#18 | Responsable Citizen | Jo Barnard

Regenerative Business with Jo Barnard (Morrama) 

What does regenerative business really mean and why is sustainability no longer enough? 

In this episode of Conversations with Roberto, Roberto Inderbitzin sits down with Jo Barnard, Founder and Creative Director of Morrama, to explore how responsible design, leadership, and regenerative thinking can shape better products and better businesses. 

Jo shares why designers must think beyond objects, how product lifespan affects culture and resources, and why businesses should aim to give more than they take. 

This conversation is for founders, designers, and leaders who care about impact, longevity, and meaningful innovation. 

In this episode: 

- Regenerative vs sustainable business
- Designing for an appropriate lifespan
- Responsibility in leadership and design
- B Corp, ethics, and culture
- The future of business and humanity

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Transcript

Jo: [00:00:00] I think businesses should all be regenerative. And when I say regenerative, and I've thought about this a lot as to what this term means. And for me, it's about giving more than you take. 

Roberto: I'm not sure if this for you, but do you wanna create products and experiences with the potential to become iconic in this podcast?

Is. Welcome to Conversation with Roberto. Here I sit down with top runners, innovators, designers, founders, and top leaders. And I'm driven by curiosity and seek to unpack actionable and meaningful insight for you. Because as a designer, I believe I have an obligation to create more than just well designed products and experiences.

This creation must serve a clear purpose, embody innovation, perform exceptionally, and exhibit an outstanding quality. In essence, my goal is to guide you in building iconic products and experiences that matter and get people talking about you. Just imagine with this knowledge, we can create a better future for all of us.

I'm Roberto in biting the founder of REFRAME frame.design, and internationally active purpose-driven design studio based here in Zurich, [00:01:00] Switzerland. ~By bye.~

There is a great story on the book when you were like talking like your first product that you launched eraser or your own product, and I mean, it looks easy on from the outside, you know, like design a product, produce a product. But after that, like the sales there, 

Jo: it was, uh, 

Roberto: yeah, the shipping and all, that's such a headache.

Jo: It was, it was the moment. It was definitely the product that made us realize that we were designers and not salesmen and. I have no interest of going through that process again for a long time. Anyway, it was stressful, but really, really insightful to fully understand the logistics of ordering and shipping and managing warehouse stock and everything of a product, and it's equally important to understand as a designer, what happens to your product after they're designed.

Roberto: I think it's super important. I mean something that you can talk with your client and they're like, okay. They got us. They know, they understand what we hassle every day. ~Cool.~ I like the part where you're like, try putting the trolley on, on the streets. Like, 

Jo: yes. 

Roberto: That's just, that was painful. Anyhow, so I'd like [00:02:00] to start the question, like the cocktail question.

So when you're having, um, a cocktail or beer at the bar and somebody asks you, so what do you do and why do you do that? ~What's, uh, usually the, the answer you give? ~

Jo: Well. What do I do? We design physical products and so anything that gets manufactured at scale, by that I mean it's not a single one-off piece of craft we will work on.

It can range from packaging to luggage, to tech, to tableware. It's a real kind of variety of things that we, that we work on and all with a really thoughtful approach to what that. Product means, what's that experience that we're creating and what's the impact of that product in its life and at the end of its life?

Roberto: And what drove you to these end physical products? 

Jo: Well, I was fortunate my school, we had product design as an A level and that's becoming more rare in, uh, in schools in the uk. And I was able to take small class. There was small, there wasn't very many of us who had a lot of attention from the teacher and [00:03:00] we got to.

To experiment with different materials and make different things. And I made a, a table and a lamp shelving and really just loved the sort of hands-on tactility of making something real, making something physical, and there was a logical step to just take that curiosity and passion for a subject into university.

So. There I was. I was studying it at university, and once you have a degree in something, you feel like you need to use it. And here we go. Here I am. 

Roberto: The one thing is designing it and building it, but then you decided to, to start your own studio. Yes. Which it's a, it's a 

Jo: big step, 

Roberto: especially like, yeah. Yeah.

It is a big step. Anyhow, whatever it is people 

Jo: say it's a big step. I think at the time it just felt like a series of small steps, to be honest. It was. I wasn't on my own, and I think that I am now the sole founder and the kind of chief of morrama, but at the time I had a, a friend from university who was really keen to start a studio together.

And I think that when there's two of you, everything feels a little bit [00:04:00] less scary because. You have each other, and he was really, really keen and I was already just working freelance, so it was such a small step for me to go from working under my own name to then working under a company name. Not to say that I was an established freelancer.

I had been doing it for like less than six months. And yeah, most of my income came from a part-time design assistants job that I had where I was basically just a CAD monkey. So I still had that role. I, it wasn't as if I just packed up everything, started with a complete blank piece of paper and said, right now let's create a business.

It's, it was just a series of small steps that over time I let go of any other work I've solely focused on morrama. A year later, Rob, who I'd started the business with, left. And so by that point, it had been a year. I knew the sort of ins and outs of what we were doing, and it just slowly happened bit by bit.

So it seems like a big step to people from the outside, but honestly from the inside it really [00:05:00] was just one foot in front of the other. 

Roberto: I mean, now it seems that a lot of designers. After you need to go and build their own design studios or it's more common. I think 10 years ago it wasn't that common in the field here.

I don't know. It's how in the uk 

Jo: certainly not any that come to mind. From my immediate circle of like design peers, there were a couple that subsequently started their own teams and you know, I obviously know them. Because it's not a big kind of community in the uk. But yeah, I think it, it's become more common because there's less jobs.

So now designers have no choice. I mean, if they want to work, you either set up by yourself to some capacity, whether that's just taking the odd kind of piece of freelance work here and there, or you become employed and if you, there's no employers taking on juniors, then you kind of only have one option.

So I think there are more people taking that jump, taking that risk. It's a lesser of two [00:06:00] scenarios. I mean, either way, if you have no money, you have no job. You've gotta start somewhere. So, yeah, and I, and I think also there are, there's a bit of a pressure and a bit of a squeeze on the creative industry at the moment.

It's if businesses are not doing that well and there's been a lot of, you know, big companies posting for profit, not meeting their revenue targets. And so a lot of the time it, the reaction to that. Which I think in some cases is not the right reaction, but is the reaction nonetheless is that companies will double down on what they're currently doing rather than invest heavily in new product development.

Roberto: Yeah, that's something that I don't get that one, or, yeah, they still do that. And 

Jo: so that might mean that they cut creative budgets, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they. Don't want to bring in that creativity. So they may seek smaller, more agile teams, smaller, maybe work with freelancers over an agency, for example, and, and that means that there is opportunity there for those who are kind of entering the career and looking for.

Opportunities. If [00:07:00] they're, yeah, if they find a ways to take them. 

Roberto: Sure. At the beginning you started actually working more with startups, is that right? And at the moment you are still with startups and also like established brands. Do you feel that this. A lot of startups wanna be like this huge brand, so they wanna be stay lean and and innovative.

And when is the shift, when they like stopping this innovative, do you see something from, from your side? 

Jo: Most startups don't have a huge amount of foresight. Like they might have a, they might have a five year plan, but I don't know how many actually stick to that. It's mostly put together for investors and, but I do think that there's real enjoyment in the sort of early stage lean, agile nature of companies and.

Firstly, we love working with them during that phase, and, and I think that there's a, there's definitely sort of an excitement, you know, within the, within the companies as well. When there is increasing pressure from investors, then it becomes, and. As you grow by nature, the risks become higher. Releasing a [00:08:00] a product, when you earn a brand that's nobody knows and something goes wrong with that product, nobody cares.

But if you've got millions of customers and you bring something out and or you. Release an update to something and it doesn't land as you expected, it can really, really damage your reputation. You know, there is an increasing level of risk and, and therefore sort of everything slows down a little bit. I don't think that most companies these days want to be as slow and immobile as the really big corporates.

Like, who would want that? Nobody. There's not even a level of security that comes with that. It's just sluggishness and, and, and inability to move and adapt. So I think there's definitely. The other way perhaps, you know, there's big companies seeking to actively work more lean and, and, and be more agile because you need to, to, to adapt.

In the world that we live in right now, everything is changing, regulations are changing, political landscape is changing. You know, you could be slapped with tariffs and suddenly you need to move your whole supply chain [00:09:00] around. You know, the sue canal gets blocked and you stock doesn't land for six months, like everything is up in the end.

I think with climate change on top of that, we're only gonna see. Things become more unpredictable. 

Roberto: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's something that we, as designers, we are tend to look into the future. I mean, we design into the future with the design for the now that's a part of, yeah, I think that's something that we can actually contribute a lot to the companies.

But as you mentioned, like it. When you do a, a product that is gonna be be sold hundreds, thousands, millions of times, how do you handle that pressure? Or how do you look into designing a product that is gonna be relevant in five years or in two years when they launch it or even longer? ~What is the intention behind the the product?~

Jo: I mean, if we can get it right once, then we don't worry too much about how many times it's gonna be made, because it's crazy when you think about it. If it's in, you know, in terms of millions or tens of millions of units. But at the same time, you have a responsibility to think about. [00:10:00] The impact of that at that scale.

So the positive impact that you can create by bringing a product to market that is maybe more sustainable than what's come before, or, uh, improves people's lives. Then there's the, the kind of material impact of that product. Because yeah, we design a product for maybe today or then next year or the year after that, but actually most of the materials that we're using fundamentally will.

Will last in that form for centuries, you know, or at least decades. And so how can you make something that remains relevant for that amount of time? You fundamentally, you can't because we don't know what the world's gonna look like in 10 years. If we think back what happened 10 years ago, there's, it's crazy to think how far technology has come and you have to create.

I mean, it's why we believe in creating objects that are as simple as possible, because then their core function is. You know, something that [00:11:00] can remain and then can, will last. And therefore it will serve a purpose as a tool, uh, for, for as long as possible rather than, you know, chucking in a load of a load of sort of things or, or reacting to trends.

We wanna create something that in its material value has. Value. So a way that you could kind of break it down into its component parts and, and recapture those materials, those, you know, the, the electronics, the battery, the plastics, the metals, whatever it may be that you've used to put that object together.

And then from a de design perspective, you know, creating something that is simple and beautiful. Encourages a sense of pride. You know, the customer, you want someone to want to own that product and you want to look after it. But if they don't want it anymore, that they see enough value in passing it on.

And rather than it being something that's a bit complicated that they didn't really like and that therefore they don't really wanna put that on anybody else. And when it comes to it, they don't hand it on or pass it down. They just sort of put it in the bin and [00:12:00] hope that nobody judges them for it. 

Roberto: Yeah, that's the scary part, isn't it?

If you have the old, I mean, you have first of the design brief, which is kind of like, okay, that's things we wanna do. But then on the other hand, it's like what everything else that comes with it. Like you wanna build something that's gotta be forever, let's say next 10 years, people are gonna love it.

Yeah. 

Jo: I mean, we talk about sustainability, but really it's about future proofing. It's making a product remain relevant and remain useful and remain. Functional or, and it's equally valid to create objects or create things that are designed not to last. That are designed to, to serve a temporary purpose and then to be able to return to a valuable material, um, you know, as easily as possible or into the ground, you know, something that can break down and decompose in a safe way.

It's not about necessarily designing everything for longevity, but certainly designing for an appropriate lifespan. 

Roberto: I see you, you're not using the, the word purpose here. 

Jo: Well, 

Roberto: I, yeah. I don't know. I mean, it's, it's. [00:13:00] Even I use it on the, on my website, the design we, we design with purpose, but I don't know, it can be so inflated and it's so difficult to just break it down what it is.

It's funny because 

Jo: I don't think we use that word on our site anywhere, and it's not something that's really a part of, of the language that we use. We are definitely a purpose-driven agency. I mean, everybody in the team has a sense of responsibility as a, as a designer, that we are crafting, you know, the future to some extent.

We're not in control of much. I mean, the world is far too complex for that. But within these little systems that we work within, you know, with each, with each product, we have a, you know, that, that. Object is gonna be in the hands of people and it's going to be giving people jobs and responsibilities and it's going to, it's part of a system that's made up of loads of different stakeholders, and we have a responsibility to think about that wider system, not just that product, and designed for that and designed to nudge behavior to be better across that.

Supply chain all the way through to that [00:14:00] product's end of life, however we can. And I think that is what gives us purpose then, then great. And we will continue to do. Good work and 'cause we love it and we think that, you know, it gives it meaning, it gives that object meaning to have to have been not just, oh, let's make this pretty thing and now we'll do it like that 'cause it's cheap, but like, actually what's the, what's 

Roberto: exactly.

Then let's, let's move to another one. I remember that, uh, on the last conversation you talked that you wanna be a responsible citizen as a designer to be a responsible citizen. And I, I really like that. Yeah. To take responsibility of the, of the product, of the resources of. The environment, everything we do, and I mean, that reflects on, on your new product 

Jo: when it was about 20 20, 20 21.

There was a lot of conflict in my mind about the, the state of the, the climate and also the systems that we work within. You know, this, this system that's absolutely reliant on production and consumption and the work that we do, [00:15:00] and thinking maybe it would be better for the environment. I put some of my energy anyway into something else, you know, not creating or adding to this, you know, not creating a new product or adding to the problem of potential like waste and, and impact and carbon and everything.

But I had a really interesting conversation with a guy called Rupert Reed, who has many. Clever things to say and he started something called the Climate Majority Project, and he said something, which to me is now really, really obvious, which is that as a, as a human being, the best thing that you can do when it comes to trying to make a difference to the climate crisis is to apply the best skills you have.

So not. Go out and necessarily stand on a picket line or, uh, stick yourself to the road. But, uh, not necessarily just re you know, not recycling and cutting down your flights, although all valid things to do, but actually apply the, the training and the skills you have that [00:16:00] you are good at. In the best way.

And so I see that the responsibility is not just in me as a designer to, to be thinking about the impact of, you know, human, non-human and planetary need in every project we do, but also my responsibility as a person on this planet, as a human in this society wants to help protect that society. I mean, that's the point, right?

Like we're, we need a purpose in life. It is to be. A responsible citizen. 

Roberto: Yeah, that would, will be actually great tool as, as a hat or I don't know, like for the design schools and professionals and all that, so 

Jo: Yes, and it's, it is interesting. Maybe go 

Roberto: for it. Go for it. 

Jo: We will. Yeah, it is. We'll design something up and uh, and you can promote it on your site, on your, uh, podcast.

Roberto: Yeah, definitely. We'll do that. Absolutely. Is that the reason why you guys went into a B Corp? Or was that before you had the conversation? We started 

Jo: talking about B Corp a long time before, back in like 2018 actually, when it was really, really novel to for anybody to be B Corp, but we didn't. Actually fully [00:17:00] go through the process until after the pandemic and think we were accredited in 2022 or 23.

And one of the reasons was that we just believed in the movement. We believed in. We believe in what B Corp stands for. We feel like it's been an incredible process to go through and it definitely taught us a lot about how to run a really. Good ethical business more so than from a sustainability perspective, actually, the, the actual, you know, how to run a really productive environment, you know, that's, that's conducive to good work with good people and yeah, really proud of the B Corp badge on our website.

Roberto: I don't know if it took a lot of convincing inside of your team to go to tower sets since, uh, I mean, reading your book, it feels. That everybody's aligned with each other. Like it's aligned in a way of, that's kind of like the mission not aligned of maybe there's some people that they have different opinions and listen to each other.

You have respect to each other, ~but, uh, yeah, you're, you guys are ~aligned to, to build something that it's lasting. 

Jo: ~I mean, it's, ~

Roberto: ~it look, it feels like, I mean no, no, no. Like internally ~

Jo: we're all, we're all aligned. But you what, like, that's for [00:18:00] sure. Everybody has different ideas and opinions and that's. If we didn't, then it would be a useless design agency because we'd all just have, we wouldn't have any, we wouldn't be challenging each other.

Right. And so the ideas that came out would be pretty one sided, but no, it's. Everybody at MUR believes that our work is not just to design a beautiful object, but it's to think about the context in which that sits and the impact in which it has and the future in which we are ultimately like that object is going to persist into.

And so I love the fact that everybody really wants to explore those futures. And we do A lot of, you mentioned earlier, like the idea of of, of like futures design and we do a lot of exploratory work off brief. You know, if we've got a topic that one of the team's interested in, we'll just all. Get behind it for a couple of weeks and, and just talk about it and research it.

And yeah, by the end of it, we're just like really full of ideas and then, then it just sort of sits and percolates and suddenly little [00:19:00] kind of relevances and, and connections come out of that, which we can bring into the, you know, existing projects, but also just really help us in navigating like how we want the world to look like, like what are we working towards?

Because, you know, even just the topic that we were discussing the other day, the, a lot of people in the world that believe the natural evolution of humans, you know, the next step in evolution is to become much more at one with the machine and with the evolution of ai, you know, and robotics and everything, you can really see this, this shift happening.

And yet there's this equal and opposite. Powerful movement of people that absolutely believe that we are so deeply connected to nature, that it's impossible for us to separate ourselves from that and even just really. Having a discussion about the impact of that, you know, without putting our own, necessarily our own opinions into the mix, but like what does it look like?

You know, what does the future of education in a transhumanist world, what's the future of education? [00:20:00] If we look well, what's the history of education if we take a more animist approach? And I think it's really fascinating to think about that. Particularly for me having just like recently had a child and knowing that it's, this is his.

These are the sort of tensions that is are coming, you know, in his future where there is this like increasing challenge. Yeah, a challenge between the tech, you know, technology and, and nature. And particularly when the climate is becoming and the planet is becoming increasingly impacted by what we are doing as humans in society.

Roberto: And in such an increased speed that actually it's scary. You think about like what's happened in the last couple two years, just in two years in terms of, uh, education, ai, what's happening, um, with all of those, uh, newest technologies. So yeah. That's, that's scary. I mean, I have an also a, a kid and it's, uh, it's mind blowing what's, what's happening and in my opinion, one of the best approaches is to help them learn to be, uh, to, to love the learning part.

To love to learn new skills. [00:21:00] Kinda like the entrepreneurial approach. There's a problem, solve it. There's another one, solve it. Instead of like learning it as it used to be 10 years ago, 15 years ago, because I don't think that's, that should be sailed. 

Jo: I mean, we, we have an education system that's still very much a legacy from the early industrial revolution that's taught us to turn upon time and be a good factory worker.

Actually, there's this level of creativity and critical thinking and ability to adapt that we are going to need to have the resilience to meet the challenges the future brings. And that comes for me, that comes from, from collaboration and, and being able to bring different people together to make things, to create solutions fast rather than.

Working, you know, independently in silo and being able to do that in a really kind of adaptable way. And it's obviously like much of what we do at work, to be honest, because every brief brings a completely different product. [00:22:00] We have to learn a whole new set of skills to, to tackle that brief. Have to understand.

Like a completely different technical requirements. The, you know, new build, new relationships with new stakeholders, new manufacturers, new supply chains, everything has changed. Everything is new. It is the fun part. It's the bit that I love the most is that we're constantly learning and I think that we are humans, our curious creatures.

We want to. We want to learn given the right circumstances, but in many cases we've just created an environment where everything is, is, is quite simple. It's quite easy, uh, in, in particularly in the western world. And so I'm really interested in what's coming in the future because I think there's going to be challenges.

But you know, there's obviously the climate crisis. Puts a huge amount of pressure on things like migration, which puts a huma, huge amounts of pressure on politics, material resources puts a and unpredictability of material pricing is gonna change the way we make, we're [00:23:00] looking to onshore as globalization per perhaps.

Starts to shrink. It's posing a lot of opportunities as well as, you know, potential for challenges. And I don't know, innovation comes from those moments. 

Roberto: Yeah. When there's pressure, then there's innovation. You look a lot into the future. ~I think I like that.~ 

Jo: Yeah. I mean, you can't, you, 

Roberto: ~sorry.~ 

Jo: We learn a lot, I think by, by imagining plausible futures.

And there's this, um, that I, I love called Zootopia, which is, it's like looking at ways in which we can approach. Future challenges in a realistic way rather than perhaps like a dis the, the, um, paralysis of dystopia and the. Unrealistic, kind of optimistic hopefulness of utopia, which 

Roberto: minority report? Uh, 

Jo: yes.

Well, so like this is what we do a lot idea of, of through Utopia exploring those. But you learn a lot about yourself as, and also we learn about a lot about each other in, within the team actually, because everybody has like a slightly different view on what we think the future's gonna [00:24:00] be. Nothing more telling, I think, than asking somebody what they think about the future because it really, it really reveals.

Kind of what they, we all have opinions about the past, but it's ultimately fact. 'cause it's done, it's there, but nobody knows really what's hap gonna happen in the future. And so 

Roberto: they're giving some, some beers, two, two or three beers. And that's gonna change a bit more and deeper. Getting deeper. It's, yeah.

Yeah. It's, it's interesting. It's 

Jo: very interesting. 

Roberto: Yeah. It's, it's super interesting. And af uh, did you read the book of, uh, Nick Foster about the future? No, 

Jo: I not read that yet. It's a good, 

Roberto: ~highly interesting book.~ It's good. It's because it's not this, about this utopia, it's more like. Observing and those different kind of people that look their future different like the could, like the should and so on.

~And it's so interesting.~ It's like looking from a different angle, not just imagining, you know, what the future's gonna be, flying cars, let's say. And just talk with the people in the corner store, how they interact with each other. And then you see so much about the future and how they're gonna be in the, in the next couple of years, they're still gonna go and do some [00:25:00] shopping, they're gonna do some buying some cigarettes in the old fashioned way.

It's not all shiny and Yeah. Yeah. Minority port style. I 

Jo: mean, human nature isn't going to disappear because we have a new form of technology or the next smartphone. We are designed to be empathetic, to connect with each other, to be sociable, and to have those moments where, as you say, you. Sit and chat on a street corner.

And I think there was an interesting period of time when I was teaching at the Royal College of Arts. So I was an associate lecturer on the Design Futures platform and every year I would sit down with a different cohort of students and we would explore the potential future scenarios. And it was really fascinating.

And these were, you know, they were young people, so mostly in their early twenties, and they had very. In many cases, [00:26:00] quite dystopian v visions of, of the future. So they were taking their, their ideas to quite negative directions. I mean, these were kids that had had, you know, key teenage years in, in lockdown, have grown up around technology.

You've got Trump, you've got a lot of fake news, you've got this. Yeah, there's a lot, like a lot kind of going on. And so yeah, there's a lot of feeling that life wasn't gonna get better. As, as the years go by, it was going, things were gonna get more and more difficult and understandably, like, I think a lot of people feel that or, or believe that.

But also it really depends on your viewpoint as to what better or worse is. One of my roles or one of, or at least what I felt my role was, was to bring it back to the human level. So yes, you've painted a picture where there is increasing level of data and surveillance and there's, nobody has any privacy anymore, and social media is.

Become this like real life and everyone's sort of [00:27:00] living in this really weird digital world and et cetera, et cetera. And you've painted this idea that we've kind of lost our freedoms, but what does that look like when you start to think about somebody at a human level? Like what does a 21-year-old, you know, if you're talking about in their own terms, do in that situation, like what, what do you think their day looks like?

What do you think their reaction is? What do you think their feelings are about this situation? And when you actually spoke to when we actually got down to it to a human level, then that's where things got really, really interesting and a lot less dark and negative and a lot more human and hopeful. And I think because actually, if you really think about it.

We're still gonna find ways to do the things that are essential to us. Eat, sleep, keep warm, drink, click, clean. And then the next step is connect. Have we still have family? We still have friends. No one takes those away. And then you still have creativity. You still have ways of finding entertainment, making [00:28:00] music, gaming, going out and playing football.

And actually then life doesn't look that crazy anymore because it's like, well, if you still have all of those things. Isn't that what's important? And so, yeah, it's really interesting. I find it fascinating. 

Roberto: It is fascinating. Just imagine, I mean, you have all the gadgets and then you're sick and you're still at home, drink your tea and are, I don't know, on the sofa, on the blanket.

All technology, everything. And you're like still sick as 50 years ago. ~So it's like, yeah. It takes a, yeah, makes it develop. Bit, lot of relevant to looking at the new technology. Yeah.~ But I mean, it seems to be very positive on the, on the future, what's happening. 

Jo: Yeah. Well, I see no benefit in walking around with a frown.

It's much. Not to say that there aren't days where I'm finding it difficult to know, like, you know, to find the motivation to get out of bed. Everybody has those days, but I'm very fortunate. I have an amazing environment to come into work to. The team are amazing and we do great projects with great clients and most importantly, we have the freedom to push and pull the business in the directions we wanna go.

And so if we're as a team, really [00:29:00] passionate about something and we wanna go and explore it, we can do that. And that's a really, really fortunate position to be in. And I'm, and I'm obviously, I recognize how grateful, how lucky I am. To have that freedom, but it's, uh, we don't take it for granted, that's for sure.

Roberto: How do you do that? I mean, you, you talk about, about finding the, the freedom in, in business. Yeah. I mean, you, you are the owner in this case. Yeah. So you're the founder, and to mention even a female founder, which is rare, even after you wrote here. 

Jo: I did, I did write that once. I was, uh, that was 10 years ago.

Yes. That was one of the first articles I wrote that got a lot of attention because of the title. For those who haven't read it, I don't believe that men are better designers than women, but if you were to judge from history and design teaching. You would think that men must be better because no one ever talks about women.

So, uh, yeah, I'm doing my best to change that opinion. I am the founder and the, and the director of morrama. And therefore, effectively it's not [00:30:00] in the control of anybody other than myself and the team. And if we wanna set ourselves a, you know, a new requirement for the kind of projects we take on, we can do that.

Obviously we have targets to meet. I have to make enough to. Pay everybody in the business and keep the lights on. But we approach every project with the same sense of belief and purpose, if you will. And. That means that we don't, you know, we don't just turn things away because of on the face of it, we think that it's not like, oh, oh, that's not a sustainable project.

It's like nothing's a sustainable project. I mean, we're making products here. Like we're not ignorant to the fact that they are gonna have an impact. If we've got a client that doesn't really understand that impact and doesn't really, hasn't really thought about it that much before, that's great because we get to change that and we get to take them on that journey.

And so there's no requirements to come work with Moama other than. You've got an open mind. And so we are happy to take on all kinds of [00:31:00] jobs, all kinds of projects, and we find the beauty and the interest and the, and the intrigue in, in, in all of them. So yeah, I think when you have that kind of mind mindset and then we've created that kind of culture within the business, then it's a great place to work.

And it's a great place. To, to be, I come in five days a week to the office and I enjoy it. That's very privilege. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, I don't underestimate that, but I did work freaking hard to get it here. 

Roberto: No, I'm, I mean, you're still, I'm, I'm a bet you're still working hard, so, I mean, 

Jo: obviously every day, but, uh, yeah, it's, and it takes, takes nurturing it.

Roberto: So it's not overnight success. 

Jo: I mean, maybe one day I'm waiting for that overnight to happen, but, uh, until then, 

Roberto: I know there's 10 years overnight success 

Jo: will. You never know. I dunno, what'll happen in 10 years? I mean, maybe mi mur will still exist, but it might look like something completely different because we wanna adapt to, we also want to remain adaptable and agile to the [00:32:00] needs of what business needs and, but also to what we believe business should want.

Uh, and tell them, you know, you should, you should want this because this is what's important for what's coming. 

Roberto: What's for you? Something that you believe business is something that doesn't need to be something that just provides revenue or growth or you believe in, in growing as some, some big companies.

Jo: I think businesses should all be regenerative. And when I say regenerative, and I've thought about this a lot as to what this term means. And for me, it's about giving. More than you take. And obviously you've got that in terms of say, regenerative farming or regenerative like manufacturing, some uh, instances makes sense.

But actually from a business perspective, I think it's about doing more for the people that you work with, the communities that you work within, the industries that you operate within, to upskill them, educate them, work [00:33:00] with them, support them on their own journeys and growth towards. Whether that be sustainability or rebuilding community.

And so like at Morrama, we do whatever we can to upskill ourselves with regards to what sustainability and regenerative design is. We'll share that with the wider community. I've done a huge amount of work setting up design declares, which is a community, a growing community that supports the industrial design, um, industry, but also graphic communication, service and digital.

And it's bringing people together to talk about these topics and to, and to, you know, learn about how we can implement more sustainable and regenerative thinking into our design process across. Across countries. You know, this is the global movement now, and that is something that. We can do at Murma because we have an influence, you know, we have a network, we have, uh, we've built a reputation that allows us to demand a certain level of respect.

And so when we [00:34:00] then have these kind of conversations and we share this kind of passionate topic, it's, it gets listened to. And, and I think that as a brand that has a voice, you have an opportunity to stand for something. And, and I, and for companies that don't stand for anything, I think it's such a waste.

It's such a waste. And it's like there's no integrity. There 

Roberto: it is. And it's, yeah. I think what you mentioned, like the waste, such a waste of resources of people that the. You can go towards something that's meaningful and not just something that's just round and round and round it goes. I think it's, yeah, it's mind blowing that so much is just done because it's needs to be done instead of like, yes.

With intention. So how do you take that energy? I mean, where does this energy come from? 'cause you seem a bit of restless. 

Jo: Yeah, I'm a restless, I'm a restless person. For sure. Uh, I am working on about 17 different things at any one time. Most of what the team do, I think is. Try and make sure that I finish one project [00:35:00] before starting another one and actually get things done.

But I just think there's a lot to be done, you know, and there's not enough time in the day to do it all. Uh, there's just a lot of work that I'd like to do. There's a lot that I would like to see. Changed in the world, and I'm always thinking about ways in which that can could be done. I like do a lot of research.

I think I have an amazing team of designers who, who honestly do much more design work than I do these days. I do a lot of strategy work, a lot of research, lot of writing, a lot of thinking and engaging in kind of conversation with, with other people and bringing that knowledge and experience and insight into the team and sharing their knowledge and experience and insight.

Outwardly into the rest of the community. And so, yeah, I'm just like a, a, a conduit most of the time, and that just gives me a lot of energy because there's just a lot of like ideas and knowledge like flowing through me both ways. So I haven't really thought about that before. I think that's really what, where I get my energy from.

Roberto: Yeah. It's, [00:36:00] it seems like, like the sharing and curiosity, like, like little, yeah, yeah. Oh, definitely. Candy store. It's, it's, I think one the, our profession is such a, such a privilege to be a child or to. To let you in a child out without being needing to justify. I've 

Jo: definitely become, yeah, I've become more, it feels like hard, like as I've gotten more comfortable and more confident with, with myself as a creative and definitely had that in me really early on in, in my life and my career.

But then I think def for a while, you know, in the sort of fourth, fifth, sixth year of Morrama, it all got a bit heavy and a bit more focused on. Growing the business. Now I've come background to being, to realizing that actually if you're not having fun, there's no point. You know, it's, I mean, it's, it life is, is fundamentally a role, a game to be played.

And if you're not having fun doing it, then kind of pointless. So, yeah. And I want. The environment, you know, with every project that we work on, the environment that we create for the [00:37:00] people working on that, whether that's in the team or with our clients or stakeholders, to be one of joy and one of passion and one of pride.

Because otherwise the work we're doing is, it's just, it's just a Yeah. It's point again, pointless. Yeah. And have 

Roberto: fun on it. It's funny, I, I, I was, um, I had, uh, Joe Foster on my podcast, um, the founder of Reebock, and then I asked him, so gimme some your tips on. On life and business and is there something you wanna share?

He's like, yeah, there are three, uh, three things that you need to know. First is you need to have fun. Like, okay, I can do that. Second one, have fun, and third one fun. It's like, yeah, okay. Got it. And he is, yeah, he has, he's been done doing great and he's 93 year now ~digital nomad.~ So, um, very good advice, nice person to look up to.

Cool. There's something that I, or I always ask, I mean, we can go on with some other topics, but one thing that I really like to ask is, what is something that you believe that nobody else does? 

Jo: Oh, I believe, and it's not that nobody else believes. For sure. I think that a lot of people have [00:38:00] lost a connection with, I believe that we're all connected to each other and that every, you know, there's a, there's a stream of consciousness that runs through everybody and runs through everything.

This is not a novel. There's lots of people who believe this, but I think that. There's a increasing number of people who have lost the ability to feel that connection. And I think sometimes for me, I, I have a sense of like intuition about an idea or something that is really hard to explain, but it's just like, no, no, this is the way that it is.

This is the way that it should be. And I then have to spend a lot of time trying to work out why it should be like that rather than it just be a feeling it to be something that is known and can be explained. But yeah, I think that. That deep kind of sense of connection is something that we all need to tap back into because historically we've known about it.

You know, there's plenty of, um, there's still tribes around the world that, that innately understand and believe that, and this connection that we have with nature and with each other, and I think that's something that I'm a big believer in. [00:39:00] And I think that's why it's so important to have such positive energy because you draw that to you if you have it.

You know, we've all been in a room with someone who's like deeply negative and just being around them like sucks out the energy even before they've opened their mouth. And there's no, you know, the only way that can be possible is if there's some form of connection between the two of you before if it's not in words.

So yeah, I, I think that's something that I believe in which not many people really. Spend much time thinking about, and I think we should, we should think about it more because I think it would change the way we act if we all really thought about it and the implications that we have, that we have and when 

Roberto: we listen to yourself.

Yeah. Oh, that's great. I like this ending, but I really wanna say that, uh, that your book is, I wanna give you a big praise of the book because I really like Thank you. Reading it. It's refreshing and it's something you can start reading and read through it. And I like that you give it, uh, a voice to, to your team or people that actually impacted, impacted you, and, uh.

I'm as well, which is, it's nice. It doesn't feel like very me, me, me, but it's [00:40:00] us. 

Jo: It's funny having put a book out into the world, because at the time when you're writing it, well, for me, when I was writing it, it felt very easy to get the words out because it felt like the way I've described it, it was like a dish in the oven that was cooked and ready to go and that just needed to get it out.

Of the oven. However, once I got it all out onto a page, I was like, no, this isn't very good. And it took my, um, I actually, my wife is the editor and she's the one person that has been on this journey with me from the beginning and knows me and the business really, really well. And so she was the best person to actually edit the book.

And she did an amazing job and given me the confidence to actually put it out into the world. Because it's one thing, like putting it all on on paper, but there's a whole nother thing, like putting it into print. In a physical book that will be on somebody's shelf and in someone's hand. And, but it's not long and it's not complicated to read.

And I like that about it because my attention span is not, is not long either, and I don't like big words. [00:41:00] So, you know, we've all picked up a book that we're like, oh, this is interesting. And you read through the first chapter and it's like thought provoking, but you have to chew on every sentence. And it's like, it's an effort, you know?

And you get to like halfway and you're like, oh, that will do. It's like, no, no. I want you to read from the very beginning to the very end. It's not, it's not hard to do. No, those books 

Roberto: are horrible. No, that's a good book. It's, it, it's, it's, yeah, but it's deep. It's, you know, 

Jo: it's printed on good paper with, by good people, with good inks and down the road from us.

And that all mattered and we make no money from it because it's far too expensive to make a book these days for the price that you sell it for. But that's okay because it's just a lovely, lovely thing to have in the world that is a stamp of, of like. Us and this is what we stand for and this is what we believe in and this is what we wanna share with the world and hope they learn something.

Roberto: How come you, what was the intention of writing a book? Um, 

Jo: I dunno. A mark in the sand, A celebration. Uh, curious to know what it's like to write a book. I love the idea of writing more books and you've gotta start somewhere. 

Roberto: Cool. So what's your [00:42:00] next? I mean topics I guess you have, I'd like to write something around 

Jo: joy and design.

Uh, design for resilience I think is something that's a topic that's close to my heart right now, but I need, I need a couple more years to really like, dig into the subject and, and look at kind of what other people are doing and learn from other cultures and other countries and other, other ways of thinking and practicing.

So it would be a lot more of a, a thought provoking, deeply researched book than the last one. 

Roberto: I mean, you're good on. Stock provoking the article you wrote here. It's, it's great. 

Jo: Well, yes about 

Roberto: ~the man. It's a great article. I like it. ~Well, I 

Jo: do write a lot, so, and it is, I do have a blog if anyone's interested.

That's comes from Morrama. So it's on, you can access it through our website, but it's, and it's good. Four things a week. I don't actually write it every week. I actually write it every fortnight. But I used to write every week. I should probably change the name to four things at Fortnite, but yeah. Yeah.

Fellow one six sounds like that's, um, a little bit more kind of, yeah. Sort of reflection on what's happening in the world right now and ideas and innovation and [00:43:00] technologies and things that are coming out. So, yeah, I mean, I write a lot. 

Roberto: I like it. It's, uh, it's also, I'm gonna put it on the show notes. I mean, it's, it's a great newsletter when it's out there.

So when it comes out, it's great. So, Joe, thank you so much for, for your insights, for your thoughts. And, uh, the work you're doing. Thank you. Really appreciate it. Thank you for having me on work. Appreciate you. It's 

Jo: been a lovely conversation. 

Roberto: At conversations with Roberto, we believe we can build better brands, experiences, and products by having conversations and learnings from experts and leaders in the fields.

Send this episode to a friend or friends that need those insights and frameworks, and feel free to rate us and review us on your favorite platform. Thank you for listening to conversations with Roberto. Bye.