“In order to have a smart city, you need to have smart citizens. It’s not about the technology. That was very much a first-generation view. Increasingly, we’re seeing smart and resilient cities that are about citizen co-creation and enabling citizens to be more proactive in the way that they shape cities.”

In this first episode of a miniseries produced in partnership with the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) and Insignia Ventures Academy, host Paulo Joquino speaks with Professor Jason Pomeroy, founding principal of Pomeroy Studio, founder of Pomeroy Academy, and CISL Fellow. The conversation traces Jason’s evolution from architect to interdisciplinary sustainability leader, beginning with how his Cambridge master’s degree opened a systems-thinking approach to the built environment that conventional practice could not provide.

Jason explains how his signature four-sphere model (engaging civil society, state, academia, and industry simultaneously) shaped the Idea House in Malaysia, one of Asia’s first zero-carbon homes, and how that same methodology has since scaled across Southeast Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. The discussion broadens into digital twins before turning to what “smart cities” actually requires: not smarter technology, but smarter, more engaged citizens. The episode closes with Jason sharing the three frameworks (four spheres, six pillars, and the three Ds) that have guided both his practice and his teaching at Cambridge.

Timestamps

1:17 – Introduction to Jason

3:42 – Cambridge Spark Moment

7:57 – Building an Interdisciplinary Practice

10:24 – Asia Innovation and Net Zero Homes

16:44 – Designing for Sweden

18:45 – Academy: Bridging Worlds

21:00 – Digital Twins Explained

26:02 – Smart Cities Need Smart Citizens

30:02 – Automation and CISL Wrap

About our Guest

Professor Jason Pomeroy is an award-winning architect, academic, author, and TV presenter regarded as one of the world’s leading experts in sustainable design. He is the founding principal of Pomeroy Studio, an interdisciplinary sustainable design and research firm based in Singapore, and the founder of Pomeroy Academy, a platform for sustainability education and research in the built environment. Jason holds professorships at the University of Nottingham and James Cook University, and leads a sustainable urbanism module on CISL’s Interdisciplinary Design for the Built Environment (IDBE) master’s programme at the University of Cambridge. He is a Fellow of the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership.

Jason gained his undergraduate and postgraduate degrees from the Canterbury School of Architecture, a master’s degree from the University of Cambridge, and a PhD from the University of Westminster. He is the author of five books on sustainable design and urbanism, including Idea House: Future Tropical Living Today (2011), The Skycourt and Skygarden: Greening the Urban Habitat (2014), and Hardware, Software, Heartware: Digital Twinning for More Sustainable Built Environments (2023). He has hosted four architecture and urbanism television series (Smart Cities 2.0, City Time Traveller, City Redesign, and Futuropolis) which have aired across Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.

Transcript

Show Intro and Guest

Paulo: We are back with a miniseries, a series of episodes we’re doing in partnership with the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership. Our education arm, Insignia Ventures Academy, has recently launched a partnership with [CISL] to run their Business and Sustainability Programme in Singapore, the Asia Seminar, this coming October.

In the lead-up to that, it’s really my pleasure to have not just alumni, but also faculty of the programme. For those who are interested in learning more, you don’t only get to read about the programme on the website, you actually get to hear from the people who have run it over the last few years and who have also gone through it.

So in this first episode of the miniseries, we have with us a Fellow and also a faculty member of the BSP, the Business and Sustainability Programme. He’s none other than Jason Pomeroy. He’s the founding principal of Pomeroy Studio and the creator of Pomeroy Academy, which is one of the only sustainability scholarships for Southeast Asian built environment professionals to study at Cambridge, where he himself was educated and developed his own approach to sustainability, which we’ll also talk about in this episode.

He’s pretty prolific in terms of writing about built environments and sustainable urbanism. He’s written five books on the topic, hosted a couple of TV series, and holds professorships at Nottingham and James Cook University. He’s also teaching at Cambridge with CISL’s [IDBE] master’s programme. I’m really excited to talk to him, not just about his experiences, but also his views on the future of built environments, sustainable urbanism, and the technology he’s working on. Pomeroy also has its own technology arm, which we’ll get to in a bit. But first of all, welcome, Jason. Thanks for being on Call with Insignia.

Jason: Paulo, an absolute pleasure to be here.

Paulo: Where are you calling from today?

Jason: Good question. Today I’m actually in Singapore. I just flew in from Kuala Lumpur this morning, and soon to be off to Bangkok. So it’s good to be on home turf, so to speak.

Paulo: A little more comfortable space from which to share your experiences.

Cambridge Spark Moment

To kick things off, your journey into sustainability leadership started with architecture. You went to the Canterbury School of Architecture and then Cambridge for your master’s. Maybe you can share how you came across CISL in particular and how that really took your approach to architecture and your profession to the next level.

Jason: That’s a really good question, Paulo. You know when you have this itch that needs to be scratched? The architectural journey I took at the Canterbury School of Architecture prepared me with the tools to be an architect and to design, but it would only take me so far. And when you’re in practice, you often run into the same situations where the architect is perceived as doing a particular role, the services engineer is doing a particular role, the structural engineer is doing a particular role, the cost consultant is doing a particular role. In this day and age of trying to break down the silos and create more integrated systems thinking across all these different professions to get better outcomes, that was the itch that needed to be scratched.

And so when it came to systems thinking in the built environment, breaking down the silos to create more of an interdisciplinary understanding of working collaboratively, with the goal of a sustainable process delivering a sustainable product. I went on my search. And ultimately, the search led me to CISL.

Back in the day it was called the IDBE programme, the Interdisciplinary Design for the Built Environment programme, which is now called the Sustainability Leadership for the Built Environment programme, purely because it has become this vehicle for creating thought-provoking leadership to influence the built environment industry. It was an awakening. 

Going to do this CISL course and get a master’s degree in this subject, really starting to ask the key questions, breaking down the barriers, being more collaborative, thinking about the system of systems and the processes to deliver more sustainable products. This was the catapult for my onward journey, not just with Cambridge, but within my profession: establishing my businesses and hopefully being a force for good today.

Paulo: And I think it really took your approach from just doing for the sake of doing to really thinking about why we’re doing certain things, why we’re making certain choices, why we have the processes that we have.

Jason: Absolutely, Paulo. I think you hit the nail on the head. It’s the question why. Why bother? Why do it? Why are we going through business as usual when we could actually be innovating and finding solutions that will transform businesses, products, or processes?

And ultimately, it’s that level of inquisition that CISL programmes are often able to tease out, coax, and cajole from cohorts and students. There’s a lovely Cambridge saying: “quiet down your cleverness.” Be able to ask the right questions at the right time and not be scared of being inquisitive. That was an incredibly valuable quality that we picked up in the Cambridge journey. And dare I say it, as you get older, you realise how little you know and how much more you need to learn. That is something we all get from the Cambridge experience.

Paulo: I really appreciate that mindset. I think there’s a tendency, especially for folks who are very much experts in their fields, to think before listening. But that mindset can really spark a lot of conversation and reflection on why we’re doing certain things.

Building an Interdisciplinary Practice

And I think that’s translated well into your business, in particular, Pomeroy Studio, where one of the descriptors that caught my eye is that it’s truly interdisciplinary. I’d love for you to share how that’s worked in practice in terms of pulling in different expertise and different fields to work together.

Jason: Absolutely. I think when you end up in a lecture theatre with not just another group of architects holding the black pen, you realise all of a sudden that sustainability and sustainability leadership means different things to different people in their different sectors and disciplines. So rubbing shoulders with a barrister at law who specialises in construction, through to policymakers, developers, financiers, and the built environment professions of engineering and architecture, it made me realise that the only way to get to the truth, the fact and reason of good quality sustainable design, is through interdisciplinary thinking.

That’s what made me want to create Pomeroy Studio as a vehicle for master planning, landscape design, architecture, interior design, graphic design, and branding, all underpinned by fact and reason. That’s Pomeroy Academy: sustainability research in the fields of vertical urban theory, net zero homes, modular construction, digital twins, and the role of culture and conservation in society. And ultimately, the bedrock of the Academy, its courses, events, and social outreach, the knowledge we gain from this can feed into the Studio.

That ultimately allowed the Studio to be a very purpose-driven, evidence-based design studio, not driven by the whims of a designer holding a black pen, but based on fact and reason. And the work we do then feeds back into the Academy. The Academy also provides a platform for our thought leadership, through broadcast media, book publications, and so on. And then we created a technology company as well, but that’s another story.

Paulo: So I guess it’s really a virtuous cycle that you’ve created, from the Studio to the Academy and even to the technology side as well.

Asia Innovation and Net Zero Homes

Given the amount of evidence, data, and insights your businesses have gathered over the years, what have you learned about Southeast Asia in particular? You mentioned at the top of our conversation that you’re travelling around from day to day. What have you learned about Southeast Asia’s built environments? And maybe to ground things a bit for our audience, we’ve been talking at a fairly high level, can you paint a picture of what you actually do in terms of sustainable design?

Jason: Where there’s a will, there’s a way. I think there is this appetite in Asia to be slightly more entrepreneurial within the realms of slightly more flexible policies. And I do find a fundamental difference between the way things are done in the Global North and the Global South.

There is greater tolerance for new ideas and innovations in Asia, which allows us to bring systems and products to market with speed. And I think there is an inbuilt inclination in some regions, like Thailand, like the Philippines, where new ideas are innovating through designs that are low in consumption: energy consumption, water consumption, or material resources. There is a natural inclination to want to do this anyway. There’s not always a government in place to say, “You’ve got to do X, Y, and Z.” There is this natural aptitude for being lean, clean, and green culturally, and that is a perfect platform for us to be able to innovate in this region.

Paulo: Glad you brought that up, that inclination for these kinds of solutions. Maybe you can share some examples. You mentioned Thailand, and I’m calling from Manila, so a Philippines example would be welcome too.

Jason: I’ll give you one classic example from Malaysia, a very small testbed project. I had the privilege and pleasure of designing the first zero-carbon house in Asia: the Idea House. When you look at the fact that the housing market is constantly under the stress and strain of needing to create more affordable housing outcomes for a growing global population, this sat very uncomfortably in Malaysia, where there were record levels of waste and record population growth. There was this need and desire to create a new sustainable product.

So we were approached to create this R&D prototype, a net zero home that would generate as much clean energy as the family could consume, which would then serve as the benchmark for the developer to scale these residential developments into townships, and also be a force for good and an influencer on Malaysia’s housing market.

But we knew it wasn’t just going to be the will of one architect holding a black pen. We engaged with civil society groups to ask: “What do you want from your Malaysian home? What does a Malaysian home look like?” We engaged with industry players, in particular the supply chain, to ask: “What makes a sustainable home more sustainable, and what products go in there?” So it could also be a platform for the supply chain to market their own new innovations and products.

We went to the state to ask: “How are you going to be a force for good? How can you use this R&D prototype to change policy, to influence green rating tools, to create better and more resilient residential homes in the future?” And we went to academia to ask: “How can we record all of this? How can this be documented as papers or books that can then go back into academe, or even to civil society and influence a broader audience?”

And so ultimately, it was this four-sphere approach, which I learned at Cambridge and adapted further, to really get to grips with good quality stakeholder engagement across civil society, state, academia, and industry working collaboratively together. We created this net zero prototype, which was built, and which then became the platform for the developer to scale and create greener, leaner, cleaner townships.

It became a book. It turned into a TV show. It influenced the first Green Mark residential rating as a green design tool used by other developers and architects. And ultimately, it gave everybody within the four spheres of influence a buy-in to be better. This is the model we’ve applied in Indonesia and in the Philippines. We look at every single project not just as a commercial vehicle, it is also a vehicle that can be a force for good across those four spheres of influence.

Paulo: And I guess even longer term, how do you grapple with the challenge of making sustainability sustainable? Making sure that whatever you started continues to be monitored, as in the Malaysia case?

Jason: Absolutely. So the book was the vehicle for us to do post-occupancy analysis. We continued the line of development with that particular developer. But just by virtue of looking over the garden fence, other developers were seeing what this developer was doing and saying: “I want some of that. I want to innovate. I want to have a first mover advantage in my territory.”

Paulo: The FOMO effect is real.

Jason: Exactly, and that allowed us to scale. To go into the Philippines, go into Indonesia.

Designing for Sweden

I remember when I was doing one tour and I was in Sweden, a totally different climate. You’re looking at a cold to temperate climate zone, and they were saying: “We’ve seen your buildings. Can you do the same in Sweden?” And we basically said: “The buildings will not look white. They will not be reflecting the heat away. They will not have lots of lush green sky courts and sky gardens. They will need to lock in the warmth in winter and be open in summer.”

But what was wonderful is that they understood our process, the four spheres of influence, engaging with key stakeholders, looking at sustainability beyond the triple bottom line of social, economic, and environmental principles to also think about space, culture, and technology as equally important design parameters. They understood our DNA of collaboration across those six pillars. And they said: “We know that whatever you design will have your DNA, and it will suit Sweden.”

And sure enough, [the Läkerol Candy Factory project in Gävle] doesn’t look like it’s in the tropics. It looks like it’s part and parcel of the DNA of what Sweden should be about, and it has become an incredibly successful story. Ultimately, if you get the method of thinking right, if you get the sustainable process right in order to then get the sustainable product, irrespective of place, people, climate, and culture, it will work.

Paulo: And with the Sweden case, you were sharing your methodology, and they were able to apply it within their own context, their own culture, leveraging the technology available to them. And so with the Academy as well, how have you seen the talent pool and the professional pool around built environments evolve since you started the Academy and the Studio?

Academy: Bridging Worlds

Jason: It’s a wonderful growth journey. What started out from the humble learnings I gained at Cambridge, setting up in Asia, expanding from Singapore regionally, and then slowly but surely growing the portfolio into the Middle East and Europe. But ultimately, the core mission of the Academy was to translate the research we were doing within the built environment industry across our building projects into academic lectures and courses that could be undertaken in partnership with leading institutions like Cambridge, King Saud University, [one further institution, name unclear in recording], James Cook, and Nottingham, effectively being the linchpin between academia and industry.

Ultimately, it’s those two spheres of influence, academia and industry, and engaging with state policymakers and NGOs to enrich the academic programmes we were creating. And so even the academic programmes we still shape always seek to reach out to a very broad portfolio of policymakers, academics, NGO leaders, and industry captains to enrich the content.

And if they can also help influence within their networks, it allows us to expand our footprint, which has allowed us to work with the British government on creating the ASEAN Sustainability Leadership in Infrastructure programme, in partnership with CISL. So where there is a will, there is a way.

The future of education is not just purely within the realms of an academic institution. It does have to engage with other spheres of influence, not too dissimilar to your good selves.

Paulo: And speaking of other dimensions of sustainable design, technology is certainly a large part of it. In particular, you have a focus on digital twins. Maybe for our audience who isn’t as familiar, could you start with a definition and then move on to where that applies in your work?

Digital Twins Explained

Jason: Absolutely. A digital twin is a digital replica of the physical world. And we should be no strangers to digital twins in different industries. If we take NASA creating one of the early digital twins for the Apollo space mission, you wouldn’t send an astronaut into space without doing a few trials first and a few real-time simulations of what the impact would be on the astronaut in space, and on the return mission to Earth. You wouldn’t run complex heart surgery without doing a few tests beforehand. You wouldn’t roll a car off a production line without doing a few simulations first. So imagine a digital twin, in any industry, not just the built environment, as basically a virtual, three-dimensional digital replica updated in real time.

For the built environment specifically, we look at spatial models of cities as three-dimensional digital replicas. And we’ve taken the digital twin model one step further, not just thinking about the spatial data of what the confines of a room are, or the lighting, but also thinking about the other data pillars. So in addition to spatial, and just like our six pillars, there’s the social pillar of data, the cultural pillar, the environmental data pillar, the technological, and the economic. You can then start to create a platform for data across all six pillars.

I was doing a show many moons ago for Channel NewsAsia called Smart Cities, and the Singapore episode was talking about digital twins. We had the privilege and pleasure of the Secretary of State for Slovakia seeing the show on his return flight, bored on the plane, flicking through channels, and sure enough, the show came on and he went back and spoke to his team. We were eventually appointed, through a tender process, by the Slovak government to create the digital twin strategy for Slovakia.

And ultimately, digital twins can be a force for good. If you can measure in real time the impact of your decisions, you can shape, hone, and monitor the outcomes of your interventions in the built environment. Gone are the days of holding the black pen, doing the design, building it, installing the sensors into the city, only to realise you’re sensing too late. You realise you’ve got the park in the wrong place, or the socket in the wrong place in your bedroom, and you need to undo it, and that’s going to be costly and resource-intensive. Digital twins allow you to test real-time scenarios before they become physical reality.

Paulo: Earlier we talked about ratings for built environments, and there are obviously also certifications and compliance elements to it. But if you have a whole layer that’s already smart enough to collect data at even a city level, I would presume it makes things a lot easier for people to buy in and actually implement.

Jason: It comes down to the quality of the data and what is the common data platform that allows you to use data wisely. There is a saying: too much information is bad information. Are you using the right data at the right time, and is it being accessed by the right people to achieve better outcomes?

Within this realm of big data and its application to digital twins, there are, shall I say, data gateways, data portals. How far do you open that door to allow the right data to come in? Who uses that data, and to what efficiency will that data be used? And ultimately, if we imagine big data being a force for good, the question becomes: how do you use artificial intelligence to process that data and provide different scenarios and outcomes?

I think we’re still at the cusp of seeing AI as a very young child that still needs to be nurtured by responsible parents. The problem comes when we’re not very responsible. So I do think this is still a very early point in AI’s journey. We still need the sentient mind of a designer, of a policymaker, to be the responsible adult in order to shape better built environment outcomes.

Smart Cities Need Smart Citizens

Paulo: “Smart city” is not really a new term. You mentioned the show you were doing a few years back. I’m curious: what are the challenges ahead? What’s the next step for smart cities to really get to that next level, from awareness of these initiatives to something more substantive? What’s the missing piece?

Jason: That’s a good question. I think the words smart, sustainable, resilient have become so interchangeable and quite hackneyed. It’s funny, I was doing a Channel NewsAsia interview last week, and the word AI seems to have just replaced the word “big data.” All the questions I was looking at, I was thinking: five years ago, the same question would have been “does big data help shape cities?” or “do digital twins help shape cities?” So we can be quite whimsical when it comes to using these terms.

Let’s go back to your question about smart cities. In order to have a smart city, you need to have smart citizens. It’s not about the technology. That was very much a first-generation view. Increasingly, we’re seeing smart and resilient cities that are about citizen co-creation and enabling citizens to be more proactive in the way that they shape cities. So how do you engage with seven-year-old children all the way through to seventy-year-old grandparents in using technology as a force for good? How do you mobilise them through apps or digital platforms that allow them to contribute?

I remember the former mayor of Bandung, Ridwan Kamil, who was absolutely brilliant at mobilising 1.5 million people, his constituents, to come together and share their views on the city. He basically said: “Come, tweet me, Facebook me, communicate with me. Tell me what’s wrong with the city.” And through a digital platform he set up, algorithms sifted through all the trending topics, congestion, crime, pollution, and ultimately, he was able to assign his resources wisely, listening to constituents and applying those lessons to actually solve the key challenges, as opposed to throwing resources ad hoc and hoping something gets fixed.

So the ability to engage with citizens, co-creation, mobilising people, mobilising the senses, and creating smart citizens is far more important than the technology itself. That’s the direction we’re starting to see smart and resilient cities move in. Generation three is all about the four spheres of influence coming together, being mobilised to help shape the city bottom-up as opposed to top-down.

It’s not just about the government anymore. It’s equally about industry, civil society, having great impact verified by academe to say: “This is a good idea. This is going to be good for the city.”

Paulo: My next question was going to be about how you align incentives and really motivate people, because I think at the end of the day it boils down to what motivates leaders and people to do the right thing. And I think you answered that as well.

Jason: It’s funny you mention that, because incentivisation can be quite tongue-in-cheek and even fun. If I think about Amsterdam, they had a trial project where there was free Wi-Fi in the streets, but the Wi-Fi would cut out if pollution levels in the air reached a certain amount. So all of a sudden people were saying: “Hold on, my Wi-Fi has just disappeared. Why? Oh, because there are higher levels of pollution right now.” And so it forces everybody to do the right thing. I think that’s quite a genius move.

Paulo: Yeah, it reminds me of the book Nudge, and a lot of the experiments they talk about, small things that can really shift the way people behave.

Automation and CISL Wrap

Going back to Pomeroy Technology, I’m curious, as somebody who works at a VC and with startups. What kinds of startups are you interested in working with? What kinds of technologies, apart from big data and digital twins, have been top of mind for you these days?

Jason: It’s interesting. I think this is the third time I’m raising my black pen, because I’m still quite analogue in the way I go about things, love to sketch, and love making models in 3D printers. But I do think that we’ve shifted in the design process from the analogue to the digital.

Part of the journey for creating Pomeroy Technology was actually born out of the digital twin research we did and the digital twin consultancy for governments like Slovakia, Oman, and Saudi Arabia. What we found really interesting was the process of creating large packages of drawings for high-rise structures, large airport terminals, and so on. There are reams and reams of drawings that need to be created for contractors to do what they need to do: build the thing. So what were the shortcuts that could save time and resources?

When we think about Building Information Modelling, BIM, and platforms like Revit, these are great digital tools that allow us to create more effective packages of drawings that integrate across architecture, engineering, and cost consultancy. A common digital platform, a drawing suite, allows us to effectively deliver the sustainable product: the city, the building, the landscape, whatever. But even within those, you’ve got the boring and mundane details of creating window schedules, door schedules, repetitive tasks that can take so long. And ultimately, what we wanted to do was automate that process.

So Pomeroy Technology took those areas that were repetitive and could be automated to really help architects and designers save time and resources. The platform creates fast-track procedures, common plug-ins to standard automated workflows, to save time and resources. What would have taken teams of people can be done by one individual. What would have taken weeks can now be done in hours. And ultimately, that element of automation will hopefully allow us to be even more effective, not just within our own Studio, but by sharing that product with other architects, engineers, contractors, and developers in the marketplace.

Paulo: I think it’s something we’re seeing even with AI, as a lot of AI labs have developed their own LLMs, there’s definitely, especially in Southeast Asia, a rise in very vertical, industry-specific models. And obviously there’s an advantage for somebody building that from within their own industry, knowing what matters to the stakeholders, what kind of data is important, and what processes are repetitive and could be automated.

We see that across a lot of sectors. We did a podcast a while ago about somebody doing that in banking and financial institutions. And now here, you’re doing it for BIM and the different processes that architects like yourself would have to go through. Circling back to where we started, CISL, your journey with CISL, how you’ve applied that to the Pomeroy Group of businesses, now going back to CISL: you’ve been a faculty member of the BSP and you continue to give back through various programmes and partnerships. What excites you about what CISL is doing today, compared to when you first encountered them?

Jason: That’s a really great question, Paulo. What CISL does is empower the individual to be a force for good, to be able to influence either internally within an organisation or externally across a whole industry or sector. I remember taking my master’s from Cambridge and then going on to do a PhD afterwards. That PhD became a book, and then it became a TV series, and so on. The ability to influence externally through something that started internally as a personal mission. That’s what I think CISL is very good at. Being able to craft the individual with the basic skills and know-how to look across the spheres of influence, to not be scared to ask the right questions with confidence, and then go and externally influence.

When I think about how CISL is doing this on a global platform, I think that’s also really quite interesting, because Cambridge is an over-800-year-old institution with a remarkable research reputation. The ability to make partnerships both with other academic institutions and with industry partners that are global and have a reputation, I think is similarly fascinating, enriching, and interesting. So my journey continues, both back in Cambridge through the SLBE programme, the Sustainability Leadership for the Built Environment programme, and through the BSP, and through bespoke programmes.

When I think about the BSP as a platform for true business transformation, that’s where I also think CISL is incredibly successful. Because it is the confidence to be able to challenge preconceived ideas and business as usual, to start thinking more broadly about how there can be greater purpose-driven impact within a sector and a discipline.

And being confident enough to stand up and say: “I know this is a lonely journey. I may be the only chief sustainability officer in this organisation. I know it’s a long, lonely road sometimes. But I will be able to influence. I have the facts and reason. I have a network supporting me, and in this endeavour, I will be able to achieve.”

So I think that is also something that is part and parcel of the Cambridge process, to deliver that sense of confidence in the individual, knowing too well that it rests on a bedrock of fact and reason.

Paulo: For those who are listening or watching and want to speak more with Jason, I think the best way is to check out the programme. He’ll definitely be there as a faculty member, and it’s a great opportunity to meet folks like Jason, who are really building their own businesses not just for commercial objectives but for real societal impact as well. You teed up future episodes talking about CSOs and their “lonely journeys”, we’ll see how lonely it is, or how they adapt. But excited to have more alumni on in the rest of the episodes.

Any last words for our audience, Jason, regarding the BSP, but also for the many founders who tune in? They may be very focused on building their companies and technology, but with your experience of thinking more broadly about how you impact society —

Jason: For me, throughout my journey, it’s always come back to identifying what my weakness was. And there are many weaknesses. As someone with ADHD, it was very important for me to have structure in my life. And so the ability to establish in my head the four spheres of influence, that would always provide a framework for stakeholder engagement and having multiple parties come together to influence for good. That was one frame.

The six pillars, going beyond the triple bottom line to think about space, culture, and technology as challenges, but also opportunities for us to shape better outcomes across our businesses. That was another frame.

And the third frame for me to process all of this was what I would call the three Ds: distil, design, and disseminate. The ability to distill lessons from the past, and there have been remarkable people who have done this before me. I am simply, to borrow from some Cambridge greats, standing on the shoulders of giants.

The ability to distill lessons and facts and reason from the past in order to design for the present. And then the ability to use the lessons learned from those designs today to disseminate for future generations, whether through the buildings we create, the papers, the books, or the TV, to share a greener message. Then I would say I have done my job.

And ultimately, if I can do that to influence and scale my business operations, then I will likely think that I’m being a force for good.

Paulo: That was definitely impactful, really going back to first principles and thinking about the frameworks you use day to day. Thank you again, Jason, for joining us on On Call with Insignia. Looking forward to working more closely with you in the next few months as we head into the [BSP] in Singapore this coming October.

Jason: Indeed, Paulo. Many thanks, I really appreciated the conversation.

References

• Professor Jason Pomeroy, CISL Directory, Source for guest identity verification, title, academic appointments, books, and TV series.
• Jason Pomeroy, Wikipedia, Additional biographical details and project history.
• Pomeroy Studio, Candy Factory, Confirms the Läkerol Candy Factory project in Gävle, Sweden and its carbon-negative design.
• Pomeroy Studio transforms Swedish candy factory, Australian Design Review, Details on the Sweden project’s sustainable design features.
• The Interview: Ridwan Kamil, Mayor of Bandung, GovInsider, Confirms Ridwan Kamil as former mayor of Bandung and his use of digital platforms for city governance.