Goc O'Callaghan part 2 - The secrets and learnings from the dark side of Disney's magic

[00:00:00] Steve: Why hello everybody. My name is Steve Usher and a warm welcome to the Experience Designers podcast. [00:00:10] So let's kick off this episode with a question. What if the magic behind your favourite experiences wasn't just a coincidence? And in this second part of this two-part series with Goc Goc, Co owner of Arc Tangent Festival and Global Experience Lead at Borough Happold, we peel back the curtain on the often overlooked and unknown dark side of Disney's magic. [00:00:36] From the hidden infrastructure at Disney's parks to designing festivals that feel like second homes, Goc reveals how intentional design can transform ordinary spaces into extraordinary memories. So get ready to explore behind the scenes of thoughtful details and see how the environments around us are engineered to make us feel, move and connect in profound ways. [00:01:01] So without further ado, let's dive in. [00:01:05] So Goc, um, Welcome back to the experience designers. [00:01:10] Goc: Thanks, Steve. Good to be back again. [00:01:12] Steve: Long time. No speak So this is uh, yeah look Part two and, definitely a different vibe in this one and a different focus from, the previous session, which, for those that perhaps you're starting on session two, I'd recommend absolutely getting into, listening into session one, to get a little bit more sense of, Goc's journey, particularly in the festival scene and, her stories are very powerful, so highly recommend it. [00:01:38] Um, but Goc, just for those that perhaps have joined. For the first time on our session two. Just a quick intro to yourself. , and we can dive straight in. [00:01:47] Goc: Sure. Uh, my name is Goc O'Callaghan and I am the co founder and director of a multi award winning festival called ArcTangent here in the UK. And I am also global experience lead for a structural engineering firm called Borough Happold. [00:02:00] Steve: Amazing. Thank you for that. So now everyone knows at least, this is Goc, looking forward to it. , so Goc, we left the last episode , with the tag of, , the Dark Side of Disney. , so let's just dive in there. I'm curious. What does that mean? [00:02:15] Goc: Dark Side of Disney is a fascinating part of the Disney enterprise that quite a few people are not aware of. [00:02:24] , I'm definitely not one of your, , Disney fanatics in the sense of Disney princesses or the cartoons or the kind of musical side of things. In fact, I actually can't stand that side of Disney, if I'm perfectly honest with you. But what I am interested in is Walt Disney's desire to deliver the best customer experience possible and the way that is now being achieved through, , Um, some of the imagineering that goes into the different Disney parks and attractions, uh, and the kind of the illusion of the magic that enables this to happen. [00:02:59] , and some of the , tip tips and tricks, um, that a Disney imagineering might give to somebody who's delving into the world of experienced design. [00:03:08] Steve: Love, it. There's. Lots of learnings. From Disney, for. Sure. So let's jump in. So, let's, , let's, there's a, there's a bit of a system that they use, , at Disney. [00:03:17] Um, just, what sits behind the,, that lovely glossening, , Disney brand. [00:03:24] Goc: So if you look at the Magic Kingdom that Disney builds, , they vary from, geographical location to geographical location, and there is always something designed that is more specific to that geographical location to make it feel more at home in the culture in which it sits. [00:03:43] , All of those Disney Magic Kingdoms are designed on a cartwheel system with the castle in the middle, spokes that come off from it, and then a circular outer ring road, if you like, and there's a reason for that, and that is to say that you can feel like you're exploring a much bigger space than the actual footprint that the park takes up because of the different ways that you can meander through. [00:04:09] The other reason that works is that the cart system is duplicated sometimes up to about three or four levels below the ground and that allows for an awful lot of infrastructure to be hidden. , so for example, you'd never see , a waste clearance truck coming to empty the bins at Disney. It doesn't happen. [00:04:27] Because when you put something in the bin, that waste goes down, however many levels it is, to a lower tier. And those bins are then emptied underground with a series of, , golf buggy carts. , and then processed and taken away out of sight of, , the people at the Disney parks that are there as visitors. [00:04:48] , this cart system also works as well. Obviously, Mickey Mouse is such a huge character in the world of Disney and I've seen absolute hysteria with kids trying to find where Mickey Mouse is and when they find him. So what Mickey Mouse will do is be moved to different parts of the park where there are less people to create this hype, to encourage people to move to that part of the park, which means that they're then walking past concession traders, um, they're joining rides for queues that are perhaps slightly. [00:05:20] less than, you know, the congested parts of the sites. And as quickly as Mickey Mouse appears, Mickey Mouse can disappear because he'll go underground to one of these, lower tiers, jump in a golf buggy and be driven to the other side of the park and appear the other end. This kind of, elusiveness of, of Mickey Mouse is very intentional. [00:05:39] Um, you'll also never see Mickey Mouse with an ice cream handprint or spilt coffee down His suit. And that's because, and this to me is immensely dark, there is a chamber, for want of a better word, underground, which is known as the costume zoo, where there are multiple versions of all of the Disney costumes hung up. [00:05:59] So that if one of the characters does end up getting covered in ice cream or, you know, it's probably from kids dirty hands that they can get changed. But the image of all of these costumes hanging up in the costume zoo, like these deflated Disney characters on maps, you know, is nothing short of horrific. [00:06:17] Um, but the thinking behind it is fantastic. But [00:06:20] Steve: yeah, I [00:06:21] Goc: think [00:06:21] Steve: that's immensely dark. Whoa, that's amazing. So what's the, Number one, I love that level of detail. And also it's putting the customer experience like front and center that they're removing so much of those elements that can get in the way or. [00:06:41] perhaps feel not so Magic Kingdom, you know, is a, a waste truck moving around or people pulling bags out of a bin, , which doesn't feel very Disney, , in any shape or form. Um, so that's super logic, but I love that there's this kind of CIA level bunkers below that has this kind of purpose to support that, that, , that front of house. [00:07:03] Goc: Yeah. I mean, the CIA kind of spy theory goes even further. Insofar as, the Disney characters that walk around the park are effectively spies, they are there to feed back to what's working and what's not working at the park. You know, if they see something that needs cleaning up, they can then radio that in. [00:07:22] Disney plant people in queues to, to listen in real time to customer feedback. Um, there's this whole, idea that the queue lengths are intentionally distorted in terms of time. So if you join a queue that says you've got an hour long wait and then you realize after 40 minutes you've gotten the ride, you're like, yes, I beat the system. [00:07:40] And sometimes those queue lengths are artificially extended with these kind of Disney spies within the queues that they then decide they're not going to wait for the ride and that reduces the queue time. So it's distorting people's perception of time. Um, but the kind of spy. approach is there to enhance customer experience. [00:07:59] Some of these Disney spies, for want of a better phrase, it sounds awful, they're not spies, they're there to enhance customer experience. If a child was to say, lose the ice cream off the top of their cone, a lot of the Disney characters have the, authorization to go to a ice cream kiosk and just replace that ice cream and just not, not, not create a fuss, just literally replace it and walk off. [00:08:21] Um, but Which I think is a really nice touch because actually it doesn't cost Disney a lot of money, but that could really upset Somebody's day that child loses their shit over, you know, ice cream having dropped on the floor [00:08:33] Steve: Yeah, and the impact of the parents the stressing, particularly if you've got multiple kids and trying to maneuver Yeah, they are stressy moments. [00:08:40] That's quite amazing what else do you know about what is there anything else that they do just as loads of things [00:08:47] Goc: they do Um, so I'm a big believer that we should be designing for the senses and there aren't just the five senses, there are 42 senses, and Disney are pro designing for the senses. [00:09:00] Um, so they're, they'll always, all of the different zones will have some sort of smell about them that you may not notice, but the overwhelmingly obvious one is a vanilla. And vanilla has this, um, biological impact on us, which makes us produce oxytocin, which is the chemical that makes us feel like we're happy. [00:09:20] So when you walk into a Disney park, there is the smell of vanilla. So subconsciously, you are being made to feel happy before you've even started on your Disney journey. Um, Disney spend a lot of time, especially at Epcot, choosing what concrete or what, um, flooring you're walking on and how the texture of that changes your experience and whether that helps you to walk quicker or slow you down. [00:09:43] That's all intentional in the design. So it's a touch sense, but it's not a touch sense that you're going to obviously translate to your experience. So there's so many of these things that go on. And also another touch thing. Disney princesses are obviously a big hit with kids, they're such huge characters in a lot of Disney films. [00:10:04] If a child instigates a hug with a Disney character, the Disney character is not allowed to let go first. It's for the child to leave the length of time that they want that hug. Oh, love that. Which is very sweet. [00:10:18] Steve: It's very cool. Empowering your youngest customer. I'm loving it. [00:10:23] Goc: And that's, that leads into, the saying that of Disney being a second home is that there's a way for everybody to feel welcome and relaxed there. [00:10:30] And I think it's why Disney has such incredible power with people wanting to go back multiple times over and over to get that, that warm feeling, that, that sense of belonging. And that's. That's a very clever thing to have designed into these parks. [00:10:45] Steve: Yeah. There's a lot to unpack in that. [00:10:48] What's, what's some of that, maybe just taking it into the normal business world, should we say, in comparison to Disney experience? Um, but , what are some of those? elements in there that we can learn from because I love that I always believe in like outer bubble learning. [00:11:02] It's like from lots of people listening now, some of them may have even been to Disney who are completely unaware of what you've just shared. And rightly so. Um, But also as well as learnings, maybe if we could pull out some of those and contextualize it into other areas, what are, what can we take from Disney in terms of some of those core learnings or opportunity areas that we could test in different environments? [00:11:27] Goc: So for those who haven't listened to the first podcast, we ended on the idea that if you design somewhere, well, the visitors shouldn't be aware of the amount of effort that's gone into making that space or place feel that way. comfortable and enjoyable for them. Um, we'd also discussed that with the festival, we have the benefit of it being temporary infrastructure. [00:11:49] So you have this capability to move things around and make improvements year on year. But if you're creating something like a theme park or an entertainment venue where the infrastructure needs to be fixed, to think about experience once that space has been built is not going to allow you to optimize that experience. [00:12:06] So integrating experience design from the very, very early stages of design. You know, concepts and, uh, you know, initial designs and using experience as a way of measuring whether or not that design is going to fulfill the optimum end user experience will help improve that design because once that space is built, it's very difficult to go back and change that without a lot of effort and money. [00:12:30] So integrating experience design and taking some of these sort of Disneyfication ideas forward can really help optimize that experience, but it needs that early engagement. [00:12:42] Steve: And also like a really, continuous, and hence some of the planted, spies in, the queues is that you need that real time feedback. [00:12:50] You need to be able to really understand those needs of your customers or end users, um, not only as kind of proud of perhaps the more strategic element, the beginning of designing, but also as well in real time and iteratively along the way as well. It's such an important component. [00:13:06] Goc: And that real time feedback from the Disney staff that are feeding back, that's so important because it's said in that moment. [00:13:15] Um, obviously lots of people write reviews and there's all this sentiment analysis, but the problem with that is there's a memory recall bias there. When you're recording an experience you have, whether you're writing a review or you're talking to somebody about it, that experience can be distorted by the fact it took you three hours to get home, not half an hour because the traffic was bad. [00:13:34] It could be that your boss has called you on your day off and has really wound you up. That's going to distort your view of the experience that you've just had. Um, and again, we spoke about memory strings and how that changes when you recall this memory. So there, the post experience analysis, sentiment analysis, is never quite as accurate as the real time one. [00:13:56] So I think it's very clever being able to capture what people are genuinely feeling in that moment. To get that real time feedback. [00:14:05] Steve: My mind's also going to being in the shoes of one of those employees in one of the suits or, planted in a line or one of the sweepers, um, and part of your job is not just to be, to clean up or to hug children, dressed as Mickey Mouse. [00:14:25] Um, it's also empowering those employees to. To observe, like constantly observe and focus on the customer at all times. And to you, I, it just, I think that's a, it's quite a different uplift in many ways, to a lot of kind of environments. I think it's quite empowering, actually. [00:14:45] Goc: Very empowering. And just how those staff as well can be used to make you feel extra welcome. [00:14:50] You know, Disney are well known for, if you go there on your birthday, you're given a badge and it has your name on it. So all the staff greet you and say happy birthday and include your name in what. In that well, which, so that sense of belonging there and feeling special, it's such a simple trick, but what that does for that person's feelings about that space and that draw to go back is huge. [00:15:11] You know, imagine being a seven year old kid and all these sort of very smiley theatrical Disney staff are saying, Hey, happy birthday, Joe, happy birthday, Claire. Like, you're going to lose your mind, aren't you? As a seven year old in that environment. And then suddenly these really cool people were. [00:15:26] Wishing you happy birthday and not just wishing you happy birthday, but calling you by your name as well, you [00:15:30] Steve: know, that's amazing. Um, let's, uh, the Disney five for a moment. And let's bring this level of curation into, your world and your work you're doing with, Buro Happold. [00:15:43] Is that Buro Happold? Um, what's the business? What do they do? Just as a bit of an intro into their organization. [00:15:50] Goc: Buro Happold are a global structural engineering firm that build everything from universities to entertainment venues to entire cities. [00:16:00] Um, there's a huge amount of capability within the company from, the actual master planning to mechanical, electrical, plumbing resources to sustainability, to power, to facades. They have behavioral scientists work for them. They have crowd modeling companies that have acoustic sound consultants. [00:16:19] So Harport was I started working for a company called Crowd Dynamics, which are a crowd modeling company that look at, people flow through various different spaces. Um, I went in there, with my experience of the festival world to help with the CrowdDNA project that we spoke about on the previous podcast. [00:16:39] Um, just as a quick summary, CrowdDNA is looking at crowd movement through various different spaces to help increase the safety and prevent the crowd related disasters from happening. So that was my route into Crowd Dynamics, with a key focus being on the end user experience. So the Crowd Dynamics company were really good at helping people to optimize the layouts and designs of spaces to enable people to go through that space, in the least, with the least friction as possible. [00:17:09] Um, my role was then to bridge that gap between this sort of more desktop study into the real world with some of the production considerations and experience design, aspects that I've been doing at the festival and all of the other work that I've been doing. That then paved the way for experience advisory, which is the department that I'm in charge of, which is helping our clients to find, define and unlock the perceived and actual value in the experiences that they're offering for their users. [00:17:38] So this isn't just the audience that might go to an entertainment venue. It could be. scientists within a science lab. It could be university students within a campus. It could be, workers throughout a city in the Middle East, for example. So there's a lot there, but basically it's optimisation of experience. [00:17:56] Steve: From the human perspective, in the constructed environment, is it for, or is it bringing both of them together kind of equally? [00:18:04] Goc: Bringing both of them together equally. [00:18:06] Steve: Yeah. [00:18:07] Goc: So it's a human centred focus as a. design principle to enhance experience. [00:18:14] Steve: Whoa, that's cool. Okay. I can, and I can understand from the festival and also, yeah, as to why you've ended up doing what you're doing in this particular context. [00:18:23] Um, that's amazing. [00:18:26] Goc: There's surprisingly a lot of, similarities between designing a festival layout and designing the master plan for a city or a district within a city, same sort of considerations. You know, festival is a temporary town. But a district might be a permanent part of a town, but you still need the same resources in both spaces. [00:18:43] They're just on slightly different scales and with different levels of, permanency. [00:18:49] Steve: Tell us a little bit about the kind of the, um, the, the approach to that kind of work. I know all projects are going to be inherently different or maybe if you can share an example of a project, but just like just what some of that process to that work [00:19:04] Goc: it's very difficult to compare one project to another as like comparing apples and pears to this, a huge amount of personalization that needs to go into this. So I think, yes, possibly it's best if I explain the methodology behind how I'm approaching this experience of consultancy. And that is that first and foremost, most people or most companies will claim to offer a good experience for their end users. [00:19:31] But when you quiz them on what that good experience is, they can't actually describe it. [00:19:35] You know, [00:19:36] Goc: let's take the O2 Academies that we spoke about in the last venue. How do, how does the O2 Academy know that their audience have had a good time? Over and above people have clapped at the end of the show or they've had a beer or, there's no way of measuring that. [00:19:50] So at BoroHappold, I've been working on a methodology to be able to quantify the experience in these spaces. And what that looks like is an immensely in depth experience framework that has, I think it's probably now around 300 different metrics that can be measured relating to experience that fall into three key categories. [00:20:14] One is personal user experience. So that is something that is. very specific to an individual or a psychographic profile. So that could be, behavioral influences. So what makes you choose to go left rather than right? What makes you pick that food stand over another food stand? it could be quantitative human factors. [00:20:33] So this could be things like dwell time, queue time, walking distance, thermal comfort levels, or it could be experience design metrics. So this could be things like your, engagement levels, your participation realm, your effort levels, for example. And what I, what I do for each project is I work with the client to work out which combination of metrics will best demonstrate to them the experience that they're trying to create. [00:21:02] Um, I work with them to create a hierarchy of those metrics and through a series of quite complicated calculations can give them a impact value for each of those measurements. Sorry, each of those metrics, which tells them how well that particular metric is performing. And then there is a relative impact value of those metrics combined. [00:21:25] Now, if we were looking at a design, we could compare one design to another design, using those metrics and determine which of those two designs best performs from an experience perspective. We could then also look at if we slightly tweaked that design, which metrics does that impact? And whilst the impact value is a number, it's only numerical insofar as to show whether or not something has improved or got worse. [00:21:51] Thanks. Um, and it's used as a benchmarking tool rather than the number being worth a number. [00:21:59] Steve: So it works down and up. So you have the venue or the space has a goal in terms of the experience that they want to create. You then define then some of the metrics apart out of those 300, say, these are the ones that we recommend would be. [00:22:15] The most appropriate to use in this context based on your goals and your why and what, and then you then do you run some kind of, um, test against that, or do you need some real time data? Do you need real data for that? Or can you, is it more predictive as well? [00:22:31] Goc: So this is where it's. Quite clever in that respect. [00:22:37] Um, it can be used to work for the reiterations of the design to optimize the design. And then once the venue or the space is in use, it could then be used to validate whether the predictions were correct, it can then be used as a, an assessment tool to make sure that the experience remains as it's forecast to be for the users and highlight where there might be short fallings and therefore where there's the opportunity to optimize that experience in that space. [00:23:05] Because it's something that couldn't have been predicted off of the, the, master plan documents or the 3D models that have come forward. The interim step between those desktop studies and the live is that I have the capability to put this into a game engine platform and to walk through the space and show in first person, real time, what that experience is looking like. [00:23:29] And it will demonstrate with kind of a dashboard down the side of the game engine platform. where that experience is going up or down. It could be your engagement type or the impact on my thing, for example, that is shown in real time as you walk through the game engine model of the space. [00:23:45] Steve: That's next level. [00:23:47] Goc: It's proper nerdy. Like, and I, you know, this is far too clever for me to be able, I'm not the one creating the game engine platform, and I'm the one contributing to the maths, but I'm, I've got a team of immensely talented people that are bringing to life this idea around, experience advisory, Um, to really enable us to demonstrate to our clients the value of being experienced first in their approach to designing new spaces and places. [00:24:13] Steve: New spaces, yeah. Because I guess, history has told us we've got, we're littered with spaces that, might look great, but not optimized for humans. I [00:24:24] Goc: mean, Thomas Heatherwick, in his book called Humanize made a very interesting point that, Buildings are often designed for the people that go inside of them. [00:24:32] So that could be, one or two hundred people if it's an office block. But there's very little consideration to the experience of the thousands of people that walk past it every day and that we should be That we should be changing our narrative around, the design of buildings. It should be designed for those that don't go inside [00:24:47] Steve: Yes I love that [00:24:50] good quote. Good quote. Um So what let's um for some of the audience might be like, Oh my God, like, you know, just like measuring and experience because it's, it's, uh, it's a tough business. Um, how can we simplify this a little bit? Can we give a sense of like what measurements or how that's measured or how that would work. [00:25:14] Goc: This is one of the biggest challenges around the quantification of experience is that it's very subjective. Yeah. We are, every single one of us will have a slightly different experience, even if we're stood in the same space at the same time. So we, it's not possible to go into that granular level of detail. [00:25:32] We would have to look at either demographics or psychographic profiling, which we mentioned in the previous podcast, and look to quantify experience for a particular group. Group or groups of people. One of the ways I found to, to reduce the subjectivity of this is taking an engineering mindset. So say for example, I wanted to look at the impact that lighting has on an experience. [00:25:59] I will work with the lighting design team within Borough Hapwood that have specialists in there that have studied the impact of lighting on how people feel, so their well being, perhaps on their behavior. Perhaps on how you can use lighting, um, to enhance or reduce people's, participation or their feeling of participation, and then how that in turn impacts on experience. [00:26:23] So, using lighting as an example, we might say, if the lighting is natural light that scores a range of, that comes in the range of one, um, If it's in a tungsten light, that's a range of 2, and if it's a red light, that's a range of 3. Where we say, in this scenario, we want natural light, so that's a score of 1. [00:26:41] If we don't want red light, that's a score of 3. So when you do the calculation, the range that has been attributed to that lighting, it's given it something tangible to measure it with. and that range has been determined with lighting experts to make sure that the subjective element of that is removed as much as it can be. [00:27:03] So by bringing in specialists from lighting, acoustics, behavioral science, we are looking at this in a more mathematical, scientific way without it being purely maths or purely silent science. Yeah. But we are using a range of experts in their field to validate the numbers that we are calculating to give these impact values for experience. [00:27:30] I'm not sure that's made it any clearer or any more straightforward to comprehend. No, no, [00:27:34] Steve: no, no, it's good. No, it makes sense. I'm just, there's a number of things, that come into mind as you were sharing. I just want to share a fun story is in relation to lighting as, um, There was, it was a number of years ago, but they were running an experiment on the South Bank in London of the impact of lighting when drinking wine and we had to I think it was the acidic test, you know, the, um, I don't know what you call it when they test your acidity before you then, so that was part of the calculation, but it was mad because they changed the color of the light from red to blue to green, some of the main primaries and, and the wine tasted different. [00:28:14] Now I don't know whether because they were suggesting it would taste different, but for others it was actually, no it doesn't taste any different, but for me some of them did and it was fascinating. I think we got the results and There was a difference in some of the lights changing, how that impacted. [00:28:26] And that brings me onto my next thing that was, as you were just sharing some of that is. Highlighting the fact of just how programmable we are as humans and that this could be created for good and to enhance, but also for manipulation in a way, but perhaps positive manipulation. So that kind of was coming to mind. [00:28:47] Um, and then also as well, I was also thinking that, some of this predictability only gets us so far, the rest is that's part of designing and creating experiences is don't actually know what's going to happen. And that's part of that trust of what you have created. Um, yeah, you can't always be in control. [00:29:06] You have to also release control to the audience or the, or those in that space, and see how they react. And then that's where the more reactive listening and iteration then is so important, as part of that. [00:29:17] Goc: So I think this comes down to. Apply and experience design in the very early stages, because if you design a space well, when people step into that space, their psychological safety will feel quite high. [00:29:32] And the higher your psychological safety levels, the more likely it is that you are to participate in something. If you feel unsafe, you're not going to then go and dance on that dance floor over there and just lose yourself for a few moments. You're going to be more worried about how do I get out of this space because I don't feel safe. [00:29:50] But if you start to include. these sensory elements within that. So you're talking about the lighting impacting the taste of the wine. You can do that with smells, we spoke about vanilla earlier and how that impacts how people feel. We could have all of these, little tips and tricks up your sleeve that are manipulating your audience in a way that they're going to engage better within that space. [00:30:13] If you think about the number of retail stores that use a scent to draw you in, you can smell when there's a lush in a shopping mall long before you see it. Supermarkets pump out the smell of bread from the bakery that draws you in, all these tricks of combining senses and this sort of synesthetic approach of. [00:30:30] Combining senses together to enhance that experience is really interesting and it's a field that I'm going down a bit of a wormhole of with my research, but a classic, the more you know, the less, type of thing because you discover new things that teach you more, but bringing this into experience design and being able to positively manipulate somebody's experience. [00:30:50] And also use it as a memory recall tool as well is hugely powerful. [00:30:54] Steve: Yeah, I'm jumping between the one end that we've explored, which is Disney, the Disneyfication element. And then I'm also like now pulling, comparing and moving into a like typical workplace environment, which for me, I don't know, in my mind, I'm thinking gray and quite dull, environments in many respects, in many areas. [00:31:17] I've seen some amazing recent designs of some amazing offices. But how do we see that genre, of space evolving, as we go forward? [00:31:26] Goc: Yeah, so, I think it comes down to people's capability to personalize the space they're in. Traditionally office blocks have been very much tungsten light, grey walls, probably a bit too warm for people's level, uh, comfort levels, or really cold because they've put the air conditioning on. And it's just, you can never appease everybody in an office space because there's lots of people. [00:31:50] But if you could have zoned lighting, for example, where if you have a sensitivity to tungsten light, you could turn down, The intensity of that light, or you could opt to sit closer to windows. Um, or, um, you could be in a room that better suits your. Your personal needs. Um, that then enhances the feeling of being in an office and the desirability to, to be in there. [00:32:15] I think culture is a huge thing now, isn't it? Around the office spaces, there needs to be a good coffee machine. And if the office can't provide good coffee, they're better off not providing it at all because mediocre coffee is just going to annoy people. So all these little things that might seem So simple can actually go a really long way to, to enhance people's experiences, especially with all the smart integration into buildings now to, if you think about your ID cards that scan you into a building for security, what if you could set the profile of your room to your personal needs? [00:32:50] So you touch your card on the, the electronic device, just inside the door, it dims the lights, it reduces the temperature. It sets an alarm for you at 12. 30 when you've got your lunch meeting, all of this personalization is going to make those office spaces significantly more appealing to be in. [00:33:06] And it's not difficult to do. [00:33:09] Steve: No, and the pro, the property tech is there now. I heard a lovely one recently where, If you, when you book a meeting room, say for 10 and only eight confirmed, then it will automatically move you to an eight person room to four. So that, yeah, more efficient. But it also knows that if you had lunch and, say it's during, it's a lunch meeting and then lunch has been ordered. [00:33:32] What it will do is it will increase the ventilation. And then once the meeting is finished. finished, it will actually increase and then remove any smells from the room by increasing the ventilation for the next party that is coming in. So I think there's some really cool little tricks like that. I think that, and the tech to enable those kinds of things, which, we need more of that. [00:33:50] I think, and particularly we're still in this argument of coming back to The office hybrid working, the moments now, particularly if we are working more hybrid and virtual, , the moments when humans come together in a space of an office, uh, HQ, um, have to be even more for me, like experience should be part of that strategy or building that period. [00:34:10] When you are together, why are you together? What is it you're trying to achieve? What environment will support that need, rather than just getting into a normal office? I mean, in my mind. If it's a co creation session, then a boardroom, for me, isn't the kind of environment that particularly lean well for that, as an example. [00:34:28] Yeah, [00:34:29] Goc: I think as well, it comes down to sort of incentivization as well, isn't it? If you need to return to the office or your company is insisting you return to the office, to have to be there 9 bang on, means that people are going to be commuting. Potentially busier time and that creates for a stressful environment so that when you get to work, you're not going to be on your best form. [00:34:48] So what could businesses do around incentivization to get you in there from 7. It's like, well, that's when the best coffee is going to be and your breakfast will be provided for free. But also you're allowed to then leave work at 4, 4. 30 in the summer that gives you effectively a whole day's worth of daylight to go and live your life outside of work. [00:35:06] So, [00:35:07] you know, [00:35:07] Goc: I don't think the nine to five rigid structure will ever come back because I think. Quite frankly, people aren't going to put up with it. And nor should we, as I think COVID has done us a huge favour, one in terms of remote working, but also awareness around wellbeing at work and how damaging those office spaces can be if They're not well designed and also there's not that flexibility for people to have that work life balance. [00:35:30] I [00:35:31] Steve: agree. I think it was the, uh, all for the wrong reasons. And I've said this many times, it's been the greatest workplace experience, we've ever had in history. And we're still reeling and learning from it even to this day. I think universally, Yeah, lots of humans got off the hamster wheel and reassessed and I think that's well documented today. [00:35:51] So it's um, it's very interesting very interesting um So just because I think just something that we definitely talked about previously, but I just really want to dive in a little bit around this kind of practical And academic. You've got this really interesting melee of festival organizer through to, academia really taking, really going much deeper with the experience design. [00:36:12] Then of course, from a consultancy, more practical element. So you're applying it in so many different like ways and going deep in some elements. Where are you with that right now? Just to, to give us a sense of this journey that you're on. [00:36:26] Goc: I mean, I've said it a few times, but it feels like the more you know, the less, you know, this is, it seems like experience design is an ever growing area of research with, you know, uh, Joe Pine, who established the experience economy now writing a book on around the transformational economy. [00:36:42] With organizations like the world experience organization is demonstrating that globally, there is this weird melting pot of people that are just obsessed with creating incredible experiences. So what I'm trying to do is combine my practical application of having worked as a production manager, and owning and running an independent festival, that experience I've had on the ground of physically building events. [00:37:05] With my consultancy work through Borough Happold, which is a lot around strategy and obviously the consulting side of things, but also with my academic research to try and bolster this experience advisory offer. So I'm hoping that with that triad of, three quite diverse skill sets, it means I'm a very trusted advisor because I've been on the ground, I've done it, I've done my academic research and I'm qualified in that. [00:37:31] And I'm a consultant that has offered advice that has resulted in tangible results. So that's my approach. And I, I don't know if that's been an intentional, route of my own, but it seems to be working for me so far. So I'm going to keep going. Keep on and keep on keeping on until, I think there's something else I need to do to enhance it further. [00:37:52] Steve: Yeah. I think your journey makes sense, I think it's been a really nice light evolving one that's a story that's continued to unfold and build along the way, and you can really see that. Um, yeah. [00:38:02] So look, just to kind of, um, , let's see if we can tie in both of our sessions, to some kind of tangible, recommendations or thoughts, or reflections you could share with people? [00:38:16] Goc: Definitely. I think my first one would be don't assume that your definition of experience is the same as the next person's. There are so many different ways that you can interpret the word experience and there are so many different meanings that you can assign to it. [00:38:32] So if you're having a work related meeting, for example, I Make sure that everybody is thinking along the same lines of what experience is. Because if you don't start From the same place, you're not going to end in the same place. If anything, you're going to go completely the opposite ways to each other. [00:38:49] I think if you're a business now that isn't considering experience as a huge part of what you do, you're going to be left behind. Especially with the shift and the consistently, the consistent evidence that's coming out that good experiences are relating to wellbeing. And that doesn't mean going to the pub or going to a festival or going to a theme park. [00:39:09] It means having. An experience that makes you feel psychologically safe. It enables you to enhance your life and you're pushing towards this transformational experience of self actualization that's the top of the Maslow's hierarchy of needs. So being experienced first, being human centered in your approach to anything you do in any industry, I think is immensely important. [00:39:32] Um, I think again, coming back to that COVID thing, the thing that us as human beings desire more than anything else is, other people's companies. other people's time. We have this fundamental need to spend time with people and it doesn't have to be in huge crowds. It can be with one or two others and we have this need to create memories and tell stories because that's how we've evolved as human beings. [00:39:57] That's how we've got to where we are and the capabilities that we have. So finding opportunities to, to have those experiences with people, whatever your choice of experience is, it doesn't matter how different it is from somebody else's. It's about. you finding your pack, your herd, your tribe, your group of people that, you create these memories and it could be sitting around a campfire. [00:40:20] It could be going to the other side of the world. It could be going to parties or festivals, whatever it is that, that ticks your box, make time, make sure you're finding time for these experiences. From a more, for people that are interested in experience that perhaps want to learn more, I highly recommend reading, Joe Pine's book, The Experience Economy, Matt Durden's book around experience design, Watch Beyond the Attraction on Disney Plus, which is, some of the, where some of the dark side of Disney stuff has come from. [00:40:51] Um, and I think if you want to work in experiences, there's no right or wrong way to do it. I mean, as I prove with, You know, Gocstock going bust from an investor pulling out to now being an Arctangent, give it a go The best lessons that you're going to learn are they are going to be from the things that go wrong [00:41:10] Steve: Absolutely [00:41:11] Goc: and give something could go and if you realize it's not what you want to do Not knowing what you don't want to do is as powerful as knowing what you want to do So just I think We need to be less serious as a human race and, uh, embrace play. [00:41:25] Steve: And [00:41:26] Goc: with that will come a huge amount of evolution, I think. [00:41:28] Steve: Totally agree. I mirror the human centric. I think far too many particularly in hierarchical systemic environments, where it's very top down, imposing experiences on what you think people want, is, not a good start, um, start, start with those in which you're designing for. [00:41:45] And I think I've got one more add to that as well is if, if experiences is what you Is all that we have let's make them more intentional. [00:41:52] Goc: Absolutely I'm onboard with that way of thinking [00:41:55] Steve: All of the books that you quoted. I have them in my bookshelf I will absolutely put links in the show notes as well Also to add in there Goc, what's the best way for people to contact you? [00:42:06] Where can they find you hanging out apart from? Kazakhstan, is it where you're heading next? Kyrgyzstan, I think. Kyrgyzstan, um, yes, um, so yeah, in the mountains. Um, but where, where can It might be slightly [00:42:18] Goc: tricky to find there. [00:42:21] Steve: Where can, they find you? [00:42:22] Goc: I'm on LinkedIn. Goc O'Callaghan Goc, Goc spelt, G O C. [00:42:26] You can find me on Instagram. My handle is Goc O'Callaghan and also Goc O'Callaghan. co. uk where you can link through. and email me. Um, in terms of conference and events, I'm going to be at the Immersive, uh, Immersive Experience Network which is in Southeast London. I'm going to be at IBTM World in Barcelona and I'll be at the World Experience Organization Summit in, I think it's the end of April, beginning of May, uh, next year. [00:42:53] Steve: Amazing. So I will see you at the Immersive one. I'm going to be there. Oh, fantastic. And then, I'm definitely, I'm not missing the WX01. I've missed the first one and the second one and the third one now I've got too much FOMO, so I'm going to have to, I'm definitely going to be there. [00:43:07] Oh, brilliant. Well, we'll [00:43:08] Goc: definitely have to catch up for a point or two outside of the podcast world. [00:43:12] Steve: Love to, love to. Um, but look Goc, I just want to say thank you so much for sharing so much of your time. I know you had such a crazy August with Arctagent. Glad to see you looking, healthy and energized even after a very busy period for you. [00:43:26] Enjoy your break and, I look forward to seeing you in London, later this year. Thank you so much for having me. Yes, indeed. Yeah, you're so welcome. [00:43:34] Goc: Yes, it's been really good fun, and I said this on the previous podcast, not just the recording sessions today, but the chats that we've had before, , leading up to it. [00:43:41] And if you can't tell, I get absolutely buzzed by these conversations when you share the space with someone who's as enthusiastic about experiences as I am. It's a, yeah, it's an exciting place to be. [00:43:51] Steve: Amazing. Thank you again. [00:43:53] Goc: Thanks Steve. [00:43:55] Steve: So there you have it. Thank you so much for joining us as we dived into exploring how festivals, structural engineering and the masters themselves, Disney shape experiences with Goc O'Goc. [00:44:07] And this was part two of our two part series and we hope you're leaving with fresh insights into the subtle details that create extraordinary moments in places we often take for granted. And if today's episode inspired you to reimagine your surroundings or sparked new ideas, don't forget to follow and share this podcast with others who might just be as passionate about design and storytelling as yourself. [00:44:32] So until the next time, keep exploring the extraordinary in the everyday, and I'll see you in the next one. Bye for now.