In Episode 3 of the Covid-19 Dispatch series, we talk to The Atlantic’s Derek Thompson, who recently wrote about contact tracing. In the fight against Covid-19, this critical public health tool has been used unevenly. Thompson notes that South Korea and Singapore have had success with smartphone apps, but that South Korea’s reliance on GPS, along with surveillance video and credit card transactions, raised privacy concerns and may have discouraged participation. Singapore used Bluetooth proximity data, which doesn’t reveal geolocation information. The latter may provide the model for tracing efforts in the US and elsewhere.    

The pandemic has magnified Amazon’s role as household supply line and pushed the company to quickly adjust how it does business. The retail giant has revised scores of operating processes in response to customer demand, workplace safety requirements, and public health directives. For an enterprise with half a million employees in the US, implementing these changes has been a mammoth management challenge. Ardine Williams, the company’s vice president of workforce development discusses how the coronavirus has changed business as usual.

The Covid-19 pandemic has thrown more people out of work than at any time since the Great Depression, and did so with unprecedented speed. In this debut episode of the Managing the Future of Work podcast’s Covid-19 Dispatches, economist and New York Times columnist Justin Wolfers discusses alternatives to the official unemployment figures; best and worst case scenarios; economic insecurity; and the need for federal aid to state and local governments.

Artificial intelligence seems to have repealed the laws of business physics, allowing “digital native” companies to grow at the stroke of a key and cross traditional market boundaries unimpeded. In their new book, Competing in the Age of AI: Strategy and Leadership When Algorithms and Networks Run the World, HBS professors Marco Iansiti and Karim Lakhani show the inner workings of the “AI factory.” Traditional businesses can’t bolt on AI and analytics and expect to compete. Marco explains how firms can adapt and discusses the implications for workers and public policy.

Fred Goff wants to tap the Web’s scale and connectivity to rebalance capitalism for the benefit of workers. The former hedge fund manager launched Jobcase, a workforce platform and online labor organization, in 2015. It’s a job search site, a clearinghouse for qualifications, and a support network for its 100 million members, most of whom lack a four-year degree. The AI-augmented community wields significant consumer- and investor influence. Fred shares his views on degree inflation, the skills gap, and the need for greater diversity in the workforce.

Nearly twenty years ago, Richard Florida famously identified the “creative class,” an amalgamation of knowledge workers and those in the arts, culture, and design fields. He established creativity as a basic economic force. Amid increasing inequality and unstable work arrangements, diminished techno-optimism, and the rise of global innovation hubs, he is still bullish on America’s capacity for invention. Florida argues for place-based economic development and skills-building up and down the socioeconomic ladder.

Workplace sexual harassment can derail careers, depress morale, and decrease productivity. The #MeToo movement focused attention on the issue, but left companies to figure out how to address this common and underreported problem. Harvard Law grad Ally Coll and tech entrepreneur Neta Meidav are working to change the culture around harassment. Coll is cofounder and President of the Purple Campaign, a nonprofit focused on business practice and public policy that is piloting a corporate certification program with the likes of Uber, Airbnb, Expedia, and Amazon. Meidav is cofounder of startup Vault Platform, whose application makes it easier to report and track harassment. They discuss the broader cultural and legal context and what leadership can do to promote safety and fairness in traditional and nontraditional workplaces.

HBS alum Stephen Moret led Virginia’s winning proposal for Amazon’s 2019 HQ2 expansion. A crucial factor in the Commonwealth’s success was its billion-dollar commitment to developing talent, particularly in computer science and engineering. In beating out states that pledged vastly greater subsidies to the retail giant, Virginia validated the view that targeted investments in workforce development can spur economic development. Moret draws on his experience in Virginia and Louisiana, and his doctoral research on higher education to explain how public and private sectors can boost growth and improve worker prospects. He also sheds light on the role post-secondary studies play in determining the arc of graduates’ career opportunities.

Dan O’Connor, retail expert and executive-in-residence with the HBS Managing the Future of Work project, traces the evolution of retail from the corner store through big-box, e-commerce, and the emergence of omni-faceted digital platforms. What are the implications for employers and employees throughout the sector? Retail accounts for more than 5 percent of US gross domestic product (GDP) and employs more than any other industry, roughly 16 million workers, or one in ten. Globally, the emergence of mega-platforms like Amazon and Alibaba, with their consolidated supply chains and mountains of customer data, is forcing the industry to adopt leaner and more responsive operating models while the workforce comes to terms with automation and other advances.

Amazon in the summer of 2019 announced a sweeping five-year plan to bolster the skills of a third of its US workforce—close to 100,000 worker-learners. The plan includes apprenticeships, partnerships with local community colleges, and internal programs. As Amazon’s Vice President of Workforce Development, Ardine Williams, notes, the initiative isn’t philanthropy. She argues that Amazon’s investment in training workers—even if some ultimately leave for higher-paying jobs—makes good business sense.