Anthropology in Business with Matt Artz

In this episode of the Anthropology in Business podcast, Erin Taylor speaks with Matt Artz about her career as a business anthropologist. The conversation covers Erin’s journey from studying economic anthropology to the founding of Finthropology, a consulting firm focused on the FinTech sector.

About Erin Taylor

Erin Taylor is an economic anthropologist who specializes in research in FinTech. She is the Founder and Principal Consultant at Finthropology, and previously Canela Consulting. Erin is the author of the book Materializing Poverty: How the Poor Transform Their Lives (2013, AltaMira), which deals with socioeconomic transformation in the Dominican Republic. She has published chapters (with Professor Heather Horst) on financial inclusion and financial literacy in Haiti and the Dominican Republic in Money at the Margins (2018, Berghan), Design Anthropology (2017, Springer) and Linguistic and Material Intimacies of Cell Phones (2018, Routledge).

Recommended Links

In this episode of the Anthropology in Business podcast, Melissa Vogel speaks with Matt Artz about her career as a business anthropologist. The conversation covers Melissa’s journey into business anthropology after training as an archeologist and working in academia for 15 years, and the challenges of switching mid-career.

As a Business Anthropologist and Director of Qualitative Research at Hanover Research, Melissa is committed to demonstrating anthropology‘s relevance to everyday life and using it to improve cross-cultural understanding.

During her academic career, she created Clemson University’s Business Anthropology program, which gives both industry professionals and students the global mindset and social science research skills needed in the modern job market. In her applied work, she has assessed workplace climate and diversity education needs, and gathered consumer insights data for such clients as Lego, Ann Taylor Loft, and FedEx Office. She has also conducted evaluation research with her team at UCLA’s CRESST Center.

For 18 years she directed field research on the development of urbanism in prehistoric Peru, which is published in her two books: The Casma Capital City of El Purgatorio and Frontier Life in Ancient Peru.  She also published 18 articles in academic journals and books.

The Anthropology in Business podcast is for anthropologists and business leaders interested in learning more about the many ways anthropology is applied in business and why business anthropology is one of the most effective lenses for making sense of organizations and consumers. It is hosted by Matt Artz (https://mattartz.me), a business anthropologist specializing in design anthropology and working at the intersection of product management, user experience, and business strategy. To learn more about the Anthropology in Business podcast, please visit the website (https://www.mattartz.me/podcasts/anthropology-in-business-podcast/).

In this episode of the Anthropology in Business podcast, Simon Roberts speaks with Matt Artz about his career as a business anthropologist. The conversation covers Simon’s twenty-year career, which has included founding the UK’s first dedicated ethnographic research company, running an innovation lab at Intel, being ethnographer-in-residence at technology think tank iSociety, and co-founding Stripe Partners. The conversation also dives into the concept of embodied knowledge which Simon discusses in his recent book, The Power of Not Thinking: How Our Bodies Learn and Why We Should Trust Them.

Simon Roberts is Co-founder and Partner at Stripe Partners and President of the EPIC Board. Simon’s work has been covered by Bloomberg, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, BBC Radio 4 and Quartz. His book on embodied knowledge, The Power of Not Thinking: How Our Bodies Learn and Why We Should Trust Them, was published by Bonnier in 2020.  Simon holds a PhD in anthropology from the University of Edinburgh.  

InThe Power of Not Thinking, Simon engages with the growing body of science to explain the concept of embodied knowledge. The book demonstrates the value it has for the ambitious organizations and leaders. Using case studies from Facebook, Procter & Gamble, Air Liquide and Intel, The Power of Not Thinking lifts the lid on how Stripe Partners do it and why it has worked to transform how its clients operate.

The Stripe Partners team blends hands-on business know-how with rigorous, academic-led expertise in ethnography and the human sciences. We are a diverse group brought together by a shared passion for bridging the gap between business and what happens in the real world.

In this episode of the Anthropology in Business podcast, Autumn McDonald speaks with Matt Artz about her career as a business anthropologist. The conversation covers Autumn’s journey into anthropology after two decades at Fortune 500s in corporate America, and the starting of ADM Insights & Strategy, LLC.

With over 2 decades of experience in Research, Insights, and Analytics spanning 6 continents, Autumn D. McDonald is the owner of ADM Insights & Strategy, LLC. She leverages her multifaceted expertise to aid the clients of ADM Insights & Strategy, LLC in designing research organizations, developing research plans, harnessing impactful learnings, and identifying actionable paths forward. With diverse angles of expertise ADM Insights & Strategy is uniquely equipped to greatly illuminate insights. ADM Insights & Strategy, LLC utilizes mixed methods approaches that integrate market research with an anthropologically inspired lens for greater human-centricity and depth of understanding.

Previously, she was the Senior Director Global Consumer Insights at The Hershey Company, leading the entire consumer research function worldwide. Autumn was responsible for spearheading the organization to provide consumer insights, tools, methodologies, models, and analyses needed in developing superior marketing, sales, and product strategies grounded in human understanding.

Prior to her role at The Hershey Company, she was responsible for providing competitive advantage by identifying consumer driven opportunities, uncovering consumer needs, and creating synergies in consumer research across geographies at Mattel. Before joining Mattel, Autumn led the entire Global Knowledge & Insights organization worldwide for the Revlon company. Her work in uncovering and bringing to life engaging consumer insight at Revlon resulted in earning a 2014 Ogilvy Advertising Award. Earlier in her career, Autumn spent 4.5 years at Kraft Foods where she was responsible for leading the Company’s In Market Testing for Growth organization. During that time, she oversaw Analytics in market testing that touched each of Kraft’s Business Units and more than 15 retailers. Before Kraft, Autumn spent roughly 2 years at Colgate Palmolive, leading Shopper Marketing across the company’s largest business. Her time at Colgate Palmolive was preceded by nearly a decade with Procter & Gamble, where she led research teams spanning multiple organizations, including the Multi-Cultural Business Development Organization focused on African American and Hispanic consumers.

In addition to her global research experience, Autumn has spearheaded over 500 research studies and secondary analyses focused on Black and Latinx constituents in the United States. These include, but are not limited to, the creation and validation of new research methods specifically designed for Latinx and Black consumers, quantitative habits and practices studies focused on multi-cultural populations, countless qualitative interviews with Black and Latinx constituents, in context participant observations with People of Color (POC), and new immigrant ethnographic studies.

Autumn’s expertise in research, race, and culture, and has resulted in invited speaking engagements with the Advertising Research Foundation, the Black Family Digest, the American Marketing Association, and the Hispanic 360 Conference, to name a few.

Autumn earned a Dual Degree in Mathematics and Spanish from the University of Texas at Austin and is currently developing her Master Thesis in Applied Anthropology at the University of North Texas. Her specialization is Socio-Cultural Anthropology, with an emphasis in intersections of race, ethnicity, and space.