May 15, 2024 • 50 mins
Ever looked at the piles of work on your desk and thought "there's got to be a way to make this fun - or at least less boring?" Then you've summarized the thesis of my guest's entire career.
Chris Chapman is the former Global Creativity & Innovation Director at Disney, and the founder of Imaginology —a global innovation agency established in 2019 that specializes in creative collaboration workshops, design sprints, and development projects. His interactive and entertaining approach and kind yet rebellious attitude drive real change for companies and individuals. His recent partnerships span a diverse range of professionals, from Oscar-winning producers and animation directors to Fortune 500 leaders, academic researchers, psychologists, even surgeons and the Sesame Workshop.
During our chat, we looked the trajectory of Chris's career - how he climbed the ranks at Disney, started his own work, explores how AI can be a positive force for creativity, and how solo creators/entrepreneurs can employ the modalities he teaches for their own use.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
- Hello, friends.
Welcome back to BuildingValue with Jason Nellis.
You might be surprised tolearn I'm still Jason Nellis,
my family and I are still traveling.
There's lots going on tofill you in on, I promise,
in an upcoming episode.
I will do just that. But for today,
let's talk about my guest.
Today I'm speaking withChristopher Chapman,
who was formerly the Global Creativity
and Innovation Directorat Disney for 17 years.
(00:22):
He helped organizations withinDisney improve the way they
work and improve the way
that they communicate their creativity, so
that they can build better,build faster, and build smarter.
He and I met throughImaginology, his current agency
where he helps organizations
and individuals think more creatively.
Chris and I spoke on a number of subjects,
including applications of AI
and the work that he does,how he managed to do all
(00:44):
of his work during a pandemic,when a lot of it needs
to be done in person,and how a lot of the work
that he does can be applied
to individuals rather than large groups.
If you just tweak someof the ideas, if you like
what you see, if you likewhat you hear, then subscribe,
follow, leave me acomment, leave me a review,
whatever you feel moved to do.
This is Christopher Chapman,and here we are with Chris.
(01:06):
Chris, thanks for joining,man. Good to have you,
- Jason. Stoked to be here, man.
- I appreciate that. Not everybody is,
sometimes it feels likethe Spanish Inquisition,
you never expect it, but here we are.
- Love the curiosity. Always,
always here for that. I'm glad,
- I'm glad.
Well, you know, I would beremiss if I didn't speak first a
little bit about, youknow, the, the big chunk
of your career at Disney, right?
Mm-Hmm. You were there from 2002 to 2018.
(01:29):
You worked as art director forDisney experiences, you know,
uh, Disney, excuse me, parks,experiences and products.
Uh, and then you were aglobal, uh, creativity
and innovation director.
So I know, as I'm sure you do, lots
of people whose life goalit is to work at Disney.
Was that yours? Is that where you were
aiming for post-College?
- Yeah. You know, it goes backto when I was really young.
(01:52):
Um, the joke was whenI was, I got about five
or six, um, I knew Iwanted to work at Disney,
um, and I was told a lot bypeople outside of my family,
like, oh, like that, that's impossible.
That, and then through my life,
(02:12):
it became a little morereal as I went to art
and design school and I startedtelling my dad like, Hey,
I really think I wanna pursue this.
And, um, he was like, Hey, yeah, like,
if you want that, go for it.
And he gave me some thoughts and steps
and ways to think about that,what the galvanizing moment
of serendipity was.
(02:33):
I was a sophomore, um,
and I saw a billboardlittle thing up to my campus
that said, Disney's coming to campus.
I was like, okay,.Um, and I went, listened.
And they offered somethingcalled the Disney College
Program, which was an opportunityto, uh, either do a summer
or a semester off for exchangeof some credits where you got
(02:55):
to do something through theirDisney University program.
You worked in the parks, youhad open doors for networking.
And, uh, yeah.
So that was my first touch point,
working at Disney AnimalKingdom, selling ice cream
and, uh, popcorn
and Cokes, um, intooutdoor food and beverage.
Uh, while I got what theyaffectionately called a, uh,
a master's degree or a doctorate,
(03:16):
I got the doctorate after Donald Duck.
True Disney fashion. Yeah,that hurts. It was priceless.
Yeah, it does. It was kind of like, it's,
it's cheesy in all the right kind of ways.
Yeah. Um, but yeah, thatwas kind of, uh, the path.
And then everything was a small step,
but I was laser focused onwanting to, uh, be a creative
with inside the Walt Disney Company.
(03:37):
- Love that. Tell me alittle bit about, you know,
when you start off in that space
and you grow to where youended up in, in the end
of your time there, you can't do it alone.
Nobody can. So I, I'd love tohear a little bit about sort
of who were your mentors whohelped you along the way,
and, you know, more broadly,how did they help you sort
of think about creativity within Disney,
which is such a largeand bureaucratic company?
(04:00):
- Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, the first shoutout I have to give is
to Quinn Kimball, who is a,um, at Disney Design Group.
Um, he's somebody I met through networking
and he took a shot on me,like he saw my portfolio.
I was, uh, eager like a,
a baby dolphin, probablyeven a little annoying.
Um, but he saw something in me
and we met at like, kind of a,
(04:21):
a little mini conferencewhile I was interning.
Um, and I just, that was thefirst part about relationships.
Quinn was always amazing atmentoring the next group coming
in and paying it forward.
And that became a massive part of my life.
Um, another one was Chuck Hoffman, who's
inside the advertising group there, uh,
a group creative director.
(04:42):
He would just go to lunches.
We go to lunches all the timeand intellectualize things.
He'd gimme great advice. Um, for example
of like never go anywherewhere, uh, you're the top dog,
you know, um, alwaysmake sure it's somewhere
where you remain, you know, stretching
and pushing to learn, uh, something new
and being challenged.
Uh, but other ones, TonyBaxter, uh, uh, a Disney legend,
(05:03):
um, Imagineer who, uh, youknow, led everything from,
uh, splash Mountain, uh,to the creation of, uh,
Disneyland in Paris.
Just an incrediblelegendary Imagineer that
took me under his wing tojust share a philosophy
around storytelling and kindof the human experience.
(05:24):
Byron Howard, Australiandirector of Zootopia, same kind
of graciousness of justlike spending time with me,
having lunches with me and,
and sharing kind of what it's like
to advance in your creative career
and what it means to like,satisfy your inner truth when it
comes to creativity,especially when it's also
inside something that is a
corporation, you know, and is a business.
(05:45):
Um, Christina Reed, who isa producer in animation, um,
Karen Nolton, uh, whoworked with Adam Grant,
I got connected from Adam Grant to Karen.
Um, she just kind of beenadvising me on startup
and organizational health.
Lauren Dier, who also worked,
she was at a BCA mutual friend of ours.
Uh, she's been a great mentor
and recently she introducedme to Eric Coleman, who used
(06:05):
to be head of, uh, TV animation.
These are all people who,when they see someone
who shares the same values
and believe in what you do,have just really taken their
experience in the ups anddowns and paid it forward.
And it's been invaluable.
And I aim to continue to dothat with people that reach out
to me and, and sharesome of those same values
(06:28):
- When we think about the arc
of a time at a company like Disney.
Right. You're starting sortof at the, the low end of the,
of the org chart, so to speak,
and you're working your way up, you know,
how did these mentors help youthink about your trajectory?
Because I think for alot of folks, you know,
you think about a bigcompany, you think about like,
I gotta play the politics game.
(06:48):
I gotta, you know, sortof find my little corner
and take it from there.
And it sounds to me like yougot a lot of support from folks
who let you build your skills
and do all the things that needto happen in a big company,
but also dream and think aboutthings outside of a standard,
you know, uh, uh, company matrix, right?
You really got to paintwith a broad brush as well
as a fine one, it sounds like.
(07:10):
- Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, it goes aboutsaying, um, a another mentor
that kind of galvanized that
for me was Duncan Wordle washeading up the innovation
and creativity groupthat I was hired into,
and he took a shot on me
and him along with the rest, kind of
as I was thinking about my development.
I never wanted to play the, the game
(07:35):
of climbing the corporate ladder.
I despise the game.
Um, it's not part of my DNA to try to, um,
climb a ladder for titlesfor the sake of doing so.
Um, my whole thing is, am I fulfilled with
what I'm doing creatively?
I enjoying who I'm working with,
and am I making a positiveimpact on both those around me
and those I'm making things for
(07:57):
That can be a massivedisservice in the reality of
what it is to be inside any company, um,
because there is a certaintrajectory that happens
where you start gaining more influence
for the decision makingpower you wanna have.
So Duncan gave me a ton of autonomy
to essentially run my own,um, incubator consultancy,
(08:20):
uh, within Disney.
And arguably one
of the greatest gifts Iever got from a leader,
like true autonomy.
So within that, some of the other advices
that I got were counterintuitive.
You know, I thought I was gonna stay
with Disney until I retired.
And not necessarily fromthe people I mentioned,
(08:41):
but other executives had said, Chris,
I want you to recognize something.
Climbing the ladder does notmean you'll have more control.
It doesn't. It's, um,
I remember hearing Bob Igertalk about, uh, how part
of his percentage ofhis job is just managing
and speaking to Wall Street.
Um, the stakeholdergame gets more complex,
(09:03):
the higher you rise, the risk does,
and you being accountable,which is a big learning for me.
There's one thing when you'rea creative being protected
by leaders to not feelthe impact of failure.
The leaders that areprotecting you from that,
they're taking it on the chin,they're falling on the sword.
And so it's a differentworld at that level.
(09:27):
So I think that wasanother realization of,
do I wanna keep climbing thisto become, who knows, like,
you know, a president of oneof the divisions of Disney.
I didn't feel a motivation towards that.
I felt a motivationtowards working with people
and telling great stories and,and, and using design, art,
and creativity andbusiness to make it happen.
(09:47):
So I think that was a bigkind of wake up call for me,
I think on that journey.
- I appreciate you're,
you're reflecting onsomething I've heard many
times in my own career.
I, I remember particularlyback at my time in Hulu,
you know, I, I worked with NBC Universal.
Disney was not my assigned account,
but I do recall we used tohit a lot of friction with
(10:09):
executives who'd climbedthe, what was originally ge
and then became the ComcastUniversal, you know, tree.
And they were very happyon their little spots,
but some of what they weremanaging were technologies
that were slowly fadingaway, uh, electronic sell
through on platforms likeiTunes, uh, even DVD or VHS.
That was still a thing at that point.
(10:30):
And, um, the pushback we gotconstantly from those folks
when looking for, uh, rights
or the ability to stream certain content
that they had locked upin these archaic, uh,
contracts, they wouldn't let us have.
Because as you were talking about, they,
they had never given themselves the space
to really build somethingcreative or flexible or nimble.
They just found a fiefdom
and they wanted to protect their fiefdom
(10:51):
until they got to retirement.
It's refreshing to hear your story about
how you really balked thatyou really said, I I need
to go find my own space
and not be the person
who is a thorn in somebody'sside 10, 20 years from now.
Um, what was it like not,it sounds like you were able
to make some change atDisney, though, in your role,
because you wouldn't havegotten that pushback.
(11:12):
You wouldn't have gotten that feedback
if you weren't doing something right.
- Alright, so there is a, uh,
pretty galvanizing moment inmy career, uh, related to that
where we were in a brainstorm.
Uh, it was our group withinDisney Parks, um, parks
and Resorts, uh, Disney,uh, consumer Products
and Experiences andPixar animation studios.
(11:33):
And I remember sitting there watching, um,
different levels ofleadership in the room.
Um, a type extroverts dominatingthe conversation, some
of the most brilliant introverted artists
and designers, not speaking,um, a person up front with a,
a flip chart and a marker
(11:53):
and all of us whispering in the back, none
of these ideas are evergonna have actually happen.
And I had this kind ofmoment of epiphany of like,
what is going on here?
Like, I knew how startupswere, were formed.
I knew how our work was effective, but
whenever I saw cross-functionalgroups come together
or try big initiatives,
(12:14):
it was always too manycooks in the kitchen.
It was always the loudest voice wins.
And it was always just this kind of like,
we're gonna have a brainstorm, um,
which most people don'teven know the history of,
which is Alex Osborne geta quantity fine quality.
So within those, I stopped
and I said, I need totake a step back here.
I wanna look in like,what is brainstorming?
(12:36):
What is innovation? What is creativity?
What is, um, collaboration?What is inventing?
I, and I started having conversations
with Wal Disney Imagineering at that time,
target was crushing it, talking with them.
Um, I was talking withpeople, um, at Stanford, uh,
that had the D school
and trying to get underneathwhat all this meant.
(12:59):
And I started to recognizethe human element internally
for when people come together,collaboration, chaos.
And it can be a magicalmix like, uh, Jordan
and the dream team, uh,during the Olympics,
or if you watch the lastdance, a galvanizing moment,
but often you're gettingpeople put together
(13:20):
and you have to recognizeeveryone has potentially different
criteria for what success means to them.
Everybody might have adifferent communication style.
Everyone might have adifferent, um, relationship
with fear and risk.
Um, also there'sdifferent thinking styles.
So what I to headline all
of this is I started recognizingnot just the human element
(13:42):
of who the idea is serving,
but also the people that were creating it.
That there are systems andstructures that can unlock that,
and they, they can be superlight, you know, systems
and structures can destroy creativity,
but they also can unlock 'emwhen they're gentle, you know,
creating scope of a playground, et cetera.
So realizing the empathy requiredfor everyone's experience
(14:04):
was really kind of a galvanizing moment
and launched me out of thatkind of art director, uh,
position into reallyexploring that next role
of global creativityand innovation Director.
- It sounds to me as ifyou really felt a calling
to go help people directly,
that you were not seeing the light
and the path taking youthrough more Disney time
(14:24):
to help folks internally, but rather exit.
Was, was that transitionout challenging for you? Oh.
And what would you say wasthe biggest takeaway from
that time that you still hold with you?
- Going back to ByronHoward, um, the director, uh,
who directed Zootopia, Iwent and met with him, um,
(14:45):
and I sat down and I wasjust like, I'm having a kind
of internal creative purpose crisis
because I grew up with Disney believing
so much in stories that can, um,
help us relate to eachother, to ourselves.
Um, having seen theeducational side of Disney
(15:06):
and things like Epcot
and, uh, theme parks,
they're about helping peoplecreate tangible memories, uh,
and, and, and kind of these milestones
and to really, you know, findjoy together as a family.
All these things meant so much to me
and my mission, you know, um, of
(15:27):
empowering people'screativity and collaboration
and to reach their full potential.
I'm sitting here going like,
I don't think I can stay within Disney
and do that as effectivelyas I would like to.
And Byron gave me some great advice
and he just said, Hey,look, like, just recognize,
you could always boomerang and come back,
(15:47):
but you could go out andfind something that's
so much more meaningful,impactful to the world.
And so that gave me the first step.
I then went for long walkswith people across the company,
having these conversations.
And there was a certainpoint where I was offered,
um, kind of would say thelast hope I was offered a,
(16:10):
uh, an opportunity to pitch,to become the head of, uh,
culture for Walt Disney Imagineering.
Um, it fell through in the 11th hour
because someone moved out of that division
that I've been reporting to.
And I sat there, I'mlike, now is the time.
I knew intrinsically, now is the time.
And I started thinking about leaving.
(16:32):
And at that same time,um, they started layoffs
and I took a separation package.
So I kind of got the nudge out the door.
But what I want to share with you from
a vulnerable place is I hadto go through an ego death,
my identity growing up,aspiring to work at Disney,
(16:53):
15 years at Disney.
I got to a place where I started having
to separate myself from thatand mourned the loss of it.
I went to therapy. I talkedto friends and family.
I had to mourn the creativestorytelling purpose side of
that and recognize myself as an individual
(17:14):
and recognize a deeper kind of, um,
rebirth of what are my values?
What do I stand for?
'cause I think what happenedin Disney was I had my values,
but just like anywhere,there are corporate values,
but there were many different people
with different types of values.
So I was able to gothrough a very hard time.
(17:36):
I went through, uh, a,a small depression, um,
but I was kind of planting the darkness
and reborn out of it more clear
and sharper on what I wantedto do and why I was doing it.
And it was incredibly, incredibly hard.
Um, but I don't regret it for a second.
Forged through the flames, if you will.
(17:58):
- Well, I appreciate thevulnerability of that.
I, I had a somewhat similarexperience with my three
and a half years at Meta before I was part
of their big layoffs,
and I wasn't dreamingof working at Facebook.
So I can only imaginehow much more difficult
and impactful that must havebeen in your experience.
Uh, tell me how you thenthink about, okay, I,
I know I've got this skillset,
(18:19):
I know I've got thispassion for creativity.
Uh, you and I both come from,you know, a background of,
you know, uh, children'stheater, creative drama, right?
This sense of play at work, right?
Play as a, as a tool, notjust as a, a sort of, um,
recreational activity.
How do you then start to thinkabout your current work in,
uh, your, your daring playand Imaginology at large?
(18:40):
Like, how does that turn intosomething that you think,
okay, I'm ready to go bringthis to other organizations,
other people, and sort of,uh, preach a philosophy of,
you know, dare dare to break out of your,
your structures and try new things.
It's really okay, youcan always go back home.
Kind of an approach to it.
- Yeah, it was interesting,um, when I left, I
(19:02):
had a lot of friendsinternally at Disney just say,
why don't you create an externalWalt Disney Imagineering?
Um, and it was aspirational for me.
And I had another journeyof like, is it that?
But I had, I, I kind of wentthrough this reevaluation of
what you brought up aboutchildren's entertainment
(19:26):
and theater and some ofmy biggest heroes, right?
Mr. Rogers, Walt Disney,Jim Henson, LaVar Burton
of Reading Rainbow, and of course
for Star Trek fans out there.
Um, and there was thiseducational component,
if you look at my DNA mom, a teacher, uh,
with artistic talents, mydad, uh, a photographer,
(19:48):
architect, agency guy.
So this marriage of learningand doing, and the curiosity
and the courage found in PlayCore to my values on top of
that at a higher level.
So if I took those as kind ofthe, the underpinning values
as what's my North Star
and the North Star was always put,
(20:08):
people first always be experimenting.
So love it that that sparking play
and those foundationalaspects of play, I, I I,
that was in there, butI had to start doing
to find those things.
So the doing was okayif we're not gonna be,
I don't necessarily wannajust recreate a a imaginary
externally, I started just taking
(20:31):
a service I knew Icould provide, which was
going in understanding someone's needs
around developing ideas
and lead design sprints
and lead workshops.
Other people also said,we saw your background.
Do you do trainings? I would just say yes.
'cause I did do some ofthat, you know, at Disney
where we'd pair the learningwith the doing skill 'em up in
(20:53):
how to do design thinking, run that.
So I started with that,
and as it evolved, I startedto recognize I worked
with some amazing people from doctors
and physicians tofilmmakers, product owners.
It started this kind of realization of
how vital the humanelement of the creator is.
(21:13):
And so I started just evolvingthat along the way to be
a development of bothpeople and their ideas.
And so we ended on beinga creative consultancy.
Some still call us a creative agency, um,
and the day that's, we're more than that.
We, you know, serve those two things.
And that's kind of a lighttrajectory of how that evolved.
(21:36):
- A lot of folks who hadexperience in your space, uh,
would think more in the direction of,
how do I take this learning Ihave from all these years at
Disney and make it asbroadly available as possible
and become what I'm generouslygonna call an online guru
of sorts, but a creator, right, right.
Somebody who puts thatcontent out into the world.
Um, tell me what was something like
(22:00):
that ever attractive to you?
'cause it sounds like Yes. Oh yeah.
Okay, good. I hit thenail of the head. No,
- No, no.
It's nailed it. No, thequestion's fascinating
because I've struggled with it.
- Oh, good. Okay. So tellme about that struggle,
because have, that's something I,
I constantly struggle with too.
- I have no interestin being an influencer.
I have no in, in, in the, inthe, the term of influencer.
Um, okay. I love that, thatterms d it's becoming makers,
(22:23):
um, more of that and curators.
Um, yeah, when I look at people out there
that, um, they write the bookto sell conference speaking,
and the conferencespeaking sells the book,
and then they sell, sell somekind of workshop that may
or might not work, andthey build a following,
(22:44):
and then it's about monetizing that,
that makes me want to vomit.
But, but I think I had a wrong lens on it.
Um, Adam Grant shared alot of people go through
that self-promotion.
Um, uh, I, I thinkthere's a duality in there
of both imposter syndrome,which is very real for anybody.
(23:06):
Um, but then also this notion of like,
I don't wanna make my businessabout promoting myself.
And so Adam put a lens on it
and said, it's not that Irespect the way he does it
in a very deep way.
He's like, you are honoring the message.
You are in service of the message.
(23:28):
So when I was creatingImaginology, everybody's like, no,
no, no, Chris, it shouldbe chris chapman.com.
You're selling Chris Chapman,you're selling Chris Chapman.
I'm like, well, I knowI have a value theft.
I want to Imaginology.It's bigger than me.
Adam's approach was that.
And I, I remember immediatelymy personal website, I changed
(23:51):
to the daring play.com
because I was like, it'snot Chris chapman.com.
You know, it's, it's the bigger message.
So I'm starting to recognizethe importance of me, um,
being a, a, a person
that can put up the flarein the sky that says, Hey,
we believe these values, um,
(24:12):
and this is how we're doing that.
If you're into it, comecheck it out. Have a look.
Um, I think that's beenthe big pivot for me.
- You do realize you'respeaking on a podcast that
for the first 10 episodes wascalled the Jason Nellis Show,
not because I was being self important,
'cause I literally couldn'tcome up with another
name, so I just want to call out. But
- There's all but, and here's- The thing that hits
- Home.
There's no judgment inthat. I still think there
is an aspect of that.
(24:34):
Sure. It's like, I thinkAdam Grant site still is adam
grant.com, but he, he stillelevates his books, you know?
Yeah. And you can, it's a very fine line.
It might not be, um, on the surface,
but you know, when you cansmell the bullshit.
- Yeah. Yes.- When, you know,
someone's just self-promoting
and, you know, it's all on their ego.
(24:54):
Look, we all spend our entirelives either being aware
or on the spectrum to unaware of our ego.
If the removal of that and, and,
and in saying like, I'mhere to do something
and that do is not promoting me,
that's not the, the end game.
So it's like something I loveabout you, Jason, when we
(25:14):
and I met, we connected,was we are kindred spirits.
We both have this passion forthings that are value-based,
and the things that wewalk our talk, right?
Um, so I commend you on that,
and I, I, the cautionary tale is
you are also a carrier of your message,
therefore, your name for the show
(25:35):
works. You know what I mean?
- I, I, that's very generous of you.
And by the way, I thinkthe term for the two
of us is nerds, and I'm goodwith that.. Yes,
- Absolutely.
- But no, I mean, that's, that's also part
of the reason why I'vebeen trying to rebrand it
as building value with Jason Ellis.
Because for me it's moreabout who, you know, talking
to creators who, and, and,
and I wanna say not justcreators, but people broadly
and what I think of as thecreator economy who aren't just
(25:59):
as you so adeptly described,selling you crap, right?
I don't want to talk to somebody
who built a big following in,uh, YouTube with their shorts
that were generated by AI just
so they could sell a bunchof merchandise, right? Like
- Yes.
And just hacking psychologyfor clickthroughs, right?
And then they're also just re-skinning
what everybody else isalready put blood, sweat,
and tears in, in, in doing.
(26:20):
And they're like, I'm just gonna lift that
and I'm gonna try to makemoney off of eyeballs.
That turns me off so fast.
- So I'd love to learn a littlebit more about the tenets
of the company specifically.
So like, what are your,what are your pillar values?
What are the things that youwanna bring to the table?
If I'm a company that you're speaking
to about an engagement opportunity?
(26:43):
- Absolutely. So on a
nor, uh, we like tocall it the North Star,
some call it your big why or your purpose.
Ours is to spark childlikecourage and curiosity.
Um, the reason to do that,we lose it, you know?
Um, when we're children,uh, I talk to this
with adults all the time.
I, you went through thisexercise, I had 'em draw some
(27:05):
of these to play with, ora game they used to invent
with people, but reallyunpack underneath that
what they felt back then.
You hear, they felt free.
They felt more joy, theyfelt more experimental.
They felt, you know, limitless.
So sparking that childlike c courage
and curiosity as a bridgeinto adulthood is really,
so we can improve humanity'screativity, collaboration,
(27:28):
and critical thinking, right?
Creativity, collaboration,
and critical thinking, vitalskillset for our future.
So that's applied in ourcurrent mission as a consultancy
to stoke this daring play with business
and creative teams underpinningthat North Star are values.
And those values I broughtbefore always be experimenting
(27:51):
and always putting people first.
Um, underneath that arereally the behaviors that are
teachable, measurable,
and we can hold our ourself accountable.
'cause look, we're all gonnadrop the ball at the end
of the day, but we canpoint to these things.
It's like the ultimate creative brief.
Um, so experimentation,supporting behaviors show up
(28:12):
through walking the talk of curiosity, uh,
courage and play.
Uh, and then people firstshows up through empathy, uh,
care and transparency.
- All of that sounds great.
But there is a big hiccupthat I've been thinking about
as we've been talking, which is
that when you started thecompany in 20 18, 90 some odd
(28:33):
percent of people were in their office.
Now there's hybrid working,there's fully remote folks.
How do you take the tool setyou normally take to an office
and apply it to a hybrid oreven fully remote setting?
- Oh, this is a great question. Um,
- Thanks.
I feel really good about it.,
- In the beginning.
Um, no virtual collaborations full stop.
(28:55):
Um, I'm still, uh, an adamantsupporter of in-person work.
I think we have over-indexed on virtual,
and I think we're gonnasee a massive snapback.
Um, there is loads ofdata out there that shows
how vital it is for us, um,to relate to each other.
We are social creatures,uh, being in proximity
with each other, um, let alonea new study that came out
(29:18):
that shows that people are happier
when working with their hands.
You know, when we workwith paper and drawing
and sticky notes insteadof in a Google doc, um,
your joy index goes up, yourbrain works differently.
It's kinesthetic push thatto the, there are realities,
there are people whoneed to work from home.
Um, there's life situations,um, from having kids to flex,
(29:39):
working, you know, being in office
and then also working from home.
So how do we, to your question,
how do we apply this stuffin a virtual environment?
There's many aspects,
but let me just giveyou maybe the top three.
Number one is withineverything that we do, um,
a big core of this is how weshow up with our mindsets.
(30:02):
Uh, so yes, we have structures.
Um, let's, let's think of it this way.
If there's an engine, um,
that's our design thinking approach,
which we call design thinking2.0, also known as empathy,
design bias, if that'sour creative problems,
problem solving framework.
And that's the engine and the tools we use
to spark people into thinking differently,
(30:23):
to crack insights faster,to get aligned, uh,
to visually unpack
and hear people's, uh, viewpoints,
no matter how diverse they are.
And those are the pistons.
An engine needs oil,and that's the mindsets.
So if you don't havethe oil in the engine,
the pistons are gonnaheat up with bad friction
and the engine's gonna lock.
(30:45):
So even if you don't use our process,
and we often adapt withothers to their process
to make it work, it's the behaviors
and the mindsets of how we show up.
So in the virtual environment,we were forced to test it
during the pandemic, um,doing some stuff with Nike
and, uh, with Apple, and itworked, it worked fantastically.
(31:05):
So what we saw therewas, yes, it does work.
No, it's not our top preference.
Um, but when we put those
Behaviors is a priority,everything else can fall in line.
So I think that was the, the,the, the biggest learning from
that aspect is to make surethat we place light structures
(31:26):
around helping peoplecreate greater awareness
around their behaviorsand how they show up, uh,
as they collaborate andcreate together the work. I
- You spoke about challengesin, uh, adjusting to, uh,
the rapid change ofthings like, um, uh, COVID
and being home for, uh, the pandemic.
(31:47):
I'd love to hear your thoughts
and really, you know, particularlyin the modern era of, uh,
AI and the big scariness ofAI that everybody is dealing
with, I'd love to hear
what you think about rapidchanges in the marketplace
and how what you bring tothe table can help buoy
and in some ways surf thewaves of this constant change.
You know, what do you think about how
we can use AI in the workplacein an effective way, uh,
(32:10):
even though some peoplesee it as being something
that takes their job away.
- The work I do is act is, is is agnostic
to a discipline
or an industry, which can feel
counterintuitive sometimesfor a lot of people.
Um, because at the end of the day, it's,
it's problem solvingand people collaborating
(32:32):
where they can thrive, right?
So as the exponential rateof technology comes in,
um, and the great human experiment of
how we exist on this planet changes, uh,
as we saw a force factorcome in from the pandemic
and, uh, the greatresignation and quiet quitting
and all these things, the constant here
(32:55):
that keeps bubbling up to the surface, um,
surface is specifically related
to something I believe I broughtearlier, which is the three
vital core skills we willall need is creativity,
collaboration, and critical thinking.
Some might add in afourth one communication,
but I concern that asubset of collaboration,
(33:16):
so within those, um, I thinkit was actually at, um,
the World Economic Forum,they spoke about this related
to ai, and they said
like, critical thinking is gonna be vital.
And I've already noticedwith people that I work with
that can transfer their skillsinto using AI as a tool.
(33:36):
Um, yes. Is there a threatwith ai? Absolutely.
Uh, this black and whitethinking has got to go,
it's like fire can, uh,shoot bullets, um, can, uh,
you know, melt human beings
and, uh, can burn down entire cities.
Guess what? Fire can alsocauterize wounds, uh,
can cook food to make it safe,
and it can light the dark for us.
(33:57):
So when I look at somethinglike ai, what's vital is
that we can have creative conversations
and creativity defined as,you know, conversations
around new approaches that are useful.
Um, critical thinking,be able to reductively
unpack the pros and the cons
and make decisions together, right?
(34:19):
And the collaboration piece come together
and turn, which from me versus you to me
and you versus the problem.
And if we're able tocontinually boost, refine, hire,
celebrate, creativity,collaboration, critical thinking,
we can take on the exponentialchange from technology,
(34:41):
workplace, environment, anything else
that's coming down the pipeline
that we can fathom right now.And we all know it's coming.
- My background is, uh, a hybrid
of media and technology, right?
For, for most of my career,I've been at that intersection
where creatives
and, you know, for lack ofa better term, you know,
bureaucrats and pencil,pencil pushers kind of meet.
(35:03):
So I know that when I bringsomething to the table,
I've gotta have it backed up, not just
with a compelling narrative,
but it's gotta have hard science.
There's gotta be data, right?
So talk to me a little bitabout beyond, you know, the,
the collaborative structuresyou're talking about
and the ways in which we canbe creative with each other.
Like, what's the data that backs this up?
Because I assume you have some,
(35:23):
and more importantly, it's compelling.
- There's a certain pointin my career when I was
recognizing the expansivecreative dreamers
and kind of people thathave more analytical,
um, had this tension.
And I saw that I was kind of a bridge
between both theexpansive artistic dreamer
and kind of this reductive,pragmatic realist.
(35:48):
And when I was introduced todata, um, Tim Kda, who was, uh,
in Parks Resorts digital, Ithink he was VP at the time,
introduced me to a termcalled being data curious.
I'd always used research, uh,
as an approach to create anything.
So I started digging, notjust only into my me search,
(36:10):
things I've seen, heard better experience,
but I dialed into that reading part of
how can I make sure what I'm doing?
And what we're applying is bothgetting feedback from people
we work with, but also looking at large
studies and anchoring in it.
So we've constantly used these,
and I, I'll share three,um, that come to mind,
that have kind of become somewhat
(36:31):
of cornerstones to what we do.
One aspect is, you know, we,as we grow and develop people
and their ideas, we usean approach of learning
through doing, right?
So learning and simulatedprojects as well as real projects
or design sprints, wewanna make sure people are
getting sticky learnings.
They can do it without us,but also they're getting
(36:52):
that kind of learning whilethey're applying it themselves.
And the reason we prioritize play, um, is
that, yes, it brings joy,
it opens up people's subconscious minds.
It, um, allows more creativity
and expansive thinking to flow
and makes the reductivethinking far more enjoyable.
But from a sticky learning standpoint, um,
(37:13):
research shows it takesapproximately 400 repetitions
to create a new synapsein your brain, this kind
of connection that galvanizes.
But with play, it takes 10 to 20,
we are meant to play, right?
Like, that is what it is tobe human, um, to play, is to
(37:35):
experiment, to try something, to see
what happens if I do itthis way or try it this way.
It's to rapidly fail and learn
and grow in a consequence freefeeling of an environment.
So that's one aspect of thescience of why we elevate play,
and those underpinning piecesof play a beginner's mindset,
not married to an outcome.
Right? Let's go into the next piece.
(37:56):
When we're bringing people together
and there's cross-functionalcollaboration, you're going
to have unhealthy collaboration,
chaos, or unhealthy friction.
But there is required healthy friction,
industrial light, magic Pixar.
They thrive on this radicalcandor feedback systems.
However, not everybody isgreat at doing that in a way
that takes into considerationdifferent people's
(38:19):
psychology or thinking styles.
So you can get culturesthat can spin out of control
or people that are winningOscars and making amazing things,
but kind of not feeling greatabout it inside the culture.
So what I started recognizing was
the researcher on thepsychology of the evolution
of human collaborationand the psychology around
(38:40):
happiness chemicals.
So the headline on this oneis stress reduction, baking
and science of how weshow up with each other
to remove cortisol are stresshormone that's only supposed
to come in bursts and movingto oxytocin, our trust,
support and social happiness, chemical
and serotonin, um, uh,
(39:02):
happy chemical comes from usfeeling secure, um, respected
and validated in the work we do.
The third is navigating fear.
Um, expansive thinkers.
Uh, the dreamers, the artisanshave this, uh, ability
to almost shut off the fearmechanism more than others.
Um, I live more in the space than
(39:23):
I do in the reductive side.
Um, I had to learn how to be able
to step into the reductiveside of realities
to help make these things happen.
So I had to start looking at the science
and psychology of how we're actually born
to reject novelty or new things.
Um, I'd love to do this with you.
You remember me doing it with you once
before. Remember the arm fold thing?
(39:45):
- Oh yeah.- Just go ahead
and we can show peopleon this, right? It feels
- Well if you're listening,this is a good call to action
to tune on, uh, to the, uh, YouTube.
- That's podcast. So we haveour arms folded right now.
We just naturally folded too.
Shake out your arms and nowcross 'em the other way.
- Oh, God, I can't even, and
- How's that feel? Jason
- Super uncomfortable, actually.
(40:05):
- Uncomfortable. Awkward
because your brain createdrepetitions your whole life.
So this is comfortable
and safe, kind of like theexecutives you talked about
working with that alreadyhad an existing business
plan structure.
It's secure. We're born
to find systems that make life easier.
So when we try to change thesethings, we feel threatened
by them, and then we reject the call.
(40:28):
Um, if you're familiar withthe Hero's Journey, um,
Joseph Campbell's work around all stories.
We are all born at some point to reject.
We're in an ordinary world,
and there's an invitation called Adventure
to an Extraordinary World, A New World,
and we reject that call.
So working with that
and accepting fear, BreneBrown talks about, um,
(40:51):
fear is allowed to be onthe, the, the road trip,
but it has to sit in the backseat.
It can't sit shotgun or drive the car.
So welcoming fear
and addressing it insteadof stuffing it down
and trying to avoid it, um,
and baking that into ourkind of make, show, test,
learn approach when we'reprototyping has really also
helped, uh, bring in psychology
(41:12):
and science into how we canget ideas through the gauntlet
of we can't do that.
It won't work..
- Uh, one of the things you mentioned, uh,
radical candor is something that I've, uh,
often had a challenge with.
And, and I, I wanna also say, you know,
I appreciate you sharingsome of the, the, um,
magic ingredients and thesecret sauce, so to speak.
But I, I do think it'sinteresting that, that, you know,
(41:35):
a lot of times, both inthe creative space as well
as in the entrepreneurentrepreneurial space, you find folks
who read a particularphilosophy, you know, in, uh,
one book, uh, radical Candor
or the Lean Startup methodology,
or, um, uh, you know, Rick Rubinhas his book on creativity,
which is more about sort of waxing poetic
than a specific framework.
But in all of that, you, you find folks
who glom onto one thing.
(41:55):
And I, I'm remembering aspecific time when I worked
with somebody who had read thebook, radical Can, you Know,
read a book on radical candor
and then basically was justsaying whatever was top
of mind without really having a filter.
And I think it's interestingthat you speak to the idea
of sensitivity is an actual integral part
of all these things that you're,you're describing in terms
of systems, because itisn't just about the output,
(42:17):
it's about how it's received,it's about how it's processed,
and then it's about a, acycle of flow of information
and emotions and discussion, rather than
somebody feeling empowered
to say whatever they're Idwithout any processing just wants
to put out into the world.
Um, do you find that thereare folks that are sort
of stuck in those sort of,they, they get attached
(42:39):
to one characteristic of your framework
and then they can't break out of it?
Or do they see the forestfor the trees as you go
through the, the, the work with them
and it's easier for them to sort
of process all of it together?
- There's an importance of this
is really about awarenessabove all else, um, awareness
(43:00):
that you are, again,another Brene Brown quote,
you are different like me.
So within that, to recognizewhen you're working with people
that are highly expansive in the arts
and creative efforts, um,our engineers or marketing
or strategy people, there is a spectrum
of different thinking styles there.
(43:21):
There's a differentspectrum of emotional, um,
relationships, emotional awareness.
You know, I've worked withpeople who have shared, um,
with me about their aDD, Asperger's, um, uh,
Tourettes, many different,uh, uh, conditions
or people that, uh, say, you know,
(43:41):
I am an anxious driven person.
So I, my primary function I'vebeen hired to celebrate is
to look for risk.
Just be able to have those conversations
and understand wheresomeone's coming from,
helps us understand their feedback.
So it's one thing tohave radical candor and,
and, uh, Pixar became famous for this.
(44:02):
It's about the idea, it's not about you.
While at the same time I'veseen people deliver radical
candor a way that cuts.
Um, so finding a way to dial up empathy
and define empathy, not aswalking in someone's shoes,
but rather to believe insomeone's experiences,
even when it doesn't match our own,
(44:23):
is the vital aspect here.
And we can start forming acommon language as a bridge here.
We can start creatingbuckets of like, Hey,
right now we're just gonnatalk about what's working
with this idea and what we love about it.
Maybe it's sending people offon their own for long periods
of time to come back together.
But when we come togetherensuring we can have radical
candor in a way that's transparent,
(44:45):
but also comes from a place of care,
and it's a skillset we can buildup and build repetition in.
And when that happens, there'sthe trust, there's the bonds,
hard conversations are vital.
Um, but we can do those inways that build trust instead
of just advance a product, you know, like,
(45:07):
let's take care of eachother while we also
take care of the thing we're making.
- Does this all applyequally across companies
of varying sizes?
Like, does this work,'cause you've done work
with like Sony, you mentioned Nike, ESPN,
uh, Kaiser Permanente, right?
Those are massive companieswith giant workforces. Yeah.
Does this work at a companyof a thousand 110 people?
(45:30):
- A absolutely. So I'm gonnastart with the caveat of
this does work, but what Idon't do is I don't scale it.
So if you have a 50,000 personorganization, what I came
to realize is I'd have towork with one organization
and the CEO and the board ofdirectors for 10 years, right?
Maybe five. I work with, um,
(45:55):
team individuals from one, uh, up to teams
and groups of 250 to 500 people.
Um, the beauty is I've seenit transform those lives
beyond it spread in organizations.
Uh, but I've worked withfilm directors developing,
uh, TV shows, uh, directors and producers.
(46:17):
I've worked with product ownersand teams of four and five.
I've worked with just seniorvice presidents, one-on-one.
Um, we've worked with teams of seven to 12
that are cross-functional marketing, sales
and external agency, theinternal creative agency, right?
Um, so it's really, um,
it can be applied on anindividual larger basis.
(46:38):
Uh, and that's kind of a really,uh, beautiful aspect of it
that I've really enjoyed.
But it's definitely aboutimpacting the people we're there
with, um, and helpingit extend not only in in
that space, but in theirprofessional lives, yes.
But also in their personal lives.
So that's kind of been the,the sliding scale of, of size
of, of groups we work with.
(47:00):
- A lot of your workstarted with big companies,
and I know you've workedwith smaller companies.
I'm a solo entrepreneur, youwere solo at the beginning.
A lot of my listeners arefolks who are at the beginning
of their careers
as independent creatorsand business owners.
How do you take these principlesof creativity, of fun,
of play, and apply themwhen you're one person
working by yourself?
(47:21):
- That's, that's a fantastic question.
So right now, as we'reworking high touch with, um,
individuals and, uh, youknow, leaders inside groups
and corporations and creativeagencies, et cetera, what, uh,
I think the next evolutionfor this is, is pointing back
to proof points that wegot from working, um,
(47:41):
with large groups and seeinghow the work we did with them
stuck in a way that theywere able to apply it
to their personal and professional lives.
So, uh, I'll give you two examples.
The first one was working with a, um, uh,
a major food company.
And at the end of a four hour session, uh,
(48:02):
he came up to me and he showed me a text
and he said, uh, I just texted my wife
and apologized for my lack
of active listening over thepast 20 years of our marriage.
- Wow.- Another executive from that same session
walks up and goes, you needto do this for marriage
(48:24):
and for couples.
So that being said, that impact
and awareness is oneexample of it going there.
But now to your point, how dowe then create greater access
for people like him to continue that work?
We have our own approachesfor that currently,
but now how do we scale that?
Well, we looked at Nike,we've worked with leadership,
(48:45):
250 people, groups, smaller groups,
and saw that same kindof stickiness happening,
not just on the project,but for the individual.
So our next evolution thatwe're exploring right now is
what does it look like for us to scale out
deeply engaging content thatstill applies hands-on learning
(49:05):
through doing to embed the learning?
Um, and we don't know whatthat might look like right now.
Um, might that be digital?
Maybe I'm more interested inwhat might that look like, uh,
to send out, you know,kits that you open up
and you can start workshoppingthings yourself, uh,
in simple, no-nonsense ways
that create very tangible applications
(49:27):
to what you have right now.
So I think that's the nextevolution to help reach a greater
and wider audience that, uh,
you should look for in the future.
- I smell a merch store. No,I'm kidding. I'm kidding.
I'm kidding. I would neverdegrade it to that point. No.
Um, thank you. I mean, thishas been really insightful.
I appreciate not only yourdeep history with Disney
and how well that appliesto so many other areas,
(49:49):
but the, the playfulness as a, as a theme
for life is something you don'thear very often from folks,
and the fact that you'vebeen able to take it
and turn it, not just into a career,
but I, I think in manyways a philosophy is
really refreshing.
Um, if anybody's excited,wants to learn more,
what's the right place to send them?
- Yeah, absolutely. Youcan, uh, check us out at
(50:09):
www dot Imaginology dot co.
Um, again, Imaginology dot co.
And take a look and, uh, reach out.
- Awesome. Chris, thanks so much.
I really appreciate it. Have a great day,
- Jason.
Fantastic time, great questions,
and uh, appreciate you, man.
- All right. See you next time.
- Ciao.
- Hello, friends.
Welcome back to BuildingValue with Jason Nellis.
You might be surprised tolearn I'm still Jason Nellis,
my family and I are still traveling.
There's lots going on tofill you in on, I promise,
in an upcoming episode.
I will do just that. But for today,
let's talk about my guest.
Today I'm speaking withChristopher Chapman,
who was formerly the Global Creativity
and Innovation Directorat Disney for 17 years.
(00:22):
He helped organizations withinDisney improve the way they
work and improve the way
that they communicate their creativity, so
that they can build better,build faster, and build smarter.
He and I met throughImaginology, his current agency
where he helps organizations
and individuals think more creatively.
Chris and I spoke on a number of subjects,
including applications of AI
and the work that he does,how he managed to do all
(00:44):
of his work during a pandemic,when a lot of it needs
to be done in person,and how a lot of the work
that he does can be applied
to individuals rather than large groups.
If you just tweak someof the ideas, if you like
what you see, if you likewhat you hear, then subscribe,
follow, leave me acomment, leave me a review,
whatever you feel moved to do.
This is Christopher Chapman,and here we are with Chris.
(01:06):
Chris, thanks for joining,man. Good to have you,
- Jason. Stoked to be here, man.
- I appreciate that. Not everybody is,
sometimes it feels likethe Spanish Inquisition,
you never expect it, but here we are.
- Love the curiosity. Always,
always here for that. I'm glad,
- I'm glad.
Well, you know, I would beremiss if I didn't speak first a
little bit about, youknow, the, the big chunk
of your career at Disney, right?
Mm-Hmm. You were there from 2002 to 2018.
(01:29):
You worked as art director forDisney experiences, you know,
uh, Disney, excuse me, parks,experiences and products.
Uh, and then you were aglobal, uh, creativity
and innovation director.
So I know, as I'm sure you do, lots
of people whose life goalit is to work at Disney.
Was that yours? Is that where you were
aiming for post-College?
- Yeah. You know, it goes backto when I was really young.
(01:52):
Um, the joke was whenI was, I got about five
or six, um, I knew Iwanted to work at Disney,
um, and I was told a lot bypeople outside of my family,
like, oh, like that, that's impossible.
That, and then through my life,
(02:12):
it became a little morereal as I went to art
and design school and I startedtelling my dad like, Hey,
I really think I wanna pursue this.
And, um, he was like, Hey, yeah, like,
if you want that, go for it.
And he gave me some thoughts and steps
and ways to think about that,what the galvanizing moment
of serendipity was.
(02:33):
I was a sophomore, um,
and I saw a billboardlittle thing up to my campus
that said, Disney's coming to campus.
I was like, okay,
And they offered somethingcalled the Disney College
Program, which was an opportunityto, uh, either do a summer
or a semester off for exchangeof some credits where you got
(02:55):
to do something through theirDisney University program.
You worked in the parks, youhad open doors for networking.
And, uh, yeah.
So that was my first touch point,
working at Disney AnimalKingdom, selling ice cream
and, uh, popcorn
and Cokes, um, intooutdoor food and beverage.
Uh, while I got what theyaffectionately called a, uh,
a master's degree or a doctorate,
(03:16):
I got the doctorate
True Disney fashion. Yeah,that hurts. It was priceless.
Yeah, it does. It was kind of like, it's,
it's cheesy in all the right kind of ways.
Yeah. Um, but yeah, thatwas kind of, uh, the path.
And then everything was a small step,
but I was laser focused onwanting to, uh, be a creative
with inside the Walt Disney Company.
(03:37):
- Love that. Tell me alittle bit about, you know,
when you start off in that space
and you grow to where youended up in, in the end
of your time there, you can't do it alone.
Nobody can. So I, I'd love tohear a little bit about sort
of who were your mentors whohelped you along the way,
and, you know, more broadly,how did they help you sort
of think about creativity within Disney,
which is such a largeand bureaucratic company?
(04:00):
- Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, the first shoutout I have to give is
to Quinn Kimball, who is a,um, at Disney Design Group.
Um, he's somebody I met through networking
and he took a shot on me,like he saw my portfolio.
I was, uh, eager like a,
a baby dolphin, probablyeven a little annoying.
Um, but he saw something in me
and we met at like, kind of a,
(04:21):
a little mini conferencewhile I was interning.
Um, and I just, that was thefirst part about relationships.
Quinn was always amazing atmentoring the next group coming
in and paying it forward.
And that became a massive part of my life.
Um, another one was Chuck Hoffman, who's
inside the advertising group there, uh,
a group creative director.
(04:42):
He would just go to lunches.
We go to lunches all the timeand intellectualize things.
He'd gimme great advice. Um, for example
of like never go anywherewhere, uh, you're the top dog,
you know, um, alwaysmake sure it's somewhere
where you remain, you know, stretching
and pushing to learn, uh, something new
and being challenged.
Uh, but other ones, TonyBaxter, uh, uh, a Disney legend,
(05:03):
um, Imagineer who, uh, youknow, led everything from,
uh, splash Mountain, uh,to the creation of, uh,
Disneyland in Paris.
Just an incrediblelegendary Imagineer that
took me under his wing tojust share a philosophy
around storytelling and kindof the human experience.
(05:24):
Byron Howard, Australiandirector of Zootopia, same kind
of graciousness of justlike spending time with me,
having lunches with me and,
and sharing kind of what it's like
to advance in your creative career
and what it means to like,satisfy your inner truth when it
comes to creativity,especially when it's also
inside something that is a
corporation, you know, and is a business.
(05:45):
Um, Christina Reed, who isa producer in animation, um,
Karen Nolton, uh, whoworked with Adam Grant,
I got connected from Adam Grant to Karen.
Um, she just kind of beenadvising me on startup
and organizational health.
Lauren Dier, who also worked,
she was at a BCA mutual friend of ours.
Uh, she's been a great mentor
and recently she introducedme to Eric Coleman, who used
(06:05):
to be head of, uh, TV animation.
These are all people who,when they see someone
who shares the same values
and believe in what you do,have just really taken their
experience in the ups anddowns and paid it forward.
And it's been invaluable.
And I aim to continue to dothat with people that reach out
to me and, and sharesome of those same values
(06:28):
- When we think about the arc
of a time at a company like Disney.
Right. You're starting sortof at the, the low end of the,
of the org chart, so to speak,
and you're working your way up, you know,
how did these mentors help youthink about your trajectory?
Because I think for alot of folks, you know,
you think about a bigcompany, you think about like,
I gotta play the politics game.
(06:48):
I gotta, you know, sortof find my little corner
and take it from there.
And it sounds to me like yougot a lot of support from folks
who let you build your skills
and do all the things that needto happen in a big company,
but also dream and think aboutthings outside of a standard,
you know, uh, uh, company matrix, right?
You really got to paintwith a broad brush as well
as a fine one, it sounds like.
(07:10):
- Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, it goes aboutsaying, um, a another mentor
that kind of galvanized that
for me was Duncan Wordle washeading up the innovation
and creativity groupthat I was hired into,
and he took a shot on me
and him along with the rest, kind of
as I was thinking about my development.
I never wanted to play the, the game
(07:35):
of climbing the corporate ladder.
I despise the game.
Um, it's not part of my DNA to try to, um,
climb a ladder for titlesfor the sake of doing so.
Um, my whole thing is, am I fulfilled with
what I'm doing creatively?
I enjoying who I'm working with,
and am I making a positiveimpact on both those around me
and those I'm making things for
(07:57):
That can be a massivedisservice in the reality of
what it is to be inside any company, um,
because there is a certaintrajectory that happens
where you start gaining more influence
for the decision makingpower you wanna have.
So Duncan gave me a ton of autonomy
to essentially run my own,um, incubator consultancy,
(08:20):
uh, within Disney.
And arguably one
of the greatest gifts Iever got from a leader,
like true autonomy.
So within that, some of the other advices
that I got were counterintuitive.
You know, I thought I was gonna stay
with Disney until I retired.
And not necessarily fromthe people I mentioned,
(08:41):
but other executives had said, Chris,
I want you to recognize something.
Climbing the ladder does notmean you'll have more control.
It doesn't. It's, um,
I remember hearing Bob Igertalk about, uh, how part
of his percentage ofhis job is just managing
and speaking to Wall Street.
Um, the stakeholdergame gets more complex,
(09:03):
the higher you rise, the risk does,
and you being accountable,which is a big learning for me.
There's one thing when you'rea creative being protected
by leaders to not feelthe impact of failure.
The leaders that areprotecting you from that,
they're taking it on the chin,they're falling on the sword.
And so it's a differentworld at that level.
(09:27):
So I think that wasanother realization of,
do I wanna keep climbing thisto become, who knows, like,
you know, a president of oneof the divisions of Disney.
I didn't feel a motivation towards that.
I felt a motivationtowards working with people
and telling great stories and,and, and using design, art,
and creativity andbusiness to make it happen.
(09:47):
So I think that was a bigkind of wake up call for me,
I think on that journey.
- I appreciate you're,
you're reflecting onsomething I've heard many
times in my own career.
I, I remember particularlyback at my time in Hulu,
you know, I, I worked with NBC Universal.
Disney was not my assigned account,
but I do recall we used tohit a lot of friction with
(10:09):
executives who'd climbedthe, what was originally ge
and then became the ComcastUniversal, you know, tree.
And they were very happyon their little spots,
but some of what they weremanaging were technologies
that were slowly fadingaway, uh, electronic sell
through on platforms likeiTunes, uh, even DVD or VHS.
That was still a thing at that point.
(10:30):
And, um, the pushback we gotconstantly from those folks
when looking for, uh, rights
or the ability to stream certain content
that they had locked upin these archaic, uh,
contracts, they wouldn't let us have.
Because as you were talking about, they,
they had never given themselves the space
to really build somethingcreative or flexible or nimble.
They just found a fiefdom
and they wanted to protect their fiefdom
(10:51):
until they got to retirement.
It's refreshing to hear your story about
how you really balked thatyou really said, I I need
to go find my own space
and not be the person
who is a thorn in somebody'sside 10, 20 years from now.
Um, what was it like not,it sounds like you were able
to make some change atDisney, though, in your role,
because you wouldn't havegotten that pushback.
(11:12):
You wouldn't have gotten that feedback
if you weren't doing something right.
- Alright, so there is a, uh,
pretty galvanizing moment inmy career, uh, related to that
where we were in a brainstorm.
Uh, it was our group withinDisney Parks, um, parks
and Resorts, uh, Disney,uh, consumer Products
and Experiences andPixar animation studios.
(11:33):
And I remember sitting there watching, um,
different levels ofleadership in the room.
Um, a type extroverts dominatingthe conversation, some
of the most brilliant introverted artists
and designers, not speaking,um, a person up front with a,
a flip chart and a marker
(11:53):
and all of us whispering in the back, none
of these ideas are evergonna have actually happen.
And I had this kind ofmoment of epiphany of like,
what is going on here?
Like, I knew how startupswere, were formed.
I knew how our work was effective, but
whenever I saw cross-functionalgroups come together
or try big initiatives,
(12:14):
it was always too manycooks in the kitchen.
It was always the loudest voice wins.
And it was always just this kind of like,
we're gonna have a brainstorm, um,
which most people don'teven know the history of,
which is Alex Osborne geta quantity fine quality.
So within those, I stopped
and I said, I need totake a step back here.
I wanna look in like,what is brainstorming?
(12:36):
What is innovation? What is creativity?
What is, um, collaboration?What is inventing?
I, and I started having conversations
with Wal Disney Imagineering at that time,
target was crushing it, talking with them.
Um, I was talking withpeople, um, at Stanford, uh,
that had the D school
and trying to get underneathwhat all this meant.
(12:59):
And I started to recognizethe human element internally
for when people come together,collaboration, chaos.
And it can be a magicalmix like, uh, Jordan
and the dream team, uh,during the Olympics,
or if you watch the lastdance, a galvanizing moment,
but often you're gettingpeople put together
(13:20):
and you have to recognizeeveryone has potentially different
criteria for what success means to them.
Everybody might have adifferent communication style.
Everyone might have adifferent, um, relationship
with fear and risk.
Um, also there'sdifferent thinking styles.
So what I to headline all
of this is I started recognizingnot just the human element
(13:42):
of who the idea is serving,
but also the people that were creating it.
That there are systems andstructures that can unlock that,
and they, they can be superlight, you know, systems
and structures can destroy creativity,
but they also can unlock 'emwhen they're gentle, you know,
creating scope of a playground, et cetera.
So realizing the empathy requiredfor everyone's experience
(14:04):
was really kind of a galvanizing moment
and launched me out of thatkind of art director, uh,
position into reallyexploring that next role
of global creativityand innovation Director.
- It sounds to me as ifyou really felt a calling
to go help people directly,
that you were not seeing the light
and the path taking youthrough more Disney time
(14:24):
to help folks internally, but rather exit.
Was, was that transitionout challenging for you? Oh.
And what would you say wasthe biggest takeaway from
that time that you still hold with you?
- Going back to ByronHoward, um, the director, uh,
who directed Zootopia, Iwent and met with him, um,
(14:45):
and I sat down and I wasjust like, I'm having a kind
of internal creative purpose crisis
because I grew up with Disney believing
so much in stories that can, um,
help us relate to eachother, to ourselves.
Um, having seen theeducational side of Disney
(15:06):
and things like Epcot
and, uh, theme parks,
they're about helping peoplecreate tangible memories, uh,
and, and, and kind of these milestones
and to really, you know, findjoy together as a family.
All these things meant so much to me
and my mission, you know, um, of
(15:27):
empowering people'screativity and collaboration
and to reach their full potential.
I'm sitting here going like,
I don't think I can stay within Disney
and do that as effectivelyas I would like to.
And Byron gave me some great advice
and he just said, Hey,look, like, just recognize,
you could always boomerang and come back,
(15:47):
but you could go out andfind something that's
so much more meaningful,impactful to the world.
And so that gave me the first step.
I then went for long walkswith people across the company,
having these conversations.
And there was a certainpoint where I was offered,
um, kind of would say thelast hope I was offered a,
(16:10):
uh, an opportunity to pitch,to become the head of, uh,
culture for Walt Disney Imagineering.
Um, it fell through in the 11th hour
because someone moved out of that division
that I've been reporting to.
And I sat there, I'mlike, now is the time.
I knew intrinsically, now is the time.
And I started thinking about leaving.
(16:32):
And at that same time,um, they started layoffs
and I took a separation package.
So I kind of got the nudge out the door.
But what I want to share with you from
a vulnerable place is I hadto go through an ego death,
my identity growing up,aspiring to work at Disney,
(16:53):
15 years at Disney.
I got to a place where I started having
to separate myself from thatand mourned the loss of it.
I went to therapy. I talkedto friends and family.
I had to mourn the creativestorytelling purpose side of
that and recognize myself as an individual
(17:14):
and recognize a deeper kind of, um,
rebirth of what are my values?
What do I stand for?
'cause I think what happenedin Disney was I had my values,
but just like anywhere,there are corporate values,
but there were many different people
with different types of values.
So I was able to gothrough a very hard time.
(17:36):
I went through, uh, a,a small depression, um,
but I was kind of planting the darkness
and reborn out of it more clear
and sharper on what I wantedto do and why I was doing it.
And it was incredibly, incredibly hard.
Um, but I don't regret it for a second.
Forged through the flames, if you will.
(17:58):
- Well, I appreciate thevulnerability of that.
I, I had a somewhat similarexperience with my three
and a half years at Meta before I was part
of their big layoffs,
and I wasn't dreamingof working at Facebook.
So I can only imaginehow much more difficult
and impactful that must havebeen in your experience.
Uh, tell me how you thenthink about, okay, I,
I know I've got this skillset,
(18:19):
I know I've got thispassion for creativity.
Uh, you and I both come from,you know, a background of,
you know, uh, children'stheater, creative drama, right?
This sense of play at work, right?
Play as a, as a tool, notjust as a, a sort of, um,
recreational activity.
How do you then start to thinkabout your current work in,
uh, your, your daring playand Imaginology at large?
(18:40):
Like, how does that turn intosomething that you think,
okay, I'm ready to go bringthis to other organizations,
other people, and sort of,uh, preach a philosophy of,
you know, dare dare to break out of your,
your structures and try new things.
It's really okay, youcan always go back home.
Kind of an approach to it.
- Yeah, it was interesting,um, when I left, I
(19:02):
had a lot of friendsinternally at Disney just say,
why don't you create an externalWalt Disney Imagineering?
Um, and it was aspirational for me.
And I had another journeyof like, is it that?
But I had, I, I kind of wentthrough this reevaluation of
what you brought up aboutchildren's entertainment
(19:26):
and theater and some ofmy biggest heroes, right?
Mr. Rogers, Walt Disney,Jim Henson, LaVar Burton
of Reading Rainbow, and of course
for Star Trek fans out there.
Um, and there was thiseducational component,
if you look at my DNA mom, a teacher, uh,
with artistic talents, mydad, uh, a photographer,
(19:48):
architect, agency guy.
So this marriage of learningand doing, and the curiosity
and the courage found in PlayCore to my values on top of
that at a higher level.
So if I took those as kind ofthe, the underpinning values
as what's my North Star
and the North Star was always put,
(20:08):
people first always be experimenting.
So love it that that sparking play
and those foundationalaspects of play, I, I I,
that was in there, butI had to start doing
to find those things.
So the doing was okayif we're not gonna be,
I don't necessarily wannajust recreate a a imaginary
externally, I started just taking
(20:31):
a service I knew Icould provide, which was
going in understanding someone's needs
around developing ideas
and lead design sprints
and lead workshops.
Other people also said,we saw your background.
Do you do trainings? I would just say yes.
'cause I did do some ofthat, you know, at Disney
where we'd pair the learningwith the doing skill 'em up in
(20:53):
how to do design thinking, run that.
So I started with that,
and as it evolved, I startedto recognize I worked
with some amazing people from doctors
and physicians tofilmmakers, product owners.
It started this kind of realization of
how vital the humanelement of the creator is.
(21:13):
And so I started just evolvingthat along the way to be
a development of bothpeople and their ideas.
And so we ended on beinga creative consultancy.
Some still call us a creative agency, um,
and the day that's, we're more than that.
We, you know, serve those two things.
And that's kind of a lighttrajectory of how that evolved.
(21:36):
- A lot of folks who hadexperience in your space, uh,
would think more in the direction of,
how do I take this learning Ihave from all these years at
Disney and make it asbroadly available as possible
and become what I'm generouslygonna call an online guru
of sorts, but a creator, right, right.
Somebody who puts thatcontent out into the world.
Um, tell me what was something like
(22:00):
that ever attractive to you?
'cause it sounds like Yes. Oh yeah.
Okay, good. I hit thenail of the head. No,
- No, no.
It's nailed it. No, thequestion's fascinating
because I've struggled with it.
- Oh, good. Okay. So tellme about that struggle,
because have, that's something I,
I constantly struggle with too.
- I have no interestin being an influencer.
I have no in, in, in the, inthe, the term of influencer.
Um, okay. I love that, thatterms d it's becoming makers,
(22:23):
um, more of that and curators.
Um, yeah, when I look at people out there
that, um, they write the bookto sell conference speaking,
and the conferencespeaking sells the book,
and then they sell, sell somekind of workshop that may
or might not work, andthey build a following,
(22:44):
and then it's about monetizing that,
that makes me want to vomit.
But, but I think I had a wrong lens on it.
Um, Adam Grant shared alot of people go through
that self-promotion.
Um, uh, I, I thinkthere's a duality in there
of both imposter syndrome,which is very real for anybody.
(23:06):
Um, but then also this notion of like,
I don't wanna make my businessabout promoting myself.
And so Adam put a lens on it
and said, it's not that Irespect the way he does it
in a very deep way.
He's like, you are honoring the message.
You are in service of the message.
(23:28):
So when I was creatingImaginology, everybody's like, no,
no, no, Chris, it shouldbe chris chapman.com.
You're selling Chris Chapman,you're selling Chris Chapman.
I'm like, well, I knowI have a value theft.
I want to Imaginology.It's bigger than me.
Adam's approach was that.
And I, I remember immediatelymy personal website, I changed
(23:51):
to the daring play.com
because I was like, it'snot Chris chapman.com.
You know, it's, it's the bigger message.
So I'm starting to recognizethe importance of me, um,
being a, a, a person
that can put up the flarein the sky that says, Hey,
we believe these values, um,
(24:12):
and this is how we're doing that.
If you're into it, comecheck it out. Have a look.
Um, I think that's beenthe big pivot for me.
- You do realize you'respeaking on a podcast that
for the first 10 episodes wascalled the Jason Nellis Show,
not because I was being self important,
'cause I literally couldn'tcome up with another
name, so I just want to call out. But
- There's all but, and here's- The thing that hits
- Home.
There's no judgment inthat. I still think there
is an aspect of that.
(24:34):
Sure. It's like, I thinkAdam Grant site still is adam
grant.com, but he, he stillelevates his books, you know?
Yeah. And you can, it's a very fine line.
It might not be, um, on the surface,
but you know, when you cansmell the bullshit
- Yeah. Yes.- When, you know,
someone's just self-promoting
and, you know, it's all on their ego.
(24:54):
Look, we all spend our entirelives either being aware
or on the spectrum to unaware of our ego.
If the removal of that and, and,
and in saying like, I'mhere to do something
and that do is not promoting me,
that's not the, the end game.
So it's like something I loveabout you, Jason, when we
(25:14):
and I met, we connected,was we are kindred spirits.
We both have this passion forthings that are value-based,
and the things that wewalk our talk, right?
Um, so I commend you on that,
and I, I, the cautionary tale is
you are also a carrier of your message,
therefore, your name for the show
(25:35):
works. You know what I mean?
- I, I, that's very generous of you.
And by the way, I thinkthe term for the two
of us is nerds, and I'm goodwith that.
- Absolutely.
- But no, I mean, that's, that's also part
of the reason why I'vebeen trying to rebrand it
as building value with Jason Ellis.
Because for me it's moreabout who, you know, talking
to creators who, and, and,
and I wanna say not justcreators, but people broadly
and what I think of as thecreator economy who aren't just
(25:59):
as you so adeptly described,selling you crap, right?
I don't want to talk to somebody
who built a big following in,uh, YouTube with their shorts
that were generated by AI just
so they could sell a bunchof merchandise, right? Like
- Yes.
And just hacking psychologyfor clickthroughs, right?
And then they're also just re-skinning
what everybody else isalready put blood, sweat,
and tears in, in, in doing.
(26:20):
And they're like, I'm just gonna lift that
and I'm gonna try to makemoney off of eyeballs.
That turns me off so fast.
- So I'd love to learn a littlebit more about the tenets
of the company specifically.
So like, what are your,what are your pillar values?
What are the things that youwanna bring to the table?
If I'm a company that you're speaking
to about an engagement opportunity?
(26:43):
- Absolutely. So on a
nor, uh, we like tocall it the North Star,
some call it your big why or your purpose.
Ours is to spark childlikecourage and curiosity.
Um, the reason to do that,we lose it, you know?
Um, when we're children,uh, I talk to this
with adults all the time.
I, you went through thisexercise, I had 'em draw some
(27:05):
of these to play with, ora game they used to invent
with people, but reallyunpack underneath that
what they felt back then.
You hear, they felt free.
They felt more joy, theyfelt more experimental.
They felt, you know, limitless.
So sparking that childlike c courage
and curiosity as a bridgeinto adulthood is really,
so we can improve humanity'screativity, collaboration,
(27:28):
and critical thinking, right?
Creativity, collaboration,
and critical thinking, vitalskillset for our future.
So that's applied in ourcurrent mission as a consultancy
to stoke this daring play with business
and creative teams underpinningthat North Star are values.
And those values I broughtbefore always be experimenting
(27:51):
and always putting people first.
Um, underneath that arereally the behaviors that are
teachable, measurable,
and we can hold our ourself accountable.
'cause look, we're all gonnadrop the ball at the end
of the day, but we canpoint to these things.
It's like the ultimate creative brief.
Um, so experimentation,supporting behaviors show up
(28:12):
through walking the talk of curiosity, uh,
courage and play.
Uh, and then people firstshows up through empathy, uh,
care and transparency.
- All of that sounds great.
But there is a big hiccupthat I've been thinking about
as we've been talking, which is
that when you started thecompany in 20 18, 90 some odd
(28:33):
percent of people were in their office.
Now there's hybrid working,there's fully remote folks.
How do you take the tool setyou normally take to an office
and apply it to a hybrid oreven fully remote setting?
- Oh, this is a great question. Um,
- Thanks.
I feel really good about it.
- In the beginning.
Um, no virtual collaborations full stop.
(28:55):
Um, I'm still, uh, an adamantsupporter of in-person work.
I think we have over-indexed on virtual,
and I think we're gonnasee a massive snapback.
Um, there is loads ofdata out there that shows
how vital it is for us, um,to relate to each other.
We are social creatures,uh, being in proximity
with each other, um, let alonea new study that came out
(29:18):
that shows that people are happier
when working with their hands.
You know, when we workwith paper and drawing
and sticky notes insteadof in a Google doc, um,
your joy index goes up, yourbrain works differently.
It's kinesthetic push thatto the, there are realities,
there are people whoneed to work from home.
Um, there's life situations,um, from having kids to flex,
(29:39):
working, you know, being in office
and then also working from home.
So how do we, to your question,
how do we apply this stuffin a virtual environment?
There's many aspects,
but let me just giveyou maybe the top three.
Number one is withineverything that we do, um,
a big core of this is how weshow up with our mindsets.
(30:02):
Uh, so yes, we have structures.
Um, let's, let's think of it this way.
If there's an engine, um,
that's our design thinking approach,
which we call design thinking2.0, also known as empathy,
design bias, if that'sour creative problems,
problem solving framework.
And that's the engine and the tools we use
to spark people into thinking differently,
(30:23):
to crack insights faster,to get aligned, uh,
to visually unpack
and hear people's, uh, viewpoints,
no matter how diverse they are.
And those are the pistons.
An engine needs oil,and that's the mindsets.
So if you don't havethe oil in the engine,
the pistons are gonnaheat up with bad friction
and the engine's gonna lock.
(30:45):
So even if you don't use our process,
and we often adapt withothers to their process
to make it work, it's the behaviors
and the mindsets of how we show up.
So in the virtual environment,we were forced to test it
during the pandemic, um,doing some stuff with Nike
and, uh, with Apple, and itworked, it worked fantastically.
(31:05):
So what we saw therewas, yes, it does work.
No, it's not our top preference.
Um, but when we put those
Behaviors is a priority,everything else can fall in line.
So I think that was the, the,the, the biggest learning from
that aspect is to make surethat we place light structures
(31:26):
around helping peoplecreate greater awareness
around their behaviorsand how they show up, uh,
as they collaborate andcreate together the work. I
- You spoke about challengesin, uh, adjusting to, uh,
the rapid change ofthings like, um, uh, COVID
and being home for, uh, the pandemic.
(31:47):
I'd love to hear your thoughts
and really, you know, particularlyin the modern era of, uh,
AI and the big scariness ofAI that everybody is dealing
with, I'd love to hear
what you think about rapidchanges in the marketplace
and how what you bring tothe table can help buoy
and in some ways surf thewaves of this constant change.
You know, what do you think about how
we can use AI in the workplacein an effective way, uh,
(32:10):
even though some peoplesee it as being something
that takes their job away.
- The work I do is act is, is is agnostic
to a discipline
or an industry, which can feel
counterintuitive sometimesfor a lot of people.
Um, because at the end of the day, it's,
it's problem solvingand people collaborating
(32:32):
where they can thrive, right?
So as the exponential rateof technology comes in,
um, and the great human experiment of
how we exist on this planet changes, uh,
as we saw a force factorcome in from the pandemic
and, uh, the greatresignation and quiet quitting
and all these things, the constant here
(32:55):
that keeps bubbling up to the surface, um,
surface is specifically related
to something I believe I broughtearlier, which is the three
vital core skills we willall need is creativity,
collaboration, and critical thinking.
Some might add in afourth one communication,
but I concern that asubset of collaboration,
(33:16):
so within those, um, I thinkit was actually at, um,
the World Economic Forum,they spoke about this related
to ai, and they said
like, critical thinking is gonna be vital.
And I've already noticedwith people that I work with
that can transfer their skillsinto using AI as a tool.
(33:36):
Um, yes. Is there a threatwith ai? Absolutely.
Uh, this black and whitethinking has got to go,
it's like fire can, uh,shoot bullets, um, can, uh,
you know, melt human beings
and, uh, can burn down entire cities.
Guess what? Fire can alsocauterize wounds, uh,
can cook food to make it safe,
and it can light the dark for us.
(33:57):
So when I look at somethinglike ai, what's vital is
that we can have creative conversations
and creativity defined as,you know, conversations
around new approaches that are useful.
Um, critical thinking,be able to reductively
unpack the pros and the cons
and make decisions together, right?
(34:19):
And the collaboration piece come together
and turn, which from me versus you to me
and you versus the problem.
And if we're able tocontinually boost, refine, hire,
celebrate, creativity,collaboration, critical thinking,
we can take on the exponentialchange from technology,
(34:41):
workplace, environment, anything else
that's coming down the pipeline
that we can fathom right now.And we all know it's coming.
- My background is, uh, a hybrid
of media and technology, right?
For, for most of my career,I've been at that intersection
where creatives
and, you know, for lack ofa better term, you know,
bureaucrats and pencil,pencil pushers kind of meet.
(35:03):
So I know that when I bringsomething to the table,
I've gotta have it backed up, not just
with a compelling narrative,
but it's gotta have hard science.
There's gotta be data, right?
So talk to me a little bitabout beyond, you know, the,
the collaborative structuresyou're talking about
and the ways in which we canbe creative with each other.
Like, what's the data that backs this up?
Because I assume you have some,
(35:23):
and more importantly, it's compelling.
- There's a certain pointin my career when I was
recognizing the expansivecreative dreamers
and kind of people thathave more analytical,
um, had this tension.
And I saw that I was kind of a bridge
between both theexpansive artistic dreamer
and kind of this reductive,pragmatic realist.
(35:48):
And when I was introduced todata, um, Tim Kda, who was, uh,
in Parks Resorts digital, Ithink he was VP at the time,
introduced me to a termcalled being data curious.
I'd always used research, uh,
as an approach to create anything.
So I started digging, notjust only into my me search,
(36:10):
things I've seen, heard better experience,
but I dialed into that reading part of
how can I make sure what I'm doing?
And what we're applying is bothgetting feedback from people
we work with, but also looking at large
studies and anchoring in it.
So we've constantly used these,
and I, I'll share three,um, that come to mind,
that have kind of become somewhat
(36:31):
of cornerstones to what we do.
One aspect is, you know, we,as we grow and develop people
and their ideas, we usean approach of learning
through doing, right?
So learning and simulatedprojects as well as real projects
or design sprints, wewanna make sure people are
getting sticky learnings.
They can do it without us,but also they're getting
(36:52):
that kind of learning whilethey're applying it themselves.
And the reason we prioritize play, um, is
that, yes, it brings joy,
it opens up people's subconscious minds.
It, um, allows more creativity
and expansive thinking to flow
and makes the reductivethinking far more enjoyable.
But from a sticky learning standpoint, um,
(37:13):
research shows it takesapproximately 400 repetitions
to create a new synapsein your brain, this kind
of connection that galvanizes.
But with play, it takes 10 to 20,
we are meant to play, right?
Like, that is what it is tobe human, um, to play, is to
(37:35):
experiment, to try something, to see
what happens if I do itthis way or try it this way.
It's to rapidly fail and learn
and grow in a consequence freefeeling of an environment.
So that's one aspect of thescience of why we elevate play,
and those underpinning piecesof play a beginner's mindset,
not married to an outcome.
Right? Let's go into the next piece.
(37:56):
When we're bringing people together
and there's cross-functionalcollaboration, you're going
to have unhealthy collaboration,
chaos, or unhealthy friction.
But there is required healthy friction,
industrial light, magic Pixar.
They thrive on this radicalcandor feedback systems.
However, not everybody isgreat at doing that in a way
that takes into considerationdifferent people's
(38:19):
psychology or thinking styles.
So you can get culturesthat can spin out of control
or people that are winningOscars and making amazing things,
but kind of not feeling greatabout it inside the culture.
So what I started recognizing was
the researcher on thepsychology of the evolution
of human collaborationand the psychology around
(38:40):
happiness chemicals.
So the headline on this oneis stress reduction, baking
and science of how weshow up with each other
to remove cortisol are stresshormone that's only supposed
to come in bursts and movingto oxytocin, our trust,
support and social happiness, chemical
and serotonin, um, uh,
(39:02):
happy chemical comes from usfeeling secure, um, respected
and validated in the work we do.
The third is navigating fear.
Um, expansive thinkers.
Uh, the dreamers, the artisanshave this, uh, ability
to almost shut off the fearmechanism more than others.
Um, I live more in the space than
(39:23):
I do in the reductive side.
Um, I had to learn how to be able
to step into the reductiveside of realities
to help make these things happen.
So I had to start looking at the science
and psychology of how we're actually born
to reject novelty or new things.
Um, I'd love to do this with you.
You remember me doing it with you once
before. Remember the arm fold thing?
(39:45):
- Oh yeah.- Just go ahead
and we can show peopleon this, right? It feels
- Well if you're listening,this is a good call to action
to tune on, uh, to the, uh, YouTube.
- That's podcast. So we haveour arms folded right now.
We just naturally folded too.
Shake out your arms and nowcross 'em the other way.
- Oh, God, I can't even, and
- How's that feel? Jason
- Super uncomfortable, actually.
(40:05):
- Uncomfortable. Awkward
because your brain createdrepetitions your whole life.
So this is comfortable
and safe, kind of like theexecutives you talked about
working with that alreadyhad an existing business
plan structure.
It's secure. We're born
to find systems that make life easier.
So when we try to change thesethings, we feel threatened
by them, and then we reject the call.
(40:28):
Um, if you're familiar withthe Hero's Journey, um,
Joseph Campbell's work around all stories.
We are all born at some point to reject.
We're in an ordinary world,
and there's an invitation called Adventure
to an Extraordinary World, A New World,
and we reject that call.
So working with that
and accepting fear, BreneBrown talks about, um,
(40:51):
fear is allowed to be onthe, the, the road trip,
but it has to sit in the backseat.
It can't sit shotgun or drive the car.
So welcoming fear
and addressing it insteadof stuffing it down
and trying to avoid it, um,
and baking that into ourkind of make, show, test,
learn approach when we'reprototyping has really also
helped, uh, bring in psychology
(41:12):
and science into how we canget ideas through the gauntlet
of we can't do that.
It won't work.
- Uh, one of the things you mentioned, uh,
radical candor is something that I've, uh,
often had a challenge with.
And, and I, I wanna also say, you know,
I appreciate you sharingsome of the, the, um,
magic ingredients and thesecret sauce, so to speak.
But I, I do think it'sinteresting that, that, you know,
(41:35):
a lot of times, both inthe creative space as well
as in the entrepreneurentrepreneurial space, you find folks
who read a particularphilosophy, you know, in, uh,
one book, uh, radical Candor
or the Lean Startup methodology,
or, um, uh, you know, Rick Rubinhas his book on creativity,
which is more about sort of waxing poetic
than a specific framework.
But in all of that, you, you find folks
who glom onto one thing.
(41:55):
And I, I'm remembering aspecific time when I worked
with somebody who had read thebook, radical Can, you Know,
read a book on radical candor
and then basically was justsaying whatever was top
of mind without really having a filter.
And I think it's interestingthat you speak to the idea
of sensitivity is an actual integral part
of all these things that you're,you're describing in terms
of systems, because itisn't just about the output,
(42:17):
it's about how it's received,it's about how it's processed,
and then it's about a, acycle of flow of information
and emotions and discussion, rather than
somebody feeling empowered
to say whatever they're Idwithout any processing just wants
to put out into the world.
Um, do you find that thereare folks that are sort
of stuck in those sort of,they, they get attached
(42:39):
to one characteristic of your framework
and then they can't break out of it?
Or do they see the forestfor the trees as you go
through the, the, the work with them
and it's easier for them to sort
of process all of it together?
- There's an importance of this
is really about awarenessabove all else, um, awareness
(43:00):
that you are, again,another Brene Brown quote,
you are different like me.
So within that, to recognizewhen you're working with people
that are highly expansive in the arts
and creative efforts, um,our engineers or marketing
or strategy people, there is a spectrum
of different thinking styles there.
(43:21):
There's a differentspectrum of emotional, um,
relationships, emotional awareness.
You know, I've worked withpeople who have shared, um,
with me about their aDD, Asperger's, um, uh,
Tourettes, many different,uh, uh, conditions
or people that, uh, say, you know,
(43:41):
I am an anxious driven person.
So I, my primary function I'vebeen hired to celebrate is
to look for risk.
Just be able to have those conversations
and understand wheresomeone's coming from,
helps us understand their feedback.
So it's one thing tohave radical candor and,
and, uh, Pixar became famous for this.
(44:02):
It's about the idea, it's not about you.
While at the same time I'veseen people deliver radical
candor a way that cuts.
Um, so finding a way to dial up empathy
and define empathy, not aswalking in someone's shoes,
but rather to believe insomeone's experiences,
even when it doesn't match our own,
(44:23):
is the vital aspect here.
And we can start forming acommon language as a bridge here.
We can start creatingbuckets of like, Hey,
right now we're just gonnatalk about what's working
with this idea and what we love about it.
Maybe it's sending people offon their own for long periods
of time to come back together.
But when we come togetherensuring we can have radical
candor in a way that's transparent,
(44:45):
but also comes from a place of care,
and it's a skillset we can buildup and build repetition in.
And when that happens, there'sthe trust, there's the bonds,
hard conversations are vital.
Um, but we can do those inways that build trust instead
of just advance a product
(45:07):
let's take care of eachother while we also
take care of the thing we're making.
- Does this all applyequally across companies
of varying sizes?
Like, does this work,'cause you've done work
with like Sony, you mentioned Nike, ESPN,
uh, Kaiser Permanente, right?
Those are massive companieswith giant workforces. Yeah.
Does this work at a companyof a thousand 110 people?
(45:30):
- A absolutely. So I'm gonnastart with the caveat of
this does work, but what Idon't do is I don't scale it.
So if you have a 50,000 personorganization, what I came
to realize is I'd have towork with one organization
and the CEO and the board ofdirectors for 10 years, right?
Maybe five. I work with, um,
(45:55):
team individuals from one, uh, up to teams
and groups of 250 to 500 people.
Um, the beauty is I've seenit transform those lives
beyond it spread in organizations.
Uh, but I've worked withfilm directors developing,
uh, TV shows, uh, directors and producers.
(46:17):
I've worked with product ownersand teams of four and five.
I've worked with just seniorvice presidents, one-on-one.
Um, we've worked with teams of seven to 12
that are cross-functional marketing, sales
and external agency, theinternal creative agency, right?
Um, so it's really, um,
it can be applied on anindividual larger basis.
(46:38):
Uh, and that's kind of a really,uh, beautiful aspect of it
that I've really enjoyed.
But it's definitely aboutimpacting the people we're there
with, um, and helpingit extend not only in in
that space, but in theirprofessional lives, yes.
But also in their personal lives.
So that's kind of been the,the sliding scale of, of size
of, of groups we work with.
(47:00):
- A lot of your workstarted with big companies,
and I know you've workedwith smaller companies.
I'm a solo entrepreneur, youwere solo at the beginning.
A lot of my listeners arefolks who are at the beginning
of their careers
as independent creatorsand business owners.
How do you take these principlesof creativity, of fun,
of play, and apply themwhen you're one person
working by yourself?
(47:21):
- That's, that's a fantastic question.
So right now, as we'reworking high touch with, um,
individuals and, uh, youknow, leaders inside groups
and corporations and creativeagencies, et cetera, what, uh,
I think the next evolutionfor this is, is pointing back
to proof points that wegot from working, um,
(47:41):
with large groups and seeinghow the work we did with them
stuck in a way that theywere able to apply it
to their personal and professional lives.
So, uh, I'll give you two examples.
The first one was working with a, um, uh,
a major food company.
And at the end of a four hour session, uh,
(48:02):
he came up to me and he showed me a text
and he said, uh, I just texted my wife
and apologized for my lack
of active listening over thepast 20 years of our marriage.
- Wow.- Another executive from that same session
walks up and goes, you needto do this for marriage
(48:24):
and for couples
So that being said, that impact
and awareness is oneexample of it going there.
But now to your point, how dowe then create greater access
for people like him to continue that work?
We have our own approachesfor that currently,
but now how do we scale that?
Well, we looked at Nike,we've worked with leadership,
(48:45):
250 people, groups, smaller groups,
and saw that same kindof stickiness happening,
not just on the project,but for the individual.
So our next evolution thatwe're exploring right now is
what does it look like for us to scale out
deeply engaging content thatstill applies hands-on learning
(49:05):
through doing to embed the learning?
Um, and we don't know whatthat might look like right now.
Um, might that be digital?
Maybe I'm more interested inwhat might that look like, uh,
to send out, you know,kits that you open up
and you can start workshoppingthings yourself, uh,
in simple, no-nonsense ways
that create very tangible applications
(49:27):
to what you have right now.
So I think that's the nextevolution to help reach a greater
and wider audience that, uh,
you should look for in the future.
- I smell a merch store. No,I'm kidding. I'm kidding.
I'm kidding. I would neverdegrade it to that point. No.
Um, thank you. I mean, thishas been really insightful.
I appreciate not only yourdeep history with Disney
and how well that appliesto so many other areas,
(49:49):
but the, the playfulness as a, as a theme
for life is something you don'thear very often from folks,
and the fact that you'vebeen able to take it
and turn it, not just into a career,
but I, I think in manyways a philosophy is
really refreshing.
Um, if anybody's excited,wants to learn more,
what's the right place to send them?
- Yeah, absolutely. Youcan, uh, check us out at
(50:09):
www dot Imaginology dot co.
Um, again, Imaginology dot co.
And take a look and, uh, reach out.
- Awesome. Chris, thanks so much.
I really appreciate it. Have a great day,
- Jason.
Fantastic time, great questions,
and uh, appreciate you, man.
- All right. See you next time.
- Ciao.
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