I’m tired of explaining myself
I’m tired of the sudden swell of
adrenaline when I sit down beside a new
person on a plane or talk to a new
friend and they ask that dreaded
question now what is it that you do I
have ten answers to this question I’m an
innovator I’m a city builder I’m a
designer
I’m an urbanist I’m a change maker
having multiple ways of describing what
I do is that one’s empowering and
exhausting because we don’t live in a
world anymore where we stay in jobs for
decades on end the new job is knowing
the problem you want to solve my friend
rachel advocates for children’s rights
my friend Cassie helps women understand
the toxins in their environment my
friend Kyle helps most creative people
in the world tell their stories on stage
it’s often a signal that you’re talking
to someone interesting when they talk
about what’s changed in the world as a
result of their work not the titles or
the accreditation they’ve held if I want
to increase prosperity for all I might
write policy and local government I
might work for a local charity that
increases access to local economic
development I might even work for a bank
to figure out how to get new types of
people checking accounts freeing me from
this orientation towards professional
titles allows me to be so many things in
advancing an important agenda why should
it matter if I do it from inside of a
charity or inside of a bank why do
people even care well it seems to matter
to a lot of people we as humans love to
credential as each other and it’s not a
bad impulse it tries to bring clarity to
situations that feel murky but it
becomes a challenge when people get left
behind because they don’t have a fan
title or credential to participate more
often than not if we can’t fit people
into a tidy box we don’t give them a
chance I’ve never had that impulse to
chase titles because every time I get
close to something I think I want I
realized that titles come with
preconceived notions of how change
happens change requires power to lie at
the top change requires an understanding
of people to come from desk research
change requires experts to speak on
behalf of people whose problems were
trying to solve so let me tell you how I
describe what I do I say that I design
for the public interest and I work to
design systems that give people power
now when I say this I get one of two
reactions either a blank stare as people
try to understand what it is that I mean
or they nod voraciously so that I think
they understand and we can just go on
talking about something else I’ve worked
to give people power by bringing
children to policy tables bringing
newcomers to the center of capital
projects in marginalized communities and
bringing frontline caseworkers into the
design of critical benefits that they
deliver every day I look for places
spaces and systems where citizens voices
aren’t heard because I believe that when
we engage those closest to the problem
we’re trying to solve we have a better
chance at designing a solution that
actually meets their needs and I believe
that it is our right to be considered
and it’s actually maybe even a simpler
way of describing what I do that I Pete
help people understand that we all have
a right to be considered for a long time
most of my work was done alongside folks
who had dedicated their entire lives and
careers to making social change happen
and social change makers myself included
are the worst sometimes because I hear
this painful orthodoxy all the time this
social sector is good the corporate
sector is bad this is the accepted and
unchallenged wisdom around change-making
and it turns out it isn’t true so I
decided to try and experiment a few
years ago I decided that working
exclusively in the social sector
wouldn’t help me scale the impact that I
want to see happen in the world if we
want to increase access to dignified
housing we need to work with insurance
companies we need to work with banks
housing experts perhaps those even in
academia if we want cities more like
what Urbanists jane jacobs envisioned
they would be safe places with eyes on
the street like the diverse array of
commercial and community and
recreational amenities we need to work
with developers policy officials
community organisations and small
business owners so I accepted the
position to lead the Canadian studio of
the oldest design and innovation firm in
the world we work to bring together
people and organizations in the public
and private sector to remind them that
if they focus less on protecting their
scale their size and their market share
and they focus more on building things
that are driven from deep and nuanced
human insights they win and they can
still make money I wanted to see if we
could have a material impact on the
issues that matter by bringing
billion-dollar organizations into these
really cool places the homes the lives
the workplaces and hearts of the people
that they’re trying to serve essentially
we teach large organizations how to
listen and have them confront their
organizational egos about how much they
actually know about the people they’re
trying to serve so often they orient
themselves towards what’s feasible and
viable that they completely forget
what’s desirable for people now this is
not because large organizations are bad
or because they don’t care it’s because
they think that people problems are too
small and the problems they’re trying to
solve are so big and they forget that
small people problems are their big
problems as an example our studio is
Reese
engaged by our federal government in
Canada to solve the challenge of
onboarding seniors to one of the most
critical benefits programs available to
them now it should be known that this
program has single-handedly contributed
to reducing poverty for seniors living
in Canada and the federal government had
a hunch that creating digital platforms
would facilitate and increase access
they had invested a lot of money against
developing against this hunch and they
hadn’t gone and talked to people yet so
we went and talked to people we went and
talked to seniors and social workers
helping seniors and we discussed the
experience of Aging and we heard two
things one it’s really embarrassing to
age and feel like you need handouts from
the government and two even if you do
when your senior you don’t have a Sherpa
you don’t have someone beside you to
help you figure it all out and so we
spent all this time looking for this big
transformational digital innovation and
really what we needed to create to solve
this very critical problem was a PDF 26
pages that quickly and simply educate
seniors that a it’s a benefit it’s not
welfare it’s just a thank you for being
Canadian and B you can literally trace
your finger along a decision tree in a
few minutes and figure out if you’re
eligible and as designers our instinct
was to make a cool and interactive and
we kept getting told by seniors and
social workers not to bother because
they were just gonna print it out
anyways we learned that we weren’t in
fact serving a digital mandate but we
were addressing the shame and opaqueness
of government systems it was a literacy
building exercise not a digital one and
it takes courage to solve for something
that specific like solving for shame but
when we do we save millions of dollars
we address a need very quickly the
solution is now out in the world it’s
not caught up in the Machine of
government and we invest in building the
right thing once instead of partially
effective things twice
this work matters in real life it’s not
as pithy and involves managing a lot of
anxiety uncertainty and egos it requires
us to honor and respect systems that
people uphold and then gently and
simultaneously move them toward
dismantling those systems so they can
create the impact that they want to have
in the world now people don’t write
managing egos anxieties uncertainties in
most job descriptions this work helps me
achieve my goal of giving people power
and supporting people to have power in
their lives and communities but when
people ask me what I do I still don’t
have the courage to simply say I work
really hard and I try to create systems
that give people voice sometimes I get
called a designer sometimes an innovator
sometimes a consultant and all of those
titles make me shudder they don’t feel
honest they don’t feel like they really
capture what I do so today I challenge
the orthodoxy that having a fancy title
means that you have power because if I
truly believe that kids can build
buildings and people suffering with
addiction issues can design the most
thoughtful healthcare systems and new
moms can design the most envelopment
retail experiences then I have to
believe that they can do it without
credentials without a fancy title that
they can hang their hat on innovating
large institutions and big bad companies
meant leaving the social enterprise that
I built and ran for ten years you know
most people know me as a as a thinker
and social change and and citizen
engagement and civic innovation and here
I was going to run a design studio that
had just been purchased by the largest
management consulting firm in the world
in the minds of most people
I was definitely leaving the world of
change making and I heard the word
sellout a stint that this was a phase I
was going through and it hurts
it felt like it was attacking my
identity at its core and challenging
what I was actually trying to do it left
me feeling judged but these feelings
were signals to me there were signals
that I was pushing up against them
entrenched orthodoxies about who owns
change-making
I am learning that social change cannot
just be left to those working in the
social sector I’m learning that we have
to diversify the number of entities that
solve people problems and I’m learning
that those entities include both two
person art collaborative and
billion-dollar companies I’ve often
thought that this picks up on the work
that one of my greatest influences Jane
Jacobs where she left off she wasn’t a
planner or an economist yet she served
as one of the most influential thinkers
of our time in both of those spaces and
she used her influence to build soap
boxes for others like her she wanted it
to be valued that lived experience has
power and that you don’t need to be an
expert to make change happen you just
have to have a willingness to see that
change happens everywhere in the last
line of her seminal book the death and
life of great American cities she so
poignantly says that lively diverse
intense cities contain the seeds of
their own regeneration with energy
enough to carry over for problems and
needs outside of themselves I believe
that when we invest in diversifying who
gets to participate in solving wicked
problems we to plant the seeds of our
own regeneration we diversify the types
of experiences approaches ideas and
expertise they give us a better shot at
building solutions that stick resilient
ideas that can adapt as the world
changes and evolves so today I challenge
you talk about what you do without a
title please stop saying it let I’m just
I’m just a mom I’m just a volunteer I’m
just a student don’t rest on the name of
your organization your boss your degree
your school give your lived experience
some power and know that that’s saying I
do work that I deeply care about and
it’s good is the best credential you
could ever have
thank you
[Applause]
I’m tired of the sudden swell of
adrenaline when I sit down beside a new
person on a plane or talk to a new
friend and they ask that dreaded
question now what is it that you do I
have ten answers to this question I’m an
innovator I’m a city builder I’m a
designer
I’m an urbanist I’m a change maker
having multiple ways of describing what
I do is that one’s empowering and
exhausting because we don’t live in a
world anymore where we stay in jobs for
decades on end the new job is knowing
the problem you want to solve my friend
rachel advocates for children’s rights
my friend Cassie helps women understand
the toxins in their environment my
friend Kyle helps most creative people
in the world tell their stories on stage
it’s often a signal that you’re talking
to someone interesting when they talk
about what’s changed in the world as a
result of their work not the titles or
the accreditation they’ve held if I want
to increase prosperity for all I might
write policy and local government I
might work for a local charity that
increases access to local economic
development I might even work for a bank
to figure out how to get new types of
people checking accounts freeing me from
this orientation towards professional
titles allows me to be so many things in
advancing an important agenda why should
it matter if I do it from inside of a
charity or inside of a bank why do
people even care well it seems to matter
to a lot of people we as humans love to
credential as each other and it’s not a
bad impulse it tries to bring clarity to
situations that feel murky but it
becomes a challenge when people get left
behind because they don’t have a fan
title or credential to participate more
often than not if we can’t fit people
into a tidy box we don’t give them a
chance I’ve never had that impulse to
chase titles because every time I get
close to something I think I want I
realized that titles come with
preconceived notions of how change
happens change requires power to lie at
the top change requires an understanding
of people to come from desk research
change requires experts to speak on
behalf of people whose problems were
trying to solve so let me tell you how I
describe what I do I say that I design
for the public interest and I work to
design systems that give people power
now when I say this I get one of two
reactions either a blank stare as people
try to understand what it is that I mean
or they nod voraciously so that I think
they understand and we can just go on
talking about something else I’ve worked
to give people power by bringing
children to policy tables bringing
newcomers to the center of capital
projects in marginalized communities and
bringing frontline caseworkers into the
design of critical benefits that they
deliver every day I look for places
spaces and systems where citizens voices
aren’t heard because I believe that when
we engage those closest to the problem
we’re trying to solve we have a better
chance at designing a solution that
actually meets their needs and I believe
that it is our right to be considered
and it’s actually maybe even a simpler
way of describing what I do that I Pete
help people understand that we all have
a right to be considered for a long time
most of my work was done alongside folks
who had dedicated their entire lives and
careers to making social change happen
and social change makers myself included
are the worst sometimes because I hear
this painful orthodoxy all the time this
social sector is good the corporate
sector is bad this is the accepted and
unchallenged wisdom around change-making
and it turns out it isn’t true so I
decided to try and experiment a few
years ago I decided that working
exclusively in the social sector
wouldn’t help me scale the impact that I
want to see happen in the world if we
want to increase access to dignified
housing we need to work with insurance
companies we need to work with banks
housing experts perhaps those even in
academia if we want cities more like
what Urbanists jane jacobs envisioned
they would be safe places with eyes on
the street like the diverse array of
commercial and community and
recreational amenities we need to work
with developers policy officials
community organisations and small
business owners so I accepted the
position to lead the Canadian studio of
the oldest design and innovation firm in
the world we work to bring together
people and organizations in the public
and private sector to remind them that
if they focus less on protecting their
scale their size and their market share
and they focus more on building things
that are driven from deep and nuanced
human insights they win and they can
still make money I wanted to see if we
could have a material impact on the
issues that matter by bringing
billion-dollar organizations into these
really cool places the homes the lives
the workplaces and hearts of the people
that they’re trying to serve essentially
we teach large organizations how to
listen and have them confront their
organizational egos about how much they
actually know about the people they’re
trying to serve so often they orient
themselves towards what’s feasible and
viable that they completely forget
what’s desirable for people now this is
not because large organizations are bad
or because they don’t care it’s because
they think that people problems are too
small and the problems they’re trying to
solve are so big and they forget that
small people problems are their big
problems as an example our studio is
Reese
engaged by our federal government in
Canada to solve the challenge of
onboarding seniors to one of the most
critical benefits programs available to
them now it should be known that this
program has single-handedly contributed
to reducing poverty for seniors living
in Canada and the federal government had
a hunch that creating digital platforms
would facilitate and increase access
they had invested a lot of money against
developing against this hunch and they
hadn’t gone and talked to people yet so
we went and talked to people we went and
talked to seniors and social workers
helping seniors and we discussed the
experience of Aging and we heard two
things one it’s really embarrassing to
age and feel like you need handouts from
the government and two even if you do
when your senior you don’t have a Sherpa
you don’t have someone beside you to
help you figure it all out and so we
spent all this time looking for this big
transformational digital innovation and
really what we needed to create to solve
this very critical problem was a PDF 26
pages that quickly and simply educate
seniors that a it’s a benefit it’s not
welfare it’s just a thank you for being
Canadian and B you can literally trace
your finger along a decision tree in a
few minutes and figure out if you’re
eligible and as designers our instinct
was to make a cool and interactive and
we kept getting told by seniors and
social workers not to bother because
they were just gonna print it out
anyways we learned that we weren’t in
fact serving a digital mandate but we
were addressing the shame and opaqueness
of government systems it was a literacy
building exercise not a digital one and
it takes courage to solve for something
that specific like solving for shame but
when we do we save millions of dollars
we address a need very quickly the
solution is now out in the world it’s
not caught up in the Machine of
government and we invest in building the
right thing once instead of partially
effective things twice
this work matters in real life it’s not
as pithy and involves managing a lot of
anxiety uncertainty and egos it requires
us to honor and respect systems that
people uphold and then gently and
simultaneously move them toward
dismantling those systems so they can
create the impact that they want to have
in the world now people don’t write
managing egos anxieties uncertainties in
most job descriptions this work helps me
achieve my goal of giving people power
and supporting people to have power in
their lives and communities but when
people ask me what I do I still don’t
have the courage to simply say I work
really hard and I try to create systems
that give people voice sometimes I get
called a designer sometimes an innovator
sometimes a consultant and all of those
titles make me shudder they don’t feel
honest they don’t feel like they really
capture what I do so today I challenge
the orthodoxy that having a fancy title
means that you have power because if I
truly believe that kids can build
buildings and people suffering with
addiction issues can design the most
thoughtful healthcare systems and new
moms can design the most envelopment
retail experiences then I have to
believe that they can do it without
credentials without a fancy title that
they can hang their hat on innovating
large institutions and big bad companies
meant leaving the social enterprise that
I built and ran for ten years you know
most people know me as a as a thinker
and social change and and citizen
engagement and civic innovation and here
I was going to run a design studio that
had just been purchased by the largest
management consulting firm in the world
in the minds of most people
I was definitely leaving the world of
change making and I heard the word
sellout a stint that this was a phase I
was going through and it hurts
it felt like it was attacking my
identity at its core and challenging
what I was actually trying to do it left
me feeling judged but these feelings
were signals to me there were signals
that I was pushing up against them
entrenched orthodoxies about who owns
change-making
I am learning that social change cannot
just be left to those working in the
social sector I’m learning that we have
to diversify the number of entities that
solve people problems and I’m learning
that those entities include both two
person art collaborative and
billion-dollar companies I’ve often
thought that this picks up on the work
that one of my greatest influences Jane
Jacobs where she left off she wasn’t a
planner or an economist yet she served
as one of the most influential thinkers
of our time in both of those spaces and
she used her influence to build soap
boxes for others like her she wanted it
to be valued that lived experience has
power and that you don’t need to be an
expert to make change happen you just
have to have a willingness to see that
change happens everywhere in the last
line of her seminal book the death and
life of great American cities she so
poignantly says that lively diverse
intense cities contain the seeds of
their own regeneration with energy
enough to carry over for problems and
needs outside of themselves I believe
that when we invest in diversifying who
gets to participate in solving wicked
problems we to plant the seeds of our
own regeneration we diversify the types
of experiences approaches ideas and
expertise they give us a better shot at
building solutions that stick resilient
ideas that can adapt as the world
changes and evolves so today I challenge
you talk about what you do without a
title please stop saying it let I’m just
I’m just a mom I’m just a volunteer I’m
just a student don’t rest on the name of
your organization your boss your degree
your school give your lived experience
some power and know that that’s saying I
do work that I deeply care about and
it’s good is the best credential you
could ever have
thank you
[Applause]
Please follow and like us: