🔮 Where we’re taking Exponential View next

On finding the right editor for a research studio

Azeem, Marija & Greg. Photo by Chris Ratcliffe

For nearly two years, Marija and I have been looking for an exceptional Executive Editor to work with us. We never rush important hiring and we knew there were only a few people fit for the job. Today, we have news to share and give you a sense of where we’re taking Exponential View next.

We took our time with this hire. Exponential View is a research studio, not a newsroom – and the distinction matters for who can lead its editorial operation, a job previously split between Marija and myself. Our members, you, are deep thinkers, inveterate tinkerers and some of the world’s most consequential decision-makers. You turn to us for insight that is tough to produce: synthesis, frameworks and the non-obvious thinking that changes how you see the world. Finding an editor who understood that difference was the whole search.

Today, we’re announcing that Greg Williams joins Exponential View as our first Executive Editor.

What drew us to Greg wasn’t any single chapter of his career — it was the pattern across all of them. He helped define the nineties at the seminal style-and-ideas title Arena. He spent nearly a decade in New York, where the rigorous standards of American magazine journalism got into his bones. Then he ran WIRED UK for close to a decade, becoming one of the defining editors in technology, across print, audio and video. He is also an accomplished novelist.

Each of those was a different register, a different audience, a different set of rules and Greg won on all of them. The proven ability to learn fast and win on unfamiliar pitches is what we were looking for the most. Exponential View operates across disciplines and formats. So must its editor. But range without rigour is just restlessness. We’ve seen in Greg the rare combination of adaptability and standards.

Greg’s job at Exponential View will be to extend what makes our work worth reading and find new formats which will help people like you make the most consequential decisions over the coming years.

For my part, this change frees me to do what the moment demands of me – deep cross-disciplinary synthesis, the analysis that takes experience and judgement to get right. For Marija, this will be a time of deepening of the team’s bench so we can better deliver for you in all ways.

We can’t wait to show you what comes next.

Azeem & Marija

A message from Greg

Greg Williams. Photo by Chris Ratcliffe

I’ve been a subscriber to Exponential View and a deep admirer of what my friend Azeem has built over the years: a publication with a distinctive point of view, serious intellectual ambition and an audience unlike any other.

Exponential View is not just read widely; it is read meaningfully. It informs business decision-making for people in some of the world’s most important leadership positions, at a moment when vast amounts of capital are being deployed in response to profound technological change. And this transformation is reflected internally: EV has a distinctive approach to building AI systems that actively challenge ideas and handle the heavy lifting – protecting the space that rigorous, independent thinking requires.

For me, the opportunity to help build the next phase of that editorial offering – with a team I deeply respect, that cares about quality, originality and impact – was genuinely irresistible.

As for what to expect: my focus will be on ensuring EV’s analysis stays ahead of the questions that matter most to leaders navigating this moment – rigorous on the technology, meticulous in our sourcing (much of which is proprietary), sharp on the implications and always asking what it means for how you act professionally and personally. I want the work to be genuinely useful at the level of decisions, not just ideas.

But I’d rather not assume. I’d genuinely love to know what would make it more valuable for you – what we’re getting right, what’s missing and what you wish existed. Consider this an opportunity to help us build something even more essential for what comes next. Fill out this form to schedule a call or share thoughts with me as I settle in – your point of view is as useful to my onboarding as anything else!

Greg Williams