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Noam Chomsky:
Reading between the lines

Noam Chomsky—American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. He is sometimes referred to as ‘the father of modern linguistics’ and is also a major figure in analytic philosophy, and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. Here, he talks about the changing nature of media, journalism, politics and censorship. This interview was featured in Open Manifesto #4 which focused on the theme ‘Propaganda’.

Note: This interview took place in 2007 and refers to specifics from that time.

Kevin Finn: There is a saying: ‘A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing’.

Noam Chomsky: Would you agree with this statement? A little bit of knowledge is, almost by definition, omitting certain facets of information, which are very likely entirely relevant. A little bit of knowledge can give a very distorted picture. One of the reasons propaganda is so distorting is that it focuses on a little bit of knowledge, which may be true, but it is removed from the bigger picture and this changes the story entirely.

Historically, there have been particularly visual reactions to this. For example, graphic design has a history in political poster art—Eastern Europe, Cuba, the American Civil Rights Movement, The Vietnam War, CND, etc. This is not so prevalent today. Where do you see the visual arts political commentary currently?

The visual arts? Well, they are very prevalent today. A big part of the youth culture is gaining an understanding of the world from music, visual arts, graphics, comedy, and so on. It’s true you don’t have the remarkable virile character of the poster art of those particular periods, or at least, not that I am aware of. But it’s taking other forms.

What other forms do you see are more prevalent?

Oh, just watching my grandchildren; music, for example, which has political content—I don’t grasp it, but they do. Or film. Most films these days have a similar influence.

With this political content, do you feel that propaganda has an inherently political agenda?

No. It depends on how broadly you interpret ‘political’. People who have some message or doctrine, they’re all typically prepared to use the most attractive ways in the control of thought to make it work for them.

People who have some message or doctrine, they’re all typically prepared to use the most attractive ways in the control of thought to make it work for them.

You mentioned film and music. Do you subscribe to Marshall McLuhan’s phrase ‘the medium is the message’?

I understand what he is saying. There is some truth to it, but I don’t think it’s a good idea to accept that it applies to everything. There is no doubt the medium in which some messages are conveyed may of course have a major effect in fulfilling them forcefully and dramatically. For example, I have seen documentaries and films that have been incredibly moving, as with music of course.

In light of heightened media coverage of conflicts and international upheavals, has the media replaced ‘reporting’ with ‘entertainment’ for the sake of ratings?

I’m not so sure there has been increased media coverage. In many ways it’s the opposite. For example, embedded journalists do not report directly. Their reporting is indirect. In contrast, journalists who are out in the field and who are not embedded within military units get a good picture of what is happening, but they are outside of controlling it. That is the reason for the recent practice of insisting on embedding reporters. And generally this practice is not just used by The Pentagon. It is also used by the major corporate media, which often will not purchase material from non-embedded reporters.

The craft of journalism is a very honourable one and there are people who do it brilliantly and courageously. But it is also very easy to become embedded (to borrow the word) into a system of doctrines and perspectives, which very much narrows and distorts the picture of what is being presented. And there is a lot of that.

How can we counter this?

The way to counter that is by compensating for those clear and obvious distorting perspectives by looking for other sources, by reading between the lines, by comparing today’s news with yesterdays.

There are even some simple tricks. For example, if you read an article about a current contemporary issue, say in The New York Times, or any one of the world’s major newspapers, you see the front-page story, with a big headline, and this follows on in a continuation page. I have learned over the years a useful practice, which is to start reading the article from the end. That is, pick the last few paragraphs on a continuation page and read them.

What you find very often (I don’t know if this is done consciously by journalists) is the material there is very significant and is marginalised to a degree because it is hidden at the end where people are unlikely to see it, except for the really dedicated. What is in the first paragraph, which is basically for the headline writers and the editors, tends to veer more towards the accepted party line. Of course, it’s not like an algorithm. It doesn’t work mechanically, but it is one of many devices people can use (and there are many) to decode the material that is being presented and to penetrate the reality.

In some respect, it’s not unlike the sciences. Mother Nature doesn’t tell you, ‘This is the important information’. You have to find it; you have to pull it out of masses of irrelevancies. The difference in reading the media or the journals, etc, is that Mother Nature doesn’t have an agenda. It’s not trying to persuade you.

The way to counter that is by compensating for those clear and obvious distorting perspectives by looking for other sources, by reading between the lines, by comparing today’s news with yesterdays.

Of course, that would rely on education, general knowledge and a will to actually seek out that information.

One has to be careful about that, too. In fact, George Orwell made an interesting comment about it that should be better known. Everybody has read Animal Farm [1945]. But very few people have read the introduction to Animal Farm. The reason is it wasn’t published. It was discovered later in Orwell’s unpublished papers.

The introduction is interesting. It’s not his greatest essay, but it is interesting. It’s about what he calls ‘literary censorship’ in England. In his introduction he states the book is about the hideous controls enforced by a totalitarian state. But in free England, it’s not very different. He says in England it is possible to suppress unwelcome thoughts without the use of force. And he has a few remarks on how it’s done. They are brief, but basically correct.

He says one reason for this is that wealthy men own the press and they have every reason not to want certain thoughts to be expressed. And the other reason is a good education. Go to the good schools (you have your Oxford and Cambridge), and you simply have instilled within you an understanding that there are certain things that wouldn’t do to say—or, for that matter, to think. And you have it internalised. That’s one of the effects of a ‘good’ education.

It’s my view, and I have occasionally written about this, that if you take the opinions of Americans, which is a very well studied society, on a wide variety of issues, they are considerably more civilised and constructive than the policies of the political class and, for the most part, the intellectual class. I think the reason is that they are just less indoctrinated.

Do you see entertainment playing a role as a tool of propaganda?

It has an enormous role. Look at a television ad: if we lived in a market society and there were advertisements on television, they’d resemble what you study in economics courses, which tell you a market is based on informed consumers making rational choices. So the ads would give you necessary information about the product. But when you look at an ad on television, say a lifestyle drug, is it trying to turn you into an informed consumer making rational choices? No.

Businesses are spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year to create uninformed consumers who make irrational choices by entertainment, by delusion. The lifestyle drug doesn’t say, ‘Here are my characteristics’. It has a model or a football player or somebody saying, ‘Ask your doctor whether it’s good for you. It’s great for me’. This is followed with a presentation of a marvellous scene showing how great it is. It just happens to be entertainment but it is primarily intended to be delusion. It’s oppression and an undermining of markets.

It’s the same method public relations companies employ to sell [political] candidates. They don’t want you to know the candidate’s stance on issues. They want you to be deluded by imagery of their qualities and their personalities, and so on. And pretty much the same measures used to undermine markets are used to undermine democracy. And that’s through a kind of entertainment.

Businesses are spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year to create uninformed consumers who make irrational choices by entertainment, by delusion.

Is it fair to say whatever ‘delusion’ advertising might offer that it is, in fact, a form of education of the masses—on a large scale—somewhat akin to the indoctrination of the political and intellectual classes Orwell discusses?

If you change ‘education’ to ‘miseducation’, that’s more or less true. There is a certain similarity of intent and of process.

Earlier you mentioned advertising and its tendency toward using elements of propaganda. Do you think, in the present ‘cult of the consumer’, graphic design and advertising are behaving irresponsibly?

In more honest days it was called propaganda. If you take the book written by one of the founders of the American public relations industry back in the 1920s, Edward Bernays, he wrote a particular book, kind of like a handbook—and it was just called Propaganda. During the Second World War, the term propaganda took on a negative connotation. It became associated with the Nazis and the Russians, and so on. So the term fell out of use in English-speaking countries. In fact, it is still in use in some other languages. But in the English-speaking countries, the term propaganda was restricted to the propaganda carried out by enemies. In contrast, what we do is called something better, like ‘information’.

In some countries it gets pretty funny. Take Israel. Hebrew used to have a word for ‘propaganda’. Now it’s used in reference to the propaganda of others. And it has been replaced in Hebrew by a word that translates as ‘explanation’. That’s Israeli propaganda.

The usage carries the presupposition that ‘since everything we do is obviously right, we don’t have to convince people. We just have to explain it to them’. Well that’s a good technique of propaganda and we [America] use a similar one.

Another phrase might be ‘manufacturing consent’.

Well, ‘manufacturing consent’ is a phrase that I’ve used but I borrowed it. I borrowed it from the leading public intellectual of the 20th century, a most noted and honoured figure in the media, the liberal progressive, Walter Lippman. His argument, back in about 1920, was that there was, what he called, a new art in democracy—namely ‘manufacturing consent’ to decisions made by the leaders.

He had a theory that the public is irrational, they are hysterical outsiders, a bewildered herd. For their own benefit, we, the wise, serious, responsible men, must manufacture consent to what we know is in their best interest. It would be too dangerous to let them make their own choices.

It’s like speaking to a three year-old. You wouldn’t want a child to run into the street so you grab their arm and pull them back. As responsible intellectuals, like Walter Lippman, we have a task of ensuring that the dangerous and irrational outsiders—the public—don’t enter into public affairs.

Edward Bernays said pretty much the same thing in his book. He called it ‘engineering consent’. He said the intelligent minority, namely us, must engineer the consent from these stupid and ignorant masses—the public—for their own good, of course.

And this is not right wing. These are the liberals on the liberal left. And it’s an old view of the liberal left. Notice that it is very similar to Lenin. There is a striking similarity between Lenin’s doctrine and progressive liberal democratic doctrine. I think that is one of the reasons why people flip so easily between one position and another. It is basically the same doctrine: ‘we’ know the right way and they are too ignorant or stupid to understand it so therefore ‘we’ have to drive them in the right direction, by force if necessary. And if we can’t achieve this by force, we will do so by propaganda, by engineering consent, by entertainment, and so on. But the principle is very much the same and it runs right to the present.

It is basically the same doctrine: ‘we’ know the right way and they are too ignorant or stupid to understand it so therefore ‘we’ have to drive them in the right direction, by force if necessary. And if we can’t achieve this by force, we will do so by propaganda, by engineering consent, by entertainment, and so on.

As you have mentioned in one of your books [Imperial Ambitions (2006)], there is a direct relationship between propaganda and privilege. How does this manifest itself?

One relation is (you can see the history develop very clearly) as countries became more democratic, through popular struggle—and remember it was a struggle, it was never a gift—as more and more rights were won by the public, for example the rights for women to vote, the rights of unions and so on, the power to coerce was reduced. And as the power to coerce was reduced, educated sectors, like those we quoted, recognised that it would be necessary to turn to another means of control. We can’t control them with a club anymore so we have to control them with propaganda because we are more privileged, more right. And that was explicit.

Another effect, which I think is more demonstrable but more subtle, is what Orwell was talking about. That is, the more privileged and educated you are the more likely you are to be subject to indoctrination.

Sometimes the elite are extremely frank about this. For example, after the 1960s, which was a very civilising and democratising era, that’s why they call it the ‘Time of Troubles’, things changed dramatically. This period immediately raised the level of civilisation in countries, and not just here [America]. And that was terrifying for the elites.

In fact, it was called a ‘crisis of democracy’. There was so much democracy they had to do something about it. I’m now just keeping to the liberal internationalist sectors, not the reactionaries. Now, their position was explicitly that we have to move the mass of the population back to apathy and obedience. And in particular, we have to ensure that the (and I’m virtually quoting now) ‘institutions responsible for the indoctrination of the young’ do their job properly to prevent any further ideas like these from developing. Carry out your task of ‘indoctrination of the young’. That’s their phrase—on the Liberal side.

What about propaganda’s relationship with religion?

Well, it varies with different countries. I mean, there is a fundamentalist wave spreading all over the world: Hindu fundamentalism, Islamic fundamentalism, Jewish fundamentalism, Christian fundamentalism. It’s just about everywhere you look. And it certainly is being stimulated by propaganda. I don’t know if you follow this [in Australia], but take the mega-churches of the United States. The United States has always been off the spectrum in relation to religious extremism. This goes back to the early colonies and there are regular periods of great revival. [America] has always been deeply committed to religious fundamentalism—very different from most other industrial societies. I don’t think you’ll find any other country where half the population believes the world was created, maybe 10,000 years ago exactly the way it is now. You might have to go off and find a remote tribe in New Guinea or somewhere like that to find something similar. But it’s about half the population of the United States.

And this has now become organised, explicitly, via major propaganda efforts by public relations firms. One of the recent developments, which is quite dramatic, are these mega-churches. They are huge institutions where thousands of people are brought together and whipped into emotional fanaticism and religious zeal with what are called ‘charismatic preachers’ in some huge church in the middle of a region surrounded by satellite churches, all linked together by top-notch technology.

Watching these things, I have to tell you, it reminds me of childhood experiences, which I was too little to understand but I could sort of get the picture. I remember as a child, back in the 1930s listening on the radio to the Nuremberg rallies. I didn’t understand the words, but I caught the mood. It was scary.

Is there such a thing as good propaganda?

It’s almost a contradiction in terms. It depends on our values. If we regard it as ‘good’ for people to be free to make up their own minds, to have adequate resources and access to information, to think creatively and freely in their interaction with others—if that is our ideal, the enlightenment ideal, by definition propaganda is not good for us because propaganda is designed to undermine all of that.

Image Credit:

Noam Chomsky portrait sourced on Britannica website

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Edward de Bono:
Thinking to create value

Edward de Bono—influential physician, psychologist, author, and inventor—discusses the value of design and creativity. This interview was featured in Open Manifesto #7 which focused on the theme ‘Enlightened self-interest’. (Sadly, Edward passed away in 2021, aged 88.)

Kevin Finn: Can you describe, in simple terms, the essence of your approach to thinking?

Edward de Bono: My approach to thinking is based on an understanding of how the brain works. In my medical research I dealt a lot with the complicated systems of the body—glands, kidneys, circulation, everything. I developed theories of self-organizing systems and applied these to the neural networks of the brain. My book “The Mechanism of Mind,” published in 1969, describes this. To put it simply, the brain works as a self-organizing system; it forms patterns. So I explored the question: “What is a logical patterning system?” From that, I developed my approach to thinking.

In your book Lateral Thinking you place a great deal of importance on design. Is this because design is a deliberate act and aligns well with how we should think?

Yes. I put a lot of importance on design, because design is putting together what you have to deliver, in terms of the values you want or provide. Most of our thinking at all levels—school, university, everything—is concerned with analysis. Analysis is concerned with finding the truth: “What is this?” Design, on the other hand, is producing something which isn’t there, or wasn’t there before. Indeed, there’s a huge problem with our thinking in general and at all levels, including at senior levels. The problem relates to a belief that our thinking is concerned with finding the truth. This began in The Middle Ages, where schools, universities, and general thinking were all in the hands of the Church. The Church was interested in finding the truth, in order to prove heretics wrong and to support their belief structure.

So we developed good thinking—finding the truth—which became scientific thinking, which is excellent. But culturally, we never developed thinking for creating value.

So, how do we need to think to produce something that doesn’t yet exist? Design is one particular aspect of that because it concerns itself with creating something that doesn’t yet exist, as opposed to finding the truth, which is always there until we find it.

In your work, you often refer to breaking patterns of traditional thinking. Since design is a very deliberate act, is it correct to say your work seeks to promote and prompt people to think deliberately?

Yes, certainly. That’s why the Chinese are very interested in my work, because they know they need creativity. They’re not going to be creative by being crazy or ‘off the wall.’ They like a sensible, structured approach to creativity, so they like my books and training programmes.

You also place considerable importance on creativity. In your book Lateral Thinking you state: “In order to be able to use creativity one must rid it of this aura of mystique and regard it as a way of using the mind—a way of handling information.” I understand you have been criticized for not offering a definition for creativity. Why are you reluctant to define creativity?

Our general approach to creativity is a belief that it’s not normal, that it’s mysterious, that it’s some strange talent that only certain people have—which we believe most people don’t have—and there’s nothing you can do about it except find people who are creative. That is so ridiculous.

Our general approach to creativity is a belief that it’s not normal, that it’s mysterious that it’s some strange talent that only certain people have—but most people don’t have—and there’s nothing you can do about it except find people who are creative. That is so ridiculous.

I look at creativity as an activity of the brain, an activity with patterned systems. Interestingly, the most important function of the brain, which amazingly philosophers have never mentioned and psychologists pay very little attention to, if any, is humour, because humor indicates the brain is working as a patterning system.

Here is a simple example: A man aged 90 dies and goes down to hell. As he’s wandering around, he sees a friend, also aged 90. His friend has a beautiful young lady sitting on his knee. So, he says to his friend: “Are you sure this is hell, because you seem to be having rather a good time?” His friend looks up and says: “It’s hell all right. I’m the punishment for her.”

[Laughing]

This demonstrates a pattern, a perfectly logical pattern heading towards an end-point. But then a different end-point is introduced, which in hindsight is perfectly logical. If the brain can do that, then there’s an absolute need for creativity because there are points in the brain, which you cannot get to with logic, but once you’re there they are perfectly logical in hindsight. So without creativity you’re never going to get to those points, meaning humor is very, very key—and, as I said, it’s totally neglected.

Now, with regards to offering a definition of creativity, the problem with creativity in the English language is that it’s so wide. It covers artistic creativity, intellectual creativity, etc.

I would define creativity as developing an idea—or project, or product, or whatever it is—which in hindsight is valuable and logical but which you could not have gotten there by logical development. In hindsight, yes, but not with foresight. So, it’s the asymmetry of patterns that defines creativity.

I would define creativity as developing an idea—or project, or products, or whatever it is—which in hindsight is valuable and logical but which you could not have gotten there by logical progression. In hindsight, yes, but not with foresight.

You believe: “Insight, creativity and humour are so elusive because the mind is so efficient.” You go on to describe how this is based on patterns and the objective is to re-pattern the mind. But is this easier said than done? Are we simply hard-wired to resist change?

Now the brain, of course, is designed to use patterns, otherwise life would be incredibly difficult. If you get up in the morning and have 11 pieces of clothing to put on, there are actually over 39 million possible ways of getting dressed. If you tried one every minute of your waking life, you would need to live to be 76 years old doing nothing else except trying ways of getting dressed. So clearly, we should be immensely grateful that the brain establishes routine patterns and uses them.

In general, for almost all our activities, we should be very grateful that the brain does use patterns. But then we also need to find ways of escaping from these patterns, and that is what I’m talking about.

I love the audacity of the opening line in the preface of your book Six Thinking Hats: “The Six Thinking Hats method may be the most important change in human thinking for the past twenty-three hundred years.” You go on to qualify: “That may seem a rather exaggerated claim, but the evidence is beginning to point that way.” The evidence you refer to relates to major corporations like IBM, Siemens and Statoil, who have implemented your methods with great success. Successful outcomes are an obvious benefit to business, but can you share with us some of the tangible benefits businesses can expect from employing your thinking methods?

Yes, yes. I often say Six Thinking Hats may be the most important change in human thinking for the past twenty-three hundred years, because it relates to practical thinking. I say this because of the Greek gang of three (Socrates, Plato and Aristotle), whom twenty-three or twenty-four hundred years ago developed logical argument. Again, because of the influence of the Church, we were very happy with logical argument, and we base everything on logical argument whether it’s law courts, parliament, whatever.

So we have that, and it is excellent, but it’s not sufficient. Argument is all about proving your case, so the use of the mind is entirely negative. Technically, it’s simply defending your point of view.

Now, the brain works according to its mood, and there are many other possible moods in the brain, which we never use, for example the constructive mood, the creative mood, and so on. The Six Thinking Hats allows every person at the meeting to use their brain fully, not just for attacking.

What is really interesting—and contrary to expectations—you might think if people use their brain so much more thoroughly in all the different aspects—emotional, creative, etc—then it should take longer to resolve things. Right? In fact, it takes one tenth of the time. A major American bank claimed that using Six Thinking Hats reduced their meeting times to one tenth of what it normally took.

The reason is that, in argument, everyone wants to exert their ego in any little point they pick up to be negative and this produces endless little negative arguments. Whereas, with Six Thinking Hats there is a requirement to be constructive. You have to move something forward. Of course, the Black Hat is there to criticize and to be critical, but that’s only one of the Six Thinking Hats.

The Six Thinking Hats has had many successful outcomes. I once worked with a company, which experienced a lot of staff strikes. They used Six Thinking Hats to reduce the number of strikes to around one quarter of what they had been.

Another example: when Nokia started making mobile phones, they invited me to Helsinki right at the beginning of this transition. At the time it was a timber company making paper—specializing in lavatory paper, I think. I began by talking to a whole group, approximately 70 people. They listened, and they developed Nokia to become the biggest suppliers of mobile phones in the world.

So your work and your thinking tools are a catalyst for change?

Yes. Of course in the case of Nokia, the advantage was that they were entering into a new area so they didn’t have established ideas, or an established business. Of course, this could be interpreted in a different way.

Some might say they were successful because they had a clear idea, which is why they invited me in the first place. This is possible.

In your words: “Culture is concerned with establishing ideas. Education is concerned with communicating those ideas. Both are concerned with improving ideas and bringing them up to date. The only available method for changing ideas is conflict.” Educators like Sir Ken Robinson, and more recently Salman Khan of the Khan Academy, also believe the one-size-fits-all approach to traditional education is incredibly limited and, like you, they prefer a more creative, self-paced approach to learning. In your opinion, is the traditional education system too big, too conservative and too business-oriented to change—is there too much at stake? To use your own terms, is this the difference between the perceived ‘rightness’ and ‘richness’ of education?

The problem with education is it believes it has a responsibility to teach youngsters about the way the world is. But even in that, I think it is deficient.

For instance, in some countries like the United Kingdom, a great deal of time is spent on history—the Tudors, the War of the Roses, etc—but no time at all is spent on the “now story.” Current education doesn’t really focus on how the world works today, how business works, how employment works, how government works. So youngsters may leave school knowing all about history, but not much (if anything) about the world today. That’s one problem.

I believe the business of education is to teach children how the world works. But generally speaking, the impression is that the role of education isn’t to develop the full potential of the skills of children, particularly in relation to skills they would need to improve the world. This is missing. Although, when schools teach my thinking skills tools, it shows significant improvement in all other subjects—between 30 and 100 percent in all other subjects.

When we look at the world today—with continued financial instability, increasingly volatile conflict zones and the real threat of climate change—one would sense our society might have thinking deficiency. But how can these immense and sticky situations achieve better outcomes, considering all the cultural, economic, societal and political nuances involved?

Now, the problem with our regular thinking—and again, this applies to many areas, and universities in particular—is that the approach is on analysis. In a way, this is caveman thinking. When a caveman comes out of a cave, and he sees a red object in the bushes, what is his thinking? He’s thinking: “What is this? Is this an apple, which is good to eat? Is it a poison or something dangerous? Is it something I don’t know?” In other words, his thinking relies on recognition.

Take a doctor in a clinic. They see a patient. The doctor examines the patient. They do some tests. What are they looking for? They are looking to identify a standard situation so that they can then apply a standard treatment.

Virtually all our thinking in school—and thereafter—is to analyze, to find the standard situation, to provide the standard answer. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s very useful, but it’s not sufficient. That’s why we find it difficult to make changes

Virtually all our thinking in school—and thereafter—is to analyse, to find the standard situation, to provide the standard answer. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s very useful, but it’s not sufficient. That’s why we find it difficult to make change.

It is widely accepted that you are the original innovator and pioneer of new thinking approaches. We now see the emergence of many thinking-oriented approaches, for example Design Thinking, which have led to successful business enterprises based on these thinking concepts. We could confidently argue this trend might not be possible if not for your work. But does this trend encourage you, or are you concerned in any way?

Yes, obviously, I started writing about these things in 1970. Since then, there have been many other approaches. Some of them are based on my works. Some of them are inspired by my work. Some of them are just co-incidental.

Would this trend have been possible without my work? It’s impossible to tell, but I think that my work has had a big influence on the whole trend happening at the moment. I hear from many different fields—people in music and art, among many other areas— about how my work has affected them. Of course, I am concerned about people who—as it were—steal my work and claim it’s theirs. That’s a problem.

But are you encouraged by the general sense that a focus on thinking is becoming more mainstream?

Yes, yes, I am.

When we spoke yesterday you mentioned a new book you’re writing—and which is yet to be published. You have recently turned 82, a wonderful achievement in itself. You are still developing ideas and material, but what do you believe will be the legacy of your life’s work?

My new book will be about ‘thinking to create value’ because, as I say, the Church was only interested in finding ‘the truth.’

Thinking to create value, which I call ‘bonting’—a word that comes from the Latin ‘bonus’ and ‘bonum,’ and of course, my name de Bono. Lets say we are sitting at a meeting and we are analyzing figures, and so on. We could say: “Wait a minute. Let’s do some bonting. Let’s create some value.” Because creating value is important.

I think the legacy of my life work centers around attention to deliberate direct thinking, both in terms of lateral thinking, and creativity, as well as the Six Thinking Hats, and aspects like that. They’re very different from just the analysis of philosophers who were looking at things and putting names on concepts, and so and so.

Even though you’re working on new a book “Bonting”, is it a correct assessment to suggest your work has always been about creating value?

Yes, that’s absolutely true. It is the creation of value which doesn’t yet exist, rather than the discovery of truth. I’m not saying discovery of truth is wrong. It’s excellent, but it’s not enough. That’s why, a few years ago, I invented the word Ebne, (Excellent But Not Enough).

[Both Laughing]

You might clean the floor, and may have done an excellent job—but not enough. We’ve also needed that word for twenty-four thousand years—since the Greek gang of three. Previously, we couldn’t have added it because, if on the other side of the dialectic is ‘truth’, well, if someone was true, you can’t be more true than the truth, right? It had to do with action operations.

The other side of the dialectic is perhaps good wasn’t enough, and it would be very wrong to say, “It’s fine,” when it’s not. But it would be very wrong to say, “It’s wrong and bad,” when it’s not wrong and bad. So we do need a way of saying, “It is excellent but not enough.”

And when you bring in ‘truth,’ there is always the possibility of fanaticism—those people who will not budge because their belief is embedded in a particular truth…

Yes, that’s right! And because with the truth, there’s all the religious connotations; fanaticism means you can’t consider other possibilities. So, my work is about value, rather than truth. That’s not to say I think that the search for truth is wrong. It is correct, it’s excellent—but it’s not enough.

Image Credit:

Edward de Bono portrait provided by Edward de Bono

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Adam Grant:
Give and Take

Psychologist and best-selling author Adam Grant talks about the psychology between ‘givers’ and ‘takers’, the nuances around the practice of ‘paying it forward’ and argues generosity can be a key to success. This interview was featured in Open Manifesto #7 which focused on the theme ‘Enlightened self-interest’.

Kevin Finn: Can you briefly describe the difference between a giver, a taker and a matcher?

Adam Grant: I think of these as three different styles of interaction. The takers are people who love to get as much as possible from others and never want to give anything back, unless they absolutely have to. That usually means they’re trying to hog all of the interesting and visible projects and leave the grunt work for everybody else they collaborate with—and yet walk away with the majority of the credit when the work is done.

At the other end of the spectrum, we have people that I call givers. I don’t necessarily mean a philanthropist or a volunteer, but rather the kind of person who enjoys helping others—and frequently does it without any strings attached. Givers are often sharing their knowledge, making introductions, maybe providing mentoring or just stepping up to help their colleagues.

Then, in the middle of that spectrum, we have matchers, who are people that like to keep an even balance of ‘give and take.’ It’s quid pro quo. If I’m a matcher, and I was to do you a favour, I would expect an equal one back. And if you were to do me a favour, I might feel like I was in debt until I settled the score.

There seems to be an insatiable market for advice on ‘how to be successful,’ and this advice ranges from being shallow through to being insightful. However, in your book Give and Take you quote Keith Ferrazzi who employs a deceptively simple rule. “I’ll sum up the key to success in one word—generosity.” Now, that goes to your definition of a giver, but is that too simplistic? A key to success being generosity?

Well, I think it’s half of the story, for sure. I think the key to success is also the key to failure.

I think the key to success is also the key to failure.

Very true… [Laughing]

As we know, one of the things that I found most fascinating with doing the research for Give and Take, is when you compare givers, takers, and matchers. Across engineering, and medicine, and sales, you find that the givers are typically the worst performers, so they tend to have the lowest productivity in engineering, the worst grades in medical school and the lowest sales revenue.

They are also the best performers. [Laughs] It’s the givers who are at the very top of those metrics: the highest engineering productivity, the best medical grades, and even the highest sales revenue. Takers and matchers are more likely to have average performance.

I think Keith really captures part of that puzzle in highlighting how part of that generosity can accelerate your career. But if you’re not careful, it can also sink your career.

I guess the big question for a lot of people would be: how can you remain a giver, and avoid being—what you describe as—a ‘doormat’? You’ve just highlighted a really good case in point where the same fields of industry or professional practice have a hugely successful and hugely unsuccessful giver. How can one manage that?

Well, I think a lot of it has to do with recognizing that successful givers aren’t necessarily altruistic. They’re not so selfless that they put other people’s interests ahead of their own all the time. Rather, what they try to do is integrate their desire to help others with their own goals and ambitions. To your question about the ‘doormat effect,’ I think that can play out in a couple of different ways.

One of [laughs] the great ways to get exploited is to give relentlessly to takers. What I find is that successful givers are much more likely to say, “Look, if you’re going to be a ‘taker,’ then I’m going to shift my style and become a ‘matcher’—only give to you if you’re willing to reciprocate by paying it back, or paying it forward.”

Successful givers aren’t necessarily alturistic… Instead, they try to integrate their desire to help others with their own goals and ambitions.

Instead, they are likely to give most generously to givers, who do tend to ‘pay it forward,’ and matchers, who tend to pay it back. I think the rest of the puzzle is really about setting clear boundaries.

I find that successful givers tend to be specialists rather than generalists. What I mean by that is they focus on giving in a particular way they feel is aligned with their interests and their expertise. That way, if you love making connections, for example, focus your giving on doing lots of introductions and giving. If that’s your focus, it becomes pretty energizing and efficient for you as opposed to distracting and exhausting.

It’s interesting, because that brings up a really clear point: although being a giver has a self‑interest, it’s an enlightened self‑interest, because it doesn’t just benefit the individual. In your book, you offer some advice on this mannerism: help generously, and without thought of return, but also ask often for what you need. It seems that a successful giver also has to be very clear about what they’re looking for. Would that be a correct assumption?

Yeah, that’s exactly right. I think one of the biggest surprises when we look at this data is that successful givers are also successful help‑seekers. The givers who fail are the ones who are never willing to ask other people for support when they need it.

I’ve encountered givers, who are just uncomfortable asking for help. Part of that is something we all feel, which is we don’t want to be helpless or incompetent or dependent. But for a giver there’s an extra challenge, which is you like to be on the giving end of every exchange. You don’t want to be a burden to anyone else. I always like to joke with a counter‑giver who won’t ask for something. For example, I’ll say: Kevin, if you’re one of those people, if you never ask then you’re depriving the people in your life of the opportunity to give.

I think that, fundamentally, there is a distinction between taking and receiving. A lot of givers don’t want to ask, because they don’t want to be takers. A taker is somebody who uses someone else for sole personal gain, whereas a receiver is somebody who says: “Look, I often enjoy giving, but in this situation you have something that I really need. I will accept your contribution, and then maintain a willingness to help out if I can in the future.”

A different form of reciprocity you mentioned earlier—and it’s also prominent in your book—is referred to as ‘paying it forward,’ which is embedded in the idea of value-adding within a network. You give examples in your research of how this has been proven to be successful. But do you think it is widely effective and perhaps an important activity, this notion of ‘paying it forward’?

I think it is. One of the most interesting habits that I’ve found among givers who are enormously productive is that they are actually able to convert matchers into givers, in a way that’s intensified for everybody involved.

A simple example: one of my favorite characters in the book—whom I know you’ve had a lot fun learning about—is Adam Rifkin. Adam was named the best networker in the world by Fortune magazine, and just has an extraordinary number of connections that he’s developed through everybody he meets.

What Adam does, after he helps somebody, maybe it’s two or three months later, he’ll reach out to them and ask for a favour. You start to think, “Well wait a minute, this guy’s just a clever matcher. He’s helping first and then he’s asking for payback later.” Then he throws in a twist, which is, he’s rarely asking for himself. Most of the time he’s saying: “Look, Kevin, I helped you out a couple of months ago. Now, I’m trying to help somebody else in a similar way. Would you be willing to help me help them?”

A lot of the matchers he helped really want to pay it back to Adam, and the closest way that they can do that is to help him out with his efforts to help somebody different. What happens then is he’s got this whole network of people who are willing to operate like givers. This means any time anyone in that network needs help, they can go to anybody else. Whereas, if you don’t have that pay it forward mentality, you can only go to the people that you’ve directly traded favors with in the past.

There must be another element to this. Some of your extensive research reveals that particular kinds of givers are likely to become consistently more successful than maybe takers and matchers. Is this, in part, due to the rise of the sharing economy movement, or is there something more fundamental, or even more basic, at work?

That’s a great question. It’s not one I have a good answer to, especially because I like to answer most of these kinds of questions with data. I haven’t seen a good study yet about how the rise of the sharing economy has really affected the success of givers, or any broader patterns.

I think intuitively it’s right. I think that as we have more mechanisms that allow people to share their time, their knowledge, their skills, even their homes, it’s easier for people to recognize this idea that the Harvard professor Robert Putnam called ‘generalized reciprocity.’

This basically states that direct reciprocity is sort of old school: ‘you do something for me, I’ll do something for you.’ Whereas generalized reciprocity is a little more complicated. It focuses more on: ‘I’ll do something for you without expecting anything back from you, but knowing that if I do that, somebody at some point is more likely to do something for me.’ I think that the sharing economy has really promoted a mentality that allows people to ‘pay it forward’ without necessarily expecting that immediate return but believing—if they model that kind of behavior—that kind of behavior will increase, and it will benefit everyone.

In your book you mention FreeCycle, but also Airbnb and the Kahn Academy. And there’s a whole bunch of businesses operating in this new sharing economy mentality. Would it be fair to say you’re suggesting generosity—possibly in some cases altruism, maybe even humility—could be an effective business strategy?

It sounds crazy, but yes! [Laughing] I think the qualifier I would throw in there is that I believe there’s a time and a place where those strategies are effective and there are also circumstances where they’re really dangerous. I think it’s very rare to say that humility is always a good idea, that generosity is always a good idea.

I think it’s very rare to say that humility is always a good idea, that generosity is always a good idea.

I will say, though, that I’m balanced. People who adopt a giving mindset in the majority of their interactions end up finding that it brings lots of rewards with it. Not only conventional kinds of success but also greater meaning and purpose, and richer relationships.

I imagine the other side of this includes more significant hurdles, which a natural giver would face, for example social and cultural norms and expectations, particularly in the business world. For example, after reading your book, a client of mine realized he was actually a giver pretending to be a taker simply due to the common perceptions around how we traditionally engage in business. It’s this sort of difficulty, which societal norms place on givers. Do you think this is an accurate assessment and do you feel it is shifting dramatically at the moment?

I do. But it’s a complicated thing. I believe the norms vary a lot from one organization to another as well as across industries and national cultures. I’m surprised by the number of people who tell me they hold giver values, but fear that if they express those values it’s a sign of weakness. They basically leave these values behind once they walk into the office. They say: “Look, I’m basically going to adopt a ‘taking’ or a ‘matching’ approach in most of my interactions. Then, every once in a while, I’ll meet somebody who I realize has the same values and then they get to see the real me.”

I’m surprised by the number of people who tell me they hold giver values, but fear that if they express those values it’s a sign of weakness.

I’ve encountered a lot of people who fit the description that you gave of your client. I think some of that comes from an idea—which is false—that success is zero sums, that for me to win you have to lose. I think some of it also comes from the fact there are a lot of former givers and matchers who have started acting like takers after getting burned one too many times and learning the hard way. They believe: “Yeah, there are ‘takers’ out there and that means I need to be a little more cautious. If I don’t put myself first, nobody else will.”

On the flip side of that, you assert that takers are also at risk—more so today—because your research suggests that, in our networked society, when people get burned by takers, they punish them by sharing reputation information and gossip that represents a widespread, efficient, low cost form of punishment. You also refer to this as a ‘taker tax.’ Is social media simply leveling the playing field?

I believe it’s certainly taking a step in that direction. It’s harder today to be anonymous and invisible as a taker than it was before social media and also before the rise of highly collaborative teamwork and the growth of the service sector in most industrialized economies where most of us are more interdependent than we used to be. It’s certainly a lot easier to track people’s reputations now than it ever was before.

I think the reactions you’re describing are most pronounced among matchers. Matchers really believe in a just world. If you’re a matcher, you think that there should always be an ‘eye for an eye.’ When you see a taker act selfishly and get away with it, you as a matcher feel like it’s your mission in life [laughter] to punish the heck out of that person.

I think the ability to keep track of those people on LinkedIn and Facebook, to figure out who else they know, to occasionally observe their behavior on Twitter [now X], or to find out biographical information through a Google search, it does make it harder for takers to exploit one person without getting discovered by the next person.

[Laughing] It does seem very premeditated and strategic to chase someone down like that and punish them.

[Laughing] It does. I think that’s a great source of joy for a true matcher.

Are you seeing this also apply to organizations, brands, and branding? Corporate Social Responsibility, which I think we could agree is sort of tokenism in many cases, is now being replaced by the more genuine or more significant Reputation Capital. In your opinion, is this impacting the number of good corporate citizens, or is that too simplistic?

I don’t have a good sense of that. I would like to think that in general we’ve seen enough of a backlash toward Corporate Social Responsibility and cause-marketing initiatives that are just lip service, or that are done for purely instrumental reasons, that leaders are starting to figure out if they’re going to do it, they need to do it right and it needs to mean something.

I think the jury is still out from my perspective, in terms of the evidence. There was a really nice study that Norbert Schwarz and his colleagues published a few years ago that looked at the effects of Corporate Social Responsibility on companies with bad reputations. For example, if you’re a cigarette company what kind of impact do you provide when you start investing in a bunch of healthcare causes? [Laughing]

The finding was that, essentially, the more you promote those efforts, the more it backfires because people know you’re just doing it to try to make up for the harm that you’ve done. But actual time and money invested in the activities themselves really paid off. The lesson there from these researchers was you should spend more time actually doing social responsibility and less time advertising it.

You should spend more time actually doing social responsibility and less time advertising it.

Perhaps a good example might be McDonald’s where they’ve got the Ronald McDonald House for children with illnesses. The big contradiction there is that many people say that McDonald’s is contributing to obesity and child health issues. But at the same time they’re actively doing something real about trying to resolve some aspects of those conditions and illnesses. I guess that’s probably one of the few case studies that I can think of that might somehow be walking the line with some success. Would you agree?

Yes. There’s a really interesting question around this. In fact, there’s actually some research on this by Anne Lewinsky and Joshua Margolis. They talk about necessary evils in organizations, the idea being: “What happens when you do either a task, or are involved in a program that does harm, in the interest of the greater good?”

Do the ends justify the means? I think that’s a great question to ponder for McDonald’s. Is it worth actually contributing to obesity, because you can generate enough revenue and enough awareness eventually perhaps to stop it? I don’t know. Are they willing to put themselves out of business? It’s a fascinating question.

I guess the question they would need to ask themselves is: do they want to put themselves out of their current business, but perhaps find a new business model that will be more satisfying, more rewarding and more beneficial to a lot more people? It goes back to that giver culture mentality you were talking about earlier, that it’s just really a slight shift of goals and objectives that might actually give you a higher return in success, though maybe not in the short term. I know your research came up with—what is the phrase?—one person you quote says: being a giver is not a 100‑yard dash but it’s invaluable in a marathon. In terms of shifting their business model it certainly wouldn’t be a 100‑yard dash for McDonald’s to change immediately, but I’m sure if they were genuine about what they want to do, they could have a business model that would be equally as successful, maybe in a different way.

I do think that’s probably where we will see them move in the long run. We’ve all observed in the short run, the growth of healthier options on the menu. I think that is highly likely to continue.

And that’s probably due to public pressure and cultural expectations, at least in industrialized countries.

Yes, I think that’s part of the story. I’ve also been impressed by at least a few executives at McDonald’s who have said: “Look, part of my contribution to this organization is going to be pushing us toward doing what’s right.”

I guess the extreme example, on the other hand, and you mention it in your book, is Enron. But, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to be opaque today, as we discussed earlier. That said, takers also seek to adopt giver characteristics in order to get what they want in the short term, possibly at the expense of others. We’ve discussed this a little bit, but how can you spot a taker in giver’s clothing?

Well, I think that the first thing to do is contrast the idea of givers and takers with the personality trait of agreeableness. Agreeable people are people who typically come across as very warm and friendly and amiable, with disagreeable people being more challenging and critical and skeptical. Most of us stereotype agreeable people as givers, and disagreeable people as takers. Yet, I’ve found that you can actually plot those in a little 2 x 2 matrix, because you’re agreeableness is basically your outer veneer. How you come across on the surface where if giving and taking are your inner motives, what are your real intentions toward others. That means, we have some people who are actually disagreeable givers who might be rough and tough and gruff but ultimately have others best interest at heart.

I know a few of those…

To your point, we need to watch out for the agreeable takers, those are the takers who create an aura of generosity but then ultimately are trying to only advance their own interests. There are a couple of different ways to spot truly agreeable takers in particular, one is a pattern that I’ve come to call, ‘kissing up, kicking down,’ which is something we see a lot.

The takers are typically trying to act generous when impressing powerful people, but find it’s a lot of work to fake generosity in all of their interactions. They let their guard down a little bit when dealing with peers and subordinates. One implication is you might refer to somebody with the following attitude: don’t trust it as much if it comes from above, than if it comes from below.

The takers are typically trying to act generous when impressing powerful people, but find it’s a lot of work to fake generosity in all of their interactions. They let their guard down a little bit when dealing with peers and subordinates.

There are a few other tell‑tale signs. When talking about their successes, takers tend to claim personal credit for collective achievements. They use more I’s and me’s instead of us’s and we’s. On the flip side, when they fail they’re more likely to blame others.

One of my other favorite ways to spot a taker is not asking them what they would do in a situation but what they think others might do. Let’s say this is a job interview setting. Rather than asking what would you do in this situation, Kevin, I would ask what you think ‘other’ people would do, because most of us tend to project our motives onto others. There’s integrity test research for example, suggesting that if you look at stealing, you can ask people: “What percentage of employees do you think steal at least $10 worth of merchandise from their employers every year?” The higher your guess, the greater the odds that you’re a taker. This is an exercise which is great fun. You think about that question and you’re like: “Well, if I’m a ‘taker,’ I took $400 last year from my company, so probably a lot of people do that.” Whereas, the givers are like: “Who would steal a tent?”

[Laughing] Another insight in your book, which is of particular interest, relates to your suggestion that the size of a portrait photograph in an annual report can actually tell givers from takers. Can you expand on that discovery?

This is a brilliant study by Chatterjee and Hambrick. They listed over 100 tech companies. They got Wall Street analysts to rate the CEOs of those companies. It was basically a taker scale: how selfish, how egotistical, how narcissistic is each CEO?

Then they looked for clues that correlated with the analyst’s ratings, and indeed, the CEOs who were rated as takers by the analysts had more prominent photographs of themselves in their company’s annual reports. Their pictures were larger and they were more likely to be alone, sending a pretty clear signal that: “I’m the most important person in this company. It’s all about me.”

We can see those patterns in everyday life too. There’s a recent study by Keith Campbell and a colleague, showing that on Facebook, you can actually spot the narcissistic takers by looking at how attractive they appear—how vain—in their profile photo. I like to point out here that the takers are not necessarily ‘hotter’ than the rest of us, in general, but you will find a bigger gap between their average photo and how good they look in the profile picture. They’ve got to put their best foot forward.

You’ll have a whole rush of people now going to check their Facebook photo.

[Laughter]

Once again, it does come down to these perceptions, social norms and expectations. Not only in the business world but just in society, there seems to be a much more competitive attitude out there. When anyone is putting any kind of image forward they want to make it look as best as possible. Of course, there are some who claim the people who obsessively use Facebook are narcissistic (or voyeuristic), so there is a societal cultural shift happening anyway. Does that muddy the waters, or is it simply that people who are a bit vain might also be quite generous?

I’ve long been interested in tracking another huge but related area, which is: do you, in your profile, show a picture of yourself with the most important person you’ve ever met, thereby trying to get status by association?

I think it’s fair to say that not all narcissists are takers. There’s such a thing as a narcissistic giver. I’ve encountered it from time to time when people will claim that they’re better at helping others than anybody else: “I am the most generous person you’ll ever meet.”

That’s a contradiction in terms.

In a way, that’s right! Some of these people are really passionate about helping others and that’s what their ego is invested in. They have an inflated sense of their own generosity and importance in helping others.

For the most part, I find a very strong correlation between narcissism and taking. One of the tell‑tale signs of many narcissists is that they have fragile and inflated egos because they believe that they have to be better than others in order to succeed.

That doesn’t necessarily muddy the waters, but it does get tricky when you’re trying to spot takers and givers. Something that comes to mind is, when looking at the complexities of what we’re talking about, it could become hard work for people to either spot takers and givers, but also to decide whether they themselves are a taker or a giver. You would want all this to be a very natural, free‑flowing, organic way of being. How then can someone transform themselves after realizing they’ve been living a taker behavioural life for a long time, for reasons that are perhaps external—for example, how they were brought up, or places they’ve worked; whatever. But they come to this realization and they want to move towards being a giver. I know we’re generalizing, but is that something they have to work at, or would you say it needs to be a more natural shift?

It could actually go both ways. I think one of the easiest ways to shift your style is to recognize that we all tend to become more giving when we’re really passionate about something. If you were to think about your favorite topic to read about, or a hobby that you really love, it’s really hard not to share that with other people. In fact, sometimes, you cross the boundary from giving to just annoying people, because you’re so into something.

I think focusing on things that you really love, is one of the easiest ways to become a little more giving.

I think focusing on things that you really love, is one of the easiest ways to become a little more giving. My other favourite step is something I learned, again from Adam Rifkin, who I mentioned earlier. Adam says if you want to be a giver, you don’t want to be Mother Theresa or Gandhi. That’s not sustainable for most of us. Rather, you should try to do a few more ‘five‑minute favors’ every week.

Adam will say: “Look, there are a lot of ways that you can add high value to other people’s lives at a low personal cost. For example, making an introduction, writing a little recommendation or a note of gratitude to somebody else.” He’s got a whole list of favours that I think the easiest deliverance step is to say: “I’m going to pick a few people that I would like to add more value to, and try to figure out how—in just a few minutes—I could make their life a little bit better.”

I think there’s another important point here: a giver needs to manage their time because, as you said earlier, you don’t want to be one of those unsuccessful givers where you’re doing everything for everyone and all of a sudden you don’t have any time to do what you need to do. You need to edit or curate who you are able to best add value to. Is that what Adam is suggesting?

Yes, I think that’s exactly right. In a way Adam is thinking about return on investment: “Where could I give effectively that’s going to allow me to have the most impact?” That doesn’t necessarily always involve the greatest investment of time.

If I remember correctly from reading your book, I think Adam actively asks people to pay it forward as well. He doesn’t consider it as an assumption. He actually asks people.

He does.

Could this also be part of coaching givers to become more strategic about how they spend their time? For example, if a successful giver keeps reminding people: “Make sure you pay this forward,” just as one little tip, because this has a ripple effect and helps that person understand how giving can actually add value.

I think it’s useful in that way. It’s also probably a pretty good screening mechanism for figuring out what the other people in your network are—giver, matcher or taker. This is something that I’ve been doing more often lately. For example, when somebody asks me whether I know somebody who can help with a particular request, or if I have the contact to a certain organization where they’re looking for a job, what I will often do is send them the contact information but let them reach out independently, and allow them to just use my name. Then I get a pretty independent view into whether that person is genuinely willing to help.

Whereas, when I make the introduction, usually people will follow through and I don’t then know if it’s because they genuinely enjoy giving or because they’re just trying to match something that I’ve given to them in the past. I like letting people give in a more naturalistic, spontaneous experience. And this helps me figure out whether somebody’s going to pay it forward or not.

You probably also spot those who are just being opportunistic because, again, it moves closer to matcher or even taker where they’re leveraging a connection with someone—but purely for their own ends.

That’s right.

It might prompt people to consider how they operate in a network, being very conscious of what they do and that could lead to a little bit of paranoia. It’s funny: In your book you touch on paranoia. Particularly the highly competitive world where there is paranoia, for example in the business world. But this can also influence behavior and action. The distinguished psychologist Brian Little poses a compelling opposite—pronoia: ‘the delusional belief that other people are applauding your well‑being or saying nice things about you behind your back.’ Humorous and interesting as that is, you suggest it may be a reality for givers, rather than a delusion. Does this go back to Reputation Capital, which we discussed earlier?

Yes, I think it does. I’ve enjoyed the idea that perhaps we could envision a world where we had more givers and instead of worrying that people were out to get you [laughter] you could worry that they were out to help you. I think, at some level, if that’s the fear you’re creating, it does have a lot of reputational benefits with people trying to figure out: ‘why is this person conspiring to help me?’ [laughter]

The other thing that I find interesting about the pronoia concept is that the only reason it can exist is because people are either skeptical by disposition or they’ve had some experience to suggest that when others help they probably have some ulterior motives. The idea that when somebody tries to help, one might immediately begin to think: “What’s really going on here?”…

What’s the agenda?..

Yes. I think this suggests that somebody’s probably been surrounded by too many takers. One thing we can probably all do more effectively is figure out who the givers and matchers are around us and create a little community of people that we can trust.

I guess another way is to be much more relaxed about it. If you do get burned, just say: “Okay, I’m not going to chase them down and issue a ‘taker tax.’ I’m just going to quietly shift away and never interact with them again.” It’s more about surrounding ourselves with people we have a natural affinity with, as opposed to overanalyzing it…

I think it’s very tempting to become almost overly scientific about this. I could start keeping track of all the cues [laughter] that lead me to think that somebody has one style or another. A lot of it is going to be based on intuition and gut feeling and everyday experience. I think it’s reasonable to treat the sense of trust you have with somebody else as a proxy for what their style might be.

Personally, on a rare occasion, my natural instinct might be to try and pursue a taker for whatever reason. But generally, my thinking would be I’d rather spend that time doing something more meaningful or helping somebody else rather than interacting with this person who I feel just burnt me. I prefer to just step away. I think that might be, at least in my experience, a way of trying to not make this too scientific, not make this too onerous.

On a deeper level, there are a lot of cues you talk about but which could make people feel this is a lot of hard work. However, over time, you suggest just having a few things on your radar can keep you focused. Otherwise, it should be a very natural way of living. Would that be a good assessment?

Yes, I think that’s a great summary, actually.

With that in mind, do you foresee a genuine, mainstream, even sustained corporate giver culture any time soon?

I’ve certainly been excited by some organisations taking steps in this direction. How widely will it spread? For me, this is an open question. But I think there are many organisations working on doing a better job of screening out takers, of redefining performance to not just include individual accomplishments but also the impact of your success on other people, to really create norms that make it acceptable to ask, so that givers know who could benefit from their help and how. I’d love to see more of those practices spread.

With that in mind, Kevin, let me turn this around on you and ask: if you were going to build an organisation that really operated with a culture of giving, what are a few of the steps you’d recommend from your experience?

There are many organisations working on doing a better job of screening out takers, of redefining performance to not just include individual accomplishments but also the impact of your success on other people.

I think one of the key things I feel is very current—but also very close to me—is a culture of collaboration. That’s not just because everyone has a voice. It means if you’re involved, we expect to hear from you. I genuinely feel—and I’ve said this for many years—whether you’re a student or a high performing executive, you have some life experience, some outlook on the world, and you have an opinion. That’s all valid. It doesn’t really matter about seniority. It really relies on your experience. That’s the first thing I would establish.

The other thing—which I also actively pursue—is to try and do things that are meaningful. I don’t just mean not-for-profit or charity, though that could be part of it, but that your service or product isn’t just another widget or another ‘thing’ to do. We must constantly remind ourselves that we turn up to work every day, 10 hours a day. We sit with people. We need to like the people we’re sitting with and we’ve got to feel like we’re contributing something meaningful—at least in our understanding of what’s meaningful.

I believe these are the two cornerstones, which I’d start with. And I actively strive to do this in my own business. I’m not sure if that clearly answers your question, but that’s how I would at least start, and then pursue.

Great! A related question that I was curious about, since you’ve implemented some of these ideas and shared them with other people in your network: what have people been most surprised by?

First of all, it is clear there’s terminology around all this. The client I mentioned earlier; I don’t think he was even aware there was a way of looking at splitting up personas between giver, taker and matcher. All of a sudden, a light bulb was turned on in his mind and it allowed him to reshape and refocus his natural characteristics and be comfortable in his own skin. That’s one of the first clear things I’ve witnessed.

In terms of my own experience, I think it’s probably made me a little more aware of whom the takers might be. My own fear—and a fear I’ve heard from other people—is the unsuccessful giver, the person who naturally wants to help people but really feels like: “Why the hell aren’t I getting anywhere? I’m helping everyone. I’ve got to just stop this. I’ve got to stop giving so much.” As opposed to: “I’ve got to stop giving in the way [laughs] that I’ve been giving.” I think that’s another light bulb moment for people.

Then, at the higher end, what I’m hearing, and this is only at the early stages… [Pause] I’m working with a client with offices around the world. The person I gave your book to is a senior manager, and I think they are looking at—as you said earlier—encouraging the quiet achievers, those people who get a lot done but they do so by helping others. I think this senior manager is becoming more aware and asking herself: “How can we celebrate this behaviour—for them and for the company? How can we generate incentives?”

The greatest insight, which I’ve gotten from your book, is that it provides a framework for issues people may not have been naturally able to identify within themselves. They may in some cases have been uncomfortable with being burned too many times but still want to give.

That’s such an exciting way to think about these ideas.

Kevin, you’ve obviously demonstrated your style in all the time and effort you put into actually modelling this behaviour and trying to encourage others to adopt it as well.

One can’t operate as a person with all of this criteria needing to be ‘ticked off’ every day. It has to be a real, genuine, authentic characteristic and behaviour.

I think it has given me a framework. Giving is something I am naturally inclined towards, simply because I enjoy helping people. Not because I want to get a return on it. I just didn’t think I was being as effective as I could be. The ideas in your book really helped put some frameworks around this. But in a way that can be maintained; in a way that’s natural; that’s not forced; that’s genuine and not just: “I should do this because it’ll be a good thing to do.”

Although all this must be natural I also realised from your book these frameworks are rather scientific—research‑driven. In saying that, one can’t operate as a person with all of this criteria needing to be ‘ticked off’ every day. It has to be a real, genuine, authentic characteristic and behaviour. Once you know that, then you work on it, you can—as Adam Rifkin says— focus and be more strategic about how you can best add value and how you can best help people.

The ‘five-minute’ favour activity, which Adam Rifkin suggests, has also influenced how I might see a quick way to help people or introduce somebody. Even on LinkedIn, where it is easy to recommend or endorse someone. It’s really simple. It’s the little things.

Excellent!

Image credit

Adam Grant portrait photography supplied by Adam Grant

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Kevin Finn In Uncategorized

Daan Roosegaarde:
Prototyping the future of cities

Daan Roosegaarde—Dutch innovator, founder of Studio Roosegaarde, and Young Global Leader at the World Economic Forum—talks about his passion for prototyping the future of cities and what it means to be a leader in society and design. This interview was featured in Open Manifesto #8, which focused on the theme ‘Change’.

Kevin Finn: Among other things, your work involves art, design, innovation, science, engineering, architecture, business, and politics. So, how do you describe yourself? How do you describe what you do?

Daan Roosegaarde: I’m a maker [laughs]. It’s very simple. And most of all, I’m a hunter. I hunt ideas, which is very important. I have an idea in my brain and I become a sort of a solitary prisoner of the imagination. I start hunting the ideas to grab them, to drag them into reality. That’s the best way to describe it.

All the things that you mentioned are somehow tools in order to enable that. I’m in the studio with smart people, so you need an entrepreneurial side, you need to work inside the artist to make sure an idea survives in the world we live in. And you need a sort of political agenda to create impact. But I think, most of all, it’s the hunting and the capturing of an idea, and then dragging that idea into a better direction.

In 2006, you founded Studio Roosegaarde and since then you’ve made a massive impact, not only in creative terms but also on a social and cultural level, too. How did you embark on this trajectory? What was your foundation project, or your initial sponsor, or client?

I started when I was studying Fine Art in 2003. I built one of the first liquid space installations. It was a huge sculpture—eight by four by five meters. I made it with some whizz kids from the The Fine Arts Academy, which was based nearby.

When you entered the space it would become smaller and bigger, with the notion of space reacting to your senses, rather than the sum of walls, door and windows.

We worked on that project for about a year, to a year and a half. When it was launched, it worked for three weeks, and then it died. But that was the first time I realized that I can use technology to bring things alive, where the visitor isn’t just an observer but a participant—sort of directly connected to the DNA or the behavior of the artwork itself.

Jumping out of art school I studied a Masters of Architecture, and then worked at [Rem Koolhaas’s] OMA, as well as MVRDV, and some other architectural studios. Around this time, we built the first Dune project, which uses fibers of light that react to the sounds and motion of people. We actually did the first pilot in the Maastunnel, the pedestrian tunnel, in Rotterdam.

And then the Tate Modern called to do a piece with Lucy Bullivant for a big show in 2007, called 4D Social, which was sort of important because I think that was actually the first time we got a little bit of budget. We had budget for six months to make the piece for the show.

That’s when I got the studio space with the people I worked with—whom I had paid in ‘pizzas’ before—and was able to give them a little budget. But we soon realized we would only be up and running for six months and then we’d be broke again, so something had to happen. That’s how the studio started.

You said that if you didn’t get another project in two or three months from that time, you’d be broke. But if we move onto today, you’re now a Young Global Leader at the World Economic Forum. How did that come about and what’s your role there?

Well, I’ve always kept investing in new ideas and new projects. I’ve always had—how do you say it—a good atmosphere of being surrounded by a good team of people who can pick up things and handle them. Although the team has changed, the people with whom I started with have all left, but there are new people around me now. And that’s very important.

I think it was also a time—and it still is a time—when we started to connect this sort of high technology with more social interaction. It was kind of a ‘human and the machine’ type of research. And we achieved it; we created our own little niche, I think, even with that first museum installation.

Now we’re attracting larger landscape type projects; we just got the go-ahead for a project involving a 32 kilometer dike in The Netherlands. That’s going to consume the coming five years of our time, which is great.

But it has always been about changing the dream, materializing it, and also feeling the zeitgeist—plugging into it and questioning it. We ask questions like: Why are we shutting down street lights at night? Do we accept pollution? How does a jellyfish emit light underwater without battery or solar panel or an energy bill? We’re constantly asking what can we learn from questions like that. It starts with asking questions, and then dragging them into a proposal.

But the impact has grown, and that’s also because I refuse to be put in the white cube of a museum, where signs read: “Do not touch.” I’ve always gone outside to public space.

It has always been about changing the dream, materializing it, and also feeling the zeitgeist—plugging into it and questioning it.

If we consider the perceptions around the World Economic Forum, we understandably think ‘business and economics.’ Do you think that a designer’s role, in the position that you have, is purely to question, or is there another aspect to that role?

No. More than ever there’s a desire for new ideas. You can feel that the big corporations, big CEOs—even the ones that have a lot of money—have very few innovative ideas, have very few ideas about the future. This is the role of the designer, or the maker, or the artist. To come up with new ideas, to build them, to work together, and to materialize.

In a way, when we did Sustainable Dance Floor in 2008—harvesting energy from dancing—this was the first time we actually connected design and art with social topics, like energy. Then with Smart Highway, we connected this to mobility, and with the Smog Free Project, we connected it to health.

There is a real desire for creative thinking and creative leadership in this hard capital world, because the old system isn’t working anymore. Money is not the most important thing out there anymore, and it’s crashing. It’s crashing! It’s not working, so we need to reinvent, to prototype a new world, and to build it. I think that is the role of creativity.

We’re discussing how business is changing. And based on what you’ve just said, there’s a real desire for creative ideas. But do you think there’s anything within the design disciplines that needs to change?

I think that, for too long, design has been focused on making another chair, another lamp, another table. With all due respect to my fellow colleagues, we have enough. We have enough of that. Please stop. Stop making them, and designing them.

There are so many problems and potential niches out there which need this creative thinking. You just need to go there and own it, and say: “Hey, I’m an expert in this. I have ideas about this. Look at me trying to make sense of it.”

What I notice when I’m at Salone del Mobile in Milan, and events like that, is a lack of curiosity towards the future. I think this is limiting our creative freedom.

I think that, for too long, design has been focused on making another chair, another lamp, another table… we have enough. We have enough of that. Please stop. Stop making them, and designing them.

It’s interesting to suggest “we have enough”. It strikes me that every developed and developing economy pushes for economic growth. But this insatiable desire—often fueled by political agendas, it must be said—is unsustainable, given our current global issues. Do you foresee a future where constant growth is not a requirement, and might even be frowned upon?

Yeah, but then you have to define what growth is in that way, because the future will not be linear but exponential. That’s the difference. For example, let’s focus on mobility. If you focus on underground parking places, you can spend all the time, money, and innovation to make the best parking place in the world. It’s clean, and it’s spacious, and everybody knows where to go—blah, blah, blah! And you can spend all your money in the world on it. That’s great! But then the self-driving car comes along and you suddenly become obsolete, or less important, because the car is self-driving. Why does it need an underground parking place?

What I’m trying to say is, things which can be meaningful now, and in which you can invest, which you can grow, might become obsolete because of new technology, because of new ambitions that people have. I think growth should be mostly focused on redefining what is necessary.

What is the true answer? I’m not sure yet. In many ways, it’s easy for me: being Dutch, having a Dutch passport, and being able to travel. But when you live in China or India, there is a short term vision due to circumstances. But there must be a way.

Taking into consideration where we live and our circumstances, if we look at what’s been happening with the Syrian refugee crisis in Europe, once again it illustrates the impact of an abrupt movement of people across borders as they flee their frightening circumstances…

And we have no idea how to deal with it.

Exactly!

All these politicians have no idea how to position the mass of people. Some share their houses with refugees. It’s all great, but is that solving the problem? No, it’s just trying to show a sign of empathy.

Of course we’re likely to witness another increasingly worrying kind of refugee—the environmental refugee. Do you think there is—or are you aware of—any sort of programs that might be put in place? Are there any discussions at the World Economic Forum around how countries might react to the economic and societal impact of this seemingly inevitable environmental refugee crisis?

Oh, Absolutely! Actually, last time in Davos [where World Economic Forum meetings are held] there was an installation of refugees being filmed, and trying to give them a human face as an art installation, so it’s definitely a topic there.

I believe there should be a new international human right, the right of Schoonheid (a Dutch word that literally means beauty that cannot be properly translated to an English word); that everybody has the right to clean air and water. It’s like, the moment you are born on planet Earth you have these rights, and governments and people around you should take that into consideration and should validate that human right. I think it starts there. Huge groups of people are denied that right—even now—and that’s problematic.

Of course, in your own country there was a group who took the Dutch government to court and successfully sued them in relation to an environmental case.

Yeah. So you see, there’s a whole system of economy, and growth, and progress, and it’s hitting us in the face, and we don’t know how to deal with it. So, there are two possibilities. Either, A: the current system adapts and changes; or B: it breaks down into 5,000 little pieces and something new has to come out of that, and we see where it takes us.

When we spoke in India, we briefly discussed a recent World Economic Forum panel, which included Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever. The panel focused on the role of business and climate change. All four members of the panel agreed that business needs to—and is willing to—play a bigger role in reversing, or stemming, climate change. However, even though they were optimistic, they acknowledged the prediction of a devastating 4 percent increase in temperature, which may only be reduced to 3.5 percent, but it actually needs to be capped at 2 percent. How do you remain optimistic in these circumstances?

[Laughs] I believe we have a duty to be optimistic towards ourselves, towards others. I don’t have an answer for that. Sorry, I don’t have the obligation. As a maker, the only thing I can do is use all the creativity and energy that I have to come up with new proposals, new ideas, how I want the future to look like and to engage and enable people to create a movement.

For example, when the Kickstarter campaign we launched for the Smog Free Tower finished over 1,600 people supported it, engaged with it, shared it, and said: “Yeah, why do we accept pollution? Why do we accept this as something normal?” These are just strong movements, which are created to give a different voice to the discussion. But in the end it’s about leadership, and about people in charge making the right decisions. It’s my job to feed them with options that they might not have thought about. That’s what I can do—and the rest is the rest.

[Laughs] It’s interesting that you bring up the Smog Free Project, because I read that you were in Beijing and could see from your hotel window the iconic headquarters of the China Central Television, known as the CCTV Building. But then later that week, the now famous Beijing smog had all but obscured the building. I believe it was at that moment, when you couldn’t see the building, that you decided to tackle smog, which is a huge, huge issue. Is this how you often decide on pursuing a project, through observation?

Oh, Absolutely, because it was such a sad image, because I realized, A: “I cannot see the world anymore, so I’m just trapped.” And, B: “I know the impact of smog on human life. We live two or three years shorter.”

There was a big article which mentioned three million people per year die because of air pollution. It’s more than AIDS and malaria put together! It’s like: “Are you insane? Who decided to do that?” So, as a studio, we vote on what projects we want to tackle—and we agreed to tackle this.

It starts with a personal sadness, or a personal frustration, or a personal interest, and from that I try to shift it, to change it, to reconnect things, with hope—not just as a symbol, but to really engage a different discussion.

This is the first chapter of the book “the solution”. [Laughs.] This is what I’m good at. This is my way of observing our world and our reality.

When referencing the Smog Free Project, which is the world’s largest smog vacuum cleaner, you’ve stated: “It’s not going to cure smog on a large scale, but at least we can remind people what clean air looks like.” You’ve been meeting with Beijing officials to discuss your ideas around this project and your objectives for reducing smog. Can you elaborate on the Smog Free Project, but also what Beijing’s response to it has been?

I think the Beijing government realizes more than ever this issue of air pollution. They declared a war on smog four or five years ago. Most of the measurements they’re taking—and the actions they’re taking—are countering it, including relocating factories to less inhabited areas and encouraging people to cycle, in a world where the car is a status symbol.

I think we should do more, not less. But it’s China. In the beginning, when you present your ideas, they don’t know you. They haven’t seen you before, so they have to get used to you.

We had some fruitful discussions. And there is incentive to change— because of the smog free tower actually being there. Our Dutch Ministry of Health System has also validated our tests and approved it, so there are official documents which can be shared with the Chinese government. That helps them, especially with the 2022 Olympics. They really need to catch on and fix this.

There’s a lot of sentiment in the beginning. But Beijing, and other cities, wouldn’t directly support the project initially, because they were of the mind: “Yeah, but then everybody knows we are a dirty city,” and I’m like: “Yeah, but, A: everybody knows already. You can see it,” and, B: “so what are you going to do? You can’t do nothing. So what’s the answer?”

Within a political system in every country, there’s a risk-avoidance mechanism which pops up and kills innovation. So you need to have laboratories, areas in the city where you can test, where you can experiment, where you can learn, where you can fail, where you can update.

The Netherlands is defining this as Creative Industry, realizing you have to spend money, time, and energy on it to help it mature. I would recommend that every city is more open towards these kinds of new ideas and innovation. It just gives them a chance. Maybe four out of 10 will fail. But you still have six really good new ones. That’s also part of innovation.

You’ve mentioned the political situation in China—among other things the need for clean air for the 2022 Olympics—along with global awareness about the Beijing smog, which doesn’t help China. Is this how you navigate the political landscape, using context, or is it more about metrics, measurements and documents like the Dutch Ministry of Health has provided? Or is it about both?

In a complex world, I think you need both strategies. It’s the same when you’re in the shower and you want more warm water. To get more warm water, you can add more hot water or you can have less cold water.

There are always different ways to achieve your goal. In this case, you need to put forward new goals. On the one hand, you need to address the social agenda, like: A: “Hey, be good for people. Be good for citizens,” and, B: You need to prove it, to show it’s possible—and in a language they understand, particularly when we speak different languages.

I remember at the beginning of the Smart Highway a few years ago, when we were working with a high profile multi-infrastructure company. We didn’t know each other that well, and the directors were showing me around.

While walking around the corridors I mentioned that the curator from the Tate Modern was coming to our studio the following week and that I was very excited about it. Modern; good museum; London! They sort of looked at me in a complete shock, and I’m like: “Are you jealous? What’s going on?”

It actually took us a couple of hours to realize that the word curator in my world is, of course, a moderator, someone who makes an exhibition. But in the infrastructure business world, the word curator means the person who knocks on your door when your company goes bankrupt. [Laughs] That’s a curator. When you go broke, they come and do all the costs, and check what you have in stock, and stuff like that.

They were like: “My god, this guy’s going bankrupt, and he’s actually enjoying it!” We were both Dutch, so if we already had this misunderstanding about one word, then you can imagine doing a several million Euro Research & Development trajectory crunching business, where there isn’t a 100 percent guarantee, and you need to fight for it. When you do something new, you need to speak several languages to achieve your goal. Absolutely!

I guess the other side of it—and lets take the Smog Free Project again—is about capturing the public’s imagination. And that’s a powerful tool…

Absolutely.

The way you achieved this is to suggest they can create a place that’s 75 percent cleaner than the rest of the city. This creates a powerful incentive for people to clean the whole city. But you’re not just stopping there.

You have created jewelry—the Smog Free Ring and the Smog Free Cuff Link—which fuses compressed smog particles. That, in itself, captured the public’s imagination. Is that a tool that you actively seek to use?

Yes. You have technological innovation—the tower—which is a machine which does its thing. And, of course, it’s tested and proven. But you also need social innovation to make sure that it changes perceptions. Because if it’s just technological innovation people will just rely on that technology, but no real change is made.

[Laughs] But you also need social innovation, something that becomes a part of their emotional values, part of their lifestyle. You need it to infiltrate in that way. The rings and jewelry are a great way to achieve this, but also to just get initial funding.

The concept is very simple: use the waste as fund raising for the actual Smog Free Tower. The first time I explained this to my business developer she was, like: “What are you talking about?” It was like a silent car alarm for her.

[Laughs]

She was, like: “We’re going to use the waste, and we’re going to make profit, and that’s what we’re going to use to reduce the waste in the end?” I said: “Exactly!” And it worked—and people got excited about it. You need technological and social impacts to create change. You need them both.

You need technological and social impacts to create change. You need them both.

Of course we also need to consider beauty. With your recent increased interest in biomimicry over the past few years, your glowing trees project combines natural luminescence with plants, which you suggest could eradicate the need for street lights. This could be a glimpse of a future where we are surrounded by—as you put it—energy neutral tools and artifacts. This suggests a world where technology is less screen based and more environmental, or experiential. It sounds incredible, but is it ambitious to think that today’s society will accept that we don’t need, or don’t want, screen based digital technology?

First of all, your initial comment is absolutely right! I think our desire for beauty—a natural desire for beauty, which everybody has, even the hardcore business people—is the real force that will hopefully save planet Earth from us human beings. [Laughs]

I believe it’s in our DNA. In the end, when we really, really, really, really have to make a decision, we’ll say: “OK, look. Maybe we shouldn’t make these ugly coal factories. Maybe we should just find a new way.”

The notion of beauty is really underestimated in a lot of discussions, even in a public forum. But I think it’s a true essence of being human. Beauty, in that way, is not decoration, but a very powerful tool, and a powerful dream to reform. So that’s one point.

Second: today, technology isn’t just jumping out of the screen. It’s on our bodies, our clothes, and what we wear. So yes, there will be screens. But we won’t be looking at them in the same way, or as much as we do now.

I don’t have any children, but if I did and they asked: “Daddy, daddy, what should I study?” First, I would say: “You figure it out for yourself. But if you really want me to give you advice, don’t study architecture. Don’t study design. Don’t even study technology. Study biology or biotechnology, learning from nature, and where can we implement that in a world of today.”

It’s not just about putting grass on roofs, or planting more trees. It’s really about understanding the core principles, for example an anthill, and then looking at ourselves and acknowledging: “Wow, we are a brutal people. Maybe we should find a better way.” So now my focus is mostly on that.

It’s difficult, because you need a lot of fundamental research. When I think about the cities of the future, that’s going to be incredibly important, where we’ll grow things rather than just build them.

Earlier, you mentioned wearing technology and I’m fascinated by your Intimacy Project. In the race to dominate wearable technology, we seem to be limited to watches and wristbands but you’ve developed a project where technology is built into the clothes themselves. It explores the relationship between emotions and technology, with the clothes becoming increasingly transparent based on close encounters with other people. With this in mind, what’s your view on the future of wearable technology?

It’s going to be interesting. First of all, it’s weird that most innovation in wearables is absolutely not happening in the fashion world. When you talk to the major fashion brands— Louis Vuitton, Dior, Gucci—they’re still in the era of the fax machine. It’s incredibly conservative—and boring—in that way. So that’s very disappointing.

Secondly, it happens mostly on the American West Coast. The tech industry is waking up and it becomes really powerful when it moves away from blinking LEDs, or just as an effect. For example, when it gets connected to health.

If I have a suit which measures my heartbeat, or how much vitamin A, B, or C I need at that moment, it becomes something that helps me filter information, which gives me a hint or advice about my body. I think that connection will be made in the near future. And it will be incredibly powerful.

You’ve also previously stated that your job as a visionary is to play with a problem, propose solutions, and to make people think. However, your critics might suggest that your projects, although stunning and compelling and incredibly aspirational, haven’t been scaled. In a previous conversation you and I had, you described your work as prototyping the future of cities. Is your intention to show the way forward, to provide a glimpse of a possible future, or to encourage others to take up your ideas? Or is it really about scaling your prototypes to fully realize global movements?

To be honest, it depends on the project. There is an increasing focus on intimacy; showing and hinting; and hacking and questioning; and that pushes the discussion, and other people can pick up that idea. They come into contact with that idea and then start doing their own thing with it.

With the Smart Highway or with the Smog Free Project these are absolutely meant to be scaled up—gigantically—to become part of the new standard. But as a young design studio—we’re only six or seven years old—it is difficult to achieve at the moment. That’s why we work together with the big industrial companies.

But we are definitely looking for that scaling, and not just for our ego or the money. We need to create impact, so that’s straight in the kitchen, as we say.

These projects should be more than just a symbol, or for promoting awareness. Even though that can be great, it’s not going to save our ass. We definitely need to do more, so I agree with the criticism.

On the flip side, your email signature includes a striking message: “I believe we should do more, not less, and make modern cities liveable again.” That seems to be your beacon, your mission in life.

Yes because I can be surrounded by people with opinions saying: “Do this or do that.” That’s all great, but I cannot do it alone. I’m tired of opinions. I want proposals. I also need to have leaders who can say: “OK, Daan, this is our problem. This is our budget. This is our question. This is our dream. Go!” And I also need the context to do it in.

How can we organize a system which is more proactive, which is more about capability rather than sitting behind and just giving commands—and needing to be right all the time! This is passive and won’t help us, at all. It needs to be social. It can’t be like my business developer’s initial reaction about the jewellry proposal. It needs to have a proactive mentality. This attitude and mentality is in our studio all the time.

To ensure we achieve it, we intern every senior person who comes to our studio. They get this mentality engraved in their brain. If they disagree, that’s fine. I don’t care if they’re the intern or a senior manager. If you save time and come up with a new proposal yourself, then you’re automatically part of the process—as a participant, not as an observer. That’s really important to make sure things are done and realized.

It reminds me of [Architecture For Humanity founder] Cameron Sinclair’s comment: “People don’t fund problems, they fund solutions.” This sounds similar for you: if you have an issue with something you’re proposing and you don’t agree with it, come back with a solution. Come back with something else. From what you’re saying, that’s ingrained in the culture of…

For sure, that’s part of the process in order to speed things up. Why am I traveling around the world like a mad guy? It’s because I need to have leaders, or people who take ownership and make that part of the solution instead of the problem. And I’m curious to watch that happen. And in the moment, I really feel it. I talk with them. I can connect with it. That’s when new projects start. Things like budget deadlines, etc, come later, but that initial approach is really important.

And we don’t always connect with others. For example, with the Smog Free Tower project I had many, many meetings, and nobody wanted to do it, or to spend time, money, or energy on it. The Smog Free Tower project was partly financed by our own studio—is partly financed—because nobody wanted to take the initiative. But now, it’s there. Now, everybody is calling us. So you need to take some risk for yourself, as well.

Commitment and risk!

With that in mind, no doubt many people would agree that your work epitomizes innovation. Of course, it has become fashionable in business and design circles to loosely throw around the word innovation but with little evidence to support those claims. My view is that innovation is a game-changer, not a tweak. In your opinion, what are the greatest impediments to true innovation?

Every good idea has a consequence. Every good dream can be redefined. A lot of innovation is, indeed, focused on one component to do a new thing—but in the old way. It’s like your Mom wants to be your Facebook friend. These days, a lot of so-called innovation is defined as doing the same thing but less bad, five percent less worse. For me, this is not innovation. It’s just damage control.

These days, a lot of so-called innovation is defined as doing the same thing but less bad, five percent less worse. For me, this is not innovation. It’s just damage control.

The true sense of innovation is redefining the purpose. Who you are, what you want and how are we going to do it? And having the guts to question that. That’s why I’m giving you the example of the underground parking places. You can make parking places even better than they already are and forget about the self-driving car, seeing it as an issue that pops up somewhere else. But it is hacking your business, it is hacking your existence—and you don’t even know about it, or choose not to care.

You need to have a 360 view and as a big corporation, you can do that with good leadership, by teaming up with smaller companies who are more flexible and faster, which speeds up the process.

Most of all, it is about having the curiosity, or just sheer desperation if it helps motivate innovation. I have those kinds of clients who are curious and who are incredibly desperate. I like them both—a lot.

I’ll finish on this question: What advice would you offer designers who are interested in changing the world for the better but aren’t aware of how to do so, or how to start, or how to achieve a small percentage of what you’ve done in a relatively short period of time?

I don’t know. Just start doing. Just because there is no door doesn’t mean there isn’t a key. You just start. You go out there. You get annoyed. You get amazed. You get obsessed. You get curious. You come up with proposals and make a prototype.

You think about: “Oh, who should I contact? With whom should I talk? Where should I position this idea to create maximum impact?” Just start talking about it to your friends, to your wife, to your boss, to your fellow colleague and sooner or later, somebody will plug in to that idea. It starts to grow.

Be amazed and drag that amazement into action. That’s innovation in a world where we are all more or less connected. I make things, but the making also makes you. There’s this interaction between you and world. You should embrace that—and help old lady’s on a Sunday evening. That’s also amazing.

[Both laughing.]

Image Credits:

All project images sourced on Studio Roosegaarde website:

Dune

Sustainable DanceFloor

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Karin Wanngård:
The Mayor of Stockholm on how to design a successful city

As cities become more influential in an increasingly complex world, Karin Wanngård, Mayor of Stockholm City, talks about what it takes to successfully navigate this opportunity.

Stockholm, was founded in the year 1252. Today, my city is at the forefront of the technological revolution. Attracting the world’s leading IT-companies as well as skilled professionals from all over the world—new and thriving companies are started here every week. Many factors contribute to this. Stockholm is a beautiful, old, quaint and attractive city to live in. We have a high-skilled labour force, mainly due to education—from kindergarten to university—being free of charge. Health care is universal, and Stockholm offers a wide range of cultural activities and green areas.

Stockholm’s fast-paced growth is a success story, but it is also a story that comes with a wide range of challenges. We have a housing shortage that, if not fixed, may deter people from moving here. We need to expand the city, but this must be done in a sustainable way; Stockholm’s good environment being one key factor for many when deciding to live and work here. I strongly believe that the solution lies in welcoming and applying new technology

We have the ambitious goal that Stockholm should be the smartest and most connected city in the world. When it comes to connectivity we are far ahead, having established a company, Stokab, owned by the city that provides dark fibre—reaching 90 percent of the households and 100 percent of businesses. The basic philosophy behind it being that access to fibre infrastructure is a strategic utility for the city—just like water.

Having solid infrastructure in place is, of course, a pre-requisite when building smart cities. But again, the crucial part lies within the process of application. There’s no use in installing faucets in every home, if the water is undrinkable. This is where political will and decision-making comes in.

Some of the most interesting things are the developments made within open data, big data and Internet of Things (IoT). Combining big data, open data and IoT provides endless possibilities.

There are many examples. Soon, traffic planning can be done in real time, based on open and big data, providing information on traffic jams before they occur to speed up transport and decrease congestion. Automatic control of flow in storm drains to avoid flooding; parking spaces that communicate when they are free; smart and connected lamp posts providing street lighting when needed to save energy and that can measure particle concentrations in the air as well as providing Wi-Fi.

A smart city is also a sustainable city. Finding ways to build sustainable cities and regions will provide those that succeed with a competitive advantage.

A smart city is also a sustainable city. Finding ways to build sustainable cities and regions will provide those that succeed with a competitive advantage. Most people want to live in healthy and good environments, this will in turn attract talent and businesses to those that can offer it.

Tackling climate change is therefore a growth opportunity for cities as it raises the standard of living for citizens and helps attract businesses. And I truly believe that cities can succeed if there is political will and an openness to embrace new technology, while keeping their historical heritage in the process. From old to smart, without losing one’s history.

Image Credits:

Karin Wanngård portrait supplied by Karin Wanngård

Stockholm City / Shutterstock

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Jules Pipe:
How to foster a design-led city
(with London’s Mayor, Sadiq Khan)

Jules Pipe, Deputy Mayor for Planning, Skills and Regeneration, London, shares the City of London’s approach to ensuring design principles are embedded in future plans, all of which has been driven and supported by London’s Mayor Sadiq Khan

The recent draft London Plan is the overarching spatial strategy for the future growth and prosperity of the city over the next 25 years. This new plan positions good design principles at its heart.

It also advocates for ‘Good Growth’ that promotes new design-led development opportunities to accommodate London’s growing population while making sure that London’s special character and liveability is maintained and enhanced and that benefits are felt by all Londoners.

The Mayor’s planning team works proactively with developers, local authorities and other stakeholders to achieve the best possible planning and design outcomes for all development proposals that are referred to the Greater London Authority. Of key importance to achieving this is to engage with applicants at the earliest possible stage, before an application is submitted, to ensure that good design principles are embedded from the outset.

The detailed policies of the new London Plan provide a strong framework for measuring and assessing each application. These include requirements for activating the ground planes of buildings with public facing uses, a contextual approach to forming an appropriate scale and massing to buildings, securing high standards of residential amenity and the best quality of architecture and placemaking.

To support and help to deliver quality in the built environment, the Mayor has launched the Good Growth by Design programme and appointed 50 Design Advocates who are all recognised and experienced experts in the fields of urban design, architecture, sustainable and inclusive design.

To support and help to deliver quality in the built environment, the Mayor has launched the Good Growth by Design programme and appointed 50 Design Advocates who are all recognised and experienced experts in the fields of urban design, architecture, sustainable and inclusive design.

They provide support to the Mayor, myself and our planning team by providing scrutiny to the Mayor’s investments, decisions and policies, by developing design research and policy for the most pertinent issues facing London’s built environment and promote and advocate for the design sector in London. Initial investigations have included developing the Mayor’s approach to housing design, the circular economy of the built environment, the diversity of the built environment profession and promotion of quality procurement.

As part of this programme, the Mayor has also placed an increased emphasis on the role of design review in London, making it mandatory when development that is above a stated height or density, or where schemes benefit from Mayoral investment or land.

A new London-wide panel has been established—the ‘London Review Panel’—and has provided reviews for high-profile projects like the pedestrianisation of Oxford Street and the regeneration of Crystal Palace Park.

The ‘London Quality Review Charter’ has also been launched which looks to promote consistency and quality across the London borough’s design review panels. Looking ahead, an audit of borough level design review panels is being undertaken. This will reveal the extent and quality of design review of major schemes across London and make recommendations for providing additional support where needed. This helps ensure the boroughs have the design expertise to meet the added design scrutiny that is required to deliver genuinely well designed places and buildings for the years to come.

Image Credits

Jules Pipe portrait provided by Mayor of London’s Press Office

London city skyline / Shutterstock

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Aiyemobisi ‘Bisi’ Williams:
How to foster massive change

Aiyemobisi ‘Bisi’ Williams—co-founder of Massive Change Network with Bruce Mau—shares her expert advice on how to foster change through collaboration and leading by design.

Design is Leadership: Lead by Design

Design often falls into the ho-hum status of how things look and feel. It’s true, the world notices the sleekness of a smartphone. The coolness of a Tesla. The hipness of a font. But what happens instead when design is lifted a bit higher and seen as a way to save the world?

It sounds grandiose, if not far-fetched, because we tend to think of the planet’s salvation as every problem solved in one fell swoop. But the process of design is really applicable to any challenge, and its tools are available to everyone. So if we all design one thing at a time, one solution after another, we can begin to understand that we truly can design a better future—before it even happens.

To me, that’s inspiring. And at Massive Change Network, the global design consultancy I co-founded with Bruce Mau, this is our first principle. We believe that to succeed, design must inspire. It needs to gather people up in its beauty and bring them along in the embracing vision of a better world.

We believe that to succeed, design must inspire. It needs to gather people up in its beauty and bring them along in the embracing vision of a better world.

It’s an optimism that’s actually fact-based. Our work is grounded in extensive research and close collaboration, incorporating ideas and perspectives from all levels of our studio and our clients’ organizations. It brings a diversity of roles and skills to the table, and at that amazing intersection of disciplines, we look for inspiration. And always find it.

The notion of design is expanding. It’s no longer about how things appear, but how something works. Design (if we dare to confine its wonder to a single word) gives us a process to align who we are with what we do, on every level. And that tends to reveal our Superpower.

Yes, Superpower. Each one of us has one. We possess an inherent strength, a talent, an insight, a piece of the greater solution to make even the most evil thing more beautiful. We just need to know how to use it. We can make the invisible visible, and when we visualize the challenge, the unseen obstacle to a better future, we can begin to articulate it.

To design a good life? That’s magical.

Design sends a message. And today, everything communicates. How we do things expresses who we are. It is ever more important to articulate it, so that you can align that understanding at every level of an organization. When you do that, you assume a mantel of design leadership. And if we don’t do that, if we simply fail to design, we design for failure.

The internet launched an age of transparency. We can no longer hide behind a scripted front because anyone can access information that demonstrates who we are. And that’s a big change: the explosion of information. In minutes, we can see what’s already been done and what others have tried. And because of technology, we can combine our Superpowers and collaborate as never before, even as a team spread across the globe.

Design is a mindset that is available to all.

There is power in numbers. Two heads being better than one is an enlivened maxim in the 21st century. And with innovation as the new normal, change is accelerating. Not only for creatives, but everyone. Anyone can be a designer. We can all take up the tools of design. It’s a skill set, it’s an imperative, and it’s wonderfully democratic, too—design is a mindset that is available to all.

Look, it’s just how I feel. Design is change. And together, we can change the world with design.

Image Credit:

Aiyemobisi ‘Bisi’ Williams portrait sourced from the Massive Change Network website

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Edward de Bono:
Visual Language

Edward de Bono—influential physician, psychologist, author, and inventor—discusses the immediacy of visual language, how the brain organises visual patterns and why he chooses to draw as he speaks when delivering a presentation. This essay was featured in Open Manifesto #2, which focused on the theme ‘Interpreting Visual Language’. (Sadly, Edward passed away in 2021, aged 88.)

You can recognise a friend instantly because visual perception allows many things to be assembled at once. Imagine trying to recognise a friend by building up and using a verbal picture on every occasion. The ‘totality’ of a visual impression is one of the key advantages of visual language.

When I lecture, I draw continuously on an overhead projector. As a result, the attention of the listeners is always on the point of development of the image. This is very different from presenting a fixed slide, which shows the same ultimate picture. But one of the limitations of visual language is that, often times, everything must be shown at once—for example, as in a printed advertisement on a page. If it were possible to allow the image to develop step by step, it would be much more powerful because the attention would thereby be controlled instead of choosing its own path.

The brain organises incoming patterns into routines and is a self-organising information system or pattern-making system. Pattern-making systems are always asymmetrical (having a lack of symmetry) and can be explained visually in the following simple diagram.

It is true that this simple diagram could be described in words, such as: “the path from A to B is not the same as the path from B to A”. While this verbal description may be technically correct it does nothing to convey the function of an asymmetric system.

When the asymmetric system is presented as a diagram it becomes very easy to see how the formal tools of lateral thinking are logically based on the system. For example, it becomes very easy to see how ‘challenge’, ‘concept extraction’ (finding the general objective), ‘provocation’ (provocative suggestions) and ‘random entry’ (introducing random elements) all arise from the very nature of the system. Of particular interest, it would be completely impossible to see this from a verbal description of asymmetry.

Of course, the process of provocation seems totally irrational. To suggest that a car might have square wheels is an engineering nonsense. But from this provocation comes the idea of anticipatory suspension. With the introduction of a provocation, or ‘Po’*, the following visual diagram of an asymmetric pattern shows very clearly how and why this can come about.

*Po cars have square wheels.

A visual language shows the interplay of complex factors in a way that would be very difficult if using verbal language. This interplay contains powerful factors but also uses more subtle factors and nuances. For example, a picture of a building is always going to be more comprehensive than a verbal description.

Essence.

One of the advantages of a visual language is the comprehensiveness and totality that can be conveyed. Another advantage is almost exactly the opposite. Caricatures are not photographs. Caricatures do not show something as it really is but distil and emphasise certain features in a way that goes beyond realism and, in a sense, becomes even more realistic.

Here is another example; a good sign can compress a complicated message into a simple visual form. This is a lot harder to do with verbal language because a visual language can be pictorial or diagrammatic. It can also be half way between the two by using simplified pictorial effects that approach being diagrammatic, something that an equivalent verbal language would find impossible to achieve.

Symbols.

Certain visual symbols come to have a rich identity of their own. For example, the simple arrow can come to mean different things;

– this leads to something else.

– this influences something else or some process.

– these things come together to create something else.

– pay attention to this point.

etcetera.

However, we have yet to reach a stage where we have symbols for a wide range of concepts. If we were at that stage, we could string these symbols together to describe complex situations. Indeed, we might still prefer to seek to do this in one visual effort rather than use the sequence effect that verbal language has to use.

Familiarity.

A visual symbol that becomes very familiar still has a high communication value but can, in some circumstances, lose its ‘attention getting’ value. The power of a fresh visual representation is strong in getting attention but has less immediate communication value because the viewer is required to ‘figure it out’ rather than use an established understanding.

Of course, it all depends on the viewer’s motivation. If the viewer is already interested in the communication then established symbols can work quite well. But if the viewer is not so interested, then a fresh symbol has a stronger chance of capturing attention.

Irritation.

In writing my books, I often use diagrams to explain a point in a parallel way. Usually, these diagrams are optional, meaning the point has been covered in the writing and the visual picture is just a way of reinforcing and clarifying the point.

However, I have been told that some readers find the diagrams to be irritating. This may be because they do not understand the diagrams. It may be that they have understood the point so well from the text that the diagram is superfluous—and hence irritating. It may even be that some people are actually unhappy with a visual representation. This may be because they understand the point but cannot see how they would use the diagram, in conversation, to convey the point to others.

To accommodate these circumstances, I try to include three modes: text, diagrams and metaphors. Incidentally, of these three, metaphors are the easiest to convey to others.

One of the obvious challenges to visual language is the conflict between being simple and being comprehensive.

Simplicity.

One of the obvious challenges to visual language is the conflict between being simple and being comprehensive. If all the factors and processes have to be included then communication becomes rather complex. If only the essence is included then the communication is usually incomplete. There is also no point in communicating the wrong message very effectively, but neither is there any point in having a message so complex that it cannot be communicated at all. Such is the challenge of effective visual communication.

The future.

There is a real need for a comprehensive visual language, which would at once be international. But there is also a need to develop ‘visual literacy’ in youngsters so that they can comprehend visual language more effectively.

There will always be a need for traditional verbal language but the special advantages of visual communication need to be explored and used more fully than is the case at the moment. This has special relevance not only to less developed societies but even the most developed societies where there is a great need to communicate complex concepts more effectively.

Editor’s Note: This essay was written in 2005, but I have always felt that—in his comments about ‘The future’ — Edward had foreseen what would eventually become a universal visual language popularised by youth beginning in 2010: emojis.

Image credits:

Edward de Bono portrait unknown (sourced on www.aljatasi.com, which is no longer operational).

Diagrams reproduced from faxed illustrations provided by Edward de Bono to Kevin Finn.

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Ken Segall:
The transformative power of simplicity, and working with Steve Jobs

Ken Segall—best-selling author and ex-Advertising Creative Director for Apple—talks about the power of simplicity, citing numerous examples and case studies across the design and business worlds, and discussing his 12 years working alongside Steve Jobs.

Kevin Finn: The opening line of your book Think Simple sets the entire tone. It states, “Simplicity is one of the most deceptive concepts on Earth”—which is a compelling claim. But it could also be a little concerning for those who are seeking to adopt simplicity. In what way do you see simplicity being such a deeply deceptive concept?

Ken Segall: As a creative person in advertising, I come from a marketing background and I came to appreciate the value of simplicity in some of my earliest days. You know… How do I phrase this? [Laughter] When you have different bosses, different Creative Directors, and sometimes, when you present a really simple idea it gets rejected because it seems too simple or too obvious [laughs]. As a result, you end up getting into these discussions about: “Well, wait a second. That kind of simplicity really strikes home with people.”

But there’s this constant, I suppose, tension between people who don’t quite understand the value of simplicity. You have to fight your way through all those different layers. Especially when you’re working for a company with multiple levels of approval. Everyone’s second‑guessing and trying to make things “better” by adding layers to the idea—because everyone has to have their input.

So the challenge is not just to have the simple idea, but to have it recognised as a simple idea and to be able to keep it pure and simple, from beginning to end. That’s why I inevitably bring the Steve Jobs’ example into my story because—of all the people I’ve ever worked with or for—he was the one person who really understood simplicity and who was always looking for the simple idea. He went to extraordinary lengths to protect the idea, to keep it simple—from beginning to the end.

So the challenge is not just to have the simple idea, but to have it recognised as a simple idea and to be able to keep it pure and simple, from beginning to end.

It strikes me there’s probably an element of fear in people who say: “Oh, that’s too simple.” A feeling that something can be simple, but that it also needs to have a level of complexity within it for it to have some kind of weight or visible value…

Yes! I worked on the Apple advertising with TBWA/Chiat/Day. It was actually my fourth time working with the agency. I’d had many different stints with them over the years. They would do revolutionary work and receive amazing press coverage for it. At the time, I was formulating my personal belief in the power of simplicity and so I would often look at their work and think: “Well, it’s kind of obvious, isn’t it?” With this in mind, I’d Google to see who else had the idea. But I found nobody else ever did have the idea.

There’s something about a simple solution. It can be fantastically creative, and it often makes you think: “Well, certainly somebody did that before.” But then you realise, no-one actually ever did, which is so astonishing and impressive.

TBWA/Chiat/Day achieved that time after time. And it struck me—before I even got involved with Steve Jobs—that’s the way these guys worked. They managed to come up with ideas which strike a chord with you. Ideas that almost seem familiar, and yet they’re still surprising, wonderful and fresh. That’s when I really started to recognise the power of simplicity. It can appear so easy.

So the arguments I used to have about simplicity were because it’s only obvious when you see it done and when you think about it in hindsight. Those kinds of ideas connect with people better.

Of course, Apple had the benefit of producing amazing devices. Yet there was nothing terribly familiar about what they were doing because it was ahead of its time. But, if you look at the principles in the advertising we created, it really was very simple. I felt it reinforced the whole belief Steve Jobs had in applying the power of simplicity in many different ways inside the company.

So the arguments I used to have about simplicity were because it’s only obvious when you see it done and when you think about it in hindsight.

It reminds me of a conversation I once had with Dr. Edward de Bono where he suggested design can be simple and obvious in hindsight but not particularly simple and obvious at inception. It requires one to first wade through complexity in order to arrive at the simplicity. We have to do all the heavy lifting on behalf of others and, in doing so, put them in a position to see the simplicity presented to them…

That’s so true. When you look back and think how simple it is, or how simple it seems to others, it’s a reminder of how much incredible work, debate and anguish went into it. And yet, it often ends with people saying: “Oh, that’s so simple.”

In my book Think Simple I interviewed a few Australian leaders. One of them, Laura Anderson, creates strategies for very complicated companies. And it reflects what you just said. She requests to see all the company’s complexity. That’s how every project starts. She says: “I want it all on the table, just pour it on. We’re going to go through all this complexity and distill it into something simple.” So, you need to start with all that—and she’d create something simple from all that complexity; an actionable strategy that actually guides the behaviours and decisions, which spring forth from the simplicity. That takes a lot of work—and they pay her a lot of money to do it.

You also mention in your book that many companies behave as if simplicity will happen all by itself. This suggests leadership and deliberate action are the foundation stones of simplicity. So why is it so hard for some leaders or businesses to adopt an approach of simplicity?

That’s a very good question. I think it’s because it’s so obvious. That’s why I say people think it’ll take care of itself. Clearly, most people want things to be simple, so there’s a desire to have a simple idea which can then be executed.

But I believe, if you really understand the nature of simplicity, and you work hard to create something wonderfully simple, it takes a lot of effort and it needs attention. For example, with a lot of companies I’ve worked with previously, at the beginning of every project someone would typically stand up, make a pretty strong speech about how they’re going to do it this time, how it’s going to be so much different than last time. And then it ends up being a a pile of crap again because—suddenly—other people get their fingers in it. It’s a case of having to please ‘these guys’ and ‘those guys’; and do the research around the country; and revise it three or four times. Of course, before you know it, it’s not simple anymore. I believe people who don’t truly appreciate the power of simplicity tend to let it go along the way in the form of compromises.

I believe people who don’t truly appreciate the power of simplicity tend to let it go along the way in the form of compromises.

I guess, in many ways, it refers back to the point we discussed earlier about the pitch process where, oftentimes, the pitch process becomes self-selecting. Verbal identity helps that self-selection, in terms of who you might attract. For example, the gym you gave as a case study, they will attract a particular kind of person who is looking for that experience. It is self-selecting.

Absolutely! They know exactly who they want. They don’t want some 20 something that just wants it to be cool and hip. They want somebody who is an elite athlete and they’re obviously clearly positioned that way. It may not work as a mainstream proposition— it probably wouldn’t—but for them that’s absolutely spot on.

It’s a niche market. They know exactly what to do, what they want to do, and I’m sure they have included within their language that it’s not just about the brutality of the experience, but also the benefit, the outcome.

Absolutely. Yeah. You get the full leadership piece that they have on their site about the kind of development and how they grow their people. Everything is pretty extraordinary. You can see the whole package, in terms of this intensity and brutality on one side, but you also see yourself coming out the other end as the best person you expect to be.

You’ve mentioned ‘innovation’ a few times, and in a recent conversation we briefly discussed the issue of innovation and its potential overuse in the context of business expectations. My view is that true innovation is a game changer, and usually only happens over a longer period of time. You argue that the idea of innovation can actually be a language tool, which can be used regularly to specifically leverage or persuade in a client situation. Can you expand on this?

It very much comes down to whether you want to narrowly or broadly define the nature of innovation. It’s not so important to me. I probably use the term as a short-hand because there are lots of different types of innovation. There is business model innovation. There is service innovation, client innovation. There’s all sorts of ways to actually cut that conversation up. For us, the idea that innovation needs to be something big isn’t the case, because innovation can be evolutionary by its nature.

You don’t necessarily come to an end, but we see the exploits and end results of innovation, and usually those innovations are a consequence of months, years, decades of evolution, and work, and thinking. That’s why I probably have a wider view of it. I know when you look back on the history of branding it has evolved, but it has been done through certain individuals and organisations who question the way branding works and find a better way of looking at it, which actually moves things along.

For us, the idea that innovation needs to be something big isn’t the case, because innovation can be evolutionary by its nature.

You touched on something else in your book, where you claim most business strategies are based on cold, hard facts, but that simplicity is based on an understanding of human behaviour. I assume understanding human behaviour relies on data—but also on intuition. And that’s easier said than done, particularly because most business leaders were probably trained in cold, hard facts. So it must also take behavioural change on the part of business leaders to move into this space. If so, how can they adapt?

Many of the people I talked to for the book were already of this belief and persuasion. I sought them out because their companies fit a certain model. Many said they want to see the data, but they don’t want to lose sight of the emotional reactions and some of the things that can’t necessarily be quantified in data.

I’ve always thought Steve Jobs was the great example because it takes boldness to do that. I mean, he was willing to gamble tens of billions of dollars on something that he had no proof of, other than what he felt in his gut. Most companies don’t do that because even the CEO’s are afraid. Their job is on the line. If it doesn’t pan out, then the Board’s probably going to fire them.

So, I imagine most people get into this mode where they need validation. And that validation only comes in the form of things that can be measured—in very cold ways.

That points to a level of confidence. I never met Steve Jobs but from what I’ve gathered—through reading, videos and media—he had an abundance of confidence. Some might have interpreted that as arrogance, but it was confidence nonetheless. Perhaps, in the corporate world, it’s a lot harder for some leaders to have that confidence without the validation.

That’s true. And it was actually what I was leading to. It does translate to confidence. I agree a hundred percent. And you’re right, there’s a fine line between confidence and arrogance. I think a lot of people would look at Steve Jobs and say: “Yeah, he was really arrogant.” But he had a great sense. He trusted his own experience. A lot of business leaders I’ve spoken to think along those lines. For example, they say things like: “I’ve been doing this all my life. I know this business inside out, so why would I need to rely on something like validation, when I know in my gut this is correct? I don’t want to waste my time,” or: “I don’t believe those numbers.” They have the confidence to make decisions and literally risk large sums of money going in a certain direction. But, they don’t it blindly. That’s important to mention. They do look at the numbers. Obviously, they don’t want to make stupid mistakes. But they give themselves a lot of credit.

In contrast there are businesses like Intel—which I like to bash, but I used to work there so I know. The highest level off marketing people would be in meetings—two or three people. Then we’d have the creative team, and the agency people who were, you know, marketing experts. So you’d think with that amount of expertise in the room, they could just say: “This is good and that’s bad,” or: “We like this the best. Let’s go with it.” But they were unable to make those decisions, because nobody wanted to make a mistake. They didn’t have that kind of confidence.

They would pick two ideas—they couldn’t just pick one—and then they’d do research all around the world, in many different countries, to get comments. Then they’d actually produce two entirely separate campaigns, before testing them to make sure they were going to run the right one. It was so much time and so much money. When we worked on Apple I always felt like we were almost winging it. We’d have a debate in the room. We’re smart people. So smart people would agree that this was the right idea. And then we’d go off and produce it. Essentially, we’d short‑circuit a process that normally takes three months in these other companies. We’d do it in three weeks—from presentation of the idea to the finished product.

That suggests it’s more about informed intuition—one that is informed by experience, by data, and by the other people in the room…

Yes! It’s about not being blind to the facts and experiences that others in the room bring.

John McGrath is one of those people who disparages other companies because they would spend so much time researching what was important to the buyers. He said: “I’ve been in this business my whole life. I’ve bought and sold property all my life. I know how I want to be treated. That’s all I need to know. I just want to treat customers with respect, not lure them in by avoiding to give them the prices and suggest they have to come in to the office so we can talk about it.” He said: “I don’t want to be treated that way, so I’m not going to treat my customers that way.” And it seems to have served him fairly well.

In your book, you throw a curveball by suggesting: “There’s no such thing as simplicity, only the perception of simplicity.” Doesn’t that undermine the power and attraction of simplicity if it’s all about perception?

Yes and no. Actually, I would say no, because it’s the basis of my thesis. [Laughter] But my point really is, so many things appear simple to us, but they’re not—for all the reasons we’ve already talked about. There’s so much work and debate; so much revising, and all the stuff. Hopefully, it finally gets in front of someone and they think: “Oh, that was simple.” But it wasn’t simple getting there. Yet you perceive it as simple.

For all the reasons why something might be simple or complicated, it really doesn’t matter. The important thing is the customer’s experience with your product or your service. If they feel like it was simple, then it’s simple. The simplicity is real. So, it’s all about creating that perception, working on that perception.

For example, say a company has 40 different products—and they need to have 40 different products because they have many different kinds of customers. You don’t have to design a web page presenting all 40 products at the same time. You can group them in certain ways, like ‘good’, ‘better,’ and ‘best’. It’s about creating the perception that it’s a simple experience, even if—technically speaking—it isn’t.

Again, I use Apple as an example because they only show a couple of models of computers, even though you can configure them to create 10, 20, or 30 different models. But they don’t prepackage all those different models and try to get you to choose one or the other. Someone may think there’s an easier way to approach the problem and present all their products at once. But the likelihood is, most people might think: “I have no idea where to even start with these guys. But Apple just made it so simple for me so I’ll go there.”

So it’s that perception of simplicity, even though the number of models Apple offers compared to the other guys might not be all that different. It just appears to be different.

Using your website analogy, it’s the same with content and how it’s being presented. Through the navigation design, there is an opportunity to offer the perception—or the impression—that it’s easier to navigate. Even though the amount of information on the website hasn’t changed, just how it’s accessed….

Right, right. To your point, it’s my view that if you make that experience feel so simple, then that’s when people might talk to their friends or their colleagues. They might say: “Oh, I had a great experience with this company. You should check them out.”

Whereas if you have to work to get what you need, you’re not prone to talk up that experience. That’s how Apple is always attracting people, because customers talk about their experience. And friends and families get influenced by that.

If you have to work to get what you need, you’re not prone to talk up that experience. That’s how Apple is always attracting people, because customers talk about their experience. And friends and families get influenced by that.

Apple is often seen as the holy grail. They’ve moved from their customers being ambassadors and champions to almost being evangelists. It does come down to the experience—and Apple’s understanding of the customer experience—and then presenting it in simple terms.

Yes! Though, I try to issue disclaimer at various points because I always go back to Apple, and it’s actually an unfair example because they make these beautiful, shiny things and people have these experiences through owning them, holding them. It’s very different from a company who might, for example, make small engine parts. It’s difficult to fall in love with that company in the same way you might with Apple. But you could fall in love with the experience of dealing with that company.

I’ve spoken with telecommunications companies and TV cable companies, those sorts of businesses. They understand their customers are never going to love them like Apple customers love Apple. But they can create an experience with them that is above what they produce and more about the customer service and experience.

Apple creates love. Everyone can create love, to a degree, but for some companies it can be difficult. For some, the nature of some companies simply means: it is what it is. Still, like I say, the experience—that feeling of the company—can be simple versus complicated.

That reminds me of a conversation I once had with Blair Enns—a Canadian consultant in the creative space. He shared a story where a client once said: “We want to be the Apple of our sector, or the iPhone of our sector.” And they say it with great enthusiasm. He let it hang for a few minutes and then replied, saying: “OK. But are you brave enough?” This goes back to the confidence issue because I think a lot of people, when they talk about Apple, they’re only looking at the results, not the work or the process that Apple went through in order to get to the end result. I guess that’s also why you need to include your disclaimer about Apple because it’s unique. Regardless, I think people tend to base their judgments on what Apple ‘has’ achieved, not ‘how’ they achieved it—which is the hard work. And that’s where courage and confidence is required.

Yeah. [laughs] It’s funny because, in my advertising consulting life—either through my own experiences or people I know who tell me—clients have said: “We want to do something like what Apple would do.” Because, again, there is a perception that it looks simple, so people think it is. And this feeds the perception that Apple achieved it overnight. But it was over 20 years—doing it over and over and over again, building loyalty among people who appreciate a company that makes wonderful things simple.

I assume most organisations and businesses understand the importance of simplicity when it comes to products, systems, and processes. However, you also talk at length in your book about the importance of simplicity with regards branding, including simplifying internal communications around mission, and values—those sorts of things. Most organisations might not make a connection between simplicity and branding so why do you see simplicity—in these particular areas—being so important for organisations to embrace?

Well, I just think that if you have those clear missions and clear values—and again, it reflects many of the conversations I’ve had for the book—I was hearing the same things over and over again. It’s about guiding a company to avoid standing over people’s shoulders telling them they’re doing it right or wrong. If staff understand the values of the company, or they understand there’s a clear mission, then when they’re creating products or making decisions in marketing, or whatever, they’re all consistent. They’re all moving in the same direction.

If staff understand the values of the company, or they understand there’s a clear mission, then when they’re creating products or making decisions in marketing, or whatever, they’re all consistent. They’re all moving in the same direction.

In fact, I recently spoke to a friend of mine, who I had lost touch with for a while. He was telling me why he’s no longer with the company he worked for. He had philosophical differences with the company because it’s from a world where you just keep people churning out new product ideas. The problem was they couldn’t really focus on anything, which made it hard to invest money in any one thing. The company was just doing way too many things and, ultimately, he just had to leave because of this different view around simplicity versus complexity.

So, I think if you have that appreciation through the power of simplicity it prevents you from doing these types of things. It helps ensure you avoid inconsistency with your Mission and your Values—and it lets people do their job because they know how to do their job without other people telling them how to do their job. But, ideally, everybody’s on the same wavelength.

The CEO of The Container Store Kip Tindell is a good example. It’s a very big national US retail chain. He said they have a set of values, which they indoctrinate their people with, so that everyone knows how they’re expected to behave—what end result they want to achieve. And then they don’t say anything more to them. It’s up to the individual to creatively execute. They can work any way they want to work, as long as they don’t go against the values. So it empowers them to be creative in their jobs and it makes them feel like they’re doing their thing, but they work for this bigger company. And, this company is quite amazing. I believe that over a period of 25 years they’ve never had a down year. It’s incredible.

I guess it’s because it has become cultural through simplicity. That said, I believe organisational culture can’t be—or shouldn’t be—designed or manufactured. It can be facilitated and nurtured, of course, but it must grow and evolve organically. So, are you suggesting that, through simplicity, the vision and mission can become cultural, rather than just statements of intent?

That’s how I put it in the book, where all these things combined create the culture. There are cultures of complexity and this can drive people away. There are quite a few examples where people I spoke to attributed their success to having a strong culture, or in the case of Ted Chung in South Korea [CEO of Hyundai Card], he faced a total mess when he arrived, where the company was projected to lose two billion dollars in the first year.

But they turned it around. What he did to the culture was amazing. In fact, I met him because I was doing a presentation in Seoul. While I was there, someone suggested visiting the business. I met him and got a tour of the company. By the time he was done, I wanted to work there!

[Laughs]

I thought: “This is the coolest place!” The architecture, the design of the lobby, the vending machines, the designer furniture—all this stuff. He told me he wanted to change the culture of the company. He knew it was all about how credit cards represent a lifestyle and they all needed to embrace that thinking. So it became all about about design. Of course, I was thinking: “How could a credit card company be about design?” But it was! And it permeated the workplace. It completely changed the way people thought, the way they design their cards and the type of events that they would sponsor. It became all about lifestyle. They did a complete turnaround. He was my big culture story in the book.

And then there is Telstra, which has had some horror culture stories. I talked to Telstra Executive Robert Nason at the end of his third year. He said they’d made a lot of headway, considering all the things that are typical of a big company. And a lot of it’s in the culture.

An example he offered was around presentations. He enforced a rule where there had to be one slide for every minute of a presentation. Meaning if you’re giving a 45‑minute presentation there needs to be 45 slides—and it needs to stay on topic. Previously, if you did that, people might look at you like some kind of a renegade, thinking: “You don’t belong here.”

So, it feeds on itself if your culture is one of simplicity—and I use Apple again as an example. I was in plenty of meetings without Steve Jobs where people were preparing their presentations. They’d help each other by saying: “You’ve got six things on that slide. That’s probably a bit more confusing than it should be. Can you get it down to two?” And they would.

People were always looking to help one another to do something that was more consistent with the culture. Culture has a lot more than simplicity but having this as a central philosophy is stronger—as opposed to a culture where processes are more important than anything else and where people must follow the process above all other things.

Culture has a lot more than simplicity but having this as a central philosophy is stronger—as opposed to a culture where processes are more important than anything else and where people must follow the process above all other things.

In terms of advertising, that drives people crazy because at Apple, creativity was important. If we had a new idea on the [production] set, that was the most fun part of working with Steve. He’d approve one commercial, and we’d show up with 10. We’d always do the one we’d set out to do and oftentimes he went with the original one. But other times, he’d get excited about something that we hadn’t even thought of before he visited the set.

In contrast, at Intel or Dell—or one of those types of companies—you’ve already sold the idea to 30 different stores around the world. And if you don’t end up with the exact thing they approved, they’re never going be happy.

At Apple it was a culture of creativity, where the best idea should be produced, even if that meant revamping the schedules. With other cultures—where it’s all about processes—creativity is seen as a lesser value.

It strikes me it’s a deliberate choice that people make, possibly because in some organisations it’s easier to hide within complex layers, where it’s easier to shirk accountability and avoid responsibility. Is this a byproduct of a bureaucratic organisational structure, or do you think that retaining complexity might be more intentional for those reasons—to sort of cover your tail?

It’s hard to say. But pretty much every organisation starts small, in some way—and then it grows. So somewhere along the line it changes. And when it gets bigger, it develops processes. It brings in smart people to ‘run the company like a big business’ and can lose sight, as a result.

Steve [Jobs] was able to straddle this. He built Apple as the world’s largest startup. He didn’t want to lose those values. It’s that cultural thing again. Your job, your company, it’s all about the culture—and within that processes can be created but the values show up.

In marketing, there are those who have embraced the whole ‘honesty’ thing—which they obviously should. But then there are many companies that are tempted to think: “Let’s just use a little hyperbole here.” This can be really misleading.

I think your whole professional life is about finding that place to work, where you really feel like you’re in tune with the values of the company.

By the way, you talked about how hard it is to do something simple. It just reminded me of the quote: “If I had more time I would have written a shorter letter.” It’s attributed to a number of people, but the premise stands. It really is hard to do something simpler. It takes time and a lot more effort to reduce things…

I think your whole professional life is about finding that place to work, where you really feel like you’re in tune with the values of the company.

In your book, you touch on the issue of “faster, better, cheaper”. General consensus is that only two of these are possible at any one time. However, you propose it’s possible to achieve all three—but only if organisations tackle simplicity properly. How can simplicity achieve “faster, better, cheaper” without compromising quality?

The key is having really great people. And that was always a priority for Steve. He said many times that his most important job was hiring brilliant people. So, you’ve got really talented people; you give them responsibility; and you don’t threaten to bring in 10 more people when they failed to do their job. But that’s not about doing all the late nights, losing holidays with your family. It’s about getting a smaller group of people who can work quicker together. When Steve rejected our work we’d simply come back a few days later with new work. It wasn’t about getting six more teams involved if the work was rejected because we’d just have to sort through it all.

Sadly, the indications now are—in the absence of Steve—Apple is kind of…

Faltering?

Gravitating more towards the big‑company way of doing things where they have 10 different teams working on every project, with lists of events, meetings and things you need to be in. We didn’t have that. We didn’t have an official creative brief. Steve would give us the details on the product. We come back with ideas and then often use those ideas as fodder for discussion, which a lot of creative people hate—and they often refused to work in that way. But I actually found it to be fun because Steve couldn’t really understand how it would end up on TV unless he could see it. He didn’t want to have creative brief meetings. He just wanted to talk about work.

So, without all the different layers it happens faster. I often tell people about my experiences with Dell, IBM, Intel, BMW, how we would spend far more time creating a campaign than we did on Apple. We would spend less money because we wouldn’t be doing all the research and have too many people involved. And if you look at the work that came out as a result, it was much better than the work we did with the other companies. It speaks for itself when you have that simplicity of thought.

There are so many ways that simplicity leads to a better product. There are so many obvious examples with Apple and I’ve never understood why other companies try to copy the products but they don’t try to copy the the company—how it works. They don’t try to understand how Apple can do it time after time.

I guess some things just don’t really sink in. A good example is the iMac. By the way, this isn’t about creating just a style, but when the iMac was released Steve literally said: “In about two or three months from now, you’re gonna see a lot of these one‑unit things out there: all-in-one, easy Internet, the whole bit.” That seemed obvious to us—but it didn’t really happen.

I remember a meeting with him some time after the iMac launched and he said: “I personally don’t get it. We’ve showed them the playbook. And it’s become the best‑selling computer in the market. Yet people aren’t copying it.” Not that it worried him…

[Laughs] One way of translating this—and it’s mentioned in your book—simplicity was Steve’s greatest business weapon. That’s a really interesting way of synthesizing all the things we think about with Apple: design, attention to detail, craft, consumer awareness, customer experience, etc. You’ve boiled it all down to ‘simplicity as a business weapon’. So how did you see that having been translated practically?

For starters, clearly there are many reasons why Apple is successful. And I’ve seen this applied in so many different places: it’s in the organisation of the company, the advertising, the design of the Apple Stores. And there are so many different processes that they haven’t put in place. It was always in Steve’s head.

Especially when you look at things like the iPhone, or the iPod where Apple entered markets that were dominated by established companies. The music player market was looking for leadership because it was so splintered. There were a ton of them out there. So simplicity was his weapon because he used it competitively. And when all of these people laughed at the idea of Apple stepping into the phone market, a sector they knew nothing about and which was dominated by these giant companies—the fact he would even have the nerve, to have that confidence, and to think he could compete. And he basically took it over. It changed the whole course of how that the category developed from that point on. It really just shows the power of simplicity as a weapon, that he could offer something amazing to customers that’s really easy to use.

In fact, I worked on the original iPhone advertising development and in the initial briefings I remember the first meeting we had with the product manager. He said: “We all use BlackBerries here.” That was the accepted thing to use in business for email, etc. He went on to say: “But we don’t use around 80 percent of the features in a BlackBerry because we have no idea how to.”

So, the idea of the iPhone was that you wouldn’t even need an instruction manual. It would just be so obvious how to use it. The idea was you would simply use the features because they’re right in your face. You don’t need a manual for it.

I think it’s hard to deny that it’s one of the most powerful competitive weapons because, if you give the customers a choice of a difficult way or a simpler way, human nature will go with the simpler way.

I guess simplicity comes along in stages. You look back at things that we thought were simple years ago, but which were actually terribly complicated. We all grow up together and become more sophisticated. But I think it’s hard to deny that it’s one of the most powerful competitive weapons because, if you give the customers a choice of a difficult way or a simpler way, human nature will go with the simpler way. So, if you can make that clear to people, to communicate you’re offering simplicity—and in the case of Apple, where there’s a lust factor for a cool‑looking thing, because the design is so beautiful—it’s hard to lose.

It’s actually amazing to me how Apple hit so many things at once. It got people to open their eyes because, remember, the company was previously a failure. When Steve came back, it was near bankruptcy. It’s an amazing story. With all the various movies and everything that has been produced about Apple and Steve, it’s a shame they never really captured that aspect of it. It was always about his temper, and all that kind of stuff.

The cult of Steve Jobs?

The business story is quite fascinating, from getting fired by your own company, and starting Pixar and all the things that made Steve what he was, what he became and then how we applied that to Apple when he had the chance to return. It’s an amazing story. I just really haven’t ever read it anywhere.

You included a number of Australian organisations—quite favourably—in your book, including Westpac Bank, Bank of Melbourne, and McGrath Real Estate, among others. Why do Australian organisations stand out to you? And how do you think they rate in terms of the adoption of simplicity?

I think almost all of the leaders had that confidence we talked about earlier. They just hit all the things I believe in—because I saw those characteristics work with Apple. They all have a common theme. They needed to create a brand and identify what the company is going to stand for. They talked about simplifying their storyline—and every single thing they did had to fall under that theme, right down to the way they designed their offices; how they interacted with the community or customers; the way they set up their phone support lines.

It seems obvious, but these things didn’t exist until they did! Someone had to come along and say: “This is what we need to do”—to crack the whip, so to speak, and to make sure everybody was in line with that singular idea, to understand that it’s going to gain value for them because everybody would line up behind that arrowhead.

Earlier you mentioned businesses usually start out simple and then, as they grow, they get more complicated. So, is scaling simplicity the greatest challenge? How do you fend off complexity creeping back in?

Yes. I talk about this frequently. There are big companies who try to simplify. There are small companies that are simple and need to defend against the forces of complexity as they grow. Interestingly, if you have a successful small company you don’t always think it was successful because it was simple. So you allow things to happen to it because you think it’s all about scaling. You think, as you scale, you need to do all these complex things. But then, you look back one day and realize just how complicated things have become.

How do you fend off the forces of complexity? It’s about ensuring the processes don’t become more important than the ideas—and being somewhat ruthless in enforcing the simple things that are defining your company.

How do you fend off the forces of complexity? It’s about ensuring the processes don’t become more important than the ideas—and being somewhat ruthless in enforcing the simple things that are defining your company.

Sometimes, as the Mission Statement gets more complicated, the values get less clear. And before you know it—as things grow—there is a decision made to bring someone in to handle things. They start applying big company values to your company. As a result, people become less passionate about the work, because suddenly they now have to operate under all these different burdensome guidelines.

One of my favourite cases is a Czech Republic soft drink company called Kofola. As they got bigger, the founder brought people in from big companies to help. But staff started getting very dissatisfied with their jobs because it wasn’t fun anymore. There was a creative group there and they had a messy workplace. The new regime cleaned it all up, made it ‘modern’. But it just felt like all the fun had been sapped out of it. That’s an extreme example because it’s so visible. But culturally, they were really a bunch of hippies making cool drinks, and when suddenly it was like a job, and you were just a part of a company, everything became sterile. They didn’t feel like they could even dress as ‘loosely’ as they had before. This dramatically changed the happiness level of the employees. The owner realised he needed staff to enjoy their work. So he got rid of those other people and decided to make the place messy again—the way it used to be. And things started taking off again. And they all felt much better about it.

So, the lesson is: it’s just as hard to scale culture as it is to scale simplicity?

Yes, because, as they get big most companies introduce processes so things are much more controlled—because failure seems to have such a huge price. There is a sense that: “We can’t possibly fail.”

When I was at Intel I couldn’t understand why they thought they’d go out of business if they ran a bad ad. At Apple, we ran some bad ads, you know? There are some things we developed that I would never show anyone. We thought it was good at the time. It didn’t work so we yanked it off the air and we did something else. It’s not like the company had to close down over it. You can still shoot for the starts—and failure is part of it. There’s no freedom in a culture where failure is unacceptable.

Of course, Steve Jobs would get mad at us when we did a bad ad. But he didn’t fire us. So somewhere in the back of my mind at the time I remember appreciating that we tried something new, because we believed in doing something different. We talked Apple into doing things sometimes and Steve would say: “I wish you guys didn’t talk me into that.” In those instances, he often just said: “You can do better!”

You can still shoot for the starts—and failure is part of it. There’s no freedom in a culture where failure is unacceptable.

Shifting gears a little, something that struck me in your book was your suggestion that: “since the dawn of advertising, agencies have built reputations on their ability to create outstanding brands because, the brand is arguably a company’s most valuable property.” I agree that a brand is arguably a company’s most valuable asset, but I have to challenge you on agencies building this. Don’t businesses build their brands—day in, and day out? Advertising agencies promote the product and service. And that’s important. But they’re not involved in everyday business—day-to-day. It’s the business which does it and therefore it’s the business that builds the brand. Would you agree?

First of all: how dare you question me! [Laughing] But seriously, I do think that maybe I’ve been fortunate to have worked with brands that actually value their agency’s input. Some more than others, of course. But I think we always considered ourselves as the steward of the brand because our advertising was the most visible thing they did. But, obviously, the brand is more than just the advertising. It’s PR and all the things that the company does and which add up to what the brand is.

But I think the agencies have a lot to say about that, and in the case of Apple maybe it was an unusual case because Steve Jobs loved marketing so much. He loved and understood the power of the brand. Many of our conversations were about that kind of stuff, whereas other other companies might not treat their agency that way.

We saw ourselves as being important and knew the advertising we put out really was going to shape the brand so it had to be consistent with the values, the level of creativity—all of that. A good advertising/marketing person needs to be extremely aware of what they’re doing to the brand work because you are a major contributor to what the brand is.

There’s a lot of movement in the creative industries, from technology to consumer behaviour, etc. Are you optimistic about the future of advertising? Where do you see the future of advertising moving towards?

It’s funny you should mention that because I watch a lot of TV at the moment, primarily to see the ads but I’m so amazed that we have this man [Donald Trump] as president.

I agree! Don’t get me started…

Well, sometimes I watch the news for hours every day. I can’t take my eyes off of it. And to think that it could all end in a nuclear war, it’s not even funny.

It’s horrifyingly addictive.

Yeah. He’s an idiot, but it’s fascinating. Anyway, as I’m watching I begin to wonder what the demographic is for CNN, because I’d hate to be in it—it’s largely pharmaceutical advertising.

It seems you have to be over 60 to watch and appreciate the ads. But sometimes I just lament the state of advertising. Perhaps it’s something people have done for decades. The Super Bowl is always a good example. I think people legitimately lament that the advertising was more entertaining 20 years ago than it is today. Now, it’s not even a surprise because half the time the companies do sneak previews a week before the Super Bowl—trying to get in before the other guys. It’s not even a surprise anymore. That’s all bad.

But it validates what I’ve believed for a while—there really aren’t great talents in the world any more—those really great agencies and individuals. How often do you see something that you wish you did? It’s not that often anymore. Ads are mostly a lot of ‘filler’.

But, once in a while, there’s something that just makes you say: “Wow! That was amazing.” But it only happens once every year or so. And that’s so few. Because of that, my mind always wonders what the discussion with the client was like. I wonder if it’s really what the creative people wanted to produce? Were they talked into it? I’d love to know the backstory.

Of course, advertising is so different today because of ‘digital’—which at first was so offensive to creative people and the agencies. They though of it as ‘busy work’. But now, you can do some of the coolest things because you’re not on network television and that frees you up to create different things. Some spend millions of dollars on videos, with budgets comparable to what you might spend on a traditional commercial. But it seems like that they’re just the only way to get a great idea out these days.

However, advertising is still about what it has always been about— the great idea. It’s everything. Once you have the idea you have more ways to get it out into the world today than you had previously. In the old days, it was print and television, that was basically it. ‘Outdoor’ [including billboards and poster campaigns, etc]. But now that there’s so many other ways and people are dreaming up new ways all the time.

But it’s a double‑edged sword, because it leads to advertising pollution. There’s stuff people are trying to advertise in so many places that it makes you start resenting advertising—more than you might have before! I wish there were more ethical advertisers around, who would treat advertising properly. Otherwise, it’s like throwing trash on the highway. We need more respect for our world and not dirty it up with things that are just annoying.

Earlier, you mentioned Hyundai Card, and Ted Chung, the Vice Chairman. You state that he believes: “The age of advertising is over, the age of expression is here. And when it comes to expression, design is one of the most important elements.” In your opinion, how does design, in practical terms, factor in the future of most businesses or organization’s success now and in the future?

I think design has become hugely important in the same way that it became important at Hyundai Card. And it’s beyond just product design. It’s the design of a company—it’s everything! There’s great value in designing beautifully, whether it’s a thing that can be aesthetically pleasing, or a company that just runs so well. People like being part of a company when it’s beautifully designed. So, I think design has far deeper meaning today than it did 10 or 20 years ago.

Design has far deeper meaning today than it did 10 or 20 years ago.

And civilization has collectively become more sophisticated. When you look at things that worked 10 or 20 years ago, they seem so unsophisticated now. But at the time, they were very sophisticated. As a civilization, we tend to appreciate things that we didn’t appreciate in previous years. I think design is now one of those things.

I’m trying avoid saying: “It’s all because of Apple” but I think Apple was a huge contributor to people being more aware of design-led companies; being more aware of the value of design. Apple have made products that are beautifully designed, where customers actually start demanding that level of design from other companies. So more companies have started responding to that demand. And now we have a lot of really beautifully designed products in the world. I believe more companies are now conscious of the value of design in many different ways, including the structure of the company itself.

Previously, design was seen as a luxury—something to have as an extra. Whereas today, for many companies it has to shifted to an important baseline. It’s become central to how value gets added to a business, and how success can be achieved. It’s not seen a luxury anymore…

I think if you have hopes and dreams of excelling and being the best in your category, if you’re not concerned with design, you’re not gonna make it.

If you have hopes and dreams of excelling and being the best in your category, if you’re not concerned with design, you’re not gonna make it.

I’ll finish on this question—and it might be a little bit left-of-field. In many instances, technology has proven its potential to be a great catalyst for simplicity. Apple is a great example of that. It’s also a fact that AI (Artificial Intelligence) and machine learning is going to obliterate many professional and industry sectors. However, there’s an argument that creativity and design won’t be affected as much—because of the human factor in creativity. But AI can already design a logo to an acceptable level, and it’s likely to improve upon this. Designing a logo could be seen as a small achievement right now, but that could just be the tipping point. In your opinion, how do you think technology is going to impact design and creativity in the future?

That’s a good question. It’s funny because all my life I’ve been a sci‑fi [science fiction] fan. Those are just my favourite kinds of movies. Now that this stuff is actually becoming reality—and you hear people like Stephen Hawking or Elon Musk saying we’re all going to die because of AI—you think could it really turn into Terminator, where the machines enslave us. In terms of creativity—I could be very wrong about this—but I believe advertising will always need to have a good idea and I find it hard to believe that machines can actually create. It could be my famous last words because, if a machine could literally think like a person ultimately I’d be wrong about my prediction. But it’s just hard for me to imagine AI being able to do what a really creative human being can do—at least in the near future.

AI will do an awful lot of things but the heavy lifting—the interesting big ideas—will have to come from a human being who understands the way human beings work and what people respond to. Steve Jobs had that ability. Whatever your thoughts about his temper and his brutal nature at times, he really understood people. I’m not convinced AI will understand people in my lifetime. Who knows what happens in the far future.

AI will do an awful lot of things but the heavy lifting—the interesting big ideas—will have to come from a human being who understands the way human beings work and what people respond to.

It’s possible that AI and machine learning has been embraced for efficiency—as opposed to creativity. And AI and machine learning can provide that type of reliable efficiency, even around the edges of creativity—and that’s valuable to a degree. But is it likely to replicate creativity?

I was a musician before I got into advertising. Sometimes you hear that AI has written a song. When you listen to it, it’s not terrible—particularly due to the way music is made today, which is so much easier. But when you go to a concert, for example a pianist who’s been studying their whole life, and you watch that person play. It’s just, wow!

But it’s also quite worrying sometimes when you wonder whether that ability will be lost. I’ve given up the highest quality of music for the convenience of MP3s, and I’ve given up super high‑quality photography because it’s just easier to take a picture on my phone—even though that level is getting very high now.

But there is a part of me that worries whether the simple and faster way to make music might mean that in the future fewer people will study it for 20 years, to master an instrument (or something) because they think it’s not worth the effort. I assume there will always the purists. But I do think there is value in learning and practicing the piano or the guitar. So, sadly, there are areas where machine learning is going to start encroaching.

Still, I find it hard to believe that a passionate human being can’t always win in the end when it comes to writing music. It’s about really understanding what people are going to respond to, as opposed to learning some series of rules and applying them like a formula.

So, yeah. I’m still strong for the humans!

Image credits

Ken Segall portrait provided by Ken Segall

Apple—Australian Homepage, March 2018

Kofola photo sources on Reddit [no photography credit provided]

Back to Research

Kevin Finn In Uncategorized

Neil Harbisson:
The art of being a cyborg

Neil Harbisson—a real-life cyborg—talks about the future of technology and cyborgism, which is cheaper and far less threatening then most people might think. This interview was featured in Open Manifesto #8, which focused on the theme ‘Change’.

Kevin Finn: You were born with achromatopsia, a rare condition of colour blindness where you can only see in grayscale and where you can’t sense colour. I think the statistic is that it affects one in about 33,000 people in the world. For those who don’t know your story, how did you come to change the way you live with your condition? When did you decide to go through the physical change?

Neil Harbisson: When I was 11, I started different methods to receive colour. First I used people. I had a person for each colour. If someone said, “Blue,” I would think of a person that behaves like blue, or for “Yellow,” someone who behaves like yellow, because when you ask people to define a colour, it’s like they are defining a person more than a physical thing.

So, I had these different people and then if someone said, “Pink,” I would think of this girl who, for me, is very pink or, if someone said, “Red,” I would think of this boy who, for me, was very red—like passionate, aggressive words. All these elements that contain simple…

Characteristics?

Yes, characteristics. That was my first way of perceiving colour. Then I started using the piano, with each note of the piano being a different colour. When I was 20, I went to a lecture on cybernetics by Adam Montandon. It was then I realized that technology could also be used as a sense. That’s when I approached Adam and said that I wanted to extend my senses and asked if he could help, if we could create something. That’s how we started this project. I could decide how I wanted to sense colour—and I decided I would sense colour through sound.

You’ve set up The Cyborg Foundation which, among other things, supports the cyborg community. You must have a very strong sense that what you’re doing can truly help other people in similar situations. Is that something you’re actively pursuing, to promote a solution for other people with the same condition as yours?

It’s not people in specific conditions. We want to help everyone to extend their senses… Yes!

[Laughs]

We should all extend our senses; that’s what The Cyborg Foundation wants to do—to help anyone that wants to perceive more, to help them develop the sense they already have, but in a way that makes it a new sense.

And this relates to everyone, because there are many people who lack senses, but they don’t want more senses, for example many, many blind people or deaf people. There are even communities of deaf people who are defending the right to be deaf. Then there are people that hear perfectly well, but they want to hear ultrasound and infra sound.

There’s no relation between people who lack senses and people who don’t. It’s just people that want to extend their senses and people that don’t: they’re the two groups. Most are people that want extra, or more senses that go beyond the human senses. These are the ones who contact us.

In 2004, you had the bendable antennae surgically implanted in your skull. It works through bone conduction and allows you to sense vibrations. What interests me is you also had a chip inserted in your skull that allows you to access the Internet. How does that work? How can you be connected to the Internet?

It works in a similar way to how the sensor picks up light frequencies, and then transforms them to vibrations in my skull. The same system can be used to connect to other cameras, not just the one. It’s like a colour sensor, but it’s a camera. You can actually connect to external cameras if you have Internet.

That’s how I’m using the Internet. It’s actually Bluetooth in my head, so the Bluetooth can connect to any other device. If that device has the potential of receiving images, then these images can go directly to my head. That’s how I’m using it.

It’s actually Bluetooth in my head, so the Bluetooth can connect to any other device. If that device has the potential of receiving images, then these images can go directly to my head… It’s the use of the Internet as a sense.

Can you control that connection, or is it something that just happens? For example, does it constantly scan devices and pick them up if they’re available?

I can switch off the Internet connection, but I leave it on from 10am to 10pm so that I can receive colours from my friends.

There are five people that can send colours to my head, and I can also connect to NASA’s International Space Station every now and then. I’m training my brain to perceive the colours from space now.

The aim of the Internet connection is that I can be permanently connected to space. That’s how I’ll be using the Internet. It’s the use of the Internet as a sense.

That’s incredible! Many might describe how you sense as being similar to synesthesia. I know you’ve got a very distinct definition between how you sense things and how synesthetes might sense things, but can you describe the difference in your mind between synesthesia and your sense?

Synesthesia is the union of two existing senses, whereas in my case, it’s the creation of a new sense. That’s why I think it’s different from synesthesia—because I’m not uniting two senses, because I don’t see colour. If I could see colour, and at the same time be hearing the sound of it, then it would be the union of two senses, but I’ve never seen colour.

Synesthesia is the union of two existing senses, whereas in my case, it’s the creation of a new sense.

To me colour is a new sense. Also, I’m not hearing it through my traditional hearing sense. I’m creating a new sense, which is a vibration in my skull, which then becomes sound. Hearing colour is actually a secondary effect of the vibration, so the actual sense is the vibration, which is a new sense for me.

In both cases, it’s a new sense: it’s not hearing—it’s a new sense, because I don’t see colour.

In the era of wearable technology, you’ve said that you don’t feel like you’re using technology; you don’t feel like you’re wearing technology. You feel that you are technology. Can you expand on that?

Yes, the union between cybernetics and organisms, the feeling of being cyborg is more of a feeling, and I feel that I am technology. I don’t feel separated from it. It’s definitely a feeling. You don’t need to be biologically united to cybernetics to feel this union.

I know people that don’t have any cybernetics in their body, but they feel cyborg. I also know people that have cybernetics in their body, and they don’t feel cyborg.

Being a cyborg needs to be seen more as a feeling, in the same way that someone might have the body of a man, but feel that they are a woman. They need to be respected in this way. For example, if they feel they are a woman—even if they don’t have the body of a woman—they are a woman. Some of these people will have transgender surgery, and then they will become a biological women, as well.

What is most important is what you feel. I started feeling that I was technology very early, after a few months of hearing colour. It was more of an invisible union. The union between the software and my brain made me feel cyborg.

I started feeling that I was technology very early, after a few months of hearing colour. It was more of an invisible union. The union between the software and my brain made me feel cyborg.

You also refer to the fact that you get software upgrades. Does that dramatically change the feeling that you have, or is it literally a…?

Yes! Suddenly, reality becomes more intense or it mutates. When you upgrade your senses or when you add new senses, then your surroundings become new again. You are re‑exploring your context. It makes your context become interesting again. If you’re used to something, suddenly if you have a new sense, that becomes new.

Instead of exploring new countries or new spaces, by adding a new sense you’re suddenly exploring your reality again.

Visually, you stand out to people—not just because of your antennae, but because of your clothes. You often wear very bright clothing, because you’re wearing a particular sound that corresponds with that colour. I’m sure this draws further attention to you—visually. So, what has been the general reaction towards you and your appearance, and how has it changed over the past decade?

Yes. People shout things at me in the street, either for the clothes, for the antennae—or for the haircut. These are the three things that I’ve experienced.

[Smiling] People are very rude sometimes, or intolerant, but I’m completely used to it, because this has been going on for over a decade now. If I go out in the street something will happen, every day. It hasn’t changed in the last decade. What has changed is what people think the antennae is. That has certainly changed.

In 2004, people thought it was a light. In 2006, they thought it was a microphone, one of these chat microphones. 2008—no it was 2007—they thought it was a Bluetooth phone; handheld, hands‑free phone.

Then they thought it was GoPro. I think that was 2008 or 2009. Then in 2011/2012 people started thinking it was something to do with Google Glass. Now the latest thing was when a child asked me if it was a selfie stick. That’s the latest.

It’s always changing with the context of where technology is in the mainstream?

Yes.

So their perception is running with their understanding of present technology?

Hopefully, there will be a point in time where people will see it as a body part and as a sensory extension. I guess one day it will happen.

Because the context will change?

Yes! So they will ask what sense I am sensing. That still hasn’t happened.

Of course, this is now part of your identity. I know you had a challenge with getting your UK passport, purely from a visual point of view, because your photograph wasn’t going to be accepted. The UK government has now legally recognized you as a cyborg. Has that changed things for you in other ways?

In 2004, I had this issue and they didn’t accept my passport photograph. Then I explained to them about what I felt. I felt that this was a body part. But it went on and on. They didn’t like it. I insisted that I felt that I was cyborg, that I was this technology. In the end they agreed and accepted the picture.

This appeared in the local news, because I was in a very small town in England. Very small! Of course, people at the university knew what was happening. But I ended up in the local news and the journalists published it as something like: “UK’s first recognized cyborg.” That’s how the journalists defined it, and since then they’ve been using this term.

The result is that I can now legally travel, but I always explain what happened to me, and then people write it in their own ways.

It’s interesting how the media has defined you: the first legal cyborg. I imagine this has helped you in many ways. But has the media also hindered your story in any way?

Yeah, somewhat. Unfortunately, all articles have mistakes in them, but we no longer write to them and say: “Hey, this is not correct. You should change it.” We’ve stopped this because we realize it’s actually normal.

Some of them create these articles without ever even interviewing me, and then they write really inaccurate things, or extreme things. They’ve sometimes even quoted me, where I’ve never said the things they claim I have said, or they create this scary impression of me.

In the India Times they said: “there was a robot man in this country,”—or something like that. Some people create these types of articles just so that people will read them. Others do so because they like writing [the word] ‘first’ in articles, because then people read it, if you include a ‘first of something.’

I think they should stop this. It’s not necessary to create this or to use the word ‘first’ to create an interest in things. We’re not in the Olympic Games so there will be no first. We’ll all have our own things. We’re all different…

It’s not the same code of Olympic race?

No, exactly.

It’s interesting—with the prejudices you’ve faced, possibly as a result of popular culture and science fiction—what you, and others like you, represent could be scary, confronting or frightening for some people. How do you deal with that, the fact that you possibly represent a frightening future? How do you respond to that?

I don’t know how to deal with this. Many people feel threatened by individuals like me and The Cyborg Foundation, and they feel that we also go against God and against nature. Many people don’t really listen to what we say, because we’re not against religion.

I don’t think there’s anything I can do.

I receive death threats from people that are really against me. They even say that I should avoid certain countries, otherwise they will find me and kill me, and things like this. Some of them are really, really strongly against The Cyborg Foundation and against me. You can’t really talk to them. There’s no way for me to reply to these threats.

I receive death threats from people that are really against me. They even say that I should avoid certain countries, otherwise they will find me and kill me…

Of course people face racial prejudice, which is unfortunately still prevalent around the world, and we have it here in Australia. But when you look at the colour of people, you don’t distinguish between black or white or brown. You have identified a colour hue which is consistent among all humans, and it’s in the orange colour spectrum.

Yeah.

Do you think that could perhaps be useful in fighting racial prejudices around the world, because if we look at the universal colour of our blood, it’s red—it doesn’t matter what colour your skin is. Now, you suggest the human hue is also a similar colour. Is this something that could be used to perhaps remove some of the racial prejudices out there?

I hope so. I always try to mention this whenever I talk to journalists, and when I give talks. I always try to. I had also intended to include it in my TED talk. But that’s the paragraph that I missed out, because I was nervous, and because I couldn’t see the time monitor. There were some things I didn’t say in my TED talk, and that was one of the things. I felt it was really sad that I missed saying that. Now I keep saying it even more.

As I mentioned earlier, your antennae is now part of your identity. You’ve achieved what you set out to achieve—your personal objective to hear colour. It’s also influenced your art. And that’s also a big part of your identity. Now you’re a spokesperson for the cyborg community, and the cyborg movement. Is that something that has happened inadvertently, or did you set out to be a spokesperson?

No. I never thought I would be talking so much. My aim was that music should be my language. Then, suddenly, people started asking questions. I had to find answers. Then I was invited to places to talk, but it was never, ever my intention to talk. I’ve been pushed or forced to talk.

But I think it is necessary in some cases because it also makes the artwork feel closer to people in a way. The first talks I gave in 2004/2005, I was very shy. I didn’t know what to say. It’s difficult sometimes to share what you are experiencing, especially in the beginning. In the first big interviews I was really simple.

Journalists have basically created my speech, because they’ve asked so many questions. It’s thanks to them that I’ve thought about things. And questions from the audience always bring new thoughts.

It’s like real-time direct feedback, which you can then research if you need to, or respond to in a certain way.

Or think about, yeah. I don’t think so much about my identity or my senses. I’m focused on living. Then, suddenly, I stop and ask so many things. When I walk around the street, I have to talk to so many strangers every day. So, yeah, talking has become the main thing.

But it wasn’t at all intentional?

No.

You mentioned earlier about some of the prejudice you’ve faced, for example people saying you’re against nature. What I found interesting is that, ironically, when you were designing your antennae you specifically looked to nature for your design research. It’s like biomimicry, which can be a significant and influential driving force in contemporary design. We look to nature and say: “That works. We will replicate that.” Was the design of your antennae a long process for you to research?

Yes, it was long and it’s still going on. There’s no end to the design of this new body part. It can continuously evolve. For example, it’s not moving independently, so it’s like a dead body part in a way. It’s alive because it senses things, but it doesn’t move. But it should be able to move through thought. I should be able to move it without using my hands. That’s one of the next stages as a body part.

Also, the antennae’s energy should come from my body. These are two elements that are really important to the development of the body part. It’s still in development. And like many things, once you’ve achieved your aim, then suddenly your aim becomes a different one. I realize there’s no end to the body part or to the sense. Once you perceive certain colours and you’re used to them, you can then extend it. There really is no end.

Becoming a cyborg isn’t necessarily an expensive pursuit.

There is another surprising aspect to your research, which I heard you mention in London: Becoming a cyborg isn’t necessarily an expensive pursuit. People would think technology, biotech, all the names that we have for it, is expensive. In your circumstance, it wasn’t necessarily very expensive at all.

No. Most of the things I’ve mentioned are not expensive. They’re actually cheaper than an iPhone. This iPhone [pointing to phone] was really expensive. It was a lot! It has a lot of capacity. But you can actually extend your senses with $10 vibrations. For example, the technology in infrared hand dryers. You can take the sensor, create an earring, pierce it in your body and then feel vibrations if there’s a presence behind you. That’s very simple.

If you wear it for several months, or for years, you won’t even notice the vibrations. You will actually feel a presence behind you—or the lack of it behind you. This is a very simple way of extending your senses. There are many more examples.

Teeth are another example. Instead of asking your dentist to implant gold teeth or different materials that can be really expensive, you could have a sensor, like a small microphone that allows you to hear ultrasounds and infrasounds, or any other little sensor that would allow you to extend your senses. There are many of these examples.

Are you considering anything at the moment, apart from your antennae?

Yeah, my teeth are something that I might actually use to move the antennae—maybe. I just thought about that yesterday. I have a lack of teeth now. I have a lot of space in my mouth. [Laughs] That’s why I eat a bit slow. It’s good because in that way I’ll have extra space. The next time I have another tooth removed I’ll have very big spaces on each side of my mouth. It would make sense to have it connected wirelessly to the mechanism that would move my antennae.

I’m still exploring how to do this through thought but I would have to wear a helmet because it’s still not well developed enough to detect thoughts. But if I want to do move my antennae now, I could do it through my teeth instead of with my thoughts.

Previously, we talked about the ethical and moral issues around cyborgism. Has this changed much in the last decade, or is it still a slow process?

At least people talk about it now. In 2004, there were no real conversations with people. It was: “Wow, that’s weird.” That was about the height of it. Whereas now, people ask more in‑depth questions. There is definitely a change in more of the philosophical and the ethical discussion. This is something that people are talking about much more, now.

Of course, your view of the future suggests that cybernetics will move into genetics. This will be a much more ethical and moral question for people. But you see that’s where things are moving, that’s how society is changing. In your mind, is this something that will happen sooner than people think?

Yes. It will be this century. Many children today will see this occur in their lifetime and might actually experience it themselves. In a way, cybernetics is just a transition, where we still need metallic body parts and metallic sensors. Whereas, eventually we will slowly stop using cybernetics and instead use our own DNA. For example, there are animals that can detect infrared. That DNA could be transposed to a human.

We can explore things like this—and also body parts. For example, using existing antennaes we could use DNA for the creation of my antennae and then biologically adapt it to humans by modifying my genes. As a result, the antennae would grow. Maybe it can be grown separately and then implanted. It would still be from my body.

There are interesting things going on in Perth [Australia], at the moment. They’re creating body parts from their own stem cells. They can grow parts separately…

If we refer to popular culture again, we might call what you’ve just described as superhuman—genetics being modified. But in fact, everything you discuss seems to refer back to the natural world. It’s back to biomimicry, where you’re suggesting if we look at what’s happening in nature and then mimic it through genetics for ourselves, it starts to remove the myth of the superhuman and brings it closer to the natural animal world. In fact, you, yourself, have said that you feel closer to animals now than ever before, possibly even closer than you do to humans.

Yeah. I’ve slowly felt less comfortable defining myself as a human, because if you call yourself human, you separate yourself from other animals and it feels wrong. With this thinking, you’re more comfortable defining yourself as an animal. But then, when you define yourself as an animal, you separate yourself from other living organisms. I feel much more comfortable defining myself as an organism.

I’ve slowly felt less comfortable defining myself as a human, because if you call yourself human, you separate yourself from other animals and it feels wrong.

In my case, I’m a cybernetic organism. Cyborg, because I have cybernetics inside me. When you call yourself an organism, or when you define yourself as one, your group is wider. You are at the same level as an insect or a tree. That’s how I feel. That’s why I also don’t eat animals. Since I was 12 or 13, I’ve never liked this disconnection from organisms.

The way we can learn from other organisms is by observing them and also learning from their senses. People don’t value the senses of other animals. They think of knowledge or intelligence or whatever. I think we should stop looking at the animals like this. We should start looking at their senses and how much we can learn from them.

In my mind, becoming a cyborg feels like it was a very deliberate design process for you: to observe, to find a solution which is deliberately designed, and then produce or reproduce it for a specific outcome. This is the design process. Is this something you think about, that you’re designing body parts? You’re designing a way to access senses? Or is it something less deliberate and more intuitive?

All my life I follow intuition—always! Everything has been…That’s the main thing which really…

Drives you?

Yeah. It’s just intuition. I don’t take thought too seriously. That’s the second thing.

That’s interesting. Can you expand on that?

If I think that I shouldn’t do something or shouldn’t go somewhere, but then I feel that I actually should go there, then that’s what counts. Even if I really think I shouldn’t do it.

So, the design is simply the way to achieve it? It’s not something that you deliberately set out to do initially?

No. For example, when discussing surgery for my antennae a doctor once said that this is not the zone where it should be done [pointing to his head]. They never do surgery here. They do it here, in the front of the face, where, for example, you can drill new ears, or if someone loses a nose you would drill the nose. If surgery is required it’s always here at the front, not at the back, not at the occipital bone.

They were trying to convince me to put my antennae somewhere else, for example have it sideways. And if you think about their reasons, they were—of course—quite logical. Maybe it’s true. Also, surgery in this area could be close to the spine and it could be dangerous. But my intuition was so strong. I knew where my antennae should be and I decided exactly where. Then they did it.

That’s one example of where, perhaps, if I had thought about it too seriously I might have said: “No, you better be safe.” That’s just one example.

Also, in 2004, when the sounds and the colours were overwhelming, I had lots and lots of headaches. I thought, maybe I should stop because it’s just too much. But then my intuition said that I shouldn’t stop, that I should continue and that the brain would adapt. And it did! That was also a moment where I didn’t do what I thought I should do. I did what I felt I should do. It’s constantly happening.

Your world is sound. I was wondering, is there a natural rhythm to the human‑made world or environment, which might be different to the natural environment? Is there a rhythm to what we’ve created as humans, and is there a rhythm to the natural world, or is it all very different?

Colour has no rhythm unless there’s…

Composition?

Yes! Or two colours at the same time. If there’s two colours at the same time, then they create rhythm—if they’re very close to each other. Human faces usually create rhythms, because we have different shades of orange. Usually the hair and the skin and the eyes for many people are three shades of orange, which is three shades of brown usually, or very close to each other. That creates rhythm when you play them together.

In nature, there’s also lots of similar rhythms, because in the forests you can hear many shades of green, which are many shades of the same hue. So that creates extreme vibrations, as well.

The reason I ask is that you did a project based on cities, seeking to identify the dominant sound of a city. Because of this, I was I wondering whether is there a rhythm to what humans build, because what we make is perhaps contrived, whereas the natural world is organic and has developed over millions of years. And there’s much more symmetry in nature. Does that translate to sound?

Maybe more into volume than it does to rhythm. Human‑created realities are usually louder than natural ones. It’s to do with saturation. There’s differences in saturation.

Finally, I’m going to have to ask. And I’m sure everyone asks you this, but what do I sound like? [Laughs]

[Getting closer with his antennae] You have high‑pitched eyes. G eyebrows. Your nose is between G and F#. Your lips are E. Your eyes are around C.

C, E, G. You have lots of different notes. E, C, G, F#—again F#, and then G, and F#. It’s F#. Five different notes.

Image Credits:

Neil Harbisson portrait photograph supplied by Neil Harbisson

Neil Harbisson, TED

Final interview portrait photograph supplied by Neil Harbisson

Uncategorized

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Design is a mindset that is available to all.

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So the challenge is not just to have the simple idea, but to have it recognised as a simple idea and to be able to keep it pure and simple, from beginning to end.

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I believe people who don’t truly appreciate the power of simplicity tend to let it go along the way in the form of compromises.

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Culture has a lot more than simplicity but having this as a central philosophy is stronger—as opposed to a culture where processes are more important than anything else and where people must follow the process above all other things.

I think your whole professional life is about finding that place to work, where you really feel like you’re in tune with the values of the company.

I think it’s hard to deny that it’s one of the most powerful competitive weapons because, if you give the customers a choice of a difficult way or a simpler way, human nature will go with the simpler way.

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You can still shoot for the starts—and failure is part of it. There’s no freedom in a culture where failure is unacceptable.

Design has far deeper meaning today than it did 10 or 20 years ago.

If you have hopes and dreams of excelling and being the best in your category, if you’re not concerned with design, you’re not gonna make it.

AI will do an awful lot of things but the heavy lifting—the interesting big ideas—will have to come from a human being who understands the way human beings work and what people respond to.

It’s actually Bluetooth in my head, so the Bluetooth can connect to any other device. If that device has the potential of receiving images, then these images can go directly to my head… It’s the use of the Internet as a sense.

Synesthesia is the union of two existing senses, whereas in my case, it’s the creation of a new sense.

I started feeling that I was technology very early, after a few months of hearing colour. It was more of an invisible union. The union between the software and my brain made me feel cyborg.

I receive death threats from people that are really against me. They even say that I should avoid certain countries, otherwise they will find me and kill me…

Becoming a cyborg isn’t necessarily an expensive pursuit.

I’ve slowly felt less comfortable defining myself as a human, because if you call yourself human, you separate yourself from other animals and it feels wrong.

TheSumOf©2007—Present

TheSumOfGPO Box 448BrisbaneQLD 4001Australia

TheSumOf
GPO Box 448
Brisbane
QLD 4001
Australia