It was the end of the Summer, and a switch labelled “go for a run” seemed to flip on in my head. That switch is still stuck in the “on” position six months later! This week I heard that I have a place in this year’s London Marathon, so I…

We should put what really matters at the heart of how we work — A year ago I left a well-paid tech job to turn a side-project into a business. I’ve started and grown several businesses, with some success, some failure and a lot of learning in between. This time, though, I’m taking a very different approach. Makelight, the learning community we’ve set up…

For the last couple of years, Makelight, the learning community that I help run has been really growing. It’s turned into a wonderfully supportive and collaborative membership. Each month we pick a topic to focus on. A theme for us to explore that will help us grow as people and/or…

Today I was flicking through a book on the Japanese artist Hokusai with my daughter. He’s most well known for this image, which I’m sure you’ve seen: We looked through his images, talked about the beautiful way he captured the movement of water, the sense of space and depth, how…

On growing a passion project into a passion business without taking investment. — This time last year my wife, Emily and I were kicking off an experiment to answer a fairly big question: Could we combine both of our creative energies to find a way to make a living that lines up with family life, working on what we both enjoy and are…

For the last few months I’ve been unusually quiet online. I’ve been keeping up my usual rate of life-observations and banter on my Twitter account, but other than that I’ve been keeping myself to myself. “What have you been up to recently?” has become a common conversation starter from friends…

Commuting, for those of us who must do it every day, is generally not an experience to be relished. The hours lost in a useless limbo travelling to the workplace and back, day in, day out, are not generally ones that are well-spent or enjoyable. In the past, my family…

There’s a gender gap in tech. Can we narrow it? — Prompted by an invitation from Women Shift Digital to speak on a panel at Nesta FutureFest, here are some thoughts on the subject (as a man). Cooking in progress by Jaume Escofet Growing up in the eighties I was lucky to be part of a generation that was encouraged to…

What‘s next after Makeshift? I’m leaving Makeshift The idea of Makeshift was to try out many tiny “hacks” and turn the best ones into digital products that could become businesses. Year one was all about invention — we sketched up about fifty ideas, and did twelve prototypes. Year two was all about choosing what to focus on…