DU058 - Sustainability and COVID-19 - Yasmin Borain Interview

Introduction

0:00hello everyone again this is um carla lindarte and welcome to design untangled uh today chris can't be with us but i have lovely yasmin borain who is a um creative director at sapient or

0:33publicist sapient is now isn't it that's the name of the of the company now um it's changed so many so many times the name um and i'm really excited about this we've tried to do this podcast last year when i was heavily pregnant before i had baby elliott in january then we tried to do it again before um after i had the baby and then we had lockdown so but finally we're here jasmine i'm so glad you're here with us i know it's so exciting i'm so excited we're finally doing this this is

Sustainability Topic

1:03great okay so before we start talking about um sustainability which is the topic that we we wanted to talk to uh to you about today just tell us a little bit about you and your background and how did you end up being you know creative director at sapient yeah so um like you said i'm creative director at publicist sapient in london um where a lot of what i do is kind of using the power of design to look to brand people and culture to kind of unlock values and new opportunities really for

1:33clients and what we all love to do is creating you know these products and services that people love but prior to being at publicist as well as living in london i lived in san francisco and i worked for other agencies like rda and mccann mrm and there i worked mainly with like tech and retail clients and i also um in my time in san francisco also spent about a year and a half building a smart space which really um challenged me and got me to really kind of understand the

2:05digital world and our experiences with objects and digital life to um another um degree and um prior to that i was just an artist like i think you know as a young child i always just had kind of this dream um to be an artist and that led to be a designer and now an experienced designer and a creative director so that's kind of my path to here what kind of art did you do so i um did all sorts of art but i think that what i am mostly my most talent is sketching and graphite so um i used to i don't

2:38have that talent anymore but i used to be able to draw someone's face quite detailed um in like five minutes you know so um but um i haven't i need to polish up on that skill that's really amazing oh well um i guess thank you so much for your time and i know this is a very very busy time for you because um as everyone knows we're in lockdown um and then you're homeschooling as well you have two boys and i can imagine this has been really tough for you hasn't it you know it it has and

3:09it hasn't like you know a lot of people always ask and i have to say even though sometimes finding that right balance between work and homeschooling is challenging i feel so lucky and i know it's probably hard to hear it's such a hard time that we're having but you know we're we're healthy um i feel like you know my company and my clients and colleagues have been really supportive in having these two little superheroes join meetings and i'm getting to have dinner with them every night of the week which is not the norm for us so it's you know that i think that i'm just appreciating the

3:40time and the health that we have but um i also have found that even with the design community like there's this connection of like to the to the larger global community and having so many people reaching out to talk about innovation or talk about things or just trying to see what we're doing in london so i find it's it's really interesting how it's bringing a community together yeah definitely i can see that as well even though i'm on maternity leave i i try to get in contact with with people in the design industry and i can see that like positive energy like going around designers at the moment

4:13i mean some people obviously are struggling with work etc but i think as you said it's been quite positive so far so hopefully we we're staying the same way i mean just to give a bit a bit give um the audience a bit of context um yasmine and i were planning to do a workshop in milan in january i mean i said i was planning to do it because um i was due to have a baby in january so i was planning to do it but not very sure i was going to be able to do it um and this workshop was uh for

4:44um i remember then remind me the name of the conference oh my god my memory um yeah i xda so we were going to do um a workshop in sustainability i could unfortunately i couldn't make it but some from from my team at the google zoo um we actually you guys managed managed to do it and we were going to do this podcast to talk about a little bit about what sustainability sustainability meant for organizations and how designers could be part of this but now with

Covid-19 Impact

5:18covid19 things change a little bit right but before we talk about how these things have changed just um tell me a little bit about what you heard from clients last year in the past few years basically about sustainability and how's that been really important now for organizations to be part of their their strategy and their brand purpose so we we've kind of known for a long time that you know the world as we know it or its future is at risk right however in 2015 we saw this really kind of change with

5:52globally focused on inclusion and sustainability across like you know not just businesses governments people civic groups like you name it it was really a global kind of change when the un committed to those 17 sustainable development goals which we focused our workshop on and at the time you know since then we've seen you know the 193 governments within the un set new priorities and those new priorities didn't just affect the governments but affected individuals and individuals and businesses alike just started to rethink their behaviors and strategies to align to those goals and so one of

6:27the things that we started really seeing a change in brands like brands were already starting to kind of unlock value and growth not only through connecting their purpose to customers needs and beliefs but all of a sudden they were looking beyond that like they were looking at not just how their purpose aligned to customers but how they're they played a new role in saving the overall good of society and the planet and so the conversation was just different and we started to see this new focus on sustainability which created the shift from like a very human-centered approach to solving problems

7:03to more of this beyond human and i think we're starting to see different labels pop up around this some of it's around society-centered approach or a global-centered approach or i've seen late you know relationship-centered approach but what we're really seeing is it isn't just focused on these like individual needs but this over collective needs and collective needs including society and the planet you know and so you know you and i have talked a lot about like patagonia like that's the example that everybody uses because there's such a big global footprint but i think what we started seeing is

7:37that you know it it was other other kind of you know airbnb was starting to stand for like peace and justice and strong institutions by providing these relief workers with places to stay we saw waitrose standing for environmental impact by looking at what the future shopping will be without plastic like we're seeing all these companies that were starting to kind of look to make that change yeah definitely i mean also as we as we were preparing for this workshop we also um identify a

8:08big trend in customer behavior because even though as you said it's less about user centricity and more like kind of you know society and planet first um it also like consumers are now more and more interested in being part of that change so it means that companies that have tried to change their strategy to focus on sustainability are also listening to their customers because it's a trend now like people we saw remember i don't remember the numbers really well but um i saw a lot of data from

8:38google on you know searches for sustainability sustainable life um you know how to live you know with less stuff like um so i think it's also a trend it was also a trend that was um it was happening in the world and how organization will respond to to that um it was interesting to see but i guess with um covid 19 do you think this kind of um view of sustainability has been reframed a little bit or just made it stronger yeah it's it's a really great question because i think you and i've been you know

9:12talking about it a little bit and i think that you know when i look at the current crisis it's reminded us that the kind of future is determined by what we do right it's you know and like every crisis before it it causes us to kind of innovate and rethink at a faster rate and so due to covid businesses have no choice but to change they really just don't have a choice and so every single business is across the globe it's not just in one area but across the globe is looking how they can adapt how they can be flexible how they can survive and i think that this lockdown also has started to

9:47kind of move us like you're seeing a huge movement to more digital experiences like with you know for example the fashion industry or trade shows or conferences like you know they're starting to happen virtually which that is significantly having a lower impact on the planet right so there's other existing trends because people couldn't get the products that they needed that they were you know looking to sustainable materials or buying locally so a lot of the lockdown has kind of caused us to kind of i feel move a little bit quicker and also a lot of businesses are shut down so they're having

10:22to reflect and reshape the pressures that we're putting on the natural world which then affects our society so i i believe that while it's hard times like it is moving us forwards yeah i think so too it's kind of accelerated what you know we would have seen the next five you know to ten years like now um it's happening so quickly because we've been forced to think differently as well which i think is very positive i i recently read um an article about um the world economic forum when they're talking

10:55about you know this reframing of um sustainability and just putting you know um planet people actually people planet and then profit as kind of the bottom line for organizations rather than just being profit only um however even though we've seen all these positive like signs of what covid 19 has brought to the world we can also see that for example when um the lockdown finished in china a lot of the you know the pollution levels actually went up again and a lot of things kind of became business as usual

11:29you know like before covid kind of thing so do you think the world and the organizations are actually ready for the real change so do you think for example if we get if we find a vaccine in september and things become normal again you think uh organization actually going to change yeah i mean no matter i think no matter what setbacks we may kind of see in certain countries or businesses or governments we are evolving daily and i i believe that we must believe you know that beyond covid there is a more

12:04resilient and brighter future for us in the planet so like yes we are in those uncertain times and yes there might be setbacks but we're seeing that brands are really trying to maintain the empathy and drive those experiences that like you know have that lens of the customer but also society like you know you see it in these unexpected partnerships that are happening and and that makes me believe that we won't go back to business as usual you know you know yes there are certain habits and behaviors that both customers and brands will go back to that's just natural for us as a human

12:36society right as humans but customer expectations have changed and so has how we do business in the end of

Design Role

12:43the day yeah definitely and how do you think so what's the role of design in all of this what's the role of design and how designers can help organizations and also like their own communities um in that change yeah i just i love i love that question because i think that um you know as designers we've always played a particularly like key role because every day we're kind of turning people's vision and their attitude into these tangible products and services right and there isn't first of all there

13:15isn't a product or service that doesn't kind of require material input or doesn't produce waste or doesn't you know involve labor but now in these like upcoming months organizations will need to reimagine their whole purpose like they don't have a choice like before covid they were considering whether their purpose should have social impact or emotional change i'm sorry environmental change but they now don't have a choice their processes need to be reimagined their products and you know so our job is to make sure that that reset happens in the right way so i believe that you know creative

13:49thinking more than more than it has in a long time will be instrumental in this next phase of society and that's where we come in as designers yeah definitely i think creative thinking and just um i remember actually and for example of that how you know situations like covid 19 could force things that you could potentially uh you know you could thought about um being quite hard or pretty much impossible to do i remember i'm not going to mention the brand name but i actually was in a room with um you know

14:22people from the board of a grocery um business in this country like telling them how to partner with you the likes of deliveroo for example to do their deliveries locally and how we actually remember we we thought about how that could work and we prototype you know some some ideas of how customers would actually do that and at that time i was like you know this is impossible we're never going to be able to do that blah blah blah and now we see like um you know mns for example partnering with deliveroo to be able to do the deliveries that they couldn't do themselves so i think as you said like

14:56things are actually accelerating so much and designers are and obviously design thinkers like us should be still driving all these ideas to businesses because they some of them just don't really know how to do it or they've also been so used to their own ways of working that you know if we bring like new thinking into the into the way they work i'm pretty sure this is a great opportunity to get them think differently and i think that's i think you know the example you brought up is is a great example because i think that people always believe that innovation needs to happen

15:30in these big big ways right that you need six months planning you need and you know i think what what a crisis does in times like this is makes us to um you know think both short term and long term but also makes um the possibility the impossible feel possible because you don't have any choices but to think differently and what we're seeing as well is we're seeing a lot of not just companies looking across their ecosystem to partner but we're also seeing companies looking within their own companies

16:01to co-create where they wouldn't have co-created before um and it's and it's fascinating it's absolutely fascinating and that's where we as designers are really going to help to kind of push forward that that next phase of innovation yeah definitely i mean another example of that is i was recently talking to my colleagues and at google at google zoo which traditionally google zoo would be working more you know in kind of advertising campaigns and things like that and now like the questions that they're getting from businesses like how do we rethink a whole industry how can we do you know an event

16:37that is normally for um you know a face-to-face big bang event how do we do that digitally and how do we we can make money with it as well because obviously people and planet are important but also profit so how do we make our business more profitable with digital and i think it's that is a great opportunity for us as designers in the in the digital industry isn't it because before i mean obviously i talk about many years ago when um obviously showing my age digital was um like the second you know the the secondary thing you know like the shops were the most important thing and digital yeah we have a

17:12website and we sell things online but now that's the switch like the switch is is unbelievable like now you know people like tesco for example they can't really cope with the number of like online shopping that people are doing and things like that you know this is changed completely and i think i know it's a bit hard for some people some people are losing their jobs i mean i also heard from designers who are actually struggling trying to get work at the moment but i think especially if you are in the digital industry this is a great opportunity because now it's more than

17:45ever it's demonstrated that that's the way forward in and we are here to help businesses achieve that whether it's a big business or a small business in your community as well and i think i think what you're hitting too is you know um transformation has been kind of the buzzword for now you know the last three years um and i think that you know a lot of companies have their own view what transformation is but i think what's really fascinating is that it doesn't matter your view it doesn't matter your perspective on what that means but right now everything that you just described is transformation

18:17and i think it's fascinating you even look at like you know you brought up you know shops and stuff so there's been for years we've been talking about you know where's breaks and borders where are they going what are what are the what's the future of banks what is the future you know because everyone is looking at changing what that space might be and we went from destination to this and right now people i mean i read an article this morning where a company is using their offices as a homeless shelter you know to give to help the community and you know they're they're having to

18:50rethink about how their services um you know provide like you said provide value to customers to society but also profit to themselves and in the past they would have just looked at even that shop only producing products that they produce themselves right and now they're they're rethinking what that means and that that's true transformation um and that's what's going to really kind of get us to that next phase of where we're going and and what the future is going to look like yeah definitely i mean

19:22it's super super interesting and as you said like there's a lot of work to be done in communities i mean there's lots of like where i leave for example there's lots of like little shops and stuff like that that they've very quickly put a website up together um there's people who are trying to sell on whatsapp you know like things like that they're trying to survive and i can see you know a lot of like even if you don't have a job as a designer you could actually try and help all these people as well to run their business digitally and because there are you know a lot of businesses in this

19:54country and and around the world and they don't really know what digital is i mean we we live in a world especially in london where everything is is very well digitalized and i would say it's still a lot to do but there's a lot of work to be done for organized for small businesses to to achieve you know a you know a way of surviving in in in the covet world so there is a lot of opportunities for us as designers to help um these businesses and also like keep you know keep things going um and help

20:26people with the you know websites and apps and stuff like that because i think it's necessary at the moment and i'd love you know you bring up that example and i look at like you know where i live i live slightly outside of london and you know we have this um coffee truck that's in town and what i just found out from some friends um last night is the coffee truck is actually now back in business is going around to um different locations so people are what's happening each other when the coffee truck is on their street and they're you know so they're they're doing their same business but in a different

20:58way and now what they're doing is getting people to even be more sustainable than they were before environmental friendly because people are bringing their own coffee cups from their house because they're just walking out of their house you know but it's just amazing that this business has been able to find like you know what they don't have to just be in the center of town to provide that service to people and they're bringing smiles on people's health you know it's reminding me of you know the old movies where you see the ice cream truck that comes around you know and it's but it's for adults and it's just fascinating how you know we can during this hard time still

21:30find new ways to you know rethink and reimagine and hopefully um get us but you know like we talked about before will business be as usual no will we go back to some of our habits absolutely but our expectations are changing throughout this time and and that is going to make for um hopefully some positive impact in the future yeah definitely definitely i mean i've seen it as well in the shops around here where you can go on but you know like it used to be when i was little in colombia you know you go

22:00for the mail for the eggs and you have to bring your tray because you know they're running out of trays for eggs and stuff like that it's it's fascinating it's amazing it's kind of all going back to it should have been you know um you don't have to generate all this waste you can actually reuse a lot of stuff and i think it's it is it is very positive um i mean obviously there are a lot of audiences like young designers and we know that from statistics that a lot of young people are losing their jobs and it might be a bit a negative so for some people these times would be would have been a

22:32bit negative but is there anything like any books or any things that you've like recently listened to or viewed that you would recommend for people to kind of have this positive energy especially for designers in the in these uh difficult times yeah and i think that you know before i give some

Positive Energy Recommendations

22:50examples i think one of the most important things of kind of keeping positive in this time is that you know i i think that learning mindset you know i think it's very easy when we're going through you know kind of hard times that we we try to kind of follow the rules and as designers and creative people that's not what we do that's why we have such a big learning mindset and i think not losing sight of that and just really pushing yourself being you know more creative and thinking and just looking for those opportunities because i think we're in the time right now where if you have an idea of voice that leaders are listening and businesses are listening more

23:24now than they were before because they they don't have the answers themselves um some of the more interesting kind of things that i've been you know looking at and i think more kind of related to our topic of sustainability um i just recently discovered the rewind nature series on national geographic which is spotlights change makers who are making like these small changes that have big impacts and i think it's a partnership with north face and um rei but they're just really nice series to watch um and i also um i find that there's a you know there's a lot of podcasts out there that are kind of talking about

23:59sustainability and all that but two of them that i kind of really just enjoyed listening to not saying that they're the best but i just really enjoy one is um conscious chatter and the reason why i enjoyed that one is i'm really big into fashion and style and i think that it is a very hard industry to kind of really get people to kind of think about how can we be more environmentally friendly how can we kind of really look at that kind of global supply chain and i think they just have really nice discussions about um sustainable fashion and style um and then the other one is uh good with good plus social

24:34it's another podcast that kind of explores these like stories behind innovation and entrepreneurs and activists who are kind of like changing the industry for the better and again they're just really positive kind of stories and interesting people that are making social impact um but those those i would kind of say are really interesting and then this is a really really old book um it's from around the time i think i believe it's around the time um that the sustainable goals were kind of um signed off you know in 2015 but don't don't i'm not positive but it's how to thrive in the next

25:10economy designing tomorrow's world today and the the author um is just one of those kind of people that were on the forefront of that more than human approach so like at the time he was going to a lot of different schools and businesses talking about kind of place-based design and getting students and professionals to kind of think like a forest and you know i think it's just really interesting and i i feel like i recently kind of went back to the book and and i just feel like there's certain things in it that are still relevant to to what we're discussing today oh amazing jasmine it's been amazing having you

25:47in our podcast you always fill me with lots of energy every time i talk to you you're always very positive very very energetic so i hope you know our audience can see that and just feel much better about all these difficult times thank you so much again for your time i know uh you've been really busy and i really appreciate it and hope to to to do more stuff with you in the future yeah thank you so much for having me and yes i um am really excited for us to continue doing the great work that we do so um thank you again for having me okay thank you search and subscribe to design untangled using your

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