Ollie Walshの文化的好奇心
This is Reina Moro's podcast, The Creative Mindset.
Hi everyone. Welcome to The Creative Mindset,
a podcast about what the future holds at the intersection of creativity and technology.
I'm Reina Moro, the founding partner of I&CO,
a global innovation firm based in New York, Tokyo, and Singapore.
Today's guest is Ollie Walsh, the founder and CEO of Invisible Dynamics,
a brand transformation agency based in LA.
In part one, we talked about the story behind the scenes of Gap's recent campaign,
Better in Denim. In part two of the conversation,
this was, to be completely honest, was a little unexpected because I didn't think I would hear
from him about the habits and systems that he uses for his life and work and how that enables
the success that he's able to achieve in his work.
And it's these little things that he does in daily routines that make a big difference,
and it made me realize the power of compound interest in life and work.
So let's get started.
Having worked with you for the past month or so, and you and your team are very good about
just paying attention to what's happening in culture and paying attention to the individuals,
say, you know, actors or musicians or culture movers who may be on the cusp of breaking either
big or at least getting recognized more so than they are.
And, you know, you've had a few moments, whether it was Tyra, I think, about a year ago with
the Grammys, I think.
Yeah, 24.
24, so a year and a half ago.
Yeah.
So just, you know, being on top of those things.
So do you do that yourself?
Do you have a team?
And I know some of your team, but, you know, how much of that do you do yourself?
I would say I have a natural cultural curiosity.
I've always loved a variety of aspects of culture.
Obviously, there are some that I particularly over-index in, but I love broad creative
culture. I love all forms of art and design and expressions of that anti-culture.
I love sports.
I love, you know, I play more probably than I follow, but I love theater and dance and
music and film and TV and sort of a multitude of it.
So I'd say I'm a good generalist.
And then certain areas where I have particularly deep interests, I obviously go a little bit
deeper, but I have an incredible team.
And I think the culture that we internally set is of one of cultural curiosity.
And we have an incredibly diverse team.
We have a global team.
We have HQ in Los Angeles.
We have a team now in New York and London.
And I'd say most of my team are more deeply culturally connected to what's happening in
the social media ecosystem, much more than I am.
They are identifying cultural trends that are happening, that are rippling, that are
building.
They're really thinking around connecting the dots between what's happening and then
one of the insights that we can derive from them.
人脈の構築の重要性
And are those insights relevant enough and big enough for us to then ideate against?
And every idea that we have is built upon insights versus instinct.
I think I remember reading either some quote or something that you were mentioned in.
This is like maybe six months ago.
I think it was you and apologies if I got this wrong.
But I thought it was something like you tried to meet a new person like every week.
Was that you?
Yes, exactly.
Yes.
I've done that since I was very young.
And I think it's just become a sort of natural part of and it's become a muscle.
I don't need to think about it.
When I was 21, I sort of thought to myself, okay, if you're that expression, your network
is your net worth, which is, I think, as true now as it has ever been.
I said, well, I don't really know anyone.
I know who I am and therefore, I don't have a powerful network that can support my goals
or that I can leverage for business opportunities.
So I said, well, that's just simple.
Let me meet a simple person every week and say, I have two weeks off and I don't do it.
There's 50 people a year.
And say, then you build relationships with 20% of them.
That's 10 people a year that you've got good, strong relationships with.
習慣形成と複利の力
And I'm a big believer in the power of compound interest across every aspect of life,
whether it be financial management, whether it be relationship building, whether it be
code building.
The more that you do something, it has a disproportionate impact on the outcome when
you think of it through the lens of compound interest.
And so that's one aspect of my sort of professional, one of my systems and habits.
I think a lot about systems and habits and habit building, which can have compound benefit.
So that particular system that you just talked about, do you meet them in person?
What's the system to meet these new people?
Now I probably meet five new people a week or maybe more.
So yes, it's now I'm fortunate enough to be meeting new CEOs and entrepreneurs and founders
and potential team members and members of media.
And so I now meet a great deal of people I love and prefer in person.
To me, that's because you can really get a sense for somebody.
But Zoom is fantastic as well.
I think it opens up the world in a way, which is a really positive thing.
Yeah, yeah.
Do you travel a lot and meet these people?
How much time do you spend on the road?
I spend, I'd say, as little as I can, which is still a lot.
Yes.
I have three kids and I'm a big believer in being very present in their lives.
And so I think it's a very short window of time where you have small children around
and it's really important to be around for them.
But at the same time, we have partners all over the world and team all over the world.
Yeah, yeah.
And they're doing activity all over the world.
So it's also important to be there in person for all of those reasons.
Yeah, sure, sure, sure.
健康と非二元的意思決定
So then it's about the balance between the two.
Yeah, yeah.
What are other systems and habits that you can share?
What are the secrets that you, in order to generate compound interest?
What are the systems?
Yeah, definitely.
I mean, there's a few simple hacks.
There's one which is about personal health.
Because I'm a big believer that you need to look after yourself and put as much effort
into your health as you do into your personal aspects of your life.
And so there's a very simple thing I did maybe.
But there's really two things that I did probably coming up to eight years ago now,
10 years ago, was through this lens of non-binary decision making.
Non-binary decision making?
Non-binary decision making.
So if you remove the yes, no from the equation, then it makes habit forming a lot easier.
So if I go, oh, hey, Ray, you're going to do some exercise today.
And you go, oh, I didn't know.
Let me look at my diary.
Maybe.
Like I might do, I might not.
Chances are that you might not do some exercise.
Whereas when it comes to exercise, I do exercise every day.
There's no no.
I'm never no.
So it changes the opinion from, am I going to exercise today?
To what and when am I going to do?
And then you make it your schedule because it's not a choice.
I don't have a choice.
I don't have a choice not to do exercise today.
But what exercise am I going to do?
When am I going to do it?
And how long is it going to take?
So, OK, just to make sure I understood this correctly.
So you've removed these non-binary decisions from your, is this both your life, like personal
life and work?
It's anywhere that I see an opportunity to apply it for the benefit of of my personal
professional life.
So the answer is either yes or no.
No, you remove the yes or no.
Oh, you remove the yes or no?
You remove the yes or no, because if you if there's a yes or no, then you can go one way
or another.
So you either 100% yes or 100% no.
So my 100% yes is every day I do exercise.
I have to.
And so then I have a very busy life and I travel and I do that.
But I have to do something every day.
I know that.
So then I just have to consider that into my schedule.
And then what that does is it means I'm much healthier as a result of it, because I exercise
健康習慣の重要性
every day and I have to think about it and plan for it and make it happen.
The other one is on weekdays, before dinner, I don't eat carbohydrates.
That's a no.
So in breakfast, I just have a bulletproof coffee and lunch, I just have a salad and
protein and that's it.
So I'm never going to be like, oh, I feel like I'm feeling hungover.
Maybe I should have a pasta or this.
I don't have it.
And then that helps me from a dietary perspective, combined with my health.
Interesting.
Where did this come from?
I actually read this.
There's a chief investment officer newsletter that I get and he has a fund, which is quite
successful.
He sends out these sort of newsletters about investment philosophies, but also life philosophies.
I read this, like I said, maybe eight, 10 years ago.
He had applied it in his life and I thought, oh, that's a very interesting principle.
Let me give that a try.
Give me an example of this system applied to some of the things that you talked about,
the two things that you talked about, health-related decisions like exercise or diet.
Yeah.
Tell me how you may apply this to a non-health-related, say like work-related decision.
Well, I mean, it's the system that you mentioned about meeting a new person every week.
So just a yes.
You have to meet somebody new every week.
And so, okay, if you have to do that, then it's not a yes or no.
It's like, just say yes.
It becomes just about figuring out how do you incorporate that into your professional,
your week.
Yeah.
So yeah.
That type of thing is, it's a lot.
And then that's sort of non-binary.
And then of course, there's more common hacks such as stylistic hacks.
If you basically have a wardrobe like I do, which is basically tonal, it makes life easy.
You can just get up and you can put any combination of anything on and it's white,
blue, black, and maybe a little bit of gray and that's it.
And you don't have to think about it.
Because so as opposed to having to actually think about what your wardrobe is,
but you can shave time down by just pour, pour, pour.
Okay, great.
Everything you know works because it's tonal and it's modular.
And so, yeah, there's definitely efficiencies in that front.
Yeah.
But are you doing these systems in order to, why are you doing these systems?
I'm really curious and fascinated about this.
I'm doing them to ultimately get, they say, if you want to achieve your goals,
focus on your systems, not on outputs.
And I'm a big believer in that.
I think it's okay.
So I have goals.
I have objectives.
I want to be as healthy.
I want to have the greatest quality of health span, not just lifespan.
I don't want to get sick and incapacitated when I'm old.
And so I know that.
I know that now.
So then I focus on these health habits now.
And I will actually have much better chance of being strong and healthy
when I'm older in life than if I weren't.
人間関係の構築
You know, I want to, I love meeting interesting people.
I also know and believe that your network is your net worth
and that the deep relationships that you have with successful individuals
and not just successful individuals who inspire you
and who you can build those type of relationships with,
that will have a myriad of benefits across the different ways.
They will, you know, more interesting things.
They'll have you on the podcast.
They'll bring commercial opportunities to you.
All of the things above.
And then if you need, oh, hey, I need a partner for this
or I need a solution for that, or I need somebody,
you can pick up the phone.
Hey, what do you think?
And so, you know, there's going to be unexpected benefits
from having an incredible network of amazing people.
And then also it gives you, that's what life's about.
I think it gives you energy and it's exciting.
So I think all of those, there's so many elements, you know,
and I like structure because I think we can't control so much of the world.
日常の決定の重要性
And so giving structure to aspects of the world helps.
I use that across rubric.
And if you break down, I typically break down personal,
professional, family and health.
Those are the four categories against which I set my goals,
my short-term goals.
And so I think personally within those rubrics.
And then of course, when it comes to building businesses,
if we are wanting to become one of the most creative companies on the planet
to build scale, and in order to build scale,
you need to have infrastructure.
And in order to have effective industry,
you need to have really thoughtful, logical,
people, processes, technologies,
and the sort of underlying ways of communicating and thinking,
which then deliver proven results in the pursuit of what it is that you're growing.
Yeah. Yeah.
Wow. This is a side of you I didn't know.
We rarely get to talk about these systems and habits in business meetings.
So I'm glad that I brought you into this conversation.
So that was part two of my conversation with Ollie Walsh,
the founder and CEO of Invisible Dynamics,
a brand transformation agency based in LA.
The key takeaway from this conversation with Ollie
was shifting the way you make small decisions every day can change your life.
He said that he believes in the power of compound interest.
And even though I had heard similar habits or systems in life,
I don't think I've heard it in such a way that he talked about,
which is shifting the way you think about decision making.
So small things like what he eats on a daily basis,
you know, eating proteins and eating vegetables,
mainly for his lunch, let's say.
And that can, you know, just repeating that routine on a daily basis
can dramatically increase his health a year, two years, five years,
or even 10 years down the line.
Another thing that he said also somewhat casually was
he said that he limits the number of colors in his wardrobe.
He tends to have more black and white, monochromatic,
and perhaps blue in his wardrobe.
So that it eliminates his need to think about what color to wear
and how to match this color versus that color.
So it simplifies his decision making process on a daily basis.
Another thing that he mentioned was that he works out on a regular basis.
And that's his way of releasing stress and switching his mind
when he's feeling tired, when he's feeling stressed,
or when he's feeling down.
But if you have a binary decision that you have to make,
or should I work out today or not?
Should I eat this or not?
Should I do that or not?
Then it allows you to say yes or no.
Therefore, you could get swayed one way or another.
But by eliminating non-binary decisions,
if he decided that he's going to work out,
that's what he's going to do.
If we decided to eat this way versus that way,
that's what he's going to do.
So by eliminating a certain way of decision making from his mindset
can make those little decisions,
small decisions that he makes on a daily basis,
that we make on a daily basis, it can simplify.
And by doing that on a regular basis,
by building compound interest,
what you would get out of it a year, two years,
10 years down the line could be well beyond your imagination.
So the key takeaway,
shifting the way you make small decisions every day
can change your life.
ポッドキャストの締め
And that I think is quite literally
the power of compound interest in life and work.
So that was part two of my conversation with Ollie Walsh,
the founder and CEO of Invisible Dynamics,
a brand transformation agency based in LA.
If you're listening to this on Spotify,
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We'd be so grateful.
I hope you enjoyed this conversation with Ollie Walsh
as much as I did.
I'm Ray Namoto,
and this is The Creating Mindset.
See you next time.
