAVID KEPRON:LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/david-kepron-9a1582bWebsites: https://www.davidkepron.com (personal website)vmsd.com/taxonomy/term/8645 (Blog)Email: david.kepron@NXTLVLexperiencedesign.comTwitter: DavidKepronPersonal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidkepron/NXTLVL Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nxtlvl_experience_design/Bio:David Kepron is a multifaceted creative professional with a deep curiosity to understand ‘why’, ‘what’s now’ and ‘what’s next’. He brings together his background as an architect, artist, educator, author, podcast host and builder to the making of meaningful and empathically-focused, community-centric customer connections at brand experience places around the globe. David is a former VP - Global Design Strategies at Marriott International. While at Marriott, his focus was on the creation of compelling customer experiences within Marriott’s “Premium Distinctive” segment which included: Westin, Renaissance, Le Meridien, Autograph Collection, Tribute Portfolio, Design Hotels and Gaylord hotels. In 2020 Kepron founded NXTLVL Experience Design, a strategy and design consultancy, where he combines his multidisciplinary approach to the creation of relevant brand engagements with his passion for social and cultural anthropology, neuroscience and emerging digital technologies. As a frequently requested international speaker at corporate events and international conferences focusing on CX, digital transformation, retail, hospitality, emerging technology, David shares his expertise on subjects ranging from consumer behaviors and trends, brain science and buying behavior, store design and visual merchandising, hotel design and strategy as well as creativity and innovation. In his talks, David shares visionary ideas on how brand strategy, brain science and emerging technologies are changing guest expectations about relationships they want to have with brands and how companies can remain relevant in a digitally enabled marketplace. David currently shares his experience and insight on various industry boards including: VMSD magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the Interactive Customer Experience Association, Sign Research Foundation’s Program Committee as well as the Center For Retail Transformation at George Mason University.He has held teaching positions at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.), the Department of Architecture & Interior Design of Drexel University in Philadelphia, the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (L.I.M.) in New York, the International Academy of Merchandising and Design in Montreal and he served as the Director of the Visual Merchandising Department at LaSalle International Fashion School (L.I.F.S.) in Singapore. In 2014 Kepron published his first book titled: “Retail (r)Evolution: Why Creating Right-Brain Stores Will Shape the Future of Shopping in a Digitally Driven World” and he is currently working on his second book to be published soon. David also writes a popular blog called “Brain Food” which is published monthly on vmsd.com. ************************************************************************************************************************************The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too. The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too.

Dec 7, 2022 • 1h 13min

Ep. 46 Immersion And The Science of The Extraordinary with Dr. Paul Zak, Professor and Chief Immersion Officer - Immersion Neuroscience

ABOUT DR. PAUL ZAK:Dr. Paul Zak’s LinkedIn Profile:https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-zak-91123510/Websites:Immersion book link: https://www.amazon.com/Immersion-Science-Extraordinary-Source-Happiness/dp/1544531974/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1669735115&sr=8-1Twitter: @pauljzakWebsite: https://pauljzak.comWebsite: https://www.cgu.edu/people/paul-zak/Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_J._ZakEmailpaul@immersionneuro.comDr. Paul Zak's Bio:Dr. Paul J. Zak is a Professor at Claremont Graduate University and is ranked in the top 0.3% of most cited scientists with over 180 published papers and more than 19,000 citations to his research. Paul’s ten decades of research have taken him form the Pentagon to Fortune 50 boardrooms to the rainforest of Papua New Guinea. Along the way he helped start a number of interdisciplinary fields including neuroeconomics, neuromanagement, and neuromarketing. He has written three general audience books and is a regular TED speaker. His newest book is Immersion: The Science of the Extraordinary and Source of Happiness. Paul is also a four-time tech entrepreneur; his current company, Immersion Neuroscience, is a software platform that allows anyone to measure what the brain loves in real-time to improve outcomes in entertainment, education and training, live events and to help people sustain emotional wellness. He frequently appears in the media in such places as Good Morning America, Dr. Phil, Fox & Friends, ABC Evening News, and his work has been reported in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Time, The Economist, Scientific American, Fast Company, Forbes, and various podcasts. Fun fact: he is a member of the Screen Actors Guild and has created dialog for two movies.SHOW INTRO:For some time, I have been intrigued by experience making, especially those that we might qualify as ‘immersive.’ When I have imagined what these experiences might be like, I have mostly considered them as being in places that surround you with an environment that is all encompassing, enveloping you in multi-sensory input.Immersive digital environments can do this.I have a deep enthusiasm for the merger of digital technologies, especially in our nascent capacity to blend art, AI and neuroscience into data visualizations. I have a fascination in the creation of places that make the invisible, data, visible.The digitally immersive experiences we now see like the multiple Van Gogh exhibits - or those that bring the art of other famous artists like Picasso, and Degas to digital life - are beautiful and are part of a shift in the nature and relevancy of museums. Venues are emerging like Artechouse whose immersive experiences have included the digital virtuosity of data visualization artist Refik Anadol. Companies like Moment Factory are transforming disquieting nighttime forests into delightful walks illuminated with stories projected on trees.These are all captivating and visually rich experiences. And yet, I have equally puzzled over the idea that ‘immersion’, as an idea, is more than data paintings filling museum spaces from floor to ceiling. Immersion is more than a feast for the visual, and maybe auditory, systems of our brains. On some level, I have felt that ‘Immersion’ is something more transformative. Something that activates areas of our brains that are responsible for feelings of arousal or pleasure as well as areas that give us the sense that what is happening has a resonant social value. This is where Dr. Paul Zak steps into the narrative. Dr. Paul J. Zak is a Professor at Claremont Graduate University and is ranked in the top 0.3% of most cited scientists with over 180 published papers and more than 19,000 citations to his research. He has stood on the TED stage 5 times and speaks all over the world.Immersion, he suggests, is driven by two factors:the activation of areas of the brain that produce the neurochemicals dopamine and oxytocin. Most of us will have heard that dopamine is the ‘pleasure’ neurochemical. It plays a role in the pleasure center of the brain and is tied to addiction. Dopamine is also tied to our brain’s ability to predict and prediction errors. It is connected to our ability to differentiate anomalies in complex patterns.It sort of creates an alert system that something is worthy of our attention. It is part of how we learn.When we hear the word ‘oxytocin,’ some may know it to be the “Love hormone.’ Among other life moments, it is present in childbirth, breastfeeding, sex, a good long hug…Oxytocin is often linked towarm, cozy feelings. It has the ability to regulate our emotional responses and pro-social behaviors, including trust, empathy, positive memories, processing of bonding cues, and positive communication. All of which are critical to having positive brand experiences.Oxytocin has a connection to whether or not an experience has a level of emotional resonance and the brain’s ability to identify an experience as having some social value, some relational component. When experiences combine the release of dopamine along with oxytocin, then according to Paul Zak, we have Immersion. Immersion is contagious – the more we are immersed in an experience the more our brain says that it was amazing, creating value in the moment and it induces a craving to repeat it in the future. And that is the essence of customer loyalty.When a retailer/brand creates such an amazing experience that you want to repeat it.Paul’s ten decades of research have taken him from the Pentagon to Fortune 50 boardrooms to the rainforest of Papua New Guinea. Along the way he helped start a number of interdisciplinary fields including neuroeconomics, neuromanagement, and neuromarketing. His current company, Immersion Neuroscience, has developed a software platform that allows anyone to measure what the brain loves in real-time to improve outcomes in entertainment, education and training, live events and to help people sustain emotional wellness. In Dr. Paul Zak’s new book “Immersion: The Science of the Extraordinary and Source of Happiness,” he offers a framework for transforming nearly any situation from ordinary to extraordinary. Based on 20 years of neuroscience research from his lab and innumerable client applications, Dr. Paul Zak explains why brains crave the extraordinary.ABOUT DAVID KEPRON:LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/david-kepron-9a1582bWebsites: https://www.davidkepron.com (personal website)vmsd.com/taxonomy/term/8645 (Blog)Email: david.kepron@NXTLVLexperiencedesign.comTwitter: DavidKepronPersonal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidkepron/NXTLVL Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nxtlvl_experience_design/Bio:David Kepron is a multifaceted creative professional with a deep curiosity to understand ‘why’, ‘what’s now’ and ‘what’s next’. He brings together his background as an architect, artist, educator, author, podcast host and builder to the making of meaningful and empathically-focused, community-centric customer connections at brand experience places around the globe. David is a former VP - Global Design Strategies at Marriott International. While at Marriott, his focus was on the creation of compelling customer experiences within Marriott’s “Premium Distinctive” segment which included: Westin, Renaissance, Le Meridien, Autograph Collection, Tribute Portfolio, Design Hotels and Gaylord hotels. In 2020 Kepron founded NXTLVL Experience Design, a strategy and design consultancy, where he combines his multidisciplinary approach to the creation of relevant brand engagements with his passion for social and cultural anthropology, neuroscience and emerging digital technologies. As a frequently requested international speaker at corporate events and international conferences focusing on CX, digital transformation, retail, hospitality, emerging technology, David shares his expertise on subjects ranging from consumer behaviors and trends, brain science and buying behavior, store design and visual merchandising, hotel design and strategy as well as creativity and innovation. In his talks, David shares visionary ideas on how brand strategy, brain science and emerging technologies are changing guest expectations about relationships they want to have with brands and how companies can remain relevant in a digitally enabled marketplace. David currently shares his experience and insight on various industry boards including: VMSD magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the Interactive Customer Experience Association, Sign Research Foundation’s Program Committee as well as the Center For Retail Transformation at George Mason University.He has held teaching positions at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.), the Department of Architecture & Interior Design of Drexel University in Philadelphia, the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (L.I.M.) in New York, the International Academy of Merchandising and Design in Montreal and he served as the Director of the Visual Merchandising Department at LaSalle International Fashion School (L.I.F.S.) in Singapore. In 2014 Kepron published his first book titled: “Retail (r)Evolution: Why Creating Right-Brain Stores Will Shape the Future of Shopping in a Digitally Driven World” and he is currently working on his second book to be published soon. David also writes a popular blog called “Brain Food” which is published monthly on vmsd.com. ************************************************************************************************************************************The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too. The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too.

Nov 23, 2022 • 1h 17min

Ep. 45 Color Archeology, Trends and Forecasts with Montaha Hidefi, Color Archeologist, Author and Public Speaker

ABOUT MONTAHA HIDEFI:Montaha’s LinkedIn Profile:linkedin.com/in/montahahidefiWebsitewww.montahahidefi.cawww.colorlanding.comwww.colorarchaeology.caPhone+1-519-760-5910Emailmontaha.hidefi@yahoo.comTwittercolorfulmontahaMONTAHA HIDEFI's Bio:A world-renowned Color Archeologist™, Montaha Hidefi centers her consultancy services on developing color trends foresights and color forecast projections, portfolio ideation and customized color related insights to small, medium, and large organizations on a global basis.In 2020, Montaha established the notion of Color Archaeology™, a trademark of her Color Landing Studio, to best define the practice of color forecasting and its intricacies. Color Archaeology incorporates the skills and expertise to track and observe societal trends, analyze how they are interpreted in current times, and predict how they will evolve into the future.A public speaker, Montaha lectures and keynotes about color and trends virtually and in-person at international events and company settings. Her articles on the subject matter are published in countless trade publications.Montaha serves at Color Marketing Group® (CMG) as Vice President of Color Forecasting, at the Executive Committee of the Colour Research Society of Canada (CRSC) and as Vice President of the Canadian Freelance Guild (CFG). She holds a comprehensive background in international marketing, color marketing and the coatings industry. Montaha was born and raised in South America, is an avid traveler and has lived and worked in the Middle East, Europe, and North America.She is the author of Giving Voice to My Silence, Dando voz a mi silencio, and Groping for Truth, and the co-author of Colour Design: Theories and Applications.SHOW INTRO:On my first day of the freehand drawing studio at McGill University School of Architecture, the teacher, Gerry Tondino, explained that he would not teach us how to draw. Instead, he said, we would learn how to see. To understand light. How without light nothing exists. How it created form, texture, and color.I loved those classes where every week, for three hours, we would ‘learn to see.’ I took additional drawing classes in the evenings and Sketching School where we would travel to some location and spend a week drawing outdoors.And learn to see I did.Gerry Tondino fostered my love of drawing with his gentle teaching approach. He would walk the studio in his well-worn jean jacket saying “put a line at the top of the paper, now another one at the bottom, now draw the figure…” 30 seconds late he would say it again, and again, and again. The 3 hours studio seemed to go by in 30 second increments as we learned to see.Mostly we worked in black and white. Charcoal on newsprint paper.Color would come later. Color had its own challenges. Understanding color was tough. Understanding color was a process that went on for years. Even now in my recent paintings, color is a challenge but one I take on with enthusiasm. What color goes with what other color. How does one color seemingly change the hue of another simply because it is adjacent to or surrounding it? How is light reflected off of one object coloring another? Cool. Warm. Saturated. Transparent. Opaque. I love color. Fuchsia particularly. To me, it is vibrant and signals enthusiasm and creative innovation. And then there is understanding color from the neurobiological point of view. How our brain processes color is fascinating. The eyes take in wavelengths of light activating rods and cone in our eyes sending signals to the occipital lobe in the back of our head and the information is turned into our perception of color. And that is the simplest description that there ever likely was of how it works.The other thing about color, especially when we think about objects ‘being colored’ is that isn’t actually what is happening. Our human eyes are actually able to only see a very small portion of the full light wavelength spectrum. Some animals are actually better at seeing light in the infrared spectrum which we cannot see. These wavelengths still enter our eyes but our visual apparatus isn’t able to ‘see’ it.So, when the full sunlight hits objects, a certain portion of the visual light spectrum is absorbed into the molecular structure of the object. The remaining wavelengths of light are reflected and are perceived by our eyes and decoded by our brain as color. What we see is the reflected wavelengths. So, if you looking at a red shirt, all wavelengths of light except those that are perceived as red are absorbed by the fabric and pigments and the red wavelengths are bouncing off and entering our eyes and voila… red shirt.But it is oh so much more complex than that…And what about how certain colors make us feel? Colors affect our mood. Our neurology and colors are interconnected and there’s a heft of science that describes the very real relationship of color to our emotional state. Colors activate our neurobiology and can be calming, activating, agitating, and directly affect the way we feel in places we inhabit.Next time you are anywhere, outside, at home, in a store, driving on the highway take notice of all of the colors. Everything is colored. Most everything we buy is colored and the shade of red, or yellow or blue really matters to our perception of the product, our willingness to buy it and the brand or store that sells it. Colors have become so connected to our consumer environments that we have come to attribute certain colors to certain brands. Tiffany … blue.Red … Coke or TargetYellow … McDonalds or Best BuyAnd then there is the psychological connotations of colors. Red is a popular color in Chinese culture, symbolizing luck, joy, and happiness. Purple was been linked to royalty or the church.What does color mean? What colors will be prevalent next year? How are colors tied to human experience, economics and political movements?Color. More than we can unpack in this one podcast but worth understanding because so much of human experience is connected to it. To help us get there is Montaha Hidefi.She is an internationally distinguished Color Archaeologist, who develops color trend concepts and color palettes for organizations around the world.Montaha is the Vice President of Color Forecasting atColor Marketing Group® (CMG) and Vice President of theCanadian Freelance Guild(CFG). By creating a color forecasts designed specifically to company’s target markets, Montaha Hidefi helps organizations optimize their product portfolio and create color stories that brand’s target audiences can relate to.The ideation of your color direction is done by examining your past and current colors, understanding the present trends, and setting new parameters based on research and a scientific forecasting process. She presented at conferences, color seminars, universities, and trade shows, all around the world.She is the author of Groping For Truth - My Uphill Struggle for Respect, co-author of Color Design - Theories and Applications(1st and 2nd editions). From a young age growing up in Venezuela Montaha has had a love affair with all things colored. She feels so interconnected with color that she explains that color and her are like talking about the same thing. Welcome Montaha Hidefi….ABOUT DAVID KEPRON:LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/david-kepron-9a1582bWebsites: https://www.davidkepron.com (personal website)vmsd.com/taxonomy/term/8645 (Blog)Email: david.kepron@NXTLVLexperiencedesign.comTwitter: DavidKepronPersonal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidkepron/NXTLVL Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nxtlvl_experience_design/Bio:David Kepron is a multifaceted creative professional with a deep curiosity to understand ‘why’, ‘what’s now’ and ‘what’s next’. He brings together his background as an architect, artist, educator, author, podcast host and builder to the making of meaningful and empathically-focused, community-centric customer connections at brand experience places around the globe. David is a former VP - Global Design Strategies at Marriott International. While at Marriott, his focus was on the creation of compelling customer experiences within Marriott’s “Premium Distinctive” segment which included: Westin, Renaissance, Le Meridien, Autograph Collection, Tribute Portfolio, Design Hotels and Gaylord hotels. In 2020 Kepron founded NXTLVL Experience Design, a strategy and design consultancy, where he combines his multidisciplinary approach to the creation of relevant brand engagements with his passion for social and cultural anthropology, neuroscience and emerging digital technologies. As a frequently requested international speaker at corporate events and international conferences focusing on CX, digital transformation, retail, hospitality, emerging technology, David shares his expertise on subjects ranging from consumer behaviors and trends, brain science and buying behavior, store design and visual merchandising, hotel design and strategy as well as creativity and innovation. In his talks, David shares visionary ideas on how brand strategy, brain science and emerging technologies are changing guest expectations about relationships they want to have with brands and how companies can remain relevant in a digitally enabled marketplace. David currently shares his experience and insight on various industry boards including: VMSD magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the Interactive Customer Experience Association, Sign Research Foundation’s Program Committee as well as the Center For Retail Transformation at George Mason University.He has held teaching positions at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.), the Department of Architecture & Interior Design of Drexel University in Philadelphia, the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (L.I.M.) in New York, the International Academy of Merchandising and Design in Montreal and he served as the Director of the Visual Merchandising Department at LaSalle International Fashion School (L.I.F.S.) in Singapore. In 2014 Kepron published his first book titled: “Retail (r)Evolution: Why Creating Right-Brain Stores Will Shape the Future of Shopping in a Digitally Driven World” and he is currently working on his second book to be published soon. David also writes a popular blog called “Brain Food” which is published monthly on vmsd.com. ************************************************************************************************************************************The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too. The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too.

Nov 9, 2022 • 1h 26min

EP. 44 Design, Discovery and Dichotomies with Gabriele Chiave - VP GLOBAL, DESIGN CREATIVE DIRECTION & INNOVATION The Estée Lauder Companies Inc.

Oct 26, 2022 • 1h 51min

Ep. 43 Design For Massive Change with Bruce Mau - Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Massive Change Network

ABOUT BRUCE MAU:For press and event inquiries: info@massivechangenetwork.com INSTAGRAM ACCOUNTS:Bruce Mau - https://www.instagram.com/realbrucemau/#Aiyemobisi Williams - https://www.instagram.com/aiyemobisi/Massive Change Network -https://www.instagram.com/massivechangenetwork/ LINKEDIN ACCOUNTS:Co-founder, Chief Executive Officer Bruce Mau -https://www.linkedin.com/in/bruce-mau/Co-founder, Chief Insights Officer Aiyemobisi “Bisi” Willia -https://www.linkedin.com/in/bisiwilliams/ Company Page Massive Change Network -https://www.linkedin.com/company/massive-change-network/about/WEBSITES:Massive Change Network -https://www.massivechangenetwork.comHealth 2049 Podcast -https://www.health2049.comMAILING LIST:https://massivechangeworkshops.us7.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=edecf2a3075fbcc167f6019ec&id=592db25fb8 BRUCE'S BIO:Bruce Mau is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Massive Change Network (MCN), a global design consultancy based in the Chicago area. Across more than thirty years of design innovation, Bruce has worked as a designer, innovator, educator, and author on a broad spectrum of projects in collaboration with the world’s leading brands, organizations, universities, governments, entrepreneurs, renowned artists, and fellow optimists. To create value and positive impact across global ecosystems and economies, Mau evolved a unique toolkit of 24 massive change design principles — MC24 — that can be applied in any field or environment at every scale. The MC24 principles underpin all Bruce’s work — from designing carpets to cities, books to new media, global brands to cultural institutions, and social movements to business transformation – and they are the subject of his book,“Mau: MC24, Bruce Mau’s 24 Principles for Designing Massive Change in Your Life and Work.” Books are central to Bruce’s purpose of achieving and inspiring understanding, clarity, and alignment around visions of a better future. He is the author of“Massive Change”;“Life Style”; and“Mau: MC24: Bruce Mau’s 24 Principles for Designing Massive Change in Your Life and Work”;– all published by Phaidon Press. Bruce’s“The Incomplete Manifesto for Growth,”a forty-three-point statement on sustaining a creative practice, has been translated into more than fifteen languages and has been shared widely on the Internet for nearly twenty-five years. Bruce is also co-author of several books, including the landmark architecture book“S, M, L, XL”with Rem Koolhaas;“Nexus: Augmented Thinking for a Complex World – The New Convergence of Art, Technology, and Science,”with Julio Ottino, dean of Northwestern University’s McCormick School of Engineering;“The Third Teacher”with OWP/P Architects and VS Furniture; and“Spectacle”with David Rockwell.Bruce has collaborated with clients on the development and design of more than 200 books, including Art Gallery of Ontario, Claes Oldenburg, Douglas Gordon, Frank Gehry, Gagosian, Getty Research Institute, James Lahey, Mark Francis, and Zone Books. In these times of complex, interrelated challenges that are unlike any we’ve faced before, Bruce believes life-centered design offers a clear path towards identifying the full context of our problems and developing innovative, sustainable, and holistic solutions. Bruce’s work and life story are the subject of the feature-length documentary, “MAU,” scheduled for North American theatrical release in May 2022.EP. 43 BRUCE MAU - SHOW INTROWhen I was a kid, my parents used to load my four brothers and I, along with our dog, into a station wagon, hook up a trailer and travel on summer vacation from Montreal to Winnipeg, effectively halfway across Canada, to visit my father's family. The trek would take us along the Trans Canada highway following a route around Lake Superior and passing through cites like Wawa, which had an enormous Canada goose statue, Dryden with the monumental statue of Max the Moose, and Sudbury Ontario with the Big nickel.The big nickel. It was enormous. This thing was a towering 30 feet tall and was said to be about 64 million times the size of the nickel you’d have in your pocket. In a time when penny candy stores were a big thing for a youngster in the late 60’s, how much that nickel could buy at Ed’s market, the candy store a walk from my parent’s house, was beyond imagination. Sudbury was also one of the largest nickel mining areas on the planet. My memory of Sudbury at that time was that it was desolate. For miles around the nickel mines, Sudbury was gray. The landscape was just gray. There were no trees. There was no grass. It was the closest thing my young mind could have imagined when thinking about what the surface of the moon would have looked like. In those seemingly dead zones, it was stark and infertile.In 1971 and '72 NASA actually sent its astronauts to train there for the Apollo 16 and 17 missions, because it approximated what astronauts would encounter when they landed on the lunar surface.While I passed through as a tourist on vacation, there was another boy who lived there in the house at the end of a street beyond which there was only 200 miles of Boreal Forest. As an adult the boy who lived at the end of the street before the forest started would describe those years as ‘lawless’ and like walking a Vaseline greased edge on which a misplaced step would send you careening into a chasm from which you would never climb out. Finding his way out of the Boreal Forest, it turns out, would also serve in later years as an apt metaphor for finding a way out of a childhood of adverse experiences to a career as one of the most successful designers of the last 50 years. The house of the end of the street was not the end of the road for Bruce Mau. At a young age, he had other plans to not slip and fall into the chasm, but to find his way out of the forest. To follow a path with an entrepreneurial spirit, of exploration and discovery, continually scanning the world for opportunity. Mau believes that “you need to be taught the entrepreneurial mindset of being lost in the forest and discovering a methodology for finding your way out. You need a compass. You need a way of actually navigating any forest not just the one in front of you.” That, he says, is a very different mindset and design is actually built to do it. That's what designers do…”Looking back, Mau now deeply appreciates how those decisions that he made when he was twelve set that in motion and kind of created the space for him to do what he does and to be who he is.Despite his extraordinary success, he understands that, whatever the kind of problem and no matter how right he believes his solution is, it is it's meaningless if he can't inspire people to do it.He explains that “..I have to show them what that means. I have to show them the destination and I have to take them there in their imagination. I’ve got to say, ‘look I know we're here now but we're going to go over there. I'm telling you over there is awesome and here's what's going to happen…”I was first exposed to Bruce’s creative thinking process through his landmark architectural book “S, M, L, XL”with the world renowned architect Rem Koolhaas. SML XL is not a book you read cover to cover. It is something that you live with, explore and reference over and over again. Bruce is a lover of books and has collaborated with clients on the development and design of more than 200 titles. He says “I consider myself a ‘biblio-naire.’ I'm not a billionaire but I am a biblio-naire.”One of these books, that I have read cover to cover, is MC24 “Mau: MC24, Bruce Mau’s 24 Principles for Designing Massive Change in Your Life and Work.” This volume is more a manifesto or a unique toolkit of 24 massive change design principles that can be applied in any field or environment at every scale. These 24 principles underpin all of Bruce’s work — from designing carpets to cities, books to new media, global brands to cultural institutions, and social movements to business transformation.Today Bruce has navigated the slippery line of life a long way from his childhood years in the liminal space where the road ends and the forest begins. He is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Massive Change Network (MCN), a global design consultancy based in the Chicago area. Across more than thirty years of design innovation, Bruce has worked as a designer, innovator, educator, and author on a broad spectrum of projects with some of world’s leading brands, organizations, universities, governments, entrepreneurs, renowned artists, and fellow optimists. Bruce’s work and life story are the subject of the feature-length documentary, “MAU,” that was released to North American theatres in May 2022. It is a captivating and candid look into Bruce Mau’s life of ideas. I encourage all to see it. ************************************************************************************************************************************The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “dialogues on DATA: design architecture technology and the arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too. And remember you'll always find more information with links to content that we've discussed, contact information to our guests and more in the show notes for each episode. ABOUT DAVID KEPRON:LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/david-kepron-9a1582bWebsites: https://www.davidkepron.com (personal website)vmsd.com/taxonomy/term/8645 (Blog)Email: david.kepron@NXTLVLexperiencedesign.comTwitter: DavidKepronPersonal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidkepron/NXTLVL Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nxtlvl_experience_design/Bio:David Kepron is a multifaceted creative professional with a deep curiosity to understand ‘why’, ‘what’s now’ and ‘what’s next’. He brings together his background as an architect, artist, educator, author, podcast host and builder to the making of meaningful and empathically-focused, community-centric customer connections at brand experience places around the globe. David is a former VP - Global Design Strategies at Marriott International. While at Marriott, his focus was on the creation of compelling customer experiences within Marriott’s “Premium Distinctive” segment which included: Westin, Renaissance, Le Meridien, Autograph Collection, Tribute Portfolio, Design Hotels and Gaylord hotels. In 2020 Kepron founded NXTLVL Experience Design, a strategy and design consultancy, where he combines his multidisciplinary approach to the creation of relevant brand engagements with his passion for social and cultural anthropology, neuroscience and emerging digital technologies. As a frequently requested international speaker at corporate events and international conferences focusing on CX, digital transformation, retail, hospitality, emerging technology, David shares his expertise on subjects ranging from consumer behaviors and trends, brain science and buying behavior, store design and visual merchandising, hotel design and strategy as well as creativity and innovation. In his talks, David shares visionary ideas on how brand strategy, brain science and emerging technologies are changing guest expectations about relationships they want to have with brands and how companies can remain relevant in a digitally enabled marketplace. David currently shares his experience and insight on various industry boards including: VMSD magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the Interactive Customer Experience Association, Sign Research Foundation’s Program Committee as well as the Center For Retail Transformation at George Mason University.He has held teaching positions at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.), the Department of Architecture & Interior Design of Drexel University in Philadelphia, the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (L.I.M.) in New York, the International Academy of Merchandising and Design in Montreal and he served as the Director of the Visual Merchandising Department at LaSalle International Fashion School (L.I.F.S.) in Singapore. In 2014 Kepron published his first book titled: “Retail (r)Evolution: Why Creating Right-Brain Stores Will Shape the Future of Shopping in a Digitally Driven World” and he is currently working on his second book to be published soon. David also writes a popular blog called “Brain Food” which is published monthly on vmsd.com. The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too.

May 11, 2022 • 1h 20min

Ep. 42 Telling Architecture's Story In Film with Kyle Bergman, Founder - Architecture and Design Film Festival

Apr 14, 2022 • 1h 34min

EP.41 Thriving And Sustainable Ecosystems with Denise Naguib VP, Sustainability and Supplier Diversity, Marriott International, Inc.

ABOUT DENISE NAGUIB:Denise’s LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/denisenaguibEmail: denise.naguib@marriott.comTwitter: dnaguibBio:Denise was born in Cairo, Egypt where she lived for half of her childhood before moving to Michigan, Minnesota, and finally Oregon. She attended the University of Oregon, earning a Bachelors of Science in Geography with an emphasis on biological and human impacts on the environment. After graduating, Denise became involved with Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Ocean Futures Society, implementing environmental education programs at various locations. In 2005, Denise moved to the Cayman Islands to implement Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Ambassadors of the Environment program at The Ritz-Carlton, Grand Cayman. Naguib moved to Washington, DC and led the environmental strategy for the brand, as well as supporting the growth of the Cousteau program within The Ritz-Carlton. In January 2010, Denise joined the Global Operations group at Marriott International and continued her work on sustainability strategy for all brands, as well as expansion of the Cousteau program. In 2012, Denise was named Vice President of Sustainability and Supplier Diversity, integrating both of these important subjects in the company’s global operations. In 2017, Naguib launched the company’s new Sustainability and Social Impact platform, Serve 360, and accompanying goals. Denise is working on a variety of projects including responsible sourcing, food waste, carbon reporting and supporting efforts to increase spend with diverse businesses globally.Denise currently serves as Vice Chair of the Board for WEConnect International, the global organization supporting women businesses around the world. She is also the Chair of the National LGBT Chamber’s Procurement Council, on the Board of The Conference Board’s Sustainability Center and serves on the boards of The Ocean Foundation and Arbor Day Foundation. SHOW INTRO:A few years ago, my family gave me a book that was full of amazing illustrations of planet earth… without humans.The images it showed were both fantastic and tragic. But as you looked through the images one thing became perfectly clear, that earth without humans was actually OK. Now I'm not suggesting that we work hard to leave earth. On the contrary, I'm actually suggesting that we need to work harder at saving earth from ourselves.When you think about it, in the grand scheme of things, the big universal timeline, humans have been around for a micro moment, not even a blink of an eye. And to be sure, in the very short time that we've been around, we have done some pretty remarkable things. There isn't a day go by that I don't marvel at human ingenuity as well as the strange paradox that we equally seem to be working as hard at making this planet uninhabitable for ourselves well at the same time we're trying to save each other from devastating diseases to keep us alive for as long as we can.Which I suppose points to the idea that despite our irresponsible treatment of mother earth we really love being here.As an architect I am particularly tuned in to what our built environment costs, not in terms of materials or operating expenses, but in terms of what it does to the environment around us what natural resources we strip from the earth, the cost of shipping them to construction sites and the leftovers of the construction process that end up in landfill. As a LEED certified architect I'm even more tuned in to the lifespan of buildings and the impact that they have on the environment. Alan weismann’s book “The World Without US” brought to light some pretty interesting ideas regarding how the world would be if we simply retreated further into the background and let natural ecosystems take over.We've seen some of these changes over the past two years in the context of the global COVID-19 pandemic. It's kept people inside, animals have had a chance to roam, our urban environments have become less raucous, the ozone layer has had a chance to mend and even the canals in Venice are running clear.So, it does tend to make you want to question what would happen to our planet if for example we weren't here. Now, having said that, I think most of us want to be here. We find this little blue dot spinning uncontrollably in the vast universe an astounding place to be with a wealth of natural resources flora and fauna, that if you look, just for a moment, you can be nothing but amazed at the complexity, beauty, detail and design of all things.It's not surprising as well that during this pause imposed on us over the past couple of years, that people have begun to reconnect to the value of nature. Biophilic design is rolling off the lips of more people these days than ever before and sustainable practices are being embraced and young GenZers, like Greta Thunberg, are being lauded for sailing across the ocean and bringing a global consciousness to the climate change issue.I can tell you, my sons are quite concerned about the planet they've inherited. And what we need to do to make it right in the next few years so that the trajectory of climate change won't lead to a climate calamity. I don't know, maybe it's quite likely that our influence on climate will likely be the demise of humans long before some asteroid hits us like in the movie Don't look up.”I was also quite struck by the Salesforce commercial playing during the Winter Olympics with Matthew McConaughey who was suggesting that space is ‘a final frontier’ might be a misappropriation of our attention. We might be better off connecting better and creating viable alternatives to the way that we've treated mother earth, a planet that we've been gifted and need to be better stewards of.I liked the idea of SalesForce’s “Team Earth” commercial.Bravo for bringing that into the social consciousness.When I was at Marriott our chief engineer Terry Smith was on a mission to remove plastic bottles from hotels and implement water filtration systems that would remove millions of plastic bottles from landfill every year.You know, there's a plastic island the size of Texas floating in the Pacific Ocean and everything we can do every day to remove things like that from our planet the better off we all will be, humans and ocean life alike. When I was at Marriott there was a woman who seemed to make it her life purpose to connect us to the consequences of our behavior on geography and the natural ecosystems. Denise Naguib is an extraordinary person with a passion for education and growing our awareness of how to interact with a world around us that produces better human outcomes.Denise was born in Cairo, Egypt where she lived for half of her childhood before moving to Michigan, Minnesota, and finally Oregon. She was originally on an education track that would put her into medicine. But one day, when needing to take an elective for one of the courses to complete her Bachelors degree, she discovered the world of geography… and that changed everything.She earned a Bachelors of Science in Geography degree from the University of Oregon with an emphasis on biological and human impacts on the environment. After graduating, Denise was hired to be a snorkeling instructor at a summer camp on Catalina island off the coast of California. She had grown up snorkeling and this was a natural fit for her.And, as fate would have it, one day she got a call that led to becoming involved with Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Ocean Futures Society, implementing environmental education programs. In 2005, Denise moved to the Cayman Islands (not a bad gig) to implement Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Ambassadors of the Environment program at The Ritz-Carlton, Grand Cayman. With the success of that program, Denise then moved to Washington, DC and led the environmental strategy for the brand, as well as supporting the growth of the Cousteau program within The Ritz-Carlton. In January 2010, Denise joined the Global Operations group at Marriott International and continued her work on sustainability strategy for all brands, as well as expansion of the Cousteau program. In 2012, Denise was named Vice President of Sustainability and Supplier Diversity, integrating both of these important subjects in the company’s global operations. In 2017, Naguib launched the company’s new Sustainability and Social Impact platform, Serve 360, and accompanying goals. Denise currently serves as Vice Chair of the Board for WEConnect International, the global organization supporting women businesses around the world. She is also the Chair of the National LGBT Chamber’s Procurement Council, on the Board of The Conference Board’s Sustainability Center and serves on the boards of The Ocean Foundation and Arbor Day Foundation. When I was at Marriott, I liked visiting Denise in her office as often as I could, because it was filled with plants and just smelled better. Her little enclave of the building felt a little bit like a place that grown over after humans had left. Except that at Marriott Denise Naguib is very much there connecting a network of over 8000 hotels and the companies that supply them to the world of sustainable building practice. She leads a team who spends there days connecting to hearts and minds to what we can learn from, and the value of, natural ecosystems helping to make sure that this little blue dot we live on… will not just be there for future generations but be one we can continue to thrive on. ABOUT DAVID KEPRON:LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/david-kepron-9a1582bWebsites: https://www.davidkepron.com (personal website)vmsd.com/taxonomy/term/8645 (Blog)Email: david.kepron@NXTLVLexperiencedesign.comTwitter: DavidKepronPersonal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidkepron/NXTLVL Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nxtlvl_experience_design/Bio:David Kepron is a multifaceted creative professional with a deep curiosity to understand ‘why’, ‘what’s now’ and ‘what’s next’. He brings together his background as an architect, artist, educator, author, podcast host and builder to the making of meaningful and empathically-focused, community-centric customer connections at brand experience places around the globe. David is a former VP - Global Design Strategies at Marriott International. While at Marriott, his focus was on the creation of compelling customer experiences within Marriott’s “Premium Distinctive” segment which included: Westin, Renaissance, Le Meridien, Autograph Collection, Tribute Portfolio, Design Hotels and Gaylord hotels. In 2020 Kepron founded NXTLVL Experience Design, a strategy and design consultancy, where he combines his multidisciplinary approach to the creation of relevant brand engagements with his passion for social and cultural anthropology, neuroscience and emerging digital technologies. As a frequently requested international speaker at corporate events and international conferences focusing on CX, digital transformation, retail, hospitality, emerging technology, David shares his expertise on subjects ranging from consumer behaviors and trends, brain science and buying behavior, store design and visual merchandising, hotel design and strategy as well as creativity and innovation. In his talks, David shares visionary ideas on how brand strategy, brain science and emerging technologies are changing guest expectations about relationships they want to have with brands and how companies can remain relevant in a digitally enabled marketplace. David currently shares his experience and insight on various industry boards including: VMSD magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the Interactive Customer Experience Association, Sign Research Foundation’s Program Committee as well as the Center For Retail Transformation at George Mason University.He has held teaching positions at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.), the Department of Architecture & Interior Design of Drexel University in Philadelphia, the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (L.I.M.) in New York, the International Academy of Merchandising and Design in Montreal and he served as the Director of the Visual Merchandising Department at LaSalle International Fashion School (L.I.F.S.) in Singapore. In 2014 Kepron published his first book titled: “Retail (r)Evolution: Why Creating Right-Brain Stores Will Shape the Future of Shopping in a Digitally Driven World” and he is currently working on his second book to be published soon. David also writes a popular blog called “Brain Food” which is published monthly on vmsd.com. The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too.

Mar 31, 2022 • 1h 9min

Ep.40 Jazz, Creativity And The Brain With Dr. Charles Limb, Chief of the Division of Otology, Neurotology and Skull Base Surgery, UC San Francisco

ABOUT DR. CHARLES LIMB:USSF Health: https://www.ucsfhealth.org/providers/dr-charles-limbhttps://ohns.ucsf.edu/charles-limb https://profiles.ucsf.edu/charles.limbWikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_LimbTED Profile: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_LimbTED Talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/charles_limb_your_brain_on_improvKennedy Center:https://www.kennedy-center.org/artists/l/la-ln/charles-limb/https://www.kennedy-center.org/video/center/discussionspoken-word/2017/jazz-creativity-and-the-brainsound-health-music-and-the-mind/https://www.kennedy-center.org/video/digital-stage/discussionspoken-word/2019/music-and-the-voice-brain-mechanisms-of-vocal-mastery-and-creativity--sound-health/https://www.kennedy-center.org/video/center/discussionspoken-word/2019/sound-health-inside-esperanza-spaldings-brain--the-kennedy-center/https://www.kennedy-center.org/video/center/classical-music/2018/music-and-the-mind-with-piano-prodigy-matthew-whitaker/The Art of The Spark: Musical Creativity Explored with Dr. Charles Limb: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQmGOVr8aJ0Articles: https://www.artsandmindlab.org/charles-limb-md-mapping-the-creative-minds-of-musicians/On Creativity: mihaly csikszentmihalyihttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mihaly_Csikszentmihalyi DR.CHARLES LIMB Bio:Dr. Charles Limb is the Francis A. Sooy Professor of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery and the Chief of the Division of Otology, Neurotology and Skull Base Surgery at UC San Francisco. He is the Director of the Douglas Grant Cochlear Implant Center at UCSF and holds a joint appointment in the Department of Neurosurgery. Dr. Limb received his undergraduate degree at Harvard University, medical training at Yale University School of Medicine, and surgical residency and fellowship training at Johns Hopkins Hospital. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship in functional neuroimaging at the National Institutes of Health. He was a faculty member at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Peabody Conservatory of Music and the School of Education between 1996 and 2015. Dr. Limb joined the UCSF Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery in 2015.Dr. Limb is the 2021-22 President of the American Auditory Society and the Co-Director of the Sound Health Network sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts, NIH and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He is the PI of an NEA Research Lab and Co-PI of an NIH R61/R33 grant. He is the past Editor-in-Chief of Trends in Amplification (now Trends in Hearing), and an Editorial Board member of Otology and Neurotology. Dr. Limb was selected as the 2022 NIH Clinical Center Distinguished Clinical Research Scholar and Educator in Residence. He was also named in 2022 as one of the Kennedy Center’s Next 50, a group of fifty national cultural leaders who are “moving us toward a more inspired, inclusive, and compassionate world”.His current areas of research focus on the study of the neural basis of musical creativity and the study of music perception in deaf individuals with cochlear implants. His work has received international attention and has been featured by National Public Radio, TED, 60 Minutes, National Geographic, the New York Times, PBS, CNN, Scientific American, the British Broadcasting Company, the Smithsonian Institute, the Library of Congress, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Sundance Film Festival, Canadian Broadcasting Company, the Kennedy Center, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the Discovery Channel, CBS Sunday Morning, and the American Museum of Natural History.SHOW INTRODUCTION:A number of years ago I attended a series of lectures at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC that focus on music and the brain and as I sat and watched and listened to these presentations, I was absolutely amazed with the interrelationship between brain activity, spontaneous creativity, music, language meaning and all these things that we share as human beings.For years I've been fascinated with the creative process. It seems natural I suppose given that I'm an architect, an artist, an author and occasionally I might even consider myself a novice musician because I can bang out five chords of a James Taylor song on my guitar. I do however have the extraordinarily good fortune of living with three musicianS. MY sons who are jazz musician, a pianist and a drummer, and a wife who is also a pianist and composer/songwriter and have been surrounded by music and love it for years.In fact, when I paint, and I happen to be focusing on a series of portraits of famous jazz musicians and other musical artists, I only listen to their music as I'm creating. Somehow I think I'm channeling John Coltrane or Miles Davis or Keith Richards or Janis Joplin or Prince.But it helps, it really does. It gets me into a flow state and the world outside me just disappears. For a long time now I have held that creativity is part of who we are. We are equally Homo Faber man the maker as we are Homo Sapiens man the wise.I deeply believe that the creative process is something that is intrinsic to building community and connections with other people for years. We have danced around fires and stamped out meaning with our feet and sang songs and beat on drums and created extraordinary symphonies or rock concerts and in doing so we come together and better understand ourselves our community culture and, in some strange cosmological sense, our relation to the larger whole of humanity.It seems to me that vocal utterances (not speech as we now know it) or producing melodic or rhythmic sounds, beating on drums etc., predated organized or syntactic speech. Since adapting to changing circumstances in the environment around you required some degree of creativity, it seems that there would be a natural connection between the development of creative thinking processes as a matter of survival and what we now know as music as a way to exchange these ideas. Music and music with language, lyrics, are extremely powerful mechanisms to evoke and share emotion and communicate with each other. Building strong social groups and the use of communication tools like language and certainly music has been part of our evolutionary process. Our brains have evolved into these immensely complex systems of functional areas that provide us with the magic of music and art and creative invention. We humans have survived at the top of the food chain not because we have bigger brains than other creatures on the planet, but as I understand it, because our brains are wired differently. And how all of this relates to creativity is particularly interesting. When you see jazz improvisation happening, what has always amazed me is the speed with which the brain is making decisions and the amount of information it is processing:…what note to hit next? – how does it related to the last? – where is the improv going? - is there a structure of any kind? – how the brain makes those decisions and then send signals to motor areas and then electrical impulses to muscle groups that produce fine motor movements in hands and /or other body parts to create sounds… this is all happening with electricity and chemicals moving between cells…this is a bit overwhelming to figure out! It’s like the brain is out ahead of the body in its thinking…When I sat in the audience of those early Kennedy Center music and the brain sessions, there was one that was particularly interesting to me. Dr. Charles Limb had intriguing conversations with musicians including Jason Moran - the Artistic Director for Jazz at the Kennedy Center - and he described some of the work he was doing with trying to understand the neural correlates of creativity.How was he doing that? Well, he was taking some of the best jazz musicians on the planet and putting them into fMRI machines and observing their brain activity while they were in moments of spontaneous creation - jazz improvisation. And what he's begun to discover is something pretty remarkable.Certain areas of the brain are deactivated in these moments of spontaneous improvised creation while others are lit up.From Dr. Limb studies, it seems that conscious self-monitoring, a function of the Prefrontal Cortex, is deactivated opening a gateway for spontaneous creation unencumbered by self-monitoring or concerns about inappropriate or maladaptive performances and areas that are connected to autobiographical narratives are more active.“In jazz music, improvisation is considered to be a highly individual expression of an artist's own musical viewpoint. The association of the MPFC activity with the production of auto biographical narrative is germane in this context, and as such, one could argue that the improvisation is a way of expressing one's own musical voice or story.”Dr. Limb’s own story is nothing less than remarkable. From his early years as a young musician, to his study of medicine, he has become one of the preeminent scientists looking into music, the brain and the neural correlates of creativity.His list of professional accomplishments and appointments to various medical institutions is extensive and include:Being the Francis A. Sooy Professor of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery and the Chief of the Division of Otology, Neurotology and Skull Base Surgery at UC San Francisco. The Director of the Douglas Grant Cochlear Implant Center at UCSF and he holds a joint appointment in the Department of Neurosurgery. Dr. Limb received his undergraduate degree at Harvard University, medical training at Yale University School of Medicine, and surgical residency and fellowship training at Johns Hopkins Hospital. He was a faculty member at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Peabody Conservatory of Music and the School of Education between 1996 and 2015. Dr. Limb is the 2021-22 President of the American Auditory Society and the Co-Director of the Sound Health Network sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts, NIH and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He was also named in 2022 as one of the Kennedy Center’s Next 50, a group of fifty national cultural leaders who are “moving us toward a more inspired, inclusive, and compassionate world”.His current areas of research focus on the study of the neural basis of musical creativity and the study of music perception in deaf individuals with cochlear implants. His work has received international attention and has been featured by TED, 60 Minutes, National Geographic, the. New York Times, PBS, CNN, Scientific American, the Smithsonian Institute, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Sundance Film Festival, the Kennedy Center, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the Discovery Channel, CBS Sunday Morning, and more.It is my distinct honor to be able to talk with Dr. Limb about music, creativity and the brain. ABOUT DAVID KEPRON:LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/david-kepron-9a1582bWebsites: https://www.davidkepron.com (personal website)vmsd.com/taxonomy/term/8645 (Blog)Email: david.kepron@NXTLVLexperiencedesign.comTwitter: DavidKepronPersonal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidkepron/NXTLVL Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nxtlvl_experience_design/Bio:David Kepron is a multifaceted creative professional with a deep curiosity to understand ‘why’, ‘what’s now’ and ‘what’s next’. He brings together his background as an architect, artist, educator, author, podcast host and builder to the making of meaningful and empathically-focused, community-centric customer connections at brand experience places around the globe. David is a former VP - Global Design Strategies at Marriott International. While at Marriott, his focus was on the creation of compelling customer experiences within Marriott’s “Premium Distinctive” segment which included: Westin, Renaissance, Le Meridien, Autograph Collection, Tribute Portfolio, Design Hotels and Gaylord hotels. In 2020 Kepron founded NXTLVL Experience Design, a strategy and design consultancy, where he combines his multidisciplinary approach to the creation of relevant brand engagements with his passion for social and cultural anthropology, neuroscience and emerging digital technologies. As a frequently requested international speaker at corporate events and international conferences focusing on CX, digital transformation, retail, hospitality, emerging technology, David shares his expertise on subjects ranging from consumer behaviors and trends, brain science and buying behavior, store design and visual merchandising, hotel design and strategy as well as creativity and innovation. In his talks, David shares visionary ideas on how brand strategy, brain science and emerging technologies are changing guest expectations about relationships they want to have with brands and how companies can remain relevant in a digitally enabled marketplace. David currently shares his experience and insight on various industry boards including: VMSD magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the Interactive Customer Experience Association, Sign Research Foundation’s Program Committee as well as the Center For Retail Transformation at George Mason University.He has held teaching positions at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.), the Department of Architecture & Interior Design of Drexel University in Philadelphia, the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (L.I.M.) in New York, the International Academy of Merchandising and Design in Montreal and he served as the Director of the Visual Merchandising Department at LaSalle International Fashion School (L.I.F.S.) in Singapore. In 2014 Kepron published his first book titled: “Retail (r)Evolution: Why Creating Right-Brain Stores Will Shape the Future of Shopping in a Digitally Driven World” and he is currently working on his second book to be published soon. David also writes a popular blog called “Brain Food” which is published monthly on vmsd.com. The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too.

Mar 18, 2022 • 1h 6min

Ep. 39 Unlocking Gen Z With Hannah Grady Williams - Speaker, Author, and Gen Z Business Consultant

About Hannah Grady Williams:Hannah’s Profile: linkedin.com/in/hannah-williams-genz-ceo-advisorWebsite: hannahgwilliams.com/ (Personal Website)Phone: 828-490-7535 (Work)Email: hannahnaomigrady@gmail.comBio:As a 12-year-old middle schooler and the oldest daughter of seven children, Hannah Williams’s dad took her to work at his start-up one day per week. Usually, they would visit properties, collect rent, and file paperwork, but one afternoon was different. “Hey Hannah, the phone is ringing. There’s a guy on the other line with a house for sale and you’re going to close the deal.” Hannah took the phone and fumbled through the call, but sure enough, within weeks, they owned the property.Before long, Hannah was religiously consuming business books. She enrolled in college at age 14 and graduated with a degree in international business by 18. Since then, Hannah has consulted Fortune 500 companies and boutique luxury brands and has had the pleasure of working with some of the best and brightest leaders across the globe. Hannah is now on a journey to help companies connect with her generation, and her first book will be published in the Summer of 2021. In a time when the world is increasingly divided, Hannah has made it her mission to foster #RadicalEmpathy in the workplace - helping both young and old gain a voice.SHOW INTRODUCTION:Since watching my son Ben create Instagram posts years ago when he was 12, I have had an intense interest in what Gen Z was doing with their phones beyond using it for a communication device. As I have watched and seen the creativity pouring out of my sons in the making of digital content, I have become increasingly aware that what they are doing with their digital devices goes beyond texting, playing games and watching videos, they are imbibing content at a remarkable pace, learning more about the world than I knew about the world well into my early adulthood and… making stories.They are content creators writing narratives of their own lives. They are bringing to life themselves, their own personas, as individual brands, with strong points of view on politics, media, identity, social issues, the economy, climate change and more.As content creators they have a facility with media production not seen in generations before them. That power of connection into the digisphere lays in the palm of their hands and they come to the table with an expectation set that is very different that other consumers.Contrary to popular belief, they don’t love digital technology. They aren’t amazed orconfounded by it. It just is. It is as if it is simply another appendage that they wouldn’t be able to navigate the world without. And, this mindset has particular consequences in how brands and corporations will interact with them. As they create media content whether on FB, Instagram, TickTock or myriad other platforms, they become their own brands with thousands of followers who align with the projection of their personal brand image - all before the age of fifteen.They have become savvy marketers. They have had to, because to be relevant in their sphere of influence, they have attached relevancy to the system of ‘likes’ that tells them what they are producing and pushing out on digital platform is valid – that they are valid – that they exist and matter.As long as they are recognized for what they produce and validated for creating it, the Brand of Me counts. This is of course a real challenge, rife with psychological complexity and pitfalls that can lead to significant emotional issues. Nevertheless, they have had little say in the matter since they were born into a system of digital platforms that promulgates the creation of content that is targeted directly at the base of the brain stem feeding primitive neurobiological processes. But then, they are generally wise to that too.However, conscious awareness of the slippery slope that digital content consumption has them careening along, does not necessarily supplant brain chemistry that has one going back for more. Even if you have an inkling that it’s likely not good for you. Gen Z sees through inauthenticity and want straight talk and not BS. They’ll jettison brands that speak out of both side of their mouths paying lip service to social causes while they sit on a historical heap of supporting institutionalized inequities. They can smell a sales pitch a mile away and will dump a brand relationship in a minute, not necessarily because they don’t align with the company’s brand position, but that the company doesn’t align with their individual brand ideology.As culture shifts in response to exponential change, this emerging generation of experience-seeking consumers may be less tied to tradition as a benchmark for their engagement with a brand. They live in a series of nows. The fluid nature of the digitally enabled world might suggest that what has worked in the past is simply no longer relevant today, tomorrow or in the next moment. This group seems to be more deeply connected to experiencing moments than they are to monuments.Relying on the past to predict the future requires that something has survived the test of time. As we move into a new experience paradigm of continual change, failing fast and continual iteration may become de rigeur because constant change will demand it and make it mainstream in order to remain in sync with change.With attention spans shortened due to a constant flow in information to attend to, GEN Z is perfectly adept at moving fluidly between experiences.They experience life in a strange state of ‘inbetweenness’ – between what is now and what is next. And, the delta between these states becomes smaller as the exponential rate of change continues bending upward, faster with every passing day.Seems like we all may find ourselves living in a perpetual state of change – living in the presence of a future absence and the absence of a future presence.Emily Dickenson said “Forever is composed of nows.” It seems that this is a truth that becomes more self-evident as we experience life in the fastlane.And, for this new group of consumers now is simply more relevant than what has been. This presents a particular challenge to brands who have relied on traditional narratives, like many luxury brands, because culture shifts swept by rapid change may not have them looking backwards when “back” fades quickly from a front row seat in a bullet train. All of this poses particular challenges and opportunities for brands meaning to sell goods, services and experiences and for companies looking to hire and retain them.This is where Hannah Grady Williams comes into picture. Hannah consults with corporate CEOs who are often more than twice her age. She knows Gen Z – because she is one of them. She can demystify this complex generation because she lives it every day and understands what makes her generation tick… or shall we say - click.Hannah’s trajectory to being a consultant to corporate CEOs started at the age of twelve when she closed a real-estate deal for her father’s business and hopped on the fast track to finishing an International Business degree at the age of 18. Since then, she has consulted Fortune 500 companies, boutique luxury brands, and has worked with some of the best and brightest leaders across the globe. Along the way, Hannah started two companies that failed, and says she’s proud of that.Out of these failures Hannah embarked on a journey to help companies connect with her generation. Why is this her passion you may ask? Simply put, in a time when the world is increasingly divided, she exists to foster #RadicalEmpathy in the workplace - helping both young and older have a voice.Hannah Grady Williams bridges the gap with insight that only come from direct lived experience. She’s a straight forward, no nonsense communicator who is like a Sherpa guide helping corporate leaders find steady footing on the footpath to unlocking Gen Z. ABOUT DAVID KEPRON:LinkedIn Profile: linkedin.com/in/david-kepron-9a1582bWebsites: https://www.davidkepron.com (personal website)vmsd.com/taxonomy/term/8645 (Blog)Email: david.kepron@NXTLVLexperiencedesign.comTwitter: DavidKepronPersonal Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/davidkepron/NXTLVL Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nxtlvl_experience_design/Bio:David Kepron is a multifaceted creative professional with a deep curiosity to understand ‘why’, ‘what’s now’ and ‘what’s next’. He brings together his background as an architect, artist, educator, author, podcast host and builder to the making of meaningful and empathically-focused, community-centric customer connections at brand experience places around the globe. David is a former VP - Global Design Strategies at Marriott International. While at Marriott, his focus was on the creation of compelling customer experiences within Marriott’s “Premium Distinctive” segment which included: Westin, Renaissance, Le Meridien, Autograph Collection, Tribute Portfolio, Design Hotels and Gaylord hotels. In 2020 Kepron founded NXTLVL Experience Design, a strategy and design consultancy, where he combines his multidisciplinary approach to the creation of relevant brand engagements with his passion for social and cultural anthropology, neuroscience and emerging digital technologies. As a frequently requested international speaker at corporate events and international conferences focusing on CX, digital transformation, retail, hospitality, emerging technology, David shares his expertise on subjects ranging from consumer behaviors and trends, brain science and buying behavior, store design and visual merchandising, hotel design and strategy as well as creativity and innovation. In his talks, David shares visionary ideas on how brand strategy, brain science and emerging technologies are changing guest expectations about relationships they want to have with brands and how companies can remain relevant in a digitally enabled marketplace. David currently shares his experience and insight on various industry boards including: VMSD magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the Interactive Customer Experience Association, Sign Research Foundation’s Program Committee as well as the Center For Retail Transformation at George Mason University.He has held teaching positions at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology (F.I.T.), the Department of Architecture & Interior Design of Drexel University in Philadelphia, the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (L.I.M.) in New York, the International Academy of Merchandising and Design in Montreal and he served as the Director of the Visual Merchandising Department at LaSalle International Fashion School (L.I.F.S.) in Singapore. In 2014 Kepron published his first book titled: “Retail (r)Evolution: Why Creating Right-Brain Stores Will Shape the Future of Shopping in a Digitally Driven World” and he is currently working on his second book to be published soon. David also writes a popular blog called “Brain Food” which is published monthly on vmsd.com. The next level experience design podcast is presented by VMSD magazine and Smartwork Media. It is hosted and executive produced by David Kepron. Our original music and audio production by Kano Sound. The content of this podcast is copywrite to David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design. Any publication or rebroadcast of the content is prohibited without the expressed written consent of David Kepron and NXTLVL Experience Design.Make sure to tune in for more NXTLVL “Dialogues on DATA: Design Architecture Technology and the Arts” wherever you find your favorite podcasts and make sure to visit vmsd.com and look for the tab for the NXTLVL Experience Design podcast there too.

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