Leadership Beyond Borders

In ancient times the ability to memorize was a considered a magical skill --sometimes even thought of as mystical and it was essential to the passing down of stories, legends, history, and taboos and laws. It was used as a basis for social and economic development.

Today, the Internet seems to be making memorization irrelevant. What we don’t remember, we look up.

Many schools have also generally abandoned requiring students to memorize poems, famous speeches, math tables, and all sorts of academic material that used to be ingrained in the curriculum.

The question is -Is technology making us mentally lazy and if so how does that affect us in our business and private lives?’

Memorization is a discipline of the mind and our guest on this episode believes we should exercise our memory more than we do.

After 8 months of virtual working we are repeating this interview to exercise our brains.

COVID-19 has impacted our healthcare systems, in both positive and negative ways. The challenging strain we have felt on our healthcare infrastructure has very often masked the positive impacts the pandemic has had on medical technology advancements, and artificial intelligence has moved to the forefront. The application of AI across healthcare networks and in medical devices is helping us improve systems that perform tasks normally requiring human intelligence. It is giving us the bandwidth to perform tasks at greater speed, with better accuracy and helps us in predicting patterns. But just as any technology AI can have security issues when not managed correctly and when it comes to health and medicine this could cost lives. In this episode we look at AI in healthcare and medicine and talk about the kind of cyber security we need to not only protect our personal data but to keep us from harm.

COVID will be remembered as a time of tremendous upheaval and change. One that extends across industries and economies, as well as social and political structures and the impact, will be felt for at least a decade if not a generation or more. COVID has changed how we communicate, how we behave and also how we consume. If you have to point to one phenomenon that characterizes the COVID-consumer experience, it's e-commerce. Online shopping grew in the US and Europe by triple digits during the lockdown periods, as people were compelled to shop online. But what kind of impact is this having on the local economy? Will these current trends be the foundation for consumer behavior in the future? In this episode we look at this new consumer behaviour, what kind of impact it is having on local businesses, retail and brands, as well as how they are and should be preparing themselves for the future.

As the Coronavirus Escalates we are being asked to download tracking and tracking apps, fill out papers with personal information and supply our data to multiple organizations. At the same time, we are seeing a surge e-commerce. We are buying more online which ultimately leaves it easier for companies to target us online. In general, our personal data is in more places today than it was before the pandemic, while cybercrime has ramped up amid this crisis. Working from home, multiple platforms use, the majority of the population workings online and much more, makes both company and personal data more vulnerable today than in the past. It's been over 2 years since the EU introduced GDPR, followed by similar laws like CCPA in the USA. In this episode we talk to 2 privacy experts, about has happened concerning privacy in the last 2 years, how the pandemic has effect privacy laws and we expect to see in 2021.

Over the last months we have sometimes witnessed the clashes of values and beliefs and many of them have revolved around our views concerning gender and roles. I heard an interview from a US voter, who clearly said that women do not belong in the White House, while at the same time political discussions concerning wage equality, the validity Roe vs Wade and many other gender issues are always in the media. But it seems that most of the discussions revolve around women, leaving the question, what is happening to men in today's world? Gender roles have shifted both at work and in the home, and expectations of both genders is shifting as our values and understanding catch up with the times. In this episode, we explore what is happening with men. What are they facing in this shifting world, and will masculinity be newly defined?

Business has certainly changed, today we are facing new challenge and new opportunities but even in the midst of this crisis business and negotiations must go on.

We are operating in highly unusual and disrupted commercial environment today, therefore even the location of negotiations has changed, they may not be happening in the board room today but on virtual platforms.

But no matter where discussions and negotiations are taking place and under what conditions and what altered business practices we have ; the principle of the negotiation process has not changed.

Our circumstances may mean we are facing different kinds of discussions, negotiations, conflicts, disputes and difficult conversations today, with everyone from family members to clients and customers, but differences are still there, maybe even more prevalent than before.

This is why the skill of negotiating has never been as important as it is today, and this episode helps you make the art of negotiation easier.

As we move into another period of lockdown, we would like revisit some of the observations we made in the beginning of the year when we first faced the unseen enemy of the pandemic.

Revisiting what we predicted in April can help us reflect on what has become the new norm and what we may have not yet implemented because--- lets be honest--- it was hard to change all practices and processes at once.

In March, time-strapped, and under tremendous pressure we were forced to re-evaluate practices and processes. We witnessed great creativity from agile companies. Quick to respond, they showed us best practices that we continue to learn from. In this episode we speak with the Chief Commercial Officer of a medium-sized European Company, that was first out of the gate with many best practices that have now been adopted in many companies. Listening to this episode can help you review your own practices as we enter this second wave.

Growing up, it was a Sunday tradition that my Dad would get up in the morning and go get a dozen Dunkin' Donuts . We could each pick one kind for ourselves, and the rest was a surprise mix. My brother always took the Jelly Stick ( with the illusion it was bigger ), my mother the chocolate glazed, and I always picked the mysterious Butternut. Back then, I thought Dunkin' Donuts was a neighborhood shop, our local donut shop, because the brand blended so well into our neighborhood. It was years later I realized it was a national franchise and even later in university, realized it is one of the best brand stories in the history of entrepreneurship in the USA. In this episode, we get to speak with Robert Rosenberg, whose father founded the famous donut chain and where he served as Chief Executive Officer of Dunkin' Donuts from 1963 until his retirement in 1998. His story is fascinating, a story of entrepreneurship, vision and leadership that we all can learn from.

Holiday parties, mistletoe, lighting the Menorah, 3 King Celebrations, children sitting on Santa's Lap or just meeting a group of friends in the pub for a pint are memories of holidays past as we adjust to 2020's new reality. Typically, December is a time of traditions, and part of its charm is knowing what's coming every year, but this year will be different. The torrent of shoppers in the run-up to the Holidays has been around as long as Holiday Glitter, but many long-standing traditions, are now on the verge of change. As we approach the most significant shopping time of year, we see changes in consumer behavior and some retailers are adjusting, while others are still trying to navigate the new world. In this episode, we take a look at what is happening in retail this Holiday season how can the local "Brick and Mortar Shops" actually thrive in this new world of limited foot traffic and more e-commerce.

Prominent business disasters such as the collapse of Enron and Northern Rock, to such devastating events as the BP Texas City oil refinery explosion, are very often blamed on Company Boards and Governance. But many of these disasters happened in times that were not as turbulent as they are today. A recent report done by Deloitte on the challenges of Boards, states that "The way in which Boards do their work at this time will be a critical factor in an organization's ability to emerge from the current crisis and push forward into a new era of economic recovery and opportunity for the benefit of all stakeholders." In this episode, we pose the question: Are Boards up to governing in these challenging times and do they have the proper governance that can help guide them through rough times and onto recovery?