A vision for a Humane Web
So far in this series I’ve spoken to Tod about our Discovery process and Chânelle about Designing for a Humane Web. Both these pieces give an insight into the processes the agency follows. But in this piece we’ll look at the bigger picture and talk to our MD Chris about how he is guiding Wholegrain. It’s nearly 3 years since Chris took over the day to day running of Wholegrain from founders Tom and Vineeta. It’s been a time of internal change but the direction has remained steadfast – building websites (and by extension a web) that are better for people and planet.
This article will give a better idea of what inspires and influences Chris, his thoughts on the sustainability space and his vision for the future of Wholegrain
Inspiration
I kick off our chat by asking what influences Chris both personally and professionally. I already know he’s one of the B Community’s foremost experts on vegan hot spots so I steer clear of this topic as it might derail my research. Chris describes himself as a serial hobbyist. “If it’s creative and something you can learn, I’m pretty much going to say yes – from pottery to sewing to painting, I’m happy using my hands to make something.” Having previously seen Chris’s incredible hand made backpack this definitely rings true.
More surprising is a keen interest in Architecture. Chris is careful to stress that he’s got no idea of the names of buildings or even architects involved. For him it’s “about the impact space, light or form can have on you as a person”. When faced with a difficult project or decision he’ll often take these thoughts to different buildings or spaces. The simple act of changing your surroundings can be a great way of unsticking an issue. “It’s so interesting how something like a building, that is fundamentally about shelter and survival, can also provide creativity and emotion.”
A recent trip to the Design Museum with the team
I’m keen to find out a little about his professional inspirations too. He comes alive when describing the creative services offered by Nice and Serious. “To me, they were a driving force behind what I think of when it comes to creativity for good.”. He’s reverent about the lack of ego and self promotion in their work and I hear echoes of what Wholegrain does best when he talks about “quality, creative work that is for the people who need it”.
Dispelling the myth that BCorps only celebrate other BCorps, he also mentions the work Reuben Turner is doing at Rewild. He’s taken with the “gorgeous simplicity to how he approaches creativity” and the humanity of his work. Nowhere is this humanity more apparent than on his Five Things page. The distillation of Rewild’s philosophy into five simple pillars is something I see in Chris’s approach too, as well as the treatise that “Allies always win”.
The Rewild Five Things page
As a leader of a celebrated agency I’m interested in other organisations that Chris looks to for leadership and operational ideas. He highlights humanity as being incredibly important to him and it’s a theme that we will revisit over and over again in our conversation. Chris looks for organisations outside of the agency and BCorp bubbles to find people that live and breathe their values on a micro and macro level.
He highlights Hearth as an example. The Wholegrain team recently visited this social enterprise community bakery in Hackney. They “operate in such a circular way that when you see it, you can’t help but be inspired. The impact that individual people can have on the fundamental needs of others and the planet is really inspiring. I want that to be something I distill into Wholegrain.”
Wholegrain and the Humane Web
Humanity has always been important within Wholegrain and how we operate on a day to day basis. Nowhere was this more obvious than in the pioneering work done on Sustainable Web Design. It’s an oft repeated line but our founder Tom, literally wrote the book on the subject. Under Chris’s leadership, Wholegrain has been evolving. Sustainability is still a key but our operations and philosophy are becoming more holistic. Enter the concept of the Humane Web.
As Chris puts it:
“For a long time Wholegrain has been at the forefront of digital sustainability but we also know that alone is not enough. The reality is that the internet needs far more nuance than just making it sustainable from a technical point of view – it should work for every person that needs it, wherever they are and however they access it. A Humane Web is the defined vision of that thought and it perfectly sums up how Wholegrain has evolved its ways of working over the past couple of years.”
The Humane Web concept is changing Wholegrain on a technical, operational and foundational level.
“Its changed the shape of our business and led to creating roles within our team that focus on experience design and technical delivery alongside the more traditional agency roles to design and build websites. It goes past the idea of ‘user centric’ and instead builds websites that enable users to define what that even means for them individually as they engage with your site – as an example, it leads us to consider users who want exploration and fact gathering in order to convert with equal weight to those who want quick conversion.
Self paced, accessible both in terms of design and data and high performance built in, are key to everything we do.”
Low weight, highly performant, robustly coded and accessible Wordpress sites remain at the core of everything we do as an agency. We’ll be committed to building low carbon websites as long as we operate. But this evolving approach has allowed us to look beyond websites to be able to offer something more transformative.
“We have crafted and defined a new service offering that stitches the work we do together across accessibility, sustainability and data inequality for organisations to go past just their website and consider the impact of their entire digital estate. Sustainable Digital Transformation is the best way to evolve and future proof everything digital in your organisation.
It’s a really exciting evolution of what Wholegrain can do to further the mission of a Humane Web.”
I suggest that this approach might be seen to be at odds with the actions of the big tech firms that shape the way we browse and live online in today’s society. Invasive data gathering and massive data centre growth pushes on regardless of the societal and environmental costs they reap.
How does he navigate that tension?
“The tension is definitely there but so is the simple fact that a more humane website is a better performing website in all areas. I hold that front and centre whenever we hit that tension because I don’t think there is any brief or hurdle that I’ve seen that can’t be solved with it. If you want to increase performance, a sustainable site does that. If you want increased conversion rates, robust experience design will deliver that.
We can’t change big tech but we can show organisations and individuals that there is another, greener, fairer, more effective way.”
Inevitably Generative AI sneaks into the conversation at this point. I ask what one word springs to mind when Chris thinks of AI. After a moment’s thought, he settles on “regressive”. It’s not the technology itself that feels regressive rather the models the platforms are based on.
“Any model, in any area of life, that is based on mass data input and then making decisions based on averages – feels regressive.” This belief has played a part in Wholegrain taking a cautious approach to AI adoption. As with any digital agency, it’s a constant presence in client and technical discussions. For the time being Chris doesn’t see this approach changing.
Never say never though.
“As we get further clarity on the benefits and negatives, there is definitely room for a more sympathetic and considered way of using AI and Wholegrain will follow that path.”
The bigger picture
Anyone who works in, or adjacent to the sustainability and purpose driven “sectors” will recognise that the past few years have been tough. The push back against environmental protections and equality by the Trump regime has sent unwanted ripples across the world. Charities and sustainability focussed organisations have suffered. Chris and others in Wholegrain’s leadership have worked tirelessly to protect the agency and team against this backdrop.
More positively it looks like there are green shoots of recovery starting to become visible. The successes of Zohran Mamdani in New York and Hannah Spencer for the Green Party in Gorton and Denton have provided succour. Their successful campaigns have also marked a shift in sustainability messaging. Equality and quality of life are the core messages with sustainability an important but less explicit policy point. It’s something Chris and I have discussed a lot recently.
I ask what organisations like Wholegrain could learn from this shift in approach and messaging.
“Whilst Wholegrain has always led in digital sustainability, there is a legacy and baggage that comes with the word ‘sustainability’. That realisation runs parallel to a second, which is that in the world as it exists in 2026, what’s important is humanity. We see that with the evolution of the Green Parties core messaging and we will start to see that with Wholegrain evolution over the year ahead as we start to position ourselves more authentically to the agency we are now.”
As I start to wrap up the conversation I ask what aspect of Wholegrains’ ethos he’d like to see other organisations and competitors adopt. Again, humanity is a key influence.
“Short wins don’t benefit like long term impact does. I struggle to see why that wouldn’t be something that doesn’t steer your approach when it so clearly benefits the quality of your output, the impact of digital on the environment, the experience of the user and the clients ability to meet their goals.”
Additionally there is sometimes a lack of true authenticity in the “business for good” sector. Conversations with prospective clients in the sustainability space can be frustrating. “The amount of purpose or impact driven organisations that don’t live the same values in their digital space when the benefits are so undeniable on all levels.”.
As we often say in our presentations, digital is physical. You can’t separate your online and offline actions and decisions and policies when it comes to equality and sustainability. There is an idea that story telling and impact on a website comes from autoplay videos and heavyweight javascript powered features. Performance and environmental impact be damned.
For my final question I keep things nice and easy.
What’s the thing that Chris is most proud of in his first 3 years at Wholegrain?
After mildly berating me for the question he considers and settles on “resilience”. As I mentioned earlier the past few years (most of Chris’s time in charge in fact) haven’t been made any easier by external factors.
“Wholegrain has a legacy that was definitely heavy to carry when I first started and as a sector, agencies have not had an easy few years, but we are still here, still innovating and still moving the needle on what a purpose led business in our space can do. I’m proud of that.”
For me, the most important thing innovative and ethical businesses and organisations can do is continue doing what they are doing. They have to keep carrying the torch and inspiring others to do better. With Chris at the helm, the Humane Web as a guiding light and resilience as a core tenet, Wholegrain looks well set to do just that.
*Author’s note. In early drafts of this article I used phrases like “flesh out” or “adding meat to the bones” which are wildly inappropriate for our proudly plant powered MD. I briefly thought about using “adding pulses to the salad” but it didn’t quite land. If you’ve got plant based metaphors to use in place of carnivorous ones, drop me an email…
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