Commonwealth Club of California Podcast

When someone you know is hurting, you want to let her know you care. But many people don’t know the exact words to use—or are afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing. This thoughtful, instructive guide, from empathy expert Kelsey Crowe, blends well-researched, actionable advice with the no-nonsense humor and immensely popular empathy cards to help you feel confident in connecting with anyone experiencing grief, loss, illness or any other difficult situation. Whether it’s a co-worker whose mother has died, a neighbor whose husband has been in a car accident or a friend who is seriously ill, Crowe advises you how to be the best friend you can be to someone in need. Crowe is the founder of Help Each Other Out, which offers empathy boot camp workshops to give people tools for building relationships when it really counts. She earned her Ph.D. in social work at the UC Berkeley, and is a faculty member at the School of Social Work at California State University. Miller is a hospice and palliative care specialist who treats hospitalized patients with terminal or life-altering illnesses at UCSF Medical Center. He also sees patients in a palliative care clinic and at the cancer symptom management service at the UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Great bosses have strong relationships with their employees. Kim Scott has identified three simple principles for building better relationships. She will share the framework to help build, lead and inspire others to do their best. Learn more about “radical candor,” the effective management method that Scott developed from her years working at Google and Apple and from serving as a coaching executive at Twitter and Dropbox.

Teenage brothers Angel and Miguel worry every day about their mom. She is undocumented, and she’s put together an emergency binder telling her sons what to do if she’s picked up by immigration authorities and doesn’t come home. Kaushik came to San Francisco from India five years ago to attend college. He found a job as an app engineer, but because he’s here on a specialized work visa, he isn’t sure if he can continue living in this country. Esra, a student at San Jose State University, must think about her safety when she gets dressed in the morning. Last year, a stranger tried to yank off her hijab while she was in a campus parking garage. These real stories illustrate what is unfolding across the country and in Bay Area communities. Our panelists say that, unlike any other region, the Bay Area is equipped with the history and willpower to stand with and protect immigrants and their families at this time of crisis. In January, San Francisco, a city led by the son of immigrants, became the first city in the country to sue the president for threatening to withhold federal funding from sanctuary cities. In February, Muslim artists began staging prayer sessions in public plazas throughout San Francisco to combat growing Islamophobia. In both February and April, more than 100 tech companies, including many founded by immigrants, banded together to file legal challenges to the president’s executive orders on immigration. And on May 1, tens of thousands of Bay Area residents took to the streets to demonstrate immigrants and workers’ essential contributions to society.Please join the San Francisco Foundation to hear from Bay Area leaders seeking to protect and defend immigrants (who represent more than 40 percent of Bay Area residents) so that they can continue to contribute to the economic prosperity and cultural vibrancy of the region.

The new documentary Is America in Retreat? examines the greatest foreign policy debate of our decade and the hard questions American leaders face in dealing with a rapidly changing world order. Since the Second World War, the United States has been at the forefront of a Pax Americana—a period of relative peace guaranteed by U.S. military might. Today, that peace is threatened by an ambitious and aggressive foreign policy in China, Russian territorial claims and occupations in Eastern Europe, and deteriorating conditions in the Middle East and North Korea. More than half of Americans polled today believe we should “mind our own business.” Is there a downside to retreat, or does the world still require American global leadership? Come view a clip of the documentary. A discussion will follow.

Californians are accustomed to living through wet times and dry times, but lately things are getting more extreme and much more difficult to predict. After five years of severe drought, Californians are now talking about what it means to have too much water. The end of the drought is a blessing, but the state may need to find $50 billion to repair dams, roads and other infrastructure threatened by floods. The damaged spillway at Oroville Dam highlighted what happens when the state doesn’t keep its water system in good working order. How is California preparing for the whiplash of going from really dry to really wet years? What will it take to fix the system that delivers the water that keeps us alive and lubricates our economy? How will state and federal governments work together to modernize the water systems responsible for growing the food that lands on our dinner tables?

For more than 100 years, gay clubs and bars have served as havens and sanctuaries as well as party spots and hookup sites. They've been the centers of solidarity, community and education. They've also been the sites of violence and persecution that ultimately led to great advancements in pride, rights and freedoms. Unger's richly illustrated talk highlights the history of a long and colorful American tradition central to the LGBTQ community: the gay bar—from jook joints to the Stonewall Inn to Orlando's Pulse and beyond.

We live in a time when machines outplay humans at strategy games, new companies such as Apple and Google destroy industry stalwarts, and ideas from the crowd are repeatedly more innovative than corporate research labs. Come hear Andrew McAfee and Erik Brynjolfsson, co-founders of MIT’s Initiative on the Digital Economy, talk about the new dynamics between minds and machines, products and platforms, and the core and the crowd. Join us for an intriguing conversation on what the effects of the digital revolution are and how society is changing because of it.

Learn how to transform retirement into "revivement" and revitalize your later years. We will cover: how leading-edge scientific research can inform you in making your brain smarter and younger, how to influence your genes, and how to increase your longevity. Also learn how to plan the rest of your life—and about the beauty of age as well as the nine pillars to having a life of meaning and fulfillment. Is there something you always wanted to do? Areas you wanted to explore? Ideas you wanted to create? Accomplishments you wanted to achieve? Now is the time! Learn how to make your next years your best years.

In an emotional roller coaster of real experiences, Cleve Jones will take you through the gay liberation movement and AIDS epidemic of the 1980s. Jones will share how Harvey Milk became the first largely outspoken gay elected official—as well as Jones' mentor. Jones keeps Milk’s legacy and the gay liberation movement alive, aspiring to have a similar impact on young adults as Milk had on Jones. Come hear Jones’ inspiring words on the political movement. Jones joined the gay liberation movement in the early 1970s. He was mentored by pioneer LGBT activist Harvey Milk and worked in Milk’s City Hall office as a student intern until Milk’s assassination in 1978. Jones co-founded the San Francisco AIDS Foundation in 1983. In 1987, he founded the Names Project AIDS Memorial Quilt, one of the world’s largest community arts projects. Jones was portrayed by Emile Hirsch in Milk, Gus Van Sant’s Oscar-winning film, and served as the historical consultant for the production. In 2009, Jones led the National Equality March in Washington, D.C. He served on the advisory board of the American Foundation for Equal Rights, which challenged California’s Proposition 8 in the U.S. Supreme Court. In November 2016, ABC aired a miniseries partially inspired by Jones’ 2016 memoir, When We Rise.

Here’s a rare chance to hear from an officer of the Federal Reserve on the state of the economy and where it’s headed. Having served as the 30th president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas since September 8, 2015, Robert Steven Kaplan represents the 11th Federal Reserve District on the Federal Open Market Committee in the formulation of U.S. monetary policy. He oversees the 1,200 employees of the Dallas Federal Reserve. Before his work at the Federal Reserve, Kaplan served as the Martin Marshall professor of management practice and a senior associate dean at Harvard Business School. Prior to this, Kaplan was the vice chairman of the Goldman Sachs Group, Inc., where he was given global responsibility for the firm's investment banking and investment management divisions. During his 23-year career at Goldman Sachs, Kaplan served in various other capacities. He was the global co-head of the investment banking division. He was also a member of the firm’s management committee and served as co-chairman of the firm’s partnership committee and as chairman of the Goldman Sachs Pine Street leadership program. Kaplan serves as co-chairman of Project ALS and as co-chairman of the Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation, a global venture philanthropy firm that invests in developing nonprofit enterprises dedicated to addressing social issues. He is also a board member of Harvard Medical School. Born and raised in Kansas, Kaplan holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the University of Kansas and an MBA from Harvard Business School.