Worldwide Creative Officer of EF Education First Joel Hladecek shares his personal experiences of how he has overcome three crises - the Dot-com crash, the 2008 financial crisis, and now Covid-19. From the ending of a company to the loss of a job, based on his own ups and downs, Joel explains how these challenging times can be unexpected opportunities to do new, innovative things. For finding inspiration, he recommends designers not to reference other people's work but to be inspired by something else - a book, one's childhood, or even the problems we're facing in a pandemic - to invent and be unique.

Joel Hladecek is responsible for overseeing EF’s creative, design, and experience globally. Spanning 500 offices in 50 different countries, he works with the creative teams in each office to ensure that the key consumer touchpoints feel consistent across all of EF. Joel currently lives in Lucerne, Switzerland where EF has its global headquarters.