William Villalobos: The Futures

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Alright everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today I have William Villalobos with us. He's a Venezuelan-British design and technology entrepreneur, architect, and speaker living in London, United Kingdom. He is the founder and CEO of The Futures, which is a rapidly growing company that performs agile services within the realms of design and audiovisual work, serving and empowering SMEs, entrepreneurs, and marketers to achieve more with their content and storytelling. So welcome to the show, man.

Thanks, Tyler. Thanks for the invitation. Really appreciate it.

Of course, man. Grateful to have you on. So the first question we ask on this show, William, is what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?

Yeah, I think it's not a unique story. I think it happens to a lot of people, but having lost both my parents earlier than I expected, it really put things into perspective for me. I think someone once said that the imminent idea that our lives are finite is what makes us achieve things. And it helps us in building purpose because there's a lot that we want to see while we're here and while we're alive. So perhaps there's some truth in that, you know. But besides that, having lost both of my parents earlier than I expected, that also helped me in building a sense of purpose in my life. You know, when you have somebody 63 years you really feel like you need to stick around to take care of them. But when, you know, when you lose something or someone, you also gain at the same time freedom, you gain perspective, and on that path you also gain purpose. And I think that would be that story for me.

And then what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?

Yeah, so as you mentioned, you know, we do design and we're about to do audiovisual work. We do content and I come from a background of design, communications, and architecture. So to me, any creative design industry, whether it's graphic design, industrial design, interior design, product design, architecture, illustration, or video, is all about storytelling. And that is also— you have to do that by sending a congruent message to the rest of the world that not only appeals to those people that are receiving that message, and that message has to be functional, but it also has to appeal to the receiver at an emotional level and bring pragmatic results that at the same time can provide what you want to achieve, and also it can effectively make you feel better about the things that you're doing and to the people that you're serving.

And then what is your best piece of overall business advice? So not necessarily industry-specific.

Um, okay, yeah, I think my advice would be more in terms of how do you operate within your business, and I think Allowing yourself to create a strategy that permits you to work on your business and not in your business is something that people should be thinking about. Sometimes this means building a team, delegating, or automating things within your business. But most of all, you have to create those processes that allow you to really be on it and not in it, and allow yourself to think of your business as a solutions machine.

And then if you can give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?

Um, I think I can divide that in 3 things, uh, and, and that those 3 things, uh, come down to spending more time. So, uh, number 1, you should be spending more time surrounding yourself with people that are smarter than you are much wiser than the media. Secondly, you should be spending more time probably, I mean, reading biographies of people that have lived before you and have done great things. And this is just so you can learn how others before you thought, how they envisioned the world, how that helped them to achieve, you know, great things. And number 3, again, spending more time listening, asking questions, and learning to develop critical thinking. And in order to be critical, you have to somehow be a sponge of knowledge. You have to be able to retain this knowledge and come to your own conclusions and opinions. This will allow you to influence and to be one that is to be listened to in the future, basically.

And then kind of going a little bit down a different path here, in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?

That's like the deepest of this question. You know, it's a really clever question really, because it makes you think a lot and you just use like 6 words. I would say sharing. So sharing to me is probably the key to happiness. Sharing experiences, moments, knowledge, ideas. Sharing, I think, is at the core of creation. I think sharing is at the core of growth, and most of all at the core of building memories. So if you look at life and try to subdivide it in, say, 3 phases, let's say young, adult, and old, You can pretty much attach each of these concepts to each of these phases. So when you're young, you're in an environment where the world is sharing everything it has to offer. So you become a sponge, right? In order to learn how to create and just create and do things for as long as you can throughout your life. So that is as you're young. When you become an adult, you acquire more rational knowledge, and then you can turn those into stronger ideas. You can start to build a rapport with life, really, or with experiences. And when you are older, it's all about ideas and the memories. So how can you, or how are you able to transform all of those memories and experiences that you've had throughout your life into something that can be shared with the new generations? At the end of the day, we're like cyclical, you know, we're like this beings, you know, we're like trees, and then when the tree dies, it gives life to all the trees. So we're the same way. So we're one with it all. So yeah, I would divide it in sharing, and I would say sharing is the key to happiness.

I love that answer, man. And then what is the best book that you've read, and what was the number one thing you learned from that?

Okay, so that's another tough one. That's another tough one because there's many books that I love. One book that I really— one book that, you know, that has made somehow of an impact to me, probably most recently in the last few years, is Zero to One: Notes on Startups and How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel, who's one of the co-founders of PayPal. And I think The biggest nugget on this one is to capitalize on your strengths and understand basically the economics of your time and how culture is a big, big factor in how these economics get deployed, get distributed, get used. At the end of the day, if you understand people, then you will understand business. I think it's a book of our time. It's a book of our time in terms of culture. It's a book of our time in terms of economics. And if you're interested in growing businesses and have an edge, this is a good read.

And then what is your favorite quote and why?

Favorite quote, again, you know, another hard question. I think there is one that I recently got reminded of, and it's by Maya Angelou. And I think a lot of people may know this one. Where she says, "We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty." And I think this is all about transformation. And it's all about not really judging the book by its cover and noticing that those things that we see around us that look beautiful or perfect or functional, that seem to make sense to us, they come after, you know, a trail of hard work and high purpose. So that's key to me. You know, we tend to put on a pedestal all these beautiful things and people and stuff, but we don't realize— and we're quick to criticize— but what we don't realize is that there is a lot of hard work behind that. So it's good to acknowledge that, and it's good to be to be knowledgeable of that part of the process.

Yes, man, love it. Thank you so much for coming on. The last one I have for you before we let you go is where can our audience best find you online?

Yeah, many ways. You can find me on LinkedIn as William Villalobos. That's V-I-L-L-A-L-O-B-O-S. Try to find the one that is related to the Futures. There's probably many William Villalobos out there. Yeah, you can also find me on Instagram at @iamwdjalovos with double L. And then also you can email me if you want to at william@thefutures.io because that's the company that we're running right now, which is www.thefutures.io.

Perfect, man. Thank you again for coming on.

Thanks, Tyler Wagner. Have a pleasure.

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