FUTUREPROOF.

Send us a text

We haven't really covered a critical topic: the topic of Russia, its invasion of Ukraine, and the ramifications for that conflict for the world writ large in some time—probably since we had Dima Shvets from Ukraine-founded Reface on before the war.

To cover the topic we're bringing on one of our longest sought-after guests, Russia expert Miriam Elder. She’s an American journalist who’s previously served as a foreign and national security editor for BuzzFeed News and was also formerly The Guardian's Moscow-based correspondent.

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!

Send us a text

At the end of the day, so much of society is focused on consumerism– but how do you make the right decisions about what to sell and how to sell it if you don’t understand consumers in a meaningful way? 

We’re excited to be talking to my personal favorite Kraskinski brother. Prior to co-founding Epicenter Experience, Paul Krasinski served as an SVP at SessionM, acquired by Mastercard, and at Arbitron, later acquired by Nielsen. Paul's developed and refined a deep understanding for the consumer perspective, developed insight services and the industry relationships required to revolutionize how brands and consumers connect. 

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!

Send us a text

Consumer privacy is such a big topic these days. There’s so much evidence that users really do care about their personal information—but there’s also data that suggests that people don’t care assuming they’re getting something in return for giving something up.

To dive into this topic and more, we sat down with Brian Mandelbaum, CEO of Klover, a leading fintech app that raised $60 million last year and provides high-level analytics of buyer behavior by capturing users’ spending data and compensating them for it. We talk to Brian  about the perception around legacy payday advance firms, whether we need federal privacy policies in place similar to Europe’s GDPR, and how consumer spending and behavior is changing in the wake of today’s inflationary environment.

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!

Send us a text

We live in enormously divisive times. Divisions based on class, politics, race, religion, gender, and nationality are erupting around the globe. The consequences of not having a sense of belonging range from political strife to illness to underperformance at work and in the classroom. In 2020, 40% of each political party said that supporters of the opposition party were “downright evil.” In 2019, hate crimes reached a 10-year high in the U.S. 

Americans have become disconnected from their communities. About one in five Americans suffers from chronic loneliness, especially young adults. How did we end up so divided and alienated? Why is our sense of belonging so undermined? What if there were a set of science-backed techniques for navigating modern social life that could help us overcome our differences, create empathy, and forge lasting connections across divides?

To tackle all of this, I wanted to turn to Stanford University Professor Geoffrey L. Cohen. His new book BELONGING: The Science of Creating Connection and Bridging Divides is out September 13, and available to pre-order now. 

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!

Send us a text

For brands looking to resonate with consumers, sustainability isn’t just a nice add-on. It’s table stakes. Why, then, are so many companies getting it wrong?

Today, we talk to Erin Allweiss  and Melody Serafino, the co-founders of No. 29, an acclaimed PR agency  focused exclusively on sustainability and social impact. Today we discuss exactly how much consumers do care about sustainability, why greenwashing is such a problem these days, and how brands can get on the right side of history.

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!.

Send us a text

To figure out what direction society is going, every now and then we like to check in with our friends in the investment space—after all, they’re highly motivated to get the future right. That’s why I wanted to talk to Gene Frantz, a leading investor in cybersecurity and enterprise tech and General Partner at CapitalG, the independent growth fund owned by Google parent company Alphabet.

Gene’s track record includes backing some of the most significant tech companies of the past decade, including CrowdStrike, Zscaler, and Freshworks Collectively, his investments at CapitalG have achieved nine major exits, including four IPOs, and are worth more than $125B. 

We talk to Gene about how much emotion should come into play when investing in startups, the problem with greater sums of money going into capital rounds, identifying the companies of the future,  how many hits you need to offset the investments that don't pay off, and more.

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!.

Send us a text

David Livermore is a social scientist devoted to the study of cultural intelligence (CQ) and global leadership and the author of several award-winning books. He is a founder of the Cultural Intelligence Center in East Lansing, Michigan, and prior to that, he spent twenty years in leadership positions with a variety of nonprofits and taught in five universities. 

David is a frequent speaker and adviser to leaders in Fortune 500 companies, nonprofits, and governments, and he has worked in more than one hundred countries. He has been interviewed and referenced by myriad news sources, including The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, CBS News, the New York Times, and quite a few other spots.

He’s also the author of the forthcoming DIGITAL, DIVERSE & DIVIDED: How to Talk to Racists, Compete with Robots, and Overcome Polarization, which is out this September and is available for pre-order now.

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!.

Send us a text

Saleem Ali is the Distinguished Prof. of Energy & the Environment at the Univ. of Delaware. He’s known for his work in environmental conflict resolution and was recognized as an “Emerging Explorer” by National Geographic. Dubbed the “The Alchemist” by Forbes, Ali connects politics, science, and nature in Earthly Order, weaving narratives of his experience as a National Geographic field explorer throughout. I’ve included advance praise for the book below my signature. He’s also the author of Earthly Order: How Natural Laws Define Human Life, which just hit shelves July 1.

We discuss how  natural and social/political systems influence planetary crisis (and climate change in particular), how climate change acceptance evolved over the time he's been focused on this topic, and how much hope we should have for the future, considering how much work there's left to be done.

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!.

Send us a text

Gretchen Rubin is one of today’s most influential and thought-provoking observers of happiness and human nature. She’s the author of many books, including multiple New York Times bestsellers—her books have sold over 3.5 million copies worldwide, in more than thirty languages.

On her top-ranking, award-winning podcast Happier with Gretchen Rubin, she discusses happiness and good habits with her sister Elizabeth Craft. She is a regular columnist for O, The Oprah Magazine and makes regular appearances on CBS This Morning.

She’s also a sought-after collaborator, and recently partnered with Oracle on some really interesting research about…you guessed it, happiness. So I’m excited to talk to her about that today.

Read the full report: https://www.oracle.com/cx/happiness/

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!

Send us a text

According to INSEAD professor Nathan Furr and entrepreneur Susannah Harmon Furr—yes, they are married—we really can learn how to face the unknown and find the creative opportunity – the capacity for innovation - that it represents. In their new book The Upside of Uncertainty: A Guide to Finding Possibility in the Unknown, which hits shelves mid-July and is available for pre-order now, they present a reassuringly practical approach to help us all develop the critical skills we need for dealing with uncertainty. 

We discuss whether or not uncertainty can be a blessing in disguise, leaning into serendipity, how much the pandemic has changed our relationship with uncertainty, and today's current challenges relating to inflation, supply chains, and politics.

As always, we welcome your feedback. Please make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play - and make sure to follow us on Facebook and LinkedIn!