Stewardship in Action: What “Values-Driven” Design Really Means With Phil Harrison and Lindsey Peckinpaugh

[Music] Hello and welcome back to the I Hear Design podcast by Interior and Sources. Your source for interior design and architecture and news, interviews, opinions, and conversations that matter. I'm your host Robert Niaminen and I'd like to wish you all a very happy new year. It's hard to believe 2026 is already upon us but I am excited to kick things off with a bank. Today I'm joined by Phil Harrison and Lindsey Peckinbaugh of Perkins & Will to talk about their latest impact report titled Stewardship and Action, a values-driven approach to design. In this conversation we unpack what it actually means for architects and designers to be values driven in practice. From human-centered, biophilic spaces that prioritize health and well-being, to a design ethos rooted in humility, pragmatism, and service to something bigger than the building itself. We also dig into Perkins & Will's living design framework and how it expands design thinking to include things like performance, inclusion, research, and innovation. We also discuss a standout example of this ethos in action. Toronto's DAWL's library, a net zero carbon community hub shaped through indigenous design principles and deep co-creation, including a star blanket facade concept developed with smoke architecture. And we get real about the profession, including a conversation around data-driven accountability, healthier materials, biodiversity, talent pipeline challenges, and even how AI can reduce busy work without replacing the human heart of design. So grab a cup of coffee or maybe champagne if you're still on vacation and ringing in the new year, and join me for this insightful conversation with Perkins & Will. Hi Phil, Hi Lindsay, welcome to AIHR design. It's great to have you both on the podcast. Thank you Robert. It's great to be here. Thank you Robert. Definitely. Well, I think this may be the first time you both been on the show together, but Perkins & Will as a firm is certainly no stranger to this podcast. We actually had Coco Nomura and Normala Shrinivasa to talk about their collaborative approach to project management recently. And back in January, Urese Juarez joined us for a conversation with a couple of other guests to discuss regenerative design practices and circular principles, which were both really interesting and insightful. So for our listeners out there, if you haven't listened to those episodes yet, I urge you to go back and check them out when you get a chance. Is there some really great content that I think you'll find equally helpful and inspiring as well. In other words, Perkins will really has been a thought leader on this podcast as well as the industry at large. And so I'm really grateful to both of you for having taken time to share your latest insights with our listening audience. And I think our topic today just couldn't be more relevant as I've personally just witnessed a shift in the industry towards design that goes beyond just the form and function. And that really embraces a deeper set of principles that I think are pushing the boundaries of how we think about the bills environment and its impact on people and the planet. And to that end, Perkins will recently released a report that highlights your firm's approach to this paradigm, if you will, that I'd love to unpack with you during this conversation. So why don't we start at the beginning with a title of the report. So it's stewardship and action, a value driven approach to design. So my first question really is, you know, when you talk about being values driven, what does that mean in practical terms for Perkins will and how would you or how would a client or a community really feel that difference in a finished project. Well, thank you, Robert. We, you know, on behalf of Phil and I just want to say thank you for having us. We're pleased to be here and we're certainly very proud of the impact report and recognize that it takes a tremendous amount of work to publish something like that. So thank you for for reading it and inviting us to talk about it. So being a value driven firm is something that we're incredibly proud of across our organization and in practical terms that has tremendous impact on really all aspects of our business from the work that we pursue to our design approach and our project delivery approach and certainly to our finished product. So I love that you asked how communities and clients may feel that difference when they they encounter our work has certainly designed does have the power to evoke emotion and I think we've all been in a space that gives us a sense of all our sense of wonder when we walk in but I think in our firm, what I admire so deeply is beyond just that initial reaction. We are proud that our work really has deeper meaning behind it and intentionality behind it and so I have a belief that the longer you spend time in our spaces, the more that that appreciation kind of grows on you and I think it shows up in the attention to detail and craft. In our spaces are commitment to health and well-being and so many of our spaces of course are connected to nature and design to be bio-philic and and I think one of the most important things for us and something that I really hope translates in our work is that our design work is human centered and so our spaces are really meant to be of human scale connected to nature connected in the communities in which they belong. And I think that is the sense of optimism and hope that I hope you encounter in our projects. Yeah, absolutely. Speaking of the you know you talked about design having the impact on us personally right like when you walk into a space and just on a personal note like a year ago I had the chance to visit the Lesser Grata Familia Chapel in Spain. I mean to the cathedral like wow like what talk about impact that architecture has on you you know and how it makes you feel and so yeah and I just love that that architecture and design are sort of moving in that direction of really considering how you know how it impacts people into your point Lindsey about it just being human centric right and that's just it's so important. And I know as a firm that something that you've been focused on for quite a while and so fill the next question really is geared towards you but you know when you zoom out and look across the firms was at 90 year history now what common threads do you see in how Perkins will has tried to balance things like beauty and sustainability and equity like where do you see the biggest evolution happening over time. Yeah, well we came out of Chicago and the firm started in the Midwest and embraces what I consider to be Midwestern values. Lindsey talked about being human centric but more than that I think the firm comes from a place of moderation and pragmatism sort of sense of humility and that architecture and design is in service of something bigger it's not about itself but it's in service of the human. And being that occupy this base and out of that comes an ethos of generosity what I would say and and so this notion of balancing beauty and sustainability and equity sort of flows come out of that sense of purposeful humble service that buildings serve the communities for a very long period of time is not about a headline or flashy thing that happens for a short time but a recognition that buildings last. Sometimes hundreds of years and you know there's tons of architecture like that in Chicago itself or not the only good architecture firm that came out of Chicago but that sense the broader sense of how we're contributing to the world in a purposeful way to me that's a continuum that's existed across the firm throughout all 90 years the biggest evolution in our firm over time has been scale and diversification when I joined the firm in 1995 30 years ago we were. 10 times smaller maybe 12 times smaller about 200 250 people and so the way you get to sort of the humanness in a larger organization is sort of fundamentally different and so we've had to evolve the way we lead and manage and communicate in the firm but the values are the same so the sort of permanence of values but organizational principles have been completely changed over this time and we've had to reinvent the firm many times long the way. Well one of the things in the report that you mentioned was you know this concept about living design and I think the phrase that popped out was together we designed for life so Lindsay how would you define like living design today and is there a recent project you can share where that philosophy really sort of came to life in a way that our listeners could clean from. Yeah we started to set this up nicely in your intro to the podcast that for us design has evolved well past just poetic some beauty and craft and given environmental societal challenges of today we have to think about design much more holistically and so in our firm we do that through the living design framework which really takes into account. Other lenses such as tectonics and technology research and innovation health and well being community and inclusion into our design process and we have so many examples in the firm Robert of where we've done this successfully I don't know so I think of like does library in Toronto which is a project I don't know if you're familiar with it Robert but this is a project that's come out of Ontario studios and it is a branch library and community hub for the church. The community hub for the Toronto public library system that we won this commission during COVID actually in 2021 and the purpose of the project was to design a community hub that is intended to be net zero carbon. and also the project brief described that it was important to be rooted in Indigenous design principles and in the Indigenous worldview. So our design leadership in Toronto Andrew Fontini partnered with Smoke Architecture as an Indigenous design partner and really sought true collaboration and set up the whole teaming approach and design approach for that project really trying to optimize opportunities for co creation with the client. With the client, with the community, with Smoke Architecture and with over a dozen community organizations and you know I could wax politically about the project that Andrew Fontini does a beautiful job describing the project and the journey in his book episodes on public architecture episodes in public architecture, I should say. And it's just a few interesting things about how this played out in the design working with a lot of smoke and smoke architecture Andrew and team were really looking for ceremonial and representative ways that the project narrative could show up and be translated into the architecture and two of those pieces of symbolism are they integrated architectural frames and platforms that are vernacular common and Indigenous long houses into the design. And a lot of you also came up with the idea of incorporating the star blanket, which is traditionally a ceremonial blanket that's given as a gift to really signify community helping community benefit and service and Indigenous communities. And what resulted is this dramatic facade, which uses modular metal panels that wraps the facade of the building, emulating in an expressive way that star blanket for the community and to pull this off, you know, they had to be very nimble and how the team was working together really testing our limits between analog exploration and digital fabrication practices. And the project is going to open next year targeting net zero carbon really embracing a true meaningful and collaborative partnership with smoke architecture and one of the accolades that the Toronto Public Library client has given us is that from the client perspective. Their team couldn't really see where Perkins and Wells team and smoke architecture team started and stopped that we just work together and such seamless partnership in the spirit of co creation on that project. So that's one that we're really proud of and a Polter living design framework. If you don't mind me just adding on something I find in that project is living design can be difficult to describe, but when you experience it, it can be transformational. And for me, when I first saw that project, the project actually made me sort of uncomfortable because I'd never seen anything quite like it. It blurred and broke design standards that I was accustomed to the more I looked at it the more I learned about it, it was more and more interesting and a shift in my perspective and meaningful ways. And that's an example of how a piece of architecture can actually shape you your own perception and become meaningful in new ways. And so that's what's exciting to me is I actually love the idea of being changed by the environment in a positive way and transformed for the better. Absolutely. Yeah, that's something we don't talk about very much of just being challenged by architecture in a way, you know, but that's really provocative. I like that. So, you mentioned something about sustainability and decarbonization, which we're going to get into in just a minute, but before we do, we touched on the work working with indigenous communities, which really kind of speaks to the environmental social and governance elements of it for the architects and interior designers that are listening who maybe don't have a big ESG team or global framework behind them. What are some specific low bar actions that could take in the near future to sort of move their practice closer to this concept of living design. Well, I think there's some some things we should all be prioritizing and focusing on. I mean, something we're really focused on now and in the coming year is institutionalizing energy modeling on all of our projects and really building performance modeling, but notably energy performance modeling. We are signatories of the a 2030 commitment and are behind quite frankly and making sure that we're getting the information needed to make better design decisions on our projects and you know some of the excuses we hear their clients don't want to pay for it. Our schedules don't allow for that work, which are just excuses we have to get over and I feel like we have to embrace energy modeling as an ethical responsibility of the practice and we can't make the work better if we don't know how our design assumptions are performing so so prioritizing that I think is something we all need to do. In April of this year on earth say we issued new guidance on advanced material health called the switch list, which is really a companion piece to the precautionary list and you know that's accessible online. We published it publicly and as a resource that firms of any size could have access to and what it does is that identifies chemicals and pollutants or toxic and materials that we have committed to phase out of our specifications and our projects. And would certainly welcome all firms to join us in that call to action and that I think is as low hanging fruit that is easy to pick up regardless of your scale. And I guess lastly I would say that we all need to be focused on your train of talent pipeline so this is you know certainly an issue for the entire industry and we're doing that in meaningful ways through our partnerships with NOMA through mentorship programs like black and design and ACE and certainly NAPA. And I think that's a pressing issue of the industry that we should all be turning our attention to. And you mentioned you know materiality assessments framework like GRI detailed energy tracking that sort of thing. Why is it important for design firm and not just a corporation to measure you know impact at that sort of granular level and how does that data really shape the design decisions on the ground. Sure we're living in an age of transparency honesty I suppose and this goes a little bit back to our Midwestern values but this applies to the whole industry our clients are expecting a level of rigor in the design process to demonstrate performance. It's a form of risk management but there's you know if you design a green building that's going to be net zero they want to know that it's really going to be net zero and not just kind of sort of net zero you know. And in order to do that you have to take a data driven approach in the design process and happily the technology that's available to us is quite robust these days and any firm can have access to these the tools and the methods to achieve a much more rigorous design process. And that we're all sort of learning to become data architects while we're design architects at the same time some challenges to that you know sort of a more complicated design process but in essence we're doing an iterative process used to be we managed cost and schedule all the time now or managing costs schedule carbon material health water consumption all those things at the same time in the design process and it's becoming the lingua franca of the design process people know what. Energy use intensity is or you know how much chemicals are in the building or how much and body carbon and so it's it's part of being taught in school so it's it's not that. Part but it is completely different and so that takes shifting of frames it sounds like there's definitely an increased layer of complexity there right I think you track of of all those metrics but fill follow up question for you. What changes then in your operations and or design standards did you have to make to help Perkins and will achieve its sustainability goals and then I'll have a follow up for the take away from that. Sure I mean what I was just describing as the design process changes it also naturally becomes more complex and one of what we found our self adding layers to the design process which makes it harder and more stressful for our design teams and an effect eventually it's a less creative process if all you're doing is record keeping through the process. As opposed to designing right so that has been a challenge for us and so what we've had to do over time as that it gets more complicated you have to step back and rethink the whole process and what we're trying to do now is reintegrate these new methods into the design process in a more natural way so that the teams are more empowered by the information as opposed to burdened by the record keeping the administrative processes. So it does take a whole cloth reinvention reassessment of how you work and so long as I think you have that mindset you're doing the right things at the right time the new kind of data sets the new workflows actually can empower a team as opposed to slow them down and that's what we're trying to accomplish that's a culture change which the whole industry is going through. Sure for the small mid-sized firms that might be listening to this and what's the takeaway for them how do they implement some of these principles. I actually think it's ironic that you suggest that a large firm has all the resources we actually envy small firms because and they by definition they have an agility making change in a small organization is naturally easier in a sense maybe there's not the same level of resources but in a very transparent world Lindsay said a lot of the tools we've developed we share a public it on the internet just because we want to have systemic change we don't want to be the only firm doing these things actually it the industry shifts our job becomes easier so I think small firms in a way have certain advantages of being small and we We always say ourselves that we're trying to be the smallest large firm or perhaps on the flip side the largest small firm And that's a verbal quit, but it's basically the point of saying agility and Purpose-mindedness together is creates impact if we're slow to change or corporate or burdensome Then that's never good for our firm or clients I'm absolutely again that impact to seen you know in the real world projects that you're doing and so I know the report highlights The regenerative design you know of Bainbridge Island net zero studio and the Metaways restored ecosystem Lindsay how are you redefining success on projects like that to include biodiversity and ecological health? Yeah, so we were really excited that last year we hired our first full-time ecologist in the firm Juan Ravolo who is part of our Bainbridge studio and One of the things Juan's been doing around the firm is really helping our teams Increase their literacy and fluency about the ecology and that's not just the ecology of sites that we're inheriting but understanding What was there before and what naturally should be occurring on our sites and what the possibility of the future is for the sites And so we're certainly looking at our projects through a new widened lens now and looking for opportunities where Our design decisions can restore habitat can connect biodiversity certainly Robert you can appreciate here in Chicago We have the unfortunate reputation of being you know an environment that's very deadly for bird strikes and so That's now a conversation that's becoming prominent in our early design phases is understanding the migratory patterns of birds and in the locations we're working in Juan is really helping us have a deeper understanding and really taking more time in the Discovery phase of projects to to learn and to understand these things the Metaway project that you reference That is highlighted in our report, you know, that's an incredible example of the 16 kilometer ecological corridor that's connecting parks and neighborhoods throughout the Toronto area and Just an incredible example of a project that's restoring natural habitat Seeding new life and you know as you said earlier it really is about taking the mindset of designing for life Not just designing for human and users of spaces, but respecting the floor and fauna and the animals and the natural ecosystems and so We're excited to have that expertise in our firm and the intent is that we'll continue to grow it throughout our platform over time Yeah, it's kind of making those projects feel really indigenous to place which is something I've heard of too But that's it's such a holistic approach. It sounds like I'm to making sure that those buildings are respecting again the the environment But then also even the people right that that you mentioned earlier you also talked about the switch list that Perkins and Will is using now to phase out horrible substances so What does that look like to embed ecological thinking and healthy materials into the everyday practice especially when budgets and schedules can present a challenge? Sure and one of the largest myths Lindsey referred to this earlier in the podcast is that high performance correlates with high cost Just because you're designing differently doesn't mean it has to cost more and our industry has had patterns of sort of having norms and those norms are the things that cost less and therefore People just use the low cost items and so we get sort of stuck in a rut and the whole point of environmental thinking or ecological thinking are thinking differently about materials is to think differently and very often we're actually Finding lower cost solutions by removing entire things out of buildings I mean simple things like why worry about the PVC in the flooring which by the way is a carcinogen when it catches fire Instead why have no floor at all? Why not just have an exposed concrete floor in the parts of the building where that sort of a thing is suitable The same with ceiling systems Ceiling systems are expensive and complicated. They make the buildings hard to maintain They do help with acoustics by the other ways to help in acoustics and as we start looking at Our buildings in terms of embodied carbon or the material health impacts and all of a sudden you see Gosh these things are making our buildings sicker or these things are making them more expensive or and so Very often you can correlate those things together and say well Let's just edit the buildings as opposed to just layering more and more stuff onto them So there's a high tech approach which can be more expensive But there's a common sense approach to design that actually just is more about editing and streamlining designs and finding ways to Be in harmony with the world around us as opposed to sort of using technology to fight against the world and that can result in actually Surprisingly low cost low energy or super healthy buildings and that's usually our objective Absolutely What switching gears with a little bit so on the people side of things we hear about justice equity diversity and inclusion It's really a strategic pillar for your firm. I think that was clear in the report I mean not just sort of a side initiative What have you learned about making justice and equity and diversity inclusion really integral to the way that you run your projects and teams And see if you want to respond sure yeah, I'll take that one and I'm sure you've heard a say rubber That for us it is a a mindset. It's never about a moment or a side initiative as you say and so we have as you see in the report We've been working on our own diversification internally because we fundamentally believe that we have a responsibility to the best of our ability You know represent the clients in the communities that we serve and in my personal practice I've been on project teams where we really couldn't establish in a competent way Trust-based relationships with our clients and communities to get the input we needed to really develop rich design decisions and so So that is a responsibility and a belief set that we we know from our lived experience makes our project outcomes better when we can get that diversification and sometimes we can't do it on our own So being honest with ourselves and real with ourselves when we really do need to seek out outside partnership has become part of our culture And sometimes we get that partnership through design partners engineering partners community leaders and Really understanding that having that depth throughout the team is is critical So the hardest work ahead is this is something I spoke to earlier it is certainly facing the headwinds around the talent pipeline and We have many of our practitioners in our studios that are actively engaged with their alumni associations and with their schools trying to get young people interested in the design professions and You know, I think that is a headwind ahead for the entire industry We get a lot of I think negative press around the industry around the burnout culture and grind culture associated with architecture and the design disciplines and so finding ways to help young people see a career path in design that is both prosperous Meaningful and packed full rigorous work that they can dedicate their life to is a lot of work ahead for all of us Absolutely, let me just add on a little bit because the diversity conversation is often couch is sort of the right thing to do But in our perspective, it's the necessary thing to do for business survival It is also of course the right thing to do But there is simply if we only hired white men into the future We wouldn't have access to sufficient talent at all and bright not to mention that we wouldn't have the right kind of talent and the right kind of diverse perspectives in the firm, but you can't just become more diverse by just hiring different people You have to change the culture of the organization to think about inclusive culture and so forth And we've had I think major success in terms of achieving much more balanced Practice in terms of gender one of the biggest challenges is racial balance in in the firm and that has to do with what Lindsey was talking about the sort of proportion of how hard we work and the economic return for design professionals is it makes the profession less attractive And so this is a large or societal problem where we need to Recognize the value of the built environment and I'm not saying this to be self-serving to raise our fees or something like that But we need to there's a flight to quality in the built environment clients want better spaces Therefore they want better designers and they want better people And so we need to attract the top talent from other industries who might go into technology or finance or law into The design professions because they're just as viable economically and socially and and so it's really is about Revolution in many ways of placing our money or our mouth is that if we really want beauty around us We need to invest in it collectively on a societal level. Yeah, absolutely that's so well said Phil and it just you know reminds me of conversations I've had with I IDA's Cheryl Durst, you know, just about educating not not just the younger generation about you know architecture and design is a viable Career option for the future but also the parents, you know because she was telling me of you know how in so many Minority communities the parents don't feel like architecture and design is a viable career pathway, right? And so they steer them towards the traditional professions like law or medicine or whatever it is And so I'm just super encouraged to see this the sort of commitment from firms like Perkins and Will as well as I IDA's you know Design your world program that's really going into middle schools and high schools and you know Interest and sources has been a media partner for that and so we really believe strongly in that and diversifying the industry as to your point of both of you. So that's really well said. And I think kind of related to that, it sort of ties into my next question, just talking about pro bono work, and really having that impact on the communities around you. So Lindsay, how would you say that the firm decides like where you focus your pro bono and co-creation efforts with minority-owned businesses, for example? Yeah, so, well, let me say it touches on something you were getting at so many community members and kids in the particular don't have exposure to what architects and designers do, right? It's just not a profession that you have commonly lived experience with. And certainly in a lot of marginalized communities, they can actually have a negative experience, because an architect shows up and neighbor has been being disenfranchised and gentrified. And so giving back and being engaged in our communities in a positive way, and giving people direct access and insight into what we do is important. But we, in the firm, have a goal to give back a minimum of 15,000 hours on an annual basis and pro bono professional design services. And that adds up to several millions dollars worth of give back to our communities. And really how we make those decisions is delegated to the studio level, because we believe our studio leaders are really in the best position to know where and who and when to extend those services to. And it needs to be in service of authentic relationships and community building, right? It's not a performative thing that we're doing. In fact, we're quite quiet about that work we do. We don't really talk about it publicly, unless our clients want to be forward facing with that. So how those decisions are made are really at the local studio level. And we have some just really amazing and beautiful stories of relationships that started as pro bono work, giving back to us in ways that we could have never imagined through relationships or other work that has come to us as a result of that benevolence. And so our goal is that every studio in the firm participates in that. And it's the right thing to do, let's say. Yeah. What have you learned about designing like with your communities rather than just for them? Yeah. Well, I, I, Robert, I don't know if you know this about me, but I have the background in sports and recreation architecture. So for many years, I was leading community recreation and wellness projects and loved being at the forefront of community engagement and facilitation. And an example of this that I like to share with people is in 2020, I was working on a feasibility study in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota, which is just outside of Minneapolis, one of the most diverse communities in the, in the country, in fact. And realized when we were putting that team together, that we did not have the representation, I didn't have the cultural competency to engage and lead facilitation in that community. So I partnered with Zon and Associates, who has really diverse staff that has local relationships in that community. And we engaged dozens and dozens of community organizations, community leaders, church groups, etc. to do stakeholder engagement on that, that project. And, and one of those meetings, we were talking to a community organization in the Mung Population, which, you know, if you follow like a Limpit Gymnastics SUNY D, the 2020 All-Around Gold Medalist is part of that community. So, so we're, we're meeting with the representatives of the Mung Population and they were asking me for some national trends in recreation center design. And I shared with them that one of the things many communities are doing are implementing child watch centers, where you come into a facility and you drop off your children and that allows caretakers to go and recreate exercise, do whatever self-care you need to do and the facility. And immediately one of those community leaders and spoke up and said, we would never do that in our culture. In the Mung culture actually, when we go to a facility like the Brooklyn Center Recreation Center, what's lacking for us is intergenerational opportunities where we can recreate together. Because we want our children and our grandparents to partake in these activities together. So that actually is a turn off for us and not, not an asset from our lens. And that's information that we would have never gone had we not had the competency and the right people in the room to build that trust. And I think that's a mistake that we see in so many communities where we're applying what we think are best practices and are really generic way across populations without understanding those nuances. So. Yeah. Well, that's really insightful. And yeah, and you wouldn't have gathered that knowledge and information if you hadn't had that direct interaction. Because yeah, it's at your point. It's so interesting that we come in with what we think are the best ideas. But really, I think it underscores the needs who really listen to the client, right? What the client's needs are. And I know that's something that you all do. And that's just a great example of how that came into to be a very practical thing that you were sort of implemented in that project. So that's great. Speaking of your internal culture, the report talks about like plus survey scores, your staff satisfaction and turnover, things like that, mental health even. How do those metrics work? Are there any that surprised you? And how are you translating those into tangible ways in the way people work day to day? So I'm still maybe I'll direct that one towards you. Sure. Well, first of all, we're very happy to have extremely happy clients. We measure their happiness and something like 78% of our clients are promoters of the firm, meaning a nine or a 10 on the net promoter score ratio. One of my biggest surprises, it's not so much surprised now, because it's been going on for about five years is more puzzling is that our staff are not as happy as our clients. And this is something that Lindsay and I and the rest of our firm are extremely focused on. We're in the creativity business. And to maximize creativity, which is our goal, we're better off doing that with the happiest staff, and this isn't a perk and some will problem. There's a broad societal trend that has been going on really since the pandemic. Yes. And the world feels like it's conspiring against us. So all of our collective peace of mind is less peaceful. There's just sort of a war, a peacefulness and happiness. Yeah. And so we're striving to find ways to make the firm happier. It goes to work like balance at some of the things Lindsay was talking about. It goes to the design process itself, simplifying that process and empowering our staff with new technologies to make their work easier. It goes to how we congregate in our studios and how we go to work or how we flex and work from home in the right way so that we maximize people's quality of life and their lifestyle and make the firm a place where people can be successful and thrive and have that joy. I mean, ultimately joy, the design process and making things is a joyful, optimistic act. We're one of the few professions that actually you can walk out and we build a building and it's going to be there for 50, 150 years. And that's not true for a lawyer who negotiates a contract that is, you know, it's in a word document somewhere on a server, but you can't see it. And so this joyfulness is something we're trying to capture and build on. And I think it's around us everywhere. And I'm hopeful that we can come up with ways to build on the optimism of design as a captivating thing. It goes back to the earlier point about the values, the societal value of design and construction, how architecture and tiers and graphic to the landscape can all sort of make pride and joy in daily life and that the making of those things sort of builds on that sort of optimism. So I'm mostly puzzled by this sort of inherent sort of anxiety and dissatisfaction that is in our staff ranks and we're trying to address it every day. Yeah, I appreciate the transparency about that field. That's really powerful. And yeah, and you mentioned earlier, just kind of the industry in general, having that sense of people just kind of work in the grind, right? And then or even getting buried, like trying to meet compliance issues. And so, yeah, that return to joy just feels so timely right now. I think for a lot of people, she thinks here's a little bit again. And I think this is really top of mind for pretty much everybody. I actually just had a conversation yesterday with some of the study on, you know, AI and the impact on the interior design industry and some of the anxiety around that. And I know there's so many question marks around it. But Phil, how do you think about the human AI collaboration piece? And how do you do that in a way that where it amplifies your values in the firm rather than undermining trust or equity or design quality? There's this question of, you know, sameness. Like, how do you avoid all that? And then, you know, really leverage this new tool in powerful ways? Well, first of all, it's it's moving target right now. Everything is changing quite rapidly, which is leads leader to a lot of hype and confusion. And maybe more anxiety than it needs to have. As I said at the beginning, we're a pragmatic humble firm. And we're focusing on sort of the basics of what we do and what we can actually benefit from AI as opposed to getting caught up in the hype. Our strategy is to help our design professionals be that much more creative and productive, but not replace design professionals. And we're starting off by very clearly articulating the basic approach in a clear strategy, a set of dues and don'ts. So there are staff are not confused by what's being said out there. And the first step is to boost pride in our own intelligence and capability. There's no way that AI anytime soon can do what a experienced design professional can do in terms of synthesizing complex problem sets with intuition, creativity, experience and confidence. And we just have to remind ourselves that we've worked hard. hard to have the knowledge we have and our client's value, it's a human art. It can't be easily substituted. That being said, the second thing is to understand what AI, how it can help us and to tamp down some of this pervasive hype that's all over the place in society. But to get more focus and say, here are a couple of ways that actually we can really help ourselves to do repetitive tasks or do the things that are more complex than they used to be because there's more data points and there are some real ways that can happen and there's some joy to figuring those out and to mapping out those new business processes and implement them. That's what we're doing, sort of empowering our staff with these tools as opposed to this anxiety, hey, you're going to be replaced with a robot sometime soon. We just don't see that happening. No matter what Sam Altman says about design will be the first industry to be disrupted. I think it's one of the last ones to be disrupted. Yeah. And I think just those efficiency gains that AI is going to afford everyone will hopefully help diminish some of that burnout and people look in the grind, right? I mean, as it's leveraged, yeah, as it's leveraged in really useful ways, it becomes the tool and not the replacement. I totally agree with you, Phil. So kind of looking ahead a little bit. Lindsay, what impact do you want Perkins and Will to be known for most? And what question do you think the design profession still really isn't asking itself gladly enough right now? Where do we want to head the next 10 years or so? Yeah, that's a big question, but it's a five question. I love to think about it. And Phil, as I'm always talking about, I don't want to be the firm that's just looking to the horizon. I want to have to be the firm with four sides that's looking 10 years out. So I love that question. And we do take time as a leadership group to look and think far out. But I guess for me, Robert, I like to think about us having both a depth and a breadth of impact. And you know, you probably on the back cover of our impact report saw that beautiful quote from our founder, Larry Perkins, where he talks about seeking the quiet trust and appreciation of our clients and public whose interests we thoughtfully serve. And to me, that's a commitment to a depth of impact that every client and every location regardless of the scale or complexity of your project. We want you to feel like you're our most important client in that we're taking deep in really serious care with your resources, with your time, with your investment. And so that sort of earnestness and that commitment to honesty and integrity in our work, I want us to continue to have that impact and be known for that. In the breadth of our impact, because we continue to expand globally, is really about figuring out how to stay on the forefront of the industry and be the provocateur and the challenger to move the needle forward. And we've traditionally done that with sustainability. We've certainly been tip of the spear with Jedi. And we want to continue to challenge ourselves to be a firm of continuous improvement that's leading the industry. And you know, I don't mean to lack humility in saying it, but I do believe it's one of the largest well-resourced and best managed firms in the world. We have a responsibility to push the entire industry forward. And that's the impact we want to have. All right. So last question for you both. Where can our listeners go to download a copy of the stewardship in action report? Yeah. Well, I'll give you the simple answer as you can go to our website. So Perkinswell.com and you can search impact report and it is going to pull right up for you. We've also put it all over social media. So you could, you can find it on LinkedIn. But we're proud of it. We hope you do take the time to read it and to spend time with it and ask us questions about it. It's there and it's intentionally transparent and hold us accountable. We are holding ourselves accountable and welcome everyone to do the same. Amazing. Well, I'll be sure to drop a link to that report in the show notes as well as to the switchless that you mentioned earlier. Well, Lindsay and Phil, it's been an absolute pleasure having both of you here on the podcast. Thank you again for sharing your thoughts and insights with us. I really appreciate it. Thank you, Robert. Thank you very much. Yeah, thank you. Thank you for listening to this episode of the IHR design podcast produced by Endeavor Business Media, a division of Endeavor B2B. Be sure to subscribe or follow in your favorite podcasting app so new episodes can be delivered straight to you. For more insights, you can visit our website at iandess.design and our social media channels on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and X. Until next time, stay creative, stay inspired, and as always, be well everyone.