José Manuel dos Santos

When I was 18 years old, I came to the United States for the first time, I can on an exchange program from AFS America Field Service and went to San Diego CA to do my 12th grade, after that I returned to Portugal. When I went back, plenty of people approached me with their assumptions and biases about the US, and I had to explain to them that the US was a very large country, with many contradictions and differences in both place and people, and that I had found the best and the worst of human beings during my stay. This friend represents the best of America, a fine American that I happily call my friend.

As we get closer to Nov 5th, it’s impossible not be involved in the political discussion going on. I believe it is impossible for a functioning member of society to be apolitical, I believe we must all participate in politics, even when we don’t believe in the justness and fairness of the political process, even when we don’t see politicians as the best emissaries of politics. I believe staying out of politics is more harmful than participating, no matter the result, voicing your opinions, discussing what you believe in and why.

I spent a few days in Cincinnati, and with no offense to all Cincy lovers, this city never really came up in my head as a destination, nothing bad, nothing good, just didn’t come up. So, I arrived with no expectations, and that is probably a good thing. I went because of two events that aligned blissfully, not by chance but by careful planning by the organizers of CODA Summit and BLINK!

I have two children, 32 and 22, and they both say I’m a workaholic. I explain to them that I don’t agree, that I love my job, and I see a continuum between my job and my life, I am a designer. Could they be right? I keep saying I’ll retire as soon as I can, and my wife laughs out loud saying I will work till my company (or life) kicks me out, could she be right?

What connects these things, at least in my head, is the impact and limits of human actions, weather by causing damage, or by attempting to fix it. I agree that it might be hard to consider all the systemic unintended consequences of complex decision making tied to any human action.

Sometimes I think about where my life would have led me if the Portland option had become true, and the reason I keep going back to this “fork in the road” is because I have not stopped thinking and dreaming in systems and, every time I go to a design gathering, the topic keeps on coming up.

I have come to believe there are human qualities that supersede any training for people leadership, I believe some people are just more natural at it, and while we can all improve in every domain, I believe natural and organic people leaders have an invisible advantage. When you are lucky to have a good people leader you know it, you feel it, your life improves, you learn and you evolve, you grow and many times you will end up moving on, and those people leaders will be a part of your life.

There is something about a crowd of 40,000 people singing at the same time, you look everywhere, and you capture the ecstasy via their shining eyes, you relate and connect with other human beings in this shared experience, independently of who they are, what they eat, who they vote for.

But I remember this particular occasion, because one morning after partying night, we were ‘asked’ to be in a meeting space at 8am. Needless to say, we were all still heavy headed and in need of plenty of water, a gentleman who by the tone of his voice had not been partying the previous night, had 4 different newspapers taped to the walls, several pages of different newspapers, with large red markings on them, all in all it must have been 20 newspaper pages, and we were afraid he’d make us read out loud!

I want to think that those that choose to work on those complex problems have their hearts in the right place, and have sound business and people skills, and understand the impact of their decision in people, families, businesses and cities for years to come, people trained in dealing with the utopia and the dystopia of cities.