Commonwealth Club of California Podcast

In an age where the phrase “cutting-edge technology” is redefined almost daily, new power shifts in the workplace are occurring on a generational scale. What does our future society look like when leaders in tech and business are getting younger and younger but life expectancy rates are at an all-time high? How can we build sustainable and forward-thinking workplace culture that lasts even during rapidly evolving times? Airbnb’s Chip Conley and Brian Chesky are high-profile examples of innovation and success on this front. At age 52, Joie de Vivre Hospitality founder Chip Conley joined forces with Airbnb’s millennial CEO and co-founder Brian Chesky to help improve guest experience and provide hosts with innovative standards in hospitality. At the time, Conley was an established giant in the hotel world but, in his own words, he “didn’t even have the Uber or Lyft app on [his] phone.” Despite his lack of tech proficiency, Conley was named head of global hospitality and strategy at Airbnb in 2013, and, since then, he has become an unexpected leader in recent efforts to merge baby boomer industry experience and perspective with millennial tech fluency and creativity. In his upcoming book, Wisdom at Work: The Making of a Modern Elder, Conley maps out his own experience with working at a tech company later in life and offers advice on how to break the traditional career mold. Join us for a candid conversation with Conley and Chesky as they discuss their unlikely partnership and what other companies can do to make the most of employees from all walks of life. The conversation will be moderated by Julie Hanna, executive chairwoman at Kiva and advisor at X — The Moonshot Factory.

This program is part of our Good Lit series, underwritten by the Bernard Osher Foundation. Many in the press feel President Trump’s administration has decidedly waged war against them. The president and his former top aide referred to media as the “opposition party” and took the unprecedented step of banning cameras from the White House press briefing. Forced to adjust under a new environment, veteran White House reporter April Ryan knows the chaos within the briefing room and the struggle to ask the difficult questions in the face of unprecedented scrutiny. Her new book, Under Fire: Reporting from the Front Lines of the Trump White House, brings readers into the Trump White House to experience the difficulty of contemporary journalism. April Ryan has served as a White House correspondent since 1997 and recently joined CNN as a political analyst. In 2017, the National Association of Black Journalists named Ryan the journalist of the year. Come listen to a conversation about the struggle to proclaim the truth and the war on information under the Trump administration.

Michael D. Rich, President and CEO of the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation, will discuss the phenomenon RAND is calling “truth decay”—the diminishing role of facts and analysis in American public life. Truth decay has led to the erosion of civil discourse, political paralysis, and disengagement from political and civic institutions. Concerned about truth decay’s effects on evidence based policy-making, RAND launched an in-depth research initiative to study the causes and address the consequences. Rich will share findings from RAND’s initial exploration, including a research agenda to help find solutions to the challenges posed by truth decay. Former President Barack Obama thinks RAND’s report is so important that he added it to his summer reading list.

“What the hell do you have to lose?” During his 2016 campaign, then-candidate Donald Trump posed this question to African-Americans, asking them what they had to lose in voting for him. To Fox News host Juan Williams, this comment struck a nerve. While President Trump considers himself a protectorate for African-American communities around the nation, Williams argues that Trump’s record of racist remarks and his reluctance to condemn acts of racialized violence demonstrates otherwise. Williams illuminates all the rights and privileges that communities of color fought for in the past, rights he now believes should be relentlessly protected today. He focuses on key components of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and lesser known heroes such as Bob Moses, A. Philip Randolph and Everett Dirksen. Join us for a powerful conversation about the war on civil rights and where America can move forward.

Think this is a record fire year? Given all the news coverage lately it may be surprising that the number of fires and acres burned in the United States is actually down this year from 2017. But the intensity and nearly year-round timing of the fires in the American West has entered a new chapter. Drought, high temperatures and winds, as well as extensive building near forested lands, are creating a volatile combination for super fires different than what we have experienced before. “We are setting new modern records, and it seems like the old rules are out,” a Cal Fire official told the San Francisco Chronicle. Scientists say climate change is creating conditions for stronger fires that are likely to occur more frequently. What role has Smokey Bear played in creating these conditions? Is President Trump correct that thinning forests would dampen fires? What happens to people and watersheds after the fires recede from the headlines? Join us for a conversation about this infernal summer and how to manage life near forests.

Our in-studio guest this week: Lynn Keiser Keiser is a transgender woman who works as a research engineer at Ford Motor Company’s Greenfield Labs in Palo Alto, California. She transitioned on the job in early 2016, after living as a gay man for many years. Lynn met her husband-to-be, Ken, in 1995 while living in New Jersey. Ken had been living in the United States by way of a temporary work visa, which was set to expire a few years after they met. In those days, the U.S. didn’t recognize same sex relationships for any purpose, and so Ken had to leave the country when his work visa expired. As the exit date approached, Lynn and Ken scrambled to find a way to stay together. They found out that Canada was welcoming to LGBT people, and in late 1998 settled in Vancouver, becoming Canadian citizens within a few years. After same-sex marriage was legalized across Canada in 2005 they got legally married, ten years from the time they first met. After living in Canada for a number of years, Lynn began to feel that something wasn’t quite right, that maybe the label of Gay Man didn’t quite fit after all. While watching a movie on television whose main character is a woman, Lynn found herself thinking “I wish I looked like her!” It was at that point the she started trying on women’s jewelry and clothes, and made connections with the local transgender support group in Vancouver. In 2013 the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the anti-LGBT laws that prevented Lynn and Ken from being recognized as a couple, and they applied for Ken’s green card. They finally arrived back in the country in 2014, almost 16 years after being forced to leave. In the meantime, Lynn kept her gender variance to herself and a small group of friends. Finally, though, the stress of hiding her true self from her colleagues became too much to tolerate, and after discussing it with her supervisor and the HR manager at Ford, she set a date to start presenting as Lynn at work. Symbolically, this was to be Leap Day, February 29th, 2016. With Lynn’s permission, her supervisor announced Lynn’s upcoming transition at an office all-hands meeting, and people clapped and gave her hugs. There wasn’t a single negative comment, only support and friendship. Since then, Lynn has continued working on advanced research projects and become involved with the local technical community, making many connections and taking part in numerous professional events around Silicon Valley. This year she helped to organize Ford’s participation in the San Francisco Pride Parade, and finally realized her life-long dream of waving to an adoring crowd from a Mustang convertible! Join us as Michelle Meow brings her long-running daily radio show to The Commonwealth Club one day each week. Meet fascinating—and often controversial—people discussing important issues of interest to the LGBTQ community, and have your questions ready.

This program is part of our Good Lit series, underwritten by the Bernard Osher Foundation. John Hennessy has been called the “godfather of Silicon Valley.” From his early days as a computer scientist to serving as the 10th president of Stanford University, Hennessy reflects on the core elements of his leadership philosophy. Focusing on the journey rather than the destination, Hennessy details the pivotal role that humility, authenticity, courage, collaboration, innovation and curiosity have all played in his successful career as a tech entrepreneur, academic and administrator.

How will artificial intelligence change our future? And who is leading the AI race—the United States or China? Kai-Fu Lee outlines the impact that AI will have not just on blue-collar industries but white-collar professionals. He reveals how these unprecedented developments are happening much sooner than we think and what needs to be done to address these profound changes. Lee has been at the forefront of AI development for 30 years. He was the president of Google China and also held executive positions at Microsoft, SGI and Apple. NOTES In association with the Committee of 100 Photo by Huili Shi

Current trends indicate a movement away from traditional religion toward more inclusive views of spirituality, indicating a clear need for establishing a balance between our spiritual longings and our material needs. Anna Gatmon will discuss her view that “people have an intrinsic longing to lead meaningful, purposeful lives, and contribute to making our world a better place. Neglecting this need has created a spiritual hunger in our culture, a great void needing to be filled.” Passionate about making spirituality practical and accessible to everyone, she offers tools on how to rise above the daily grind. Through her personal experience and research, Gatmon has found four keys that will help the audience find a more whole and compassionate way of life, spiritually and materially balanced. MLF ORGANIZER NAME John Milford NOTES MLF: Grownups

Memes, tweets, stories, DMs, emojis, face filters, viral dog videos—as a culture, we seem to be at the peak of the Internet age. Or are we just getting started? The online series “Internetting with Amanda Hess” is, according to The New York Times, "everything that's weird, wrong and totally sad about internet culture.” It's an emoji- and insight-filled look at a place where we all spend a lot of time. Join us for a live discussion with Hess. She will dissect intersections of race, gender and feminism that exist within the digital frameworks of society. She might also share a gif or two … or ten. Hess will be in conversation with writer Thomas Page McBee, author of Amateur, a book that examines modern masculinity through the lens of his own experience as a transgender man, and Samhita Mukhopadhyay, executive editor of Teen Vogue and author of Nasty Women: Feminism, Resistance and Revolution in Trump’s America. NOTES McBee photo by Kait Miller Mukhopadhyay photo by Heather Hazzan