Pete Sena: Founder and Chief Creative Officer of Digital Surgeons on the future of Digital Marketing.

Pete Sena is the Founder and Chief Creative Officer of Digital Surgeons, a global creative consultancy working on everything from venture-backed startups to Fortune 50 organizations. Pete partners with CEOs, CMOs, and creative leaders to help them set, plan, and achieve their visions.

Pete’s mission is to empower ambitious individuals and visionary organizations to design demand and engineer growth. Creating human-centric, future-forward, inspiring work. Helping partner-clients think forward through experience design, creative marketing, and digital business model transformation. 

On the podcast, we talk about the future of Digital Marketing. Pete shares his advice for building cross-functional innovation teams, and how the pandemic affected digital marketing and product launches.

TRANSCRIPT

Yulia: [00:00:00] Pete, welcome to the show. It's so good to see you. 

[00:00:03] Pete: [00:00:03] Hey, good to see you too. It's been a long time. 

[00:00:05] Yulia: [00:00:05] I know you do so much and I'm so excited to interview you because you're from my hometown and I love the work that you guys have been doing. I've been literally following you probably for the last 10 years since you guys started. 

[00:00:15]Pete: [00:00:15] it's been that long. Huh? I feel. 

[00:00:18] Yulia: [00:00:18] Yeah. And you guys have been growing and growing because, cause I remember I graduated college like 10 years ago and there was like nobody doing graphic design in new Haven and you guys were one of the few and I was like, this is cool. And then I moved to New York and I just kinda like just watched you guys grow and grow and grow and grow. 

[00:00:34] And new Haven is so awesome. So I'm just so happy that you guys are. 

[00:00:39]Pete: [00:00:39] no, We appreciate that. It's, It's so interesting to see just how small the world has gotten because of digital. And that's the one thing I love about it. And especially now with COVID we've been hiring people from all over the world to join the team. but we love, our small town, new Haven. 

[00:00:53] It's just a lot of really good stuff going on there as you know, 

[00:00:56] Yulia: [00:00:56] And the pizza is the best I have to say. Like, You can get those good pizza anywhere. 

[00:01:00] Pete: [00:01:00] Absolutely. And uh, Barstool just proved it. So that they did their big test and new Haven still won. we've definitely got some really good pizza. There's a lot of good food there too. A lot of interesting chefs popping up as well. So, I love the scene. It sort of feels like it's maybe eight, nine years ago, what was happening in Brooklyn that, arc about eight, nine years ago and and kind of feels like that's what's happening in new Haven right now. 

[00:01:20] Yulia: [00:01:20] It does. And I was there in that arc 15, 16 years ago in Brooklyn before it became like super gentrified, like on, on steroids before it became like, oh my gosh, it's almost like time square now. It's intense. 

[00:01:35] Pete: [00:01:35] Now all the cool folks are going down to Miami. It's like Miami is like the, all the rage now. 

[00:01:41] Yulia: [00:01:41] Yeah. Everybody's on Miami and, or in Mexico or in Bali. 

[00:01:47] Pete: [00:01:47] Yeah. 

[00:01:48] Yulia: [00:01:48] It's really interesting to see everybody shift. I don't know what's going to happen, but. It's certainly interesting, but I'm still interested in what you've done with Digital Surgeons, because you've built cross functioning teams. You do consultancy, you do public speaking. your work ranges from, venture-backed startups to fortune 50 organizations. And you work with CEOs, CMOs, and creative leaders and you help them build their brands. So I'm so excited to talk to you because you have such a wealth of information and it's not every day. 

[00:02:16] I get to talk about design and I'm an art director. I don't know if anybody really realizes that, but I work as a creative director. 

[00:02:21]Pete: [00:02:21] Oh, we realized it size. Style's always so awesome. You can't launch great-looking stuff like you and not have that background. So no, we realize it. 

[00:02:30]Yulia: [00:02:30] some, like two people listening. That's what I do during the day. I do that and I work at agencies and I have Dream Nation. And but it's also like the dilemma of your own stuff, but also like It's the Shoemaker without the shoes. Like you do stuff for other people, but then your own stuff is just like never finished or never done. 

[00:02:51] Like my own strategy for dream nation love is a hot mess. And I just like repost things. And while like I sit at work and create strategies for brands to do social and I wrote a strategy, but I haven't had time to execute it. It's so funny. It said that the Shoemaker like you said, it's super interesting. I find myself doing that lately too. It's I've been really getting into writing. I've been trying I'm my background is in design and development, right? So I've been designing coding since I was a kid. It's one of the reasons I started at DS and one of the crafts I've been really enjoying recently has been getting into writing, but I do it. 

[00:03:24] Pete: [00:03:24] Every night at like midnight, because it's like, when is there a time? So then you go back and you read it and you're like, wow, that's really bad. So it's just so interesting. I could definitely empathize with not having the time. And in your case, like not only are you building all these brands but also like new mom and you've got so many different things in your world. 

[00:03:39] So I'm so impressed with you. Just like how much you've done. I feel like I like every place I turn, I see dream nation popping up. So I'm just honored to be. 

[00:03:48] Yulia: [00:03:48] Thanks. Thanks. Sometimes it feels like you're like shouting into a void, but then you're like, ah, there are people listening, so that's cool. The numbers are going up, but I was gonna say Something about design and a totally sidetracked, cause I totally forgot. Oh, trying to do it all. 

[00:04:05] You know what? You just try to do like one thing a day, that's it? That's how I'm handling it. I'm like, okay, I have this one big thing that I need to do, and whatever tiny things I do after that's great. But that's been my approach. Hell, I remember what I was going to say. I was going to say instead of writing a night, have you tried waking up in the morning to do it, try to switch your schedule. 

[00:04:24] Pete: [00:04:24] I'm the worst I tried. So I'm the worst morning person I've tried for years. I took one of those. I don't know if the writer, Daniel pink he's written books like drive. And I remember reading something that he posted a Reverend who was talking about just It's true. They call them, it's not chronotype. 

[00:04:45] It might be chronotype. It's something like that where it's like, you can take this test and there's like different types of like you're a night owl or you're through that. And every time I take the test, no matter where it takes you, wherever buzz feed, like quiz, I take it on. It always says I'm a nine 11. 

[00:04:58] I just, I feel like I'm the most creative at night. But I've tried to rewire my brain. My friends tell me that are all parents and have kids that are like, oh, you're going to be helping more in person. Don't you. 

[00:05:09] Yulia: [00:05:09] I'm going to tell you the same thing. I'm an I person. And so is my husband. And now we're like, 5:00 AM. It just changes you. And you know what, as I get older, like I want to go to sleep around 11. O'clock like I'm 42 and my brain is we're going to bed. So I'm like, oh, 

[00:05:26] Pete: [00:05:26] What is it to say necessity is the mother of intervention. So yeah, no, I think with the kid on the way, I'm sure that it's just a matter of time before I'm officially a morning person, in those new things, for sure. 

[00:05:39] Yulia: [00:05:39] yup. And then you're going to be like early bird specialties. 

[00:05:42] Pete: [00:05:42] Yeah, exactly. 

[00:05:44] Yulia: [00:05:44] It's wild, but that's great that I enjoy your writing. You have a really great blog on your site and I peruse it every once in a while. And I liked your article on zoom calls. People can check it out. Payroll 

[00:05:55] are really great blog on how to improve zoom calls, which is pretty simple, which is actually like creating an objective. 

[00:06:01] I think that's like half of it, right? Like why are you meeting? And but yeah, you can discover it on the website. I won't go too much into it because I want to start the podcast, but he's got a lot of really great design information, design thinking brand management on the site and it's digital surgeons.com. 

[00:06:20] Right. 

[00:06:21] Pete: [00:06:21] Yeah, you got it right? Absolutely. I've been posting a lot, like personally, lately, I've been posting a lot on medium. I've had a medium account just because of Twitter for ages. And it's just Pete Senna on medium, but I've been having a lot of fun writing for that. Recently I wrote about low code just this past week. 

[00:06:38] Yeah. Got to connect with some really amazing people. And I think that that's the thing I love the most about just putting points of view out there, whatever those points of view are, whatever the topic is that you just find more people that either agree with you or disagree with you. And I think that there's something really interesting to come from all of that. 

[00:06:54] I'm going to keep trying to do much more of that. So thank you for noticing. 

[00:06:58] Yulia: [00:06:58] Yes, please do. Please do. It's great. And I think being creative does come at night, it's like this thing that just like beams down into your brain, like when, right when you were trying to like sleep too, you're like, ah, 

[00:07:12] Pete: [00:07:12] Absolutely 

[00:07:14] Yulia: [00:07:14] That's I love it okay. So when you were a kid, what was your dream? Did you always want to be a designer? 

[00:07:19] Pete: [00:07:19] It's funny you say that. So I think that. I want to be a designer even before I knew what a designer was. So I have this like very esoteric definition of design that I'll certainly bore you in the audience with, but the first job I can remember, like wanting to do when I was like a little kid was I wanted to be a comic book artist. 

[00:07:39] I was just like, so obsessed with Marvel and X-Men and like all that. And that I remember as I started to grow up a little bit and of course like any kid discovered video games. And I was like, oh my God, I want to make these things like forever. One of my dream jobs as a kid was just like wanting to make video games and it was that love for video games and like the art that came with it and all that. 

[00:08:05] And that's where I discovered art and design and really I was like, okay, If I want to do that, I got to learn all this coding stuff and that's like how everything was born was just solving problems with computers and design. And at that time it was a lot of design, a lot of code, a lot of UI. 

[00:08:24] And I didn't know any of the buzzwords right now, days we say words like, oh, we're UX designers or we're creative entrepreneurs, but like back then, it was like, I just wanted to make cool stuff, man. So like that was, that's what I was doing. And that's where I wanted to be from start. 

[00:08:38] Yulia: [00:08:38] I love it. I still have my X-Men card collection. 

[00:08:41] Um, I started out drawing superheroes too. A lot of X-Men like I still have all my hologram cards. I think all of it is probably worth like a hundred bucks at the most. Now I think 

[00:08:51] Pete: [00:08:51] I don't know. Maybe you can mint. Some of those as NFT is nowadays had digital NFTs who knows make millions of dollars, crime's just sold some art and I think she just made like $6 million in Fs. FFTs I didn't read the article. It keeps on popping up and I was like, interesting. 

[00:09:11] It's funny. You mentioned Grimes cause I'm a huge Elon Musk fan. I don't know if you've checked this out. I'll pull this up. Have you seen this app and I have nothing to do with this, so no ownership? They're not a client. If you want to say that I'm not plugging them for any other reason, we've seen this app called end-all. 

[00:09:27] Yulia: [00:09:27] Yeah, Is that what she was doing? She was doing the sleep sounds. 

[00:09:30] Pete: [00:09:30] Yeah. Maybe a little it by the thing. It's just, it's so cool. But you'd love the UI UX of it. Like it's just so well done, but yeah, no it's just interesting. Didn't mean to break your train of thought and it's a, you gotta be thinking about grinds and stuff. 

[00:09:44] Yulia: [00:09:44] No, I love that you brought it up because I listened to her baby lullaby. And my baby was interested. She was oh, what's this. and it was just so ethereal and so Grimsey, and it was just cool. It was just cool to see her do like baby stuff. 

[00:09:57] and just like expand on the art that she's doing and just go into a different, real. 

[00:10:03] Pete: [00:10:03] what's the power, right? That's I you know this as a designer yourself as designers, we solve problems, she wouldn't have gotten interested in babies until she had one because Grimes is Grimes. So I think what's so interesting is to see how as we change and we open up these new pathways, we find ourselves getting involved in different things. 

[00:10:25] I Just talking to you today about like kids and that sort of thing, like six months ago, like I, wasn't thinking about like breathable mattresses for kids, and now I'm like, why do I need to think about that? So I think that it's what I love about the work that I do at Digital Surgeons. And with a lot of the businesses that I advise is. 

[00:10:43] Like being in the Willy Wonka chocolate factory where it's like every day you're learning something new. And it's I didn't know what an NFT was like a year ago, and now it's like a minting stuff on the blockchain, right? I don't know anything about this stuff, but now all of a sudden we have all these new things coming at us. 

[00:11:00] So that's what I love about what we do, is we're just always immersed in something new and that's, I think what keeps that spirit going, at least for me, but I don't know what it's like for you 

[00:11:10] Yulia: [00:11:10] Yeah. I think it's like you 

[00:11:11] constantly have to learn and whether it's like upgrading your skills to a new program, you're like, oh, Figma is out. Okay. Uh, sketches out. Okay. I have to learn like you constantly, you have no choice, but to innovate it's either like you innovate or you. 

[00:11:25] Pete: [00:11:25] die. 

[00:11:26] Yulia: [00:11:26] Di. So you have to always keep going, which is exciting if you like that. 

[00:11:31] I love it and I'm sure you love it. And as designers, you get to solve problems, and like we live off of this stuff, 

[00:11:37] Pete: [00:11:37] Totally. 

[00:11:38] Yulia: [00:11:39] what's really interesting is that you've had digital surgeons for 10 years. So you see in the whole 

[00:11:43] 15. 

[00:11:44] Pete: [00:11:44] Yeah. And on March 15th is our 15 year anniversary. 

[00:11:48] Yulia: [00:11:48] oh my gosh. Congrats. That's amazing. 

[00:11:51] Pete: [00:11:51] Thanks so much. 

[00:11:52] Yulia: [00:11:52] But you've seen the design landscape change as well. There's just social now because when you and I first started out, it was just TV and radio. And now you have to design for like 3000 things and sometimes the budgets aren't there and they're like we need all these assets. 

[00:12:06] And you're like, but the money is not there. 

[00:12:09] Pete: [00:12:09] Absolutely 

[00:12:10] Yulia: [00:12:10] It's want to eat a steak dinner, but you're limited Donald's budget. 

[00:12:12] Pete: [00:12:13] Champagne taste, beer budgets. And I used to say that, but you can't say it anymore because now there's a lot of, those IPA's that are coming out are twice the cost, the champagne. So it's a mood phase now. 

[00:12:23] Yulia: [00:12:23] That's so true. So how did you start digital? 

[00:12:28] Pete: [00:12:29] the shortest answer to that question is I was in my Yukon dorm room and had a classic corporate job staring me in the face, in the future and where I was having, all of my fun was on these like side hustle projects that I was doing, like for friends. 

[00:12:47] So like making like nightclub websites, or like designing club flyers or all these different things. And it was interesting. I, found myself often getting. A lot of the projects where something had gone wrong before me. So it was like I was having to go in and like do surgery on these things. Like I was getting these really messy website projects or apps and the code was just a mess and it was done by then quickly or poorly. 

[00:13:12] And, And I was going into doing the surgery and it was just like, this one moment hit me where I said you know, I think I can do something different than just working a normal nine to five if I do my own thing. And I was always sort of very entrepreneurial, but I never really knew about what that meant. 

[00:13:29] Like I wasn't like I don't have an MBA or that sort of thing. Though I did get a business degree ultimately at the end, but the thing was interesting. It was like, I was really enamored by how. Design and tech at the time were coming together. And I thought that there was like these really just different worlds that were so separate and so, different. 

[00:13:52]it was that idea of the juxtaposition of the two things. And when they came together, that's sort of like, were my world literally changed in a flash? And I say that pun intended because I used to do a lot of MoGraph design and flash design was all the rage. So really it was like at that point where I decided to like, to leave big corporate, if you will, and say, you know what, when I'm officially done with school I'm gonna, I'm going to pursue entrepreneurship and I'm going to do my own thing. 

[00:14:17] And I did the thing that everyone always tells you not to do, which is never start an agency like without going to work for an agency. And I sorta think it's interesting because sometimes the advice that people give you in life, I think if you just flip it around and do the opposite, you'll actually be more successful. 

[00:14:33] Like I remember when someone was like, don't buy any of this cryptocurrency stuff. It's not going to be worth any money. And then like, I checked my crypto wallet and $2 is not worth like a gazillion dollars. And I'm like, okay, I guess that was a good thing to do. Yeah, I guess the advice I give to you and the listeners that is just like, if you've got this thing that is fueling you, go for it. 

[00:14:54] So that's how Digital Surgeons was born. And at the beginning, it was just me like taking projects. And then I got too much project work and I realized that I was really bad at selling myself. I was doing like $200 projects that should probably should have been 20,000 at the time. 

[00:15:12] And then I met my co-founder and we had this idea. We said, listen, why don't we join forces? And I said, sure, we'll give it a little test run. We'll do a couple of months test run. And I, here we are 15 years later we started multiple businesses. One of which I'm wearing on my chest right now. 

[00:15:27] It's a such you're… and when you said it, I was like, wow, it's been 15 years. I feel old, it's crazy, right? Time flies. I'm like, oh my God, I'm going to be 42 in April. Like, I don't feel 42.

[00:15:41] Amen. 

[00:15:41] Yulia: [00:15:41] that's gonna be what it's going to be like the age. Like I remember my friend Nancy Spiro, who's like a huge artist. She was like 96 at the time. And she couldn't design art anymore. 

[00:15:52] Her hands were like arthritic. 

[00:15:54] Pete: [00:15:54] So sad. 

[00:15:55] Yulia: [00:15:55] Yeah. She had a whole team of people designing her stuff, but she was, we were having dinner one night and she was like you know, I just feel like I'm in this ship and It's like a sinking ship. And she's like, my brain is active. I feel like I'm 20 years old still, but my body is old. 

[00:16:10] Pete: [00:16:10] It's heartbreaking to hear that. 

[00:16:11] Yulia: [00:16:11] I know, but she kept on designing. She kept on designing until the day that. 

[00:16:14] She passed away, which was incredible. as an artist, you keep on going you know, like, I'm going to see you guys like a District doing stuff when you were like 96. 

[00:16:24] Pete: [00:16:24] Listen, I hope I live that long. I hope I have hope. I'm not that privileged to do that for sure. That, that's the super interesting thing that it was recently done, you know, Tobias van Schneider? 

[00:16:36] Yulia: [00:16:36] No. 

[00:16:36] Pete: [00:16:37] He's an amazing designer. He's worked at FI and Spotify. He did the Mars Rover logo recently. 

[00:16:43] Yulia: [00:16:43] Oh, cool. Yeah, my friend, Hey, our friends created that logo from new Haven. My friend Tricia. I don't know if you remember Tricia, but she married. The guy who created the landing gear on the Mars Rover with the rockabilly there. I can't remember it. I like don't remember things anymore, but hello, back to New Haven. 

[00:17:03] Pete: [00:17:03] none new. Haven's doing some cool stuff. Don't sleep on new Haven. you got to uh, fellow creators, right from new Haven on this, very podcast. 

[00:17:10] Yulia: [00:17:10] That's true, but yeah, so he created the Mars, Rover logo. 

[00:17:14] Pete: [00:17:14] But why I was sharing him is he wrote an article recently about the death of middle management. And it was talking about how designers as we advance in our careers and we level. We then start managing people and we get further and further and further away from the thing that we love most, which is the craft itself. 

[00:17:30] It's funny to say, thinking that 20, 30, 40 years from now, I'm going to still want to be creating. And it's something that I've, I've actually had a lot of I would say tense conversations with different entrepreneurs, about different friends of mine that are CEOs or have startups that they've exited and whatnot. 

[00:17:46] It's, I've always wanted to be close enough to the. Where I can still create. So like every chance I get as nights or weekends, I'm still coding for fun. I'm still designing for fun. Lately, I've been getting really into these like 3d and I'm probably going to meet some NFTs pretty soon just for fun. 

[00:18:01] But I've been getting into like projection mapping and just different multimedia because for me I think the best thing we can do as creators is cross-trained you know, put our minds into different places. And that's why I've been trying to, trying to write, which is really hard. James’ dad who's our creative director always says to me, he's an amazing writer and storyteller. 

[00:18:20] And every time I show my writing, I'm like, I hate this. And he's like, it's like a little bit better than the last time you sent me something. And I was like, yes. All right, cool. So I'll just keep going. But in all seriousness, I think. Well, I share the thing about Tobias and 

he has this really great newsletter called from the desk of whatever, and it's the potential link to it after the podcast. 

[00:18:36] But what I love about it is he talks about just the need to continue to stay close to the craft. So whether you are a CEO, that's launching billion-dollar brands or companies, or a designer or an architect and engineer, the one thing that I always say is like, don't get too far away from the work, because that is the thing that's important. 

[00:18:55] So if you're the CEO, you don't want to be too far from your customer, right? You don't want to be too far from the work because then you're out of touch. And I think what makes a lot of the work that you've always put out there that I've always been inspired by over the years is like, you're always connected to that. 

[00:19:09] Zeitgeists, you're connected to that culture because you're in it. And if you remove yourself from it, certainly it gives perspective. But I think that there's something special about the way that creatives minds work, that only happens when you're creating. And it doesn't necessarily happen when you're in spreadsheet mode or resource allocation mode, which. 

[00:19:27] As senior leaders, we get ourselves into quite a bit. 

[00:19:29] Yulia: [00:19:29] Yeah. You know, I've noticed That over the years too like, when I entered advertising, there were just top managers who would just like manage teams. They wouldn't really do any art. They would go on a photoshoot and they go on like all the juicy projects, but they wouldn't do art, but these days you kind of have to do everything. 

[00:19:46]I can be running a 10 person team in an ad agency, but then they're like pick up a banner, pick up like an email jump into and I'm like, are you kidding? Bye do it. But it's, it's hard it takes a lot of energy to run a 10 person team successfully. If the work is like massive and usually it's like a, it's like a conveyor belt and it's very easy to feel like Lucy on the conveyor belt when the chocolates are coming too fast, then you're just like trying to gobble them up. 

[00:20:13] Pete: [00:20:13] That was the visual. That way, in my mind, before you said it, I was thinking of it. 

[00:20:16] Yulia: [00:20:16] that's what, like every day in advertising feels like you're just like this conveyor belt is like not tuned and I'm hired to tune it. And it's hard because you have to be creative, you have to help encourage other people's ideas. you know, it's a lot of managing personalities too. So it's being a designer at the end. 

[00:20:33] Like I said, it's problem solving. And I was going to ask you uh, you what do you see as being the future of digital marketing now that you've done this for such a long time? 

[00:20:44] Pete: [00:20:44] Well, The first thing I would say is the future of marketing is just marketing. Right? I think what's interesting is like oxygen. We all breathe oxygen. Digital is everything right? Digital is what's making this thing that we're doing possible. It's, what's making the information traveling to this watch possible, like digital is everything, right? 

[00:21:01] So I think the future of marketing is creating a value exchange. Between two people. And in some cases, those two people one of them is a personified brand or some form of supply and demand. But I think the future of marketing is about being able to understand the needs and wants of people and serving them in really like understanding the behavior and then shifting and changing that behavior to connect people. 

[00:21:32] So when I think about the future of marketing, it's I like to think about what's going to be true in 50 years from now. What's going to be true in a hundred years from now, right? When all this information is being beamed to us by some augmented artificial, augmented intelligence, and everything's robots and cobots and automated and et cetera, et cetera. 

[00:21:50] So when I think about that for me, the future of marketing is about. Being more exposed and being more human with the stories we tell one of the things that I think is interesting, we do a lot of work in design and digital transformation. A lot of our clients, the more of the enterprise, the clients that come to us that are larger and a bit slower moving. 

[00:22:10] In some cases, there were, it's funny that the early adopter, the smaller startup clients that we work with want to get the scale of the big companies, but then the big companies want to get the nimbleness of the small company. So everyone wants what's on the other side of the fence, as they say, or grass is greener if you will. 

[00:22:25] But what's interesting. The idea of the future of marketing is for me it's how do you let the robots do the jobs that robots were designed to do so that humans can do the one thing that I think can't be replaced by machine, which is true and natural unbridled creativity. Like I don't believe a machine. 

[00:22:44] Even one that passes the Turing test at some point in the future. I still believe that machines need a model to learn. And you need a pattern to, to play off of, and that's why folks like us exist, right? That's why, when you look at these design driven organizations that have leaders that can understand the needs of the customer, that's why they're succeeding 10 X better than what a Procter and gamble brand might do, right. or what a large corporate brand might do, because innovation really comes down to creativity at speed. And it doesn't always have to feel like that conveyor belt, but I certainly can reflect on that myself and have empathy. But I think what's interesting is the future is just about telling stories and making authentic connections. 

[00:23:28] And I think that the more that the space gets crowded. The more, the demand to be unique is there, right? We are wired. Our brains are wired. We want novelty. We want that, that new thing that just hasn't been done that way. It's why, if you look at the top 40 songs on the playlist for the past 20 years in a row, they're all converging on different genres. 

[00:23:51] They're taking things from different decades in different music, styles and melodies and all these different things. So for me, like I've got this beautiful print on my wall in my, in my study downstairs. And it's a Jackson Pollock print, of course not the real Jackson 

Pollock, but it's a piece called convergence that mark has a dear friend and our design director got for me. 

[00:24:12] And it's that idea of convergence. So I think the answer to the question in one word, the future of marketing is convergence human convergence. 

[00:24:20] Yulia: [00:24:20] I love that. And I think that's so true because I think speaking of Alan he's building neural link and I just did a podcast on like hacking neuro link just came out today with Anne Griffin, there's like all this stuff that you're not expecting, like none of us were expecting to be in a pandemic. 

[00:24:36] There's just stuff that we can't anticipate. is again, it's survival of the fittest, what agency and what person can adjust to working in the new medium and w like what is going to be the new media? 

[00:24:49] Pete: [00:24:49] what shows up for me when I think about that is what do people value? And when I think about like right now people value. Time attention people value novelty. So, you know, Again, the age-old thing is you know, entertainment, value utility. If you can serve two of the three to somebody you're going to most likely win in some way, shape or form. 

[00:25:11] you know, what's interesting to me is I'm very inspired lately by companies that are finding ways to automate the mundane, to create more space for the extraordinary some of my favorite brands that we're working with. It's I think some of the best people that are enabling these brands to grow are the customer service teams really being able to create those special moments. 

[00:25:35] When when automation basically says that you're not going to get your product for for two more days, even though you really need it because something went wrong with a FedEx delivery or whatever when you get that human text message or that human email that's. Automated by a robot, that person is like, will make your day or break your day. 

[00:25:54] So I feel like those are the opportunities for, innovation companies, oftentimes in my opinion, focused on the wrong things. And I think if you really focus on like the product and the experience that people have around it, you kind of can't lose. And like the, again, the data's out there by far smarter people than me that prove that. 

[00:26:11] But that's sort of what shows up for me just as we start to think about these uncertain futures, right? When I think about the pandemic, some of my I have some friends who were in the restaurant business that had 20 restaurants and now they're out of business and it's horrible and it breaks my heart. 

[00:26:27] We tried to help somewhere. We can and just almond ordering some different things. But what I think is interesting, it was my co-founder that said this David Salinas, who's one of my partners in District and my co-founder of digital surgeons. He said COVID will kill anything that had a preexisting. 

[00:26:46] And I think what was so interesting by that, and I love that language frame. And he's so good at these, quick things. I'm way too. Long-winded he said this thing and it got me thinking a lot about preexisting conditions. So what are the business models that are broken? What are the experiences that are broken and how might we, as creators, as designers, as entrepreneurs start to shape these newfound experiences that are really tailor-made people. 

[00:27:09] So I don't know if that's sparking you or not, but just inspires me to think differently about the idea of resilience and how we can bounce back in a stronger, better way as a result of these things that have happened and occurred outside of work. 

[00:27:25] Yulia: [00:27:25] I think that's so fascinating. Cause it makes me think of a Brooks brothers and people are like, Brooks brothers is going under, but Brooks brothers have been going under for a very long time. It wasn't COVID was just like the nail. It was like the straw that broke the camel's back. But. Brands that just get comfortable and they don't want to innovate and they just go, we're making money. Everything is going to be good. Also not adapting to just the modern world. It's you know, Ford, if he would have just built that one car and then he would have just stopped. It would have been like, No, this is good. 

[00:28:00] Pete: [00:28:00] No, I fully agree. It's so interesting too, is like, if you listen to the market, the market tells you everything that you need to know. You can't beat the market, you can't beat the wisdom of the crowd as they say, and anyone who tries to, I think those stories have been told already, so we can look back you know, the best predictor of the future is the past. 

[00:28:21] Yulia: [00:28:21] Oh, that's such a good line. Yes. You have a lot of, uh, good one-liners on this podcast. 

[00:28:26] Pete: [00:28:26] Thanks so much. I appreciate 

[00:28:27] Yulia: [00:28:27] Yeah. That's a really, I love that. And I think that's so true and I think. The past also goes back to being a designer because you can't design the future and you can design the present without having a past. And that's why it might be a little harder for robots because robots don't have a past, you don't have a background. 

[00:28:45] Like your background is unique and you bring your specific background to your work as do I. And that's what makes us unique and create unique experiences. But for a robot, if all the robots came off the factory in the same way, and if they weren't programmed with a consciousness or a personality or a background, then how does that affect work? 

[00:29:11] Pete: [00:29:11] Yeah. It was interesting to hear you say that. One of the things that I want to share with you in the audience that is really inspiring me right now is. When you look at some of, so one thing that I'm obviously, one thing that's not lost on me is just truly how much privilege I have, right. Just based on where I was born and the things that I was afforded. 

[00:29:31] And obviously I would be ignorant as hell to not be aware of the privileges that I have as a white male, which again, I try my best to create an inclusive platform for those that I, I get to collaborate with because I'm aware of that now. But I say that just specifically because of the implicit bias, that's in everything that, as humans, just all that bias in the algorithms bias in the tech and the ethics and all these things. 

[00:29:55] And one thing that I'm really inspired by right now is how the design of business products and even just graphic design and the world that you and I come from originally, how it's being shaped and disrupt. By taking a values driven approach. So what I mean by that specifically is if you want to create a set of products that are inclusive and standard, and for something, find people who share those values. 

[00:30:22] Rather than going on the homepage of dribble or be hands and finding the sexiest trendiest design or UI or motion or whatever it is that we all see, that's going to just be a lot more copy paste, copy paste, copy paste. So one thing that I started to really open my eyes up to is what are the values that we're trying to emulate? 

[00:30:41] And then how do I tap into those values to seek out people that share those values? And it's a great exercise by Bernay brown on values, if you I'm sure you've seen it just cause I feel like everything, but it's an amazing exercise for identifying what your values are and what your boundaries are. 

[00:30:57] And what I found recently, and in some of the newer work we're doing is we start to work with people from very different walks and talks of life. And I think what we're starting to see now is just how much you can disrupt a market if you are designing for, or are that market. I know obviously, you had Kara on one of your podcasts the CEO and founder of hint. 

[00:31:20] I'm a huge fan of hers. really, Really love just what she stands for. And I think a lot about what she did to disrupt the world or a market, right? So now as designers, how do we seek out other people that have the values that we seek? And if we're trying to design for inclusion, then how do we bring someone onto our team or work with someone who is very much living. 

[00:31:43] In that world or understands it. that to me is where the human-centered design aspect comes into play. And I've seen that in the ideas of the world. I've seen that in the design thinking of the world, but what I haven't seen a lot of, and we're trying to incorporate it in the work we do today is how do we bring that thinking into startups? 

[00:32:00] How do we bring that thinking into corporations? How do we bring that thinking? And aesthetic integrity into the work that we do in the stories that we tell. And that's some of the stuff that's keeping me up at night right now in a fun way is like, how do we remix that and play off that resilience and playoff all the stuff that happened in this pandemic and say, what's true now and what will be true 50 years from now, irrespective of the next plague that unfortunately might hit the world. 

[00:32:25] Yulia: [00:32:25] I think design has so much weight in this world. 

[00:32:30] As designers, we shape a visual culture and we shape the world and how the world views everything through media, through packaging, through commercials, through, through content what I think is really interesting about digital surgeons is that you are literally building cross-functional innovation teams at your agency and through and with your clients as well. And at a lot of places at a lot of, I know what a lot of agencies I worked at, like so many agencies, it's impossible to build cross-functional innovation teams. I've worked at venture development companies and I've seen workshops where we help people do that. So I know how easy it is, but some companies just have a very stuck mindset and they can't even. Think about cross-functioning because it's so dysfunctional in a weird way. And you have so many personalities and you have so many egos. And I think at the end of the day, it comes down to egos and people are like I don't want to work with that department. They're not going to tell me what to do where back to the Jackson Pollock thing. 

[00:33:36] I think if there was a lot more cross-pollination, everything would approve everything we approve across the board. But my long-winded, this is my long-winded way of asking you what is your advice for building a cross-functional innovation team? 

[00:33:53] Pete: [00:33:53] Personally I would say is thank you. Because it's, there are days I wake up and I feel like we're just not innovating enough, then we're not being cross-functional enough. And I get into my own imposter syndrome. So I'm really grateful to hear that, that, that is what occurs to you. 

[00:34:09] The only thing that I can say, just like that comes from a place of authenticity and truth to be really candid is I believe. When we've been successful at building cross-functional teams, whether it be internally or with our customers or with the products that we've worked on. I really believe it's come down to this core belief that we have. 

[00:34:30] And we say this when we pitch, and it's a big part of who we are, is I fundamentally believe that creativity and curiosity are broken. I think that broken in the world doesn't get broken in business. It's, if you look at just the sheer data from the time a child grows up, if you were to graph out how many times they ask why and how many times they ask curious questions and try new things. 

[00:34:54] Matt massively degrades as we get older, we are told how to think, and that, unfortunately, limits the lateral leaps that we're able to make as humans. So when I think about what makes a cross-functional team successful, I think it's fun. I think it's experimentation. I think it's play that's what companies like Lego have realized. 

[00:35:13] And we had the pleasure of working with them a couple of years ago we just recently hired somebody who was at Lego previously. And I think it's the idea of a state of play, but when you marry play with purpose and you incorporate experimentation, I think you're able to bring about a more iterative way. 

[00:35:30] And I think that's one aspect of, cross-functionality I think is important. But the other, the thing too, is I think just trust. I think being able to say you know, there's lots of studies out there talking about psychological safety and blah, blah, blah. So I'm not going to just pair it up the studies that everybody else reads. 

[00:35:44] But what I will say is. It's not just trust. It's also saying like, I want to hear your ideas. You know, One of the things that people really feel left behind on is you know, at the most core level we still have these lizard brains, right? So people are still driven by two things, fear and greed, if, no matter how enlightened we might think we might be, or how woke we are, we all have an ego, right? Like I've done my best to tame my ego. But I don't believe that it's possible to kill your ego. I don't at least I haven't met anyone who has completely been able to starve it off. 

[00:36:13] Yulia: [00:36:13] According to Joe Rogan. If you take enough acid nuclear ego. 

[00:36:16]Pete: [00:36:16] I, maybe I should start doing some of that. Cause I haven't, I've never experimented with that yet, but certainly micro-dosing I watched that goop episode on Netflix, and microdosing sounds like a cool thing having tried it, but maybe someone can uh, tell me more about that, another time, but in all seriousness, I think what it comes down to. 

[00:36:31] Yeah. Experimentation play. So when you, marry what I call the Delta, so we have this symbol that we use a lot of digital surgeons. It's a Delta, which is the triangle, right? So it's changed over time. When you marry experimentation with asking new questions, you unlock new answers, right? So when we've been the most successful at innovation, I think it comes down to the fact that we just didn't know what the hell we were doing. 

[00:36:53] Truthfully, like at the beginning of digital surgeons, we were competing against some of these big giant agencies you know, your former employers in some cases, and we were winning these pitches and we're like, how the hell did we win? We went in, we didn't use big words. And we just, everyone was involved in the idea and everyone was involved in making it happen no matter what background or what their title was when we do that, we win every single time. 

[00:37:15] I think what happens is when we start to let the labels dictate what we do every day, a label like account or project manager or strategist or designer or a developer, when those labels get put on us, just like the labels on these brands, right? This brand says something about who I. It also might say something about who I'm not. 

[00:37:33]So the thing that's interesting about cross-functionality is I think when you put people in that state of play and convergence, that's where you get that really magical thought is by bringing in all these different backgrounds. And really it's like, I don't want to use the token word diversity because I feel like it's being overused in the wrong ways today. 

[00:37:50]And I'm doing my best to learn and lean into it. But in all seriousness, what the true definition is by having unique and different things coming together. So that, for me, that convergence, I think is why people are winning, right? It's why someone was like, we're going to take this thermostat. 

[00:38:06] That's been around for almost a hundred years and we're going to take this thing called wifi. We're going to spank the two together. And then before you know, it, a nest is born, and then Nest goes and gets bought by Google. And now we have all these connected home products, right? So the wheels on the suitcase moments happen when we stop and pay attention and we listen. 

[00:38:25] And we started asking ourselves and our teams and our friends and our families and our clients new questions. That's where I believe cross-functionality happens. But it's the labels that limit us. And that's what I would say to answer that question, 

[00:38:37] Yulia: [00:38:37] I love that. And I think that's the key to having fun, too fun. It's just you got to create a place where people want to come to work every morning. And when they're curious and they're motivated to do work as opposed to feeling that okay, we're not innovating is just like clocking in and. 

[00:38:56] Pete: [00:38:56] right? Let me look at what does work today? I here we are having what would have been an amazing conversation face-to-face and now we're really gated to this flat screen. That's between us, right? So what is work? 

[00:39:08] Yulia: [00:39:08] Yeah, it's really interesting. And you know what I do miss? So what I used to do places, wherever I could was invite everybody for a retreat. And that's if you have a budget, there's a place in our media, New York or Connecticut in Armenia. And it's called a trout Beck. 

[00:39:24] I haven't brought anybody there yet, but like I'm dreaming of it. Like once the pandemic is over, they have this amazing hall. You can hold, You can hold like a conference there, but it's just a really dope place to just spend the weekend. And it's just gorgeous. And I think if you create a coworking atmosphere where people start to see each other as humans, or you bring the accounts team, you bring the client and you go, you know what, bring your family. Like it's okay, we're going to have a weekend or we're going to develop trust and we're going to pan out what we're going to plan what we're going to do for the year. So it's not a surprise because I think a lot of clients are like, I don't really know what I'm doing they don't want to admit it either, because again, it goes and he goes right. that leaves like the design teams and the account teams scrambling and being frustrated too, because they can't help the client. So everybody's like on this and there's kind of like go toggle, toggle war, but also like you can't help you don't admit that you need help. And once you have trust, you can kind of like establish everything that you need to deliver. 

[00:40:31] And you can have a, a roadmap. Oh, that's a keyword, right? A roadmap. 

[00:40:36] Pete: [00:40:36] We call them flight paths, that digital surgeon. So we, we have this that were to be used a lot where we always say, we want to meet our clients where they're at today. We want to understand where they want to go tomorrow. And we want to bridge that gap and that, that gap is what we call the Delta. 

[00:40:52] We recently launched a micro-site that really explains the whole Delta it's called. We designed demand.com it's sort of like a little throwback to the old flash sites that I used to make back in the day. So it was a little, it was some Easter eggs in there. I'd be 

curious to hear your feedback as a designer on it but really I share that because I think understanding and bridging that gap, what does that flight path, what does that roadmap, what is that blueprint? 

[00:41:12] I think that the first place we have to ultimately go is that place of self-awareness one of the hardest conversations that I have with founders and CEOs and CMOs is what's your vision for this venture? You know, Some of them are at the helm of a hundred year old brand. Some of them are just starting a brand new startup that they just raised some money for. 

[00:41:30] And I think what they all have in common is that fear of the unknown, right? The fear of the unknown as to what tomorrow might look like. And I think what's so interesting about that. When we let our guard down a little bit you know, Bernay brown again, bring her up because she's just so incredible and so inspiring. 

[00:41:47] Is that vulnerability, you want to let that vulnerability out? Well, We say we don't know I used to always say like, I have no idea, but let me Google it and I'll get back to you, and that was sort of like an inside joke for a bit, because we have some processes that we use for how we grok knowledge and how we acquire knowledge. 

[00:42:02] But I think it starts with what do we know? What don't we know because that's the thing that most people don't do. And that's why I believe that a lot of companies fail. They fail because they fail. Not because they don't have smart people, not because they don't have great products or that they're able to innovate, know some of them have McKinsey teaching them how to do innovation frameworks. 

[00:42:20] So they've got all the knowledge. but you know, Knowledge is only as powerful as the practice you preach and the walk you walk. And that's where ultimately, I think I empathize with these companies the ones that. Going in one direction and they're the size of the Titanic you know, and in some cases, they either believe that they're stronger than the iceberg or they believe that they don't need to change. 

[00:42:42] And I think those are the companies that in the past couple of years have had a rude awakening. You mentioned Brooks brothers. I think a lot of retail corporations have re recently realized truly how little value they were providing in their customers' lives. And I think when you don't understand the value you provide and how others value, remember that the person who determines what value is, not you, it's your customer. 

[00:43:07] And that's been sort of just a rude awakening for me in so many cases that I've had to, I've had to eat a lot of crap for uh, how my ego has gotten in the way of that. But I like to think it's improving. So 1% better every day, right? 

[00:43:18] Yulia: [00:43:18] Yeah, no, that's totally. That's 1% that's 365% over a year. Amen. And you made me think of something else too. Because I think you can apply to strategy. You can go to U Penn, you can go to Warren, you can go to all these schools and you can be really knowledgeable when it comes to strategy and everything else, but it all comes down to the execution. 

[00:43:43] You can have a brilliant strategy and when it's not executed well then you are screwed. 

[00:43:50] Pete: [00:43:50] Ideas are nothing without execution. That was a — that's a quote I've been using for about 15 years now. 

[00:43:56]Yulia: [00:43:56] if you don't hire a great designer is just not going to, you're going to think we're going to be that person. Like she coming in to fix the projects. I think my career is built on projects that were just messed up and me coming in and cleaning up messes like that is my freelance career. 

[00:44:11] I literally called in as like a ninja to like fix something. they're like, oh my God, this is really screwed up. Can you come in? I'm like, okay, I'll get them up. I'm coming in. Yeah, my mom I'm coming in, but it's fixing things, but in the perfect world your agency, in my place and everywhere else in a perfect world, you don't get into these messes because you realize that there's a way to do things properly and you don't need to get into a mess. 

[00:44:38] Pete: [00:44:38] You know, I think it's interesting. You say that. And one of the things I've been having a little bit of tension with that, I'm curious to hear your thoughts on it is around this idea of best practice. So I think what's really interesting about best practices is that there's an implicit flaw in that statement itself. 

[00:44:54] If we follow the best practices, we'll never be able to unlock new possibilities in some cases. So I think that there's like this, what I always say to people is when you start something, what are the quick wins? You know, Some people like the term low-hanging fruit, which we can't get rid of, it's like such an agency work. 

[00:45:11] What's the low hanging fruit here. It's always set in some very interesting term, right? It's low-hanging fruit. And then, so I would say, what are the what's the quick wins? And then what are the big bets and when they both have in common. And for me finding that, that sort of Venn diagram, that intersection I think is so interesting because that's where, how you start to plot innovation, it's get to the best practice and then shadow that box and shatter that paradigm. 

[00:45:37] And candidly. That's worked for, for some amazing things. And it's, unlocked incredible growth it's how we built a 20 plus million dollar tech campus. And uh, it's how we've helped brands, exit, and IPO, but it's also how we've messed up a ton, right? Because when your hubris gets in the way, and when you neglect best practices, that's when shit goes really wrong. 

[00:46:00] So when I was like, all right, what are the quick wins? What are the big bets for the best practices? Once you get everything running optimally, then how do you start to experiment with what the next best practices? we've used a framework for that, like very common like 70, 20 10 what's the 70% of the budget you're going to spend on tried and true tactics 20%. 

[00:46:19] It's a very common thing, but it works well. So what I always do now is to say well, how do you take 20 plus 10 and make 30? And how do you go 70. And then what's so interesting is one of the 30 starts to perform better than the 70. How do you start to turn down the 70 and up to 30? those math and data applications to how we create as designers, I think is really interesting. 

[00:46:40] One of the things that I believe that we fail to learn as designers is just truly how special we are at solving problems because of our observation skills and our iteration skills. And I feel like if we can teach those ways of working with people who don't necessarily have these design backgrounds, I believe that's where design can change the world. 

[00:47:03] And it already is right. All around us. Just this very platform we're talking on didn't exist a couple of years ago, right? 

[00:47:10] Yulia: [00:47:10] They just launched this video feature like a week and a half ago. So I'm really excited to Yeah, 

[00:47:16] Pete: [00:47:16] Yeah, no, I'm excited to be here for sure. It's definitely much more interactive than just the standard violent, if you will. 

[00:47:24] Yulia: [00:47:24] Totally. Oh, and for people listening, I'm 

[00:47:25] talking about squad cast. Um, I use Quantcast TV to record all my podcasts. Oh. But you know what I was going to ask if he how has the pandemic affected digital marketing and product launches for you? 

[00:47:38]Pete: [00:47:38] So it's really changed a lot. It's a great question. And so it's changed. I think the tactics we use, right? So we have a lot of clients in the CPG space and many in the food space specifically. So, One of the tried and true tactics for getting to grow in the food brand is let people taste and try the product. 

[00:48:01] And if they like it, they'll buy it. Pretty obvious. So tactics like out-of-home experiential trial events we've had to rethink, what does it mean to try a product? What does it mean to get a product in your hands? No, because no one wants to uh, Be in the middle of New York city, like handing out products in times square right now because of the pandemic. 

[00:48:19] I think tactically it's changed how we go to market. I think the speed of launches has been rapidly accelerated you know, one of the things that I really worry about companies in our space agencies consultancies is that, as you mentioned, the, I Love Lucy moment. Those conveyor belts are going faster and faster. 

[00:48:36] I was talking to a couple of friends about this recently who work on the client-side and they said you know, I left the agency world because I wanted more team, less chaos on the client world and client-side, as you know, used to be a lot slower moving. And now they're saying the pace of change is just happening so quick. 

[00:48:52] So to answer your question what's changed for us is just, we've had to pivot all the different tactics that we utilize in that go to market to move the funnel. So I think what's changed about marketing is just. People's relationship with trust people's relationship with the internet privacy fear. 

[00:49:12] And then obviously you have all these other dynamics happening at play with, respect to mental health. We have people now who as consumers, as employees, as people, we have so much more that we have to do me. You're You're lucky enough. Like you said, you've got someone to help out with your baby and the other room, but imagine if you didn't have a caretaker, imagine if you had to keep doing this and exactly right. 

[00:49:35] Yulia: [00:49:35] I will lose my mind. Like I'm already losing my mind and I'm so happy. Like my mom just retired this year and she's like, I'm a full-time grandma and like, bring it on. So I'm so lucky. And I have my husband who's amazing as well. And he helps, but even with two people, you have a little person and they're just dependent on you, 24 7, but it's nice to be able to have a little break so I can focus on work so I can just be like, okay, like I need to get this work done. 

[00:49:59] Let's plan it. 

[00:50:01] Pete: [00:50:01] you know, even focus on YouTube. 

[00:50:04] Yulia: [00:50:04] I've been trying to go for a run, but it's like the body's. So just not used to doing anything besides growing a baby. I digress, but It's just nice to just not have the baby hanging on you for about an hour. It's just nice. It's nice to be an adult and talk to another adult, even though the baby is wonderful. And I love the baby. It's just nice to have a tiny little break and not just be like, I'm just like the mom. It feels it's good to have myself back what is your dream as an adult? 

[00:50:36] Pete: [00:50:36] So I meditate a lot. It's really been a big catalyst for my mental health, my self-care routine. Some of my greatest ideas come when I'm meditating I've meditated on that question of what do I want for myself in the future? And of as close as I can think of as a dream as a, construct. 

[00:50:53] And when I think about what I want for the future is creativity and prosperity, I think are two really important things for me. And I think that the only way to achieve those two things someone that I really have a lot of respect for set to me. That's what makes you happy and yeah. What makes you successful in your own definition and how do you find happiness and success? 

[00:51:14]So whether it be some people use the term ego guy, which is you're raising debt show that your reason for being you know, where your vocation and vacation and all those things come together. Great concept. And for me, when I dream about that, it's prosperity and creativity it's and I think the only way that those two things are made possible in the intersection or the convergence. 

[00:51:33] Being a master of learning and being adaptive and responsive to all the changes that are going to come at you. And obviously with, knowing that I'm going to be a dad soon and all these other things you know, the thing that I'm thinking about most is how do I always keep creating whether I'm creating humans or companies or new ways of working like that to me is super, super important. 

[00:51:57] if I won Powerball tomorrow and I had a billion dollars and I never had to do anything else again to make a dollar I would still be creating, I would still be learning. I would still be trying to help people to better connect with the product services and experiences that light them up. 

[00:52:12] That's why I've stuck with the conveyor belt on the, I love Lucy machine for as long as I have is I'm in it because I'm truly fascinated about how people operate and as long as I'm learning and as long as I've got that creativity, whether I'm Gardening or meditating or designing the next ad campaign for a billion dollar brand. 

[00:52:34] I think I'm going to be happy. So if those things come together, that's the things that I'm looking for. That's what I dreamed about as an adult is being in that state of invention and creation and possibility. So, I'm told that it's going to be a pretty wild ride, being able to raise another human. 

[00:52:52] So I'm hoping I can. 

[00:52:54] Yulia: [00:52:54] You'll be able to, and you know what? I think you'll get like, a new set of eyes. You're just going to be seeing things for the first time through your baby. And it's like, it's incredible. And it's just. you know, you love launching companies. You're just launching a little human it's so cool. 

[00:53:06] Every day something new happens like the other day, like yesterday we had to drive into the city. We had to spend 10 hours in a car with an infant to get some paperwork done. I have to run be speaking about things that don't work. City hall does not work in New York. So trying to get like something signed at city hall. But I was just watching my little like she's the, she was going to be four months a song like next week. And she was just looking out the window in the lower east side. And you can see her mind was being blown she kind of looks around when and her little carriage, but she falls asleep she doesn't, she hasn't seen anything outside the four walls of this house. So she's like in the seat and she was driving through New York and there's graffiti and there's noise. And you can. 

[00:53:47] see that. She's just Yeah, the pattern machine is just like trying to connect all the dots and everything. Yeah. 

[00:53:52] yeah. And she's going over the bridge. And she's like, oh, water. I mean, you're going to just sit there and you're just going to like, watch this human discover the world and you're going to be blown away. You're going to be like, this is so cool. And they're going to you're creative. So the kid is going to be creative and they're going to like surprise you with all the stuff that they're going to come up with because they're going to blow your mind. 

[00:54:15] Pete: [00:54:15] No, I love that. It's, I'm super grateful to hear that frame on it. And I think framing is everything right. Can you talk about how do you be? Cross-functional all cross-functional thinking is, reframing, right? It's basically like how do you bring people together from different places, walks and talks and functions, bridge them together because that's where the best things happen is At that convergence, right? 

[00:54:37] It's you know, like one of my favorite things is Korean barbecue tacos, right? Like it's like the, you get the best of like Mexican cuisine mixed with like Korean cuisine. And it's that's where I missed. When you said New York. I was just thinking of oh, I haven't had Korean barbecue in New York in a while. 

[00:54:51] I'm like, now I'm like super hungry and I'm mad at you for that. it's super interesting. I appreciate that frame on it because I think that's the one thing I'm the most excited to do is I feel like I'm the poster child for creativity because it's helped me through like some of the hardest times I've had in my life. 

[00:55:08] And obviously I've been a lot more fortunate than some people, but I feel like if we just keep creating if we keep designing, that's how we'll keep growing as people. And ultimately, hopefully as a society. 

[00:55:21] Yulia: [00:55:21] I love that. And you know what? I also just realized that I forgot to ask you about strict speaking of convergence. I love District. I dropped by a few weeks ago to check it out and I really wanted to work out in the gym because the gym looks so awesome, but I'm just socially distancing. Cause I've got a baby in a, in my mom and then the family, but it just looks like such a fun place that you've built. 

[00:55:44] It has like a really awesome place where you can have a band come up and has a good barbecue place. I'll let you talk a little bit about it, how you got it started and. 

[00:55:52] Pete: [00:55:53] So, I mean, One thing that I'm really blessed is that I have a very crazy. Genius business partner, So for those that don't know, District is attacking innovation campus uh, and New Haven, Connecticut. For those that are dialing in or listening in from, from all over the world we're directly between Boston, New York city. 

[00:56:14] So, Pretty interesting place here in Connecticut and New Haven as you were just sharing. on the campus, we've got many companies call it home. We've got a coworking space, digital surgeons headquarters there. We've got an architectural firm, which is one of our partners there. There's a lot of different types of organizations inside of that. 

[00:56:31] And when my co-founder and I, and our partners were dreaming up what we thought the future of work was we really thought the future of work was about creating a community you know, being able to empower these creative collisions. And we asked ourselves like we worked with different architects and we sourced a lot of information inspiration, and it's what's true about Google and Pixar and all these amazing, incredible creative companies. 

[00:56:53] And it was about these creative communities about these collisions. Um, and as you know, all too well, just being from here, there are a lot of cultures, a lot of amazing things, a lot of invention that happened you know, we, we introduced the interchangeable part you know, with Eli Whitney and everything. 

[00:57:10] Really powered many forms of mass production in different ways. And lots of innovation happened right. here in the backyard. So when my co-founder David saw this abandoned Buster. he thought bigger. He went further with where it could be. And instead 

of just being a dormant empty building that was once a bustling source of transportation and life we asked herself could we breathe new life in that? 

[00:57:38] And that's when we went, we launched district. One thing I want you to know, and everyone else to know is that you know, we've done an incredible job. We have an amazing team there that this led with some great people and they've launched a series of social distancing protocols. So, obviously the gym is in full capacity. 

[00:57:53] People are able to come back I'm also nervous because my wife's pregnant, but I've been working out there with a personal trainer, obviously, masked to require. There's a number of other protocols we had to put in place. But it's exciting to me to see that the coworking spaces is still. 

[00:58:06] Has lots of energy there. Some people really want to want that face-to-face interaction. Even if it's requiring a master requiring some social distancing. What I believe the future of work is about is bringing people together at the right place at the right time for the right type of context. 

[00:58:22] I think context is really queen of all things right now, being that as much as the remote work environments, I think will transform how we work. You know, If I'm writing software and I'm coding, which I spent half my career doing I want to be behind the screen and I want to be in total silence with my earphones on. 

[00:58:38] Right. But if I'm going to be collaborating with you on an idea, sure. We've got tools like Miro and all these great tools, but I don't want to put a VR headset on, I don't want to be on a zoom call with Miro. I want to get together. I want to feel like you can see in the background here, there's all these things on my wall, but like, I want to have the post-its on my hands and the, in the whiteboard marker. 

[00:58:59] They're like, there's something special about that. And I think. We're resilient as humans. And I think that irrespective of what happens with these vaccines or the next step we are obviously in a new normal, I hate when people say that. So played out. But I think our campus at district is really a north star for how you can bring people together in a way that lets people live, work and play in a way that is creative. 

[00:59:27] And I think that it was a very design-driven way that we brought that to life with some incredible people too far, too many to name on this podcast. But I was just such a tiny part of, having that come together. But The idea for the district really goes back over a decade ago. 

[00:59:41] We've only had District for a few years now, but it goes back to my partner and I were thinking 10 plus years ago, What's the future of work. What's the future of bringing people together. We have this idea for like, a collective model where we have photographers designers, illustrators, like all different disciplines working together you know 10 years ago people were like, oh that's a crazy idea. 

[01:00:03] It was a long before that we works in all the different kind of coworking brands that have come and go and whatnot popped up. But that's been really exciting for us. And obviously, on campus, we've got Connecticut innovations, which is doing amazing work in the venture capital and the accelerator space. 

[01:00:18] So there's a lot of innovation coming out of Connecticut, a lot of innovation coming out of New Haven and I'm just excited to be a part of that. 

[01:00:26] Yulia: [01:00:26] You also have a SeeClickFix in there, I think which has been Berkowitz this company. It was my first guest on the show. 

[01:00:33] Pete: [01:00:33] That's awesome. Yeah, no, I, I don't know if Ben is still there. Cause I know that he's, he sort of exited the business, so I think he's still involved in working with them, but since they, I guess they sold, there's a transaction. I don't know all the details, but I know that they did spend some time at District and in the coworking space for a while. 

[01:00:50] I don't know if he's still there, but I'll have to check in haven't spoken with him recently, but yeah. Speaking about civic innovators and some of the work that he's done, just, Ben's just an incredible mind. 

[01:00:59] Yulia: [01:00:59] Yeah, he is. And I just love that there's so much really like amazing gems in new Haven and, uh, yeah, at the check-in with him too. He's got two kids too, and like I haven't spoken to him in a while, but maybe one day we can all have a play date Yeah, that sounds good. 

[01:01:14] we could have some great pizza. 

[01:01:17]Pete: [01:01:17] they'll all grow up and start their next startup who knows what I'll be? 

[01:01:20]Yulia: [01:01:20] I want my kid to start a band, but then again I'm like, you are going to do whatever you're going to do and I'm not going to push you to do anything. You're just going to discover what you like, and you're going to do things and you're going to be your own person. I would be really proud if you were in a punk band when you were in high school. But if you're not like, that's like what? I, it's a totally different human coming out of your body. Like, I don't know what she's going to. 

[01:01:42] Pete: [01:01:42] Yeah, no, that's awesome. I love that idea of just like, again, space to play space, to explore a space, to unlock possibilities, right. that's where I think one of my favorite things about this community that we're building is. Just the different people you know, just recently one of the founders of a business called sphere gen they just announced in the news that because of some of their Microsoft hollow lens technology, they literally just, and they're there in District on campus. 

[01:02:07] It's the founder of Ted is a serial entrepreneur and they just announced that they helped to facilitate the ever remote basically like XR type of surgery between in another country. It was the coolest thing ever. I'll send it to you. If my memory, I think it was Mount Sinai, but I'll definitely find it and send it to you. 

[01:02:26] but why I share that right, is this is the type of innovation that's happening literally in our backyard. And I think that no matter where you're dialing in from our listening to this from now or in the future innovations all around us, so if we just opened our eyes like your daughter and look out the window there's going to be something amazing out there for us. 

[01:02:46] I just think that we have to believe that. And I think mindset is everything and, I could not be a bigger believer in growth mindset and creative mindsets. And I think that those are the things that unlock the kinds of possibilities that make things like this whole thing possible, right? 

[01:02:59] Like us spending an hour together today having this awesome conversation. So thanks again for that. 

[01:03:04] Yulia: [01:03:04] Yeah, it's been such a pleasure. I'm so happy that we made it happen. It's been a, it's been a few months in the making. 

[01:03:11] Pete: [01:03:11] Absolutely. No, I'm really grateful to everybody that was involved in making this happen, but yeah, I just can't wait to see this go live and share this with a bunch of people that might hopefully get inspired by it. You know, it's, not about the quantity. It's about the quality, right? If we can inspire one person to be more happy or successful or a combination of both, hopefully in their life or work as a result of this conversation, that the two of us just had for fun on a Thursday, that to me is why I get up out of bed every day and do what I do. It's certainly not because of the, I love Lucy conveyor. 

[01:03:42] Yulia: [01:03:42] It's so true. Right. I love that. That is so beautiful. And maybe like you know, somebody's kid, who's 16 tunes in and they're just trying to figure stuff out. And, uh, and That's why I get on the phone with people phone. Yeah. Cause, you know, I think these tools weren't available to me when I was little and it's like, there's so much, there's so much content out there. There's just so much great information you can find out just by listening through your whole entire life. That's what we get paid to do, right. Is consuming, create that's what we do as humans, consuming create. And I think the, ultimately the Delta between consuming create is connection. And when we lean into those three things, that's where possibilities really happen. I love it. Pete. It's been such a pleasure and also shout out to Kyle for hooking up this interview for going through emails. I super. 

[01:04:33] Pete: [01:04:33] thanks. 

[01:04:36] Yulia: [01:04:36] I love it. I love it. Let's stay connected. I'll talk to you 

[01:04:39] Pete: I will. Okay. Have a good day. Bye.