A short bonus episode showcasing a few standout moments from this week's guest interview with Pablo Juncadella from Mucho ~

Daring Forever. Podcast with Radim Malinic

daringcreativity.com |  desk@daringcreativity.com

Books by Radim Malinic Paperback and Kindle > https://amzn.to/4biTwFc
Free audiobook (with Audible trial) > https://geni.us/free-audiobook
Book bundles  https://novemberuniverse.co.uk

Lux Coffee Co. https://luxcoffee.co.uk/  (Use: PODCAST for 15% off)
November Universe https://novemberuniverse.co.uk (Use: PODCAST for 10% off)

Radim: Hey, welcome to another bonus episode of the Daring Creativity Podcast. I'm back to unpack some of the gems from this week's conversation, pulling out those moments that deserve a second look and dig deeper in what makes them special. This week I spoke to Pablo Juncadella, a co-founder and partner at muo 

The global branding studio he's been building for nearly 25 years. In our conversation, we talked about his experience redesigning newspapers in his mid twenties, building a global studio, rooted in collective intelligence and his path that has been always shaped by curiosity, humility, and insistence on moving the

 Wheel of Design forward. the episode that was published a few days ago was titled there to Bring Creative Poetry to every problem. And we zoomed in on what it truly means to bring that poetry, not just solution to every problem that lands on your desk.

It was a great conversation that's already been proven so popular. And if you haven't checked it out, let me share with you these four standout moments.

Pablo: Part of the culture of Mocho is almost helping the careers of others. And in that sense, always come back to the idea that creativity isn't absolutely needed for anything, but it's of great help to anything that you do, regardless of it being a creative job. Creativity is capability of seeing things from a slightly different perspective to the majority, and having the capability of making others go to that place.

and I find in fact works everywhere. we tend to confuse creativity to the capability of visualizing stuff, but it's, there are really two different things. I'm a firm believer that the best lawyers are creative lawyers. The best businessmen are creative businessmen, and those are people who have or have acquired the capability of seeing things from a slightly different perspective and bringing people to that perspective.

Radim: I love this clear definition of creativity from Pablo. As you will hear, it arrives early in the conversation and almost as a throwaway, but Pablo wasn't talking about just about talent output or even ideas. He was talking about a perspective as a skill, and more importantly, the ability to move people towards it.

The second part is what separates a creative thinker from creative communicator. Anyone can see things differently, but a real craft is in bringing others with you. If you ever struggle to explain why design matters, Pablo has just handed you the words,

Pablo: So I've always been dyslexic and it's something that I've always had to deal with. And it's only after That I've realized, oh, hold on. Why are certain things for me easy, that seem to be very hard to others? and my answer is that my limitations have created also virtues, and I just try and make the best of it. I never thought much of, I really like doing magazines and newspapers, regardless of me having a hard time reading them understanding them or having to read an article three times. This is something that by that time, I was already 

accustomed to it. 

Radim: I'm sure you'll agree that there's a real freedom in this moment. Pablo was talking about dyslexia, but the inside that stretched far wider. most people spend years agonizing over what path to take, what to specialize in, what kind of creative to become.

Pablo had the decision made by his wiring, recognized it as a gift. it's a reframe of disadvantage that doesn't feel forced, or something like a motivational quote poster.

He's not saying that struggle is secretly great. He's saying clarity about what you can do is sometimes the fastest route to understanding what you can do. This is a genuinely useful thought for anyone still trying to figure out where they belong.

Pablo: And I was very lucky to land that job at very early age and work at a very hard level, but also I think one of the best. Takeaways that I got from that experience, which seems to me almost like a another life ago right now.

 but it's this idea that be too precious to ideas. That newspapers force you into a pace where you might get it really right a couple of times and you might get it wrong another couple of times. there'll be another chance the next day and I feel that this is, it's the right way to approaching our job where if we fall too much in love with certain ideas, sometimes those ideas are, they're prequel to a better one.

And it's really about doing the best that you can with the time that you have. And newspapers have this space where there's a moment where it has to go to print. That happens every week or in the case of the Guardian every day. and you have to deliver the best that you have for that day. And there'll be another day, the next day.

Radim: I mean, who needs to hear it? Who? Who needed to hear it right now because? In our early stages of our careers, how many times did we get almost married to our idea and would never let anyone to change it?

But in Pablo's moment, he really came to understand that what he learned in the world of newspapers, where the pace of production made attachment to any single idea a liability. There was always another addition, another front page, another chance to get it right. What he absorbed from that environment wasn't indifference.

It was proportion. Loving the work and being precious about specific outcomes are very different things, and conflating them is one of the most common creative traps. This idea has particular resonance for anyone. Working with clients in teams or at pace and letting go of diversion you loved isn't failure.

It's just a room you're cleared for a better one.

Pablo: Yeah, I happen to think that, this is me more than I wouldn't say that everyone in the organization thinks this, but I happen to think that we're there to contribute. So design is this big wheel that we have to try and move on every project that we do every time.

And putting the standards of what you do very high and it's non-related to what's going on today, but how do you contribute in something. That moves the wheel to design that so that somebody else can build on that. And I believe that this is something we have to try on every project and we will fail 99.99999% of the time.

Yet you have to have the courage to the next day with the new client, with the new project. Think, okay, maybe on this one I can create something that not only is effective to my client, but Moves the wheel of design and and that can bring a lot of frustration because it's putting your work at the highest standards and not really thinking that much.

What's going on today, what happened in the past it's really understanding where the client, it's also making the client happy, but as the base of what you do, not as the objective. My objective isn't to make our hap our client happy. It is the beginning I do. Of course it has to be happy, but I am the one who brings.

The standards of design and the standards of design are very high to the point where I will be frustrated with the result every time. Because I know this could have been better if I had another day, if I had another opportunity, if my client was a little bit more ambitious, if I had a slightly more talented or would've explored 3D or this or that, I maybe could have done it better.

I've been adoring Mucho work for a long time

Radim: And you would never think that the work, that studio of that size producers that, mostly it fails to move something forward because it's, I'm sure it's very much. A a, a self observed truth. But what I love about this is the, is the honesty about a percentage because. Pablo wasn't offering a, a rally in cry per se, but he was just offering a realistic contract with creative ambition.

When you think about it, he genuinely believes that contributing something meaningful to a broader history of design is the correct target to aim at. Even knowing you are almost never hit it. And crucially, he doesn't see that as a demoralizing. He sees it as what keeps the work honest.

It's the antidote to the kind of comfortable mediocrity thatcreeps in when in the client was happy, becomes the definition of success raising a bar, passed what anyone asked for, and accepting the frustration that follows is his version of staying in love with the job.

I genuinely enjoyed the conversation with Pablo about the fact, how they run the studio, the language he used to talk about his work, and I admire people like him for the fact that 25 years in the industry, if not longer. And he's still hungry. He's still, fighting, pushing, striving, and believing in the thing that he started some no three decades ago, and that's still there.

That passion is still there, and I'm, I'm hot off to him because they created an incredible work. If you haven't checked out a full episode, I can only encourage you to do so. It's a real gem, and thank you for being here. I'll cut you on the next episode next week.