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- [00:02]
Radim Malinich
Hey, just a quick note to say thank you for joining me on this episode. If this is your first time or you're a regular listener, please take a minute and rate the show on your chosen platform. A short review helps every show to be more visible to new listeners and provides them with value. So thank you for being here and for helping out. Thank you.
- [00:39]
Pablo Hanning
Success is such a tricky concept and you're right and agree that it means different things to different people. The more I talk with friends and family, even whatever means for them, it changes over time. So at any given time of my career, maybe having or creating a project for my portfolio that was success or the creative endeavor was success. Some other times was certain financial threshold. Other times is really connecting to people who are reconnecting with friends and family. It really changes for me. It has changed and it keeps changing every maybe season.
- [01:38]
Radim Malinich
Welcome to the Daring Creative D Podcast, the show about daring to forever explore creativity that isn't about chasing shiny perfection. It's about showing up with all your doubts and imperfections and making them count. It's about becoming more of who you already are. My name is Radim Malinich. I'm a designer, author and eternally curious human being. I am talking to a broad range of guests who share their stories of small actions that sparked lifetime discoveries, taking one step towards the thing that made them feel. Let me begin this episode with a question. Are you ready to discover what happens.
- [02:17]
Pablo Honey
When you dare to create? Today I'm talking to Pablo Hanning. He's a designer, creative director and educator.
- [02:29]
Radim Malinich
Born in Galicia, raised in Switzerland, he's.
- [02:32]
Pablo Honey
Also resided in Barcelona and now New York City. For over two decades he's been working for Fortune hundred companies and startups, from traditional media to emerging technologies in constant flux. In our conversation, he talks about his award winning short stories about escapism, about.
- [02:50]
Radim Malinich
Early pursuits of Adobe Flash, how he.
- [02:52]
Pablo Honey
Spent three years working in restaurants while building his design career, which ultimately led him to prestigious roles and campaigns. Pablo also reflects on his multicultural background, sensitivity to overwhelm and philosophy of ruthless hospitality that shaped his creative leadership. It's my pleasure to welcome Pablo Honey.
- [03:19]
Radim Malinich
Hey Pablo, how are you doing?
- [03:21]
Pablo Hanning
How are you? Excited to be here.
- [03:24]
Pablo Honey
So for those who have may never heard of Pablo Honey, how would you describe yourself?
- [03:29]
Pablo Hanning
My name is Pavlo Hani and if we go through the traditional professional roles, I suppose I'm a designer, creative director, and currently head of design at Automattic, the makers of WordPress and other creative tools to be on the web. I work in between Multiple disciplines of design, from technology to branding and other things in between. Though I'm not sure I'm all of those things. It's just what I do. I'm just a human, like everyone, full of fears and curiosities. What defines more who I am, I guess, is traveling in between those roles and concepts. So sometimes I'm more of a designer, some other times I'm more a creative, others, a manager, an artist, and so on.
- [04:26]
Pablo Honey
I love the way that you say I'm a human full of fears and curiosity because you're already setting the bar in the place where I love these conversations to be. You know, they're human conversations because as you said, like, whatever you do defines you at the time when you do it. But after all, we are human. Trying to sort of make these dots join and make some sort of sense of it and make a journey. Where did it all start? Because you were born in Galicia, but you were raised in Switzerland. Whenever I see your output, whenever I see what you do, I feel like Switzerland has had very big impact on what you become creatively. Have I got it right?
- [05:03]
Pablo Hanning
Very much so. I was born in this region in the northwest of Spain that historically has been quite poor. So people migrated out. They were migrating out before the second war, mainly to the Americas. And after the second war they were moving up to rebuilding Europe. And my parents migrated in the last wave of that migration, in this case to Switzerland. And that's where I grew up. It was 10 years of happy childhood and so on, surrounded by things that I only recognized much later in my career. When looking back, even traveling back to Switzerland, I was recognizing a lot of things that I loved. Architecture, typography, general design and books and signage and so on. And I did realize much later how much of an impact that childhood surrounded by all good design, how that affected my understanding or the profession later on.
- [06:20]
Pablo Honey
What you describe is very much formative years. Like you are at that time a sponge, like, as you said, almost like a subconscious sponge. You know, you picked up one of the things that made sense a lot later. So what was the age and how was the surrounding?
- [06:37]
Pablo Hanning
I moved as a baby when I was a few months in and was in Bern, the capital of Switzerland, until I was 10, a little bit above 10. So it was 10 years of being the sponge of design and design culture again. You're not aware when you're a kid, but then when you're older and follow this path and this profession, you start to self identify with certain approach and certain sensibility for creativity. And design.
- [07:13]
Pablo Honey
I'm just trying to find a concoction of these influences because obviously you've got your roots, you've got your Spanish roots, you're in Switzerland and you are on trajectory to become a creative, curious human designer, creative director. So I'm trying to find the ideas of what was the initials of the Creative Spark.
- [07:32]
Pablo Hanning
You know, this has been a theme for my entire life. There's this concept that maybe you've heard of called Third Culture Kit, which is basically this state of mind of people who were born in one place but were raised in a different culture, and they live in between those. And there's almost like a limbo space where, like they develop their own, which is a mix of both. In my case, it's even a little bit more drastic because beyond that duality of Spain or Galicia and Switzerland, then I moved into different places. I lived in Barcelona many years before moving to New York City, where I've been 12 years. New York City has been actually the longest I've been in a place. So there's all these tensions in between cultures that ultimately have formed my own profile, my own way of thinking and my own way of being. But it has, to be honest with you, been always a challenge too, because I was too Spanish to be a Swiss and I was too Swiss to be a Spanish and I was too Galician to be in Barcelona and I'm too Spanish to be in New York City. Translated to disciplines and perhaps we get to it, but I also understand the profession of design in less of boxes and more in between. So I find also myself too interactive for the graphic designers, too graphic designer for interactive folks. And it's quite funny how I enjoy being in between, but also has been a challenge belonging to groups, cultures and concepts.
- [09:30]
Pablo Honey
We'll be back after a quick break.
- [09:33]
Radim Malinich
This episode is brought to you by Lux Coffee Company, the first creative specialty coffee company building a platform to shine the light on emerging global talent. With a mission to make a positive impact on a creative industry and Beyond. Lux Coffee Co. Offers exceptional coffee sourced from around the world through ethical and sustainable practices. And you can discover the current range of signature blends and single origins coffee hardware and accessories, along with exceptional apparel. @luxcoffee.co.uk you can use the code podcast to get 15% off your first order.
- [10:20]
Pablo Honey
I love how this is all making sense. Now. You and I have met a couple of times, we have conversations, but I've never heard of the term Third Culture Kit. Would you describe in being too Spanish to be Swiss be too Swiss to be Spanish to do Galician to be in Barcelona. To a certain degree it matters to some people and to a certain degree it's a benefit, it's a gift of life. Because some people are just too Catalan to be Catalan and they want to stay Catalan. Some people are just basically hardcore New York. They're always too high school New York. But I think the way you describe yourself, like the curious human des hovering over these different disciplines, it makes sense because I feel that what you're describing here is definitely a gift of life. It's not always a smooth sailing thinking where is home? Where is my friends, where is my tribe? Where do I belong? Or where do I fit in? But in a way has given you what I'm sensing so far. This incredible gift of actually being a curious human being that transcends these disciplines into something that other people wouldn't potentially have done it. I love describing like two. Two this for that and two this for that. Because I don't think you filled up anymore, do you? Because you're not, you know, 10, 20, 25 anymore. Because it doesn't really matter what people think. Right.
- [11:41]
Pablo Hanning
I appreciate you. You say it elegantly that I'm not like so young anymore and I. I'm not really. So it doesn't matter too much now. And I do agree with you fully that I appreciate these life experiences as something that are part of me and it allows me to have perhaps a diverse set of perspectives or a little bit of richness in the thinking and making. I do embrace it and so on. But it hasn't been smooth. And especially when you are looking for your own identity and forming who you are, what you want to do and so on. It's challenging to not fully belong to anything, any group. But it is something that I appreciate today.
- [12:36]
Pablo Honey
I'm going to try to trace the creativity in your life because there's a sort of cultural mixture of all sorts of influences, dissonances and conflicts and fictions. Where does creativity come into this?
- [12:49]
Pablo Hanning
I don't know really. It's been a strange experience and case I suppose I come from a very humble background. They had to migrate one generation back, they were very poor. So there were no references for me to hold onto in for this creative career or develop these creative curiosities. There were no books at my parents house. Fast forward. I'm obsessed with books now to an extreme case. I love reading, I love being surrounded by books and so on. No one in my family went to higher education, so I was the first one going to College in my entire lineage, which was a little bit dizzy, to be honest with you. And not having these references invite me today to actually speak up a little bit more and being a little bit more public, to see if there's someone out there, maybe in a very small village like the one that I come from, that can maybe hear us talking and relate to and just have a little bit of a push forward for them to pursue their curiosities. I really don't know where mine comes from, really. I was a writer as a teenager. I would write a lot, I would read a lot. I was interested in books and magazines. I was back in Galicia. I was. We were living in a very small village. Like there are Maybe there are 50 people living there. There are more cows than people. And I was subscribing to magazines from New York City, mainly design and creative magazines, one from the School of Visual Arts, how magazine and so on. And now I laugh about it because someone was sending these magazines to this little village in Galicia. So I had this curiosities all the time about film. Films and stories and that. I'm not sure where they come from really, because I didn't have those references at home.
- [15:14]
Pablo Honey
That's really interesting that in a village where there's more cows than people, you find your way of escapism and started looking for what might be out there in the world. Because sometimes we hope that there's a sort of societal influence or there's someone who will show us the path or even try to emulate someone trying to be as good as someone like to show us the ways. But you talk about School of Visual Arts and the loop. Mostly the full circle is there what? No. You actually ended up working for School of Visual Arts later, which is a beautiful full circle. But when you said you were the first person from your lineage to go into college, did you have a pushback or did you have a support? Or how did that feel? Because the reason why I asked this, because there's often people on this, on the show talking about almost come, go. Going against the tide. Like people are not always happy for someone to go, hey, don't do this thing. Because people come up with their own real life problems at this situation. Hey, you want to do this? Are you sure? Because to themselves, security looked a lot different to the unknown as presented. So how was it for you? Did you have that support?
- [16:23]
Pablo Hanning
Full support. I was very lucky to have the parents and the family I have because they. I had this vision without knowing to support me in this journey. So they Were fully supportive of me going to college and doing what I've done later, even just quitting my job in Galicia and moving to Barcelona without a job. And they were super, super supportive, despite the pain of them seeing again someone in their lineage moving out, right, migrating out. That was a little bit painful, especially for my dad, because that generation was dreaming of coming back home and like developing a life there without their kids, to needing to move out. But I had a lot of support from my family beyond their understanding. And I again, I celebrate this duality I've experienced and I have, from this esoteric rural context to this modernist fast city of New York City. And I try to embrace both. And both her were formative and are part of who I am and how I understand the world and even the profession.
- [17:56]
Pablo Honey
You said you were a writer in your teenage years. Do you remember what stories you were writing? What was it? What was the narrative that you were putting together? Was it escapism? Was it projections? What did you write about?
- [18:08]
Pablo Hanning
Both were about scaping, actually. So I had, I had and I say both because I wrote a lot of things, but specifically two short stories were published when I was a teenager. They were part of a contest and they made it to be finalists. And then they were published in subsequent books and which I was very happy about. And that inspired me to perhaps pursue a writer career. I realize as you speak that both stories are about escapism. Just being discomfort with staying boxed.
- [18:47]
Pablo Honey
I think what have you described so far? It all makes perfect sense that those stories about reflection, potentially of the subconscious trying to come out and go, there's something else waiting. And again, you were award winning from very young age now, right? In chosen to have your stories published. That's remarkable when you think about it. Just because the longing is pushing out, it started something. So I have to ask you, from creative side of things, do you remember the very first thing that you ever designed? What was that first breadcrumb that you picked up? And go, you know what? This is quite interesting. I want to do more of this.
- [19:23]
Pablo Hanning
It's funny that you asked this because I've been in a recent journey of. It's almost like an archaeologic journey of compiling all my work over 25 years. And as I'm compiling all that work and archiving all that work, I found this very first logo that I designed, like ages ago. And I see today so many mistakes made, but I still like it. There's something fresh about it, there's something unapologetic about it. And you know, without knowing even, there's a lot of that connection with Switzerland. There's a bit of Vin Crevel in it and so on. So I look at it, I might actually fix it a little bit, just for self indulgence, I suppose. But I was very surprised to see it and still like it today.
- [20:28]
Pablo Honey
Love it, Absolutely love it. I mean, I'm very impressed that you've got the very first logo still somewhere, because somehow, personally, quite happy to have got rid of all the evidence that I used to suck. Or maybe I was a genius.
- [20:42]
Pablo Hanning
Who know?
- [20:42]
Pablo Honey
Who knows? But let's talk about the first logo a little bit more, because how did you get to do that logo? Somebody has to. Somebody must have asked you to do this, and to do this, you must have told someone, I can do this for you. So on the concept of daring creativity, step one, how did you get your first logo commission?
- [21:05]
Pablo Hanning
I think I was perhaps like first year of college, and I was a little bit of a weird guy back then, and I was doing a lot of video experiments and I was starting to play around video performances and things of that nature. So you can see that I was like getting into strange places, even with no awareness and understanding of the medium. But in that context and as well connected to the short stories I had written, someone who became a dear friend, and we were friends, you know, for so long, found those stories in a library, in a local library, and realized that this. That he needed to meet this kid that was writing this strange stories and was doing these strange things with video. And he was involved in. I guess, I don't know what the translation exactly is, but it's a association of vets in Galicia, specifically for cows and like larger animals. And they were creating this association. And he asked me to create some branding for it, I guess, before we understood what branding was, before I understood what branding was. So that there I go, I create this logo, fast forward, I create this flash presentation for the whole association, which I do have a video of, and I'm a little bit embarrassed by, but it's still like pretty fantastic to be able to have less constraints and be a little bit free with the medium. Back then, when I suppose the web and digital were a little bit more fun.
- [23:13]
Pablo Honey
What a story. And I mean, what an assignment. Association for vets now specializing in livestock, obviously, in a place where there's more cows than people on average, that makes all perfect sense. But Flash, I mean, it almost feels like a sort of this twilight zone that flash could have came, caused chaos, riot, let Everyone rip loose. I mean, Flash was basically, I think, invented so designers can show other designers what can you do with Flash in a way of showing them Flash scales, confusing everyone, everybody else. But Flashes, I think it's a perfect segue because you move to Barcelona because of certain festival and it was only the other day I found out that OF stands for offline flash festival, Offline film, flash festival, something like that. I think that's the actual definition of off, because I'm thinking, what a cool name. I'm like, what does it stand for? And I literally just few days ago was like, oh, that's what it is. Which reminds me, FITC was Flash in a car. There was a lot of Flash festivals. There are still festivals where flash is nowhere near to be found. So a complicated, silly segue into you moving to Barcelona because of festival called off, right?
- [24:33]
Pablo Hanning
That's pretty much it, yes. Before finishing college, I already had a job at a small graphic studio, graphic design studio. You know, I had a regular life, I had a job, I had, you know, family, clothes, car, home, whatnot. But I was still involved with this video experimentation, Vjing, doing video installations, interactive installations and so forth, and decided to visit Barcelona to attend this crazy event called Hoffman that a friend of us founded, actor Ayuso and now is continuing by Pep. And I attend this festival and suddenly I see this Japanese guy on stage, Yugo Nakamura, known as Yuko, presenting these visual poems created in Flash, interactive pieces of graphic design that were moving and reacting to input. And it just blew my mind for some reason. You know, sometimes like something just triggers your mind and it kind of made me move to Barcelona. So I quit my job, quit my life in Galicia and moved to Barcelona, knowing that I had to pursue something similar to what YouGob was doing.
- [26:07]
Pablo Honey
How did that go?
- [26:09]
Pablo Hanning
Pretty good, I think. I moved to Barcelona without knowing anybody and so some fears hitting there, but I had a very raw and different profile and portfolio even because I was not coming from traditional graphic design school and started to show my portfolio around really, while I was working at a restaurant to survive. So worked at a restaurant for about three years. Even when I got a job and I had a job, I had a job at an agency and I was still working at the restaurant. So I worked for three years. I worked every day of the week, basically going between the agency and the restaurants and the weekends, until a point where I got an offer to teach at the Institute of European Design. And then I had to choose, I had to choose a career and I chose, you know, Design and creativity. And I was teaching at. And also at the agency, and an agency that was very pioneering back then with flash and interactivity called W. So in general, it was pretty scary to move into Barcelona without knowing anyone and so on. But then after working hard, being in the right place, having a little bit of luck, I developed my career in that agency. And the work that I developed there got the attention of RGA New York. And at the peak of the agency, they made me an offer to come to this fantastic city to work for Nike, which I couldn't refuse. So overall, that experience in off triggered a step forward and emotion forward that brought me to this day to thank.
- [28:07]
Pablo Honey
You to off, thank you to Off. But mainly thank you to Flash. I mean, Flash was the enabler. Flash. I mean, Flash produced something you saw on a screen or on a stage. Fell in love with it. Okay, I'm moving here. This is what I'm going to do. And I'm a big advocate of moving to places where you don't know anyone, because you can start the story afresh and then you can actually focus on what you want to do, because you don't have that stability, that security. It makes you, I think, work twice as hard. I mean, in your case, I mean, you were working in a restaurant for three years, and it gives you that foundation. I think it would be wrong to say, like, it makes you be more hungry, actually. It makes you more determined to make it happen because you can almost take it easy. What I really want to know is what have you learned in those three years of being in a restaurant? Because you come into sort of famously come into contact with the public every single day. What was your role, and what have you learned that you actually still use today?
- [29:04]
Pablo Hanning
First of all, I feel a little bit old as we talk about Flash and moving from it and without nostalgia. What I learned at the. Working at the restaurant, which is still my family, actually, I call them my Catalan family. And every time I go to Barcelona, of course, there, the whole neighborhood is appreciative of. Of me being there and vice versa. So I have a love story with that restaurant still today. The restaurant, by the way, is called Fincormano's Five Brothers. It's in one of the larger neighborhoods in Barcelona and the north of the city. And the two things perhaps that I learned is, first of all, hospitality, being welcoming, nice to people, comforting. And it quite connects to the work I do in design. And we should be thinking about design and how you guide someone through experiences, how you make someone understand Communication and so on. So walking and working with people to have wonderful experiences. So I think Ruthless hospitality, almost, that's one learning. The other learning is that you gotta work hard. And perhaps that's something I'm still inheriting from my parents as a mental program where you have this survival mechanism that makes you propel forward constantly. And we have to check on that. Right, because it can be also risky to only move with that survival mechanism. But I think one thing I learned as well is that you gotta work hard. And I never believed that I had something more special than others. In fact, joining RGA from a small village, from not fancy co op schools. And it was an adventure. But one thing I had is the hard working spirit and that, you know, I inherited, as I said that from my parents and my family, as well as from experiences like working in a restaurant.
- [31:30]
Pablo Honey
I love that you use the words ruthless hospitality, which makes me believe that you haven't heard of the book about hospitality, which is called Unreasonable Hospitality. Right, because he was ruthless. And what was really interesting, because the day you were doing a talk at Mucho just a few weeks ago, I was walking to Mucho a few hours earlier to have a lunch with Pablo, another Pablo, and I was trying to decipher. I was. I wanted to announce my new book. Everyone be talking about on this podcast wanted to announce it. And I had this idea of a complicated cover, like sort of moving words and that kind of stuff. And I saw a Spanish copy of Unreasonable Hospitality looking at me from some bookshop on my walk and I'm like, yeah, it's time to keep it simple. It's time to keep it simple. This cover can just do with the words being written, you don't have to do any nonsense, like just keep it simple. And Unreasonable Hospitality, which I've read not that long ago, is a fantastic book about just like how you do just that one thing so much better than anybody else, what you get known for and what you do. So the way you said ruthless, I quite like it because that kind of takes it another step and I'm like, step forward. Yes, still meant to be ruthless. I love how all of this is sort of beautifully taking us into, you know, your new chapter with iga because that's a step up, like we go in from someone who, again, I love the fact that there's more cows than people. I know this is the last time I'm going to say it, but we going through that setting, which you would not see yourself being in that position, potentially thinking, I'm Sure. You might attest to it, like, potentially thinking, all of that work that's amazing is done by some other people. It's not done by people like me or by a lot of people like us or people from this place, only to find yourself getting an offer going, yeah, we're going to New York saying, I'm not that special. Whereas there is something special about everyone who gets the offer like this, because it wouldn't. It would employ a fool, someone who's not into ruthless hospitality or into working hard, kind of thinking, I'm coming to here actually do really good work. So we are now in New York. IG offers accepted. There's a Nike account. What happens?
- [33:42]
Pablo Hanning
I don't know. Sometimes I don't know what I'm doing and I'm just like, moving forward. It was quite a journey. RTA has been formative as well, and I moved really quickly with my broken English and my naive view of the city and business and so on. But again, I think being curious, being hardworking, being open as well to learn and being a sponge constantly is something that I continue doing at rga. And I was there for about six years and moved quite quickly through it, launching and making really good work with other people and learning from others, and also helping a lot of young designers to develop their own paths.
- [34:41]
Pablo Honey
You said Moving Forward. Moving Forward is one of the titles, one of the working titles for the book, Moving Forward, because that's what we do. I'm trying to sort of. Sort of think about it out loud right now, but if you're not thinking about the next step, you are almost falling behind, if that makes sense. I mean, I've learned to be careful about the words sometimes when you see other people and thinking, why don't you want to do this? Some people are just happy to be the thing they are now, and they're more happy to be doing the thing for next 20 years, because we need people like them. But I think we are aligned on this philosophy as moving forward and doing it with the way that, like, there is something else. That's another thing.
- [35:21]
Pablo Hanning
There's something about moving forward that is undeniably positive. And there's also a dangerous side of it. I think you and I, alongside Stefan Zagmeister, we talked at Paradiso not so long ago about chasing the next and why we are so obsessed of it. And I do find myself relating to that dichotomy of moving forward and as well, like questioning yourself why we are yet again thinking about what's next. I had a Lot of next already. And I need to check myself when I'm propelling my mind forward too much and thinking about the next ambition versus also enjoying the present. And so I don't have a lesson to give, but it's still like a good discussion to, to continue because we are in today's society we are a bit obsessed with next.
- [36:30]
Pablo Honey
You say you don't have a lesson about this, but. But you said it's undeniably positive. I think that is the lesson. I mean, yes, we are obsessed with the next. If we are sort of impatient about it now, but having done something about the next, like seeing the two steps forward of seeing and I call it like a driving in the dark versus, you know, seeing ahead for a mile, like moving forward could feel like driving in the dark. But when you know that there's a destination you're getting to actually looks after that happiness because I think looks after the satisfaction. It looks after our definition of success. Because if you don't know where you're getting, it's almost like an example of like short term projects. Now people who have 50 short term projects will dream about one long term project and there's a person with a long term project are longing for 50 small projects because they don't have that dopamine head about finishing something. Whereas the people with the 50 are like, this is chaos. I need some order to this. You know, it's just again, we on those scales of life, never really been happy with one or the other because you always want the other thing. Whereas on that mission of moving forward and thinking, actually being accountable to yourself and saying, I'm thinking, well, there's another thing that makes me excited and what is the price to pay or the price to, to give for not doing so? Because you said I need to check myself if I'm thinking too much ahead. And I'm like, okay, if it stops you from enjoying the present, maybe. But I see it as a gift.
- [38:03]
Pablo Hanning
It could be a gift. It's also fun and entertaining to project yourself somehow. But I do try to force myself into enjoying more today and the present and what I already achieved or what I did, or the people I inspired perhaps, and try to appreciate both the present and also still entertaining myself with projecting into the future.
- [38:38]
Pablo Honey
The panel that you mentioned between you, me and Stefan was titled are we afraid to be happy? Are we bending the flatline of our own success? And success is such a diverse, multifaceted word when you think about it. Like the success should mean just one thing, but success to Everybody means totally different thing. In your case, what is your definition of success? Wow, you got all the time you want.
- [39:10]
Pablo Hanning
Do we have another hour?
- [39:12]
Pablo Honey
We can have a couple if you want.
- [39:15]
Pablo Hanning
Success is such a tricky concept, and you're right and agree that it means different things to different people. The more I talk with friends and family, even whatever it means for them, it changes over time. So at any given time of my career, maybe having or creating my project for my portfolio, that was success. So the creative endeavor was success. Some other times was certain financial threshold. Other times it's really connecting to people or reconnecting with friends and family. It really changes for me. It has changed and it keeps changing every maybe season. And I'm currently in a phase where I'm appreciating a lot, connecting and reconnecting with friends, people that share certain fears and curiosities, and also people that don't agree with me. So I'm in this process of maybe coming out of my cave a little bit because I've been quite shy and focused on my own work that I forgot that there's a world out there that I can be part of and share a story, as I said, maybe inspire someone who is in a small village.
- [40:55]
Pablo Honey
I love how you're thinking about it. I love how you're going through the stages, because success initially could be very selfish. And then you can be a little bit generous with, like, how you perceive success. And then you realize that success is totally unreliant on other people, totally unreliant on anything else. Because again, you've said it beautifully said, success changes. Like, no, there's a different sort of definition to it because we look for that external validation so much at the beginning. And you mentioned success would be like, creating stuff in my portfolio and like, how much we obsessed about portfolio. So, so, so much. And then you're like, have you got portfolio? It doesn't really matter anymore. Because I believe my current definition of success outside of family life is actually being able to speak to people, actually share the philosophies and make sense and work on storytelling and actually do more with just sharing of our ideas and sharing my experiences, because that's gonna give someone a lot more inspiration or potentially take someone even further beyond just pretty piece of work that might look obsolete in 5, 10, 15 years, you know? So I think what we do currently as an industry, especially with the circles that we connected with, I think that is a success. I think we are really opening doors to that sort of emotional sharing sort of economy. If that Makes sense by inspiring people actually going and doing something for their benefit. Because in your work and. And every time I see you, I have to ask you, like, you really manage people? No, you really manage 80 designers. Especially when I found out they're in 23 countries working in 25 languages. I'm like, right, you just called yourself shy or used to be shy. How would you do all of this? Because that's a hell of a lot of people to do to manage and keep inspired, keep in check, keep them real motivated. Of course, I'm sure you don't speak to every single one of them every day, but like you now are design leader and I want to know how you do it.
- [42:56]
Pablo Hanning
Well, first of all, probably not excelling at it. I'm still craft person at heart, so there's always that tension between the management and being a craft person. At a given moment, you can find me designing an icon or, you know, what, what not. And that might take time from managing. I'm also lucky enough that there are like other people around that are better at it and also share the responsibility of guiding such a large team on top of it. It's fully remote. So it's quite hard at times because we or I miss a lot that life connection and that life creativity that sparks when we are together and so on. And we still try to do that, like flying a lot over to places where we can meet and work together. So I think, how do I do it or how do we do it? We probably need to document it at some point. But I think the key of it is probably shared by many others that you interviewed so far is having great people. And I'm lucky that there are great people at Automattic. Not just skilled and talented, but also gracious and super kind. It's probably like the kindest group of humans I've ever worked with. So that makes it quite easy. I think it's sometimes hard because there are a lot of silences in a remote culture. And I'm also shy myself and so on. But it's much easier when you choose or they choose you, but you choose the right people and the kindest people.
- [44:55]
Pablo Honey
It's a beautiful thing that you said is the kindness that you are surrounded by kind people that makes everything half as difficult as it should be. Which, you know, that's already a definition of success. You said you shy quite a few times, but I've met you when you did talk just, you know, an earlier slot of Barcelona in front of a few thousand people. We all get nerves we don't want to be on the stage, we dream to be on the stage. But something makes something helps you to break through that barrier. So would you say that your definition of shyness is connected to that Galician kid in Switzerland? Swiss like kid and Galicia. Would you say there's some sort of way of being perceived by others that makes you think that way? Because the more I think about shyness, it's. There's something else behind it. There's more vulnerabilities and more potentially shame. But you've made it far enough that you've broke through that, broke through that seal. So do you have an understanding where that come from?
- [46:02]
Pablo Hanning
I certainly have two modes. One in which you've seen me on stage in front of 3,000, 5,000 people and I can breeze through it, especially if I know what I'm talking about. And the story is something I can own and I understand and likely I've built and so on. So I feel confident in what, what I do. There's the other mode that is this kid from Galicia that grew up in Switzerland that is often, and perhaps not many people know this, but is often overwhelmed by stimuli. And I'm very sensitive to visual noise, noise itself and so on. So I don't enjoy crowds for too long because I'm constantly scanning and listening to what is happening. And if you think of it, it becomes really tiring after some time. So I retreat myself into my silences and my meditations and my solo times to recover from those busy instances in which I'm also happy. And I enjoy being around friends and people I learn from and so on. But it does force me to find these two modes where, and you know, I can be in I'm busy environment. And also I need to find those quiet settings.
- [47:53]
Pablo Honey
I think a lot of people, if they got this far in the conversation, which I hope they have, will find a lot of value in this because the overwhelm again is another multifaceted beast. You know, it comes in all sorts of shapes and sizes. Most of it is self inflicted. Sometimes you just can't really do anything about it because you want to be part of that conversation. You go to a place which is busy, noisy, you know, overwhelming, because that where the next chapter might be. And in your case, you know, I mean, when you talk about busy place, I mean, I can only think, for example, my experience is off, you know, it's just, it's a Disneyland. It's incredible. But the recovery time from that is just over stimuli, isn't it? It's over stimulated that so much, yet we need it. But like, how do you tap in into the right amount of what you can do with it? Because, yeah, it's like balance between, you know, what I'm thinking, like for our gymnastics, you know, the perfect dismount, you know, you've got such degree of precision, you know, it's just if you get something wrong, it can look not wrong. I mean, I'm talking about this month when it comes to creative crowds. But it's just, it's so to get this right, it sometimes could be out of its own, you know, I think, yeah, I envy. Sometimes I envy the people who go to orphan. They there for three days, they go home on Monday and I'm like, I'm already flying Saturday evening. I can't do even that, even the third day, you know, and so that is that. But glad you talked about it because it, I think is so relevant because sometimes people don't know how to perceive the shyness, perceive that sort of their own being in that busy, not busy space or with authoritative people in the room, you know, because I think things like shyness and imposter syndrome and introversy is often misunderstood. Sometimes it's undiagnosed and unspecified and I think be self labeled. Sometimes in a way that it's helpful because you don't have to deal with it for quite a while. And that's when the escapism comes in and potentially can be sort of creatively helpful. But then we go back in and we're like, yeah, I can't do this because, you know, I'm still shy or some introvert, but because you said what was interesting. What you said was like, I can do the talk because I know what I'm talking about, but when I don't know the situation, I'm scanning. You know, I think this is two things. You know, you can hold your peace and hold your story because you're in control of it. And then when you're not, it's like it's all out there and exhausting.
- [50:25]
Pablo Hanning
It can be very exhausting. At the same time I see a positive flip to it because it helps you. At least it helped me learn much faster because you're constantly scanning and listening actively and digesting a lot of information at the same time. So there's a learning upside. Then. The other aspect that I see positive is something I experienced often with people I work with where I'm reviewing a piece of work or we are collaborating on something and I can see a lot of things at the same time. So there's always a flip side to it. Over. Over the years, I've been able to manage it much better. And at the same time, I think it has that flip side that allowed me to learn much faster and also provide feedback and guidance on a lot of details at the same time.
- [51:23]
Pablo Honey
I mean, it's beautiful. It's beautiful. My last question to you, and this. I'm processing what you've told me for the last hour because it's. It's. I love it. But my question is, before I let you go, is it kind of goes back to the beginning. You were too Galician to be Swiss, to be Galician, too Spanish. They're not too Galician to be Catalan, then too Spanish to be in New York. Where is home? What is the definition of home for you? And is there something new on the horizon? Are you happy where you are and keeping yourself in check about your current successes and current place, or is your mind onto the next thing? Where's home?
- [52:05]
Pablo Hanning
Do we have another hour? I think it's a fantastic question. Home to me is where my feet are. And at the same time, it means that I feel at home in motion, and I feel at home on a plane where I'm very creative and feel very comfortable, unlike other people. But it goes by stages. I suppose I can call New York City home. It's the place I live the longest in my life, and despite some distance with certain things, like, I feel very comfortable here and I'm lucky enough to be working with some freedom to move. And I spent a fair amount of time back home in Galicia and Spain, where I also feel at home. So it's a difficult question to answer when home is not a place, but it's a state of mind and always in transition.
- [53:18]
Pablo Honey
You may have called it a difficult question to answer, but you've answered it beautifully because home is where your feet are. It's gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous. And I'm so happy we've met. I'm so happy we've had this conversation and all the other conversations we've had in the past and the conversation we will have in the future because there's so much we have in common. And I just hope that, you know, people have listened to the conversation already to hear because there's. Yeah, it's been beautiful. So thank you.
- [53:44]
Pablo Hanning
Thank you so much. I enjoyed it very much and I hope to see you soon. Thank you.
- [54:01]
Radim Malinich
Thank you for listening to this episode of Daring Creativity podcast. I'd love to know your thoughts, questions and suggestions. So please get in touch via the email in the show notes or social channels. This episode was produced and presented by me, Radim Malinage. The audio production was done by Neil Mackay from 7 Million Banks podcast. Thank you and I hope to see you on the next episode. If you enjoyed this episode and would like more accessible resources to help you discover your daring creativity, you can pick up one of my books on themes of mindful creativity, creative business, branding, and graphic design. Every physical book purchase comes with a free digital bundle, including an ebook and audiobook to make the content accessible wherever.
- [55:06]
Pablo Honey
You are and whatever you do.
- [55:08]
Radim Malinich
To get 10% off your order, visit novemberuniverse.co.uk and use the code podcast. Have a look around and start living daringly.