EPIC People

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Jul 2024

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About the show

EPIC is a global community of researchers, creators, and innovators doing ethnography for impact in business and organizations. Welcome to Season 1: EPIC Reflections , where we celebrate 20 years of ethnographic praxis as a lead up to our conference in LA this August. In this season we’re looking back on our past themes - from Sociality in 2005 to Friction in 2023. Join us as we examine those shifts featuring long-time and newer members of this vibrant and global community. Learn more about this year's conference at https://2024.epicpeople.org

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12 recent

July 29, 2024Episode 1213 min

"20 Years of EPIC Conversations" with Rick Robinson and Tony Salvador - PT 2

Rick E. Robinson is an interdisciplinary social scientist by way of his training at the University of Chicago's Committee on Human Development. Of his many accomplishments, he is well known for co-founding E-Lab, his time as CXO at Sapient and for giving the first keynote at the first EPIC Conference EPIC in Redmond, Washington in 2005, under the theme "Sociality". Tony Salvador is the Executive Director of the National Policy Consensus Center at Portland State University by way of Tufts University and a storied 30 year career working in tech. In addition to being the person who brought ethnography to Intel, he also was the opening keynote speaker for the 2007 EPIC Conference in Keystone with the theme "Being Heard"..In this special two part season finale, Martha Cotton (co-chair in 2007 and 2009) sits down with Rick and Tony discuss the past twenty years of EPIC conferences, the impact of bringing together people with diverse backgrounds, and how the original vision of EPIC has evolved or remained the same over time. This year’s EPIC conference will be held in Los Angeles from August 18-21. Learn more at 2024.epicpeople.org.

July 22, 2024Episode 1113 min

"20 Years of EPIC Conversations" with Rick Robinson and Tony Salvador - PT 1

June 24, 2024Episode 107 min

"Renewal" with John Payne

John Payne is Head of Design at Public Policy Lab and Associate Professor of Practice at the Institute of Design (ID) in Chicago, where he developed a series of courses describing a Post-Human-Centered Design approach. In 2002 he co-founded Moment, one of the first digital design firms on the East Coast. John co-chaired EPIC in 2012 alongside Simon Roberts.John describes the theme of "Renewal" as a response to the previous three years of economic recession and rise of the global Occupy movement. He and Simon wanted to consider how and why ethnographers might participate in the renewal for which protesters were calling. Are ethnographers agents of renewal or do they have a role to play in challenging the agendas pushing for renewal? John highlights several compelling presentations from the conference about seeking renewal from a personal lens, such as Richard Anderson's talk about mental health and his own journey.This year’s EPIC conference will be held in Los Angeles from August 18-21. Learn more at 2024.epicpeople.org.

June 17, 2024Episode 96 min

"Resilience" with Dr. Erin B. Taylor

Dr. Erin B. Taylor is Director and Co-Founder of Finthropology, at the crossroads of anthropology, financial behavior and technology. She specializes in how people’s financial behavior is changing along with innovation in financial services. She holds a PhD from the University of Sydney, Australia, and has carried out ethnographic research in the Caribbean, Africa and Europe. Erin is especially interested in how culture and group belonging influence people’s actions and decisions.Co-chairing the first EPIC post-COVID in Amsterdam, Erin discusses her initial reservations with the theme of "Resilience," as well as how the conference chairs expanded the theme's meanings in multiple directions. She recalls the success of the Wildcard track, which led to a memorable sound installation and engaging co-creation workshops.This year’s EPIC conference will be held in Los Angeles from August 18-21. Learn more at 2024.epicpeople.org.

June 10, 2024Episode 88 min

"Being Seen" and "Taking Care of Business" with Martha Cotton

Martha Cotton is Managing Director with the Design group at JPMorgan Chase, serving as UX research lead for Chase's consumer lending business, and adjunct faculty at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management. Prior to JPMC, she was Managing Director at Fjord/Accenture Interactive, and Partner at gravitytank. Martha co-chaired two EPIC conferences back-to-back: in 2008 with the theme of "Being Seen" (building on the 2007 theme of "Being Heard"), and in 2009 with the theme of "Taking Care of Business" (echoing the economic recession at the time). Martha explains how the theme "Taking Care of Business" reflected supporting one another and ensuring ongoing meaning and relevance for practitioners during a recession. She draws parallels between recent topics like the rise of AI and discussions from the 2009 conference on the deskilling of ethnographic labor.This year’s EPIC conference will be held in Los Angeles from August 18-21. Learn more at 2024.epicpeople.org.

June 3, 2024Episode 711 min

"Being Heard" and "Being Seen" with Melissa Cefkin

Melissa Cefkin is an anthropologist at the crossroads of technology, business and mobility. She developed autonomous vehicle behavior and features at Waymo, initiated and led the Human Systems Lab at Nissan, and has held research and innovation roles at IBM and Sapient. Melissa co-chaired EPIC in 2007 ("Being Heard") and 2008 ("Being Seen").Taking place during the early days of the social media revolution, when companies like Facebook and LinkedIn were just taking hold, Melissa reflects on the impact of these platforms on the theme of being heard - a time when people were being introduced to the ability to amplify their voices and find community online. As a forming community, EPIC members discussed what being heard and getting a seat "at the table" of organizational decision making should mean.This year’s EPIC conference will be held in Los Angeles from August 18-21. Learn more at 2024.epicpeople.org.

May 27, 2024Episode 611 min

"Anticipation" with Jan English Lueck

Jan English Lueck is a Professor of Anthropology at San José State University and a Distinguished Fellow at the Institute for the Future. Jan was co-chair of Epic 2021, which had the theme of Anticipation. With the backdrop of COVID-19 forcing a quick pivot to an online format, Jan discusses the goal of the 2021 conference in bringing an intentional futures perspective to the practitioners and academics involved with EPIC. Jan talks about how the theme allowed the conference to lean into science fiction metaphors, explore systems and questions around who gets to own and claim the future, and why discussions about Afro- and Indigenous Futures continue to inform how she talks about engineers and organizations to this day. This year’s EPIC conference will be held in Los Angeles from August 18-21. Learn more at 2024.epicpeople.org.

May 20, 2024Episode 55 min

"Sociality" and "Transitions" with Tracy Lovejoy

Tracy Lovejoy is founded the Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference (also known as EPIC) alongside Ken Anderson and chaired the first two conferences in 2005 and 2006. Tracey is a Coach that supports Catalysts and their teams, and is the Researcher behind the book Move Fast. Break Shit. Burn Out. Before she became a Coach, Tracey spent 12 years at Microsoft, where she worked at the intersection of technology, design, and innovation leading teams of change makers.Tracy discusses the debate during the founding years around whether academics only would participate, or also non-academic researchers, how researchers today should own artifacts and specifications much like product managers do, and why the value we bring is more important than the methods we use.This year’s EPIC conference will be held in Los Angeles from August 18-21. Learn more at 2024.epicpeople.org.

May 13, 2024Episode 46 min

"Perspectives" with Rita Denny

As Partner at Practica, Rita Denny, Ph.D. applies an anthropological framework to consumer behavior across the globe, calling on linguistic, semiotic and symbolic traditions for interpreting attitudes, perceptions and practices. Rita’s work supports strategic development of products, services and brands as well as communications strategies for Fortune Global 500 companies, government agencies and public institutions. The 2017 conference in Montreal, which she co-chaired, focused on "Perspectives," which both inform and constrain vantage points. Rita reminisces about Dana Sherwood's "sumptious rococo" culinary installations and performance art and Carolyn Rouse's talk about shifting perspective from products to the overall system of production. Rita also speaks about moving beyond insular work towards a more generative perspective in order to have more influence and impact.This year’s EPIC conference will be held in Los Angeles from August 18-21. Learn more at 2024.epicpeople.org.

May 6, 2024Episode 37 min

"The Year Without a Theme" with Simon Roberts

Simon Roberts is widely regarded as a pioneer in the field of anthropology in business and the use of ethnography, in particular, in corporate research, design, and innovation. Simon is a Partner at Stripe Partners, which he co-founded in 2015.Simon reflects on the organic production of themes for EPIC 2013, which he chaired. He celebrates the presentation by David Howes, which centers sensation in ethnographic work, and the sense of confidence the field felt during 2013, relative today's concerns about proving the value of ethnographic work.This year’s EPIC conference will be held in Los Angeles from August 18-21. Learn more at 2024.epicpeople.org.