THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING Podcast

Elle Griffin, a writer and publisher of The Elysian, delves into imaginative approaches to governance and culture. She shares her journey from a nomadic Air Force childhood to becoming a journalist at major outlets. Griffin defends bold creativity in journalism, emphasizing the importance of reimagining political systems. She explores feminist utopias and highlights the need for hopeful futures over bleak narratives. Additionally, she discusses her upcoming book on capitalism and the joy of crafting personalized news, encouraging a more engaged and visionary audience.

Shannon Gallagher is a brand strategist & writer based in the Hudson Valley. I start all these conversations with the same question, which you know, of course. I borrowed it from a friend of mine because it’s such a big, beautiful question—but because it’s big, I tend to over-explain it, like I’m doing now. Before I ask it, I want you to know that you’re in total control. You can answer or not answer any way you want to, and it’s impossible to make a mistake. And the question is: Where do you come from?Even knowing this is coming, there’s really no way to be prepared. Where do I come from? I come from here. I live in Red Hook.I was born in Hudson, just up the river. I grew up in Tivoli, right in between. I’ve been here for most of my life and definitely feel very of this place. I imagine that happens when you spend so long in the same geographic area. This is where I’m from.What does it feel like to be of this place? What does it mean to be from Tivoli? There’s such a long tail of experience, and it’s changed so much. Now in my 40s, I see how much has shifted in the last five years, and even more in the decades before. So much of my life has happened here. It’s tied to this place.My family is from here too. In a small town, that means something. You and I have had this experience: you run into someone on the sidewalk and they say, “Oh yeah, I know your mom, I went to high school with her.” It feels like we live in generational stories. My family’s story is here too.What was it like growing up here? It was great. Tivoli, which is well known now, was very different. My dad talked about how you couldn’t even get a loan from the bank to live there. There was a motorcycle gang safe house, drugs were dealt there. If you lived in Tivoli, you were probably an artist or some other unsavory character.My parents bought their first house there for $25,000. It was small, on a dead-end road, and everybody knew everybody. You were a Tivoli kid. My older brother says we were the hippie white trash—which feels accurate.We were bused to school in Red Hook, where most kids lived in developments and their parents worked for IBM. If you came from Tivoli, you were different.It’s still very much that way. I lived there for quite some time when my daughter was young and raised her there for years. A lot was the same—the kids had free run of the place, even at a young age. It was safe, intimate. But now it’s definitely fancier.Do you have a recollection—I'm dying to hear this—what did young Shannon want to be when she grew up?Oh boy. I think it changed a lot. Still does.I remember going through a phase where I wanted to be a doctor. A phase where I wanted to be a marine biologist—I think most kids go through that phase. I went through a phase of wanting to be a designer, a fashion designer.But the most pervasive one, I think, was being a writer. I always kind of came back to that.What did that mean to you, do you think? What was a writer to young Shannon?Oh, I mean, I loved books. I read very early, and they were a real refuge for me growing up. My grandmother, who I was extremely close with, was a remedial reading teacher in Hudson.So much of my childhood—so many moments of feeling connected, or inspired, or safe—really came from being read to or reading. Even at a young age, I used to drive my older brother nuts. My mom likes to tell this story, because I would be so excited about what I was reading—about the idea that a story could not just take you somewhere else, but really make you feel things.I would get so excited about that. I’d want to share what I was feeling. I’d be like, “And then this happened, and then this happened, and then they said this…” and my older brother would get so annoyed. He’d say, “Enough, Shannon.”But I just so badly wanted him to have the same experience I was having. So yeah, I think I was really enchanted by the power of language and storytelling at a very young age.And to catch us up—what are you doing now? What are you up to? What’s your work?What’s my work? Well, my work is evolving, let’s say that.I got a degree in literature and creative writing. I did some postgraduate work in literary nonfiction at the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies in Maine. I intended to be a long-form journalist. I wanted to write for magazines.Life had slightly other plans. I ended up—through someone I met… You know, if you live in the Hudson Valley, especially before COVID and remote work—if you worked here, you did a lot of different things. It wasn’t like now, where we have such a big creative community because people can work on Zoom or have hybrid schedules.I freelanced for a couple of publications. I taught Pilates. I bartended. It was a real mixed bag.Through someone I met teaching Pilates—who then joined a writer’s group I had—I got my first copywriting job. She had an agency. I didn’t even know that was a career.That’s what brought me into the world of branding and advertising. I worked as a copywriter doing comms, and then got into strategy. For the last six years or so, that’s been my job—working at an agency, copywriting, brand strategy.I was recently the head of strategy at a B2B agency in the city, and left that job in mid-June to work with you.That’s right. Congratulations on both counts. I always congratulate people on departures and transformations—good or bad, all big changes deserve it. Congratulations on that. And of course, this is the official announcement of Gallagher Spear. What do you love about your work? Where’s the joy in it for you?Oh man. Where is the joy in it for me? You and I have talked a lot about this.The joy is in the work itself. Talking about the work—great. But it’s doing the work. It’s having a problem to solve. Figuring out what that problem is. Figuring out what questions to ask. All of the research. Gathering all of the information. Talking about it. Hashing it out, like we do—even when we fight.Absolutely. And starting to make sense of things in a way that—yeah, in a way that makes sense. And then translating that into work that makes sense to other people, and that people can do things with. That whole process—I just find it so fun and exhilarating. Sort of the discovery, the act of discovery.Yeah. I'm curious—I really identified with the way you described that. I don't know if I'd heard that story before, that you were doing all these different jobs in Red Hook and Tivoli and then sort of got plucked—or invited—into this world. I identified with that. I mean, I wrote a very arrogant cover letter to a brand consultancy in San Francisco—that was my beginning. And I didn’t really know. I had no idea what I was doing or what I was applying for, really. But I feel like I found a mentor there—this guy, Mark. So I’m curious: can you tell me more about that story? About being pulled into the industry as a copywriter? What that was like, and that relationship?Oh yeah. It was Alicia Johnson, who you’ve now met—Johnson & Wolverton. She had a boutique branding and creative agency. It was complete happenstance that I met her. She went to the Pilates studio in Hudson where I taught. Her teacher was out of town, and I was covering for her.Alicia and I just instantly hit it off and stayed in contact. She had been working on a book, and I had started a writer’s group—just because I was feeling, you know, I had a toddler, I was a single mom, I was doing all these various jobs, but really starving for creative connection and an outlet.So I started this writer’s group. She came, and I ended up editing her book. It was in that relationship—and I guess you'd have to ask her what it was she saw in me—but yeah, it was a project for Food Network. And I just remember being a little gobsmacked, like, I get to play with words? Come up with ideas? The assignment seemed so fun.She still remains my mentor to this day. And she has this gift—I’ve seen it with her and other creatives—she knows exactly what to ask of you, exactly how to give you the assignment in a way that gets all your synapses firing. She teaches you to get comfortable with the idea that you can’t get it wrong.She kept seeing things in me and kind of threw me in the deep end—so I could see what I was capable of. I loved collaborating with her. I loved working with the other creatives. It was this idea that we were taking human insights and cultural insights and translating them into—objects, if you will.That whole process was just... yeah, it was fun. Just like when you and I work together—it’s so fun. And I think that’s where the best work comes from—that chemistry. Between the makers, but also with clients.Yeah. I’m really connecting two things you said. One—well, I guess it was an idea that came to me as you were describing something earlier, about words. You talked about playing with words, and how much of this work is that—just diving into language, moving around in it, seeing what happens, paying attention. So much of it is about words.Mm-hmm.It’s an odd observation, but it’s viscerally true.Yeah. When we used to joke about doing this together, and then we actually started working together—we were on a project, and the client, in one of the early meetings, said they wanted to do some qualitative research. And they said, “We want to be saying things that no one else is saying.”You and I had that conversation—well, if you want to say things no one else is saying, you have to know things no one else knows. And that starts with asking the right questions.And you always say—and I’ve told you this before—I love what you say about how research starts at the invitation. The words really do matter. From the questions you ask to get the information, to the way you then communicate those ideas back to the client so that they really understand. It’s so much about communication and relationship.And then, of course, the final product—saying things that make people think, feel, and do what you want them to do, or what will serve your objectives.That relationship piece—and the clarity of communication—is so important. And it gets lost, right? It gets lost a little in the traditional agency structure. Or maybe not lost, but deprioritized. Stymied.Can you say more? What are you pointing at? What have you learned about how to make that kind of work in an agency structure?Well, I think it can be really challenging, right? Because you're doing a lot of stuff not because it serves what you’re trying to achieve, but because it’s what needs to get done.We’re at a moment—so many people are talking about this—where the agency landscape is changing. There’s this essentialism happening. Clients don’t want big, bloated processes. They have a problem to solve, and they need to solve it. It needs to be effective. It needs to happen quickly and efficiently. There’s not a lot of time for the rest.So, as I said, chemistry really matters. When you have, in my experience—and I think most people in this industry would agree—when you have a strong rapport with the client, when they trust you, when they feel heard, when you understand what they’re trying to do, the work turns out so well. And it’s usually really effective.It becomes a very co-creative process. And you also get to be trusted to be the expert. That’s so much better than when it’s transactional—agency as vendor. A lot of assumptions about what the problem is. A default to recycled, surface-level insights. Everyone kind of doing the same things.That’s part of what excited us about Gallagher Spear. Working the way we want to—just you and me and a client—you get to have that intimacy. I hesitate to use the word collaborative because it’s overused, but it’s really about...It’s not about having a set process. I mean, obviously there are steps. But it’s more about having an opportunity. An opportunity to learn something. To make something. To do something. Again—to play.Yeah. The word that came to me before you said “opportunity” was relationship. That’s what I’ve observed in working with you. You listen unbelievably well to the client, and you build that rapport almost naturally. It makes the work better. And selfishly—it creates a better environment for me.You know, as a researcher, out there talking to people and trying to translate that back into the organization—I don’t always have a safe space. And I’m not always good at that. But you’ve always really understood what I was trying to say. I don’t know if that’s an asset or what, but it’s made our collaboration really fun.That’s how I came up, really. I was told at the beginning to just follow my curiosity—that was the only thing I needed to listen to. And that means sometimes saying things that don’t always make sense to people. I’ve had to learn to be a better communicator. Which is a long-winded way of saying that the bridge you and I provide is really powerful. And we don’t see that much anymore.The last thought in this pile of thoughts coming out of my mouth is this: for so long, as an independent—because I’ve been independent a long time—hearing you talk about agency structure can feel like an alien world. But for a long time, I wanted to appear to be a company. Do you know what I mean? Like, over the last 15, 20 years, the last thing you wanted to be was some jackass out on your own. You wanted to look like a company.But now, on a meaningful level, that’s not the case anymore. You want to appear to be a human being. A person someone can have a relationship with. So you can—like you said—get into that playful space, get creative. That seems to be what people are really hungering for.Yeah. That idea—I can’t remember where I read this—but as we turn more toward things like AI, the thing that becomes scarce is connection. Intimacy. Human-to-human interaction. So being able to offer that has real value.I love that both clients and creatives—designers, account directors—we’ve worked with, when we told them we were doing this, they said, “I want to come work with you.” They enjoy it as much as we do. And I think that says something.You’re right—once upon a time, you couldn’t say, “Well, we’re a lot of fun to work with.” But now, it works. Or at least, we hope it does.Yeah, we hope it does. Yes. So, I’m curious—two things I always circle around. I’m always curious: when did you first encounter the idea of brand? The concept of brand? And then also qualitative research—those are two big buckets for me. So let’s start with brand. When did you first encounter it?Oh, geez. Honestly, I think it was when I started working with Alicia. It was never something I had thought about before. But also, I think brand has really changed—what it is has changed.That was when I really started to understand it as kind of a living, breathing thing. And over the years, it feels like it’s become more malleable. Things change so much faster. Brands need to be everywhere and able to adapt much more quickly than even ten years ago.And that, if I may segue to the qualitative piece—that’s why it’s so important to base your brand work and communications on a real understanding of what’s happening in culture, and with the people you’re trying to connect with.So much of the packaged process—the agency promises we’re trying to get out from under—they perpetuate the idea that we know something, without actually knowing anything. We make assumptions based on what other people are assuming. But when you sit down and talk with people, and listen—and I’ve said this before, but it’s 100% your superpower—you hear things. You learn something.That somehow gets skipped over. We see it all the time. Clients just want to skip the research. “Can’t we just go straight into brand development?” It’s such a missed opportunity.My first exposure—not necessarily to qualitative, but to ethnography—was at school, at SALT. We studied fieldwork, ethics of fieldwork. We spent three months out in the field, working on a story. That’s where I learned about observing, watching, listening—letting stories reveal themselves.And I feel a kind of relief now, in what we’re doing. One thing that was always a bit of a tough fit for me in agency life, especially in strategy—there are a lot of big personalities. People talk a lot, talk fast. It’s very extroverted.I’ve always been quieter. I listen more than I speak. And I’ve gotten feedback in my career that that’s a weakness. But I actually think it’s part of what makes me good at my job.Yeah, 100%. I mean, I feel like, more than ever before, I'm finding myself really articulate—maybe just because I'm old and thinking about this too much—about really championing the value of qualitative, and what it does.You know what I mean? I don't think we're always told—unless you go to school and study this stuff—I don't think the business world tells you, "Hey, you know what? You can get all that quantitative data, and that's great, but there's also this other form of data that gives you a totally different, but absolutely necessary and complementary kind of understanding."It’s the kind of understanding that’s going to make you feel so much better about the decisions you make—and probably allow you to make better decisions—because you’re going to consider things you wouldn’t have considered before.It’s everything you talked about. I think about intuition. This is how I think about it: quantitative is the science of measurement. It gathers big data and gives you an analytical understanding of what’s happening. But qualitative is the science of description. It produces thick data, using that Geertz definition, and gives you an intuitive understanding of what’s happening—why people are doing what they’re doing.And putting intuition at the center of everything—especially in this moment where, like you said, we’re entering this synthetic madness with AI, where we’re so removed from everything—I think that’s actually kind of exciting.Yeah, well, especially too when you're talking to—especially in B2B—where there’s not as much understanding of what brand actually is and how it works. Definitely a gap, in my experience, between B2C and B2B clients.This idea that brand is essentially emotional, right? It’s intangible. It’s a perception. It’s how you make people feel. Yes, it’s communicated through tangible things, but the brand itself is a feeling. So qualitative is critical to that understanding.And I also think it sets brands up for success—especially because of the demand to be adaptable. Quant is a snapshot. It gives you a view of a moment in time—very useful for understanding a situation at scale in that moment—but it doesn’t necessarily tell you where things are going.That’s why I’ve always been amazed by forecasters—people who can see around corners culturally. But that ability is based on what you’re saying: watching, listening, intuition. Making space for that—that’s everything.I feel like I’m being a little indulgent here, talking—but teams are making decisions using an analytical understanding from their big data. But they’re also already making decisions with an intuitive understanding that’s probably not being nurtured or informed.If you’re not working in an organization that has a qualitative practice, then you're still making intuitive decisions—you just don’t know it. You haven’t gone out of your way to inform your intuition through qualitative research.So there’s this kind of blindness, honestly, where quant feels like the “right” thing because it’s correct, it’s mathematical, it’s the lingua franca. It’s numerical. All that. And somehow, it makes you feel like you’re standing on an island of certainty because you're dealing with numbers.But you forget that you’re a human being who’s making all sorts of emotional and imaginative interpretations of what you’re looking at. It’s unbelievable.Now I’m ranting, but it also occurred to me—there’s a difference between an organization understanding the emotion that a brand or category represents, and its decision-makers actually feeling that emotion.You can know the feeling—or you can feel the feeling.And that’s something I’ve enjoyed with you, especially in B2B: using imaginative exercises in a B2B context, and blowing people’s minds with the power of imagination. Helping them unlock the emotional experience of the customer—which isn’t always allowed. Does that feel like a fair description?No, 100%. That’s the thing. And I’ve said this many times, but people—like leadership clients in the B2B world—they’re people. They have imaginations and emotions. We all work more or less the same.But it’s such a human impulse—certainty. We want to feel certain. You're making big, expensive decisions. You want to say, “This is going to work,” or, “This is the right thing.” And numbers give that false sense of certainty.But I’d argue—and I think you’d agree—that having a deep, human understanding of the people you’re serving and trying to reach is a much more stable and secure position.Even in personal relationships, right? Understanding the person you’re in relationship with allows you to navigate all kinds of experiences—good, bad, neutral. You don’t always need to know the right thing to do or say. You just need to be able to show up, be present, and deal with what’s in front of you.So it creates more presence, I think—for a brand and for an organization. It allows them to be in dialogue with the people they’re serving.And like we said earlier, that’s paramount right now. People are super distrusting of brands and institutions.I remember doing a presentation earlier this year for a client’s marketing summit. They wanted to talk about the “state of brand.” And I talked about how Gen Z is super distrusting of brands. They’re like, “Forget all your super polished, cohesive, coordinated communications. We want authenticity. We want to know your people. Who are your leaders? Who works there?”They want it to be messy. They want it to feel real.So there’s this diminishing trust in brand, while also brands still need to be sewn up—organized around an idea. There needs to be a thread. Some consistency.It’s about balancing those two things. Trusting your audience—and also trusting your people. Helping them develop their intuition. Helping them assess their intuition.Beautiful.Well, listen, we’re near the end of our time. What are you most excited about when it comes to Gallagher Spear?What am I most excited about? All of it.The kit and the caboodle?Yes. I’m excited about doing the work with my best friend. I’m excited about doing the work in a way where it can be about the work. And doing it with someone where there’s shared values. I think that’s really it.Yeah. What are you most excited about?Oh, yeah. I mean—working with you. Having fun doing work with my best friend. Enjoying the hell out of it.I’ve been a solo operator for a really long time. So finding someone to collaborate with—and translate the stuff I enjoy into stuff that’s useful for clients—that’s huge. It’s always been a hand-off process for me. So I’m excited to have more contact with the final product.And what occurred to me was truth. You know what I mean? I think you and I share this—and maybe it’s the journalism part of you—but I’m just fascinated by people. No matter the category, I’m dying to know: what’s the truth of the situation?Trying to uncover it. Discover it. Articulate it. And then, with your ability to build relationships, to write and communicate—just excited about all of that. About doing good work. Real understanding of what’s going on.Yeah. And I think too, as we’ve talked about—staying in that space where, you know, especially in my last role, I had a pretty large remit. I was overseeing brand strategy, brand communications, and culture—employer branding. It was broad.But my favorite part is always the research. Translating that research into big ideas. Outlining the implications. Figuring out what to do with them.That’s the sweet spot for both of us. And getting to stay in that space—it’s still fairly broad—but getting to go deep is what delights my cat-like brain.Beautiful. Well, thank you so much for accepting my invitation. I know this was not something you were excited to do, so I appreciate you being vulnerable and joining me here to launch Gallagher Spear.Yeah, thank you.And to everybody listening—you’ll find the link. Come say hello if you have a big problem that needs solving.All right. Bye, buddy. Get full access to THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING at thatbusinessofmeaning.substack.com/subscribe

Andy Crysell is a cultural strategist, author, and former music journalist. In 2008, he founded **Crowd DNA**, a global cultural insights and strategy consultancy with offices in London, New York, Amsterdam, and beyond. In 2023, he stepped down, and is the author of *Selling The Night* and *No Way Back*, and remains active in creative and cultural projects across the UK and US.I start all my conversations with the same question, which I borrowed from a friend of mine who’s also a neighbour. She helps people tell their stories, and she had this question that was just so beautiful, I use it all the time. But it’s so big, I tend to over-explain it because I want you to know, before I ask it, that you are in absolute control. You can answer or not answer in any way you want to, and it’s impossible to make a mistake. The question is: Where do you come from?I've heard this question. I’ve heard you ask it. My answer is a pretty straightforward one. For me, it’s London. That answer is based certainly on geography, but on a bunch of other things as well. It probably sounds quite dramatic to say London made me, but I think in many ways it kind of did.I’ve always taken so much from the place, even now when I’m spending quite a lot of time in the US. I left school when I was 16—technically 15, but officially at 16. Doing that somewhere else could have been pretty scary and maybe a bit bleak. Doing that in London actually felt quite exciting. There was so much you were in close proximity to. It was all on your doorstep. If you didn’t know people, you could still find ways into different areas of culture and media.That’s probably why I feel quite defensive of the city these days. Like with other cities, there’s this rhetoric you hear a lot—especially on social media—that “London’s gone.” There’s this idea that it’s now an outrageously dangerous city, that you’ll be relieved of your mobile phone within 10 minutes of arriving, and probably stabbed 10 minutes after that, which just feels so far removed from reality.I think London is actually having a really strong period at the moment. Everything from US rappers acknowledging that London rappers are good at what they do, to how London dresses, the accents, all of that. I think it has a kind of global cultural cachet right now—probably the strongest since the so-called Cool Britannia days of Tony Blair and Britpop, which, for me, wasn’t that cool at all. These are good days for London.I’m also just kind of obsessed with cities in general. I’ve always found ways to weave that into my work or to look at my work through the lens of cities. The relationship between London and New York is particularly interesting. I’ve heard quite a few people say that London and New York might have more in common than New York and L.A. There’s some strong cultural tie there—a kind of shared cultural conversation that’s been ongoing.When I say I’m proud of being from London, I guess it’s no different than anyone else being proud of coming from Philadelphia or Tokyo or wherever. It’s about the cultural components of the city. It’s always been an incredibly creative place. Like everywhere else, it’s hugely gentrified now, but at its best, it still creates opportunities. It still has that DIY spirit. It’s always felt global, super connected to the rest of the world. It’s always changing. It’s fast—kind of like New York, but also different from it.You mentioned a love of cities, and I’d love to hear more about that. Even the way you talked about London getting a bad rap—it seems like something you hear across the board with big cities. They’re all suffering in similar ways. What do you make of the city today?I think it's emblematic of the fact that people are just a bit scared these days. And when people are scared of the world, cities tend to bear the brunt of that. There’s a tendency to focus on the downside of city life, rather than all the positives.And, you know, don't get me wrong, I love the countryside too. I love the beach, but there's just something about the energy of the city. I kind of hope that people will come around to it again and sort of see the positives there.You know, and cities are growing as well. I think all the statistics say that by, I think it's by 2050, that more people will be living in cities than not in cities. So we kind of need to get, we kind of need to find our way and find our love for cities again.Yeah. I'm curious, when you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up? Do you have recollections of what young Andy wanted to be as an adult? I think after a very brief period of thinking, maybe I wanted to be a footballer, a soccer player, then realising that was highly unlikely. After that, I think, in a way, all I really knew I wanted to do was something that was kind of a bit cool, some cool s**t, something that felt like it was the centre of the action.That's the sort of shallow level I operate on. I don't think it was particularly about a career, it's just sort of being in something that felt like it had an energy to it. I was very into music.And I was very into the media that came with it and the pop culture that surrounded it. I guess I'm not particularly unique there. Lots of people are when they're in their teens.I suppose I maybe just dug a bit deeper compared to my mates. I kind of, I was the one that read all the details on the record, read the masthead of the magazine and just kind of tried to join the dots between these things. Who were the models of cool at that time for you? I mean, I guess titles like The Face magazine, where there was a sort of, you know, I guess in London, it was sort of smash hits when you're really young.I'm not sure if you're familiar with smash hits. It was a pop magazine, but it kind of talked about pop music in a really, really different way. So on a surface level, it was all cool haircuts and shiny new pop bands.It built up this new kind of language around how you talk about pop music. And a lot of people then would gravitate from that to The Face, which I'm sure you're familiar with. It was more kind of more grown up style mag.But it just kind of, yeah, it felt like it was shining a light on a lot of young entrepreneurialism that was going on in London and elsewhere. So it kind of began from that for me, but it was all a little bit formless. I wasn't really clear how I was going to get into any of these worlds.I didn't really have much sense of access. You know, my dad was a builder. My mum was a cleaner.She cleaned people's houses and worked in pubs. There wasn't any sort of clear routes to that world. I got a job as a runner, first of all, a foot messenger, as they were called, a job that literally wouldn't exist these days.So I worked for, it was a photographic company in Soho that's still there. And my job was to go around to ad agencies with photos. It was a repro house.So I would take these big photos around in brown envelopes. Now they'd literally be emailed in seconds. But back then I got to walk around Soho delivering these photos to these ad agencies.And these places all are very cool. You know, it was, I guess it was the sort of a halcyon age of advertising in the late 80s. But I was definitely very much going in through the tradesman's entrance.I wasn't going in through the front door. So as alluring as it looked, I couldn't really see a way into that world. Yeah, and I think the thing that then changed it for me was the sort of the emergence of acid house or rave culture in London, which kind of really, really blew my mind in many senses.And all of this musical stuff that I've been interested in, but felt a little bit out of reach, suddenly felt much closer to me. You know, if you didn't know the DJ or the club promoter, you're one of your friends didn't know the DJ or the club promoter. So you could you could kind of immerse yourself in that world.And you could you could learn a lot. It felt very democratizing, really, you know, there were no there were no experts in a way. So you could become the expert very quickly.Just to jump forward, I think I’ve benefited from two democratizing moments. One was acid house. The next, about ten years later, was the first dot-com wave. There were experts, I guess, in the form of developers, but there were no experts in terms of how to create content for dot-coms or how to present it to people. So that, again, felt like a democratizing moment.Back during acid house, I didn’t have a clear career path I wanted to follow. I just wanted to be involved with it. I wanted to be immersed in it. So it began as what you’d call a portfolio career. I was running club nights, helping others run bigger ones, selling tickets to raves. I had a record deal—very briefly. I worked in a record shop and did some writing for magazines—mostly by luck rather than planning. That’s the bit that stuck, really. The other parts fell by the wayside. I ended up spending ten years working as a music and subculture journalist.So that was the early stage of my journey into, for want of a better word, a career.I came across you on LinkedIn—the way I come across so many people—and I was curious: what’s the story of Crowd DNA? How did you make the leap from journalism into cultural strategy? And it seems you’ve exited now, right?Yes, I have exited. Back then, I didn’t have a clear path from being a music journalist to running agencies. But I liked the idea of agencies. They seemed like cool places. There was one in London in the ’90s called Tomato, a design agency. It was a cryptic, collective setup that operated more like a band than an agency. I really liked that idea. Their projects felt very different. You didn’t get the sense they were hustling brands for briefs—they seemed in control of their own destiny.The dot-com boom was the bridge for me. I moved from being a print journalist to working at a dot-com startup called Ammo City. That lasted about a year and a half—lots of fun, lots of chaos. No one really knew what they were doing, as I mentioned earlier. But it was amazing. We were bringing journalists online for the first time. We also had video, and we ran an online radio station.As much as I enjoyed the content side of it, I think I also really liked being in a startup. It was the first time I’d ever heard the word “startup.” We were also trying to work with brands—brands that were intrigued by what we were doing and the audience we were building. Some of them wanted to create content on our platform to reach that audience. Others were interested in how they might mine that audience for insights—an early adopter audience, really.When that dot-com venture folded—like so many of them did because we weren’t making any money—I decided not to go back into journalism. I went the agency route instead.My first agency was called Ramp, which I started with someone else. We called ourselves a creative communications agency, and that’s really what we were. We didn’t make ads—it was more long-form content: documentaries, print media, curated events. We did a lot of work with Sony PlayStation.This was the early 2000s—around 2003. They were fun times, and it was still early days for doing creative work online. Brands seemed braver and more ambitious then. With Sony PlayStation, for example, we never did anything related to gaming. It was all about involving them in grime culture and other areas of youth culture. We also worked with Honda, Topshop, and BMW.Eventually, my business partner and I started to go in different directions in terms of what we wanted out of life. I guess you could call it an aborted project—we got about five years in and then sold the agency to St. Luke’s, the advertising agency. I stayed on and ran Ramp as a division of St. Luke’s, while my business partner left.That added a new dimension for me. Even though St. Luke’s is considered an unconventional agency, it was more conventional than Ramp. Ramp was all about ad hoc work; St. Luke’s focused more on retained client work, which created a different kind of relationship with the client.I did that for a while, but I was very keen to start another agency. I had a non-compete clause, so when I left St. Luke’s, I couldn’t immediately start another creative agency. But there was nothing stopping me from starting a more insight- and strategy-based agency. At Ramp, we’d always done a little bit of that, even if we never formally claimed it was our focus.So that was really the sort of the beginning of starting CrowdDNA. So I launched it in 2008. There were three of us at the beginning. I left it three years ago—no, sorry, no I didn’t—I left it two years ago. It was about 110 people at the end and a whole bunch of cities around the world. And yeah, lots of fun adventures along that sort of 16 years of journey.Yeah. Amazing. And what did you—what do you love about that work? Where was the joy in it for you? Of all the different parts of that kind of work, what, for you, did you get the most joy out of?Yeah, I mean, I suppose there are sort of two dimensions to that. One is the work, and one is the business, I suppose. I loved being in a business and just thinking about it obsessively—really trying to plan where you’re going to go with it, thinking about what you can do, and having this sort of blank canvas in front of you. Launching other cities was such a fun thing to do. There are so many reasons not to open offices in other cities around the world. Arguably, you could just do global work out of London. But I think we became a more credible and interesting business by setting up in New York, Amsterdam, Singapore, Sydney, and so on. That side of it was fun and really interesting—trying to build a proposition.And then the actual work—I guess I just quite loved the randomness of the briefs. I loved the brief. I loved receiving the new brief. The promise of the new brief was always really exciting when it arrived by email. You open it, and maybe it’s a topic you’re really familiar with—and that’s exciting, because you can feel how you’ll build on it. Or maybe it’s a brand-new topic, and that’s exciting in a different way—your brain’s racing, trying to find ways in, trying to find hooks, trying to find your way into that topic. So yeah, those are some of the things that come to mind.And I suppose just working with—you know, it blew my mind when this relatively small agency had people like Nike and Apple wanting to work with us. It seemed quite unfeasible, in a way. But yeah, lots of excitement came from that.It’s a little odd to be asking you about this two years after the exit, but I’m just curious: what did you—how did you—how do you talk about what you did, or what that approach was like? And what kind of problems did clients come to you for?Well, I guess we used the culture word a lot. Back in 2008, I wouldn’t say we were the first people to use “culture,” but it was used less heavily. It’s so heavily used now, which I think creates some challenges for sure. Our strapline was “culturally charged commercial advantage.” We had that from about three years in and stuck with it.What we were saying to our clients, in essence, was: we understand you’re going to want to look at your category. We understand you’re going to want to look at your customers. We understand you’re going to want to look at your competitors. And we will be doing all of that in our work. But we also encourage you to look out into culture—because out in culture, you’ll find opportunities, and you’ll find threats. And that could relate to your brand, your products, your services, your experiences.I think we were also encouraging clients to think of people as people—not just as customers or consumers. You could argue: does it matter? Is it just semantics? But I think it does matter. Being a customer is a very thin slice of time. The rest of the time, they’re being a person, with all the hopes and fears and so forth that a person has. I think you need to understand the whole person.So that was our shtick. That’s what we went in there to do.The kind of work we actually did could be anything from culturally informed work around the here and now—what does a brand need to be doing in the next three months—to what I guess you’d describe as futures work: what is the future of socializing in 20 years’ time? It was a very ad hoc business, which certainly keeps you on your toes—constantly pitching, always trying to come up with new ways to do the work. Trying to make something that feels organized in amongst a lot of chaos as well, I suppose.Yeah. And how has it changed? I mean, I guess that’s 20 years, basically—almost 20 years. Is it still the same now as it was in 2008? I mean, I’m curious on your take on culture, and what it’s like now, having...Yeah, I mean, I guess it feels like the term is very, very heavily used these days. I kind of feel it was one of those COVID-related things. COVID—I think lots more agencies started to talk about it.We found a lot more people on the client side were interested in things to do with culture. I think COVID maybe was a bit of a wake-up call—that there are things that may happen in the world that may impact you outside of your category. Not necessarily always pandemics, but other things. So I think that put the idea of culture more on the map.Yeah, I mean, I do think a lot of people are using the term without necessarily describing what they mean by it. And it seems to mean lots of different things to different people. In some circles, when you talk about cultural insights or cultural marketing, it kind of means youth marketing, maybe, or sort of early adopters and influencer-type stuff. Other people will think of it as being to do with the arts. Other people might think of it as being to do with DEI-type topics as well. I think that’s come up quite often.So yeah, lots of different definitions. I mean, what we were at Crowd, we always thought of it as being to do with shared meaning—you know, the sort of Stuart Hall-type end of the definition. We loved doing youth-related work, style-related work, but we also wanted to do work to do with families, to do with people of all sorts of different generations. So we wanted to have a slightly broader perspective on what culture meant.But it was—it's an interesting challenge, getting clients’ heads around culture. I think you have some clients that just get it. You don’t have to explain it to them. And you have a whole set of other clients where you have to work out the best ways to make that kind of work, I guess, viable. Yeah, of interest to them.Yeah, I would love to hear more on that. I’m always reminded in this conversation about culture—are you familiar with Grant McCracken?I am very familiar. Yeah.Yeah. I mean, I’ve been a fanboy forever. But I remember he wrote a book called Chief Culture Officer. I think I’m talking out of school, but I remember him sort of bemoaning the fact that everybody saw that title and just—the sort of, what he was saying was that the corporation couldn’t help but think it was talking about them.Yeah, it was corporate culture.It didn’t—yeah. He was trying to make an argument about accessing, being porous, and bringing the outside in. But the corporation couldn’t help but see it as an opportunity to talk more about me, me, me.Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that’s very correct. That is another definition of culture that comes up a lot when you talk about it in a business context—it's about the company culture, corporate culture.Yeah. Another thing I love about Grant’s work is the fast/slow.Yes.I don’t know if that was his or if he borrowed it from somewhere else, but I think that’s such an interesting and really nice way to break down this kind of large and messy topic. And it feels—so many times for the client, if they’re struggling to get their bearings around culture, to talk about how there is all the fast stuff—media and food and music and fashion. And then you have the slow stuff, the stuff that’s less observable, that moves under the surface. And depending on the brief at Crowd, sometimes we were really sort of keying into the fast culture side. Other times it may be the slow culture side.Yeah. You mentioned Stuart Hall. And I have this question I like—did you have any mentors or touchstones? I don’t know, I treat this as one question. Any mentors in your career that you really draw on or return to over and over again? Or even concepts that you kind of return to over and over again?Yeah, I find the whole idea of mentors really interesting. I love being a mentor. I’m not sure I’m that good at it, but I love doing it. And I do a lot of it these days. When I was kind of starting out, so to speak, I don’t think we had mentors back then. I just don’t even think the term existed.You know, I remember when I was first writing for magazines, you would hang out with other journalists, but no one would ever talk about—no one would ever give you advice whatsoever. The only way you kind of knew if you were doing the right thing was when you got more phone calls. You know, if you submitted work and you got phone calls, you kind of assumed you were writing the right kind of stuff. If you submitted work and you didn’t get phone calls, then you kind of assumed you weren’t writing the right sort of stuff.That said, there are lots and lots of people who have influenced me. I’m not going to name them all one by one, but yeah, I can think of lots of people that I’ve taken things through from over the years, for sure.Yeah. And you mentioned Stuart Hall, right? What’s your definition of culture? What did you mean—can you tell me more about Stuart Hall and how that influenced you?Yeah. I mean, I think his work is—I mean, obviously, it's widely used, widely reported on, and he might be slightly apoplectic about the fact it’s being used in the context of brand work.But I think the idea of shared meaning—that that is what culture is, this sort of operating system—I like that kind of language. I think that always landed really well with the Crowd team as well. And then how that manifests itself, whether it's through the conversations we have, the codes and the signals, media, advertising, products, and so on.So yeah, I think it's a good place to start when you're building out a perspective as an agency that wants to work in the cultural space. When I look at all of the agencies these days that talk about culture and use words like “cultural relevance” and so forth—without necessarily, I think, having a lot of depth there—I kind of feel they’ve got to go one of two ways. They’ve either got to really go deep into culture and articulate it in stronger, more cogent ways, or they should maybe move away from using that word and try to come up with a different language set. I think there are too many agencies that are talking about culture in a slightly vanillary, hope-for-the-best sort of way at the moment.At the risk of asking too many questions—I often ask this because my newsletter is called That Business of Meaning, and you just talked about shared meaning—what are we talking about when we talk about meaning? How would you articulate the distinction you just made about, you know, if you're going to talk about culture, really talk about culture, talk about shared meaning? How do you think about what meaning is? Sounds like a ridiculous question.Yeah. I mean, in the context of work, I suppose it’s how people relate to brands—that’s through meaning, isn’t it, really? I guess it sort of comes down to fundamentals. When you buy a Mercedes, you want everyone else to also have a shared meaning of what a Mercedes is. You're not just buying it because of its amazing engineering; you're buying it because of what it says about you and your place in the world. So you need everyone to have, I guess, some sense of a shared meaning of what that Mercedes is.Tell me about—there are two things I feel like I’ve learned about you through LinkedIn. One is the book. I want to hear about Selling the Night. So let’s start there. How did that come to be? And how is it going?Yeah. So I guess when I came out of the end of Crowd, I was looking for things to do. I spent one week sanding down the kitchen table on a January week, and I think I found I needed some projects. I was, I guess, trying to reclaim a bit of my identity again. And one of the projects that bubbled to the surface—I had a few things I was thinking about—was writing a book about dance music and club culture, and its relationship with brands and advertising and the wider creative industries.And I guess within that, for me, there are sort of two directions of travel. One is brands moving into dance music to act as sponsors and endorsers, and all of the challenges that come with that around the value exchange and so on. And the other direction is all of the ideas and the people that have emerged out of club culture—the sort of DIY creativity that it manifests—and have gone on to influence everything from travel to advertising to fashion and so on.So that was the remit I set myself. It took me about nine months to write it. Everyone says that was quite quick. For me, that felt like quite a long time. It was a fascinating process. I consider myself a pretty experienced writer, but writing 160,000 words was definitely a kind of next-level challenge.It came out in April of this year, and I guess it's been a project of two halves, really. The first half was writing—it was relatively solitary. I spent about two months in Venice, in L.A., on my own for most of it, writing it. And then the second half has been getting out there, talking about it, which has been lovely, really. I’ve got to meet all kinds of interesting people, travelled to interesting places, had a whole bunch of different conversations. So I’ve got to talk about this book in all kinds of interesting settings.And I have another book project on the go at the moment called No Way Back, which is more of a curated project, so less typing involved with this one. It’s bringing together lots of pieces of music journalism and subculture from other eras and trying to explore ways to... I guess it is about nostalgia, because it’s about the past, but we’re trying to make sure it’s about what you learn from it. We’ve got this line about “learning from, not longing for the past.” We don’t just sort of wallow in the past—it’s: what can you learn from these backstories that can help shape what comes next?So that’s been great. That’s out as well—it’s been out for a few weeks—and I’ve had a lot of fun, actually, over the last couple of days racing around New York, seeing it in the flesh in places like Casa Magazines and Iconic Magazines on Mulberry Street. It’s lovely looking, and it’s lovely selling it via your own platform, but there’s still something quite cool about actually seeing it in situ in a retail space.Yeah, that’s got to be amazing. You mentioned in Selling the Night that there were these two patterns: brands going in and then artists coming out. Can you tell me a story or example of the artists that came out of that culture?Well, I suppose it’s not specific—it can be about artists—but I suppose it’s as much about the creativity that comes out of it. So it could be around boutique hotels. You can trace the birth of the boutique hotel back to disco culture. Ian Schrager is on record saying that his ideas for boutique hotels—and he essentially created the boutique hotel—came out of what was going on in New York disco, and creating those kinds of aspirational spaces. That’s one example.I think travel was another really interesting one. Travel has been just revolutionized by the idea of people going clubbing—whether it’s Berlin for three days, where people don’t actually bother booking a hotel, they just book a flight and go clubbing for three days—or Ibiza, or Goa, you know. Etc., etc., etc.It’s sort of reinvented fashion a million times over. It’s changed drinking habits a million times over. I spoke to Ben Kelly, who designed the Hacienda nightclub, about how Virgil Abloh was incredibly influenced by the stripes that featured in the Hacienda club. And he kind of openly admitted that he borrowed those stripes for his Off-White brand.When Ben Kelly first heard about this, he was pretty irate—this guy was nicking his designs. But then they became the best of mates. In the five years up until Virgil Abloh’s passing, they worked on all kinds of different creative projects together. So yeah, there are endless examples of the kind of creative strands and the through lines that have come out of club culture.And I think there’s something quite interesting about the creativity it offers. It often comes from a kind of place of necessity. It often comes from quite marginalized people. I don’t think it’s the kind of creativity that you could cook up in daylight hours, in studios and creative agency environments.Yeah. Maybe this is associated with the other thing I see you doing quite a bit on LinkedIn—really advocating for access to planning. You often highlight job postings that are very exclusionary. I really appreciate it. I mean, I'm an American and I'm not in England, so I know culturally it’s very distinct, but it seems you’re very consistent in calling this out. How would you describe what you're doing? What’s the problem you're addressing?Yeah, I mean, I guess it’s one of my personal bugbears. And obviously it comes from my own experience. I didn’t go to university. No one in my family had been to university. My daughter is the first one in my family to have gone to university—or still is at university.I just think it’s very unfair, and a bit absurd really, that it should be the only way people are judged on their appropriateness for roles. And I guess it falls into two categories. One is entry-level roles, where you have no chance unless you've been to university. But maybe education didn’t suit someone. Maybe they had health or mental health issues during that period of their life. Maybe they had to care for someone else. There are lots of reasons why people may not have been able to go to university but might be a really good fit for that kind of work.And then you get the roles which aren't entry-level, where they ask for a whole bunch of experience—which makes complete sense—but then they also throw in the requirement for a degree, which just seems a little bit nonsensical to me. It feels like lazy thinking—or non-thinking.So I have written about it in a couple of newspapers. I’m involved in a campaign that’s taking shape. And I’ve been doing my kind of LinkedIn call-outs, which is really interesting each time. I’m staying in my lane with insight agencies, because it’s the world I know. But if I see adverts that make having a degree mandatory, I (hopefully relatively politely) call it out and question it.It’s really interesting what happens after that. I always get people messaging me from the agency in question, agreeing with me. I sometimes have people in the top brass of the agency contacting me and agreeing that they need to update their policies. I think I’m running at about 10–3 now: 10 agencies that have agreed to change their policies, and three that have so far not. So yeah, it's good. It's nice. It’s direct action.Yeah, beautiful. Does it feel particular—I mean, you have experience in other cultures and other cities, right—does it feel particular to the UK? Or is this more broad than that?I think it’s more broad than that. As I understand it, I think the problem is probably worse in the US, isn’t it?I mean, I’ve been on my own for so long, independent—I wouldn’t even know.I think it is. I think it’s worse in the US, I guess. And I have called out agencies in the US. I suppose in some ways, it feels easier—again—to stay in my lane, understanding UK culture. But yeah, I think it needs to change. It was something we definitely tried to change at Crowd DNA.I mean, no one’s going to discount education. This isn’t to suggest that education has no meaning whatsoever. And I’m also very mindful that there are lots of people who go to university who don’t actually come from a privileged background. If you're the first in your family ever to go to university, it’s an incredible achievement. And you don’t need the likes of me coming along and poo-pooing that achievement.So it’s not to say that education isn’t a relevant factor—but I don’t think it should be mandatory in whether people get accepted for roles or not.Yeah, yeah. I mean, I appreciate it so much too. I mean, especially the way you were talking about club culture, right—that it is sort of the fringe, it is a place that’s sort of outside. You know, the kind of creativity and the kind of understanding that comes from there is so fundamentally different to what’s available within the conventional pathways.It’s bonkers. What are you doing? You’re sort of restricting, you’re prohibiting yourself from it—or you’re restricting yourself from access to this really unique...You are, totally. And as you’re saying, I think people learn really fast in those kinds of worlds, you know. And you become very entrepreneurial, and you do join the dots between lots of different things. And if you’re excluding those people, you may be excluding people that are super resourceful, and super good at joining the dots.And I think you end up creating more kind of monocultural—this is really—and it always feels very starkly at odds with the kind of messages that these businesses are generally putting out elsewhere, about how they respect all perspectives. Particularly if you’re a research agency. If research agencies aren’t allowing people in from different backgrounds, that seems kind of weird.Yeah. Yes. I'm not sure—when did you come in? I feel like we are maybe peers. But I remember—I mean, I was early–mid-’90s guy. And the first firm I applied to also seemed kind of like a rock band to me. Like, they were super cool. And I was an English major, you know? I mean, I had no business experience whatsoever. And they were like, “We want you here,” because—for that same reason—this is a creative endeavor.And, you know, that’s what this is about. So I felt a little bit like we were always outsiders from the corporate culture, which was VA-driven, and just so MBA-driven, it really didn’t understand culture.So it’s interesting with that. But really—was it Tomato? Was that the firm?Yeah, Tomato.It was like a Gen X moment happening.Yeah, I think it probably was. No, they were just—they were just very cool. You know, they never really explained exactly what they did. Was it even a business? Or was it kind of a collective?Yeah.Projects seemed incredibly diverse. As I say, you definitely didn’t get the sense they were on a sort of treadmill of waiting for the latest RFP to come in. They were carving probably more unique opportunities with their clients.Yeah. So yeah, I think when you think about business in that sense, it starts to feel like an appealing place to be.Yeah. What you mentioned before—what are you doing now? I mean, there’s the book, you left Crowd, but are you still in the cultural strategy space? Are you still active? What are you working on?Good question. I mean, I suppose I’ve come out the other side of Crowd. And it’s really interesting—when you’ve been doing the same thing for 16 years. And, you know, whether you mean to or not, you do become quite indoctrinated in this thing that you were doing.I guess to me, having come out the other side, it feels sort of two-thirds super exciting, wide, wide open horizons: “What am I going to do next?” One-third existential crisis: “Oh my god, what am I going to do next?”Yeah. I suppose at the moment it’s a lot of projects. It’s the two books. We’re working out how we can maybe make more of No Way Back, how we can maybe start doing events as well—other types of media that may emerge from it.I am working with the Museum of Youth Culture, which is exactly that—it’s a museum about youth culture back in London. It’s existed in pop-up form for a few years, but it has its first permanent home opening in Camden in the autumn. That’s exciting.I work with a few charities—particularly one called 2020 Levels, which is around Black representation in various lines of work, various industries.I’m doing a bit of consulting stuff behind the scenes. I can’t really work in insight at the moment. I’m effectively serving a long-term ban with my restrictive covenants and non-competes. But that’s cool. You know, I feel like I’ve kind of done that.And I'm talking to some people about other business ideas as well. So yeah, it's kind of fun. Whether I go for it with another business or not—or sort of settle into a life of projects—yet to be decided.As you look around, is there anybody—I always think—is there anybody, any projects or brands that seem to be really doing things well or right, that kind of excite you? You know what I mean? Where you feel like, “Oh wow, they're operating in culture in a way that seems interesting and correct,” according to how you enjoy things?Yeah, I probably should have a good answer to that. I see various strands of brands doing good things. I can't necessarily pinpoint one that is nailing it all at present. I think there are some quite interesting agencies emerging at the moment. I like agencies that are playing more on the fringes and not settling into the standard modes of market research or being a creative communications agency.I think there are some interesting new mini, niche holding companies emerging—ones that feel a little bit more curated. Not just smashing together as many agencies as they can, but being more thoughtful about the range of businesses they bring together.But yeah, it’s an interesting time to have departed that world, I suppose. I guess I was leaving just as AI was entering. And when I speak to people still in the world of market research, it does feel like it’s a bit of a challenging place at the moment. Quite a lot of uncertainty out there.I’ve put a few posts out around this topic—of whether even the ethnographic, trends, semiotics, or the more cultural end of market research—should even be part of the market research industry anymore. Should it break free from the world of analytics and panels and start to reframe itself as a different kind of industry?I think that’s an interesting inflection point right now, where you could argue that people doing that kind of work—work that is maybe a bit more human, a bit more cultural, maybe a bit more journalistic in style—maybe that should move away from the other end of market research.100%. How has that position been met? What kinds of conversations have sprung up around that?I think it strikes a chord with people. It’s kind of strange—under the wider umbrella of market research, I think it sort of encourages those doing the ethnographic and cultural work to be kept in their corner. Maybe if they broke free and were able to premiumise the work they do and charge in a different way, they could start to build up a new language and a new position for that kind of work—rather than being seen as a bit of a nice-to-have alongside more mainstream market research.Is there anybody you see that looks like they’re taking that shape now, close to that kind of positioning?Yeah, I won’t name names, but I can definitely see different agencies emerging that are changing the language, I suppose, around how they talk about the work. I think the language used is really important. I'm not really that interested in people coming up with brand-new methodologies per se. I'm more interested in people who change the way they talk about the work, and therefore, the relevance the work has.So yeah, I think there are some people doing that. It does feel like there are too many agencies at the moment—it’s a very saturated space. But at the same time, I think it’s probably a good time for some people to come through and do some different things. It’s time for a bit of a freshen-up as well.Yeah. How would you describe the role of qual and qualitative research and the benefit of it? I always feel like it’s a little bit of a narcissistic, self-interested question to ask all of my guests to explain the value of qualitative research. But what do you think? What’s the role of it, and what’s the value you think it brings?Yeah, I mean, I guess for me, when I think qualitative research, I probably think as much about ethnographic research. I’ve never been that big on focus groups. I mean, we had to use them on plenty of occasions, but the idea that you put people in a room, feed them Twiglets, pay them £30, and try to get them to remember things from two weeks ago—doesn’t seem the best of routes.For me, it’s about being out there with people, really. Whether you're asking the questions or observing them, it’s being with them while they cook that meal for their family, when they go on that commute, while they buy that beer with their friends. I think you just learn so much from that sort of sense of relatability, really.And I think it’s interesting—everyone in our world wants to be the strategic person. I always feel the “strategy” word is quite a loaded word. Everyone wants to be more strategic than the other person. But I think there’s a lot of value in just being the person who can tell the stories really well. Whether you're doing the strategic piece or not, just telling stories in a way that allows people to empathize with them—and therefore to make good, strong business decisions off the back of them.Yeah. Telling research stories, basically.Yeah. I mean, I guess all of my work, in a way—whether it’s working for magazines, where you go out and tell a story about subculture and present it in a magazine, or whether you go out and do what’s happening in subculture and tell it to a boardroom—in a way, there’s a similarity to the process that’s going on there.Yeah. I feel like I learned that really, really late—that when I was presenting work to a client, just the story I would tell about an interview, or an ethnography, or an observation—that was itself the whole thing. I thought I was doing something else, but the story smuggles in so many other things. It’s sort of transformative.Absolutely. And I think more people then leave that room and go and do things that work.Yeah.If you can switch mode from research to story, and wrap it in story, then I think even people who don’t like market research—and there’s a lot of them out there—when it turns into stories, they’ll go and do good things with that work.That’s right, because we’re obsessed with people—we can’t help but be interested. Well, Andy, I want to thank you so much. I really appreciate you accepting the invitation—number one, out of the blue—and then just spending the time.It’s been a pleasure.Thank you, Peter. It’s been great to talk to you. Get full access to THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING at thatbusinessofmeaning.substack.com/subscribe

Diana Lind is a writer, urban policy specialist, and founder of The New Urban Order newsletter. She is the author of Brave New Home: Our Future in Smarter, Simpler, Happier Housing (2020) and has held leadership roles at Next City, the Penn Institute for Urban Research, the Chamber of Commerce for Greater Philadelphia, and the University of Pennsylvania. A Visiting Fellow at Johns Hopkins’s SNF Agora Institute, Lind has written widely on housing, cities, and urban futures.I start all these conversations with the same question, which I borrowed from a friend of mine. She helps people tell stories, tell their story. And so I borrowed this question from her because it's so big and beautiful. But because it's big and beautiful, I kind of over-explain it the way that I'm doing right now. And so I ask it. I want you to know that you're in total control, and you can answer or not answer any way that you want to. It's the biggest lead-in ever. But the question is, where do you come from?Oh. Well, I think of myself as coming from New York City. I feel like—growing up—I grew up in Manhattan in the 1980s, and I feel like—actually, I was just talking about this with my husband this past weekend—how your childhood just sticks with you for such a long period of time. It's so formative.So I really think of myself as coming from that city very much, even though right now I'm joining you from Philadelphia.What part of being a child in Manhattan in the '80s sticks with you? What were you talking about?Oh, I mean, just so many different things. I feel like—I grew up on the Upper West and then Upper East Sides, kind of both times on the edges of Manhattan. So in a part of where—it was very dense but also not too chaotic.And I think also, what's interesting to think about is that New York—even though people complain about how New York hasn't built housing and whatnot—so much of New York has gotten so much denser and more crowded since then, in the 1980s. I think about how it really just, for me, set the bar in terms of retail, restaurants, how people pick up ideas, what style looks like, what city life could possibly be like—all of that.And then, just in terms of other aspects of childhood, I think just the way in which so many—so many of your memories of your family life, your relationship with your friends—all of that kind of stuff sticks with you. And actually, I have a parent who has dementia, and so a lot of his childhood memories are things that he still talks about.And I think about how it's just like the innermost core of your brain. So that was a little bit about how we were thinking about childhood. And I'm joining you just after a really nice summer break in which I felt like our kids had a couple of peak childhood moments of just hanging out with friends and running around and all that kind of stuff.And it felt really good to see them experiencing that, even in times that are very different from when I was a kid. But it did feel like it was still the same kind of good stuff that you might have had in the 1980s.Do you have a recollection of what you wanted to be when you grew up?Yeah. I mean, I think from a pretty early age—beyond the initial idea that I wanted to be an astronaut or something like that—from a pretty early age, I wanted to be a writer. I just loved magazine culture and just loved that sense of seeing the world through the perspective of a writer.And even now, when I do bedtime with my kids and I read books to them, it just really brings me back to how much I get really immersed in these kinds of stories.So I think from a pretty early age, I knew that I wanted to be a writer. Initially, I think I felt like I wanted to be writing fiction. And then really, it's sort of a strange turn of events. When I went to college, one of my closest friends was an urban planning major. He also grew up in New York—but he grew up in Brooklyn—and was just very set on that. And he was a little bit of an influence. And then when I was in college, 9/11 happened. And aside from the profound sorrow and life-changing aspect of 9/11, the revitalization of downtown Manhattan was something that was really interesting to me. That was also a period of time when star architecture was also kind of at its peak. So things like the Guggenheim Bilbao and the Calatrava Milwaukee Museum, and these kinds of big buildings that were being leveraged as a way to revitalize cities. I just really fell in love with that.And when I graduated college, I had an internship that turned into a full-time job with Architectural Record. And so it was just this perfect marriage of interests in a combination of architecture and urban revitalization. And I think I eventually leaned towards being more interested in urban policy issues than architecture. But I still think that architecture is one of the most interesting kinds of art forms because of the practical nature that you have to grapple with in it.And yeah, I think if you'd asked me when I was 15—and I thought I was going to be the next Ernest Hemingway—that I would be writing about urban policy issues, I wouldn't have quite seen it that way. But I do feel like that kind of childhood in New York City prepped me well for the things that I ended up being really interested in and covering in my writing.Yeah, you mentioned magazine culture. What were the magazines that were—what was—what magazines were you thinking about and spending time with to inspire you to kind of become a writer?Oh, man. I mean, I just—I grew up in a household where my dad also—he really loved magazines and newspapers and stuff like that. So we just had everything around—everything from New York Magazine and The New Yorker to, they would let me subscribe to whatever. I think I loved things like Entertainment Weekly, and I subscribed to a lot of women's magazines like Vogue and Glamour and stuff like that, too.I definitely then also was very interested in literary magazines—eventually things like n+1 that people might know about now. But I loved the tactile nature of it. There were also smaller ones, like Paper Magazine, that were more interesting in terms of their design and their aesthetics.Eventually, the first thing I did when I was out of college—I was working for Architectural Record—I was also doing an MFA in creative writing, thinking I was still going to be a novelist or something. But I also launched my own magazine, which was called Work Magazine.That was, in some ways, a culmination of just wanting to give something back or to share my perspective on things. It was a magazine about what people do for a living, and I wanted to look at that from the perspective of everything from being a rodeo champion to somebody working in a cubicle—and to look at it not just through stories, but art and photography and all that kind of stuff as well.It was very short-lived—I think we did three issues—but it was super fun. I loved the collaborative nature of it, of working with other people who were freelancers and designers and stuff like that.That was like 2004 and 2005.It was a really fun time. You would still have launch parties, and I remember we had launch parties that brought out hundreds of people.I remember being somewhat friendly with Shoshana Berger, who was the founder of Readymade Magazine, and being part of Independent Press Association events with people from B***h Magazine, and just these small little magazines. I loved that culture of independent entrepreneurs. It’s a really different world—things like magazine distribution, trying to get people to subscribe with postcards and all that kind of stuff.But it was still not a crazy thing to do in 2004. It definitely would be now, but it was not that crazy then.So catch us up. You say you're in Philadelphia. How did you come to be in Philadelphia? And how do you talk about what you do now? What's your work?Sure. So I moved to Philly in 2008 to work for another small magazine. It was then known as The Next American City, and it was a print quarterly publication. Now it's known as Next City, and it's a daily website, a nonprofit media organization. So Next City had its offices here. I moved here in 2008, and I was with the magazine—or the organization—for almost seven years.Nowadays, I’m really splitting my time between being an independent writer—I run my own Substack called The New Urban Order, where I write about post-pandemic cities and how cities are changing at this particular time, when there’s been so much dramatic change in terms of how people experience cities and what they use them for—how they live in them and all that.I also do consulting work, and most recently wrapped up a fellowship with Johns Hopkins, where I was looking at the politics of accessory dwelling units.So I’m at this point in my life really just exploring being an independent writer and enjoying that after many years of working in full-time positions. It’s kind of a full-circle moment for me, because for about 10 years, I was in a variety of nonprofit roles that didn’t have a media focus—working for the University of Pennsylvania, working at the Chamber of Commerce—and all of those roles were really focused on policy issues and cities, but not in a media context.Now I’m firmly back in the space of writing for a living and being a bigger part of media conversations.Yeah. And that's where I found you—on the Substack. And everything that you've written has been really just amazing. I'm a total rookie, amateur. I’m a guy who had an urban planning awakening here in this tiny city of Hudson and have sort of become, I guess, interested in that same question. I love how you said it: the post-pandemic city.And I'm wondering, how do you think about that question? Like, how do you start a conversation about the changes that have happened and how we live in cities, and what we ask of cities in 2025 that wasn't true in 2018 or even 2020?Yeah. I mean, I think it's just still such an evolving story. And I think that's why I'm so interested in it.I think certainly in 2020, there was this kind of big conversation, like, are cities dead? And in fact, just yesterday, I was on Bloomberg.com's website, where they had an op-ed by Alison Schrager about, like, is the age of the big city over, right? So maybe it’s not that all cities are dead, but big cities are officially, you know, dying—which I don’t believe at all. But it's still an ongoing conversation.I think there are a number of different factors at play here. Certainly the issue of how cities have had to grapple with remote work—it's still a huge issue. The number of days worked remotely has pretty much held steady at something like 28% of workdays being done remotely, which is a huge jump from where it was before the pandemic, when it was in the single digits.So that just has a huge impact on how people navigate cities. Do they take transit or not? And if you have a drop-off of a fifth or more of your transit users, what does that mean for the ability of transportation networks to survive? What does it mean for places that used to have lunch service? What does it mean for stores, etc.?And then beyond the remote work aspect, I think over the past few years, there's been this transition to remote life writ large that definitely was accelerated by the pandemic but was maybe already starting to happen more than remote work was. People not going out to movies as much, streaming more things at home, ordering groceries from home, shopping online rather than in stores.So then it just kind of starts to beg this question of: what's the point of these places anymore? And who wants to live in them—or who can live in them?I think there's this larger tension. There's this idea that people don’t want to live in cities anymore, that they'd much rather live in suburbs or small towns or even smaller cities. And that may be true, but if it were really true, you'd start to see housing prices dramatically decline. And that also is really not happening. So there's still this hunger, but I think there's a different set of—there's a different kind of math that you have to run to figure out if the cost of living in a city is worth it.Certainly, I’m very interested in the idea of how can you make cities—because I still, and this may be going back to that 1980s New York background—I still think cities are amazing places.I was out of town for two weeks. I came back, and just by virtue of walking down the street, ran into five different people. I'm at a co-working space today and saw five other people that I haven’t seen. And it's just like—you don't get a chance to do that, I think, in a lot of other places where you just don’t have the density of people.And I do believe that the density of interactions—for some people, it’s not for everyone—but for some people, it can be tremendously exciting.So figuring out that kind of math for people is also really interesting. And how do you make it a place that is going to contribute to broader prosperity, so cities don’t end up becoming a place where only the wealthy can live and a servicing class also lives?Yeah, I feel like I’m rambling now, but that’s kind of how I start. That’s the base level of how I think about the post-pandemic city, and then I draw from there a lot of different topics that I’m interested in.Yeah. What do you love about the work? Like, where’s the joy in it for you? What do you really thrive on?In the writing about this kind of stuff?Yeah, I guess in the work you do—what’s your favorite part or where’s the joy in it?Yeah. I mean, I feel like the favorite part for me is that I’m just constantly walking around. I’m like a walking op-ed generator, walking around constantly having an argument with an imaginary set of people. And the joy is actually putting it down and synthesizing: what am I trying to say here?So, one really fun thing I’m working on right now is an op-ed I’m writing with somebody I met through one of my subscriber events. We didn’t know each other—met in San Francisco. And that was one of my most successful events, in the sense that I ended up then collaborating with some subscribers on a design competition, and we won an honorable mention.Fantastic.But anyways, we’re working on an op-ed right now. And I think what I really love about that is just being in conversation with people who are also thinking about these things. Because, you know, a lot of the writing I do is solo, and I enjoy that, but I also enjoy the collaborative process of writing with someone else. It kind of brings something out in the ideas that maybe wouldn’t come up if you were just in your own head about it.And then I think I just love walking around cities and looking at how people are living and thinking about, you know, what kind of assumptions are being made about the ways that we’re supposed to live, and how are people actually living. Where are the tensions, where are the gaps? I think that’s really where I get a lot of joy and curiosity from.And sometimes it’s a little thing, like seeing a sign on a store that reflects something that’s shifted in the culture, or seeing a place that used to be something and now it’s something else, and just thinking about why that happened and what that says.And yeah, I think the joy is really being able to notice those things and then build something out of them. That’s what I love.And it's just been really fun because we started out with this sort of idea, and I was like, I'm not sure this is really turning into something that is useful or interesting. And we just kept going back and forth. And now we’ve finally figured out: what are we actually trying to say here? I love that process of continual editing.And in fact, I would say that a lot of people talk to think, but I really write to think. That’s how I’m able to think clearly about things—through that editing process and writing things down. Maybe I’ve trained my brain that way, but that’s how I make sense of the world.So yeah, it’s like—I don’t want to call it therapy, because it’s not about getting over an issue—but it’s like that analysis and synthesis of ideas. It makes me feel like, okay, I understand the world now. I figured that little thing out that I was thinking about.And that is—I think there’s some part of that that is joyful. And then there’s a lot of it that feels just sort of satisfying. And then there are also times when you put stuff out there and you’re like, cringe. Why did I write that? That happens too. But yeah.Yeah, I’m curious. You said—and I feel like I’m identifying as well—that you're walking around engaged in some sort of argument with imaginary figures, or maybe they're just the projection of imaginary figures. Do you have any idea who you're arguing with? Do you have foils that you're in dialogue with in your head?Yeah, I don't necessarily feel like there's particular people who I'm in dialogue with, but I often feel like I'm trying to respond to something that I’ve read or something someone has said to me.One of my pieces—probably one of my most popular pieces—was about sending your kid to an okay public school, and why that is potentially a good thing to do, or why you should try it. It was pretty much: just give it a chance, as opposed to the prevailing idea that you should move to the district with the best possible school for your kid.And that was a direct instance where I was at a conference. Someone made a comment about living in a part of Philadelphia, the suburbs, where they have really good schools, and she moved there. And it was just sort of like, well, obviously, you move to wherever is the best school. And this was a counterpoint to that argument. That was an example where someone said something, and I just had my internal argument in my head and eventually wrote it out.There are other times, like this op-ed I’m writing with a friend—it’s a response to the conversation about abundance and Zoram and Dani’s primary win. I feel like it’s in response to this big conversation people are having about the future of the Democratic Party. There’s not one particular person I’m trying to influence, but it’s more like, here are some ways we’re thinking about this and what it means.Yeah. Where do you fall out on this? I’m curious to know where you are on this. I mean, of course, I’m going to look forward to reading it. What are your thoughts on the conversation about abundance and Dani? Abundance in particular—I’m curious about that.Yeah, well, I’ll just speak for myself here and say that I think both the socialist idea and the idea of abundance are really compelling ideas and visions. But they seem to forget that most people have zero confidence in government. And in fact, go beyond feeling skeptical—they’re antagonistic toward government.So the idea that—both of these are very much centered on how government is going to get us out of our current problems. Those are the visions. And I’m a believer in the capacity of government, but I also feel like people need to have more trust in government first. And actually more trust in their fellow man. People need to believe that our communities are governable, and that the mission of government is to use its scale for the public good and to provide public goods to all people.You need to have more trust, faith, and interest in your fellow man in order to believe in that role for government. So I feel like there’s a lot of work that needs to be done before either of these two very bold visions for the Democratic Party could really succeed.And maybe I’m wrong, and I don’t want to be cynical. Now I feel like I am—like I’m an older person who’s saying, no, you can’t do that or something.But I think just being exposed to a very purple state like Pennsylvania—which feels very—the sort of message of both of those messages, I could see very much how it would not be appealing to your average person who is, again, pretty skeptical of government and has, I think, legitimate beef over, like, well, I don't understand how we're going to build high-speed rail when right now we can't get a budget agreement for SEPTA, which is our local transit agency, and they're cutting back transit lines.How are we going to build a high-speed infrastructure beyond that? It just feels kind of fantastical. So I think for me, there's some first-level work that hasn't really been done, and that is a little bit more about what that might look like.Yeah, I love it. Can you articulate—how do you describe abundance to people? I guess both of them. What’s your sort of shorthand for these two approaches? And I'm really excited by what you articulated. I feel like I connect—maybe that's why I've connected to a few of your pieces—about the trust, everything around the trust.And living in a small town, I feel particularly maybe exposed to that. So I’m curious, how do you articulate—what’s the abundance promise and what’s the Mamdani promise as it relates to—because I really appreciate how you articulated that there’s sort of—I’m just going to try to restate what you said. Do you understand my question? Have you heard a question?Yes. Well, first, just saying that I don't feel like I'm an expert on either socialism or abundance. The way that I would describe it is—abundance is this idea that we have been approaching so much of our built environment as a situation of scarcity, where we're fighting over what can or can't get built. And instead, we’re a country that has this opportunity to be building more for everyone that would bring us into the 21st century.I see abundance as— a lot of the prescriptions are focused on trying to get rid of some of the barriers to building more, whether that’s housing, clean energy infrastructure, or other things. A recent example of an “abundance win,” if you will, is the rollback of CEQA in California, which was a piece of legislation that essentially enabled endless lawsuits that would prevent housing and other kinds of buildings from actually getting built. I think even Governor Newsom called out abundance in doing this.That policy move—reducing barriers to building things and making housing and infrastructure more affordable and feasible—I think their vision is that this brings greater prosperity to all by making things less expensive.The more socialist side of things, I see as using government to, in some ways, correct the market where the market has really failed to provide equity. So ideas like free buses, freezing rents, or government-run grocery stores—these are ideas that say the market has not been able to appropriately deal with inflation, public transportation, or housing, and we need to use government as a lever to make the city more equitable.In both of these cases, I almost feel like—I feel like, good luck. I wish you well. These are great ideas if they could happen. Sure. But I often see how stuff doesn’t happen.As a first step, it would be awesome if we could instead show how—let’s just say—the government could provide adequate bus shelters for people who are waiting for the bus, rather than free buses. Or public bathrooms. Or properly maintain parks and public spaces. Any of these kinds of things that feel like they're sort of the Maslow's lowest level of survival for cities.And to do them in a way in which people feel less like they need to retreat into their own personal spaces, but that actually, because of government, they’re more engaged in their community. And it's not just the private sector that is always responsible for getting people out of their houses and into community, but instead it’s actually the government that is helping to support that.I think that would go a long way to proving to people like, yes, we can do this, and then we could take on some more of these challenges. And I actually think there's a lot that can be done relatively quickly. I think Americans are—perhaps rightfully so—pretty impatient when there are big ideas about how you're going to build new infrastructure and it doesn't happen for 20 years or something like that.That's just too long a wait time. So I think also one of the key factors here is: what's going to show that government is effective faster? I think that’s a critical question that needs to be contemplated for Democrats. Because, yeah, we've got midterms next year.And this seems pretty universal. I mean, I'm, of course, always going to reference my own experience here in Hudson, which is a small town that really has pretty much every big city problem in a very strange way. And it seems like you say that these cities fail to deliver basic city services at a pretty fundamental level.And I think it's this kind of—and again, I'm going to expose my lack of expertise here—but like, Strong Towns, this movement. I feel like there's a big conversation about how the country has changed and the economy has changed, and why our infrastructure is so neglected in a way.And it's certainly the social infrastructure. I think there are a couple of things bouncing around in my mind. One is—I think the piece that you wrote that I responded to most was the idea of claiming this term “pro-social,” which is an experience that I also had. In my efforts in Hudson, it was always to try to bring—help us have a conversation with ourselves, really thinking about community engagement and civic engagement and how that happens, and how counterproductive that is often around regulations like SEQR and stuff like that.And discovering that there are models for pro-social behavior, but also diagnosing how our anti-social digital lives are the fundamental problem—the obstacle to really getting anything done.Because we talked about—we shared Josh McManus as a colleague—and talking to him, he's very explicit about his work with cities. That the biggest change—and this is what I loved about Abundance, I haven’t read the book, but just the idea of it—is ambitious enough to raise our eyesight a little bit, to think that we could do something.And I heard an interview with Ezra Klein done by Marginal Revolution—I’m not going to remember the guy’s name—he asked a wonderful question. He said, what’s the critique of your book you feel most vulnerable to? And Ezra Klein’s answer was “voice.” And he just said, we don’t know how to engage each other around the possibility of abundance, which I think is also sort of particularly universal in a way.So maybe—I don’t know what I might’ve just said that sparked something for you—but what I heard you talking about is proving the efficacy of government by building public social infrastructure, just to restore trust before maybe some of these more ambitious ideas about what’s possible.Yes. So that is actually—that’s the thesis of the op-ed, right? And I hope my colleague Amy Cohen is not upset, depending on how fast we turn that around and this comes out. But yeah, that’s basically it.It's like, we need to build pro-social spaces so that people can reconnect with each other. And pro-social means that—in some ways—it’s the opposite of anti-social, right? But it's also kind of about: how do we actually get people to connect with one another and encourage positive behavior?So many of the things that we build in cities are, in some ways, almost intended just to prevent bad behavior. A lot of benches in a park will be built to discourage a homeless person from sleeping on it. But what are we actually doing to encourage positive behavior there?I think the idea that many people are lamenting—people’s social isolation, particularly children spending all their time on their phones—but we’ve given people zero excuse or reason to spend time out in their communities with one another. And we’ve certainly not built those spaces either.So why should we be surprised that people have no concept of reality?Coming from the space of media for so long—I worked for The Philadelphia Inquirer for one year—and there was, obviously there and in many other media organizations, a big conversation about media literacy. And no one is in local news, and people aren’t getting local news and don’t know what’s actually going on.I think that’s completely true. But also, a big part of the reason why people don’t actually know what’s going on is because they’re at home. They’re not actually out in spaces. They don’t see what is happening in their city in the ways they used to in the past.So I think being able to build these kinds of spaces is a great way to restore trust in each other, and also restore trust in government—and saying that government can build and maintain this stuff, and can also find a way to reap the dividend of it. Because I think a lot of people are completely aware that it’s great if you have government that’s going to spend money on various social goods, but if they can’t figure out how to maintain it and pay for it long term, that’s going to be a problem for the city as well.To your point about not having a voice for these kinds of questions, or figuring out how to talk across these very polarized times—I think that, for me, is really my main concern with ideas like abundance, and some of the ideas that are in the Socialist Party or part of the Democratic Party.I think, how do you find a way to talk about these kinds of issues that will affect someone who doesn’t think about this stuff all the time? Who’s not a policy wonk? Who’s just trying to live their life and feels frustrated by government?I mean, the majority of Americans—even if they didn’t like Elon Musk or how Doge was actually executed—the majority of Americans do feel like government is inefficient and did think that Doge was a good idea.So how do you flip someone’s mind on that kind of perspective?I think people need to be doing a bit more listening, because I don’t know that some of these concepts are really resonating with people who are— I think about just average Philadelphians who would never previously think of themselves as Republicans, but haven’t been able to find a message that feels like it’s actually resonating with them.Yes. You mentioned listening. And another one of your pieces—I feel like I align completely on so much of what you're observing—the idea that no one really knows what’s going on.And that’s definitely my experience in Hudson. There’s so much that’s happening, and nobody has any time to pay attention. And then even if they try to pay attention, it’s sort of incomprehensible and antiquated.What inspired me, in terms of my involvement in Hudson, was around Citizens Assembly. It’s something I discovered because Bard College is nearby. And it felt like this really powerful way to bring people into the process and invest them in decision-making in an amazing way.I remember someone I met there talking about how radically our technology has changed, how radically our media has changed—and how our government institutions, even—especially—at the local level, have fundamentally not changed. The structures of the meetings, the formats of the meetings, the spaces that we come together in to create... I love how you talk to this shared reality. The spaces we have to create a shared understanding are really challenged. Do you have that experience also, or am I—Definitely. Yeah. I mean, I just think that the idea of these upstart groups that are at least trying to change who shows up at these kinds of meetings and how they're digested and shared with the community—that, to me, is really important work. In Philadelphia, there's something called the Fifth Square, which is an urbanist group focused on transportation and housing and other kinds of related issues here. They organize people to speak at city council hearings, and they also report out what has been discussed and passed and things like that.Should we require government to be innovating in and of itself? I'm not so sure. But I do think that is a place for nonprofits or concerned citizens to step up and think about how to better communicate what's actually going on in their town.I think the issue of people not really knowing what's going on—I'm also trying to figure out how to write about the police takeover in Washington, D.C., and I feel like that's a really good example of the problem when people don’t really know what’s going on. Like, is there really a crime problem in D.C., or is there not a crime problem in D.C.? Is this excessive? Is this not? What information should we be relying on? How is the government sharing its voice about what is going on, what they want to see happen?All of that feels like it’s coming to a head in D.C. It feels very confusing. And I, as an outsider, am trying to get a sense of what's going on. I’ve texted with and talked to a few people I know who live there—they also seem kind of confused as well.I don’t know what more to say about it, but it doesn’t bode well when a possible scenario is an armed takeover of your city because you’re disagreeing about whether there’s a crime problem or not. I don’t know. It strikes me as potentially pretty bad.I’m trying to figure out my particular angle on it and learn a little more about what’s going on there. But there are consequences to not having a shared reality and to having a government that’s not particularly good at explaining what it’s doing or how it’s doing it.Yeah.This has occurred to me recently, because I think about this quite a lot. And I’ve spent enough time playing around with AI and the implications of AI for creative storytelling and all that stuff to realize just how under threat the shared reality is—and the ways that we create a shared understanding. It becomes—tell me what you think about this—but it becomes a media problem in which face-to-face is the media that we need.And in that way, it becomes almost exclusively a local opportunity or responsibility, right? Because every other media is vulnerable in a way. Is that an extreme interpretation?I do. I mean, it’s definitely something I’ve thought about, which is that we are actually approaching this age where you have to see it with your own eyes to believe whatever it might end up being.Yeah. I hope we kind of don’t get there. I do think that one of the other flip sides is that media is so distributed at this point that the key is recognizing there are many different voices and perspectives on a particular thing, and ensuring that there’s not just one—that you're not only relying on a few sources to understand what is actually going on.But I do think that face-to-face—I think also, even more so—in fact, people... I had a conversation with a friend of mine who is also a writer and maybe had never actually, because of the pandemic, might not have actually met her agent in person.Maybe they had met once before, but she was just saying they’d had conversations going back and forth on the phone and email for years, and just recently met up for lunch—either for the first time ever or the first time in many years. And it was just—what a difference it makes to actually meet someone in person.I think people are increasingly realizing that. Maybe for your immediate social circle, who you see frequently in person all the time, you don’t necessarily feel it. But for so many other types of connections and people, actually being in person is dramatic.It seems like it should be completely the same as a Zoom call or whatever, but it’s actually really quite different. You get so much more information almost immediately when you’re with a person—about their essence as a human.I think that’s sort of the same thing about—whether it’s experiencing a... I think another good example of this is when the National Guard was called into L.A.—not for the wildfires, but for protesting ICE—and the sort of cherry-picked moments of chaos that were being shown on the news versus a lot of other people showing calm neighborhoods and no real reason for there to be a National Guard presence.I think this is going to be an ongoing issue—what are we actually seeing, and can you rely on these dueling viewpoints that are being shown to you on a camera? And also, just people recognizing that in-person experiences not only have a truth to them but also a value that virtual ones simply can’t replicate.So we’re near the end of our time, and I guess I would be remiss—I wanted to end maybe on a forward-looking note. Your Substack, The New Urban Order—when you look ahead and think about cities, what are you most excited about? Are there models out there that inspire you or make you feel positively about the direction we’re going in, in trying to address the way that we live now?Yeah, I do feel like I'm fairly optimistic about American cities, in fact. I think one of the reasons I went to San Francisco at the beginning of the year is that I felt like the city was really primed for a turnaround. It had sort of reached its bottom and is going to come back.So I’m very interested to see different cities that are charging ahead—whether it’s a San Francisco or Detroit. I feel, in Philadelphia, in fact, we’ve been so undervalued for so long, and I think there are a lot of other undervalued cities in the country that are having a moment to shine.What do you mean by undervalued? What does it mean—undervalued?Just like, you know, both literally undervalued in terms of—our housing is incredibly cheap here, right? And I don't think that it’s been as desirable as a lot of other cities. Like, I don’t even know—like Jacksonville or something like that. Why is Philadelphia cheap compared to Jacksonville? I don’t know.I just think it has so many incredible assets here and such a good quality of life that people haven’t quite recognized yet. And I think that is starting to shift.I think also, just in terms of—I’ve lived here now for 17 years—and just seeing how there is, I think, a pretty healthy scene of creative destruction and renewal that continues in the city. Like, we recently had a small arts college go bankrupt very quickly and publicly. And then a number of the buildings were sold off and are being repurposed—one into both housing and maker space for artists. And it's just interesting to see how that kind of happens in the city. And it's happening in this one example.But I am excited for a number of different cities that are in this upward trajectory of interesting new development. I think I’m also optimistic about cities really rethinking their streetscapes and getting way smarter.I mean, just the past year, in terms of new legislation around housing and making housing easier to build, is all very exciting. And so all of that, I think, really just kind of bodes well for more livable cities.And yet, at the same time, I’m also very concerned about things like the destruction of public transportation, the loss of federal and state funding for everything from food banks and research to housing and everything else. I feel like the fallout from that is going to be really difficult to watch.So I’m also really keen to follow—where are the smart ideas for ensuring that we come out of this still with places that are working for everyone, and not just for the people who are tax advantaged in the big, beautiful building, and so on?So yeah, it’s a combination of feeling both like there are many cities around the country that are witnessing population growth, interesting developments, new clusters of jobs and innovation, and interesting cultural institutions—all that kind of stuff. And then also just feeling very concerned about the infrastructural level of support for people and places, just throughout the country.Beautiful. I want to thank you so much. This has been a lot of fun. And I really appreciate you accepting my invitation to begin with. And then, yeah—just thank you so much.Oh, totally. I really appreciate the chance to have a chat with you and get to know you and your corner of Hudson a little bit better. And I hope we do get a chance to meet up in person.Yes, definitely. Get full access to THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING at thatbusinessofmeaning.substack.com/subscribe

Adam Talkington is Head of Ethnography at Further&Further, a strategy and research firm known for immersive cultural insight work with brands like Spotify, Boston Beer, and Adidas. Trained as a sociologist, Adam began his career in academic research. He now leads a team focused on helping brands uncover deep human truths—and isn’t afraid to challenge client comfort zones in the process.So I start all these conversations with the same question—which I actually borrowed from a friend of mine who helps people tell their story.It’s a big question, and I tend to over-explain it, like I’m doing now. But before I ask it, I want you to know you’re in total control. You can answer however you want—or not at all. The question is: Where do you come from?I come from California. And I come from a lot of tragedy, I would say. I mean, I’m a conversation analyst, so I’m interested in the way you asked that question—not the words, but how you asked it. We could talk about that.But yeah, I’m originally from LA. And I come from a pretty broken family. I think both of those things have been really important to who I am.It’s funny, even the question “Where do you come from?”—that’s something I sometimes get on the street. I've lived in really, really white places ever since I’ve been an adult. And as a sort of ethnically ambiguous brown guy, people will walk up to me like, “Where are you from?”And I’ll just mess with them—“I’m from California.”And they’re like, “No, no, no, where are your parents from?”And I say, “California.”So in some ways, California is actually a really important place. It’s a huge mix of people. LA is such a fascinating and amazing, diverse place—you’ve got Latinos, white people, Black people, Koreans, whatever. A huge diversity of people. That’s really important to who I am.Understanding those roots has been a big journey for me—something I wasn’t really able to close the loop on until a couple years ago. So yeah, the California part is really important.I’m also pretty open about the fact that I was a foster kid. I lived with my grandparents when I was two, and I was taken away from my mom when I was four. I grew up in the foster care system until I was almost 13.A lot of that time, I lived with my aunt and uncle, which was really privileged and fortunate. They gave me a kind of stability and sensibility I probably wouldn’t have gotten in other homes.But I also lived in a lot of stranger homes—foster homes, that is. It was an important part of my story. It was a kind of lonely and weird feeling for a long time. And I ended up studying informal foster care for my dissertation in sociology.So it was something that—once I realized how many people go through these non-traditional and somewhat traumatic childhood experiences—I saw it was a thing nobody really talked about. But it was something we could try to understand.That realization became not only a major focus of my PhD, but also something that helped me make sense of my own experiences—not as something isolating, but as something that could be a bridge. A way to see what others are going through, and to understand the particulars of their stories.Yeah. I'm trying to think of what to ask. I'm curious—what does it mean to you to have been raised in foster homes? And when did you first realize that was your story?When did I realize the meaning, or when did I realize I was raised in foster homes?Probably a little of both.Yeah. I mean, I was four when I was taken away from my mom. So I remember everything about it.It’s deeply imprinted in my psyche. I think there were a whole series of realizations over time. But I remember living with my aunt and uncle—we were in a tiny little mountain town in Northern California. My uncle worked at the lumber mill, and we lived just behind it.So even though I had traumatic experiences in childhood, I also had some really beautiful ones—growing up in the woods, getting lost for an entire day behind the lumber mill while my uncle worked.I remember wanting to ask friends if they wanted to have a sleepover. Or they'd ask me, and I'd say, “Yeah, let me ask my mom.” But then I’d catch myself and say, “Oh—I mean, my aunt, my uncle.”So there was this kind of linguistic difference in how I talked about things, and that started to shape how I experienced myself and my story as a kid. But yeah, it’s something I knew kind of from the start.Do you remember what you wanted to be when you grew up? What did young Adam imagine?I had no idea. I remember having this thought—this sort of projection—of what I’d look like as a college-aged person.I imagined myself as gangly, with acne... I don’t know, I think I had this 90s sitcom version in my head of what I’d look like and be like. Maybe that’s fairly normal. Maybe that says something, I don’t know. But no, I couldn’t have told you what I wanted to do for work or in life.So catch us up. Where are you now? Where are you living, and what are you doing?I live in Portland, Oregon. I did my PhD in sociology, focusing broadly on social interaction. Along the way, I did research on how testing and diagnosis happens for kids on the autism spectrum, and also on informal fostering among relatives.So I had this very serious research program that I was deeply invested in. But as I neared the end of grad school, I saw that even my brilliant colleagues—people I really admired—were struggling to get jobs in academia.And with the experience of the pandemic layered on top of that, I started thinking seriously about doing something else.I remember reaching out to Eve Ejsmont, who was a research director at Further and Further. I just asked her how someone gets their foot in the door in that industry. And it kind of snowballed from there.I ended up meeting Ian Pierpoint and Meg Weisenberg, who lead Further and Further, and eventually joined the agency. It’s been this amazing unlock—bringing my particular skills into a new industry. New for me, at least, even though I’m not new to research.It’s been an incredible arena for collaboration and figuring out how to do better and better work with people.Yeah, yeah. I know—I’ve met Megan. And I’ve always admired Further and Further from a distance. That’s how you ended up on my radar, actually—through LinkedIn and the things you share. I’m curious to talk about that a bit. You’ve described yourself as a conversation analyst, and your PhD was about social interaction. You have a very specific way of talking about what you focused on. How do you describe that work? What do the terms “conversation analyst” and “social interaction” really mean?I’d say there’s almost a hierarchy there. You’ve got the broader field of studies of social interaction.For me, in grad school, I very quickly fell in with Alice Goffman—who’s the daughter of a really famous sociologist, Erving Goffman. He died when she was a baby, so she didn’t really know him, but she comes from this sort of academic royalty.In any case, Goffman represents a whole approach to the study of mundane life. He really popularized the idea of understanding social interaction and public behavior by diving into what Thomas and Znaniecki called the definition of the situation.A lot of people who took sociology in college probably read his book The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, where he presents a kind of dramaturgical view of society—we’re all playing roles.But the roles we play are constantly shifting depending on how we define the situation. No one person has the sole authority to define it; we do it together, in concert.It’s a kind of working consensus about what the situation is. Like right now—this is an interview. We both understand that, and we’re doing “interviewee-type” things that sustain that shared understanding.Goffman was famous for diving into the mundane particulars of life. He studied institutionalized life in asylums—he actually spent time with people who had been institutionalized and looked closely at the process of being socialized into that environment, and what it did to people psychologically. So “social interaction” can be really broad. And yes, Goffman was an ethnographer—a quintessential one.Is that right? I didn’t know that was the case with Erving Goffman.Oh yeah. His dissertation was done in the UK—he studied farm life. The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life actually came out of that dissertation. Asylums was based on his time in mental institutions, looking at that process firsthand.But he also wrote a lot about public behavior. He took copious notes on things he saw happening in public life. There’s his work on Interaction Ritual, for example. The ritual element is a huge part of his larger theory—he took Durkheim’s ideas about ritual from The Elementary Forms of Religious Life and scaled them down.Instead of looking at rituals in a grand, religious sense, he looked at how ritual happens between people in everyday, concrete experiences. He was mapping that all over life.His big thing was about looking at public life. Because when you think about it, when you come across a stranger, there’s so much you have to be able to do and communicate really quickly—at least in the world he was studying.But yeah, he was an ethnographer. One of his most famous pieces was about the interaction order—this idea that you can explain what’s happening with exactly what’s present in the local environment, rather than resorting to abstract concepts from somewhere else.That framework is something a lot of people in social interaction studies draw from, including conversation analysts.Conversation analysis itself is a specific approach. It was actually pioneered by one of Goffman’s students, Harvey Sacks, along with Emanuel Schegloff—and, oh my God, I’m blanking on her name. It’ll come back to me.But conversation analysis is a way of looking at the common-sense order of things. It started with research on suicide hotlines. The practical issue was this: people would call in, but they wouldn’t give their names. And that was a concern, because clearly something serious was going on—they felt the need to reach out—but there was no way to follow up with them.So the researchers wanted to understand how those conversations worked—and whether there was something they could do differently to encourage people to share identifying info.Harvey Sacks and Manny Schegloff started analyzing those conversations and realized: there’s an order to this. They published a paper on turn-taking—that was the first structure they picked up on. From there, a whole beautiful architecture of how conversation works began to unfold. And when you think about it, conversations—across cultures, globally—are organized by turns.What’s amazing is that turn-taking requires you to listen closely enough to my turn to know when a unit might be ending—when it’s going to end in a way that invites you to take over, or to offer a nod, or a “mm-hmm,” or any number of small signals.Those responses—what conversation analysts call “continuation markers”—can be encouraging or discouraging, they can show agreement or alignment, or create distance. Later researchers dug into how those signals shape interaction, like showing agreement with a story or challenging a point.Another key feature is adjacency pairs—like question and answer.So, for example, if you ask, “Where are you from?”—that question makes a certain kind of response conditionally relevant. It creates a field of possible next turns.And the way you ask the question shapes how I hear it—and how I respond. We’re shaping each other through the interaction. And here's the key: if I don’t answer your question, you can hold me socially accountable.How would I do that?Well, imagine this. You say, “Adam, where are you from?” And I reply, “Well, I just had a bowl of yogurt and put raspberries in it—because raspberries are so delicious.”What would you say, Peter?That’s interesting. I mean, as someone who’s really spent a lot of time interviewing, I’ve trained myself to follow where people go. But I think… what would I do? I’d honor the response. I’d probably say, “Oh yeah, man, right. I love raspberries. That’s great.” And then—I’d return to the question. I’d ask again.So that’s the accountability piece. You’d repeat the question, and you might do so in a way that suggests—explicitly or tacitly—that maybe there was an issue with audio, or with hearing, or understanding. So you reformulate the question again, now with different information, or with different intonation. You might stretch things out in a certain way.When we do conversation analytic exercises, we work with these really dense transcripts of everything that happens in communication. And you're not looking at how one person uses language to get their meaning across—you're looking at how both parties involved in the interaction are co-producing meaning.Because neither one of us gets to steer the ship alone. We have to do it together.Yeah. Oh man, I love this stuff.This is the most exciting stuff. I don’t have any of the academic background you have, but I find it really thrilling. I’m thinking about so many different things.And I always come back to—maybe you can explain this to me—the Ursula Le Guin essay. Have you ever read Listening is Telling? The one with the diagrams she draws?I don’t know it, but Ursula Le Guin is from Portland.Oh, no way.Yeah, it’s one of our claims to fame. But I’ll have to check out the piece. Tell me about it.Oh man, it’s amazing. The hypothesis is—it’s called Listening is Telling. And she actually drew two diagrams. One describes the conventional way we think about communication: two boxes—you’re a box, I’m a box—and there’s a tube between us. I’m the sender, transmitting bits of information through the tube to you. And you’re the receiver. We take turns passing info back and forth through the tube.But she says: anyone who’s actually been in a real conversation knows that’s not how it works at all. Instead, she presents amoeba sex as the appropriate metaphor for human conversation—because it’s intersubjective, it’s reciprocal, and we get lost in the telling. Everything you’ve been describing. She follows that logic and says, basically, listening is the same as telling. They’re part of the same process.That really blew me away. I’d been doing research for a long time and had my own unstructured experiences of what happens in conversation—but I hadn’t heard it articulated like that before.It made me think of conversation as a place—something you enter into with someone. And you can also not be in that place, even when you’re trying to. And not being in that place, while trying to be in a conversation, is horrible.Yeah. Thank you for the recommendation—that sounds really interesting.We used to call it the conduit model of communication. And I think that underlies a lot of what we’re grappling with now—especially in questions about AI and intelligence. That model misses some of the fundamentals.Because when we think about information and how it gets produced, the conduit model conflates communication with transfer. And that’s the model Ursula Le Guin was trying to take apart and replace.It also sounds really familiar—one of the most relevant connections for me is John Dewey, the pragmatist philosopher.Oh yeah.You might’ve read this, or maybe not, but he has an essay on what he calls the organic circuit.Oh, no—I don’t know that one at all.It’s really resonant with what you were just describing. Dewey was close with William James, who wrote the first book on psychology and was also a pioneering figure in pragmatist thought.James had this model of stimulus and response. He gives the classic example of a child touching a flame and then pulling their hand back: the flame is the stimulus, the movement of the hand is the response.But Dewey, in this fairly short essay, just completely takes that model apart. He argues it’s not just a matter of stimulus and response—there’s a projected action, a kind of movement that’s already happening before the stimulus occurs.The understanding of the stimulus only makes sense within the framework of that movement—like the movement of the hand.So what he’s doing is showing that things are part of a coordinated whole. It’s so powerful. And you can apply it to communication, but also to how individuals operate. Eventually we’ll probably get into the current work I’m doing, but to me, this is foundational.When I think about how people work, I think about all these layers of ongoing “projects” in their lives—small, personal ones; bigger ones shared with people they’re close to; shared projects within communities; and even large-scale societal discourses.All of these things shape the trajectory, the channel of coordinated action, within which any stimulus has to be understood and interpreted. That’s the essential work.Yes. Your description of the Dewey piece feels like a complete takedown of conventional market research—the focus group, the whole practice of extracting people from their lived experience, stimulating them, and then somehow evaluating their response as if it exists outside of their life project.Yeah, I mean—market research, for sure. But I think a lot of research in general.I kind of cut my teeth in a really amazing sociology department. Wisconsin has one of two Institutes for Research on Poverty—do those even exist anymore? I don’t know what the current administration has done with them.But I got to spend time around amazing demographers, economists, and other people really leading their fields—just incredibly smart folks.And I found that the smartest ones used those tools with a kind of awareness. Like, yes, you can build constructs, find relationships between variables, work hard to construct them in more valid ways. But at the end of the day, there are limits.Because if you don’t know that what you have to explain are things that actually happen in the world—not just things that happen in your dataset—then you’re missing something fundamental. When you're trying to explain things in the world, you can't remove people from their real lives. Everything is understood through that lens.How does this work show up in what you're doing now? Can you tell me a little bit about the work you do at Further and Further?Well, Further & Further—Ian and Meg started it based on the limitations of that traditional focus group model. You know, the model where you bring people into a strange room, give them a sandwich and a hundred bucks, and ask them a narrow set of questions.They realized—especially through their experience with documentary filmmaking—that if you follow a person’s story, you get a much richer understanding of who they are and how that relates to the core question.So I think Further & Further was built on that realization. You’d have to ask Ian and Meg to get their version of the origin story, but that's how I understand it.Now, our mission is what we call Five Day Brands. The idea is to spend as much time with people as possible—to really immerse ourselves in their world, their relationships, their moods, and everything that changes across those five days.So when we do ask critical questions, we’re not asking them in a vacuum—we already have a sense of who this person is, spread out over the context of their life. That gives us a kind of ecological validity. That’s the term I would use.What I think is amazing is that Ian and Meg come to this from very different backgrounds, but we all coalesce around trying to understand people’s stories from the first-person perspective—with the understanding that this is valuable to the work on the other side.So a lot of our projects are foundational strategy—positioning work, for example—but increasingly we’re doing innovation work too, or digging into specific target audiences.I love it when people light up during a debrief—especially creatives. I don’t know if you’ve had this experience—you probably have. When you give people something rich about a person—their story, these lived details—you see a creative in the room go: “Oh... I can do something with that.”I love giving people insights that feel genuinely usable and informative. So I’m always thinking about that practical edge—how to take this deep, rich exploration of people and their worlds and make it usable for the people we're working with.What do you love about it? Where’s the joy in the work for you?There’s a lot of joy in a lot of places, to be honest, Peter.Coming out of academia and into this work, I found the collaboration here so much more rewarding. In academia, everything is tied to your name—you want your name first. You’re competing with your peers for a small number of slots at an R1 university.Even though I really liked and admired a lot of the people I worked with, structurally speaking, we were in competition with one another.Now, I’m doing this work where we’re just throwing our best ideas, observations, and insights at the problem—trying to get somewhere that’s both the truest possible and the most useful to someone else.And I love meeting people. It’s literally my job to meet people—like this—and then go out and spend time with them in their lives.So a typical project for us might start with an online board stage, where we get to know people and their stories. We get a sense of what a week with them could look like. Then we travel to a location—maybe three or four people in that city—and split up our time over the week, spending time with each of them. We have documentary filmmakers on staff, and throughout the work, I get to meet all these people. I think that’s amazing.Trying to figure out new aspects of life to appreciate in every person you meet—it’s such a beautiful way to experience the world. I feel really privileged. And there’s collaboration at every point.Researchers working with other researchers in different markets, collaborating with filmmakers—so I’m doing the research part, trying to understand and spend time with people, while we’re also creating space and time to make a film that moves people. A film that brings a person’s story to life, to help convey that story to clients in a way that informs their work. So yeah—there’s a lot to love.I always like to get to the elemental questions. Like: What is qualitative research to you? What makes it important? I ask partly because I’m always trying to make the case for my own career—but also because I think it’s just a vital question. How do you explain what makes qualitative research useful? Why is it so important?Yeah. Well, I think the world only happens where it actually happens, you know?There’s this conventional idea in research that something is more true if you can say a larger number of people do it. But the only way you get to that understanding is that somewhere, someone is filling out a survey. Or someone is clicking something. And there's an apparatus that captures that behavior.All of those are situated activities. So I think of qualitative research as a way of either circumventing the middleman, or just getting into the context where you actually see behavior happening.The reason to do qualitative research is—you know, Erving Goffman wrote this great essay called Where the Action Is. He was studying casinos, I think, at the time. He was breaking apart probability structures.Like, if you say something is “up to chance”—like flipping a coin—it’s only because you haven’t accounted for all the variables. But if you studied the coin’s exact asymmetries, the weight, and everything else, you'd better understand how it’s going to land.Take that framework and apply it to any other kind of probabilistic outcome you might research. You go where the action is—where things are actually happening. That’s how you come to understand things on their own terms.And when you’re dealing with people, that becomes even more important. Because the one thing you don’t want to do is build an understanding that’s inconsistent with how people experience and understand their own lives and stories.The other question I like to ask—and I’ll admit it’s self-interested, since the newsletter is called The Business of Meaning—is this: Do you have a sense of what we mean when we say “meaning”? What is meaning?Meaning... I think what’s so interesting is—we’re never really doing it alone, are we?Even when you think you’re having a private, subjective experience, you’re still borrowing from society to have that experience.That’s what language is, you know? And to stay at the more esoteric level—think of Wittgenstein and his idea that there’s no private language. That’s one of his famous lines, I think from the Brown Book.So even language itself—going back to the conduit model of communication—raises the question: Do we have these pure thoughts and experiences that just get transmitted through a tube?Or is it that language gives us a kind of resource—a set of tools—for building an understanding of what it is we’re actually doing? When you look at stories, and the role of narrative in people’s lives, I think it becomes even more clear.I don’t know if you follow a lot of the neuroscience work on this, but so many people seem to be saying the same thing: stories are essential for survival. It’s about understanding what you’re doing, where risk is, how you avoid risk, and how you make decisions that help you survive in the long term.You need to be able to catalog and interpret different kinds of experiences in ways that inform your future decisions. So I subscribe to that very evolutionary understanding of meaning.But—God—we live in an amazing world now, one with so many more layers than just basic survival. We’ve built this wild cognitive architecture that lets us create all kinds of atmospheres and environments.Meaning, to me, is how that architecture gets applied across this huge tapestry of coexistence we’ve created with one another. And the frontiers of that are still expanding—we haven’t explored all of them. So there’s always more to discover and understand about what things mean from someone else’s perspective.Yeah, that’s beautiful. It reminds me of the idea of evolutionary value—of meaning or significance. It makes me think of Stephen Asma, who wrote The Evolution of Imagination. He was one of the first people I interviewed because I found his work so inspiring. He touches on some of the same ideas as Ursula Le Guin—challenging the model of the purely rational, self-interested actor. He proposes a whole new way of thinking about imagination. He calls it mythopoetic cognition.It’s a very academic but also deeply human case for meaning that’s mythic—not constrained by this obsession with being hyper-rational. We seem to have this cultural prejudice against imagination, emotion, and what’s often dismissed as unreason.And yet, as you said with the neuroscience, that’s who we are. Yeah—Lakoff calls it imaginative reason. He talks about how we split these things apart, but in truth, we move through the world shaped by both. So honoring imagination—and all the heroic, symbolic, or emotional stuff that comes with it—that’s necessary.Yeah, and now that you’re bringing this back, you’re reminding me of one of my favorite ethnographers, Jack Katz, who’s at UCLA—I think he’s emeritus now.He wrote this incredible book called How Emotions Work. The first chapter is called Pissed Off in L.A. Each chapter focuses on a different emotion, and that one is about anger.He had student ethnographers spending time with people in traffic in L.A., trying to understand the process. His whole theory of emotion has this three-part structure, and you could easily apply it to meaning too.He focuses on the fine-grained, interactional aspects of experience—like the shaking of the fist, the way a car moves in traffic, all of it. He’s showing that these physical, social cues are part of the emotional process.Here’s your lightly edited transcript section, cleaned up for clarity and flow while preserving the original tone and meaning:And then it’s related to your own personal project. That person in the car—they’re literally going somewhere. And they understand themselves as moving within a story: this is where I’m going, this is what I’m doing.I was just in L.A. doing a research project and spoke with someone who’s a yogi. She teaches yoga—now mostly online—but she used to teach in person at studios all around L.A.It was so funny—she told this story about how she would teach a calm, grounding class, get everyone into a peaceful headspace... and then have to jump in her car and drive through L.A. traffic to the next studio. And then she’d have to reset and reenter that same peaceful, mindful headspace.So you think about that story—literally “where I’m going” becomes the container she uses to make sense of the particulars of her experience. And then there’s the community level of that story, too. She also knows what it means to be in L.A. traffic—and there’s a shared, communal narrative about that.That narrative might also connect to something bigger—a broader cultural story about life in the U.S. right now.So there are these different levels of storytelling that shape her meaning-making. And in How Emotions Work, Katz explains emotion as the process of metamorphosis—it unfolds in relation to these three layers of meaning.How about your own work—how have you grown or changed as a researcher? How do you carry these theories with you into your work, and what have you learned about how you learn?I mean, yeah—I’ve been doing research for a long time now, probably 13 years. I started out doing drug court evaluation research. I don’t know if you know about drug courts—they’re for people who’ve been convicted of a crime, but where substance use was seen as the core issue.So instead of a standard sentence, the judge assigns them to a different kind of program. I would find people on probation or parole, and I did interviews with folks in prisons.Then I shifted into the social interaction work, which focused more on children. And now I’m doing this research where I hang out with people for a week—for brand projects.So I’ve had really different research experiences. And I think a lot of that is about growth. I don’t think it’s all about the knowledge—the frameworks or theories, even though I love that stuff.For me, those ideas help articulate things I already feel are important. But the deeper learning is about something else. We have an intern right now at Further and Further who’s about to do some interviews, and I was giving him advice.I told him: the first thing you have to do is really know yourself. Because when you’re talking to someone, you have to come across as yourself.And you’re going to adjust—you’re going to show different versions of yourself depending on the context. Because you’re a distributed self. You’ll show up a little differently to different people, in different situations.So to really have this understanding of how you come across, right? We started out talking about how I’m Californian, kind of ethnically ambiguous, I talk too much, my name is Adam Hockington, I’m a conversation analyst—which is funny in itself. I’m very emotional, I’m a Cancer.There are all these different aspects of who I am. And I think now, growing as a researcher hasn’t meant going deeper and deeper into theory.I’m giving myself more space to talk about theory with you, just because this seems to be a podcast about research methodology, ideas, and all that. But in practice, the growth has been more about thinking carefully about how I come across to people—and how that brings out different kinds of things in them.In anthropology—my background is in social anthropology, even though it's technically within sociology—there was this move to acknowledge your own social position.It was this reflexive moment. For a while, you’d see it in all the articles:“I’m a straight white male, working in an indigenous community,” and so on. They’d list these identity categories.But I think the real point of that wasn’t just to check boxes—it was to ask:How does who I am, and the way I show up, influence what I can see or not see in a particular experience or social atmosphere?So when I think about how I’ve grown as a researcher, it really comes down to that: Getting sharper and more honest about who I am. What advantages does that give me in this situation? What disadvantages?Being honest about the mix of those things—so that with any person I’m interacting with, I have the best chance of learning the most about them on their terms. And understanding how my presence might be shaping those terms—so I can at least try to control for it.That’s wonderful. Well, listen—we’ve very quickly filled our time. I just want to thank you so much. This has been a blast. I really appreciate you accepting the invitation.Yeah—it’s been wonderful to talk to you. Get full access to THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING at thatbusinessofmeaning.substack.com/subscribe

Tara Isabella Burton is an American novelist, essayist, and theologian whose work explores religion, enchantment, and self-creation. Her books include the nonfiction works Strange Rites: New Religions for a Godless World, Self-Made: Creating Our Identities from Da Vinci to the Kardashians, and a forthcoming study of magic and modernity. She has a great substack - The Lost Word.So I start all these conversations with the same question, which I borrowed from a friend of mine. She helps people tell their story. It's a big, beautiful question—which is why I use it. But because it's big and beautiful, I overexplain it the way that I'm doing right now. So before I ask it, I want you to know that you're in total control, and you can answer or not answer in any way that you want to.I'm very excited. Only a little afraid.The question is: where do you come from?Ah, I will choose to answer that question—a sort of semi-combination of ideologically and personally. I am a 19th-century Anglo-Catholic Christian existentialist who loves T.S. Eliot too much, ex-theater kid, New Yorker, halachically Jewish—but a convert, as are so many. And I think how I approach both the theology side of my work and the fiction side of my work, and increasingly with The Lost Word and other projects, is an attempt to find an intersection or a kind of dialogue that bridges both, or doesn’t segment both.I will say that in the middle of that answer, "theater kid" popped out. That’s the real answer. Can you tell me a story about being a theater kid in New York City?Absolutely. So when I was 13 years old, I transferred into a school—or tested into a school—called Hunter, Hunter College High School, which is this test-only, weird, gifted-kid public school, but not part of the public school system. As you might imagine from a bunch of smart, weird New Yorkers, it was a kind of revelation for me coming in.And I was 13 years old the first year, and I immediately found my people—or who I hoped would be my people—in the Shakespeare Club. There was a production of Much Ado About Nothing, and I was the messenger. I was very excited to be cast, so being the messenger was a big deal. Of course, I absolutely idolized everybody else in the production.People kept dropping out, or getting injured, or getting sick, as tends to be the case in high school productions. So I kept sort of ascending through the ranks. By the time we performed, I ended up playing Borachio, the villain’s right-hand man.And I just remember the cast party that we had, which was actually in my— I lived near to the school, so it was in my house. The sense of all these people who were so much cooler than I was, and so much more interesting. And because they were sort of smart and weird teenagers, they were incredibly well-read, but none of us knew how to make sense of what we read except by applying it specifically to our lives.I think there was someone reading Frank O’Hara at the table, and someone told me that I was Jack Kerouac. Someone else told me that I was Isabel Archer. I think that’s what we were all reading at the time.And I think it was like two in the morning, and it was the first time I ever drank alcohol. And I thought: this is what I want. This kind of conversation, this obsession with beauty, this feeling of what I did not at the time think of as collective effervescence. But we have created this beautiful thing. We have created this production, and we are celebrating it in this way—where the ideas, and the people, and obviously all of the implicit crushes that were going on, were just beneath the surface.And somehow—I don’t know how this happened—we ended up in the East Village at 5 in the morning. I think we gave my poor mother a heart attack. She’d gone to bed. We all just snuck out. Veselka was 24 hours back then. I think it is now. Yeah.And I basically decided I was just going to chase that forever. And that’s basically what I’ve been doing ever since.Oh wow. That’s so beautiful. There’s a question I ask, which is always like: do you remember what you wanted to be when you grew up? And I feel like you just gave that answer. But how would you respond to that?I wanted to be a writer, actually. On my desk, which is in my office—to my left—there is a little note. I think I wrote “I will be a writer when I grow up” when I was 10, on some stationery. I framed it, and I just keep it on my desk because I’m very sentimental.I think I actually found it among my grandmother’s things after she died. And yeah, I always knew I wanted to be a writer. I always knew I was weirdly obsessed with the God stuff for a relatively secularly raised child.I think I once joked to a friend that I was like a horse girl for God. That was my thing—saints, theology, go to the library. I was like, I have to figure out what religion to be. I’ll learn about all of them. There was a time I really liked the Jains because they liked animals, and I liked animals. My theological sense was not super developed at that time.But yeah, it’s basically been like—I read Oscar Wilde when I was 13. I was interested in decadence and dandyism and theology. I did my doctoral dissertation on decadence and dandyism and theology. I wrote a book on self-creation involving decadence and dandyism and theology.And I’m now working on a book on magic, which deals heavily with 19th-century French occultists and decadence and dandyism and theology. So really, I think what we’re learning from this conversation is that I should be more open to new interests than I am.I don’t know. That’s maybe not the conclusion I might have drawn. I’m curious—at 10 years old, what was a writer to you? What did you think of?I very much thought of myself as a fiction writer first—as a novelist first. I still do, even as so much of my work is not just that. But I got lost in novels. And I thought—and I no longer think this necessarily—that they had the key to real life, where they felt realer than real life. I think that’s a very common way for a sort of smart, awkward kid to be. I think now the relationship is less obvious.I think if you're not engaged in your real life, you're doing something wrong. But there is something about the intensity of encountering a text. And I think, when I was younger, that meant something beautiful—something that made you aware of an enchanted register in which you could experience the world in a different way.I still haven't worked out how that all led me to Christianity. And I think something I still think about—and don't really have a satisfactory answer for—as a novelist, or as someone who thinks about novels, is: what happens after the aesthetic stage? What happens after you fall in love with books because they make you realize something, and then you have a sense of reality, or a sense of this grander story and an enchanted world? What role does reading novels serve then? And I think that's what I'm wrestling with now.I'm reading The Way We Live Now by Trollope, which I haven't read since I was sixteen or seventeen. It's interesting to read with an eye toward: I know I love this book, but why do I love it? So, you know, in a week or two, I'll have an answer. But by then the podcast will be over.So catch us up—tell me, where are you now, and how do you talk about what you do?I usually start by saying I wear many hats, which—whether or not I'm actually wearing a hat—is great. It's great that I am a novelist. I usually call myself a theologian-slash-culture critic-slash-historian. The nonfiction work doesn't have as easy a title as novelist.But basically, I think about art, God, language, magic, eros, and enchantment for a living.I'm working on my fourth novel now. I'm working on an intellectual history of modernity and magic—that’s the one with the deadline, so that’s the one I should really finish first. I'm a lecturer at the Catholic University of America. As of a couple weeks ago, I just started work on a Templeton grant to research the relationship between beauty and spiritual transcendence, particularly among the spiritual-but-not-religious.I'll be working on a book on beauty and transcendence as a result of that. I teach at Catholic—I teach creative writing. Last term, I taught basically theological aesthetics for creative writers: what is the purpose of fiction? Now go write some.And I just launched a new Substack, The Lost Word, to try and work out some of these questions in public with my friends. I think that basically everything I do is, in some way, connected to trying to work out the same set of questions that have obsessed me since I was very small. Hopefully, it will also make me a better writer of fiction to think about these questions.Although often, it feels like thinking about these questions makes me over-intellectualize things—makes it harder to write fiction. So we'll see.How clear are these questions to you? Do you have them with you all the time? Or—what are they?How clear are the answers, or how clear are the questions?How clear? I'm just curious—the way you referenced them, they felt very concrete.I mean, I don't have them written down. But basically, the sort of vague sense I have is: what do we do with human creativity vis-à-vis God's creativity? Because I've spent too much time going down the esoteric rabbit hole: what do we do with the noetic realm? Or what is the reality of that realm vis-à-vis the material realm?Are we doing magic when we write fiction? Are we hijacking people's imaginations? Am I accidentally committing an act of sorcery every time I write a novel? If not, why not? Jesus is the incarnate Word—does that, in some way, stabilize our sense of language?I'm really influenced by George Steiner, who writes about this in Real Presences, from a slightly different perspective, of course. But this idea—that there is a God, that the concept of God guarantees a kind of fundamental relationship between word and meaning.And actually, Charles Taylor's recent Cosmic Connections has also really shaped my thinking on this—this idea that perhaps these connections aren't just the relationship of language to meaning, but also that language can be understood non-verbally, or as correspondences between things that aren't just about the spoken word in a particular language.So I'd say I don't have a list of questions written down. But I wrote about this in my first Substack piece—I really like Confessions, the way Augustine opens it...And one of the things that he does is—it feels like he’s taking an idea as far as it can go. He’s like, well, if this and this… but if this is true, then is that also true? And we see him think—it’s, you know, I don’t have it to hand—but it’s something like, well, if I’m making space for you in my soul, then does that mean you’re not there already? And if you’re really big, then do you feel everything?It feels like a lot of these questions I’m working through in a way where it’s not so much that I have answers, but I go in one direction and go, okay, there’s a problem there. How is Christ the incarnate word? And what does that mean for language? And also, is spoken language, in some way, creating reality or not?It’s really just in my head all the time—which is, you know, sometimes really fun and rewarding. And sometimes it makes me less fun at parties.When would you say you realized that you could make a living doing this?Oh gosh—can I make a living doing this?My career is kind of a big accident. I was living in Tbilisi in college part-time because my mother, who was in international development, had a job at the now-defunct USAID. I was doing a doctoral program at Oxford on dandyism and self-creation in the theology department. I was funded, so I had this three-year window where I actually had what seemed to me like a huge income—for a grad student.And I thought, well, if I want to be a freelance writer, and I want to be a writer, this is a good time to pitch and get started, and do things where one does not often have a decent income. And I kind of totally randomly won a writing contest—a travel writing contest run by The Spectator. It was called the Shiva Naipaul Memorial Prize, for a piece about Tbilisi.And suddenly, I had this thing people would pay me to do, which was be a travel writer. And I started there because that’s what people wanted. Georgia was, at the time, a cool place—not a lot of people had been—so there was a lot of demand for on-the-ground reporting about Tbilisi bars or what have you.And I was able to—once editors listened to me a little—start doing some Caucasus religion stories. I think I wrote for Al Jazeera on the Sufi mystics in the Pankisi Gorge, which is a sort of ethnically Chechen region within Georgia. And suddenly… suddenly I was writing.I ended up selling my first novel in my last year of grad school. And about a month later, I got a job as the religion reporter at Vox.com. That’s V Vox, not F Fox—I always have to clarify that on podcasts.I moved back to New York with my very, very new degree in hand and left academia, and became a beat journalist at a very interesting time. It was 2017–2018, early in the Trump administration—lots of stories about white evangelicals and Trump, and what was then known as the alt-right. But also, resistance witches and the witches hexing Trump.It was a very Ruth Bader Ginsburg votive-candle sort of era.Because Vox catered to what one might uncharitably refer to as the coastal liberal elite, the stories they were interested in—and this was online journalism, so click-driven—shaped my coverage. I was encouraged to do more stories about astrology and witches hexing Trump.Somewhere in there, as is so often the case, an article I’d written for Aeon about cults led to a request to submit a book proposal for an academic book about cults, which somehow turned into a book proposal for a general publisher instead—because they paid more money. That became Strange Rites—a book that was not at all about cults.Because I had this Strange Rites project going on while I was at Vox, it became much less about cults as a phenomenon, and more about religious sensibilities among the spiritual-but-not-religious. So it became this sort of complete accident of a career—I started out as a travel writer in Tbilisi and ended up writing Strange Rites based on my work at Vox.It’s been kind of unconventional. About 18 months in, I left Vox to work full-time on book projects. I’ve been writing books ever since and have not been gainfully, full-time employed until two weeks ago.And I now, once again, have a 401(k). It’s exciting.You got a job.Oh yeah. I’m full-time. I’m now a lecturer at Catholic University of America, as a result of the Templeton grant. So I am now no longer a freelancer.What do you love about the work? Where’s the joy in it for you?Oh man—I just get to think about the coolest things all the time. And I get to talk to people about them.I love writing fiction, but it is lonely. It is lonely, and it makes me miserable. And so much of the fiction I write—I mean, I would say this about any writer—is bad. Your drafts are bad until they get good. Even if you’re the best writer in the world, probably most of what you write is bad.Unless I’m in a very particular mental place—I have a particular setting, which usually involves not having internet for several months and being in total isolation—I can do that, and it’s great. Otherwise, it’s lonely.What I found, kind of unexpectedly, about the nonfiction writing world is that it's less lonely. I can have conversations like this one with you on a podcast. There are Subs. Having been off social media for ages, I'm kind of bullish on Substack. It's fun. I'm making friends.And I think there is—it feels like a cast party. I love not only being able to think about the stuff, write about the stuff, but to be able to do it in conversation with other people. I think that balance of being able to go away—I was on my roof this morning, where there is no internet, reading a book and reviewing it, with no contact with the outside world—and then coming down and talking to you feels like a really good balance.Yeah. Well, again, I’m so appreciative of you being here. My first encounter with you, I guess, was Strange Rites, which felt like this beautiful book, talking about things in a way that you don’t always see. I felt like I hadn’t seen something like it in a while. What was it like writing that? How did it come to be?Yeah, it's a bit of a surprise. I had this book deal to write a book about cults. I had this job at Vox. The book was very overdue, because a full-time job does not leave a lot of time to write a book. So I finally left Vox. I said, I’ve got to get serious. And suddenly, the book came together.I think the writing of it was relatively quick, because so much of the research ended up being what I'd been doing at Vox for the previous 18 months. Whether it was contacts I'd made in the rationalist community, among the witches, or in Harry Potter fandom—suddenly, the book came together.And of all the books I’ve written, it’s the one I re-encounter the most. If someone’s reaching out to me to give a talk or a lecture, it’s probably because of Strange Rites. I think it’s on a lot of college curriculums, because it is—hopefully—very accessible. It was not written as an academic book.But at the same time, I’m enough of an ex-academic to try to be as academic as I can be while still being readable. And I really loved writing it. I think my next two nonfiction books—The Self-Made, which is out now, and the one I’m working on now, on magic—are a little more academic. Or at least a little more historical in scope.There’s something kind of fun about being able to, as I did in Strange Rites, include historical context. There are chapters on New Thought and spiritualism. But being able to just do cultural analysis was rewarding. It’s something I’m hoping to get back to a little more in this magic book.What did you take away from Strange Rites? Where do you end up? That was five or six years ago now?Yeah, it came out in 2020. I wrote it in 2019.How would you describe where we are now, compared to 2020?I still joke someone should pay me to write Too Strange Rites. Occasionally I think about doing a Tumblr—just picking out “Strange Rites–coded” things I see in the world.Not to be like “I was right,” but I do think the things I saw in 2020 are so much more extreme now, post-pandemic—particularly in wellness culture. Although a certain kind of wellness culture feels like we’ve hit peak saturation. I don’t think SoulCycle has the cultural capital it once did.In 2020, you still had these different camps. You had SoulCycle wellness. You had what I called the atavistic right—Jordan Peterson was more of an edge case then, although he’s gotten more extreme. There were the techno-utopians in the tech world. There were the resistance witches.And what it seems to me now is that we’ve seen a lot more bleed among those tribes. For whatever reason, my sense is that the left-coded—what was then called social justice warriors, and later called “woke”—that sacralized version of that has lost its mimetic power, as well as its political power.Even in the run-up to the 2024 election, you didn’t see that many Kamala Harris votive candles. I’m sure there were witches for Kamala, but it didn’t have the same kind of trendy, popular appeal as the anti-Trump witches did. Maybe it was overexposure, or it had already become a marketing slogan and felt disingenuous. I’m not entirely sure.Whereas it feels like that kind of inchoate enchantment—the tech right, the atavistic right, actually traditionalist Christian—Make America Healthy Again—coalition is really coalescing into a coalition.That is absolutely not my natural political home at all. But I do find it very, very interesting. That slightly more—reluctantly put—right-coded weird stuff, or just the anti-establishment weird stuff, or maybe the anti–quote unquote–rational…“Anti-woke” seems too simplistic, and “anti-rational” isn’t quite right either. But I think there’s a privileging of a certain idea of vibes that seems to be linked in some way with sex and sexuality. Particularly traditional, gender-essentialist sex roles, and the erotic creative—the celebration of erotic creative power, or the power of the ingenious technical engineer—as opposed to what they would code as…And this is really interesting because I think it's analogous to a lot of 19th-century reactionary language. This idea that democracy made everyone the same, and democracy got rid of natural hierarchies, and liberalism and equality just made us—there's a fundamental human power not being tapped because we’ve stamped it out.That’s very much the language Nietzsche uses about ressentiment. It’s the language that a lot of 19th-century dandies used about the death of aristocracy. And it is a language that's used, I think, here too—against what they call “the woke.” And for whatever reason—and I'm happy to tease it out, but I don't have a clear diagnosis—the reaction against what they see as a kind of flattening is strong enough to make very, very strange bedfellows out of tech titans and traditionalist Catholics.I'm thinking of relationships between, I don’t know, Jordan Peterson and Bishop Robert Barron, who has Jordan Peterson on his podcast. Or the relationship between Peter Thiel and large sections of the Catholic intellectual universe. I haven’t read—well, I always read just enough to be dangerous—but I feel like I’ve read... is it Reno, and his idea of the strong gods?Yeah. Strong Gods: The Return of the Strong Gods, Rusty Reno.I’m very curious because, as someone who likes things like beauty and goodness and truth—I think those are generally good things—I think perhaps returning to a model of belief in objective... not to say objective beauty, that’s a little too far, but that there are some transcendent goods that human action reaches, that not everything is relative—I’m probably broadly in agreement with that.And yet—big caveat—I don’t really see, as a practicing Christian, how you can fund it. There’s so much that is fundamentally anti-hierarchical about Christianity. It was carnivalesque. Your God died. Your king came in on a donkey. There’s a real moral, ethical, theological, cosmic demand that you do not think of, I don’t know, beautiful statue-like Greek bodies as the ideal of what beauty is.At the same time, yes, beauty seems to be something—or the ability to find the beautiful does seem to lead people to a sense of transcendence. But there does seem to be a return to a generalized desire for a kind of hierarchical, authoritarian, truth—ostensibly truth-based—model of existence, rather than a pure personal, relativistic, “all truths are equal.”And yet—and I make this case much more in the magic book—I think the way it has manifested itself is actually quite nihilistic and quite anti-truth. It ends up being about what you can convince people of, or what attention—as a kind of currency—you can wield, or an energy you can harness.But it does seem to me to be profoundly anti-Christian.We’ve got a little bit of time left—I want to hear more about the book you’re working on: the magic one.Oh yes. So it doesn’t have a title yet. I think the working title is Old Gods, although I like The Lost Word now that I’m doing the Substack on it. I don’t know what my editor will think at the end of it.But basically, it’s an intellectual history of modernity and magic.And by magic, I mean specifically the learned—what you might call the learned magic tradition. Other sources call it the Western esoteric tradition. So: Hermetic magic, Solomonic magic, Kabbalah, leading into the Rosicrucians, the Theosophists a little bit, all the way through Crowley, through the transhumanists of the 20th century.I’m trying to draw a historical lineage of the belief in human self-transcendence and self-divinization through a gnosis that is both internal and personal, but also about speaking the language of the cosmos—knowing how things fit together, how things work, what the correspondences are.The sort of paradigmatic figures—excuse me a second, there’s a fly—the paradigmatic figures here are the technologist, the artist, and the user of words. I’m interested in how, pretty consistently from the Renaissance to the present day, historical and political movements are intertwined with the history of Freemasonry or Rosicrucianism.I'm thinking about the development of the Royal Society in London in the 17th and 18th centuries. I'm thinking about the rise of nationalism in Europe, and its association with Freemasonry—from Washington to Garibaldi, both arguably Masons—to the development of the internet specifically.And there is a vague connection I’m trying to identify—more substantive, documented connections—between what you might consider the broad “esoteric idea” umbrella and these ideas about the networked noetic realm on which the contemporary internet is built.The place I want to end up—where I think I’m ending up, hopefully—is that the internet is a space where the laws of magic are real. On the internet, magic exists. You can shape reality with your mind. You can get inside other people’s heads and transform their attention, transform their desires—their desires, their energies, their erotic capacities get channeled in a particular direction. And they vote in certain ways, and they spend money in certain ways, and suddenly material reality does shift.This is something—this is Ioan Couliano here, not me—but something he identified. And this was long before the internet. He identified Giordano Bruno, the 16th-century magician, as the inventor of mass media, precisely because of Bruno’s work on the magic of binding—of binding and chaining people.Giordano Bruno’s writings on magic tend to be about—not purely psychological, that would reduce it too much—but about getting inside that part of people. Because we’re working with Renaissance views of the human body and soul, it’s often not clear or consistent what that intermediary thing is. It’s not the immortal soul. It’s not the physical body.It’s spirit. It’s fantasy. It's phantasy—the place where sense impressions get turned into ideas. And again, not everyone has the same model of what that is, but that intermediary realm seems to be the realm where magic operates.And now we get to dial into or connect with that realm all the time.Well, that’s—I mean, that’s just thrilling. And I feel like so much of what you’re sharing speaks to the excitement of... I don’t know that you run into a lot of cultural critics who are exploring things through a mystical or theological lens. I appreciate that so much.It reminds me of what you were just talking about—I think it’s Kreipel? Jeffrey Kripal—when he points out, and I mention this a lot, that telepathy—reading—is a form of telepathy, right? It’s a kind of magic. I don’t know how you feel about that, but the idea of telepathy as feeling from afar, and the idea that you can use words to elicit an emotional reaction from someone you've never met—that’s itself kind of magical. How does that correspond with your own explorations?I buy it. I agree with it. It freaks me out when I think about it too much. Christians aren’t supposed to do magic.But I think—and there’s that Arthur C. Clarke quote, the famous one—that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. It seems that’s the case for language as the ultimate technology.But then I think it challenges us to think: if we think of language as a technology—and I think especially in the era of AI, so to speak—we have to think about what technology actually is, and what that is vis-à-vis who we are as human beings. We are, and always have been—and I say this as someone with a flip phone—a technological species. Part of being human is to be technological, to be linguistic in some way.And that doesn’t even necessarily need to mean—or exclusively mean—verbal language.I’m reviewing a book for The Wall Street Journal now. It’s a reissue of Roger Shattuck’s The Forbidden Experiment, about this wild boy found in early 19th-century France, and trying to teach him language. It’s something that’s been on my mind.I guess the question is: is there a language of the universe? Is there a fundamental set of correspondences or meanings already there? And is our language an imitation of that, an appropriation of that, a co-creation of that? What is the relationship between our human language—and any other technological ways we engage with the world—and the purely natural, purely given world?And I think that’s a question about who we are.One way of putting it is that magic deals with the theological character of human creativity—or the cosmic... I’ve referred to it as a sacralization of human imagination. And depending on what your wider theological commitments are, that could be a good thing, a bad thing, a dangerous thing.What interests me as a Christian is that—we don’t want you to do divination. We don’t want you to do magic. Like, don’t summon demons. Some of that stuff is pretty clear cut.But we do have: God becomes man so that man might become God. We do have traditions of theosis, of divinization. We do have a Word that is made flesh. And that’s important. There is a promise that death will be defeated—albeit in a resurrection way, not in a never-dying way.And I think it’s important to think about—and I get into this in the book too—that whatever orthodox Christianity is now (lowercase “o” orthodox, not like Eastern Orthodox), it comes out of the same discursive, intellectual miasma as a lot of the so-called magical tradition—which is to say, late antique Alexandria.That’s where the Gnostics are working stuff out. That’s where—depending on how you historicize it—the Hermetic tradition is working itself out. Where Neoplatonists, who are kind of... we haven’t talked about them yet, but they’re very important in the story, are working themselves out.And where early Christianity and all these different groups of people are figuring out the same question. One way of putting it is: What is the relationship between Jewish history and classical Greek conceptions of God—God as being something beyond space and time—versus a conception of God acting in history?There’s the question of what parts of humanity are immortal, and what parts are not. And while, you know, I think we’re right—I think the whole “Jesus dying and coming back” thing is pretty important here—I do think it makes sense that all these different groups of people are coming up with different answers to the same questions, informed by each other.Even Augustine—I want to say this carefully—he started out, I believe, as a Neoplatonist. And you have a lot of back-and-forth: Christian Gnostics, Gnostic Christians. Because, you know, they’re all hanging out in the same city, in Alexandria.So I think one way I like to frame the question, historically, is: it’s not magic vs. Christianity, or esotericism vs. Christianity—so much as this is a kind of stepchild or stepbrother. These are cousins—working with enough similarities that, when the magical worldview becomes more ascendant, you see it. And I think right now, I’d even venture to say it’s a kind of implicit civil religion in America in 2025. Like, people who don’t think about Solomonic magic—or Christianity, for that matter—are probably thinking about vibes, and manifesting, and creating your own reality.You’re calling that the implicit civil religion?Yes. I’ll defend that if I have to.We’ve got two minutes left. I quite like it. But I’m curious—maybe this is a “so what” question—but what are we talking about when we talk about meaning? I feel like that’s at the center of all your work. And maybe it’s an obtuse, annoying question, but I’d love to hear how you approach it.We talk about being in a meaning crisis, right? We talk about sense-making—and I feel like all of these things kind of overlap. How would you respond to that idea? What are we talking about when we talk about meaning?I think the way I’d put it—because I’ve been thinking a lot about language at the moment—is: is there (and I think this is from George Steiner’s Real Presences)... is there anything to what we say? Is there a relationship that is more than conventional or pragmatic between the signs of the world and that which they signify?And I don’t mean something simple like: I say “dog” in English and it means “dog,” but in French it’s chien—that’s just convention. I don’t think it can be as simple as saying there’s one true language in which all things make sense.Although the quest for the Adamic language was absolutely a part of the magical tradition—whether it was Hebrew or Enochian—the idea that if you just got the language right, you’d get to the heart of things.But I think maybe the way I’d put it is: the cosmos has a language, and human language is in dialogue with it. I’m looking at some trees out my window. Is a tree just a tree? Does it say anything? How is it related to wood? To stories about the changing seasons? To the purpose of trees? To books and paper? There’s something more than just humans telling convenient stories to feel better about death when we look at them.I don’t know what that language is—and I don’t think it’s just the Hermetic idea of correspondences, like: this tree is associated with this planet, so use this tree on a Thursday for this kind of magic. I see why that’s appealing. But the part of me that’s Christian and doesn’t want to do magic feels like something is missing there.Although, also, the allegorical Christian tradition does say things like: rosemary is Mary’s drying herb; we’ve got the Feast of the Assumption this week; we associate this plant with this part of the theological story.So I think there are different ways to approach it. And obviously, I don’t think you have to be a Christian to think the universe has a language.But this idea—a structure between things and other things, where the relationship is more than merely conventional—to me, that’s the heart of meaning. And that’s why it grounds human language: because human language is a response to—what I would call—God’s language. Though perhaps one could find a more secular-friendly term for it.And one final question: what do you make of the idea that we’re in a meaning crisis?I believe we are. I absolutely believe we are. Maybe less than we were a couple years ago. When I started writing on this topic, it seemed like everyone felt we were in a crisis. Everyone felt a loss of meaning. There was curiosity about religion. There was curiosity about meaning-making—because it seemed like we didn’t have it, or it felt very absent.Whereas now—this could just be because I’m in particular circles—it feels like everyone around me is actively invested in this question. In a way, the sheer act of working through it makes it feel more like a creative crisis than a desiccated one. But again, that could just be because I got so into this topic that I get to talk about it all the time—which is a great way not to feel meaningless.Awesome. Again, thank you so much for accepting my invitation. It’s been a blast. Thank you so much. Get full access to THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING at thatbusinessofmeaning.substack.com/subscribe

Josh McManus is a Partner at M|B|P, an advisory firm that helps communities and organizations grow their economic and social potential. He is known nationally for revitalizing post-industrial cities through place-based development, small-business growth, and organizations that combine social impact with market success. As COO of Rock Ventures, he oversaw the transformation of 14 million square feet of Detroit real estate. Earlier, he co-founded CreateHere in Chattanooga to spark grassroots business growth. His work has been featured in Forbes, Fast Company, and The EconomAll right, Josh, thank you so much for accepting my invitation. I start all these conversations with the same question, which I borrowed from a friend of mine who helps people tell their story. And it's a really big, beautiful question, which is why I borrow it. But because it's so big, I over-explain it the way that I'm doing right now. So before I ask it, I want you to know that you're in total control, and you can answer or not answer any way that you want to. And the question is, where do you come from?I come from—I identify as coming from—a little tiny town called Rock Mart. That is in the Appalachian foothills of North Georgia. It's a place where those people native to that land were quarantined in the northwest part of the state prior to the Trail of Tears. And it's a place that's very reflective of post-industrial change.The town was arranged first around a slate mill, and then later around a cotton processing plant that took cotton and turned it into belts for tires—because before tires were steel-belted, they were cotton-belted.Oh, I did not know that.And so it's a little microcosm of the industry and post-industry across the U.S. And it's a place that is sort of firmly footed in my sort of ethos and outlook on the world.Yeah. Yeah. What does it mean to you to be from the Appalachian foothills, from that town?I think that in the national political narrative, there's always a gross oversimplification of people that are from a very—actually a huge—geographic footprint that's called Appalachia. And what it means for me is that I think that I live firmly rooted in an understanding of what it means to be working class. And everybody that comes from where I came from is, at best, working class.And I went to school with a full strata—but a full strata of working class, right? You're either on the north side or the south side of working class. And I think it really has informed everything that I've done and everything that I continue to do—that sort of grounded perspective that is actually quite egalitarian, somewhat nostalgic to a time when people lived in close proximity to each other no matter what the background was. And I think that sort of instructs how I believe that democracy can, should, would work if deployed correctly.How would you describe the childhood you had there?Yeah, interestingly, I very much identify as being from Rockmart, but I was born in DeKalb General, which would be in what's defined as Atlanta. And I went home to Gwinnett County, which was the fastest-growing county in the nation at the time—just a white flight commuter suburb. And then, in third grade, I was sort of taken out of this fastest-growing county in the nation and put into what I've later described as the slowest-growing county in the nation.Not so much—I mean, it's had some forward progress—but it was a very slow place. But that juxtaposition I think is fascinating relative to what we're experiencing as a world right now: some people are living in the fastest-growing places in the nation, in these coastal mega-regions, and then everybody else is living in what one of my heroes, Samuel Mockbee, called the forgotten places and the forgotten people, and what some folks would call flyover country. And so I'm acutely oriented to that juxtaposition of these different lives that people are living, all defined as American.Do you have a recollection of what young Josh wanted to be when he grew up?Absolutely. Yeah. He wanted to be an architect and go to Georgia Tech.Wow. Where did that come from?I think, well, I had a tremendous Lego collection, which I still have some of, and I play a lot of Lego with my son. And so I think the instinct to build came from that. I also did have these formative moments with this city and the growth that was Atlanta, which has become such a metropolis now and one of the last bastions of upward mobility in the country.And so my dad would always commute to work from wherever we were. And so when we were in North Georgia, he would commute to Atlanta to work. So I was one of the kids who had exposure to the city.And so I think seeing those buildings, playing with Lego, seeing the size and scale of the skyline—and then, pretty early on, someone gave me a book about Frank Lloyd Wright. And I remember recently recalling a couple of reports that I did—you know, when you had to assemble information, cut stuff out, paste it, and all that. One of my reports was definitely on Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater.Wow. As a kid, like elementary as you're talking?Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. One was on Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater and one was on Milton Hershey's Hershey, Pennsylvania.Well, that's a perfect segue now. So at this point, I usually ask: catch us up. Where are you now and what do you do?Yeah. Yeah. I did end up going to Georgia Tech in a circuitous way. I did not become an architect—I'm not a formally trained architect—but I have become sort of an idea architect.You know, it's hard to completely define my career, but problem-solving in post-industrial places is a big piece of it. What I call P3RE, which is public-private partnership real estate, is a big piece of it. And in some ways, I’m trying to solve the complexities of what I saw laid out before me growing up in that Appalachian foothill town.You know, so many folks there were dependent on the mill, which had been a Goodyear mill. There had also previously been one in a little—not even a town, almost a hollow—next to it, called Aragon. But everybody depended on the mills, and if the mills were going, then life was okay.And so I then, bathed in that, got involved in Chattanooga's turnaround beginning in the ’90s. Chapter one of my career was Chattanooga and its regaining of post-industrial population loss—becoming one of the repeatedly named “Best Outside Cities” in the country and “Gig City.” I then took that to chapter two, which was Detroit.And Detroit was—I went in around 2010, and I got recruited to help on transformation from a philanthropic standpoint. And so that chapter runs, you know, from 2010 until now. And I'm just now taking a deep interest in the Deep South, even deeper than where I grew up—so Louisiana, Mississippi, and the Black Belt of Alabama—as sort of my perspective, chapter three of problem solving in post-industrial places. Yeah. Yeah.Can we start at chapter one, and maybe Chattanooga is that story? But for people who don't know how much is in, you know, what you talk about—post-industrial problem solving—you’re so efficient in how you communicate. What does it mean? What are we talking about when we're talking about solving problems in post-industrial cities in America?Yeah. Well, Chattanooga in 1969—which is before I was born—but I have these folks I call my adopted grandparents that were leaders in the change. Chattanooga was described by Walter Cronkite on CBS News as the dirtiest city in America.So, topographically, it’s a saucer of land. So if you were doing heavy industry inside that saucer, the dirty air just kind of sat there. So there were stories of, you know, if you wore a white shirt to work, you had to change it at lunch because the collar had turned brown, that sort of thing.And these are mostly stories you would typically hear about, you know, New England and the Midwest. But if you think about how industry moved in the United States—just south of Chattanooga is Dalton, Georgia, which was at one time the carpet capital of the world. But, you know, textiles start in New England, gravitate down to the Midwest, and then to the South, and then offshore. And almost everything does that.Another suburb of Chattanooga is called South Pittsburgh, and that was based upon the rolled steel industry that did the same thing. You know, some of it started in New England, moves to the Midwest, moves to the South, moves offshore.And so Chattanooga had a lot of the same problems that all the cities that you wince when you hear about in the Midwest had. And even some of the cities that, you know, you wince when you hear about in the Northeast—these are all places that I've either been a part of, guest lectured in, whatever. You’re, you know, your Camden’s, your Newark’s—every state has their sort of post-industrial places that they don’t like talking about a whole lot.So, in Chattanooga, the work was—you’re losing population, which means you’re then losing tax base. So then you’re asking your existing residents—because of the way that you monetize municipalities in most cases—you’re asking your existing residents to pay more to get less, and that becomes a negatively reinforcing cycle.And, you know, sometimes urbanists will call that white flight. More so, it’s typically resource flight. If you have money to get out of a municipality that’s on the downward spiral, you do. And then what that leaves left over is people that don’t have that sort of physical mobility, and typically don’t have economic mobility.So it co-locates and isolates pockets of poverty, which have really negative outcomes when that happens. Yeah. So that happened in Chattanooga.And I had, you know, about a dozen people—some of which I call my adopted grandparents—that sort of banded together in the late ’70s and early ’80s, and they started engaging in civic intervention in a variety of ways. And they got philanthropy involved, they got the municipality involved, they got the people involved.And I’d say one of the most important things they did was they, you know, defined a destination that was different from where they were at that time. So there was something called Chattanooga Venture and Vision 2000, and they decided they wanted to be the best midsize city in the country.And they did that through a public engagement process—something called nominal group theory. And nominal group is something that we’ve all done before, which is more or less mass ideation, and then you get some sort of voting mechanism.And so, like, you know, paper dots at the time is what it was. So people come up with ideas, and then they get some voting capability with these paper dots, and then it’s supposed to show you where the will of the people is.If you do nominal group in a community enough times, people—activists—learn how to game the system. So they ask everybody to put their dots on their thing. So you can’t always use nominal group, but—What’s the methodology there? I mean, I’m sure, is that… yeah, what’s the…The best way to do it? Yeah. It needs to be a little bit more blind in my experience, because you have mimesis set in. So, even if nobody’s gaming the system, the sort of tribal nature of humans is that if something’s got a lot of dots on it, they’re really inclined to consider whether they should put a dot on it or not.I feel like that’s been called the—I think in advertising, there’s this law that they call the Matthew effect or something like that—that big things get bigger. The benefit of big is big, or the bigness is a producer of bigness.Yeah. Well, I’m a—I don’t want to call it a fan—but I’m a student of René Girard’s work, which is now somewhat championed by Luke Burgess. And a lot of the notions with mimesis are that we want what we want because other people want it. Those dots on something are an instruction—a subconscious instruction—that maybe you should want that too. Yeah. Yeah.It’s beautiful. I’ve seen him, I’ve encountered him recently too, in Luke Burgis as well. And what was I going to say? Well, actually, so I’ve interrupted you. Is there more to the thought that you’re in now before I ask the question?So, with Chattanooga, it was about changing the narrative and then doing demonstration projects—a lot of which were this P3RE, public-private partnership real estate. The world’s largest freshwater aquarium is a great example of that: city involvement, county involvement, private philanthropy involvement, land that was purchased from the private sector.And then sitting an entity beside that to do economic development around it as a sort of economic development of last resort. But if you look at it—I think the aquarium was $25 million pounds—I was talking to a friend in Chattanooga yesterday, pound for pound one of the best philanthropic interventions that’s ever happened because of the tax revenues, hotel/motel, jobs creation that has spun off of it over the years.But at the time it was considered a white elephant, a boondoggle. There was a lot of, “Hey, we should just use this money to subsidize the city budget because people are under heavy burden right now. We need police, we need fire, we need school”—all the things that you hear when people don’t understand macro mathematics.And the Chattanooga story—I could spend two days just talking about it—but Chattanooga changed their narrative. Actually, it’s important to say what I learned ultimately from Chattanooga is that you have to change the story. You have to begin to live that new story and narrative.And you have to shift from a culture of scarcity to a culture of abundance, which is very hard to do in post-industrial places because you’ve been living with a pie that gets smaller and smaller every year, handing out smaller slices. And so that notion that there could ever be abundance re-emerge—and that working together could work—violates everybody’s instincts that are involved. And so this has become ultimately the big to-do in every city that I’ve ever worked in: can you begin to rebuild the abundance muscle? Yeah.Where are we? I feel like the Chattanooga goes back a ways, right? And I feel like that was the first...Yeah, it’s a 50-year overnight success.But that work, when was that work? Was that ’90s? Is that what you said?Yeah. So they began in the late ’70s. I came into the work in the late ’90s. I led a wave that was late ’90s to 2010. But the friend that I was on the phone with yesterday—he’s now leading quantum computing efforts that will ultimately result in public-private partnership, real estate, and educational stuff.And so, in some ways, it never ends. But I will say that Chattanooga now has the flywheel of net new taxpayers so that it doesn’t have to be so much on a wing and a prayer and cobbled together by philanthropy and that sort of thing. You now have some municipal revenues. You now have some bullish for-profit actors. You’ve got a more healthy ecosystem of an economy.Yeah. What’s the question I want to ask? I’m just curious about cities in general. So that was going back 20 years ago, and there was a particular narrative, maybe even just about any city or all cities in the United States. Where are we now in sort of the history of cities? Is it the same? Are cities struggling in the same way as Chattanooga was then, or changed since then in terms of how the role that cities play and what’s possible for a post-industrial city in 2025?Yeah. It’s a good question that I’m quite ponderous about. And I would say I was baptized in—all of my knowledge on cities is a bit sort of like folk knowledge. I’m autodidactic. I just read voraciously.And so I haven’t been through a traditional curriculum. But what was going on in the Brookings and the more formal cities places as I’ve come up and come through was this sort of notion of the inevitability of urbanity. Sort of by 2075 or whatever, that most people will live in, quote-unquote, cities. And we were well on that trajectory.And then we ran into COVID and populism at the same time. And I still think the net arc is towards urbanity. My sort of my own reasoned position is that American suburbanism is anomalous, and it was created by the World Wars—but specifically World War II.So, when you come back from World War II, you’ve got these forces in place where you’ve desegregated the military. So it’s now inevitable you’re going to desegregate the population. And that puts all sorts of social forces in play.You’ve then got your Eisenhower interstate going on. You’ve got all these tools—governmental tools—like the GI Bill and a lot of housing intervention, all of which had some good actors in and a lot of very bad actors. And so you saw this sort of race to suburbanization, which then sort of spread people out.The other sort of military reason for that was the introduction of the H-bomb and then the N-bomb. It puts you in a place where you didn’t want to consolidate industrial capacity anymore. Because if you could drop a nuclear bomb on the center of Detroit and take out a large amount of capacity, that wasn’t a good strategy. So then you start putting plants and people in all these sort of different places.But I’ve not traveled anywhere that I find this suburban condition other than the United States. Yeah.I had heard that explanation for the suburbs—that it was like a military defensive strategy, right? Or sort of.Yeah.I had never… I mean, it blows my mind. I mean, I grew up in the burbs, of course. So I was an adult man before I discovered that the neighborhood that I grew in had been sort of inspired by that kind of thinking, that kind of strategy. It’s really outrageous. So where are we now? Yeah. So one of the things—and this is germane to things that I think you’re going to be thinking about—is we are left with this sort of urban form where most of the city limits were set during the time of horse and buggy. And so there’s a real question of a broken business model around municipalities.And so you take Hudson there where you are, right? There’s a lot of people outside of that city limit that depend on that city limit, right? They come in to transact commerce. They come in to actually do their business. And depending on what the sort of monetization scheme is, they very well may not be paying their fair share for the benefit they’re gaining from having that co-location of assets, amenities, infrastructure.So we have a real question before us, and it’s sort of like GDP—are we going to keep it where cities can only survive if you can grow population inside of that original arbitrary borderland? And you see some examples where this has been challenged.So, like in the state of Tennessee, Nashville is the only major municipality that has fully, functionally merged city and county and sort of taken away that dichotomy of, like, I’ll use the city, but I will benefit from tax infusion in the county.I love—I mean, of course this diagnosis is perfect, and I’m learning even about Hudson as you describe it—but what explains the broken business model? You mentioned horse and buggy, but why is the business model broken for a post-industrial city?Yeah. So, by and large, we’ve monetized cities on property tax. And so it’s on a property tax levy inside the city limits, and cities have had an ebb and flow of who’s actually living inside the city limits and what the uses are.And also, some cities have been very challenged by a number of parcels being taken off the roster because of their “charitable use.” And so what happens is you then become constrained in how you can put together resources for your city, and a lot of states have proactively said, “Yeah, that’s your only levy capability.” Like, we maintain most of the taxation capability.And some places are allowed to put additions on to their sales tax and that sort of thing, and to retain it for a specific geographic barrier. But what you have—for me, sort of like as part pragmatist, part philosopher—if you could walk all the way back and say, okay, when these arbitrary borderlines and boundaries were laid out, they were in the time of horse and buggy…So if I lived in the city of Detroit, which is 140 square miles, I’m pretty much doing everything that I do inside that 140 square miles, because it’s not pragmatic for me on the daily to ride my horse 40 miles out into the country and be able to evade participation in taxation.Well, I’m talking to you right now from Maine, but we have a real question here in that my taxing municipality from a property tax standpoint is Bar Harbor, and our taxes are going up precipitously in part because our actual residents have been falling. Well, our year-round residents have been falling.And so you’ve got the same amount of people responsible for building the new school—that’s what we’re really getting taxed on right now. But then we have 5 million people a year visit and benefit from all of our… they actually sort of take over our town, and they don’t bear much of the tax burden at all.Whereas, if you think about it, if you built that business model from scratch tomorrow, you would be like, okay, well, the people who come for a week at a time, two weeks at a time, and take inordinate benefit from it—and actually take it over for the time they’re here—they should probably subsidize the year-round residents, or at least be pari passu with the year-round residents.But that’s not the way the game was designed. And we’re not really good at going back and rethinking taxation structure. We’re not good at first principles of, like, wait, how did this business model originate? We’re not even good at saying that a city is a business model. We just sort of accept it as “it is what it is.” Yeah. Yeah. That’s amazing. What do you—there’s a lot of other stuff to talk about—but what do you love about your work? Like, where’s the joy in it for you?The joy in it for me—interestingly, because it yields in a place-based way. So, like, I’ll go to Detroit this week, and I will experience a place that’s better because of projects that I’ve had the good fortune to help with.But the joy in it for me is the teaching. It’s the sort of professorial work of helping people see these other thought models. And I’ve worked with a lot of young people in doing this work over time.I call most of them my kids. And so seeing them take the ideas and build upon them and make them their own, and sort of live out their ideas of what great cities are and can become—that’s the joy. And spending time with them and watching them grow.Because I think that goes to a sort of core part of my outlook on the world, which is: legacy is not buildings with your name on it—which is sort of what old, resourced people have thought for a long time, right? Name a building, name something at a college after you. But I’m quite convinced, and I have a sort of belief I call the “humanity immune system,” which is like, you know, people—there’s a certain set that are like leukocytes, healing blood cells. And the more people that become living leukocytes and healing blood cells in communities, that’s actually what makes a community great or not.It’s not the building stock. It’s not the special projects that somebody’s done. It’s not the public art. You know, it’s the hearts and minds of the people that occupy and operate these places. And so that’s why the people part is the joyful part to me. Yeah.What is the work that you do? Is there a way you can sort of describe what it takes to turn—I mean, to turn a city around? You talked about the shift in mindset from, you know, the scarcity mindset to an abundance mindset. What do you do with a community or within a community to make that happen? And what’s the—you know, how do you describe what you’re doing?Yeah. Well, I’ve had to turn it into—because I think it’s hard to understand, and, you know, I can’t… I’ve never gotten really good at defining it and describing it. But what I can say—I just use a case study, right, as I’m thinking a lot right now and I’m really hopeful that I get to work in Jackson, Mississippi right now. And so I’ll just use that as the example as to how I think about a place and go to work on it.And Jackson’s really interesting in that it’s like Detroit and Memphis, in that it’s, you know, one of the three most/least diverse cities in the United States. Most diverse in that it’s over 80% African American, least diverse in that it’s highly economically homogeneous. And it’s a blue dot in the middle of a red place. It’s just, you know, fascinating from an urban thinker, urban practitioner standpoint.What I do is I have developed a 20-step process over time. And I use that process repeatedly in the course of my work. And the first thing—and I, you know, I don’t know if it’s apocryphal or not—but there’s an Einstein quote about, you know, “Give me an hour to solve a problem, and I’ll spend, you know, the first 45 minutes defining the problem.”That’s the first step for me too. It’s like, you know, people are like, “Oh, we need…” You know, so I have to be invited to help in the place. If I’m invited to help in a place, then usually people start presenting me symptoms. And the symptom might be like, downtown’s empty.And I’m like, okay, well, let’s look at that. Let’s not assume that that’s the problem. Let’s analyze it and then work to determine what the true underlying problem is relative to that symptom.In the case of downtown abandonment, it oftentimes is about the failing master narrative of the city. And it’s about the fact that there’s been a ton of deferred maintenance. And so that leaves you in this position where, you know, the suburban mall is a much better argument for where to go than the urban core.Hmm. So, and also oftentimes there’s been shifts in business patterns. There’s been changes fundamentally in the type of work being done in the community. Your macro employers may have shifted. So you have to dig into all of that.You use the 20-step process to first analyze, fall in love with the problem, identify assets, physically map the place, also map any sort of points of potential you have. Where do you still have people that are coming and going?And then once you get everything sort of laid out under a problem set, then you can start getting into conversation with folks about, you know, what are your ideas? What are your hopes? What are your dreams? What do we have that we could use to sort of deploy together to create some form of energy?We do a lot of ideation. Try not to go with the first idea that we come up with. Do a lot of business modeling, because even with work that’s non-profit, you still need a business model that works over time, because permanent subsidy doesn’t play out as being a good idea.Packaging and design, and then you go into implementation. And the implementation is built on—we have about, I think we’re at like 265 lessons learned in this work so far. And they’ve all been documented.So, you know, anytime you learn a lesson—like one that comes to mind, I try to make them as short and pithy as possible—but like, “Community engagement, not community enragement” is one of the lessons learned. And the way you design public input forums can lead you to one of those or the other. And so those documented lessons then get used with this 20-step process.The head fake of the whole thing is that you’re actually teaching people how to problem-solve and work together. I mean, of course, it’s great whatever you—actually I’m excited—I’ll be in Jackson in two weeks, and we’re going to talk about gateways and some public cleanups of neighborhoods that have, you know, a lot of refuse and tires and that sort of stuff. Hopefully we’ll figure that out. Hopefully we’ll do a giant cleanup. Hopefully we’ll fill up, you know, dumpsters and dumpsters.But, like, what you’re really trying to do is build that civic engagement, civic problem-solving muscle. And when these cities got really fast-growing and, you know, wealthy—like Detroit, 1953, that was the high point of its population—they had so much tax money that you didn’t have to do neighborhood cleanup, right? You’d just be like, well, let the city take care of that.It’s when you go to decreasing revenue that you have to shift responsibility back to the… and there’s no known and logical way right now to do that. So then you just get to complete fail state, and then you have to start piecing it back together. And I like to piece those things together without just saying that, you know, subsidy taxation is the only way to solve it. Usually some creativity can help along the way too. Yeah. Yeah.What is the—this is where sort of my worlds kind of overlap—where it’s sort of, you know, in my professional life as a researcher, helping companies try to understand the people they serve better, you know, and living in a small town with no planning capacity, no public input, the whole process of how the city tries to learn about itself and improve itself is so broken, or not… sort of non-existent, really. And I’m just wondering, how—you talked about community engagement—what is the sort of the model right now? How does a small city like Hudson think about community engagement around issues of development?Yeah. I think that one of the biggest problems with community input, and how you get to NIMBYism, is that usually community engagement is a referendum on a singular idea. And it’s almost impossible to contextualize it.And so it’s like, well, you know, I want to build this 400-unit mixed-use, you know, and then I have to decide, like, what do I feel about that? And then I have to put all my biases into that. So, like, am I scared of people that are different than me? Or am I worried about my rent going up, or whatever?And I think that when Chattanooga did the “We want to be the best mid-sized city in America” or in Detroit, you know, our mantra was to stop population loss—you could then evaluate that 400-unit mixed-use or mixed-income development against your North Star, which is stopping the population loss. And then all of a sudden it’s like, man, it’s not yes or no.It’s like, how do we add those 400 units? Because we’ve agreed together that there is somewhere bigger and better that we’re going. And I—I think I mentioned this to you on our preview call—but I recently met a guy in Texas who, you know, is hell-bent that they’re going to become the healthiest city in the state of Texas.And you also can imagine that, right? If you decide to do, you know, a referendum on whether you should have park space or not—well, park space is like, “Well, I’m not sure. Are we taking money away from the school or the old folks’ home or whatever?” But it’s like, oh, if we’re going to be the healthiest city in Texas, and we’re generally aligned on that, then outdoor space that’s proximal to people that don’t have outdoor access would probably be something that’s important to us. Yeah.So, I—I—I think that no matter what size you are as a community, you should have a strong idea of where you’re going. And then—I’m very analog—I think you should also have a place where you’re documenting, you know, all of your master planning. Like, where are we going? And then, what do we think that’s going to look like so that we could think about this together?If I decided, you know, Detroit would be a lot healthier with a million people than it is with the 600,000 it has right now—from a taxation standpoint—it’s so easy for you to understand where you are. It’s so hard for you to understand where you might go.And I think that the sort of the kid that wanted to be an architect in me recognizes that—for architects—the rendering is the most important thing, because you’re selling people on a world that doesn’t exist yet. And for nine out of ten people, that’s a very hard thing to imagine.And, you know, letting go of a little bit of tax dollars or suffering through some construction process is harder if I don’t know what that end state is that I’m going to get to, and I believe that that’s going to inherently be better for me.That’s beautiful. I mean, I just loved hearing all of that stuff. That’s certainly been my experience here in Hudson. We’ve kind of come to the end of the hour. There’s so much more I want to ask and talk about, but we’ll have to do that another time. But thank you so much for joining me.Yeah. Yeah. It’s been my absolute pleasure. Get full access to THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING at thatbusinessofmeaning.substack.com/subscribe

Thomas Klaffke is a foresight researcher in Berlin, and the author of Creative Destruction, a weekly newsletter exploring thought-provoking reframings to help build regenerative systems. Previously Head of Research at TrendWatching, he led trend analysis for clients including Adidas, Porsche, and Lufthansa. So I start all my conversations with the same question, which I borrowed from a neighbor of mine. She helps people tell their story. It's a big question—that's why I love it—but because it's big, I tend to over-explain it, like I’m doing right now. Before I ask it, I want you to know that you're in total control. You can answer or not answer however you like. It's impossible to make a mistake.The question is: Where do you come from? And again, you're in total control.Okay, where do I come from? Well, location-wise, I come from the south of Germany, from a small village near the Alps, close to Switzerland and Austria, but still in Germany. Actually, it's near Lake Constance, the biggest lake in Germany.It’s a small village—very residential, with some farms, a small school, and so on. I guess it was a kind of typical German middle-class background. I lived there for the first 18 years of my life. It was a very safe environment. My dad was a policeman, so maybe even safer with a dad like that. Just a very typical German middle-class upbringing, I’d say.But I was always interested in leaving that safety behind—going out into the world, experiencing other cultures, places, and regions. So after high school, I moved to Chicago in the United States to work in a soup kitchen for homeless people. I was there for a year as a full-time volunteer. One big reason was, of course, to learn or improve my English.After that, I went to Bavaria to study. During my studies, I spent a year in Indonesia, lived there, did internships, worked. Then I moved back to Germany, spent some time in Cologne, and eventually settled in Berlin, where I’ve been for about 12 or 13 years now. I also had a short stint in Cape Town, South Africa, for about a year.So, from a very small village in southern Germany, I’ve been fortunate to live and work across different continents and cultures. That’s really shaped how I look at the world and the kinds of tools and methods I use in my work. And now I’m here in Berlin.Do you remember, as a boy, what you wanted to be when you grew up?Well, I remember at first I just wanted to surf. I was really drawn to Hawaii and the idea of studying there. My family and I went to Indonesia once too, and I got to surf there—that experience really stuck with me. I wanted to do something more sporty. That was probably in my early teens. Later on, I got more and more into computers, the internet, and design.So I wanted to become more of a kind of graphic designer, product designer, something like that. And then, however, I went into business and culture studies in the end—that’s what I did as a bachelor’s degree. And then later on, which is what I’m doing right now, I did a master’s in future studies and then kind of moved into this foresight field.Yeah. I’m curious about growing up in the village that you grew up in. It’s not an environment that I have a very clear sense of—I think I have a very romantic and likely naive idea of what that was like. But what was it like growing up in that village? You mentioned a giant lake. How do you describe your childhood there?Yeah, it was a really nice childhood. I’d say in general it was very—well, that’s why I described it as safe. I mean, kind of, you know, everything was working. When I look back and try to remember things, there’s always something nice happening. Lots of kids just playing freely on the streets, or in some fields, or at the nearby farmers’, things like that.I mean, yeah, several friends of mine had either parents or their uncle or so having like a farm, so we kind of hung out there because there was always so much space and so much, you know, stuff you could do. So doing a lot of that. And yeah, in the summer, enjoying the lake. In the winter, enjoying the Alps—snowboarding, skiing, things like that.Yeah. And what was the attraction to surfing? What was that like—discovering surfing?I was always into snowboarding. And I remember that I was a very avid reader of snowboarding magazines back then. And yeah, I think I even once won a little contest they had—a sketching contest or something—and I won a snowboarding jacket and so on. So yeah.And then, of course, those magazines were always talking also about surfing and other kinds of adventure sports. And I always kind of watched the world championships in surfing. And I always liked the lifestyle, I guess.Yeah. And your move to Chicago—how did that come about?Yeah. So back in the day in Germany, we still had this thing where, as a boy, you had to go to the military after high school. Or as an alternative, you could do some kind of social service. And I didn’t want to go to the military, so I tried to do a social service thing.And then I found out that you could also do it abroad, and that there were certain organizations where you could still get kind of the accreditation or the certificate for doing that. And I found, yeah, this organization—it was kind of a Franciscan organization in Chicago. They had one of the biggest soup kitchens there for the homeless, and one of the biggest shelters as well.And yeah, I applied there, and they took me. I was there with around eight or nine other Germans who did the same, and also a couple of Americans who were working there too.What was that experience like?It was crazy. It was really kind of the big—you know, up until that stage, I think I was very much in my own little, you know, village bubble or so. And then moving there was really—yeah, it completely changed me. It had a big impact on me, because my English back then—I mean, it's gotten worse now actually—but back then, it was really bad, and I struggled a lot in the beginning.And yeah, just dealing with lots of homeless people and people that were also on drugs and stuff, right from the beginning basically, was a little bit tricky. But it was also really—I mean, looking back, it was one of the best years I've had so far in my life, I would say. Because, you know, I was living together with all of these other volunteers, these other Germans, but also Americans. We had our own little kind of apartment above the soup kitchen.And it was such a nice and fulfilling kind of work as well. I mean, sometimes it was quite stressful, and there were some—you know, we had to call the police a lot and that kind of thing—but in general, it was just very fulfilling.And it was also, I mean, for us, kind of experiencing this new world of the USA and America and this big city. For most of us, especially the Germans, it was the biggest city we’d ever been to. And on top of that, really doing work that felt very rewarding, because it had this immediate impact—immediate feedback. Lots of people would come to you each evening and thank you for the meal you gave them, and those kinds of things. So yeah, it was a really, really nice time.Yeah. So catch us up—tell us where you are now and what you're doing for work, and what you're focused on mostly these days.Yes. So right now, as I said, I’m based in Berlin. I’ve been here quite a long time. I moved here for my master’s degree in future studies and then stayed—working at agencies or consultancies in the marketing, innovation, and foresight fields.And since around two years ago, I’ve been working freelance or doing my own thing. In particular, I have a Substack called Creative Destruction, where I share what I call “framings” and “reframings.”Basically, it all started with me just wanting some kind of vehicle or space where I could share ideas or interesting finds—articles, concepts, things I come across while doing research. And it then became something that I now call framings or reframings, as I’ve tried to add a little more structure to it.In essence, what I’m trying to share with people are interesting concepts that help them understand the chaotic world we’re living in—and also ways of building better systems. And “better,” for me, means more regenerative or sustainable systems, but also just better-designed and more beautiful things.So yeah, that’s what I’m mainly doing right now. The newsletter is something I publish every week. And on top of that, I’m also doing freelance work.And how did you—well, I love the Substack. I’ve been following it for quite a while. I love what you put out on a weekly basis.I'm curious about the future studies. How did you come to discover that as a program? I've heard you mention it—you said culture studies and then future studies. When did you first discover that this was something you could do for work? I mean, that you could study culture, or study the future, or prepare for the future? When did you first sort of decide or realize that you could do this for a living?Yeah. So during my first studies—which was international business and cultural studies—I spent a year in Indonesia, in Jakarta. And there, I worked for a German political foundation. My job was basically to read the English-speaking newspapers and then summarize what was happening in the country for the German foundation’s head office, and so on.And that was already kind of looking at trends and developments within the region—Southeast Asia in general, but also Indonesia specifically. And yeah, because the region was already quite emerging back then, it was interesting to see how things were changing. That made me more aware of this idea of looking into the future and seeing how trends are emerging.Back then, I was also really into technology. The concept of transhumanism was a big thing for me. I’m actually kind of anti-transhuman now, but at the time, I was really into the idea of how technology could help us augment human capabilities and all that. I read Ray Kurzweil—a futurist from San Francisco, or I think he's working at Google now—and I was fascinated by all of that.That kind of led me to start thinking more seriously about future studies and foresight. And then I found this study program here in Berlin, applied, and got in.And that was like the singularity, right?Exactly. Yeah, the singularity. I was really into that back in the day. It was quite an interesting concept, and the way Ray Kurzweil and others presented it was really compelling.Back then I was also reading a lot about longevity stuff—those big ideas and the prominent figures in that space—and all of that made me very excited about the future. That’s how I got into it.Since then, like I said, my views have changed quite a lot. But that was what brought me into the field.Because I’m not sure I totally understand the singularity and transhumanism—so as best you can, what was exciting to you about it? What was the attraction? I feel like we all kind of bumped into it around that time. I remember seeing it out there and thinking, oh wow, this seems like a beautiful, shiny way of looking at the future. But I never really looked deep enough to get a full understanding of it. So for you—what was exciting about it?Yeah, I mean—it’s a good question. I think what fascinated me back then was this idea of, I don’t know, like expanding what it means to be human. You know, using technology to overcome some of our limitations, whether that's biological or cognitive or whatever.And I think also this promise of kind of infinite growth, or infinite improvement, was something that really drew me in at the time. There was this idea of, like, we’re just at the beginning of something. We can become so much more—live longer, become smarter, be more connected, things like that. That felt very exciting.And also, I think there was a bit of a kind of spiritual angle to it. It’s not presented that way necessarily, but it felt a bit like this belief in something bigger, or something kind of transcendent, but grounded in science and tech. So for me it was also a kind of worldview, or a kind of hope for the future.But yeah, now I see it all a bit more critically. I think back then I didn’t think so much about what gets lost when you try to optimize everything, or what it actually means to be human in the first place. So yeah, now I’m more skeptical, but that was the initial excitement for me.So when you say now you’re more skeptical, what shifted for you? Was there a moment where something changed?I think it wasn’t one moment. It was more a gradual process. The more I worked in the field, the more I got exposed to different perspectives, different critiques. And I think I also just got older, you know? I became a bit more grounded, maybe a bit more humble about what we can really do with technology.And I started to see that a lot of the problems we face—climate, inequality, mental health—these aren’t things we can just tech our way out of. They need deeper changes. So now I’m more focused on the social side of things, on systems thinking, on how we can build better structures that support life—not just optimize it.Also, a lot of the transhumanist stuff just started to feel a bit... I don’t know, disconnected. Like, who is this actually for? Who benefits? It often felt very centered on a narrow idea of progress that didn’t include most people.So yeah, I guess it was a slow shift, but I think now I’m more interested in regeneration than optimization. In making things more livable, not just more efficient.I'm not quite sure. I guess maybe it was this kind of superhuman appeal—the idea of being able to rapidly enhance your capabilities or something like that. Maybe that was one of the appeals. Also, this idea of a future event that would change everything very disruptively—there was something compelling about that kind of transformation of the world.Yeah, something like that.And how would you say your feelings have changed? I mean, the world has changed quite a bit, obviously. But I'm wondering—how do you think about it or feel about it now?Yeah, I mean, in general, I've become a bit more skeptical about technology, and also this idea of technological solutionism. I guess what I bought into back then was more of the Silicon Valley narrative—that technology and computing could rapidly change all sorts of things. Not just solving certain diseases, but also transforming society in a big, spectacular way.What’s changed is just the experience of the last, say, 10 or 15 years, and how technology has actually impacted societies and systems. And also my own experience working in business consulting—getting a more inside look at how large corporations operate, what tactics they use, how the business world is structured, and so on.Throughout my career, I’ve gone deeper into certain rabbit holes that revealed system dynamics I now feel quite skeptical or concerned about—things I used to feel more excited by.So, you have the Substack and the consulting work. Is there overlap between the two? Or what's the relationship?Yeah. I mean, my freelance or consulting work is still mostly focused on foresight in general. So doing things like scenario workshops or scenario development for companies.Right now, I’m working on a report about climate adaptation for a startup accelerator here in Berlin. So it's more about looking into trends, developments, scenario thinking—the usual foresight stuff. I do try to bring in my ideas around reframing and narrative, which I focus on more in the newsletter. But I haven’t yet had a project that’s been specifically centered on that.Can you tell me—how do you talk about your foresight work to someone who hasn’t encountered foresight or doesn’t know why it’s important? What is foresight, and how do you work?Yeah, I mean, foresight is, I would say, basically just thinking about the future—thinking about the views of the future that already exist in our present. Just analyzing how I could do it in an organizational setting—how an organization thinks about its future and the external future. And then, through that process, maybe gaining a better understanding of oneself as an organization, but also of the external world. And from there, being able to refine certain strategies or use it in innovation work.Yeah. So, I mean, what we usually do within foresight work is look at different types of futures or different future scenarios—the more plausible futures, the probable ones, the preferred ones—the whole future cone. And then, through workshops or research, we try to get a better picture of these different futures and see how that can help align with strategies, innovation, and things like that.Yeah. And what do you love about foresight work? Where’s the joy in it for you?Yeah, I think that’s changed a little bit over time. I mean, the answer links back a bit to when I was more into the transhumanism approach in the beginning. So at first, it was really about the excitement of “What will the future hold?”—what life could be like in 10, 20, or 50 years. Just diving deep into that question.And I still find that very interesting—looking at the implications of certain technologies, not just for next year, but 50 years from now. That kind of long-term thinking is still really compelling.But what I also really like now about futures work is that the process itself gives us more agency. I call it "imagination agency." It helps us see that the way things are—or the way we perceive reality and the future—is just one way of looking at it. There are other possibilities. So it unlocks a kind of reimagining ability, and I find that really exciting.I'm also trying to dive more deeply into that imagination element within foresight right now.Yeah. Can you tell me more about that? I mean, imagination—how do you think about it? What excites you about it? And what are you hoping to do with it or how are you hoping to work with it?Yeah. So I believe we’re in a bit of a crisis of imagination. Certain systems and their narratives have narrowed down the possible future paths. There are elements that diminish our ability to imagine alternatives—other futures.At the same time, older narratives or ideologies are breaking down. So I think it's really important to strengthen our capacity to think differently and imagine otherwise. That’s why I think this element—imagination—is so important right now.A lot of the people reading my work come from the systems change sector or the sustainability consulting world. And many people in those movements say we’re missing a coherent narrative of a sustainable future. You know—how will it really look? Given the technologies we already have and the systems already in place, how do we get from here to there? What would that actually look like?Answering that question—solving that challenge—requires imagination. And that’s why I think future studies and foresight can be really helpful.Yeah. Are there—or in what ways do you—work with imagination? Are there particular tools or methods or processes that you use? I think you used the phrase... was it “imagination agency”? I’m curious how that actually looks in practice. How do you work with clients or others to, yeah, bring imagination into the process?Yeah. I mean, there’s kind of a basic foundational approach to that. For example, in keynotes or presentations for people who maybe don’t have any background in foresight or futures thinking, I’ll often start by showing a little bit of the history of future thinking—like how people imagined today’s world 50 years ago. How certain technologies were talked about in the news at the time, and so on.Those little stories give people perspective—how some things were super exciting at one point, and then, over time, kind of leveled off because there wasn’t that much substance there. That already gives people a kind of permission to look at today’s dominant narratives about the future in a more critical way.That’s something I think most foresight people do—sharing a brief history of predictions or imagined futures, and then comparing that to how things actually turned out.Another thing I use a lot—and probably the tool I rely on most—is this idea of reframing or framing, which is based on a tool called the iceberg model. It comes from systems thinking and futures studies. There’s also something called causal layered analysis by a guy named Sohail Inayatullah. That tool really helps you dig deeper into the ideologies, metaphors, and myths behind systems or topics.It’s something I use all the time, both in my research and in client projects. I use it to explore the underlying worldviews behind a particular system—understanding the power dynamics, how those systems came into being, what their history is, and which actors were involved. That’s kind of the deconstructive part of the work.And then from there, you can think about new myths or new worldviews. You can reframe things using creative tools—like putting yourself in someone else’s shoes, exploring different perspectives, that kind of thing. It helps surface new ideologies that completely shift how we look at certain topics. And that’s what opens up new ideas—new imaginations. So yeah, those are the tools I use.Is there a story you can tell—like a project or a client example—where this has worked in practice? And if not, no pressure, I don’t mean to put you on the spot...Yeah, not really a clear one, I think. But one thing I’m working on right now is a Climate Adaptation and Resilience project. The scope of the project is to look at developments and trends within climate adaptation and resilience—and also to explore what startup opportunities or investment opportunities exist within that space.What I did at the beginning was look at how we’ve built human systems—how we structure them, how they function—and then I tried to unpack the narratives within that. And I compared those to how nature builds systems or processes. Because nature seems to have figured out a lot about adaptation and resilience.There are some great examples in ecosystems or animal behavior where adaptation and resilience are deeply embedded—and I tried to use that comparison as a kind of framing tool for the project.And then we compared that with human systems, and you come to this conclusion that we’re now living in a world where nature is changing, but human systems were built for a world that was very stable, very certain, very rigid.So within this project—we're still working on it—we’re trying to combine this nature-based approach with the human system perspective and find ways to merge the two. Yeah, that’s maybe one example.But yeah, in my newsletter, I go down these rabbit holes around certain topics and try to uncover alternative narratives all the time.Yeah, I mean, that’s what I find—it’s the reason I invited you. I find the newsletter a source of real inspiration, because it’s so obviously imaginative and optimistic in a way. And I guess it kind of operates from—well, it’s right there in the title, Creative Destruction—that we’re in a moment where real transformation is necessary and possible, if you’re willing to embrace it. That’s how I take it, anyway.And that framing is such a powerful, necessary tool for any kind of change, right? So I’m curious—yeah, talk to me about framing and reframing. You’ve really organized your work around that, and the role of narrative in this process. I’d love to hear you talk about what a frame is for you, and what it means to frame something.I always like going back to fundamentals—like a kind of “Framing 101.” How do you think about what it means to frame something, and why is it important at all?Yeah. So, I have to say—there’s a kind of theoretical basis to all of this that started for me already during my master’s program. I was looking at this idea of structural determinism from two biologists and philosophers, Maturana and Varela, from Chile. It’s a really interesting idea that’s rooted in constructivist philosophy.It’s been a long time since I went deep into that theory, but the basic idea is that we’re always constructing the world as we look at it. That our perception is always influenced—by the experiences we’ve had, by our internal biases, and also by external stimuli that reach us.So whenever we look at the world, we’re not seeing it directly—we’re seeing it through a frame, through a structure or lens that’s shaped by all of that.And that theory—that way of thinking—really stuck with me. Especially as it relates to sense-making. I think foresight is really about sense-making, or at least it shares that goal: trying to figure things out.That approach—this idea of framing as a way of understanding the world—I’ve always found it really interesting and useful.So that’s the theoretical foundation of how I got into it. And then, like I described earlier, the iceberg model or causal layered analysis is a specific tool that also helps you explore that framing more deeply.But then, on the other hand, with the newsletter and the things I’ve been sharing there—I didn’t start with the idea of “I’m going to explore frames” or “I’m going to do research about reframing.” It actually started more with just finding interesting concepts—ideas that help describe certain developments in the world, or capture something about the current zeitgeist.But through doing that—publishing almost weekly for a couple of years now—I started to realize that if I structured it more, if I gave it a bit more form, it naturally lent itself to the idea of framing and reframing. And that’s when I started bringing it all together for myself.My main definition of framing—or reframing—is that it's the process or act of giving some aspect of perceived reality more prominence. It helps people understand that aspect more clearly, and ideally, it also encourages reflection.The “better understanding” part of my work is where I try to identify the zeitgeist—what feels like the spirit or texture of our time—and then find concepts or ideas that describe it well. A lot of readers tell me that I’ve helped them name or define a feeling they’ve had for a while but couldn’t quite put into words. That’s what I’m always trying to do: find the language or framework that helps clarify something already felt.And this kind of deeper understanding, I think, is really important. It offers a different kind of access to knowledge than just the rational, analytical approach—the kind that focuses only on data or surface-level facts.The reflection part is also essential. A frame doesn’t just show you something out in the world; it also shows you your own perspective. It can act like a mirror, helping you become aware of how you’re seeing things—and that awareness can open the door to shifting your perspective or imagining differently. That’s where this idea of “imagination agency” comes in.So again, for me, it’s a combination of theoretical grounding and the practice of just doing the work—collecting interesting things and then trying to trace a thread through them, to see what connects them.Recently, I shared a deeper dive into what I think of as reframing—a kind of methodology I’ve started calling the craft of reframing. I use the word craft because it really came together through doing—through making and experimenting. It’s not just an intellectual activity. It’s also a hands-on process.Somewhere in there, you described reframing as a different way of accessing knowledge. Do you remember what you meant?Yeah, I was referring to that deeper understanding. I’ve written about this in my newsletter and in a couple of articles, or shared work from others who touch on similar ideas.In the Western world—or the Global North—there’s a dominant approach to knowledge that’s very rational and often focused on control: controlling systems, optimizing outcomes. But there’s also another way of engaging with knowledge that’s more relational. It creates a deeper connection with a system or an environment. It’s less about control and more about resonance.There’s a concept called resonance I find really interesting—it's from the German sociologist Hartmut Rosa. He talks about resonance as a mode of relating to the world that’s defined by strong, meaningful connections—ones that can actually transform you internally.It’s quite abstract, but for me, it describes this more intuitive, felt kind of knowledge. And I think that’s often missing—especially in the consulting world.Are there other ideas you’re wrestling with right now—things you’re trying to name or label? What are you noticing?Just in general, you mean?Yeah.Yeah, one thing I’m thinking about quite a lot right now—I want to do a deep dive on it, but I think I need a little more time to think and research—is this idea I came across in an article about communal dreaming. It connects back to the crisis of imagination: how can we unlock our ability to imagine new ways of doing things, new ways of building systems?In general, I have this feeling that innovation has become much more shallow. So I’m asking: how can we innovate more deeply, more disruptively, more creatively? I’ve been exploring a few different elements of that challenge, and communal dreaming struck me as a really interesting one.The article talked about how, in some ancestral or Indigenous cultures, it’s common to share dreams communally and interpret them together—make sense of them collectively. And sometimes those cultures treat dreams as a kind of alternate access to reality, as a subconscious form of knowledge.I just found that a really compelling idea, especially in relation to how we think about the future. There’s so much future-phobia right now, and it makes me wonder: have we stopped dreaming? Are we even capable of dreaming anymore? And if not, how can we start again? How can we share our dreams—not necessarily literal ones, but in a more metaphorical, imaginative sense?That’s beautiful. You mentioned future phobia—I think I get what you mean, but can you say more about that?Yeah. Future phobia is kind of this idea that we’re locked into a certain kind of future—a trajectory that’s already headed somewhere, and not somewhere good. I mean, of course, this is just my view—maybe a view shaped by living in Berlin, in Europe, in the Global North—but still.It’s this sense that we’re headed toward worsening climate crisis, automation that could massively disrupt jobs and the economy, financial instability, rising living costs, unaffordable housing. And then also this growing sense that technology—especially digital technology—is delivering more negative outcomes than benefits.There’s a feeling that the story of progress has kind of broken down. And that collapse in belief, I think, contributes to future phobia.One way people seem to respond to that, consciously or not, is through nostalgia. You see it in conservative political movements, but also in culture—people turning to old music, old movies, old aesthetics. Clinging to cultural artifacts from the past.It’s funny—you’re reminding me of this line I always quote from my first job, which was at a consultancy. One of the principals there was this really sharp, intellectually seductive guy. He had a kind of guru energy—one of those people where you’re not always sure if what he’s saying is real or not, but it still lands somehow.And he had this line I always think about. He said, “We consume what we are afraid we are losing.” It’s such a strange but striking way of articulating something.Yeah, that’s interesting. I don’t know if it connects exactly, but I’ve written about a related idea. In German, we have this word: Weltschmerz. It’s kind of translated as “world pain”—that you’re feeling the suffering of the world, basically. I once wrote a piece about how we should go deeper into that feeling, instead of trying to solve it through what I called “supplements”—or through quantity.The idea was: we’re feeling this loss of beauty in the world, and there’s this deep world depression, this Weltschmerz. But it doesn’t really change us. It doesn’t make us act differently, because we’re quenching it with a kind of supplement. That could be doomscrolling, entertainment, escapism, new technologies, new stories of promise—all kinds of things.So that’s how I looked at it.In that piece, I included a quote from Daniel Schmachtenberger, who talks a lot about the Metacrisis. He was once asked on stage—after giving a really bleak assessment of the state of the world—"Doesn’t this make you super depressed?" And he basically said, “Yes. And I want people to be even more depressed. Because if they aren’t, I genuinely think we’ve lost some part of our humanity.”Like, you’re not fully human if the larger crises we’re facing don’t make you at least somewhat depressed. And then he reframed it: that kind of depression is actually a love for life. It’s a longing for beauty, for something good.And I thought—yeah, going deeper into this Weltschmerz, this world pain, might actually help us see how much beauty we still have in the world. And maybe, from that recognition, we’d be more likely to act—more likely to change things.That’s beautiful. What would that look like? Do you have a sense of what it would mean to really lean into that longing—into that loneliness that’s actually a longing for beauty?Yeah, it’s a big question. Well….I’m just following your lead!I think, in general, a very simple—but difficult—thing that I always come back to is: slowing down. I really feel like everything is moving too fast. And just a bit of slowing down might help us pause and think more carefully before we act.And within that slowing down, maybe we’d also find a greater appreciation for beauty—staying with that concept. A deeper appreciation for art, for quality, for craftsmanship, for those kinds of things. I think that alone could move us a little in the right direction.And then, in terms of bigger systems change—of course there are many things that could be done. But what excites me most right now is this idea of community-powered systems.This idea of co-ops, of building things together in a more people-based, democratic way. That’s what I find really interesting at the moment.Beautiful. Thomas, we’ve come to the end of the hour. I want to thank you so much. I’ve really enjoyed the conversation. I love the newsletter—I’ll add links for everyone to sign up. I really appreciate your time. Thank you.Yeah, thank you as well. I really enjoyed this. Thanks. Get full access to THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING at thatbusinessofmeaning.substack.com/subscribe

Natalie Black is the Founder and CEO of Culture x Curate, a strategic foresight and brand advisory based in Atlanta. She also serves as Chief Marketing Officer at Mia (Mission Impact Academy), empowering women globally through tech skills training. For over 20 years, Natalie has worked with Fortune 100 companies including Coca-Cola, UPS, AT&T, Estee Lauder, and The Home Depot.So I start all these conversations with the same question, which is one I borrowed from a friend of mine—who’s actually a neighbor—and she helps people tell their story. It’s such a beautiful question, I borrow it. But because it’s so big, I kind of over-explain it, the way I’m doing right now. Before I ask it, I want you to know that you are in absolute control. You can answer—or not answer—in any way that you want to, and it’s impossible to make a mistake. So the question is: Where do you come from? And again, you’re in total control, and you can answer—or not answer—however you’d like.Gosh, what a gut punch, the way you set that up. And I love that you said, "You're in total control." That is amazing, because it is such a—God—such a deep question.So I think of it in terms of physically—where am I from—and philosophically. I grew up on Long Island, Nassau County. And as a child growing up on Long Island, all you’re trying to do is get off Long Island.You have dreams of, you know, "I’m part of the bridge and tunnel crew." You get into Manhattan every moment you can, and you have dreams—or at least I did—like, "When I grow up, I’m going to move to SoHo. It’s going to be great. I’m going to be in fashion and beauty." It was the precursor to Sex and the City, before Sex and the City was a thing.And then I left and never looked back. Now I’m a tourist in New York, because I live in Atlanta. And I look at it with such deep fondness—having had such a suburban life.I’m a suburbanite. Having trees and neighbors and neighborhoods, right? That was like the OG framework for a neighborhood.And being part of a diverse community in a diverse space—I love that part about my upbringing in New York. That part is a gift.So yeah—Long Islander, suburbanite. But philosophically, I think that was the beginning of me coming from a place of wonder and awe and curiosity. I often describe myself as intellectually promiscuous.And I think where I came from started that—because there was always something to taste, to smell, to try, to poke at, to feel. That’s something so special about being in New York—everywhere: upstate, downstate, all of it. That kind of spark gets embedded in you. And it becomes lifelong.Do you have recollections of, as a girl, what you wanted to be when you grew up?Yeah. I—seriously, this is so cliché—but I grew up in the late ’80s, early ’90s. That whole culture shaped me. I read Sybil, the novel, at age 10 because I was always interested in what makes people tick. You know, why do we do the things we do? What are the decisions we make? All of that.So I thought I wanted to be a psychiatrist. But I also fell in love with glossies. I had every single magazine. And, you know, you don't think about it then—because I was a child—that pop culture shapes you. I had YM, Seventeen, all of the magazines—Spin, Rolling Stone, everything. If it was a magazine, I was in love with it.I was in love with the imagery. I was in love with the words. I was in love with the stories they were telling me about the world—and ultimately about myself and my place in it.So I said, well, if New York is the manufacturer of cool and pop culture, I want to be there. And I want to be in fashion and beauty. So that’s what I did.You’ll see this as a running theme: I started showing up to offices and places and meetings I had no business being in. I would just say, “I’m here, I’m an intern,” or “I’m here for the shoot.” I’ve crashed sets—things like that. Just because I wanted to be there. I wanted to learn. Because no one was willing to tell you, “Start here,” at least in my circle. So I was like, fine, I’ll just show up.I didn’t realize at the time that I was taking in strategy and research and observation—all of that. I just knew I wanted to do this. I wanted to learn how. And I wanted to learn everything about how—not just the end product, not just how it gets to the shelves or how the photoshoots happen or how the clothes are made. I wanted to learn everything.It wasn’t until I got older—went to college—and struggled in college because I wanted to be a psychiatrist, but I didn’t want to be pre-med. That felt too straight and narrow. I’m good at school, but it was boring.So I decided to create my own degree based on what I was interested in. I did bioethics and social biology. That allowed me to take psych, biophysics, sociology, political science—all the things. I just did a smorgasbord of classes and got my degree in that.At the same time, I was working in comms—at the time, it was street marketing and youth culture. Again, just showing up, like, “Yeah, I can manage accounts.” Just doing that. And I started to really formulate what my career could look like in my twenties.Then I started getting the shape of what ended up being a brand comms, brand PR, brand marketing kind of career.You mentioned—did you say social biology? What is that? Can you tell me more about it?Well, I was an impulsive 20-year-old, you know? So I was like, “Social biology—sure.” But actually, no—it was more than that.At the time, I was at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. And again, I was playing around with my love of human behavior. My mom was in healthcare—she was a nurse. I didn’t necessarily want med school, but I did want to tap into the human side of healthcare.Ethics was becoming a big thing—this global conversation—because of CRISPR and all these other innovations that were coming out. I loved the dialogue happening both at the academic level and at the practitioner level. I realized, wow, you can actually merge the physical sciences and the social sciences to really derive meaning.There was all this unprecedented innovation. Globalization was happening at a rapid pace. And no one knew what to do. No one knew what arenas or spaces were best suited to have constructive conversations that could move humanity forward in a beneficial way—for all humanity.And I thought, that’s where I need to be. Somewhere in the center of that. Not because I wanted it to be all about my thoughts or perspective, but because that’s where the global, future-shaping conversations were happening. And I just—if I could observe, learn, absorb—fantastic.But I didn’t want to be just on the tactical side, where things get discussed, and then you’re told, “Here, eat it, now do it,” with no context behind it.Yeah, I really identify with that. I feel like I had a suburban experience, too, where the whole world came to me through magazines and newspapers. And I just couldn’t get there fast enough.So, catch us up. Where are you now? What are your days like, and what are you working on?Yeah. So now, as a woman of a certain age, I’ve settled. I got my urban dreams out—New York, Boston, proper. I did all the things. And you realize, okay, this is great, this is cool—but it doesn’t exactly play out the way you think it will. Still, it gives you a certain grit.And at some point, you say, all right, I’m ready for the next level. Now I’m settled in a suburb of Atlanta. I still like to be close enough to the action, but not in the thick of it. I’m an interloper.So I like to go in and out, but I’ve traversed my entire career—which looks like a splatter map—and that was on purpose. I went from agency to small brand startup to big brand to big agency, and all of that bouncing around... at the time, it might’ve looked like I was scatterbrained and didn’t have any direction.But I did. I may not have been able to articulate it well enough, but I knew that I wanted to be part of building a brand that closely understood who they were interacting with. Again, that was strategy, right?So I was doing that and realized—after years of being a strategist and a communicator—that I got, I think, a combination of tired and bored. Tired of the pace at which large brands were moving, the lack of interest in doing any deeper studies around humans and communities, and just... how different teams were not speaking to each other.So I was like, screw it—I’m gonna start my own consultancy. Again, being very impulsive—that’s also a theme in my life and career. I started a consultancy called Culture by Curate, and my remit was to inject foresight and futures into traditional brand strategy, to impart a deep understanding of cultural intelligence—building brands for meaning.And that doesn’t have to be airy-fairy or ethereal. A lot of brand strategists say, “We’re a business. We’re in the business of making money.” Sure—you can make money and still be part of a collective that pushes meaning, derives meaning, and still makes money.Yeah. It sounds amazing. Can you tell me a little bit about what you mean when you talk about foresight—what that looks like and what it is?Yeah. You know what? The word now is so overused. I’m actually a little happy about that. And I’ll say—my background, as I mentioned, I don’t have a traditional pedigree in foresight or futures. I didn’t go to school for it. I’m kind of like a school child, right? I read things, I have conversations, I take courses—things like that. And then I just kind of go, “Okay, I’m going to do it in real time.”So what I found was—brand strategy tends to think in terms of campaigns, buyer journeys, KPIs, things like that. If you’re doing architecture, it’s narrative and messaging and personas. But it's very limited in how it thinks long-term—maybe two or three years out. And even that’s pushing it. You’re really thinking in spurts—quarters.It doesn’t account for, you know, when the proverbial s**t hits the fan. What if your audience grows up or decides something differently? People move. We evolve—based on where we are in life, where we grow up, where we move, what we do. You’re not the same person, fundamentally, as you move through life. And brand strategy traditionally doesn’t account for that.So I encountered foresight as—what corporate would call—strategic planning. Like, “What does our customer look like three years from now?” But even that felt too prosaic. Then I realized there’s a whole school of thought around systems. How does a system evolve? What does that look like for us as human beings?And I said, this is the kind of thinking brand strategy needs. It’s imagining. It’s experimentation. It’s play. It’s rigorous scientific inquiry. It’s all the things—all the skills that make human beings good at what they do—applied to brand strategy.So foresight, for me, is not about predicting the future or saying what’s going to happen. It’s more about coming up with “what ifs,” playing around with them, and being able to build on top of that.What kinds of questions do people come to you with? When do they pick up the phone and call?Well, right now, it's all about AI. It's all about AI. And it’s nice—I think we’ve turned a corner a little bit when it comes to utility. Everyone was rushing to talk about productivity and efficiencies. And now, it’s nice that we’re no longer centering the conversation on AI as just a tool for efficiency and productivity.Now, at least in the conversations I’m having with clients, it’s more like: “So we have these tools—how do we use them as co-creators, as co-pilots, so that we can be better at connecting?” And that’s such an open-ended, endless question. There’s no final answer, because we evolve, and we grow—but it’s the right question to play around with.It gives us the opportunity to say, for instance, “Now I can study, communicate, and convene with many different communities at scale—because of AI.” It doesn’t remove the need for me to interact or, I would say, to embed and embody. It doesn’t replace that. It just allows me to think about things I previously couldn’t—because of the size of the world, the nuance, and the complexity of human beings and culture. So those are the kinds of conversations I’m having right now.Yeah, what do you love about the work? Like, where’s the joy in it for you?It’s meaning, honestly. What an appropriate conversation. There’s so much we, as human beings, are blind to—and part of that has just been given, right? It’s not necessarily because we’re all completely self-unaware. I think it’s that we’re moving through the world, through systems—of work, society, everything we endure as living, breathing individuals—and we’re often on autopilot.We usually only start looking for deeper meaning when there’s a tower moment, when something jolts our very identity. Then we question, then we rediscover, then we reconfigure. That’s a beautiful process. It’s a messy process—but beautiful.And the work I do is like: Let’s lean into that. Let’s not avoid the messiness of being human. Sure, you want to build a customer journey and create personas? Great. But that’s one-dimensional. That may check certain boxes, but it doesn’t account for the totality of who someone is and what they’re experiencing.Let’s lean into that complexity so we can better understand where you, the brand, fit into someone’s life—and vice versa. And the result might be something entirely new. Whether it’s a product, a service, or even just a new way of engaging, it’s something new, rather than just transactional.They’re not just consumers. They’re beings. We are beings. So let’s remove this notion that we are one activity—that we’re only valuable if we consume, and you’re only valuable if you make. That is just an outdated way of looking at things.Yeah. Can you tell me a story about that?Yeah. I’ll talk about a client in health science. And the reason this is interesting is, number one, I’m industry agnostic. Meaning, discovery, curiosity—those things are industry agnostic. You can apply the same approach whether it’s CPG, automotive, or life sciences.This particular client had conducted both qualitative and quantitative research, which is fantastic—being able to do that and analyze the results. But what was missing was the nuance: the differences between rural, urban, and suburban communities.And I think, especially in sectors like pharma or life sciences, everyone wants to replicate what I call “the Obama strategy”—right? Grassroots: knock on doors, hand out pamphlets, do micro-this, micro-that—because it worked.But the time, energy, and effort to do that is substantial. And you have to be willing, ready, and open to learn some things that might be uncomfortable. So the idea of saying, “We’re targeting these three groups, these three sets of communities, and ultimately we want them to come in for genetic testing... we’re going to talk about how amazing genetic testing is, what you’ll learn, and it’ll go from there—it’ll be fantastic”—well, that doesn’t always work.Number one, there's the question of awareness. You can say “genetic testing” or “DNA testing”—those are two different ways to describe it. What's the level of awareness and comfort, not just with the procedure, but with the information? Where does it fit in their life?Ideally, a busy family of four is going to look at genetic testing very differently than a millennial—or an alpha kid—living in the city. So again, level-set: what’s their awareness of what it is and what the benefits are?People don’t think in terms of just features and benefits. We know this. Some of those frameworks are broken. But when you tap into what it will mean to them—how it helps bolster their identity and their purpose, based on what they assign meaning to, not what we assign—then you begin to have a different conversation.We found that for older folks in the South, in rural areas and even suburbs, the conversation around legacy and family health history really resonated. In the North and the West, it was more about longevity and biohacking. Using those kinds of terms—that was the key. Different conversation, same result.So again, when you tap into what things mean for people—how they assign meaning in their life, how they see themselves, and those aspirational (not even goals, but dimensions) of their personality—then you can have a conversation that’s actually grounded in reality and still get a so-called “desired behavior.”Yeah, that's awesome. Because you pointed it out—and it's irresistible—this series is called That Business of Meaning. So, what do we mean when we say “meaning”? What are we talking about?Gosh.It's the million-dollar question.It’s a million-dollar question. And you know, I was a philosophy minor, so I love this question. This is great. And it’s what makes your conversations so compelling—because you can get a million and one different answers.Meaning is sense, right? It’s how I see myself, what I think about who I am, what I do, where I am, and what kind of impact I have. It’s identity, it’s values, it’s beliefs. It’s that internal system I’ve built—some of it given to me, some of it absorbed—and then I chew it up and spit it back out And that becomes my small place in this human journey.And wow, right? That’s nebulous—but that is meaning. Because we’re all going to end up in the same place, right? All of us. No matter where we come from or what we do—we’re all ending up in the same place.So for a brief moment in time, our thoughts and actions are creating an imprint that signals: this is what it is to be human. And so it’s not an unknowable answer—it’s just not a concrete one. Which is nice... but also beautiful.Mm-hmm. I love your use of the word sense. And earlier you said embed and embody. Are those words you use often?I do. Because in my journey of discovery—both career and personal—we talked about it earlier, right? You do the academic thing: semiotics, culture, anthropology, sociology. The very underpinnings of academic inquiry into meaning.And it’s fantastic. It gives you a basis. It gives meaning to things you might not be able to articulate in the moment—it gives you a framework. But then you also discover different pockets and dimensions of how human beings are doing the work.Part of that includes the metaphysical. And there’s a whole language in the metaphysical and esoteric space. People there use words like co-create, embody, and embed. And those are beautiful terms—they sometimes get a bad rap.But the profound sense of what they’re trying to encapsulate absolutely has a place in business. Because when you say desired behavior, that’s one shot. It keeps things very temporal. And it also moves the goalposts every time a person evolves in their so-called customer journey.But when you say embody and embed—that’s deeper. Now, I’m no longer just purchasing Clorox. Now the idea of cleanliness, organization, and togetherness becomes embedded in deep meaning in my life.Me buying Clorox, for instance—true story, client story—that’s the output of that deeper meaning. It becomes a ritual. Not just the cleaning itself, but my relationship with that thing is helping me build that ritual and that sense.Yeah, what is the Clorox story? Can you share? I'm a sucker for a CPG story.CPGs are amazing, right? We are so surrounded by product and stuff. And when you go beyond packaging, media spend, and channel optimization—beyond those tactics—you start to realize that some of the meaning is given to us. I’m told that Clorox is amazing. It'll make my house super clean. And I’ll be the toast of the town because I have the cleanest house on the block.But the Clorox story happened at the height of the pandemic, when we were all forced to reckon with and reassign meaning and value in our lives. The social distancing, the disruption of daily activity—all of it. I mean, for the first time in our collective human experience—at least while being fully aware and alive—we all went through it together.So now, we were forming new relationships with these products and services. Some of it was a grieving—for our old lives and the old ways of doing things. And that needed to happen.Something I used to clean a toilet, or put a drop of in to wash dishes, now meant something more. Some of the work I was tapped to do was to figure out what that was. Because it wasn’t just about keeping coronavirus out of the house so my family wouldn’t get sick.It became an embodied ideal—of legacy, protection, care, stewardship. Because that was one time when we were all looking out for one another. That was the only way. There was this “we’re all in this together” kind of rally cry. So it became a notion of stewardship.And then prices were getting jacked up—because scarcity was a thing, fear was a thing. But there was almost no amount of money people wouldn’t pay. And the ultimate output of that deliverable was: how do we carry that meaning forward? Once this moment in time evolves into something else—how do we continue that meaning?Yeah. And the meaning was stewardship? That was the idea?Stewardship.And can you tell me more about what that means?Yeah, absolutely. You know, it’s about exploring old ideas, old words, and emotions.Oh my gosh, yes.Things like kith and kin. What does that look like? What does that mean? No one speaks like that anymore, right? And now we have nothing but time and the ability to explore ourselves in relation to one another.The through-line sentiment is stewardship: I take care of myself, and by doing that, I’m better able to take care of you—and vice versa. And when we take care of one another, something beautiful emerges from that: fauna and flora, community—things that happen organically because there’s a reciprocal relationship of care.Care against the coronavirus. Care about income. Care through sharing meals and outdoor spaces as we reconfigure this life in the wake of emergency.So stewardship was the theme. And you can still see it now in some of the messaging—it’s not as strongly stated anymore, because there’s been a hard pivot. So you had to say things like community, care, frontline—those became emergency signal words. But that message of stewardship still runs throughout their campaigns.Beautiful. I love that stuff. It sounds wonderful. I’m curious—when was the first time you realized you could make a living doing this kind of thing?Oh boy. That was twofold.First, you started this conversation with the idea that you’re in control. And I think I realized that early on—when I was crashing through windows, showing up in meetings, doing things I had no business doing—just because I wanted to be in control.That was probably early twenties. No matter what was thrown in my way—I became a mom early, I went to school, I did all the things. It’s not a sob story; it’s just what you do to live and thrive.And I realized, Wow. If I can be resilient enough to say, “Okay, today I’m a makeup artist, I guess I’m going to this video shoot,” or “I’m doing a book signing and now I’m a publicist,” or “I’m launching a digital magazine,” or “I’m helping an artist,” or “I’m working on the Google acquisition of Motorola”—then I can make a living at this.I was doing all these things because I said I could. It doesn’t take long to learn. Everyone’s figuring it out along the way—even the most seasoned experts.So I realized you can make a living at this. You just need a word to describe it—something people can latch onto so they don’t question it. The brain loves containers. It’s a hard intellectual exercise to break out of them, but we need those containers to start the conversation.That’s when I was like, I’m a strategist. I can’t say, “Hey, I’m a professional thinker and figure-outer”—people would say, “What the hell does that mean? I’m not paying you to do that.”But I am a strategist. I’m a planner. I’m a futurist. Words like that help people understand the containers of what I do, the value I bring, and what we’re going to explore. There are no real lines or boundaries, but I use a container to introduce the conversation.And that realization—that aha moment—came in my early twenties.Really? And what was the word? Was it strategist?Yeah, first it was strategist. That came from being a digital strategist and a digital PR strategist—back when social media was still in its infancy. It was the MySpace era, and brands like Coty came knocking, saying, “There are these folks online who seem to have an audience—we want to tap into that.”So I started doing that. I worked on JLo’s Glow and Glow Miami campaigns—it was digital PR, and we were doing events. It wasn’t exactly happenstance, but it kind of was.Then I started helping brands think about how people behave in these new online spaces, how that compares to how they interact in real life, how language evolves, how style and activity evolve. That’s thinking. That’s exploration. That’s strategy. And that became the basis of how I started calling myself a strategist.And then, when I finally got to agencies, I was told, “Oh, you're not a strategist. You didn’t get your MBA at Wharton. You didn’t do these things.” And I was like, “Oh... okay.”So I figured, all right, I need some business strategy principles. And that’s when I started calling myself an emerging venture strategist—things like that. Because it just made it so much easier for people to understand what I was actually doing, which was sense-making, place-making, meaning-making.Oh, I love it. I want to know about the name—I love the name of your advisory: Culture by Curate. Can you tell me the origin story of that name?Yeah. I think just now—over the past, I’d say, three to five years—brands are really beginning to understand how ubiquitous and important culture is to us as human beings. Culture drives commerce—not the other way around.And there are, I mean, gosh—when I say nuance, and we talk about subcultures and things like that—those are really oversimplified containers. They’re tools for brands and brand practitioners to try to understand the invisible and visible ways we interact: the signals, how we dress, what we do, what we say, what we think, where we go, how we play, what we do together as a group versus in different groups—or as individuals.Customs. Codes. All of those things—that’s what makes up culture. And I think brands often don’t understand that all of that evolves through interaction—with the outside world, and with each other. And that’s curation, right?It’s putting things together in groups, letting them spin off, evolve, form new meanings. You are curating an experience. You are curating an identity. You are curating meaning.So, in a fever dream one night, I was playing around with names—like “The Cultural Intelligence Advisory” or “This” or “That.” And all the while, in the back of my mind, I was thinking about the academics who do this—who study this for a living. I wanted to give deference to them.Because their work gives shape to a lot of what I’m doing. But I’m not an academic. I think for a living, sure—but I’m not a rigorously applied academic thinker. And there’s a place for that kind of work, because it gives us frameworks we can actually use in the real world.So in a way, I realized—I’m curating that collective intelligence myself. And when I said that to myself, I was like: Ah. There we go. Culture by Curate.It’s what I do. It’s how I’ve lived. It’s how I approach my work. It’s what brands need in order to create new frameworks for how they operate. And ultimately, it’s how we all exist in this bubble of the world—with each other.How—what have you observed has changed since you started? You’ve been in this space, working with organizations. I love how you talk about culture. You say there’s a growing recognition that culture drives commerce, not the other way around.How have things changed in terms of how your clients understand—or don’t understand—culture? Who gets it, and who still doesn’t?I’m finding that the appetite to understand culture has definitely grown—which is great. And not just because it’s great for business, but because it’s great for the evolution of humankind.Why is that? I’m curious—I want to follow up. Why do you think it’s such a good thing that organizations become fluent in culture?I think—there are so many different conversations happening right now about systems thinking, systems destruction, and systems recreation. And that can feel really big and heavy, especially to the uninitiated—for those who aren’t in this kind of work, or who aren’t academics. It can feel unsolvable, like, I can’t take part in that.But when you say, “We’re in culture thinking, in culture exploration,” then you’re doing a piece of that work. And it becomes a beacon—of hope, and of place. Like, I have a place in this larger work of reconstructing systems so that they benefit everybody.And that includes business. Because when you think about the extractive, exploitative nature of business, it’s easy to say, I can’t solve that. I’ve got to make money to live and eat. That’s the reality—we’re in a system where we need to do that.But at the same time, you also don’t want to contribute to harmful behavior anymore—to people or planet. And that can feel so big—because you’re just one person doing one thing.But if you say, “Hey, what if I could help business understand relationships better—beyond just buying?”—then it becomes a slow crack in a system that was built for a world that no longer exists. A system that’s no longer serving us. It’s a slow dismantling. A changing of hearts, minds, and actions.That’s why I think it’s a great thing for businesses to understand meaning, people, and culture. Because then it becomes—well, it’s like giving medicine to a child. NyQuil tastes terrible, but it helps you sleep. And as a parent, you’re like, This is going to help you sleep, and Mommy needs to sleep too.So what do you do? You put it in a little bit of juice. It sweetens the taste just enough. And now they’re doing the thing—they’re taking the medicine—and it’s not so bad. And then, after a while, maybe they don’t need the juice. Maybe you can graduate them to a pill. (True story, by the way.) But it’s the same notion.And how would you—actually, let me go back. What have you noticed has changed?I’d say the appetite for understanding culture is still there—and growing. But it’s still often framed as, “I want to understand culture so I can figure out what’s cool and package it and sell people more stuff.”That’s still there. But at least the door is cracked open. Because now I can say, “Great—you’ve got culture with a capital C, and then you’ve got sneaker culture, digital culture, luxury culture”—all these fractures, or splinters, of what culture is.So again, if I have to work in bite-sized shifts, that’s fine. The appetite is there for discussion and exploration. And then I can say, “Let’s talk about meaning as it relates to commerce.” What you’re really doing is slowly helping them understand that there’s more than what meets the eye—the buying part, the spectacle part.Another thing that’s changed is that a lot more practitioners are talking about culture, which is fantastic. These aren’t just pundits—they’re people actively participating in the exploration. Some have been exalted as experts, and that’s fine—because at least the conversation is moving forward. I'm okay with the conversation moving forward—as long as it does move forward. And it is. So that’s great.You reminded me of Grant McCracken. Are you familiar with Grant?Yes.I mean, he’s a hero of mine. I remember him mentioning his book Chief Culture Officer—it’s a beautiful book with a great idea. I recall him—maybe I shouldn’t be telling this story—but he sort of confessed he was exasperated that corporations, generally speaking, would see the word culture and immediately think only of themselves. They wouldn’t recognize the invitation in that word.Like, “No, no, no—not your internal culture. The culture outside.”And I think that’s one of the tragic realities—or at least a core difficulty—of doing this kind of work. Does that resonate with you?Absolutely. And I think everything is connected—including that exact challenge.I think a lot about parenthood because it’s a big part of my life. When you said that, I immediately thought of adolescence. In adolescence, you’re trying to raise a human being to understand who they are in a healthy context—and how they fit into the world. But it’s also a deeply self-centered time in life.That self-centeredness is necessary to reach the next stage. And yes, it’s frustrating and infuriating, but also essential. I think of organizations the same way.A business would love to treat itself as a separate entity—like, “We’re doing this in the name of business,” as if that absolves any responsibility for thinking critically about what you’re actually doing. But organizations are made up of people. Full stop.So when businesses start to think about culture, and they go, “Well, let’s start with internal culture”—I’ve worked on those projects, internal culture, ERGs, DEI initiatives—all of that. At the very least, it’s a small step in the right direction. It’s a way of acknowledging: “We are made up of people who have thoughts, experiences, feelings, and behaviors.”That’s dipping your toe in the water of meaning.But then, quickly, it becomes too big—too overwhelming, too complex. They start all these ERGs (Employee Resource Groups) and BSGs (Business Support Groups) because they suddenly realize: “Oh... people think differently. They’re experiencing things we weren’t aware of. They see their work differently. Some are upset. Some are happy. Some are disengaged.”And then, the question becomes—why? Why is that happening?Sometimes, that work goes nowhere. But still—it’s a beginning. A tipping point. And often, it’s the marketing and communications teams who take that momentum and start turning their focus outward—toward the culture beyond the organization. Same practice. Just disjointed. But it’s a step in the right direction.How do you—just curious—how do you work? This is a selfish part of the conversation: I’m a qualitative researcher, and I’m always advocating for the benefit of qualitative research. What role does it play for you, if any? And how do you help organizations connect with or understand culture?I’m always pushing for qualitative and quantitative research. Always.Here’s the thing: I love being around smart people. I absolutely love being around people who are smarter than me. And that’s not just lip service.Because honestly—I was a terrible employee. Now that I’m on my own, it’s different. But back then, if I was the smartest person in the room—or even just thought I was—I would disengage. I’d already figured out the plot. Part of that’s ADHD. If it’s taken 20 minutes to get to the point and I already got there? I’ve checked out. I’m done. I’m thinking, We’re still talking about this?So I need the challenge of being around people who know more than me, who think differently than me, who are true experts in something.That’s when I light up. I think, Oh, I want to learn.That’s just—I want to say, oh, this is great. Because it really feels like something beautiful is happening—this exchange. That’s what research does for me.So I partner with researchers. Number one, they’re deep in it. They understand it. I know enough to be dangerous—I say that all the time. I know enough to know the value, to speak the language, to understand the parts and the process.But I’m always working with people who are fully immersed—who really know the work. Because then we can sit and vibe, and discuss, and debate, and explore ideas together. And from there, we get aligned—and bring the client into that space too.I collaborate. I no longer work in terms of, “Okay, here’s a campaign” or “Here’s a fixed framework.” Frameworks are important, yes—but my goal is to help brand teams re-familiarize themselves with research. To fall back in love with curiosity and play.Sure, use your frameworks and funnels—I get that. I can work within them. I have. But I’m also asking, What else? What’s more?That’s how I work with brands. I acknowledge the tools and systems they’re already using—that’s great. But I also look beyond them.And part of that is working through the research: commissioning it, understanding it, and then, yes, distilling it into insights. I love insights. And then asking again: What else? What’s more?Beautiful. This hour went by very quickly. I want to thank you so much for the conversation. It was a real pleasure. I appreciate it.Likewise. I could talk to you forever. Thank you for the opportunity. Get full access to THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING at thatbusinessofmeaning.substack.com/subscribe

Simon Roberts is an anthropologist and co-founder and Partner at Stripe Partners in London. Simon’s 25-year career has included founding the UK’s first dedicated ethnographic research company and running an innovation lab at Intel. He is currently Board President of EPIC People. His book “The Power of Not Thinking” was shortlisted for The Business Book Awards 2021.Stripe Partners have one of the best newsletters going: Frame. And, here is Simon’s story told in comic book form. Here is his piece “The UX-ification of research” referenced in our conversation.I start all these conversations with the same question, which I borrowed from a friend—a neighbor, actually—who helps people tell their stories. It’s such a beautiful question that I borrowed it from her, but it’s also a big one.So I tend to overexplain it, just like I’m doing now. But before we dive in, I want you to know that you’re in complete control—you can answer or not answer however you’d like. And the question is: Where do you come from?Well, 23andMe—when I did it, maybe foolishly, many years ago—told me that genetically, I come from the Celtic fringes of the United Kingdom. A bit of Wales, a bit of Ireland, and a bit of Scotland.And weirdly, to the extent that I know, that’s broadly true. My father’s side of the family were all Welsh. Biographically, it lines up too—I spent eight years at university in Edinburgh and five years working at Intel in Ireland. So, genetically and biographically—biologically, as it were—that’s where I kind of come from.Yeah.There’s probably a deeper answer, but that’s an answer.As an American, I don’t have the nuance of Welsh, Scottish, or Irish identities. What does it mean to be Welsh—to come from Wales?Well, the second part of the answer to that first question is that, broadly speaking, I had an extremely—extremely—I was about to say "typical," but more like typical slash privileged—upbringing as a white, middle-class male in the Home Counties. So I don’t know what it’s like to grow up Welsh, aside from having a few Welsh relatives.But in general, I think being Scottish, Welsh, or certain types of Irish often means that England is the colonial—or pseudo-colonial—bully breathing down your neck.Right.Scotland has moved toward independence, at least politically in some respects. Wales, to a more limited extent. And, of course, the Irish question rolls on. So yeah, I think you’d have to ask properly Welsh, Scottish, or Irish people what it really means to be from there, particularly in relation to England. But I’m certainly aware of England’s colonial history.Yeah. I didn’t mean to put you in a politically fraught situation right at the start. Do you have any recollection of what you wanted to be as a kid? Like, what did you want to be when you grew up?Honestly, I don’t think I have any memory whatsoever of wanting to be anything in particular when I was young. And as I keep telling my children—or others who come to me for career advice—thanks to a long degree at Edinburgh University—four years, followed by another four for a PhD, which I grant you isn’t as long as an American PhD in anthropology—I managed to delay figuring out what I wanted to do until I was 28, nearly 29.Partly because I didn’t know. And I still really didn’t know until I finished my PhD. Then, I at least knew what I didn’t want to do. And what I couldn’t do—or, at least, some things I wouldn't be able to do.And I’ve been making it up ever since. But I certainly have no childhood memory of wanting to be a train driver or any of the classic things kids say. You know, in Britain, they say, "I want to be a train driver." I can’t imagine Italians say that. They probably say, “I want to drive a Ferrari in a Grand Prix.”But the British? “Yeah, I’d like to be a train driver.” I didn’t even want to be one of those. And I’m too blind to be a train driver anyway.And so catch us up—where are you now, and what is the work that you're doing?Yeah, what is the work I’m doing? Where am I now? I mean, in many ways, I think I’m still doing what I’ve been doing since I figured out what I wanted to do—which was to apply anthropology in a way that was neither full-throated academia nor surface-level market research.From the start, my aim has been to sit somewhere in a Venn diagram between commercial research and academic rigor. And I’ve been trying to locate myself in that in-between space ever since.I don’t have a long list of past roles on my LinkedIn. I did a stint in corporate—it wasn’t really for me. I’ve mostly worked in consultancy. Now, I’m 13 years into the journey—I think you’re meant to call it that—as a founder at Stripe Partners. And yeah, we’re sticking to the knitting, innovating where we can, and I’m still just trying to do good work.I go into every project with a healthy dose of fear about my inability to learn things properly. I’m always—yeah—always on tenterhooks.How do you describe Stripe Partners, if you're ever asked?I should be one of the most qualified people to answer that question succinctly, but I forever find myself completely unable to explain it clearly.Fundamentally, we’re an innovation and strategy business that combines social science, data science, and design—approaches, methodologies, ways of seeing the world—to solve problems and help large businesses chart the future. We have a particular tilt toward large technology companies.That’s about as good a description as I can give.Yeah, it’s a cruel question, that one.I think the problem is that I always answer it while making a bunch of assumptions—about what people know about consultancy, about anthropology, whether they’ve heard the word ethnography, or what they think data science means. And because of all those assumptions, I usually make a mess of it.Sometimes, the simplest way of putting it is: we help solve gnarly problems for people with good research. That’s another way to say it.What do you love about the work? Where’s the joy in it for you?I think the joy is, ultimately, being given a difficult problem and getting to a satisfying resolution. That’s what’s rewarding.Most of our projects last about three months—that’s the average, I’d say, over the last 13 years. Twelve weeks is long enough to get deep into something without getting completely swallowed by it. It’s enough time to understand the background context—organizational, cultural, political, whatever it may be—so that you can frame your findings in a way that’s impactful.But it’s not so long that you get bogged down in the topic, or in your client’s category, or in the politics and internal dynamics of the organization. It’s a nice balance—deep enough to be meaningful, but with just enough air in your lungs so you can come back up and be ready to dive into something else.That’s one answer.Another is that I really enjoy being intellectually challenged. And I suspect—though I hope it’s not true, but I think it probably is—that many people, broadly speaking, in the industries we work in are often wracked with imposter syndrome.And they’re probably at the less experienced, younger end of the community of practitioners. I sort of love and hate the continual feeling that I’m a complete imposter—that I’m not going to be able to solve the problem, that I’m not going to land it neatly, that the project is going to be a complete failure, and no one will ever want to work with me again.I know it sounds like a slightly sadomasochistic urge, but I’m somewhat driven by that. It keeps me pushing myself. And after doing this for close to 25 years—well, whatever works, right? It keeps you on your toes, and it stops you from becoming complacent. Because complacency, in any walk of life, isn’t helpful.You’ve referenced a few times that around 28 you discovered what you might want to do. But when did you first encounter the idea that you could actually make a living doing this kind of thing?A very simple—if slightly niche—answer: I ended up working in a brand consultancy that had been spun out of an ad agency called TBWA in London. This was in late 1999. The rationale was to help dot-com startups build their brands, understand their customers, figure out what they were doing in the world, and then, in a sense, pass them back to TBWA to spend their funding on marketing.I did a project for a now-defunct online toy retailer called Toyzone, which was backed by a group of high-profile investors—people like Matthew Freud of Freud Communications. I went off and did some ethnography for them, got completely thrown into the deep end, and presented what I imagine was a fairly terrible slide deck to the founders and the ad agency folks.But they were like, “Wow, that was amazing.” And I thought, Oh, well—maybe I can do this. I mean, it was the first time I’d ever done it. But it worked.So yes, that’s kind of a smug—and possibly complacent—answer. But it made me realize that you actually could do this kind of work. I can’t even remember what academic framework I used, but it was something clever—but not too clever. Just enough.And it gave me this early sense that the idea executives don’t have time for thinking or ideas is total nonsense. That people do have time to be pushed and challenged. They don’t just want a page full of verbatims from a focus group. There are other ways.You were surprised there was receptivity to that kind of thinking inside the corporate structure?Yeah, I suppose so. Although, to be fair, it was a scrappy little startup—not exactly a corporate behemoth.But still, the way you said it—it sounded like you were surprised they didn’t think it was all b******t.Right. I mean, I think they were thoughtful people. As investors, they’d already made a lot of money, and they were jumping on the next bandwagon, which at the time was the dot-com boom.And then there were planners at the ad agency. Ad agencies are full of different kinds of people—some more thoughtful than others. But the planners tend to regard themselves as the most thoughtful. There were some very friendly planners in the mix who responded positively. They said, “Yeah, this is great—you’ve given me something I can play with.”So that gave me just enough confidence to believe there was a “there” there—something I could figure out and build on.But then I made a pretty rash decision: I left that startup brand consultancy after only a year. I had very little formal training—even in an industry that essentially makes it all up as it goes along.You know, I had no formal training. And—this is a true story—I basically built a little website using some code I scraped off nameless blogs. I created a web page in Microsoft FrontPage, and then I sold Google Ads—not Instagram ads—for $0.02, or more precisely, $0.002 per click, using the keyword “ethnography.”I thought, Let’s see if anyone wants to buy ethnography.At the same time, I did what I’ve always done: tried to meet lots of people. I’ve always been proactive about building a network and finding interesting people to talk to.And through that, I found a really interesting, tech-focused think tank in the UK. They brought me in as an ethnographer-in-residence. It paid a few standing bills and gave me the freedom to experiment a bit on the side. And that was it—just making it all up as I went along, which, if we’re honest, is what most careers look like in hindsight.Yeah, it’s amazing. Listening to that story, I was thinking about where I was in 1999—and realizing how long ago that actually is. A lot has changed. How would you describe the changes in that Venn diagram you talked about—between academic rigor and commercial market research—and the role ethnography plays in it?Yeah, it’s something I think about a lot. Probably too much. It’s a bit of an inside baseball kind of question—but it’s a good one.When I first started out, focus groups were the thing in qualitative work. There was a little bit of ethnography happening in London, but it was really at the margins. It was incredibly hard to make a case for small-n studies. Incredibly hard to justify spending half a day with a single person.And to be perfectly honest, while the little micro-business I had was successful in its own terms, it was hard work. So I jumped ship to Intel—at a time when a wave was building, particularly in corporate America and tech companies. There was this growing swell of interest. In my intake alone, 35 to 40 ethnographers or anthropologists joined Intel. It was a wave, and I rode it.If you want to periodize it, the application of anthropology and ethnography in business can be dated back as far as the 1920s, depending on what you’ve read—and with good reason. But I think there was a big surge from the early 2000s to around 2010–2015.Then came the rise of terms like “UXR”—User Experience Research. And with it, a kind of consolidation—a shift, really. As I’ve written about critically, there was a “UX-ification” of the field. The focus shifted—not always, but often—toward less deep, more tactical questions.What we had at Intel was the ability to think in extremely long wavelengths, to approach problems deeply and broadly. That’s changed. The wave crested, and then a different kind of wave emerged—this UXR wave.Which brings us back to where we started this conversation, even before the microphone was on. We're now in this slightly strange moment—a time of relentless cost optimization, process orientation, and professionalization. In some ways, those things have taken over within UXR.And now, of course, our new interloper: AI.So it’s a very different environment. At this point, I think of it in three distinct phases—each of which I’ve had the pleasure (or misfortune) of riding through.Yeah. Well, I loved that piece you wrote—the one you referenced—”The UX-ification of research.” Do you have thoughts about the acronyms? I’m always struck by how odd they are—UX, CX—this strangely robotic naming of what is essentially a qualitative interface between an organization and its users. It just feels so strange to me.Yeah, it is. I suppose I haven’t really thought much about it, apart from just noting it. I mean, it would be interesting to check Google Trends—when did “UXR” actually start gaining traction as a label for a type of researcher?Because, you know, Rick Robinson and Elab, and some of that early Sapient-era stuff—that was “experience modeling,” right? As far as I know, the word “experience” entered the nomenclature in the late ’90s or early 2000s.So, in many ways, it’s fine. Everybody needs labels—labels are useful for other people. But I do think the perennial problem UXRs face is actually the “R” at the end. It signals that you do one specific kind of thing and that you occupy a particular slot in a process. It positions you as someone who provides input, rather than someone who drives an overall process.So UXR, in service of product management, has created a kind of asymmetry. And I think—and this might be a bit controversial—but I think the current obsession with research ops, with optimization, with process, with bowing down to rules that we didn’t create but that others imposed… it’s left us in a position that feels somewhat inferior. We’re beneath the centers of power.That said, researchers—at least since they’ve been in businesses—have always felt they deserved a seat at or near the top table but rarely got it. Maybe there’s something about what we do, or who we are, that just doesn’t quite enable that. Of course, there are exceptions—at Intel, I knew researchers who rose to extremely senior roles. So it’s not impossible.But at some point, you do have to be willing to step back from the “researcher” part and take on other kinds of responsibilities—ones that may be more mundane, more political, less fun. I think it’s very hard to be a fully embodied, full-throated researcher and a shoulder-padded, swaggering executive.I don’t know. Maybe that’s okay. I’m happy.How have you navigated that?I’ve navigated it by running my own businesses.And I think—speaking for myself, but also for my two co-founders and the rest of the partners at Stripe Partners—what we value most about the business is, broadly, that we run our own ship. We make our own decisions. Our targets are our own. They’re not imposed by someone else. We can chart our own course. We can be nimble.We get to decide.And it’s funny—there are a lot of founders who peacock around on LinkedIn talking about being founders, but they’re usually in tech. I think it’s interesting that people who run research and strategy businesses don’t really lean into that founder identity—the “founder mindset,” the “habits of great founders,” all that stuff. But we are founders. We’re businesspeople.We just tend to emphasize the research part of our identities, rather than the business part, in how we present ourselves. But we have mouths to feed, bills to pay, P&Ls to manage, profit margins to protect—all the same realities any business has. It’s just that we’re craftspeople at heart. We’d rather look at the world through a project than a spreadsheet.Yeah, well, that’s beautiful. All those forces you just described—those are exactly the ones that squeeze craft out of research. People get flattened by the machinery of mediocrity. So I’m curious: how do you make space for the kind of work you want to do? Ethnography, craft—the parts that get squeezed out elsewhere—how do you create space for that?I mean, I think fundamentally, by advocating for craft—right? I remember, in the very early years of Stripe Partners, we had endless conversations about, in simple terms: how do we want to be seen? Do we want to be seen as strategy people, innovation people, or researchers?And I think the simple answer is: all three.But research shouldn’t be seen as a dirty word. It shouldn’t be regarded merely as an input into “strategy” or “innovation”—and if you’re reading the transcript, those should be in bold, with quote marks. We’ve always wanted to lean into research and be strong advocates for doing it properly.Because it matters.Having a robust—if not foolproof—understanding of the world gives you the foundation to address not just the problem that brought you to write the brief, but all sorts of other eventualities too. We’ve always taken the view: let’s not be bashful about what we do. We believe in the power of research to help businesses get things done.And if that resonates with you, you’re probably going to make a good client.That’s not to downplay the importance of other things that make research successful. But we’re in a moment, as you know, where there are tools everywhere claiming to do incredibly complex things at the push of a button—sometimes with synthetic users or similar shortcuts.That makes our stance more important than ever.I read recently that the policy unit in Number 10 Downing Street was using synthetic user panels to help decide policy. And to me, there’s no greater illustration of why we have a government that promised a lot and has delivered very little of substance—because it’s not even talking to people.There are dark forces at work, and we need to be alert to them. Yes, we need to be efficient. Yes, we sometimes need to optimize processes, move faster. But we also need to be careful about what we’re letting into our corner of the commercial world. A lot of these tools are far less useful than they claim to be.Yeah. The synthetic user stuff—I remember someone asking me, “How do you make the case for qualitative research in the age of all these tools?” It really threw me. That was right around the time you and I were interacting around synthetic users. And it got existential really fast. These things are strange. How do you make the case for what you called a ‘singular understanding of the world’? What’s the value this kind of work brings—especially now, with all these cheap, easy replicas?Well, I think it goes back to this fundamental question: is research just an input, or is it something more? Is it an experience? A process? A dialogic process—a kind of exchange that you go through with clients?Very early on, we stumbled into—or maybe deliberately developed—a way of doing research that is about as far removed from synthetic users as you can get. We call it the ethnographic research studio.It’s a simple idea: if you want to understand the world, you go into the world. That much is obvious. That’s what anthropologists, ethnographers, and good market researchers have always done.But our twist was: do it with clients. Do it in a compressed, focused time frame—a week, maybe 10 days. Focus rigorously on the core problem you’re trying to solve, the questions you’re trying to answer. And take people on a journey—one that goes beyond interviews. It's about creating experiences: cocktail parties with experts at your Airbnb, dinners, guided immersions—anything that brings people closer to the world they’re trying to understand.And what we quickly discovered is: it works. It delivers a strong first set of answers, fast. The team can walk away and immediately start acting while we dig deeper, synthesize, and make meaning of what was learned. So it’s fast, it’s deep, and it’s highly embodied—a word I’ve become really interested in.It gives people—clients—verbal and nonverbal resources they can draw from later. Even subconsciously, they replay that research as they go on to do their work. It embeds.We’ve been doing it since 2013. We still get a lot of interest in it. In fact, we’ve got a team off to Atlanta next week to do just that with some clients.It works. It’s fun. It reinvigorates our clients. It reminds them that there are real people out there in the world they’re building for. And it’s magical. It puts a smile on my face, on our team’s faces, on our clients’ faces. I think even the participants enjoy it.So it’s just—an all-around knockout. A great experience, great value for money, a great way to learn about the world.And no synthetic users involved.Here’s a lightly edited and polished version of your transcript. The language has been smoothed for readability, but all tone, voice, and nuance are preserved:What do you think it is that puts the smile on people’s faces? What were you thinking when you said that?I just think it's the happy, it's just….I was doing one of these with a client—who must remain nameless—in Chicago about three weeks ago. We spent a week digging into stuff related to television, and I took a UX writer and a designer to meet two women.They happened to be living in what I think are called “drunk houses” in the U.S.—which is probably not the most appropriate term—but essentially, it was a women’s refuge for recovering alcoholics. A very different environment.And we walked out two and a half hours later, and they were just like, “Wow. There was so much in there.” And I said, “Yeah... you haven’t seen anything yet. We’re doing this all week.”I think it’s just that—corporate environments are very sequestered. If you live in the Bay Area, you get on your shiny white bus, you’re driven to a nice campus, you’ve got the micro-kitchen, all the amenities. You go to a lot of meetings, and you don’t have to pay for anything. You forget that there’s a whole other America out there.Someone once told me about their brother who works at Meta—he picked something up at Hudson News in the airport and just walked off with it. Someone had to run after him. He’d completely forgotten that, in the real world, you have to pay for things. He was just on autopilot. But Hudson News isn’t a micro-kitchen.So, I think the smiles come from that reconnection with the world. It’s the most thunderingly obvious thing to say, but it matters more than almost anything else. If we don’t do that, everything gets reduced to personas and numbers on spreadsheets—just disembodied entities we can’t truly make decisions about unless we understand what makes them tick. As humans. As flesh, blood, bones, beating hearts. That stuff matters.You need to feel it.Corporate strategy, in my view, is completely unfeeling. And—this is a longer answer—but whenever private equity firms buy food franchises, what do they do? They value-engineer the hell out of them. All the magic disappears. Why? Because they’re running businesses through spreadsheets, with very little emotional connection to the food, the customers, the neighborhoods. But if you're going to scale a food franchise, it's not about shaving off a few tortilla chips to save pennies on margins.That’s always been the thing for me: businesses have a natural tendency to distance themselves from the worlds they serve. And our job is to bring them—and their people—back into the world, and use that as the foundation for doing something meaningful for their customers.Yeah, it’s beautiful. You mentioned “embodiment,” which of course connects to your book The Power of Not Thinking. What was the origin of that? When did it occur to you that this was something people would want to talk about—needed to hear?The simple answer is: we did one of our research studios. I write about it in the book—we took a team from Duracell on a camping trip. It was completely nuts. But it worked.All of us—the core of Stripe Partners at the time, me, Tom, and Tom—we came out of it just going, “Wow.” High-fives all around. “That was f*****g amazing. That actually worked.”We got somewhere incredible with that group in one week. And then came the question: Why? Why did it work?That’s really what the book is—an attempt to answer that question. And I owe a huge debt to Tom and Tom for shaping that thinking. My name’s on the front, but the ideas were a shared effort.It comes back to what we were just talking about. Businesses disappear into themselves. They lose touch. So how do you get people out of that?Yes, great—you take them out into the world. But what happens then? Why does that work? What happens when your body experiences something, as opposed to just analyzing cells in a spreadsheet or flipping through PowerPoint slides?That was really the starting point.Then came the process of figuring out what kind of book that might become—which is a whole other story. But it was a fun experience. A difficult one, especially while running a business that was, at the time, much smaller.I have a copy here, and I love the cover. I’m sure there are different versions, but mine has this kind of generic figure holding its own head.Yeah. Well, I’m sure any author will tell you—when you see a cover or even a version of the cover, you think, OK, this is actually going to be a book. It’s exciting.But yeah, I mean, I’m sure you don’t need or want me to sit here and publicize the book. I’m not very good at that. And I quickly realized that 80 percent of writing a book is actually publicizing it—not just writing it.But I am increasingly feeling like the ideas in it are more important than ever. Even if I didn’t articulate them as well as I could have, I still think they matter—especially in the context of where the research industry is going. I think they’re relevant to policymakers and decision-makers, and their ongoing inability to really get down with people and understand their worlds.And of course, it's even more relevant now in the context of AI. I think—perhaps with the exception of what I wrote about robotics, which is going through a really interesting phase thanks to advances in general AI—I still stand by what I wrote about AI more broadly.Jan LeCun at Meta put it beautifully the other day: a child, by the age of four, has received as much data as the most powerful large language model (LLM). In other words, most of what we know—about ourselves, about the world, about other people—is not represented in any way inside an LLM.And I think we need to quit this idea that these things are “intelligent” in any meaningful way—unless we actually sit down and define what we mean by intelligence. They can’t reason the way humans can. They don’t know most of what humans know.That’s not to say they aren’t useful, or that you can’t do some things more quickly or efficiently with them. But I think we’ve slightly lost our collective mind.So the question becomes: how do we want to respond to this?I’d say with an open mind—but also a good deal of skepticism. Because I imagine most of the big tech companies touting these systems would love for us to believe they’re more powerful than they really are. That would suit them. But we don’t have to play along with that script.Yeah. What do you see next? I mean, maybe a silly question—but when you look ahead, when you think about the role of synthetic research or synthetic users or whatever we want to call it—what happens?I don’t know. I really don’t know what I see.More broadly, with AI—there’s no doubt this is powerful stuff. It’s world-changing. But as Roy Amara said: we tend to overestimate the impact in the short term, and underestimate it in the long term.And I think that’s true here. Right now, we’re probably overestimating its short-term effects—but underestimating what it will do in the long run.And that’s what’s scary. Not the technology itself, but the fact that we’ve welcomed it into our lives so uncritically. It doesn’t seem like we’ve done a huge amount of thinking about what it means—for us, for the value of what we do, for work.So, in the context of research, it’s as I said earlier: be careful what you wish for. If you want to automate yourself out of existence, well—you’re doing a bloody fine job of it. And you’re doing all of this based on a technology that’s been around for, what, a year and a half? Two years? Right?Meanwhile, we’ve got this technology called the body—which has been around for hundreds of thousands of years—and it seems to work pretty well for a lot of what we’re trying to do, which is make sense of the world.Especially in earlier phases of human history, when the world was bigger, badder, and nastier than it is now—even if it still feels like a bit of a mess today. Our bodies are pretty good. They’re well-tested. It’s well-tried kit.So I never cease to marvel at how quickly people will jump on the latest thing. Never ceases to amaze me how many “experts” pop up overnight. You’d think they’d been working on this stuff forever. It’s amazing.So yeah, I’m a healthy skeptic. At Stripe Partners, we’re trying to think carefully about how we introduce AI into our work—how we do it ethically, how it makes sense for our clients legally and from a data protection perspective. And how we use it to be more rigorous, more robust in what we do.At the same time, of course, we’re also trying to serve some of the needs of our paymasters—whether that’s doing things a bit more quickly or, occasionally, a bit more cheaply. But that doesn’t mean we throw everything out and go all-in.It seems to me that much of the industry is just putting all their chips on red. And I’m not sure red is going to come in. Or maybe it will come in—but not for a while. And we haven’t really thought it through. So yeah. I worry.Yeah. That’s a beautiful spot to end our conversation. I do have one silly question, though. I’m curious about the name Stripe Partners. Is there a story behind that?Yeah. Again—kind of like the question about what we do—what’s the good or right answer?I think we wanted something simple. I mean, we obviously needed to find a URL—which wasn’t easy, even years after the dot-com boom. So adding “Partners” made sense; it allowed us to pick another word, then attach “Partners” to it and grab a workable domain.There were three of us at the start. And “Stripe”… well, I think we wanted to communicate something simple, clean, and abstract—but also something that suggested structure, form, even movement.It wasn’t meant to be too literal. We didn’t want to be called something like “Insight Co.” or “Innovation Group” or anything overly obvious. “Stripe” felt open-ended enough to grow with, while “Partners” grounded it in the fact that collaboration is central to what we do—both internally and with clients.So yeah, practical reasons like finding a domain, but also a kind of quiet metaphor in the name. It felt right.We wanted the name to communicate, in some sense, a degree of alacrity—efficiency and speed. Which kind of goes back to where we began, right? Academic research is obviously more rigorous, more time-consuming, and—yes—in many cases, much more thoughtful than the three- or four-month projects I’ve described.But I do think that a certain degree of robustness and rigor can be achieved within that timeframe. So maybe it’s not the speediest research in the world, but it’s still research with depth.So “Stripe” was meant to signify some speed, I think. I believe that was the origin story.And you know—we’ve never been contacted by the lawyers at Stripe, the finance company, which is probably a good thing… because they’re a bit wealthier than us.Well, Simon, thank you so much. I really appreciate your time. It’s been a pleasure to speak with you.And if you don’t already subscribe to Peter’s lovely weekly missive—with five excellent topics, or thematic buckets, or whatever you want to call them—you jolly well should.Beautiful. I thank you for that.All right. 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