The RobinsonHewitt Pod: The Next Era of Tech

The future of homes is more than simply a design problem. It’s also a problem about belonging. And the technology we’re building into our homes today will either help us solve it or make it harder to see. How we live our lives is also changing. More people are renting longer, living alone, or aging without nearby family. The single-family home on a quarter-acre section is no longer the default, an...

Is Ambient AI the next evolution of artificial intelligence? Instead of existing simply as a chatbot or app, ambient AI becomes an invisible layer of intelligence embedded throughout our physical world, powering homes, cities, infrastructure, energy systems, and everyday life without needing to be consciously activated. We always note that the most transformative technologies in history have been...

We may be standing at the beginning of a second electricity revolution, but this time, the grid won't just move power; it will begin to think, respond, and adapt. This is important because every major shift in human civilisation has been tied to a new relationship with energy. And what’s unfolding is a move away from centralised systems towards distributed, intelligent networks. Today, we explore...

Today, we introduce the builder and the visionary as the co-founders of the future. Two halves of complementary intelligence learning how to build together, by blending empathy and logic. Sparked by Disclosure Day, we take a look at how these collaborations work beneath the surface, not as a single voice, but as a layered system of perception, translation, and meaning-making. We take a look at his...

We have more health data than any generation in history, yet feeling well has never felt more complicated. Wearables, AI diagnostics, biohacking, and precision medicine are transforming how we understand the body, but not necessarily how we experience it. Health technology and devices are reshaping what we know about our bodies, while older understandings of the nervous system, trauma, and the nat...

Food is becoming one of the most rapidly shifting systems in the world. Prices are rising, global supply chains are restructuring, new weight-loss medications like Ozempic are changing what people buy, and food technologies like hydroponics, regenerative agriculture, and blockchain traceability are reshaping how food is grown, moved, and trusted. Today, let's explore the future of food systems, no...

Water is often described as a resource problem or a water crisis. But when you trace how water actually moves through modern life, it becomes clear it is also a management problem; one that connects water sustainability, energy systems, food production, cities, health, and migration. In this episode, we explore the future of water, water sustainability, and how emerging technology is changing the...

Imagine an education system designed around how humans actually learn, where curiosity is the starting point and lifelong learning is encouraged to be the default, not the exception. We are in an era where the skills we learn will shift multiple times within a single lifetime, yet many of us were trained within a system built for a very different mindset toward learning. In this week’s podcast epi...

Most cities were shaped around production, movement, and efficiency rather than human experience. So why does it feel like we’re only now beginning to seriously ask what cities are actually for, especially with all the technology we have at our fingertips? Let’s trace the evolution of cities from Haussmann’s redesign of Paris, to Singapore’s garden city vision, to the rise of the 20-minute neighbo...

Most conversations about digital transformation and the future of technology focus on the systems and the technology itself. The conversation that gets skipped is about the person carrying the idea, and what it actually takes to bring something new into the world at this particular moment in history... The Founders. Drawing on Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey and the patterns Alison has observed a...

AI is transforming the future of work faster than most people are prepared for, and the real crisis may not be about jobs at all. It may be about self-knowledge, and what you actually have to offer when the job description stops being the point. In today's episode, we explore AI and the rise of a skills-based economy. Drawing on the Neolithic Revolution, Doughnut Economics, and the movie Her, let'...

What if the real crisis in our financial system isn't a hack, a crash, or a currency war, but the erosion of the social contract that money was built on? In today’s anthropology of technology episode, we explore the harder question of not just how money works, but what it actually is, and whether the system we've inherited and are building upon will serve us in the next era. From Marcel Mauss's gi...

The next era of humanity is opening the door to the stars, but what does that mean for our home planet, and for what it means to be human? In this anthropology of technology episode, we reflect on the lessons emerging from recent space missions to ask a deeper question of “how do we extend our gratitude to Earth as we begin to look beyond it?” Four astronauts travelled a quarter of a million miles...

As we face a global fuel crisis, what does it mean for the future of transportation? In this anthropology of technology episode, we break down the global fuel crisis and the shift that’s happening underneath our transport systems. And we think it’s time to start thinking about how humans will move in the next era. Using historical examples, like Henry Ford and the rise of mass production, we explo...

In this episode of the RobinsonHewitt Pod, we unpack a new operating system for growth that embraces cycles, uncertainty, and the reality that not everything unfolds in a straight line. We’re entering a world where traditional approaches to strategy and project management no longer hold. The pace is faster, the path is less predictable, and linear ways of building no longer reflect how things actu...

Big ideas and new innovations are everywhere. But the real challenge isn’t having the idea, it’s having the capacity to actually hold what you create. In this week’s pod, we go deeper into the “Crawl, Walk, Run” strategy as a way to move from having ideas and goals that can feel out of reach, and into something real and that works with your nervous system. Let’s talk about access to tools, belief...

Welcome to an anthropology of technology session with RobinsonHewitt, hosted by Alison Mackie. Today, we're thinking about how the future of fashion is being reshaped by smart textiles, adaptive materials, and responsive clothing. From programmable garments to sustainable design, this episode explores how technology, identity, and culture intersect in the next era of fashion. ⭐ Blog Post: 'Design...

To mark International Women’s Day, our founder, Alison Mackie, turns the microphone on herself and answers 21 questions about her unconventional journey into the emerging tech world. From humanities to tech futurism, today is a reflection on curiosity, career twists, and why shaping the future of technology needs more diverse voices.

Welcome to an anthropology of technology session with RobinsonHewitt, hosted by Alison Mackie. Today, we’re looking at the iceberg Anthropic has revealed, remembering that what’s visible is only a fraction of the challenges ahead in the emerging tech world. We’ll explore how public participation, ethical governance, and deliberate decision-making can help steer AI safely through these waters. A li...

Welcome to an anthropology of technology webinar, hosted by RobinsonHewitt Consulting. Today, we're opening the door to the idea of "what if" when it comes to sentient and conscious AI. We'll think about it from an anthropological perspective to help reframe the strategy, governance, and next steps for this rapidly evolving world.