Personal Purpose Stories: Matt Hocking, Leap
“We all rise to different challenges, we all have different dynamos and impetus inside us”
As part of our investigation into the importance and power of personal purpose, we spoke to Matt Hocking of Leap about what purpose means to him.
After working as a graphic designer at the world-famous Eden Project, Matt Hocking founded design studio Leap, now a certified B Corp since 2016, in Cornwall in 2004. Leap’s goal is to be a resilient and sustainable organisation that works in alignment with the planet, truly cares for its people and uses business as a tool to share its message of protecting our environment, as well as being a signpost to other creatives on how to ‘design for change’ and showing that we can all make a difference whilst making a living.
Q. Why is getting to grips with personal purpose important?
We all rise to different challenges, we all have different dynamos and impetus inside us — we have different people in our business, and they all do things differently.
At Leap, we give people space to grow and evolve the way they want to, as long as it supports the three pillars of our business. And that means we spend our time cultivating each person to see what they want to achieve and how they see their side of our studio shaping.
This means that we’ll have team members who really push for a particular client, even if I’m not sure about it, going to meeting after meeting — and then once we’ve won the business, reshaping our own processes to fit the client’s needs should they feel they have a specific or hybrid way they wish to work. This shows me that people really care for the business, and see themselves as part of the organisation’s purpose.
Q. And what’s the impact on employee commitment?
Well, our senior designer Nathan has the Leap logo tattooed on his arm! He’s very passionate about our purpose and has been with us for over seven years. That means he works hard and thoughtfully for every one of our clients, of course, but there are also some particular projects that he really champions internally and externally — not because of the client, necessarily, but because of the change that client makes to people and planet.
He’s led on most of our Surfers Against Sewage anti-plastic campaign work, going out and meeting with clients and with beach reps to inspire them about the importance of brand and design in pushing forward the issue. As well as coordinating our own team in helping him deliver set tasks, like the recent Plastic Free Communities campaign. This was an eight-week design and development project for on and offline use, and Nath worked with every member of our team to ensure it was delivered on time and on budget.
Because Leap gives everyone the freedom to change the business in that way, it’s allowed him space to build momentum to advance his career as well as shape new direction and for our ever-evolving studio.
Q. How has the relationship between your personal purpose and the company’s purpose changed as it’s grown?
In many ways, Leap is an embodiment of me as a founder: its energy, naivety, thoughtfulness etc. That means I do worry about making sure that we are all on the same page. I want us to build something that works for all of the team, rather than it all being directed from me. In fact, we’ll be taking some time in the autumn to take everything apart and put it back together: checking on what works and what doesn’t, what we aren’t doing that we’d like to — basically, a creative servicing and MOT of ourselves.
I’m very heart-based — I want to do everything, take on all of the good projects even when there is little money because I see the potential and difference it could make to people and planet. It’s perhaps a bit of a freelancer’s mentality that I’ve brought into the business. By becoming more open and more purposeful, we can put boundaries around what we do.
And becoming a B Corp helped to enshrine for us how I think a business should be, all businesses! It has also helped the team communicate for themselves what we do, to express in their own way what they are part of: doing good design for good people and organisations that do good things.
To learn more about what personal purpose can mean for your business, get in touch with The House on 01225 780000 or email steve@thehouse.co.uk.
