In part two of our three-part series on self-sabotage, Nidhi speaks with Chris about his decision to abandon Blind and start The Futur. Blind was Chris’s branding and design agency. He started it in 1995 primarily as a motion design studio. The company focused on creating design-focused video work like commercials and branded content. But after two decades of growth, Chris noticed a decline in work. He saw the inevitable writing on the wall and had to make a decision: stay the course or pivot. I...
Jun 29, 2022•50 min•Season 4Ep. 195
Have you ever worked so hard on something only to find yourself stuck and caught in what feels like a complete slog? At that moment, you may think: This isn’t working. It’s time to pivot. But what if, on the other side of that discomfort, awaits everything you want? More importantly: how do you know if it’s time to pivot or push through the discomfort? Welcome to part one of our three-part series tackling the concept of self-sabotage. Why we do it, how we do it, and finding the right balance bet...
Jun 22, 2022•1 hr 5 min•Season 4Ep. 194
Neville Medhora is best known as a copywriter. But that doesn’t mean he just writes copy. According to Neville, effective copywriting means communicating a message from your brain to millions of other brains using the best technology available. Hundreds of years ago, a carrier pigeon was the best option. Today, it’s probably a brief email that includes curated animated GIFs. In this episode, we talk with the author and copywriter about why he dropped out of college, his direct approach to helpin...
Jun 15, 2022•1 hr 16 min•Season 4Ep. 193
Kyle T Webster is an award-winning international illustrator. His work has appeared in The New Yorker , TIME , Wall Street Journal , The Atlantic , Nike , IDEO , and several other distinguished clients. Acclaimed industry publications like the Society of Illustrators, Communications Arts, and American Illustration have recognized his illustration work. Kyle also teaches at UNC School of the Arts and works for Adobe, hosting workshops and helping to make digital products like Adobe Fresco. But yo...
Jun 08, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Season 4Ep. 192
In 2017 Natasha Takahashi completed her first semester at the prestigious (and quite expensive) college, University of Southern California. She'd spent many nights writing essays and working tirelessly to attain any scholarship she could find to pay her tuition. But Natasha had a scary epiphany halfway into her second semester: This is not for me. Frustrated and unhappy with her USC experience, she decided to drop out. She even wrote a letter to her parents expressing her gratitude and reasoning...
Jun 01, 2022•1 hr 13 min•Season 4Ep. 191
Just when you thought you had the internet figured out, new waves of technology approach. With them come a torrent of unfamiliar terms: non-fungible tokens, web3, DAOs, the Metaverse. Are they real, hype, or are they keys to solving the world's biggest problems? In this episode, we host investor and futurist Lisa Andrews. She's fascinated by this new technology and sees an opportunity in it to create a positive impact on humanity. As Lisa puts it, we are living in the phigital world. That is to ...
May 25, 2022•1 hr 14 min•Season 4Ep. 190
Chris Franklin is a filmmaker, photographer, and budding YouTuber helping clients, and fellow creatives meet their goals. He's also a Futur Pro Group member, which is where he met and connected with Chris Do. In this friendly conversation, Chris shares his career path and how he went from studying pre-med biology to now running a thriving video production business. Spoiler alert: it wasn't a straight line from point A to point B. It took Chris time and inward reflection to understand who he is a...
May 18, 2022•1 hr 13 min•Season 4Ep. 189
Kindra Hall is a storyteller, acclaimed keynote speaker, and bestselling author of Stories that Stick: How Storytelling Can Captivate Customers, Influence Audiences, and Transform Your Business . She's here to remind you how important storytelling is, especially for your business. We all recognize the need for connection, now more than ever. And telling stories is an excellent way to connect with people, but being a great storyteller is not easy. Like most important things, great storytelling re...
May 11, 2022•1 hr 11 min•Season 4Ep. 188
Storytelling is one of the fundamental ways humans connect. It’s how we learn, exchange ideas, and entertain ourselves. At its core, storytelling is communication. This episode comes from a live Twitter Space talk Chris Do, and Anneli Hansson hosted. The topic: how to tell your own story. The conversation opens with how powerful good storytelling is. A well-crafted story is relatable and will draw you in, making the storyteller themselves inherently more interesting. Storytelling plays a crucial...
May 04, 2022•1 hr•Season 4Ep. 187
Mika Saulitis is the Director of Creative Strategy at branding and design studio, Trollbäck+Company. But what does a Director of Brand Strategy do exactly? As Mika puts it, there are two core components: strategy and creativity. Strategy involves strategic thinking, writing positioning statements, and determining the brand’s voice—the invisible traits of a brand. Creativity arrives in more tangible forms, like campaigns, videos, concepts, and copywriting. In this episode, Mika shares how he navi...
Apr 27, 2022•1 hr 12 min•Season 4Ep. 186
Graham Cochrane is an entrepreneur, YouTuber, and business coach whose mission is to help other people start their own businesses. You might be thinking, “Great. Another online business guru telling me to sign up for their seminar while they pose in front of a rented Lamborghini.” But you would be wrong. In 2009, right after the financial collapse, Graham was laid off. He and his wife had recently purchased a house and just had their first baby. Not a great place to be. After struggling to find ...
Apr 20, 2022•1 hr 18 min•Season 4Ep. 185
Jason Fried is the founder and CEO of Basecamp. Once a web design firm (and operating under the name 37Signals ), Basecamp unintentionally pivoted into building software with their namesake product . They also created the email app HEY , a fresh take on an old idea. As you can imagine, Jason is no stranger to change. In this episode, he shares how Basecamp accidentally came to be and the struggles they’ve encountered along the way. Like working remotely, building new products, and taking calcula...
Apr 13, 2022•1 hr 21 min•Season 4Ep. 184
Ron Baker is a writer, speaker, educator, and recovering CPA. He is the author of seven best-selling books, most of which cover economic topics—specifically, value and pricing. Throughout history, value has always tied itself to labor. These many work hours cost this many dollars, also known as billable hours. The counter to this method is value-based pricing. This thing costs this many dollars because it is valuable to you. So, which is correct? Which is fair? In this episode, Ron and Chris div...
Apr 06, 2022•1 hr 19 min•Season 4Ep. 183
Wes Kao is co-founder of Maven, a platform that helps creators build cohort-based courses. Before that, she co-founded the altMBA with acclaimed author and marketer Seth Godin. If you’re not yet familiar with them, cohort-based courses (CBCs) are a not-so-new way of learning with a group of other people. They take the best parts of traditional classroom education and blend them with online classes to create a rich learning experience. In this episode, Wes shares why CBCs are the best way to lear...
Mar 30, 2022•1 hr 7 min•Season 4Ep. 182
Jake Fellman is a self-taught 3D artist who spends his time making original, animated content for YouTube and TikTok. As of this episode, Jake has 10.9M YouTube subscribers and 11.7M TikTok followers—so whatever he’s making people enjoy watching. The videos Jake creates are anywhere from ten to thirty seconds long and often reference pop-culture and video games, like Among Us and Poppy Playtime . These animated shorts walk the line between comedy and horror and typically involve a surreal twist....
Mar 16, 2022•1 hr 4 min•Season 4Ep. 180
Nicoline Douwes is a Dutch dream expert and sleep activist. Her mission? Show everyone how to wake up with new ideas and fresh insights. While our bodies sleep, our minds continue to work. Processing what we’ve experienced and what’s troubling us—all while making new, uninhibited connections between thoughts. In this fascinating Clubhouse conversation, Nicoline and Chris dive into what happens in our brains while we sleep. They get into a bit of science, explain why dreams get so weird, and shar...
Mar 09, 2022•1 hr 43 min•Season 4Ep. 179
In final episode of our three-part passion versus profit series, Chris and Rodrigo agree to never have this conversation again. In exchange, Rodrigo makes a public commitment to remain focused on his business and sets a clear financial goal. But it doesn’t end there. Chris helps Rodrigo plot the course to achieve that goal and offers a useful equation that anyone can use to do the same. To wrap up this conversational trilogy, Chris reminds us that life is about making hard decisions. When things...
Mar 02, 2022•1 hr 8 min•Season 4Ep. 178
In part two of our three-part passion versus profit conversation, Chris, Rodrigo, Mo and Niddy pick up where they left off: to succeed you need a clear goal and to remain focused on it. The benefits of living this way are clear. It’s how Chris built his design agency and ultimately The Futur. But at what cost? To quote Chris, “I worked like an animal.” That lifestyle isn’t for everyone, but to Chris’s point, you have the freedom to design your own life. Whether you achieve that goal depends on h...
Feb 23, 2022•50 min•Season 4Ep. 177
How do you make decisions about your life? Do you follow what brings you happiness and makes you feel good? Or do you remove emotion from the process and remain focused and objective? Most of us land somewhere in the middle on that spectrum. Juggling the pursuit of our ever-changing interests while working a job that pays the bills. But what happens when your time is equally split between the two and you’re unhappy with that juggling act? In this special three-part episode, Chris helps Rodrigo w...
Feb 16, 2022•1 hr 4 min•Season 4Ep. 176
Rich Cardona is a retired Marine, podcaster, and NFT enthusiast. In fact, his podcast NFTs for Newbies, is one of the most popular shows on the subject. In this fun and informative conversation Rich takes us into the budding world of NFTs. He explains what an NFT is, how they work, and helps make sense of the jargon associated with them—gas fees and all. It is a fascinating new world, filled with both potential and problems. Rich shares his experience with both sides of that coin. On the one han...
Feb 09, 2022•1 hr 29 min•Season 4Ep. 175
Have you ever tried improv? Neither had Chris, until he met Erin Diehl. Erin is a former experential marketer and veteran improviser that conducts workshops leveraging improv techniques to improve employees’ skills in corporate settings. That’s right. She brings improv to the corporate world. One of her many mottos: Inspire, don’t perspire. In this episode, Erin shares her story of starting out sweaty and terrified of trying improv, to then wielding it as a powerful communication and teamworking...
Feb 02, 2022•1 hr 24 min•Season 4Ep. 174
Aaron Duffy is the Executive Creative Director and co-founder of boutique creative agency, Special Guest. He also works as a director with acclaimed production company, 1st Avenue Machine. In this inspirational chat, Aaron shares the story of how a project he wasn’t excited about (and nearly turned down) propelled his career forward and landed him a coveted Super Bowl ad. Sponsored by Real Vision - https://realvision.com/crypto Sponsored by Athletic Greens - https://athleticgreens.com/futur Spon...
Jan 26, 2022•1 hr 15 min•Season 4Ep. 173
Nick Harauz is a content creator, video editing expert, and student of the creative process. He's also a certified Adobe, Apple, and Avid trainer and founder of Creative 111; a company that specializes in video and motion graphics training. You might recognize him from instructional videos all over adobe.com . In this episode, Nick and Chris talk about the challenges of teaching (and learning) online, how they each prepare for presentations, and why starting is the hardest part of the creative p...
Jan 19, 2022•1 hr 19 min•Season 4Ep. 172
Carlos Segura is the founder of award-winning design firm, Segura Inc. He also founded digital type foundry T26, whose fonts you can find everywhere. Over the last 30 plus years, Carlos has built (and lived) an extraordinary life and career. And he’s done it on his own terms, whether you like it or not. In this candid conversation, Carlos shares what he’s learned along the way. From surviving the violence he faced growing up in Miami, to stumbling into what would change his life forever (spoiler...
Jan 12, 2022•1 hr 13 min•Season 4Ep. 171
Tuna Bora is an acclaimed Turkish visual artist whose clients include Google, Nike, Netflix, and Coca Cola. She’s won awards for her unique design work on several VR and AR projects and continue to explore new creative spaces. In this conversation, Tuna shares her story of immigrating to the United States alone in hopes of pursuing a career working in feature film animation. But after graduating in 2008—right at the start of the financial collapse—was met with very few opportunities. She talks a...
Jan 05, 2022•1 hr 10 min•Season 4Ep. 170
You might better know Jen and Amy Hood by their clever business name: Hoodzpah. The California-born, Kentucky-raised twin sisters co-founded their brand identity and type design studio because they had to. And before they were ready to. In this episode, Jen and Amy talk shop with us about how Hoodzpah came to be, the source of their entrepreneurial spirit, taking joy in doing the work, and how they’ve landed coveted clients like Disney, Target, and Nike. The conversation gets even more interesti...
Dec 29, 2021•1 hr 37 min•Season 4Ep. 169
Rochelle Moulton is a brand strategist and business coach that helps people (and their businesses) build authority. In this episode Rochelle shares how she prepares for important presentations, her experience self-publishing a book, the parallels of building a brand and building authority, and why having a vision for your business is imperative to its success. She also walks Chris through a niche-finding exercise that might help all your designers out there. Sponsored by Charles Schwab - schwab....
Dec 22, 2021•1 hr 23 min•Season 4Ep. 168
A great presentation will inspire you. It will leave you feeling excited, energized and most importantly: wanting more. But a bad presentation will put you to sleep. Ashley Smithers specializes in presentation design. She's helped people prepare for TED talks, design important fundraising decks, and even worked with former vice presidents on their presentations. In this clubhouse discussion, Ashley offers five tips to help you step up your pitch game. And Chris matches her. Between the two of th...
Dec 15, 2021•1 hr 5 min•Season 4Ep. 167
We last we spoke with Anthony way back in 2018, in episode 148 to be exact. At the time, he felt stagnant at his current job. Though his needs were met, there wasn’t much opportunity for growth. Cut to three years later: the world is a different place and Anthony is now right where he wants to be. But where is that? Did he remove those golden handcuffs in pursuit of something more? Did he ride out the slow boat to nowhere? Or did he do something else entirely? In this episode we find out what pa...
Dec 08, 2021•1 hr 10 min•Season 4Ep. 166
Welcome to our second installment of 5 rounds . In this episode, we welcome creative sales coach (and Futur Pro Group member) Ivy Malik to the show. Her mission: grill Chris Do with a series of five tough questions. And she does not disappoint. Ivy tasks Chris with questions about how to be your true self in both public and private, why he dislikes the current state of educational sales, the role emotion plays in his decision making, and the biggest one of all: is The Futur a cult? Sponsored by ...
Dec 01, 2021•1 hr 8 min•Season 4Ep. 165
