Latest / A New Angle / Yarrow Kraner on the Hatch network

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Yarrow Kraner on the Hatch network · A New Angle

0:09
This is A New Angle,
0:10
a show about cool people doing awesome things in and around Montana.
0:15
SPEAKER_02: I'm your host, Justin Angle.
0:18
SPEAKER_02: This show is supported by First Security Bank,
0:20
SPEAKER_02: Blackfoot Communications,
0:22
SPEAKER_02: and the University of Montana College of Business.
0:25
SPEAKER_02: Hey folks, welcome back, and thanks for tuning in.
0:28
SPEAKER_02: Today, I'm speaking with Yarrow Cranor.
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SPEAKER_02: Yarrow is the founder of Hatch,
0:32
a global network of influencers committed to progress on
0:35
pressing societal issues.
0:37
The mission statement of Hatch is to connect leaders and
0:39
organizations to a global
0:41
community to accelerate relationships and solutions to Hatch a
0:47
better world for all.
0:48
yarrow is a pioneer of social networking for good and hatch
0:52
recently celebrated its
0:53
20th anniversary yarrow thanks for joining me oh thanks for
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having me justin so
0:59
tell us where did you grow up and what did your parents do i
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grew up in bozeman
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SPEAKER_00: montana from mid-70s onward my mom and i moved here she left an abusive
1:12
SPEAKER_00: relationship
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When I was two years old and left my father and did her
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undergrad in Minneapolis,
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SPEAKER_00: and then we came here for her grad school in Bozeman,
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SPEAKER_00: Montana,
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SPEAKER_00: and pretty much in and out of Montana ever since.
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SPEAKER_00: When I was a teenager, I couldn't wait to get out.
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SPEAKER_00: Just wondered what was the other side of those big mountains,
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SPEAKER_00: and now I can't wait to get back,
1:31
SPEAKER_00: even with all the travel I do.
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SPEAKER_02: Indeed.
1:33
SPEAKER_02: Yet you still stayed in Montana for college, right?
1:35
SPEAKER_02: Studied film and marketing at Montana State?
1:39
Actually,
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first went to Western Montana for a football and wrestling scholarship,
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and
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essentially just wasted a couple of years to figure out that I
1:48
wanted to get a
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SPEAKER_00: little bit more serious about school.
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SPEAKER_00: And during the summer break,
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wandered through the Montana State University Film School and
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saw all these huge cameras.
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SPEAKER_00: And I've been carrying a camera since I was six, seven years old.
2:02
SPEAKER_00: And it was just an instant aha moment.
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SPEAKER_00: I was like, oh yeah, this is actually, this is a real career.
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SPEAKER_00: You can do this for a living.
2:08
SPEAKER_00: And
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Went to film school and then started a production company right
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out of film school
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SPEAKER_00: and then ended up moving to Los Angeles.
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SPEAKER_00: I was there for nine years,
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SPEAKER_00: did some directing there,
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SPEAKER_00: but also ended up starting the company a little bit by accident in 1999.
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SPEAKER_02: Yeah, let's talk more about that.
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What an interesting time with the skillset that you were
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developing to launch into
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SPEAKER_02: the internet,
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SPEAKER_02: into social networking.
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SPEAKER_02: Talk about that first business and what it was all about.
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SPEAKER_00: When I was leaving Montana and going to Los Angeles,
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I was convinced that I was moving to the epicenter of creative
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genius and I'd be
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SPEAKER_00: inspired every day.
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SPEAKER_00: And I couldn't wait to just be immersed in that.
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SPEAKER_00: And,
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SPEAKER_00: you know,
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SPEAKER_00: a couple of years in,
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I'm at this Hollywood Hills party looking around and everyone
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looks almost like the
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SPEAKER_00: same person.
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SPEAKER_00: Beautiful, dressed in black, looks successful.
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SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, what am I even doing here?
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SPEAKER_00: Right.
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SPEAKER_00: And
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Had this moment where I walked outside all by myself in this
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huge deck overlooking
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SPEAKER_00: the city lights and kind of the stars above and just in my head said,
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SPEAKER_00: where are they?
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SPEAKER_00: And every day for the next couple of weeks,
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SPEAKER_00: I'd met these really exceptionally interesting,
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SPEAKER_00: extraordinary stories of everyday people doing extraordinary things.
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SPEAKER_00: You know,
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when you wonder where these people are that are these real life
3:27
superheroes in the world.
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SPEAKER_00: They're all around us.
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They're in our neighborhoods,
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they're in our communities and they're inside each of us.
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And that was the aha moment where I realized that we're all
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born with this special
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SPEAKER_00: gift inside this superpower.
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And so made the commitment to go finally connect as many real
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life superheroes as possible,
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SPEAKER_00: not just athletes,
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SPEAKER_00: entertainers,
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SPEAKER_00: but teachers and scientists and composers and so on.
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And we built that from my garage into an actual company from
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1999 to 2003.
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SPEAKER_00: to about a million and a half people.
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SPEAKER_00: And we had a digital currency called knowledge nuggets where we gamify,
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SPEAKER_00: play these games,
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SPEAKER_00: gather these points.
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SPEAKER_00: The more knowledge you'd feed your character,
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SPEAKER_00: the higher you'd rise up on this karma counter,
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SPEAKER_00: which worked like a stock exchange.
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SPEAKER_00: And you'd unlock all these different real life prizes.
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So you're motivated to continue to gain knowledge and climb up
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this karma counter.
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SPEAKER_00: But there was a bait and switch.
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SPEAKER_00: Once we had them on the move,
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SPEAKER_00: there was a prompt that you would get at level two that said,
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SPEAKER_00: how do you really save the world?
4:30
SPEAKER_00: Start with where you are.
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SPEAKER_00: Type in your zip code.
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SPEAKER_00: You type in your zip code and you're given 10 things you can do.
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SPEAKER_00: One of the three mile radius where you live.
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And so we helped pioneer this volunteer match engine and we
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started mobilizing
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SPEAKER_00: people into their communities.
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and they would come home with proof of they would upload and
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fax to us on 2000 2001
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proof of their new neighborhood cleanup or walking dogs to the
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humane society or
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reading for the elderly whatever the case might be and they
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would get 10 000
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knowledge nuggets and a light bulb would go off and be like
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whoa i could play video
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games for a month and not get that and so we started mobilizing
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people into their
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SPEAKER_00: communities and that grew i think we had 10 and a half
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Billion knowledge nuggets just from volunteer hours in the year
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and a half of that program.
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SPEAKER_02: It's worth noting the date.
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SPEAKER_02: I don't want listeners to miss that.
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SPEAKER_02: 1999, 2000, 2001.
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SPEAKER_02: This is years before MySpace, years before Facebook were even an idea.
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SPEAKER_02: You were off and running,
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trying to make a social network on the internet with a
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cryptocurrency of a sort
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SPEAKER_02: embedded within it ahead of your time.
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The downfall of being a little bit ahead of the time is that
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you get a lot of blank
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SPEAKER_00: stares and you're talking to people who don't quite understand.
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SPEAKER_00: There's not a precedent for the language yet.
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SPEAKER_00: And so we were having meetings with big studios and they were interested,
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SPEAKER_00: curious,
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SPEAKER_00: but nothing like it existed.
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SPEAKER_00: And so we got a lot of blank stares.
5:53
SPEAKER_00: And so in 2003,
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SPEAKER_00: we got an acquisition offer,
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which is the same within sort of the several months of the same
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time that MySpace
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SPEAKER_00: popped up.
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SPEAKER_00: We brought the CEO in to help us scale
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SPEAKER_00: and become acquired.
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SPEAKER_00: And he's a really smart man.
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SPEAKER_00: Richard Rosenblatt had a long history with big acquisitions and scaling
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SPEAKER_00: organizations and companies.
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SPEAKER_00: And he kept telling me that our branding was too niche.
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SPEAKER_00: And I pushed back against him and I was like,
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SPEAKER_00: There was a humor involved.
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SPEAKER_00: There was a tongue in cheek not taking itself so seriously.
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And it was the hero project and we thought it was super dudes
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and all this lingo
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SPEAKER_00: that we invented in that moment.
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His sort of lesson to me was it's not ubiquitous enough for a
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real expansive online community.
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And of course,
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when we got acquired,
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we got rolled into what started that same year was MySpace.
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And Richard ended up becoming the CEO of MySpace with that
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acquisition transaction.
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SPEAKER_00: I thought we were just getting started.
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SPEAKER_00: I was pretty crushed, actually, when we got acquired.
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And so I came back to Montana to lick my wounds and figure out
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what was next.
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It was a precedent for setting the initial social networking
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platform in motion.
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SPEAKER_02: Sure.
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The only other online community at that time was something
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called Neopets.
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SPEAKER_00: And then in 2002, I think Friendster started.
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SPEAKER_00: It was something that it took me a while to get over the sting of.
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And then Hatch was formed as a result of that transaction and acquisition.
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SPEAKER_00: And
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And I'm so grateful because Hatch has become like this
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incredible family of people
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SPEAKER_00: that I otherwise never would have had.
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Some of the principles that you outlined in the social network
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that you and your
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SPEAKER_02: colleagues were trying to build,
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connecting people with service actions they can take in their
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immediate community,
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it seemed like it was conceived as a force for connecting
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people in service of
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SPEAKER_02: doing good in the world.
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SPEAKER_02: And gosh, what a moment we can have here 20, 22 years hence to reflect on
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what social networks and probably more appropriately social
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media became in that
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SPEAKER_02: intervening two decades.
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SPEAKER_02: Where do you think it went wrong?
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How did we get here and not in a place where these networks
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have been harnessed for good?
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SPEAKER_00: You know, it really always comes down to revenue models and capitalism.
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And in the case of social networks and sort of the turning
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point in which Facebook
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SPEAKER_00: started becoming the most powerful,
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SPEAKER_00: one of the most powerful platforms in the world,
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it was all about harnessing data and affinity and human
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behavioral trends with kind
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of mapping against consumerism and advertising and marketing
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and so that our model
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was much more innocent and maybe even naive but it was really
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around like how to
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empower people of all ages at the very end the part where i
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started really
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recognizing that we had something special that it was even like
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different than what
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SPEAKER_00: I originally thought it was going to be.
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I was getting all these letters from child psychologists and
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parents and teachers
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talking about the process by which we would move people through
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the exercise to
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SPEAKER_00: identify what it is within them that makes them extraordinary.
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SPEAKER_00: And what are they going to take to the world and share with the world and
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SPEAKER_00: essentially their real life superpowers.
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SPEAKER_00: And, you know, the letters would sort of outline that like,
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My son or daughter is walking with more self-esteem straight up
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and with purpose.
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SPEAKER_00: And it's been this like significant confidence boost.
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SPEAKER_00: And it was real fun and joyful.
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SPEAKER_00: But also I recognize that we all,
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SPEAKER_00: as we define what it is within us,
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SPEAKER_00: it makes us this very specific persona.
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SPEAKER_00: We started becoming those personas.
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SPEAKER_00: It was quite lovely.
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SPEAKER_00: But, you know, back to your question, like,
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SPEAKER_00: The modern social network platform is so much about data mining.
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SPEAKER_00: Surveillance capitalism.
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SPEAKER_00: And there are other models.
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The social dilemma,
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the film that came out recently,
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there was a very salient line in there.
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SPEAKER_00: If you're not paying for the product, you are the product.
9:58
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
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People will be given an opportunity to pay a monthly fee or a
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subscription to not
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SPEAKER_00: have their data mined.
10:06
and not be advertised to because technology also,
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it costs money to build.
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SPEAKER_00: So if it's creating value for you,
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I think that the challenge at this point is like how to reshift
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that paradigm of
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SPEAKER_00: value so that it's no longer reliant upon the models that need to keep it
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sustainable while also really catering to the mental health and
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wellbeing and
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SPEAKER_00: health of humanity.
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SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I agree.
10:37
And there are some like fundamental design principles that
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could hopefully be re-engineered.
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SPEAKER_02: The changing of the revenue model,
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SPEAKER_02: the profit model,
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SPEAKER_02: all those things like that's fundamental to this.
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SPEAKER_02: And in many ways, like Facebook is such a money printing operation.
11:00
it's a real big question as to whether or not they can recreate
11:04
that revenue
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generating capability through a subscription model or an
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alternative model.
11:09
But I do think we're starting to realize the consequences of
11:14
the way these networks
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SPEAKER_02: are structured and people in policy are starting to just opt out.
11:21
And maybe market forces will drive these companies to change in
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a way that we
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SPEAKER_02: didn't conceive possible just a few years ago.
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SPEAKER_00: Even also,
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I think the destigmatization of mental health and having
11:32
Olympians and professional
11:34
athletes being able to step out of their what otherwise would
11:37
be sort of a risky
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SPEAKER_00: venture to put your sponsorships at risk and things like that.
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SPEAKER_00: People are stepping out and saying, no, like enough is enough.
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SPEAKER_00: And I need to take care of myself.
11:47
SPEAKER_00: And I want all of you young people out there to do the same for yourself.
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SPEAKER_00: And that is also going to have a significant tipping point.
11:55
SPEAKER_02: It seems like a good moment to pivot to Hatch.
11:58
You come back to Montana and you keep your passion for
12:02
connecting people and it
12:04
SPEAKER_02: takes the form of this new venture,
12:06
SPEAKER_02: Hatch.
12:06
SPEAKER_02: Tell us about it and how it came to be.
12:09
SPEAKER_00: I came for a two-week break from Los Angeles.
12:12
SPEAKER_00: Two weeks turned into a couple months and...
12:16
I went through the winter and I was crashing on a friend's
12:18
couch and then started
12:21
SPEAKER_00: doing some work up here.
12:23
And then I wandered into a meeting with some crew that was
12:26
talking about doing a
12:30
SPEAKER_00: film festival in Montana.
12:32
SPEAKER_00: And they wanted me to be a part of it.
12:34
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, if it's going to be something...
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SPEAKER_00: Bozeman was at a real inflection point.
12:40
SPEAKER_00: Bozeman's gone through a lot in the last 20 years.
12:43
I think 1992 was like one of those first real significant
12:46
inflection points in
12:47
SPEAKER_00: terms of river runs through it,
12:49
SPEAKER_00: coming out,
12:49
SPEAKER_00: and you can draw very
12:51
linear path from the inflection point of real estate and
12:55
tourism dollars and the
12:56
people that came out here to start following that fly fishing
12:59
dream and then of
13:00
course it happened again in the late 90s and early 2000s and
13:06
when I got invited to
13:08
this meeting and a few of these folks were like hey we want to
13:11
do a film festival
13:12
here I'm like why do something that every other community has
13:14
let's do something
13:15
SPEAKER_00: different and they're like what do you mean I'm like I don't know let's
13:18
cross-pollinate all these different industries and disciplines
13:20
and let's make it
13:21
around mentorship and they started asking me to lead the charge
13:26
a little bit on
13:26
that and so the first few years of hatch in 2004 five and six
13:32
moonlight basin was
13:33
our founding sponsor we first thought that the mentorship
13:36
platform would be top
13:37
down like seasoned veterans to this next generation okay and we
13:41
soon realized a
13:42
SPEAKER_00: couple years in that was like top down bottom up and peer to peer
13:46
SPEAKER_00: It was beautiful to see.
13:47
SPEAKER_00: It was like genuine curiosity going both ways.
13:51
And so that was sort of a shift moment where we're realizing
13:55
that everyone has
13:56
SPEAKER_00: something to learn in the room from each other,
13:59
SPEAKER_00: regardless of age or discipline.
14:00
SPEAKER_00: And the more we started honing that and following that instinct was...
14:05
I'm getting clearer on the cross-pollination of technology and
14:10
architecture and
14:11
SPEAKER_00: entrepreneurship and science and storytelling and creativity.
14:16
SPEAKER_00: All these different otherwise siloed lanes, when you put them in a room,
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SPEAKER_00: It helps everyone see things differently.
14:23
SPEAKER_00: You get bumped out of your echo chamber.
14:26
SPEAKER_00: So that's really where Hatch has started to take off.
14:28
And now there's these kind of two main lanes of the convening
14:31
around the summits
14:32
SPEAKER_00: and the deploying with Hatch Studios and the Impact Labs.
14:36
We'll be back to my conversation with Yarrow Cranor after this
14:39
short break.
14:43
SPEAKER_02: A New Angle is proudly presented by First Security Bank,
14:46
SPEAKER_02: Blackfoot Communications,
14:48
SPEAKER_02: and the University of Montana College of Business.
14:50
SPEAKER_02: This show does not happen without these pillars of our community,
14:54
SPEAKER_02: and I'm so grateful for their support and encouragement.
14:57
And speaking of support,
14:58
have you checked out our new website yet,
15:00
anewanglepodcast.com?
15:02
There you can support our show directly with a variety of
15:05
subscription options.
15:06
Subscribers get access to bonus episodes,
15:09
additional segments,
15:10
writings,
15:10
and other benefits.
15:11
SPEAKER_02: So check it out at anewanglepodcast.com.
15:14
Hey,
15:14
this is John Wicks from Def Charlie,
15:17
and you are listening to A New Angle.
15:22
SPEAKER_02: Welcome back to A New Angle.
15:23
I'm speaking with Yarrow Cranor,
15:25
founder of Hatch and champion of social networking for good.
15:29
SPEAKER_02: So you have one or two annual Hatch conferences.
15:33
Let's maybe talk about those first,
15:34
and then we'll get into the studios piece.
15:37
The mission statement of Hatch is to connect leaders and
15:39
organizations to a global
15:41
community to accelerate relationships and solutions to Hatch a
15:46
better world for all.
15:48
And those words are pretty specific because the Sustainable
15:52
Development Goals,
15:53
SPEAKER_00: the 17 global goals that all nations came together and agreed upon,
15:58
It was rebranded from the Millennial Development Goals in 2015
16:01
to the SDGs,
16:02
SPEAKER_00: the Sustainable Development Goals.
16:04
There was a school of thought that we would be much farther
16:08
along by 2030 in
16:11
SPEAKER_00: solving this framework.
16:12
And the idea being that if you could map out all the problems
16:15
in the world into a framework,
16:16
we would have a better chance of being able to sequentially
16:21
make progress on those solutions.
16:24
The challenge being that a bunch of data came out recently
16:27
around why there's not
16:28
SPEAKER_00: been more progress there and that data showed that there's a lack of
16:32
SPEAKER_00: focus or nurturing of the relational aspects of systems change.
16:36
SPEAKER_00: And so when we say that Hatch accelerates relationships,
16:39
we do that because we keep our convenience and our summits
16:43
really small and intimate.
16:44
It's a very curated ecosystem just by virtue of the curation
16:49
and the process and
16:50
SPEAKER_00: the framework to unlock people from the inside out,
16:54
SPEAKER_00: systems change from the inside out.
16:57
How have you learned how to make choices about who you invite
17:02
to your events?
17:04
SPEAKER_00: One of the criteria is that we want good collaborators.
17:08
We want people that ask thoughtful questions at Leonin and
17:11
they're curious.
17:13
We're looking for the experts that still have a sort of a
17:16
childlike wonder and
17:17
SPEAKER_00: curiosity that don't pretend to know all the answers.
17:22
SPEAKER_00: And that usually makes a good collaborator.
17:24
SPEAKER_00: And second...
17:26
I have this theory that people that are working on projects or
17:30
intentions that are
17:32
impacting more than just themselves operate at a different
17:35
vibration or frequency.
17:37
And so when you bring a bunch of people together that are
17:39
working on behalf of a
17:41
SPEAKER_00: larger goal with potential funders,
17:44
with entrepreneurs and business experts and people that know
17:48
how to scale and
17:48
SPEAKER_00: people that know how to market,
17:50
that cross section needs this sort of diagonal swath of
17:53
humanity if there's a good
17:55
idea in the room,
17:56
you want all the ingredients present to be able to accelerate
17:59
that idea.
18:02
Any other learnings from the events that you want to make sure
18:04
listeners know about?
18:06
SPEAKER_00: To hatch a better world, you must hatch your best self.
18:08
SPEAKER_00: And so there's inner outer work that we do.
18:11
SPEAKER_00: There's large scale systems mapping,
18:13
SPEAKER_00: but there's also individual unlocking and personal transformation.
18:19
SPEAKER_00: And we don't really lead with that.
18:21
SPEAKER_00: It's not really articulated in our invites and
18:25
SPEAKER_00: I think a lot of leaders of today are like,
18:27
SPEAKER_00: hey,
18:27
SPEAKER_00: I've been there,
18:27
SPEAKER_00: done that,
18:28
SPEAKER_00: read the books,
18:28
SPEAKER_00: did the workshops.
18:29
SPEAKER_00: But we do things a little bit differently.
18:31
And we also intertwine a ton of creativity and arts and music
18:35
and culinary.
18:36
And we create a really well-rounded experience for people to
18:39
have these sort of slow unlocking.
18:44
And then they get to take that back to their communities and
18:46
businesses and so on.
18:48
SPEAKER_00: Once people have come through that summit portal,
18:51
SPEAKER_00: that opens them up into the rest of the Hatch community,
18:54
SPEAKER_00: which has been built over 20 years.
18:55
SPEAKER_00: And then there's a whole series of activities.
18:57
But the thing that I think a lot of people get really excited
19:00
about that I
19:01
SPEAKER_00: personally get really excited about is Hatch Studios and the Impact Labs.
19:04
SPEAKER_00: And that's where we get to then point these superpowers,
19:08
SPEAKER_00: all these different eclectic minds and perspectives,
19:11
almost like sunlight through a magnifying glass at these
19:15
different systems challenges.
19:17
Let's maybe draw on an example of how the studio's model makes
19:20
it come to life.
19:22
SPEAKER_00: One example was a couple of years ago,
19:24
SPEAKER_00: we got engaged by one of the top two toy companies in the world.
19:29
SPEAKER_00: And in that engagement,
19:30
SPEAKER_00: you know,
19:31
we had pushed time out like a day and a half in this two day
19:34
workshop and said,
19:34
SPEAKER_00: hey,
19:36
SPEAKER_00: recognize that you guys have the most
19:38
SPEAKER_00: you know,
19:39
one of the top two most sophisticated distribution channels are
19:42
getting toys to the
19:44
SPEAKER_00: hands of children in the world.
19:45
Imagine if you had just a small division of your company that
19:49
had a slightly different lens.
19:50
SPEAKER_00: What if you had
19:51
small division of a company that was getting toys of critical
19:54
thinking and problem
19:55
SPEAKER_00: solving in the hands of future leaders.
19:57
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
19:58
SPEAKER_00: Using that same distribution channel.
19:59
SPEAKER_00: What would your company look like 35 years from now?
20:02
SPEAKER_00: Completely different arc.
20:04
And so those are like moments of unlocking because two months
20:07
later they called a
20:08
SPEAKER_00: global town hall meeting.
20:09
The CEO did and,
20:11
you know,
20:11
rerouted a bunch of their talent to manifest that vision.
20:15
SPEAKER_00: A couple of years ago, one more example, there was
20:19
a lot of increased awareness around the toxicity of
20:21
microplastics being ground up
20:22
SPEAKER_00: in the ocean,
20:23
SPEAKER_00: evaporating,
20:23
SPEAKER_00: precipitating,
20:25
SPEAKER_00: ending up in our bodies and creating cancers and other diseases.
20:28
SPEAKER_00: And so in 2019,
20:30
we convened some of the largest creators of plastics in the
20:33
world with these
20:34
SPEAKER_00: previously adversarial relationships.
20:36
SPEAKER_00: So you had $300 billion of industry,
20:39
SPEAKER_00: Dow Chemical,
20:39
SPEAKER_00: Unilever,
20:40
SPEAKER_00: Project Gamble,
20:40
SPEAKER_00: Knut Johnson,
20:41
SPEAKER_00: et cetera,
20:42
SPEAKER_00: with a bunch of NGOs trying to shut them down,
20:44
SPEAKER_00: like Greenpeace,
20:45
SPEAKER_00: Social Conservancy,
20:45
SPEAKER_00: World Wildlife Fund,
20:46
SPEAKER_00: for four days.
20:47
SPEAKER_00: And as you can imagine, the stakes are high.
20:49
SPEAKER_00: I was walking on eggshells for the first bit there.
20:53
SPEAKER_00: But the design challenge is like,
20:55
Is it possible to get all these incredibly talented leaders in
20:59
their different
20:59
sectors with very opposed viewpoints to zoom out and recognize
21:04
that this is larger
21:04
SPEAKER_00: than their agenda or company policy?
21:07
This is about a collective human challenge that affects and
21:11
impacts everyone and their children.
21:14
And so we went through a series of exercises to find all the
21:17
aligned and shared values,
21:19
SPEAKER_00: at which point we then...
21:22
SPEAKER_00: We had a whole map of the life cycle of plastics.
21:24
SPEAKER_00: We had 20 points on that map.
21:25
We had an impact lab designated each one of those because there
21:28
was an opportunity
21:29
SPEAKER_00: for full disruption and innovation.
21:32
And 18 of those that became funded and ended up leading to the
21:35
signing of the Ocean
21:35
SPEAKER_00: Plastics Treaty by the UN a year and a half ago.
21:40
So we take those kind of examples as hope that two opposing
21:46
forces can come together.
21:48
SPEAKER_02: I'd love to talk about some of your other ventures.
21:51
SPEAKER_02: You recently launched or co-founded the Montana Festival.
21:54
SPEAKER_02: You had your first iteration in 2024.
21:57
SPEAKER_02: Talk about the Montana Festival.
21:58
SPEAKER_02: What is it all about?
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Oh,
22:01
SPEAKER_00: yeah,
22:01
I'm really inspired by the work that Pat Murphy sparked with
22:05
Montana Festival and
22:06
invited myself and Jenny Graff and a couple other people to
22:10
come together and build
22:11
SPEAKER_00: a little bit of a coalition around this initiative.
22:14
SPEAKER_00: And for me, the birthplace of Hatch is Bozeman, Montana.
22:19
And it's gone on to,
22:21
we have hatch summits in Europe,
22:23
Mexico,
22:23
Panama,
22:24
and so on.
22:25
So when Patton reached out to me,
22:27
I'd been missing more of the work in Montana.
22:32
SPEAKER_00: So it was like this perfect moment of...
22:35
SPEAKER_00: reengaging with the community that I'm from and the state that I love,
22:39
and also creating these sort of inflow outflow resource models
22:44
where not only do we
22:46
find all these beautiful pockets of incredibly inspiring
22:50
entrepreneurs and business
22:52
SPEAKER_00: leaders in Montana,
22:53
SPEAKER_00: there's so many talented people in the state.
22:56
SPEAKER_00: but also connecting them to a larger network outside of the state.
23:00
SPEAKER_00: So bringing people from the coasts,
23:02
SPEAKER_00: from other parts of the world,
23:03
architects from Denmark who have mastered certain aspects of
23:07
city planning,
23:08
SPEAKER_00: bringing those folks to Montana,
23:10
SPEAKER_00: having them fall in love with the people and the initiatives here,
23:13
but also getting the opportunity to thought exchange and
23:17
resource exchange with the
23:20
SPEAKER_00: people on the ground here.
23:21
SPEAKER_00: I mean, this is still one of the least populated states, but it...
23:25
SPEAKER_00: COVID had a big impact.
23:26
SPEAKER_00: It was one more shift on how rapidly this place is scaling and growing.
23:32
SPEAKER_00: It's not happening everywhere in the state,
23:34
but it's certainly happening in Bozeman and Billings and most
23:38
of the larger cities.
23:39
But how to manage that and how to jump ahead into the future
23:45
and define...
23:46
what is aspirational for the communities of montana both large
23:52
and and small and
23:54
then reverse engineer how to get there and be really thoughtful
23:56
because we have a
23:57
very unique opportunity there's a lot of states that are so far
24:00
out of the out of
24:01
the gates in population that they have a much harder time you
24:06
know being thoughtful
24:07
SPEAKER_00: about how they want to scale we still have that opportunity here
24:11
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, opportunity, tremendous opportunity, but significant risk as well.
24:15
SPEAKER_02: You know, it's not clear that we're going to do it right.
24:18
It comes back to where is Montana going and scaling and are we
24:22
doing it right,
24:23
SPEAKER_00: not doing it right?
24:24
it starts with real conversation and starts with having the
24:26
right people at the
24:27
table and working through a more facilitated process in which
24:32
every perspective is
24:33
SPEAKER_00: valued and being heard.
24:36
And then just a more thoughtful way of right now that there's
24:40
one of the things I
24:41
love about Pat Murphy and his vision for Montana festival is
24:44
that he's also been
24:45
involved in a lot of kind of local regional city commission and
24:49
planning meetings
24:50
SPEAKER_00: and
24:51
Just observing how some of those functions don't work properly
24:56
as they were
24:58
SPEAKER_00: originally intended.
24:58
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
24:59
SPEAKER_00: people can show up to those meetings and vent,
25:01
SPEAKER_00: but the people that they're venting to by current law can't respond.
25:08
SPEAKER_00: They just have to sit there and listen.
25:10
SPEAKER_00: And so that's not a dialogue.
25:11
SPEAKER_00: And so therefore, the people that are sitting there
25:15
complaining don't have all the context because that context
25:18
doesn't have like an
25:19
efficient avenue of participation and onboarding for people to
25:23
understand like
25:25
these are the things that are being considered and you know
25:29
implemented you don't
25:31
see the whole picture yet but there's a plan here or conversely
25:35
being able to offer
25:37
SPEAKER_00: some of those people in power
25:40
SPEAKER_00: sort of a free flow of not a free flow,
25:42
but like more efficient ways of seeing alternatives and
25:46
solutions that they might
25:47
not otherwise be privy to that have happened in other
25:51
communities around the
25:51
SPEAKER_00: country that have already been through similar things.
25:53
There's a lot of cities and communities that have learned both
25:58
how to do things
25:58
SPEAKER_00: right and how to not do things because they learn the hard way.
26:02
And some of those lessons we could benefit from not having to
26:06
live through and lament later.
26:09
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
26:11
One of the things I think we all benefit from is bringing good
26:16
actors together,
26:17
SPEAKER_02: people with good faith,
26:18
SPEAKER_02: people who are smart,
26:19
SPEAKER_02: creative,
26:20
SPEAKER_02: and want to work together,
26:21
SPEAKER_02: want to listen to various viewpoints,
26:23
SPEAKER_02: et cetera.
26:24
SPEAKER_02: Bringing them together is our pathway forward.
26:26
And you're doing that with Hetch Studios,
26:28
Montana Festival,
26:29
so many of your endeavors.
26:30
It seems like it's all centered around trying to bring good
26:33
people together to create solutions.
26:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it really is.
26:38
SPEAKER_00: And building and creating a container, the
26:41
values all the viewpoints and voices in the room and that's
26:46
it's not easy there's a
26:47
lot of different perspectives out there but if you're not going
26:51
to have a container
26:53
in which everyone can have their voice heard then that's just
26:56
going to build
26:56
resentment and nothing's productive at that point no if folks
27:02
want to learn more
27:02
about hatch studios montana festival all the good work that you
27:06
do yara where would
27:07
SPEAKER_02: you direct them
27:08
HatchExperience.org is the Hatch website and there's an apply
27:13
button there.
27:14
SPEAKER_00: There's a nominate lever.
27:17
SPEAKER_00: It's also, of course, a place to donate and support.
27:20
Hatch is a nonprofit,
27:21
and we have a next-gen program,
27:23
which I forgot to mention.
27:25
It's a really beautiful program where we're bringing students
27:28
from Montana to all
27:30
SPEAKER_00: the summits,
27:31
SPEAKER_00: and also whether they're within Montana or global.
27:34
We had Hatch Montana next-gen kids at Hatch Europe in
27:38
Switzerland last year and so on.
27:40
SPEAKER_00: And then,
27:40
SPEAKER_00: of course,
27:41
the other website that I would invite people to go to is the
27:44
Montana Festival Festival.
27:45
SPEAKER_00: to learn more about the work that's happening there.
27:48
SPEAKER_00: And the next Montana Festival is next May in 2025.
27:52
SPEAKER_02: Super.
27:53
SPEAKER_02: Well,
27:53
SPEAKER_02: Yaro Craner,
27:54
SPEAKER_02: thanks for all the great work you do,
27:55
SPEAKER_02: and thanks for telling us about it today.
27:58
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Justin.
27:59
SPEAKER_00: I really appreciate the work that you're doing and the invitation,
28:02
and I look forward to finding a way in which you and I can
28:05
collaborate a little bit.
28:06
SPEAKER_02: I'd like that.
28:12
SPEAKER_02: Thanks for listening to A New Angle.
28:14
SPEAKER_02: If you like what we do and want to support us directly,
28:16
SPEAKER_02: please consider a subscription at anewanglepodcast.com.
28:22
A New Angle is recorded at Studio 49,
28:25
a generous gift from UM alums Michelle and Lauren Hanson.
28:29
SPEAKER_02: Our presenting sponsors are First Security Bank,
28:31
SPEAKER_02: Blackfoot Communications,
28:33
SPEAKER_02: and the University of Montana College of Business.
28:36
SPEAKER_02: Kelly Larson is our producer.
28:38
SPEAKER_02: Maddie Jordan is our production assistant.
28:40
SPEAKER_02: VTO Jeff Amet and John Wicks made our music.
28:43
SPEAKER_02: And Jeff Meese is our master of all things sound.
28:46
SPEAKER_02: Thanks a lot and see you next time.