Ken is the founder of Confidant. A tiny but mighty ad shop in Nashville doing Global work. The most under-talked about agency in the south. Ken likes to do great work and keep it moving. Mark of a great leader.

We worked together at Confidant, just before Covid pulled me into a long sabbatical from the industry. At that point, I had stepped away from traditional branding to focus on social impact work. But at Confidant, I tried again - taking swings at big brands.

When I was there, I started asking a different question. Could we bring that same empathy into mainstream brands like Sony? What if we approached them with the same earnestness that i was bringing to these social impact companies?

We made a film for Sony that honored the creative community. We worked with Birchbox and used it as an excuse to talk about self-care. A lot of what we made came from that place. Honest. Earnest. Trying to make something that meant a little more than it had to. We even got to remix a Stevie Wonder classic with Haley Cyrus.

This conversation feels like a continuation of that. We talk about change. The kind happening across the advertising industry, and the kind that comes with getting older and kids growing and life happening.

We even get into what a ten-year plan might look like, shifts in his business, evolving his partnership with the PR wing of his agency. There’s some dreaming here. Some wandering too. But at its core, it’s just a real conversation between friends.

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We once made a film together called Jump. A film shot for suicide prevention. Heavy subject, but we approached it with care. With intention. It ended up being something really beautiful. It was also the first film I ever directed. It was cool project because it was always screened with a live music score and therapists on site.

We’ve been friends ever since.

Life did what life does. We both left NYC. He went back west, started building a life, raising kids. I moved to Nashville building mine too. Time passed the way it always does with old friends.

So this conversation was really just a chance to catch up.

Somewhere along the way, we went right back to where we first connected - trying to save the world by dealing with our traumas in public.

Johan is also a coach. (Some people would call him an inspirational speaker. I wouldn’t. Not because he’s not inspiring, but because the term is corny and too small of a box for what Johan offers the world.) When I first met him, he was inspiring students in auditoriums, these days he works with pro-athletes, top-executives and people operating in super-human capacities.

What strikes me about what he works on with them is how incredibly down to earth and wholesome the work is - it’s the same stuff we all need to get into. We talked about how we show up. The stories we carry and the ones we aint trying to pass on.

And right now, seems like the what he is working on right now, is at home.

We Got into the 90-second pause.

That moment where instead of rushing or forcing something, you just stop and be with your child before you just rush through. Just pause instead of forcing everybody to go so quickly. All you need is 90. Good tip.

We got into what parenting actually is about.

We both grew up thinking you’ve got to make something happen, shape your kids into something. But Johan pushed back on that. What if the real work is just making your kids feel safe?

We got into him coaching parents to be parents, athletes to be athletes and commitments to be commitments.

He’s working with athletes, executives, and parents, helping people see what’s really going on underneath performance. We touched on commitment, coaching, and what it actually takes to follow through on something.

And toward the end, we got into something that stuck with me:

As an artist, the idea that i can paint a life resonates with a lot of sentiments I’ve been feeling. That one stayed with me.

We got into a new and upcoming podcast of his: More Than One Thing.
Definitely something to look out for.

Have a listen for yourself.

-

Johan and I have committed to part two.
You have any questions you want me to ask Johan? Let me know.

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I’m shifting my studio toward public art. Work that lives outside. I want to place sculptures and murals at the center of my studio practice. Work that responds to people, to place, to history. And I’ve realized I can’t do it alone.

I want to sit with people who are building. Artists, entrepreneurs, healers. People shaping things in real time. Not just talking about what they’ve done, but what they’re working on right now. The messy middle or doubtful beginning. The part that’s still forming.

And not just the professional work.

I’m just as interested in their personal work. Personal growth. Their spiritual practice. The internal work that everything else sits on top of.

That’s where this comes from.

What You Working On Right Now? is a series of show-and-tell conversations. It’s me being a little nosey. Sitting with people I respect, people I can learn from, and asking them what they’re building, what they’re figuring out, and what’s actually moving in their life right now.

This first one is with my brother, Christopher Latouche.

He told me he’s “slinging coffee waste.” And that opened up a much bigger conversation about Jamaica’s Blue Mountain coffee industry, the scale of waste that gets left behind, and what it looks like to take something overlooked and turn it into something valuable.

But more than that, it set the tone.

This isn’t about finished work. It’s about work in progress. Ideas in motion. People building things that don’t fully exist yet, while also doing the quieter work of becoming who they need to be to build them.

That’s what I’m interested in.

What you working on?

If you want to learn more about Christopher’s Ital Coffee project email: chris@italcoffee.co

Or go to www.italcoffee.co

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