Before the Meeting: A Conversation with Erik Spiekermann

I have very strong opinions about this. The way I always worked was in a studio that was open — you didn't really need meetings because things were kind of open anyway. When I had forty, seventy people, I would walk around every morning between nine and twelve. I could quickly see what somebody was working on — at least which project, which stage. And if I saw the same screen with the same person for three days, I knew either they were bored or they didn't know what to do anymore. Then I had to interfere. I saw myself as the personal connection. I knew that Adam was doing this and Eve was doing this over here — maybe they have the same question, the same issue, the same stage. So I would say: why don't you go talk to her? I wouldn't call that a meeting. Meetings, I avoided as much as I could. The only meetings we always had were with clients. And clients like meetings because they're more entertaining than sitting at their desks. They can have coffee and biscuits and talk all day and pretend they've worked.

That's a terrible culture. But we can change it. I had a letterpress workshop with a large space upstairs that we rented out to half a dozen people — a programmer, a couple of designers, all working on separate projects. We rented it out because I needed the rent money. But it ended up being the best thing for everybody. They weren't working on the same project, but they listened to what everybody was saying. They had tea together, coffee, lunch. Just hung out. And now that it's finished, they all say they miss it. It wasn't about asking each other how something works. It was more atmospheric — just knowing that somebody else might have the same headache you have. Sometimes you overhear a conversation and think: oh, that's not just me. And that's enough. The emotional blockage disappears.

The main thing is really what happens when you're on your own. You know how it is — when you start a project, you do everything else first. You wash your car, you iron your shirts — whatever you do to avoid starting. Because you think: I have no idea. I'm blank. I'm done as a designer. That can happen when you're on your own, because all you do is look at the wall and it doesn't look back. But if there are other people around you — even if they're not working on the same thing — it goes away. You look over and see Sebastian scratching his head the same way you were. You say: what's up? Let's have a coffee. Five minutes. And the blockage is gone. It's what you might call common suffering — but it's not really suffering. It's just knowing you're not the only one.

Yes. Headphones are a signal: don't talk to me. And also: I am not interested. Unless you're writing complex code and genuinely need to concentrate, a little background noise isn't disturbing — it's actually entertaining. We had a programmer who'd have headphones on when he was deep in code for a couple of hours, which is fine. But in the open space, with twelve people? It's antisocial. It tells the others you're not part of the room. We didn't tolerate it at EdenSpiekermann. You can sit there and hear what people are saying between them. Somebody might appear behind you. You might overhear something that connects to what you're working on. That only happens if you're present.

On the staircase. At MetaDesign we were on three floors in a large industrial building, seventy or eighty people. No smoking inside, so the smokers would gather on the staircase between levels. At first I thought: they're taking an hour of my time every day. They're not working. And then I went and sat with them — and they were talking about work the whole time. People from the third floor talking to people from the second floor, which never happened normally. Nobody was listening, no boss was there, so things got said that wouldn't have been said in a meeting. Did you hear we have a new client? Oh, not that guy again. What's happening with the Audi project? Incredibly valuable conversations. And they happened because people had a reason to be in the same place outside the structure.

The insignificant gossip and chit-chat really does matter. It's human. It's a connection. And in an environment where you feel equal — sitting on the staircase, not in a hierarchy — you can say: I have no idea how to do this. Can you help me? You can't say that to your superior. But you can say it to the person next to you on the steps. That confidence, that equality — even if you have different pay grades — is what makes those conversations possible. And what makes the work better.

They stopped talking to each other. The knowledge stayed inside the department. We'd give something to the internet team and they'd take it, but they weren't involved in the conversation around it. And now, everything is connected anyway. There's no such thing as an internet project separate from the brand, or a branding project separate from the app. Everything is one thing. So the people need to be one thing too. You might not do it all yourself, but you need to understand it all — and that only happens if the people are talking.

A circular space. Like a circus. Very busy on the inside, quieter as you go out. The center has the reception, the coffee machine, the kitchen, the printers — everything that makes people move through it. Then moving outward, things get gradually quieter. The very outer layer is where people who need to think sit. Meeting rooms. Private space. But to get anywhere, everyone has to cross the center. So if you work there, you see everyone in the building at some point. And they see you. I've been in offices where people had no idea who else was in the building. They come in a side door, sit at the back, leave the same way. The reception is designed to keep people out, not let them in. That's the wrong design entirely.

We are analog people. We eat and go to the toilet and have children. We are analog beings. And especially with AI coming on, it's going to be very important that we remain analog. I'm afraid we're going to lose the facility to talk to each other — because we don't. We send each other SMS messages. You see couples in restaurants looking at their phones. And you see it in design departments too. The person sitting in front of you — you send them a Slack message. That's scary. Everything looks the same now because everyone uses the same tools. AI will make that worse unless people stay connected to their own hands, their own thinking. My letterpress workshop exists for that reason. Everything there is heavy and dirty and hands-on. Because in one more generation, if we don't do something, we won't have fingers anymore. We'll just swipe glass.

Get a shared space. But not one of those where everybody sits with headphones and nobody knows each other. Find a place where there's atmosphere. Energy. Where people share a meal or a coffee. And then — make the effort to be present in it. The work always goes better when there's a bit too much of it and a bit too much noise. The worst thing in a studio is when it's quiet because there's nothing to do. An empty restaurant looks wrong. An empty studio feels wrong. People generate energy just by being there. And that energy — that atmosphere — is where the small conversations happen that nobody schedules and everybody needs.