THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING Podcast

Eugene Healey is a brand strategy consultant and educator in Melbourne, Australia. Previously, he worked as an Associate Strategy Director at The Contenders and Head of Growth at Lively. He kind of exploded into my line of sight with super smart TikToks , so I was excited to talk to him. Check out “ The End of the Hollywood Celebrity ,” “ Identity Marketing is (sometimes) Overrated ,” “ The Power...

This is the first Encore Presentation of THAT BUSINESS OF MEANING. This serves a couple functions. It gives me a break, and a chance to highlight conversations I think are wonderful. Of course, I begin with Grant McCracken. See you in the New Year. Grant McCracken is the first anthropologist I encountered. No one had ever talked about the world I grew up in the way he did. I was a fan from the sta...

Reverend Barbara Ann Michaels is a New York-based interfaith minister and performance artist known as the " Jester of the Peace ." She combines humor, art, and spirituality in her work as a wedding officiant and event creator. She founded the Humor Arts Museum and House of Holy Humor, using interactive performance to promote wellness and social connection. Barbara, thank you so much for accepting...

Lyubov Sachkova is the Communication Manager at dating app FEELD. I met Lyubov through the Exposure Therapy community, and was excited to speak with her. I think as you know, I always start with this question, which I borrow from a friend of mine who helps people tell their story. I love it so much, but I always end up over-explaining it, because I want you to know that you're in absolute control....

Lucas Krump is the Co-Founder & CEO of EVRYMAN , an organization launched in 2017 that helps men develop emotional skills and deeper connections. Prior to EVRYMAN, he worked in media and technology, launching international editions of Travel + Leisure and Maxim. The founding of EVRYMAN came after feeling disconnected despite his career success. I met Lucas in Hudson, and was excited to learn more...

Christopher Owens is the Head of Brand Strategy at TRG in Dallas, Texas, where he has worked for almost 25 years. He also leads the Strategic Planning Boot Camp at Miami Ad School and teaches at the University of Texas at Austin. He joined The Richards Group (now TRG) in 2000, where he helped reshape the agency into a nonprofit-owned creative collective. His award-winning work spans major brands l...

Philip Lindsay is the Democracy Innovations Program Manager at the Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities at Bard College . At the Hannah Arendt Center, Lindsay leads the Democracy Innovation Hub, where he conducts workshops for public servants and educators. He has been involved in initiatives like citizens’ assemblies , which aim to foster collaborative democracy by involving everyday...

Peter MacLeod is the founder and principal of MASSLBP , and a pioneer in the practice of deliberative democracy. Under his leadership, MASS has completed more than 200 major policy projects for governments and public agencies across Canada, pioneering the use of Civic Lotteries and Citizen Reference Panels and earning international recognition. They have a wonderful set of Nine Ideas . Here is a t...

Sam Peskin is the co-founder of the creative research studio Early Studies . Previously, he was founder at Speedboat Partners and a strategy consultant at Highsnobiety. The first I heard of Sam was when they released #Census27 , their first Data Drop, which uses Social Circle Surveying (SCS), a method invented by political scientist Kristoffer Ahlstrom-Vij that asks people not about what they thin...

Dr. G. Clotaire Rapaille is the CEO and Founder of Archetype Discoveries Worldwide. His work, made famous in the 2007 book The Culture Code , focuses on understanding cultural codes and uncovering deep-rooted human motivations. He has discovered codes for over half of Forbes’ Fortune 100 companies such as Boeing, LG, P&G and many more. He just launched The Rapaille Chahal Quantum Institute with As...

Mike Lydon is Co-Founder and Principal at Street Plans , leading the firm's New York City office, and is an internationally recognized urban planner, writer, speaker, and advocate for livable cities. As the creator of The Open Streets Project and co-author of the Tactical Urbanism series, Mike is a founding member of the Congress for the New Urbanism and serves on Transportation Alternatives’ Exec...

Ben Dietz is the Founder & Chief Strategy Officer of Rangelife, a Superformat Design Group in Brooklyn. Previously, he spent 16 years at VICE, and was a co-founder of VIRTUE, it’s award-winning agency. He sends out an amazing newsletter [SIC]: A Digest of Developments , and is the organizer of Breakfast Club BK an open breakfast on Wednesday mornings in Brooklyn that has spawned a growing network...

Lindsey Wehking is the Chief Investigative Strategy Officer (CSO) at Nonfiction Research in Brooklyn. If I remember correctly, I first met Lindsey in 2021 in Brooklyn, when I reached out to Nonfiction in a fanboy kind of way. I ran into Lindsey at the 4As Stratfest in New York City, where she presented (with Jim Stengel !) “ Why taking your clients into nightclubs is the future of insights .” I wa...

Karen Faith is the CEO of Others Unlimited , an empathy training company she founded in 2021. Karen lives a country mile south of me in Tivoli, and that’s where we first met as neighbors. Her TEDx Talk “ How to talk to the worst parts of yourself ” has racked up nearly 2M views. Previously an ethnographer and strategist, I was excited to talk to her about what her path to ethnography, and then to...

Dr. Anastasia Kārkliņa Gabriel is the Senior Lead of Global Insights at Reddit, and a cultural theorist, writer, and strategist specializing in inclusivity within marketing, media, and tech. With a PhD from Duke University, she's a senior insights lead at Reddit and has advised global brands like Nike and Disney. Her book, " Cultural Intelligence for Marketers: Building an Inclusive Marketing Stra...

Sam Ladner is a sociologist, researcher, and student of productivity studying the future of work. Sam is best known for her book Practical Ethnography: A Guide to Doing Ethnography in the Private Sector . It is used regularly in design, research, user experience, business and social science graduate-level classes. Her most recent book, Mixed Methods , is a companion to her popular course Ethnograp...

Phil Barden is the Managing Director of DECODE and the author of “ Decoded: The Science Behind Why We Buy ” which is a classic text about the behavioral science of marketing. Before going out on his own, he held leadership roles at T-Mobile, First Choice Holidays, Diageo and Unilever. As his profile says, “ 25 years client-side marketing + 10 years decision science = ‘Decoded .” Okey-dokey. All ri...

Max Kabat is the co-founder of goodDog , a brand consultancy. I first met Max and his partner Lisa Hyman way back in 2013, when they first hired me to partner on brand discovery for their client, Leesa Sleep. Since then, we have partnered many, many times, and I was excited to hear more about him, Marfa and his story. Max is also the publisher of the West Texas newspaper The Big Bend Sentinel and...

Michael Lipson, PhD is a clinical psychologist, author and translator living in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. He is the author of, most recently, Be: An Alphabet of Astonishment , Stairway of Surprise: Six Steps to a Creative Life , and Group Meditation . Michael, thank you very much for accepting my invitation to this interview. Thank you for inviting me. It's a luxury to be invited. So I star...

Kate Sieck, PhD is Director of the Human Centered AI at the Toyota Research Institute, where she leads the Harmonious Communities Department whose task is “developing technology that integrates AI in furtherance of Toyota's global mission of happiness for all and collective well-being.” I met Kate through this newsletter. We spoke for the first time a couple months ago, and it was so much fun, I w...

Phil Adams is a brand consultant based in Edinburgh, Scotland, practicing what he calls Lowfalutin Strategy . He has over 20 years experience as an account manager, planner, and managing director in the advertising business. He was Planning Director at digital agency Blonde, and then Managing Director at The Leith Agency. He has a wonderful newsletter here . I reached out to him because of this: “...

Jakob Voldum is Director, Insights and Strategy at Designit in Copenhagen. Prior to that he was a Senior Consultant at ReD Associates, having joined the company at the beginning as an intern. At Designit, he is co-hosting the event “ Beyond the Lens: How ai is changing creative workflows" with the hybrid image agency Scenes . Thank you for agreeing to do this. I start all these conversations with...

Ed Cotton is a Chief Strategy Officer based in Brooklyn. His newsletter, PROVOKE , is wonderful. He spent 20 years as Chief Strategy Officer at BSSP, an award-winning advertising agency. Previously, he was Head of Strategy at McCann-Erickson in Seattle. Since 2019, Ed has been running his own consultancy, Inverness Consulting LLC. He helps brands, agencies, and marketers with strategy development...

Jason Ānanda Josephson Storm is Professor of Religion and Chair of Science & Technology Studies at Williams College. I first encountered his second book “ The Myth of Disechantment: Magic, Modernity and the Birth of the Human Sciences .” The question of this book was, “How did a magical, spiritualist, mesmerized Europe ever convince itself that it was disenchanted?” His most recent book, and what...

Joshua Tanzer wrote the headlines at The New York Post for 20 years. Examples include: “MARTHA STEWART STOCK FALLING LIKE A BAD SOUFFLÉ.”“ADULTS WHO WERE SPANKED OFTEN GET TANKED.” “AIR MORE STINKY, KIDS LESS THINKY.”“RAGING BOEHNER.” He left in 2018 to support Democratic candidates, has recently made his newsletter, The Key , available to the public. Previously only available to candidates, in i...