Most Powerful Women Summit 2022

Jennifer Siebel Newsom, First Partner, State of California 
Interviewer: Michal Lev-Ram, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Securing The Future Of Women’s Leadership

Securing The Future Of Women’s Leadership

According to the World Economic Forum's 2022 global gender gap index at the current rate of progress, it will take 132 years for women to reach full gender parity. It's a pretty astounding stats, but one that may not surprise many of you or our next guest, Jennifer. Siebel Newsom, is a thought leader in vocal advocate for change in society's limited gender norms and stereotypes. She's also a filmmaker who wrote, produced and directed three documentaries on the subject. Additionally, she is the co founder of the California Partners Project, a nonprofit focused on supporting women's representation on board. And as she probably knows, she's the first partner of California. We are honored to have her with us today to talk about her work on progressing gender equity. Please welcome her to the stage along with Michael. Thank you, Baby. Welcome jennifer, thank you for joining us. So we had Katie Porter on stage. You just saw her. I'm sorry that you both know each other. Um but you know, we we talked with her, we also we had Liz Cheney an interview with Cheney yesterday. Um, and I've been talking about some some of the toxicity in our national politics. And so I'm curious to hear just from your perspective, um what is is there a solution to that? And if so, what how do we move beyond it? So I mean we have to focus in on our common humanity and we do have a shared humanity right that um, is expansive. And we're sort of talking in the fringes right right now, we have to come together and focusing on our common humanity, but we also have to hold the individuals and the media platforms and the tech platforms accountable for misinformation and divisiveness, um, all with the larger intent of um padding their pocketbooks. And and it's, you know, we've come to this point in time where if people are have different facts. Um, I my parents or my father is a Republican, he's not a Trumper, but he is a republican. And so oftentimes we have to have conversations that kind of like slow him down and help them understand that the information that he's being fed through Fox news and all all this sort of far right platforms is not the truth. Um, and at the same time, I think we need more women in leadership, more women of color, more progressive women of color and mothers because I think we then will bring a we've been excluded from the tables of power for far too long and then we will bring our unique perspectives, our values um, to the table that ultimately are about, you know, there's this a relational um tendency that we've been nurtured into, that's been part of our socialization that is really more about like finding common ground and making about the future and Children and so I think again, it's sort of that threefold answer of focusing in on our common humanity, getting more women into leadership, especially mothers and women of color. And then obviously, you know, we've got to call out those who are profiting off of dividing us. Well, I would love to listen in on some of your family dinner conversations. I'm sure they're fascinating. Um I wanna talk about California more specifically and and where you've chosen to focus your work um here. Um can you talk a little bit about what you've done to advance women and people of color on boards and sort of what the status is? I know there was a bill that passed and has since been overturned to mandate some of the increased diversity on boards. Um What was accomplished and what's the status now? Great, well, broadly speaking, my focus has always been gender equity and child well being and that those are my priorities um in the administration, but one of the the initiatives that we've taken on isn't sure is SB-826 and making sure that this bill was implemented in a way that benefited women and represented California women. Um and SB 8, 26 what we found, So in 2018, when the first, when SB 8 26 was first signed, what we found was that 15 point point 5% of public company boards had 15.5% of the seats on public company boards were held by women today as a result of not just the law, but our cultural work To shift hearts and minds, attitudes and behaviors. We have 33% of public company board seats are held by women. So that's remarkable? Um simultaneously, it's also important to note that in 2018 30% of public company boards in California were all male boards. Because of this law. Now, only 1% of public company boards are all male boards, so that's tremendous. Um we still have work to do. Latinos represent 20% of the California population and are less than 2% of public company board seats. So that's something that is of note that we're working very intentionally on. Um and you know, again, the law was challenged in May of 2022. Another judge gave the law stay in September of this year, but regardless people have moved in the direction of recognizing the value of women's leadership. We know you all know this women whether it's in the C suite or the public company or a public or private board. What we know is that women hone in more on E. S. G. Right, so they have better environmental practices, family friendly and governance, which reduces risk. So broadly speaking, it's a win win when you have women on in leadership in companies. And so I think that narrative in that story is pretty clear now and most people are brought into it with the exception of a few. Uh but I'm really proud of, you know, the work that we've we've done in partnership with the legislature and through also the California partners project. So do you consider it a win? Generally speaking, regardless of what happens legally? Yeah. And I consider it a win. It's, you know, there are so many benefits to women in leadership and you all know that and that's why you're here. Are you, are you talking to other states by the way? Um, on similar, I know, California is not the only one, but similar initiatives. Yes. So there are a handful of other states that are doing or following suit or have done similar things. Um, and that's what's so great California where the fifth largest economy, soon to be the fourth largest economy and I'm just really proud of our um, leadership And you know, as California goes so I can go to the country and again, there are other states that are, are doing their part, but it's it's important for us to lead in California on these issues. Okay. Another question California specific, um, on reproductive rights. Um, California recently unveiled a $125 million reproductive health package and has the state has positioned itself um, as a, as a safe haven for women, um, from states where abortion has been banned, what can you share with us about what California is trying to do here and how it's Differentiated. So actually California has invested over $200 million dollars in reproductive health. There must have been some some more dollars since I last, um, so what what's important to know is that California is actually a pro life state where pro the entire life of a human being. And we invest we have universal uh T. K. We have universal school meals, free breakfast and lunch for all California kids. And one of my big in issues initiatives is farm to school, making sure that food is fresh, nutritious, delicious and locally sourced and on the scale towards regenerative if not already organic food. Um we you know, have huge literacy initiatives, were getting more nurses and mental health professionals into schools. Um we are pro LGBTQ rights, pro gun safety, have some of the strongest gun laws in the nation, some of the strongest equal pay laws in the nation. And again some of the strongest climate and environmental policy. So we are pro the entire life, the whole life of a human being, not just um at conception and and that's important to know right? Because we're seeing states across the country rolling back women's rights and basically um seeing women as second class citizens as less than as others as objects as to be controlled by the state legislatures and their governors. And it's very, very dangerous as we saw with the rollback of Roe V wade and the Dobbs decision earlier this year. Um so California again is the fifth largest economy and as a leader, you know, we have the largest population, let's not in the country. And the most diverse population, It's, we have to demonstrate leadership and that's what this is about. So part of our reproductive health care packages, making sure that we don't criminalize women for miscarriages on top of abortions, that we don't criminalize providers who are actually trying to protect women whether in state or out of state. So that there's a lot we're doing to basically show the world that we value women. We see women, we hear women and we're with them. And if they can't get care in their state, they're safe in California. Um, I think one thing that people do tend to agree on is that we all want our kids to be happy and healthy. It doesn't matter which side of the aisle you're, you are right. Um, and and some of your work is focused on this as well. Um, and the impact that media and tech that technology has on kids. Um, can you share a little bit about, um, some of the work you've done on social media anxiety disorder and what exactly what you're doing on this front, given your position? So I'm the mom of four young kids. My youngest is six have a nine year old, 11 year old and just turned 13 year old. And so this is very real and raw as it is for those of you who went through the past few years with your kids, maybe for the first time like mine being exposed to media and technology in ways they've never been exposed to before. Uh prior to the pandemic, we had a burgeoning mental health crisis right decade, a decade before with the advent of technology in the iphone, remember the supercomputer in the palm of your hand that was willing really just being given to kids. Um, as a way to stay in connection with their parents or as a gift, you know, um that mental health, you know, increases in depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, that was already happening. The pandemic obviously, you know, just pulled the curtain back on that and just it was boom, especially, you know, with what we've seen is anxiety skyrocketing, suicidal ideation and realization and um depression and you know, just it's been horrible. And and with girls in particular, L G B T Q youth girls of color, it's, you know, the numbers are extraordinary and very depressing. And so we've been, I did a listening tour during the pandemic and both in zoom and in person. And we found obviously that the burden right of all the care work of caring for Children is, you know, been on mom's shoulders predominantly. And so we've just tried to provide as much sort of education and support through my organization, California Partners project and through the first partners office to just put power back in parents hands and give them the tools and resources, but we know that we can't do it on our own. And so I'm so grateful because we through California partners project and um partnered with Buffy Wicks and the, and model new legislation privacy online privacy legislation for Children basically to protect them against, you know, the real addiction that and obviously all the privacy concerns um, and in a bill that was modeled after a U. K. Bill and so I'm really proud of where we are right now, it's just the first step but with this new legislation there changing the age of Children to 18, which should have been anyway for tech companies holding them accountable for also, you know, respecting the privacy and not collecting data that they then use against, that they can then use to exploit Children or harm them in ways um that for example, if a young kid is looking at something related to diets online, the tech company can no longer than just show them pictures of women in sexy women in bathing suits, right? Because that then can lead to more dangerous, um, self, you know, self harm etcetera. So here we are, you know, the reality is that Children do have these devices, but we're trying to slowly wake the companies up to the fact that they can't profit off of exploiting our kids any longer and I'm just, I'm proud of this. There's a lot more work to do and we're committed to, it definitely a lot more work to do. Um I want to just take a moment here um and address real quick um what some of us at least have read in the news this week that you're going to be testifying against Harvey Weinstein in the second trial here in in Los Angeles. Um I understand of course that it's an incredibly difficult time for you. Um you've asked for privacy and you also can't comment on anything because it's an upcoming trial. So I want to respect that. Um but I also want to ask you our theme this year is realizing your power. A lot of the conversations have centered around that and I want to know what is realizing your power means for you. I think I first discovered my power when I made my documentary misrepresentation. Um we premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and sold to Oprah Winfrey Network in 2011. I remember standing in the audience at Sundance up to standing room only sold out audiences. Uh and a friend of a friend in the audience said, so what did you discover making this film? And I said, I found my voice and I hear I was, you know, I was I just had my first child, I was pregnant with my second and I sort of welled up and I was like, oh my God, I have my voice. Um and that's so realizing your power is discovering your voice. And one of the reasons I gave myself the title First Partner and obviously with the administration, my husband's, you know, agreement and support that. That was kind of cool instead of first lady is because really if you if you those of you who've gotten to know first ladies or politicians, there's always someone behind the scenes who's allowing that person to do their job, who's taking care of everything so that they can be the best version of themselves in the public world. And that also is there thought partner that's the person that they, you know, the last person I talked to at night and the first person I talked to in the morning and that role has been rendered invisible just like we render invisible women's work in our society, right? All of the care work in the domestic work that we all do. Um, so first partner to me, yes, it was about the fact that we have an L G B T. Q. Governor will have a female governor someday in California. But it was also about partnership, the invisible work that women shoulder and outing that right? And then also just signaling to the world like this is about partnership. The only way we're gonna solve these tremendous problems that we have, especially in California where the richest and the poorest country in the nation where the most populous. Again we're the fifth largest, almost fourth largest economy is through partnerships. So I wanted to signal that not just to the administration, not just the cabinet and all the agencies. Uh, but to the private sector and to the nonprofit and, and you know, CBOs and what have you to show that we're gonna get through this, we'll get through it together and we're going to do it in partnership. So you've, you've had uh, other opportunities to find your voice and misrepresentation. Fair play came out earlier this summer. What's, what's next for you? So, well, I do recommend you all watch fair play if you haven't and watch it with your partner. Um, it's an important film that I think is funny too. It's not some of my films are kind of heavy and it's really funny and it will move you and it will move your partner at home. Um, if you have one. And if not, it will help you recognize, um, what to look for, what's good and all the, all the ways that we can sort of address this invisible work that again we have historically shouldered. But what's next? I'm gonna make misrepresentation to and kind of dive deeper and dig deeper into the impacts of social media and our young girls. Um, and I am going to do a film connecting to the environment and the feminine and care. And I have actually a slate of films that I want to make. But uh, you know, it's, I've got, there's a lot going on. There's a lot going on in California and it's, it's fun. It's invigorating. And I'm just trying to do my part and moving the needle forward and leaving our world in a better place than we found it. Well, jennifer, thank you so much for coming and joining us and sharing your voice with us today. Thank you. Thanks for having you. Thank you.

Carol Juel, Chief Technology and Operating Officer, Synchrony 
Reshma Saujani, Founder, Girls Who Code; Founder and CEO, The Marshall Plan for Moms; Author, Pay Up
Moderator: Ruth Umoh, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Finishing the Fight For Women’s Equality

Carol Juel, Chief Technology and Operating Officer, Synchrony 
Reshma Saujani, Founder, Girls Who Code; Founder and CEO, The Marshall Plan for Moms

Finishing the Fight For Women’s Equality

we are a room full of smart, powerful driven women and it's likely we've all we've all experienced professional challenges specific to us as women. Uh the pandemic brought the reality of workplace inequities for women to like like never before, especially when it comes to working moms. So many were forced to choose between their jobs and their roles as primary caregivers at home. Our next two guests are vocal advocates for women in the workplace and are dedicated to advancing equitable workplaces through a number of initiatives and actions. Carol Jewel is chief technology and operating officer at Synchrony and johnny is founder of Girls who code founder and ceo of the marshall plan for moms, author of Pay up and we're grateful to have her as M. P. W. Summit guest co chair this year. They they joined fortunes ruth uh um oh for a conversation on the future of the working world for women, please welcome all three to the stage. Good afternoon everyone. The final day we made it to the end. Let's jump right in the last few years have shown us that many workplaces are not working for american moms and they are voting with their feet leaving the workforce syndromes and we've seen the labor force participation. I want to do a quick pulse check with the audience, raise your hand if you know someone or you yourself have either left a job or left the workforce entirely due to caregiving responsibilities, raise your hand. That's a that's a good number of people, which is pretty telling. So that brings us to the conversation at hand today. One of the unique challenges that you all are seeing as it relates to women's workforce participation carol. Perhaps you can take this one off. Sure, thank you. I think um throughout this conference we've heard the statistics, you know, there's still one million women not in the workforce that were there before the pandemic began. And I think one of the key components of that is child care. Child care is a business issue and child care is something that we need to address to get those women back into the workforce. And in order to do that, you need to think of it as a business priority. It needs to be something that's front and center of your executive team and you need to find innovative ways to do that. And let me just share a little bit at synchrony as many companies through the pandemic. We did a lot of listening, you know, you're listening to your employees, you were understanding what's happening, you were trying to develop solutions that work for them and you need to apply innovative principles, just like any other business problem. You know when you're building products or you're building technology in synchrony, we use an agile process, we are constantly listening, adapting, developing a minimum viable product. You need to do the same thing for employees solutions, partnering with your HR teams, getting the support of your Ceo as we did and some of the things we did. We tested and we learned and they didn't always work, but they were impactful to our employees because they met the needs that they were having. One of the things that we did was really taking the friction out of child care. We have emergency childcare benefit that nobody was using, it was too hard during the pandemic, all the childcare centers were closed. So what did we do? We took the friction out of the process, just like you would take the friction out of the business process. You could actually as an employee take and use your benefits with anybody in your bubble. We heard that moms wanted safety. There were only a few people that were in their home so they could use that emergency backup child care to support their needs for their Children and hire someone that they were comfortable with and that is a benefit we've kept in place and it is 60 days a year and up to this point in 2022, we've already seen over 4000 days of emergency backup chair and what that does is that employees the opportunity to be productive that gives them an opportunity to do their job and not worry about their Children question, a similar question for you because you argue that we need to redefine the workplace completely overhaul current systems and create new ones that work for women. How do we do that? Where do we begin? Yeah, I mean, I think that we have to begin by supporting moms in the workplace and kind of redefining what we've been telling people, you know, for the past 30 years of what it takes to, you know, be sitting in this in this conference room, you know, I think for far too long we've been telling women to, you know, lean in real hard and girl bust your way at the top and if you color code, your calendar, you two can come to the most powerful women's conference. And that is simply just not the truth. And I know for me, I learned that in the pandemic, the hard way I found myself running girls in code, you know, one of the largest women and girls nonprofits in the world. I had just had a newborn baby, I was virtually homeschooling my kindergartner and trying to save my nonprofit and it nearly broke me and I learned the hard way that you know, having it all is just a euphemism for doing it all and for far too long, we've been trying to fix women. I. E just do a power pose, be a little more ambitious, leaning a little harder instead of trying to fix the structure. And so you know, now is our opportunity to like I said, you know, finish this fight for equality once and for all by fixing the structure. So what does that mean? I think, you know, carol and I are are incredible partners on, you know, the first thing is child care as as, as carol mentioned, you know, the second thing is, you know, making childcare affordable. The largest cost center for families is childcare. People pay more for their child care than they pay for their mortgage. It's the number one reason why 11 million women left the workforce because childcare was unavailable and unaffordable. The second thing is we have to have gender neutral paid leave policies. You know, uh 90% of women basically go back to work 10 days after having a baby, you're still an adult diaper and you're going back to work every single one of us raise your hand if you went back to work too soon after having a child and we never recovered from that. You know, The third thing is is, you know, the motherhood penalty. You know, we talk a lot about the gender pay gap. The gender pay gap is not a gender pay gap is a motherhood gap. The reason why we have a pay gap is because we pay mom's less and we pay dad's more. 58 cents on every dollar. And so that to me is like an algorithm solution that my girls who code console for you right in a minute, like so to me it's about focusing on these three structural um change corporate policy changes that we have to make and I think when we do that, we'll start to move towards equality, focusing on the system itself. Uh we hear that women are burnt out that they want increased work life balance. A phrase that I personally hate. I think it's far too amorphous. I I prefer work life integration. What does that look like though in terms of concrete policies? So I think It is for the workplace has changed forever through the pandemic and we firmly believe that it's not going back and flexibility is key, flexibility and choice. We surveyed our employees again, we did a lot of listening, 85% of our employees asked for flexibility and 93% of our caregivers say flexibility is critically important to them doing their jobs. And so we have leaned in and allowed employees to decide what they want to do. How often they might want to come into the office or never come into the office and then really being very specific around. When do we get together? When do we gather, What are the purposeful ways that teams need to connect and how do we balance? The need for business needs flexibility. And as my ceo says it's the grand experiment but it is working, it is working in our retention rates Are well above industry average and we have seen in the last year a 30% increase in our applicant pool in our business. So flexibility is a currency, it is in my view it is table stakes for businesses to understand to support their employees and then figure out how their company needs to involve evolve in order to deliver on that promise. Yeah, I mean, absolutely. We know that like even as we're having this conversation around hybrid work is that women need flexibility. You know, I think about myself, you know, it took me 10 years before I had my babies. You know, had so many fertility challenges. But when I had them, I saw them for an hour a day. And you know what so many women need essentially is the permission to kind of create their own schedule. And I think we're having this conversation around remote work acting as if it's a black or white issue and that we can't just redesign workplaces to make them finally work for women. I mean, think about it everything about workplaces, Why are we, why do we work 9 to 5 and school days are 8 30 to 3. You know, why is it so damn cold in those offices? Right. Like everything about the way workplaces have been built, they've been built without us. And I mean, we've talked about this. I think you always build towards the most vulnerable. That's how I built girls who code and went to refugee camps and underserved communities. And if I can teach a girl without wifi without a device, I can teach anybody if we built workplaces for single moms, single women of color. Remember black women, 90% of black women are the single caregiver and the single, you know um income, the person who's bringing in the income in the house. So we should be making workplaces work for her and when they work for her they will work for everybody. But instead we're basically building workplaces for the most privileged just to add on to them. You know, the majority of our our workforce is women and hourly workers and so understanding what the current challenges have created for that demographic and helping to build the policies. And then I think the key component to what Russia is saying is we as business leaders need to connect and share those, a big shout out to everyone in this room. If you do not know what the national Business Coalition for Child Care is, please log on to the marshall plan for moms page, learn it, understand and figure out how you can bring it back to your office, how you can bring it back to your leadership team to engage in the conversation of what we need to do to support the women in the workforce. What's interesting about the both of you, we have a mult founder, we have a Chief tech officer, neither of you are in talent or people operations related roles and you both argue that we need to look at this as through the same lens as we look at other business solutions and business Operations walk us through that framework and I mean absolutely, I mean carol see carol and increase funded the national Business Coalition for Child care because childcare is an economic issue, not a personal problems. Right? And so I think we both see this, you know, from a talent perspective and from a business perspective and that we have to start creating models where we're talking this is an economic issue, not a personal issue for far too long. Child care, like your personal problem that you have to go solve. But the number one reason why we know that we're seeing women leave the workforce, 50% of women in tech leave by the time the 35 when they're 35 to become a mom. So it's so clear, right that if we can actually solve for child care, you know, we can basically solve, you know for for the talent issues that we're facing in terms of women leaving the workforce or downshifting their careers. And that is a bit business imperative. And I think again, going back to the National Business Coalition for Child Care, I mean the government is not fixing this problem. We've seen this in terms of them not passing build back better. And so who is left to basically solve that? It's the corporate sector. It's the private sector. I mean, and again with girls who code, I mean we've taught 500,000 girls who code reached half a billion people, I raised $100 million from the private sector. The private sector help me teach more girls than any other school district and it's the same thing that we're doing here with child care. We in this room are going to solve the childcare crisis in America. We are the private sector is because it matters to us in terms of our talent, our business in the bottom line, the retention aspect of it is key. I mean it is not, it is not lost on any leadership leader in my organization that this is, it is a business crisis. If we are not addressing this, we will have problems attracting and retaining talent and that ultimately goes to the bottom line. So this is a business priority. You can offer all of these programs and all of these offerings for women but you can't force them to make use of it. I mean for instance I'm thinking of you know lactation rooms and women fearful to walk in there and and breast so how do you get them to actually take advantage of it? I think the key is I mentioned earlier, I know it sounds overstated, listening like what however you do that in your company. Is it round tables is a full service. It's really important. I'll give you an example. One of the things we leaned into was well being so we sponsored on our staff well being coaches for, through the pandemic and continuing and we will into the future. But we listened and we said, oh my gosh, wait a minute. We didn't hit the mark on that because our employees were telling us those well being coaches didn't actually didn't feel like connected with them because we did not have a diverse set of well being coaches. So that was an active listening session to say, how is this working again? That idea of an agile process, a minimum viable product, get your employee feedback, iterate the process and make it better. And I'm telling you when you listen to your employees and you act on it, that is a magical thing because they say, wait a minute, they're actually listening to what I'm saying. They're responding to my need in that network effect is what will get people to adopt these programs because that one thing and we're almost out of time. But I also think it's about culture change. We have to stop hiding our motherhood. Look most of us when we became mom. So please don't tell anybody right, because we knew that it was going to shift how much we made, whether we were taken seriously how we're seeing. And so we are at a moment where I know carol and I the first thing when you ask, well, what do you do? I'm a mom before I am the ceo of anything before I'm the leader of anything. We have to lean in to our motherhood, respected value and dignified the reason why we're the only industrialized nation that doesn't have paid leave. The reason why we don't have affordable child care is because we still live in a culture where we're told to hide our motherhood and we have to change that. Absolutely. I do. We're out of time, but I do want to underscore the fact that women want to work. They want to return to the workforce, they just don't want to return to the workplace structure that they left. And so we have to make them worth returning to thank you both for such an insightful conversation.

Katie Porter, U.S. Representative, The 45th District of California
Interviewer: Beth Kowitt, Fortune

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Challenging Corporate Accountability, One Whiteboard At A Time

Challenging Corporate Accountability

So instead of the index cards, I thought about bringing a white board to help introduce our next conversation, but I cannot compete with our next speaker because no one uses the white word quite like her. Um Congresswoman Katie Porter represents the 45th district of California, which is not that far from where we are now. She is known for her straight talk, matter of fact, direct line of questioning while grilling witnesses including C. E. O. S. In congressional hearings. She is a former law professor and single mom whose style, substance and stance on the issues has helped shoot her to political prominence in just a few short years after she took her congressional seat in 2019. Uh Congresswoman Porter is facing reelection next month and we're so grateful that she made the time to join my colleague Beth Cohen today to talk about what lies ahead. Please join me in welcoming congresswoman Porter and best to the stage. Welcome congresswoman. We're so thrilled to have you with us. Thank you. Uh Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're in the middle of a busy re election campaign season. So thank you for making the time I want to start on the single mom piece, which um, Maria mentioned because there are so few of you in congress. Why is that? And why does that? Yes. Okay. One, there were two, but the other one got engaged. Okay. To a rich guy wasn't that bad looking really when I checked why why is it the problem? And why does it, how can we, how can it change? Yes. So I mean, congress responds to the problems that they see and they can't see and do anything about things that they don't know about. So this gives way to what I call on Congress. Did. You know? So you're standing on the house floor, There's a lot of pushing and shoving. It's kind of like a bad cocktail party vibe where everyone's trying to get to the bar, except the bar is just the ability to vote right? And people will come up and say, did you know that childcare across more than college? Yes, Yes. Did you know that bacon is $8 a pound? Yes. Right. And but these people have just discovered these problems that I encounter, like every minute of every day, just because of who I am and the life that I lead. And so, you know, the, the gap, the more we can close the gap between Congress knowing what's going on. Um, and what's really going on, the more we can close that, that really helps us spring into action faster. And this was a huge problem during the pandemic. I remember saying to my staff, you know, a month, maybe two weeks even after the California closed down after schools were closed. This is gonna be a huge problem. We need to do something about this. This is gonna cause parents to leave the workforce, especially women, especially parents of younger Children. And we produced a staff report a month later describing this phenomenon. And it took like a year for people to be like, wow, you know, it's hard out there as a mom. And I was like, right, so I do think that representation matters. I think we have a lot of diversity in our Congress. It has improved a lot. But when it comes to there are still pockets where we don't have the diversity, We don't have the generational diversity that we need, we need more younger voices, more early career voices. Um, and we need that in the demo party by the way more so even than the Republican party actually, I think when I got to Congress, I thought republicans were the party of the um old rich white man. And it turns out to be only the white man part is correct. Democrats actually have a big problem with economic diversity. Um, and with age diversity and gender racial diversity just as much as republicans. So I think you can't solve what you can't see and our lives and that kind of lived experience is incredibly important to how we identify problems and how we think about what will actually work to solve them. So I've heard you say sometimes if Congress had a motto, it would be solving yesterday's problems tomorrow. Maybe that's the vibe that that vibe. What's it like to be part of an institution that you're so skeptical of. Yeah, I mean, I think that part of my duty as a member of Congress is to look at the institution. Um, and to step back from the policy making of the moment or the controversy of the moment or even the people in the moment and kind of say, what's happening in this institution, what's, what's working and what's not working. And I'll give you a good example of this. Um, we have no committee that is squarely dedicated to technology that's scattered among about three or four different committees, even as it has been the dominant force reshaping our society and our economy now for like 40 years. Right? So our committee structure reflects sort of the 19 hundreds. Right? And so that kind of rethinking of the inside, we didn't make any use of remote work capacity until the pandemic. There is still a vibrant informal flip phone caucus in Congress. Um, and you have not heard of the flip phone caucus, Let me tell you. There's uh, you know, we get on these zooms and I can guarantee you, I just count the seconds. 32. Can you hear me now? Yes, because you're a muted, we can hear you now. So I think one of the things that frustrates me is not that people don't have the familiarity. Lots of us in America for lots of different reasons, including opportunity and education may not have technology skills. It's the lack of a growth mindset. Um, it's that the way it's always been isn't necessarily the way it should always be. And I think that doesn't mean that I'm um that means that I'm pro the institution, like I believe in it. And so I feel like I have a duty to try to make it better and to fix it. And that's the kind of leadership that I want at businesses that I invest in, that I want it nonprofits that I donate to. Why wouldn't I want that kind of mindset in my government too? Yeah, thank you. So, being a single mom I know has also went a real urgency to your time in Congress. You have not been willing to wait around, you know, the 15 years or whatever to gain power within your party. How how's that going over? It's going, I mean, look, I think we have to rethink how we create opportunity in Congress and I think that the seniority system that the Democrats employee Republicans don't employ that system, they have a different system. Um they have term limits. So you do three terms, six years and a leadership position and then you rotate out. Um and they have much more of a culture of kind of contested elections. We have a much more deferential culture to our senior leaders and I value our senior leaders a great deal. I could go on and on. I won't about some of them and how much they've meant to me, we need to find ways to create diverse leadership and that means multi generational leadership. So how can we create roles and spaces for those senior leaders to still teach us to still guide us because they have wisdom and they have knowledge and they have experience that we need to learn from. But we also need to give rise to new voices. Um, and we can't treat people who want to add their voice to the leadership of our country as a problem. We have to say, this is wonderful that you two are speaking up that you two want to lead. We should be creating and cultivating that culture of leadership. Um, and the other thing about Congress is we should have a lot more professional development because we have like none. I mean, what I learned that congressional orientation could fit on a three by five card and had an awful lot to do with the fact that you're not allowed to wear your raincoat onto the floor of Congress because it's a very stern lady who will chase you down. Um, very little about how actually to do the job, very little sharing of best practices, very little opportunity to think about technology and innovate. So I think we need to innovate. And here's something I often say to my constituents, you know, I say it's been tough being in Congress, you know, because I was a law professor was considered a good job, people thought I was learned and right, and now I have the same popularity as the american cockroach. I'm not kidding. They've done polls. Congress people and cockroaches have the same level of approval. That's a real poll. And when you say that in Washington, you often hear back, well, of course, you know, what do you expect? People don't like republicans know they don't like any of us and we have to start with that. We can't look away from that. We can't pretend that isn't there. We have to look squarely at that and say, why, why do people not trust us? Why do they not approve of us? Because only when we look at that, honestly, can we start to fix it? Right. Right. I want to make sure we allow a lot of time for questions. But before I do, I'm gonna ask one more and midterms are coming up. There's been a lot of discussion about how the overturning of roe will galvanize women to come out and vote. Do you think that's gonna happen? I am not sure. And let me say why. Um, I think that one of the things that happened when row, when Hobbs was decided when Dobbs was decided, was that the narrative was sort of like abortion thrown to the states and we live in such a polarized environment where state laws so different, um that people are like, well, I'm in California. So like, I'm good, you know I've got Gavin Newsom, he's got hair gel. I can have an abortion if I need one. Right? And Gavin is doing the Lord's work. I mean, he's really doing an amazing job protecting people's rights to health care. But if Congress becomes republican controlled, they will pass a nationwide abortion ban President biden. I believe vito that, but in two years we don't know who's going to control the White House. And so there's nothing that states can do what God's really stands for is that abortion is up to all of us That right, that freedom, whether we enjoy it or we don't is up to every single voter. So when people say to me, what can we do? Like the Supreme Court took all the power away from us? I say it's the opposite. The Supreme Court gave all the power to all of us as voters. And that's what we feel terrified about, right, because it's on us to decide if this if this right is going to continue to be a right of this freedom um if this issue of equality is going to matter. So I would just really encourage everyone to make sure that people understand it is absolutely on the ballot in november, whether there's a referendum or the whenever the candidate's position are this is what republicans have said they're going to do and we should believe them. Okay, do you do you have any questions in the audience? You have one right up in the front if you could wait for the mic. Sorry, it's coming. Right, sorry. And if you could tell us who you are too sure, thank you. I'm Suzy Crampton with First Republic Bank and I don't know whether I'm naively optimistic or just naive. Um, but it feels to me oftentimes like there's so much still in the middle ground that maybe 80% of americans can really, you know, gather around and we spend so much of our time in the sort of 20% where we're polarized in opposite. And I'm just curious from your perspective, you know, do you think that there is still a common middle ground that most of us can get behind and for those of us that might be eager to say, hey, let's focus on the things we can agree with and make some progress there. You know, what advice do you have for us? I mean, is it a third party? I mean, what what is it that it might take to get us there? Yeah. So there absolutely is a lot of common ground among the american people tons on things including the right to an abortion, on gun safety, gun violence protection measures, on banning Congress from trading stocks. For example, there's tons of issues I could go on and on what there's not very much common ground amongst the people who are sent to Washington. And that problem has gotten markedly worse. Even in the four years I've been in Washington and I fear it's going to get even worse going forward. So, when we talk about gerrymandering, we often think about it about people having their vote taken away, not being able to elect a candidate of choice. And that's true. But what gerrymandering really does at this sort of institutional level is produce a much more polarized institution. So when you pack republicans often wider wealthier or whatever the demographic is into one district and you pack other people into another, what you end up doing is electing a very, very strong, progressive liberal and a very strong conservative republican. And then the common ground disappears. And so I think we have fewer and fewer battleground states. We have fewer and fewer battleground district. I represent a battleground district. My district equal numbers of democrats and republicans, and I wouldn't trade that for anything now. It's not easy, especially not easy at points like this in the election cycle, but I'm a better representative because I have to listen to learn from and talk with people who think differently than me. But those are those districts are spinning and there's fewer of them. And that I think are politics in Washington reflects that structural problem. But I don't think it's a problem among the american people. It's there, don't get me wrong. But I think it's it's more extreme. What you see in Washington is more extreme than what you see on the ground amongst the american people in terms of middle ground question, thank you. We have one in the back here, if you can wait for the mic. Hi, I'm Tracy Laney with levi Strauss. So I live up north in the state. Um I we heard from Representative Cheney yesterday about the work of the january 6th commission and obviously you were there on january 6th and we're under personal attack. And what I'm worried about these days heading into the midterms is not just, you know, kind of women coming out and allies to women coming out and supportive, you know, making sure we protect our bodies and our health. I'm actually worried that a lot of americans don't understand the existential threat to democracy that we have, especially with all the election deniers on the ballot. So I'd love to get your perspective, especially since you do sit in a diverse, politically diverse district on that particular issue. Yeah, So look, I think we have to be very clear about this. And I when I do canvas training to go out and knock doors, which I hope you all will knock doors wherever you are, please please find a race, whatever your politics are. Um, please knock doors because it will make you a better leader and a better american. Um, but when I knock doors, I always, I do canvas training for people for volunteers who are gonna knock doors and I always teach them one of my sayings on my whiteboard is knock loud. Be proud because I get people who go knock and they're like, and then they run away before anyone can come to the door, you know what I mean? It's like a stealth, ding dong ditch. I'm like, so what I always tell them is if your neighbor's house was on fire or there was a risk of a hurricane and you needed to evacuate, how would you knock on your neighbor's door loud? Because you want them to come, you'd want them to know what democracy is on fire. It is at risk of burning down the institutions that have upheld this country and frankly helped spread to democracy and human rights throughout the world are at risk. So Mac loud because because we are that kind of risk. I do think we see a strong correlation between education and kind of the way people think about the sort of institutional risk that we see versus kind of particular issues. So I'm very fortunate I represent a very well educated district. So I've had a lot of republicans come up to me, they've been like, you know, I'm not voting for a single democrat except you and you think like I'm so great and then they say, I don't even like you lady, it's just that I'm not sending anyone to Washington who will ever attack our capital and our democracy and our election system ever again, right? And many of them are veterans who fought and died for that. So I think there is some awareness, But I think frankly for younger people they have lived through so many attacks on democracy in their lives these are voters whose first memory maybe was hanging chads in florida and it's only gotten worse from there. So it's not that young people are disengaged that they're disillusioned. Um And how we get them back into the fold and turning out is something that I spend every day working on and trying to do because I think they some of them feel like it's already gone. Democracy has already lost. Um and I think we have to we have to show them that isn't the case. And I think the January six Commission on that accountability work is an important part of that. Okay very quickly you're up for tough tough election cycle for you. Um how high do your emissions go beyond the house? Oh I mean today they went to getting here on time. Like I mean my son called me, I was like half an hour later he called me and he's like mom I forgot my I. D. From my P. S. A. T. Can you drive it to school? I was like oh so that's what you know being one of fortune's powerful women looks like just making sure you get that I. D. To the high school on time. Um So I don't know I mean I think I will say this I try not to foreclose opportunity to to myself because I have found in my life um particular as a woman, as someone who grew up in a rural area. Um as someone who's not a person of wealth, like some doors get closed in my face, so I'm not gonna go pull any other ones closed, right? So you know, one of the best pieces of advice I ever got is that doors will be closed in your life and but others will open and your job is just to see them. You don't have to walk through every door, but you have to be open to seeing them. So I think about trying to make sure I can win this election and then I'm gonna stand there and take a look at the next doors and and think about what might come next. But I loved serving. Um I've loved getting a chance to learn more about this country and what makes it viable and strong and healthy and I want to keep doing that work for the rest of my career, whether it's an elected office or whether it's in some other kind of public service congressman. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you

Fidji Simo, Chief Executive Officer, Instacart
Interviewer: Maria Aspan, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Transformation On Demand: How Instacart’s New CEO Delivers

Transformation On Demand: How Instacart’s New CEO Delivers

we are moving along. Did you know you can have singer actress and entrepreneur Siara help with your grocery shopping. You really can Instacart. Users can look at cr's grocery list on the shopping and delivery app and use it for inspiration to buy products. It's just one of the company's efforts to broaden its offerings under Fiji CMO who became Instacart chief executive officer a year ago. Since then. She's expanded Instacart technology options, deepened its partnerships with retailers and signed up celebrities to help add some glamour and glitz to your grocery shopping. And in May Instacart filed confidentially for an I. P. O. It's not that confidential anymore. I guess it's a complicated time for tech startups to try to go public of course. But Fiji, a tech industry vet who previously ran facebook's flagship flagship app is used to leading through all sorts of challenges. She joins us today for a conversation with Maria Aspen about her vision for Instacart making moving from a tech behemoth to a startup and much more. Please welcome Fiji and Maria to the stage. Good morning C. G. Thank you so much for joining us. Thanks for having me. Hi everyone. It is really exciting to be sitting up here with you because um, just a little over a year ago we were sitting down at your house to talk about the new job you were taking on. Um, after many years at facebook and being a very senior executive there, you decided to jump to be Ceo of a smaller company, a big but still smaller startup and it's been an eventful year, both internally and externally for the company. How do you feel about your past year, your first year on the job as ceo Yeah, it's certainly been a full year I would say you know the thing that has been truly amazing is uh the fact that a big part of why I made the jump was this idea that I could take all of the skills I have developed that facebook, the operational rigor of the long term thinking and really apply it to a company I was passionate about and drive my own vision and so Over the last year I have really focused on getting our company to really look to the future and really focus on this big vision that we have of changing this industry which is a $1 trillion dollar industry grocery and enabled through technology and it's been so rewarding to start seeing after a year of the fruits of that, of that new vision really coming to life and uh and really helping people life. You know I was having a lot of conversation over dinner last night and I think that really showed me the most was a group of women saying that they were discussing what helps them be super women and they said like insta call really helps us like get our groceries and even save time and like even when they're traveling, make sure that the kids have what they need and they develop to their home and so we have a real impact on people's lives and that's been the most rewarding part of the job. I wonder if you could dive a little bit more into the some of the business decisions you've made because you've signed up Siara lizzo um you know Instacart developed um reputation during the pandemic as like groceries on demand, but you've done a lot of enterprise facing work to sort of diversify the revenue stream and I wonder if you could talk about how you think about you know, the less sexy side of building up a startup. Yeah, absolutely. So to me what I saw when I took on the job was not just a grocery delivery company, what I saw was this massive industry in the midst of the digital transformation and all of these actors, like mainly incumbent grocers really not adding the technology that they needed to embrace consumer needs which were you know, ever changing. And I saw insta got as the company that had the opportunity to be the technology backbone for that entire industry. And so a lot of what we've developed is not just you know, our own instagram app even so that's important but also building all of these capabilities for grocers on their own properties that should go to Kroger dot com, you can use our technology to go to public dot com. We actually built that entirely commerce experience, et cetera. And so so um that has been very much an expansion of the initial vision. And then the next step for us is doing the same thing inside the stores because the stores of the future are not what were you know experiencing right now. They're going to be much more personalized, much more immersive. And people are going to come to expect of the physical store, a lot of the personalization and immersive nous and information and inspiration that they get online. And so we're building now technologies for the store like smart cards like, you know, immersive, you know mobile app technology that you can use inside the store uh to make people's lives easier easier, both online and offline. It's been a difficult year in terms of external challenges. One of the things you did was write down Instacart valuation after investors had done so um you filed confidentially for an I. P. O. In May and not really a great time for company to go public. Um And you're not, can you tell us anything about the I. P. O. Sadly you know more in the quiet period says yes he wouldn't be very happy with me if I did have. But the bigger question is how do you how do you think about achieving a goal or changing a goal when there are these massive macroeconomic factors you can't control. Yeah I think um you you know the thing that uh the hardest to do as a leader is to really figure out what is in your control and what isn't and you know if the markets are going to do what the markets are going to do, I don't get to control that but I do get to control like the execution and the vision and how we're making progress towards that. And so the last year has been really about focusing the teams on the values that we can create increasing that value for farmers and for ourselves and even resetting our values like one of the core values that I carry deeply about this value that's called growth apply mostly because we like our food funds but also because in times like these where things are tough, you know the market stuff, people tend to go to scarcity and they tend to feel like you know you can only win if someone else's lose and we really what we're trying to do on instagram is do things that are better for the whole ecosystem, lift up our retailers, lift up our CPG partners, lift up our consumers, lift up our shoppers. And and I really believe that in times like these where things are hard, you can actually with the right values really thrive in the future. And if you keep your eyes really on the ball of delivering value for an entire ecosystem, another external factor yesterday the biden administration announced a proposal that would reclassify contract workers like you have an Instacart as employees and we saw shares of your public competitors kind of tank on the news. How do you think about this? What's this gonna do to Instacart business? Yeah, so the specific role is really guidance on, you know, what qualifies as an independent contractor, uh, Employees. So it doesn't have a very direct immediate impact on our business. But I think it sets kind of the question of uh, this type of work in the future. And I think that's interesting that when you think about personal shopper people will go pick items in the store on the art of customers. Um, about 70% of them are women and 50% of them are months. And when I talk to them, they are telling us that what they really need is extreme flexibility. We have a lot of them that are caring for aging parents, caring for their Children. And so the idea that they can open up an app and go to work like for an hour or for three hours or on the weekend and really set that into their schedule is really like important value that we bring to these people and help them earn money and make ends meet. And so I, I'm hopeful that in the future we're going to find a policy framework that maintains the flexibility where we don't end up classifying independent contractors of full time employees because like, you know, 80% of them tell us that's absolutely not what they want are very happy with this flexibility, but also give them all of the protection that they rightfully deserve and I don't think it has to be either or, and so I'm optimistic that the longer and we're gonna figure this out. Are there any questions for Fiji? I know. Okay. Um over there where mike is coming to you and if you could tell us who you are. Hi, I'm Khadijah, I'm one of the veterans here. Um it's not really a question. I just wanted to thank you um during Covid um had a lot of family members and people that were sick and you know, being safe in san Diego. I was able to actually go and Instacart and send the groceries in their area and send them groceries and things that they needed. So you made it easier for someone like me that you know, my sisters in one state, families in other states, so thank you for that. You've shown that. So I appreciate it. Any other questions. Okay. Yes. Hi, my name is Sandy Carter and with unstoppable domains and so we do what? three and metaverse. I just saw the amazing metaverse that Walmart did do you guys have any similar plans to execute shopping in a virtual environment as well? Great question. Well, you know, I kind of, I was spent 10 years that matter. So people ask me a lot about the metaverse and I, I kind of make the joke that if I deliver potatoes and tomatoes in the metaverse, people are gonna go real hungry and so for now we're staying very much in the real world but to your point I think I think that goes to the point I was making on like shopping experiences of the future are gonna need to be a lot more in and an example of something that could be amazing is that people still tell us that they go to grocery stores to be inspired to discover new products, which is kind of interesting because you don't think of the grocery store is the most inspiring place and that means that there's still a lot of room to go to really inspire people around food products but in a cultural environment you could imagine a lot of really interactive experiences around food around discovery of new products, new recipes, classes, all of that being delivered in a way that you don't have to you know leave your house and you get products delivered at your door after having at this much more immersive experience with the products you love. So that's still a little bit further away. We're trying to enable really basic technology inside the store right now but I think it will be coming in the future and one in the back hi I'm laura Manson smith from korn Ferry and I love the organizational value of grow the pie because it's real talk, you know it's not just some kind of random words and one of our speakers yesterday talked about how she likes to see the value in the halls and not on the walls, which I thought was kind of neat. So I just wonder what are some examples of how you're bringing that value, grow the pie to life? It's a great question, a very good example is so I was talking about the fact that we build technology for own marketplace, but we take all of these technologies and we make them available to our grocery partners for their own website. And initially, you know, when, when we pushed on that people investors, everyone was kind of asking us, wait, that's going to take people away from the instagram app, you're taking your secret source and you're giving it to us partners and the reality is that, you know, it certainly helps the retailers a lot, but it helps us address the entire market as well. And so a lot of what I push the team to figure out is like what do retailers need and because in the future, if we actually address their needs and if you make their business better, when it's not about like, you know, making our bottom line better, it's about really growing their business ultimately will be able to find some value out of it. Uh, and that has been the case and maybe it's lagging maybe, you know, it takes a little bit more time to figure out how you're gonna benefit from it, but when you make an entire ecosystem better, you always find a way to, you know, bring that back some kind of value for yourself, but you need to start with value for the ecosystem first, not the value for yourself, if you really want to lift the entire industry, I want to end by switching gears a little bit because we have heard a lot on this stage, including in the last session about women's health and I know this is something that you have a lot of personal experience advocating for yourself and being public about some of your health struggles, but also your um you have a different hat on in the women's health area and I wish, I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about both your experience and how it shapes what you're doing today. So, you know, I three years ago I was diagnosed with a neuro immune condition. It's basically a condition at the intersection of the nervous system and the immune system and there's a lot of these conditions like 20 million Americans and that's even in the estimation of these types of conditions and when you look at the start, usually it's like 80% women. Uh and you know, I started asking the question to all of my doctors, like why is it primarily women? And you get a bunch of different like answers, oh, women's immune system is over reactive and we don't really know why. But mostly what you get is like, well, you know, we haven't really done to research to figure that out. Even though that seems kind of pretty fundamental. And so I I realized I realized that that needed to be solved. And so I found two incredible co founders, one fantastic your gastroenterologist, one scientist. And while building his clinic and research institutes around uranium conditions based in Utah. And the idea is to bring all of the specialties of medicine under one roof to treat the whole person. And that's really what I show we're missing the most in women's health. Where like it's funny because sometimes when I say we're doing something in women's health, people immediately assume its reproductive health. And you're like, no, you know, women have other organs like big news. And so and so it's been really interesting to like see, oh, these are conditions that primarily affect women that are not just Conditions. Uh and they are they are things that are really understood and studied. So we are opening all doors in Q1 of 2023. We are really excited about the progress that we can make in the space. And it actually ties into a lot of the things I'm doing at Instagram as well because I'm and I'm gonna have to stop you there. But I just want to say congratulations, thank you for joining us. Everyone

Sumbul Desai, Vice President, Health, Apple 
Michelle Williams, Dean of the Faculty, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health (joining remotely) 
Moderator: Michal Lev-Ram, FORTUNE 

Most Powerful Women 2022 - A New Era For Women’s Health

Sumbul Desai, Vice President, Health, Apple 
Michelle Williams, Dean of the Faculty, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

Now half of the global population is women. So why aren't women better represented and cared for in health and medicine? Perhaps because women's health has long been considered a niche market? Well, the good news is that seems to be changing and there's recognition that women's health is intrinsically different than men. And with this recognition comes opportunity. According to recent stats, us digital health startups, serving women raised nearly $1.5 billion in 37 deals in 2021, nearly doubling 2020 funding. So let's get more perspective from two women who are experts in this space. Some is Vice president of health at Apple and Michelle Williams is dean of faculty at Harvard's T. H. Chan School of Public Health. Dean Williams is joining us remotely today. Please welcome them for a conversation with my hologram. They're very dramatic entrance. Hi symbol. Hi, Michelle, thank you so much for joining us. Um Hi, hi, great to see you. Um I want to start with the good stuff. Okay, so I want to hear from both of you. What are the developments in the field of women's health that you are excited about today. And Michelle, Let's let's start with you. Sure. Let me also say hello to everyone in the audience and to symbols thank you. Um let me let's start with the good stuff. The good stuff is, you know someone who's been in women's health, reproductive health research in the academia space for close to 40 years. one The things that I point to is over the years since 19 the mid 1990s to the mid-2015 we have seen maternal mortality declined by about 44%. And that's really an important single indicator of the advances we've made. I'd also like to say though, that I look at that goodness with a little bit of concern that there are disparities by race and ethnicity. Let me stay with the good stuff. One of the things that I think about is we're having this conversation around women's health at a convention and a meeting like this that brings together leaders from all sectors, academic, public private sectors to talk about women's health. That for me is the change since the 1980s when win Health was in a shadow. The other thing I want to say is I am deeply, deeply excited to be on this stage with dr symbols aside because together we've been able to form a public private academic partnership called the Apple Women's Health Study which brings the best of technology, the best of advanced analytics and the voices of hundreds of thousands of women into the space of becoming their own a citizen scientists in understanding their own health through research and collaboration. Right, thank you. And we will definitely dive into the partnership a bit more but but symbol over over to you. What are you most excited about what's positive? Well, first of all, thanks for having me. Um just by virtue of you working on this amazing topic and empowering women's conversations. I I think that is also part of the good stuff. So thank you for that. And it's always an honor to work with Dean Williams. Um you know, Dean Williams touched on it. The fact that we're having this conversation around women's health is really, really important. Women's health isn't just about cycles. Those cycles are a critical part of it, It's your health, it's cardiovascular health, it's preventative health. It's all of the aspects that make health. And when we think about health, in terms of how we look at it, we want to empower all individuals and in this case women or those who menstruate to really be empowered with actual insights driven by science. And so the fact that we can partner with such an esteemed partner like Dean Williams and the Harvard T. H chan school of Public Health to be able to work on this important topic is really important. You know, the one thing that I just want to call out is um when you think about health as a physician, we think about our vital signs. We all know our vital signs are blood pressure. But women have this additional superpower which actually is our cycles and those who menstruate, have this additional piece of information that really provides insight into your overall health. And if you all recall whenever you go to the doctor, they will ask you when is the last time you menstruating and the reason that's really important is this additional signal can give you a sense of things are going well or if there's things that need to be potentially looked at. And so the idea to be able to take this area that's largely understudied and under invested in and focus on it um, and drive, you know, features hopefully that will help empower more women to understand this. More importantly, is something that we're really proud of. The last, I'll just say in terms of the good stuff is when you have a company like ours that's willing to actually, within the first few minutes of our keynote talk about cycles and menstruation and actually have features like this driven by women at Apple who actually, you know, advocated to drive this feature work forward is something that makes me really proud and love to see that on our teams. And the fact that we drove it together with um with the Apple women's health study team who is made up of a number of women who are very passionate about this space is something that we're incredibly proud of, so take a step back and explain to us how this partnership came to be and what it is exactly, symbol. Yes. So when we um we, you know, we had a set of women who are really excited about digging into this space and making an impact and the way we approach our work is really focused on starting with the science first and when we started digging in, what we learned is most of the science around understanding our cycles was done many years ago. So we reached out to a number of experts and obviously Dean Williams and her team are preeminent experts in this space where they really have spent time over the years looking into this space. And we started having a number of conversations and got really excited together about the idea of refreshing the science in the space, but actually bringing together biometric signals that are so kind of like your lifestyle. So how much you're moving what your heart heart health is really looking at this space holistically as opposed to just focusing on cycles. And um we started talking and realized that there was a real unique opportunity to study this. So we introduced the Apple women's health study along with the apple heart and move study and the apple hearing study as part of our research app where participants say Apple one more time, One more time. Um, Apple um and uh you're not gonna get me to stop saying that, but but over 420,000 participants actually are part of the study. And uh what you can do is basically, you know, Michelle said at night, we allow people to be citizen scientists and we think that's really important, especially after we've lived through the past few years where we've all been part of a large science study together. Um the ability to actually dig in and understand what those metrics mean. So just some quick highlights from it. one. we've we've learned that when you have symptoms around your cycles are not just the traditional things that we think about what your G. I. symptoms and cramps, things like chills before your cycles are very common. And the reason that's important is a lot of time those things get dismissed by doctors. So the idea to actually have some science to show that hey, these symptoms are common, really allow for individuals to come in and be empowered in their conversations with their physicians. So we think that's really important. And the second is um in this vein of bringing together different aspects of your health, like your heart health and your gynecological health pcos. Um in our study, 12% of our participants who had pcos had 1.5 times higher likelihood of having arrhythmia. Not something that we would normally see, but because we had this data coming in from multidisciplinary areas, we were able to kind of study that. So, just some examples. Great, Thank you, Michelle, I want to ask you, my daughters are in sex Ed. They've both gone through all the regular classes and like they're still, you know, I take a look at what they're doing and it's like all the words that we used to call a period and flow and like, all right. And I know you've done a lot of work on de stigmatizing menstrual cycles. Like why are we even still de stigmatizing it And and and tell us about your work. Yeah. You know, thank you. You know, I want to underscore something that doctors decide brought forward and that women's health is so much more than just reproductive health. And you know, one of the reasons um menstrual cycle was stigmatized, but there's just so much um taboo and stigma brought forward because of lack of knowledge, lack of capacity to talk about women's biology and a lot of that lead to gaps, gaps and knowledge gaps in understanding and gaps in our curriculum. Let me just ground this using some real historical timelines. It wasn't until 1994 I was a graduate student that the NIH in its revitalization act of NIH presented guidelines requiring the inclusion of women and minorities in federally funded studies. And it wasn't until 2014 that there were requirements for the inclusion of female animals and tissue for self culture studies to include women. So there's been a knowledge gap and that gap was filled with misinformation, disinformation and worse, just a complete silence and lack of understanding of women's biology and that can contribute to the stigma that we experience. But things are different today and things are different today because women lead scientific teams are filling in those gaps and young people coming to the field of public health and medicine are also including powerful tool technology to do the study that we're doing together with Apple but also to tell stories at very young ages. I have one of our principal scientists on the Apple Women's health study just collaborated with boston science Museum to create a video film for young girls to understand what menstruation menstrual cycle means. And if we can start early and be very holistic in explaining what women's health is and look at menstruation as a vital sign which it really is 1/5 vital sign. It can help people to see menstruation as a superpower. It is a signal of our capacity to reproduce. Um It is a signal of our health and wellness across the life course then we will move menstruation out of the shadows and in a place where it belongs which is a very important biological representation of women's physiology and function across the life cycle. Thank you. I love that menstruation is a superpower. Um I want to switch gears a little bit. Um You know you you mentioned some of the very late but the advances and guidelines for um for for making research for making studies um more inclusive but we also seem to be really good at taking steps back and we recently took quite a big one. Um You said Michelle just recently that in just seven days last june the U. S. Supreme Court setback public health by 50 years. Can you explain that to us and how and why we can look at this from a public health perspective. Sure. Sure. Thank you for that. I really mean that we have lost um we have lost a very important component in the in the in the in the healthcare toolkit for women and girls in this country. And when I say we've come gone back 50 years, there are, there's evidence that we are going to see upwards of 22% increase in maternal mortality because of lack of access or delayed utilization of reproductive health care. And that 22% is even is for the population as a whole. But For vulnerable populations, particularly African American women where they're already two fold increased risk of maternal mortality. We're going to see increases in mortality that will be reminiscent of where we were 50 years ago. But even worse than that. What this does is again puts women and girls in a very vulnerable situation where the loss of bodily autonomy will impact the course of their life, both biologically socially professionally. And so I think that we have to as a nation really reflect on what the doD act represents. And it does represent a loss of agency and a loss of opportunity to um provide a full available toolkit for women, reproductive health and health and wellness across the life course. So we we we have struggles ahead of us. We've made progress and this God act is threatening the progress that we've made, especially in women's health, it's not just about women's health either. Um Child and family health and wellness, economic resilience of families that are not ready for child rearing are also going to be put at risk and this will expand outward to communities. Thank you um symbol for for you for your work. Does this recent shift um represent any any challenges, any new opportunities, Does it change the way that you pursue what you're doing at Apple? You know when we think about one of the things that comes to light and it is with all of this is the importance of privacy and privacy is an area that we have always spent a lot of time focused on um and even more so in health we've always felt like your health information should be as protected for example as your financial information and it should have that level of protection. So in one sense, I think what it does is reinforce, it's an opportunity to reinforce our approach. Um you know, we often um get asked well why didn't you come out with certain features sooner? And the reality is a lot of times it's because of our attention to privacy that we think that doing and obtaining data the right way is more important than necessarily being first. It's really important to focus on privacy and when we think about privacy especially when it comes to health, we think about it as um the same privacy that you expect from your physician you should expect from your technology and our approach has been if for example for your health data and how we go about this is that if your health data is on your phone, which your health data is on your phone, if you use touch I. D. Pass code or face I. D. That data is encrypted on device locally and if you choose to sync with iCloud then with end to end transcription with a passcode, that data is encrypted. End to end an Apple does not have access to that data. And we also have gone to great lengths to really allow for the user to feel in control of their data. So we meticulously have created granular privacy controls by data elements. So you can choose if you want to share your data with someone, you can choose which elements you want to share and you can turn it on or turn it off it's completely in the user's control. But the net is we've worked really hard with all of this um with this approach and our approach to privacy with health data that Apple cannot have access to the data and that's something that we really hold true and something we've focused on a lot with with even Dean Williams and how we think about our broader work. So I know Apple has end to end encryption across the board including for for health data. Not all apps do. I'm sure you've both been asked this um in recent months, you know, I've definitely heard a lot of conversations and read a lot of articles. Should we delete are period tracking apps? What do you say to women who ask that today? I remind people of the the data security steps that we have put in place specifically for the study and specifically the steps that Apple has taken to really allow the optionality for encrypting that information so that it is really only accessible by the user and her delegates as she chooses. So I I we have been very mindful and thoughtful um and open to answering the questions by describing the ways to reduce the harm of mis use and disuse of the data and we've taken every step possible both in the research space, but also in the context of um users of the device is um to empower them and enable them to protect their data and to not destroy the capacity to have access to information that they are just beginning to be familiar with and are using to understand how to optimize their own personal performance and to understand their own biology. Okay, either or choice. Yeah. Yes, ideally for sure. Um symbol, just just real quick give us a little bit of of a preview of what's ahead for the partnership. What else do you want to, what other areas do you want to go into? Well through the study, we're really excited and digging into areas and and again this ties to our philosophy of grounding in the science. So we're hoping that science will take us in the direction of seeing more connections between other aspects of your health and your cycles. Um We also are very excited about digging in more in the science around Pcos that we've seen some early signals in the study from and um continue to look at all of the elements. I mean one of the biggest requests we get from users is menopause and you know, what can we learn there? Um because as women, I do think cycles are super power, but I also think that we take on additional um healthy variances and superpowers as we as we progress in life. And I think really just understanding that more, I mean I think our goal really is how do we empower people to have more information about their health? So they're they're in the driver's seat of their health and how do we help you do that with a scientifically validated way? I think that's so critical and something that we really are laser focused. Alright, well hopefully next year we will have you both back here and we'll talk about menopause next time. Talk about stigmatization that's definitely needed as well. Um Michelle, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for your very, very uh you know, uh what's the right word, like your your broadband is fantastic. So we appreciate it. You're fast speed broadband. It has worked fantastically and simple. Thank you so much for being here in person. I appreciate you. Thank you, Dean Williams. It was good seeing you.

Sara Nelson, International President, Association of Flight Attendants - CWA, AFL-CIO
Interviewer: Emma Hinchliffe, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Aiming For The Sky: Leading Societal Change

Aiming For The Sky: Leading Societal Change

just about all of us flew here to attend the summit and it's so great to be flying again. But as we're all aware flying these days it's not always as easy as it once was. There's still some challenges that remain after the upheaval caused by the pandemic. Perhaps no one feels those challenges as much as the flight attendants on board the planes under pressure like never before layoffs furloughs in the early days of the pandemic and then an uptick and threats from unruly passengers. Sara nelson is the international president of the largest flight attendants union, the A. F. A. She's a veteran flight attendant herself with 26 years in the sky and a vocal champion of workers rights. She's been called America's most powerful flight attendant and was instrumental in saving the airline industry from shutting down. In the early days of the covid crisis. Sarah joins us now for a conversation with fortune, senior writer and M. P. W. Senate co chair Emma Hinchliffe, please welcome them to the stage. Hey Sarah, good morning, Thank you everybody here. Yeah. So Sarah you run the largest flight attendants union in the country. You have 50,000 members were in a room full of ceo what are some misconceptions you think this room might have about modern day unions? Well I think first of all um unions were formed mostly in the 1930s after passing labor law and after a lot of upheaval, a lot of instability. Um corporations actually wanted that labor law at the time because there was so much instability and um so that was put into place that was eroded then with taft hartley. And um what I would say too though is that at the time there was also a lot of racism and sexism um woven into that labor law woven into the labor movement. There were unions who stood up against um racism, not against sexism. Um and um and and at the we're at the forefront of the civil rights movement, the march on Washington with Dr king was arm in arm with walter routers, president of the U. A. W. United Auto Workers. And um that was a march for jobs and freedom. And so unions were really about setting a standard in the country um which created really this this pact that if you did good work um and spend your life doing that, that you could have a living wage, you could have education for your Children, secure retirement and health care and that has really been eroded, productivity has been driven through the roof. People are very angry, they're having to work two and three jobs just to get by. Um I think the biggest misconception is that unions are going to be disruptive to the property when in fact, I have a lot of stories about unions making it possible for an industry to survive. Yeah. Well how so, I mean, it sounds like based on what I just said that might have happened in your own industry over the past two years. Yeah, so um we we worked really hard. Our union was never really taken seriously. My first day on the job, a flight attendant pulled me aside and she said, listen, management thinks of us as their wives or their mistresses, and in either case they hold us in contempt. Your only place of worth is with your fellow flying partners. And if we stick together, there's nothing we can't accomplish. And I have to say, as a union leader, that's when I really learned, um, that sexism was serious and existed and um, that women have to be in the room. And we fought every which way to do that. We had to fight back against all kinds of discrimination, stepping on a weight scale even until 1993 when I started, I was required to go to makeup class and we're two inch heels, you couldn't be married, uh, you couldn't, you couldn't weigh over £15 100 £15. Um, and you couldn't get pregnant, you couldn't have these jobs. So we had to fight through all that discrimination just to get to the bargaining table to try to then make a good career when the me Too movement broke. Um, it gave us an opportunity to push forward because we never expected that anyone would make any space for us. We always fought for that space, even taking on big tobacco and getting it out of our work space. Um, but we made the most of the moment. We called on the industry to denounce it sexist past, um, to lift up flight attendants, safety professionals, and to call out a zero tolerance policy against any sexual harassment or assault in our workplace. And that led. And still, we don't have a woman as a ceo in the airline industry, but we're getting there. Um But we but we used that standing then to be very clear about the government shutdown, that our workspace was increasingly unsafe. We worked With the industry to define the very real safety concerns, and we said that we were going to strike if that government shutdown continued. And it wasn't until we actually took that action that there was a resolution. Um, and the government was reopened. Um, people were safer getting their paychecks again. And that gave us the power then a year later, um the industry reached out to me when we were in crisis. Uh the airlines were together in a room talking about the fact that demand had dropped off 97%. Uh They're in their trade association, they're not really supposed to be talking about their businesses, but they're like, they finally, the silence broke and they realized, um the airlines were going to completely crumble go out of business. Um There was no way that cash heavy business, they would be able to even meet payroll, some of them within a couple of weeks. Um let alone a couple of months. And so they called me and we had a plan based on our experience from 9 11 and the crisis that happened then, um, and the insufficient response, frankly from the government. And, uh, we had a plan that was workers first, and I said to them, I said, listen, the public hates you, you are the example of inequality when people get on the planes and people are really mad about this. There's no way that you're going to get any money. But if we make this workers first, we get grants from the government to keep people and they're connected to their jobs, uh, connected to their paycheck, then that connected pensions, um, paying into the public, paying local taxes and continuing to provide service all over the country. Um, no furloughs, no cuts in pay, then we might be able to get somewhere. And they agreed that we hammered out the details that night, and we went arm in arm with the industry to get that. It was the only industry that received that kind of support and kept workers in place so that we could, I know there's been a lot of talk about the operational disruptions, but there's a lot of other reasons for that. The airline industry would never have been able to meet the demand that was needed, as people were coming back from covid and that would have crippled the rest of the economy. So very proud of that work that we did together, and that was only possible because there was that respect, that collective bargaining relationships between unions and management. Um and we used that respect on Capitol Hill to get something done in a political environment where people thought it was impossible to get any solutions. Thank you Sarah. Yeah. Um I'm guessing we might have some questions for Sarah. Still come to the audience in a second. So keep thinking. But you know right now, we're seeing a wave of unionization across industries, across companies that have not traditionally had unions. You're wearing a Starbucks workers United pin. We have amazon. What is your advice to corporate leaders who are seeing unions emerged at their companies? I mean the advice is not to fight them. There's a whole industry of union busters who would like to tell you that it's better to fight the unions and they're gonna take your money and leave your corporation in shambles because it is going to destroy morale, It's disrespect towards the workers. Um They have a playbook that is the same every single time. If you really wanted to bust unions, you can just pull it up on the internet, don't pay those guys $3500 a day. Um But my my suggestion is to actually um have a neutrality agreement, have some peace and uh in the um in in the workspace where people can make those decisions, they can make those decisions on their own, but you've got a set of rules about how those conversations are going to take place and where they can take place. Um So that it's not disruptive and then that collective bargaining relationship frank is really important. It's important for um tackling the issue of equal pay and equal rights and women who have the ability to join together in their unions. They have that in black and white, what everyone is getting paid, they're able to negotiate on the things that um don't happen otherwise, because they have a way to bring forward the healthcare demands that we have and that we need to have in our plans, for example. Um And we also have our union has an a f a a p professional standards plan, that the um that has been recognized by the President of the United States for over 30 years, and um and what it does is it addresses issues where people are having problems, get some, get some help sooner, they get back to work sooner. It puts 18% paid back in the workers pockets who are able to use this program and guess what? Management doesn't have to have as many people handling these problems and they refer these cases to our union. We deal with that outside the workplace. There's, I could go on and on, but there's a lot of benefits to having a union on the property that is worker led people right there in the workplace. You can also talk more about the business. I talked about this the other day at Berkeley law. Um the much more likely that union members actually understand the total business and are more likely to be responsive to the needs of making changes or problem solving. And so it's a very structured way to deal with those workforce issues. And frankly, if you're negotiating and creating better pay and benefits, it's also going to attract people to those jobs so that you can actually perform the work that's needed and meet the demand that's needed. Any questions for Sarah. Okay. Finally, I would just say this is critical for our democracy because women have to have the ability to speak up and there is an absolute attack on women, our rights, our own bodily economy um and our independence. And if we want to step up and have women in places where we're leading this country where we're actually leading with pollutions because we understand how to put our anger in check. We understand um how to find creative solutions because no one made that path for us and we need leaders who are women everywhere. And if we're going to do that, we need to also make sure that women have the ability to lead unions, join unions, lead unions and view the problem. Um Sarah what made you join your union originally and pursue a path of becoming a union leader. So I grew up in Oregon. Um my mom was actually a union member, but I didn't have a consciousness of that until much later, we didn't talk about it in my house, I only knew about her, had heard about jimmy hoffa and that didn't end well, so didn't necessarily have a great idea of unions. Um I um I was going to be a high school english teacher and I was planning to start my classroom the next year in inner city, ST louis was working for jobs at the time just to try to make ends meet. And my girlfriend called me from the beach in Miami. Um She had become a flight attendant. We laughed about it at the end of our career, we knew nothing about this. Um and she's razzing me that I'm in ST louis um working my rear end off and um barely scraping by on a cold cold day. And she had her toes in the sand in Miami Beach. And she went on and and she raised me about that, but then she said no, seriously. All of our jokes aside, this job is no joke and she explained the pay, she explained the benefits, she explained the flexibility and she explained the pension that would allow you to retire at 50 and at 23, working four jobs, I was like, that sounds good. So I drove to Chicago the next day um interviewed with United Airlines and when they put me out on the line as a flight attendant, they failed to pay me. Um, and I couldn't get any help from anyone. And it was a fellow union member when I was really in crisis and out of money and not able to eat there in the office of the company with no one helping me. Who tapped me on the shoulder. I'd never seen her before, but I turned around and she's holding her checkbook, asking me how to spell my name. She handed me a check for $800 and she said, number one, you go take care of yourself and number two, you call her union. And I did call our union. I had my paycheck the next day, but I always tell everyone that I learned everything I needed to know about our union in that moment when she was in front of me because in our unions, we care about each other very much and we can make the most out of that care by being organized together. And I have to tell you then we negotiated a contract that I hated. I became a dissident. I was a real rabble rouser and people just kept asking me to do the next thing and the next thing and the next thing. Um, and a strong sense of justice and a loud mouth will carry you really far. And finally, I would just say at five years, 9, 11 happened. And um, the uh, flight 1 75 you can picture it flying into the south tower of the World Trade Center um because all cameras were trained on it because Flight 11 had hit the north tower 17 minutes earlier. And those were my friends. That was my flight that I worked very regularly. I knew all seven flight attendants and the two customer service agents who were going on vacation together to Disneyland. And um, that changed everything. And in that crisis there were people who wanted to take advantage of taking away that pension that I drove to Chicago for um, the next day and um, taking away all the work rules that we had fought to build up and taking away pay. And I know that the people on that plane would never have stood for that. They are my heroes forever. Um, I say their names when I need strength and um, it's uh, my commitment to making sure that their life means something. Um, that keeps me going every day and make sure that everyone has a voice. Everyone has a way to take care of each other. Um, and everyone has a way to love and problem solve. Thank you so much. Sarah

Judith McKenna, President and CEO, Walmart International 
Interviewer: Beth Kowitt, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Global Growth

the pandemic economic uncertainty, supply chain issues, inflation, changing consumer habits. It's a lot and it's all led to challenges for the retail industry, both here in the U. S. And around the world? It's part of what Judith McKenna is tackling as president and ceo of war Walmart International Judith oversees all aspects of Walmart's footprints outside the us and leads a team of 550,000 associates in 23 countries. It's a massive job and one that puts her in the 14th spot on this year's most most powerful women list, Judith joins Fortune senior editor and M. P. W. Summit coach. Er Beth co it to talk about innovation, consumer habits and leading $100 billion business towards growth and uneasy conditions. So please welcome Judith and Beth to the states Judith. Good morning. Hello, good morning, good morning everybody. Um so as up here you run a massive business like everything in Walmart, even the international businesses massive. 101 billion in sales around there. If it were a standalone company, it would be number 34 on the Fortune 500. It would massive company. Um but in the last year the size of the business is actually shrunk and that's been intentional on your part. Tell us a little bit about this refocus here. Yeah, so it's actually over the last few years we both we made a decision to really look at the business and to say are we a healthy business for the future And we have this really simple strategy which is strong local businesses powered by walmart. So we looked everywhere, we operate and ask ourselves, are we operating strong local businesses and what does that mean locally relevant and set up for long term and sustainable growth and powered by walmart, there is a unique advantage of being part of the wal mart family and some of the markets that we looked at, we realized we couldn't get to full potential. So we made the decision to divest of those markets and that was brazil, Japan, Argentina And astor. And in the context of our scale that's about 40 billion of sales that we divested of. Um and that sounds like quite easy when I say it but aster is where I grew up in the UK business. It was um kind of my home, it's you know my kids were born when I was there like all of those things and we divested of it so that there's this kind of It's the right thing to do. But it's also quite a big business personal challenge when you go through this kind of restructure and transformation that is left ear's now operating out six primary markets which we have regional proximity to which is how we get to the 23 markets. What it also allowed us to do is invest where it mattered. So we reinvested into India we bought a business called flip card. We made a $16 billion investment there to buy a e commerce business one of the world's you know fastest growing economies really nascent from an e commerce perspective. But growing fast. So reinvested, refocused made those changes growing nicely now. We just had a good Q. T. Results when we announced those what's next? Really is not only where do we operate but how do we do business? So we're doing digital transformation, we're thinking about new services such as financial services and healthcare. So you've got a geographic transformation and then you go business transformation as well. That's interesting. And flip cards a really good example there because you know, I think it showcases how you're thinking about things differently, right? You don't own the whole thing which is a change and also rather than physical stores, it's a digital business. I mean is this and also not just growth for growth's sake. Right? Like you are closing your closing markets has happened hard to kind of wrap your head around as an organization. I think when you like anything that you try to do with your significant change if you set out the Endgame and why you are doing it, it's way easier to take people on that journey. And and that's really we were very clear this was for a growth strategy, not a shrinking strategy and we were very clear why we were making the new investments we were making as well and some of those are into existing businesses like our Mexico business into becoming an omnichannel retailer and somewhere into new businesses like India into the flip card business as well. So we've been able to take people on that journey and that powered by walmart bit is the piece that allows us to stitch it all together, which also helps you know, we're talking way More about creating global platforms, shared learnings and this structure piece that you bring up which is what are the structures that we've got around the world. We run public companies, we have 100% owned subsidiaries, we have majority ownership with private ownership from other investors as well. The learnings we get from others as they help partner with us. It's probably been the best piece. So with your global purview, tell us what you're seeing in those markets that you're now really focused in and what is that telling you about where you see the global economy headed? Yeah. So I wish I had a crystal ball like doesn't everybody I said that probably for the last, I don't know how many years I've been in business but it's particularly felt that way The last few years and we serve 240 million people a week in Walmart. They come through our doors come online and shop with us and I think there are two things that we're seeing everywhere. Every geography is different. The economics of every geography are slightly different but there is definitely commonality around inflation and general uncertainty At the moment and inflation is really customers are feeling it, you know, you must have all seen as well. Real incomes are shrinking in many places and people are switching their spend into food and consumables and having less discretionary spend to be able to use that. We talked a lot in our Q2 results about and we're seeing behaviors where people thinking about buying private brands rather than necessarily just branded products. They're thinking about what pack sizes they're buying. So that behavior of customers is really fascinating to watch. The general uncertainty I think gives another dimension to this as well. And and what I would say is I don't know what the future's gonna look like, but what we've learned as walmart through the last few years in particular is staying agile, staying nimble. Having data. Really thinking about how we use that is critical and we're very much thinking on a short term medium term and the long term because when you've got these kind of economic environments and I, you know, was in the UK, I once, I was fortunate to be there when we went through a recession. They're in fact two of them and not only is what you do when you're in them, it's what you do when you come out of them when you also have to consider what you're gonna do longer term and if you lose that insight about what does your growth strategy look like? What are your long term investments need to be, don't be, you know what is it penny wise pound foolish like that kind of thinking that was my very british just coming out there um sent wise and foolish whatever way that goes around that is that is really important. So I don't know exactly what it looks like for the future. What I do know is the businesses that will do well irrespective of what sector you are in or what roles you are in. You will be nimble, agile. Thinking about the long term as well as how to manage the day to day. We know that some of the market's urine are very ahead of the US in terms of e commerce digital, what does that really indicate to you about where the U. S. Consumer is going or might go? Yeah I actually um the U. S. Is making leaps and bounds and like pretty much every market in the world. The pandemic change some of the digital trajectory that we saw. And the work that the walmart U. S. Team has done on grocery home shopping on marketplaces has been great to see maybe two things in two markets. It's worth highlighting best one is in e commerce delivery but particularly for groceries and the second is payments and digital payments. So in china that is probably the market that the highest digital adoption of any market in the world currently and even our business has a has about a 40% penetration to sales of digital business. So I think this e commerce the way that's going to continue customers are gonna expect and want convenience, they want good prices but they want good quality but they really want it whenever they want it in china. It's probably got the biggest digital ecosystem of anywhere. And we're seeing that play out. We've taken a lot of learning from our china market. The other one is digital pay me. We also when we did the flip Kite investment, we also invested in a business called phone pay. There are financial services and payments business and to give you an idea of scale and how digital payments in India is scaling and that has got about a population of 1.3 billion in India phone pay process is about 3.1 billion transactions a month. So the government made some changes that may you know really wanted to adopt a digital economy in India and made the ability to do digital payments on a set of guardrails and payment rails called U. P. I much easier. Phone pay is one of the leading businesses there in that and that has been fascinating to watch how if you go to in there have been there a few times this year and the Q. R. Codes absolutely everywhere like on everything everywhere street vendors. It's all there and that digital adoption of the way to pay it's safe. It's secure, it's easy there, it's all connected to a mobile phone number I think is another one for the future. And you know, in walmart us we have warm up pay and then Mexico we have a similar kind of tool called Kashi, slightly different at the moment. Not externalized phone pay you can use in over 30 million merchants, but I do think that's another trend we're gonna see more of. I want to open it up to questions and in just a second here. But first you mentioned earlier this idea of sharing between markets. Yeah, it's really hard to do. How have you figured out how you solved that problem and or our markets to local at this point where it's actually not all that helpful actually, the reverse of that, the way we think about local versus global is the closer to the customer you are, the more local you've got to be, that's where you need your tailoring. The more back end to everything, the systems that you have, the processes that you have, the more global learning that can be applied. And I think that is really helped to start to figure out global leverage. I've been part of international, been at walmart 27 years that I've been part of the international business for about 20 years when walmart bought our business in ASta and I've seen everything tried, I've seen portals playbooks like you name it, I've seen it, the single biggest factor is having the right people having the right conversations and having the right technology that people see the advantage of when you bring those things together, you don't know, you no longer have to push leverage. It's a pull and we're seeing it between markets across regions with suppliers as well legally, but in the way that we do business with them and sharing of how technology is working and shaping businesses. So I this powered by walmart piece of the strategy, I'm really excited about what we can leverage of that for the future. Do we have any questions for Judith in the audience here? Take a look. Okay. Um then I want to ask you about global sourcing that falls under you massive piece of the business as well. What do you think in terms of the supply chain, are things getting cleaned up a little bit? What what can we expect to happen? Yeah, our our walmart sourcing business is really interesting. Also does made in America program as well, which is really important because domestic sourcing is our number one priority. And then we think about how do we globally, there have been huge shocks to the global supply chain over the last 3, 3.5 years, it has been seismic to watch what that has happened. I've mentioned a few times the need for partnerships that supply partnerships around the world have been an incredibly valuable part of that journey for us. That same principle that talked about being agile, flexible and using data to how we think about those supply chains is equally important. We're also thinking about how we source, we, I talked about India and domestic sourcing, we have the business in India and we just launched this 10 year commitment to source out of India. So we are, we're excited about that, I think there's still a lot to learn, I think working together, working in partnerships, working in collaboration and we don't have time for it today, but we could have a whole different topic on sourcing and supply chain about regeneration as well, which is going to be important. Tell us quickly, just we have one minute left, tell us tell us about that, what do you think is gonna happen? I do think that the focus, you know, people are going to care more about where they get their products from, how they're manufactured and where they're sourced from and I think there is more that we can do and continue to do in the supply chain. I just came back from Vietnam and Thailand and talking to suppliers there about regeneration. How do you make it way more circular on things like waste and waste products from anything that you produce, use them back into sourcing in different products and in different ways and I I think this is going to be something where businesses can shine in the future by truly caring about it and it's one of the reasons I Of what I do is that we have 240 million customers who all have really high expectations and it makes us think differently. And the commitments that we're trying to make around regeneration, I think, are probably some of the most impactful things that we'll do in the future, too, and it applies absolutely into sourcing Judith. Thank you so much for joining us talking about your $100 billion business. Thanks for being here. Thank you very much.

Liz Cheney, U.S. Representative, WY (joining remotely)
Interviewer: Alyson Shontell, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - The Great Task (Ahead)

in a speech last june, our next guest said these days for the most part, men are running the world and it is really not going all that well, it was a message intended for young girls and young women to inspire them to act the speaker of those words. Us Congresswoman Liz Cheney. As you know, congresswoman Cheney watched her bid to retain her seat in the house during the Wyoming primary in august after coming out of a vocal opponent to former president trump and his efforts to overturn the election results After the primary law, she said now the real work begins and has acknowledged he's thinking about a presidential run in 2024. Representative Cheney joins us now via remote for a conversation with Fortune Editor in Chief Alison Chantelle. Please welcome them both. Alright, good afternoon everyone. Good afternoon, congresswoman Cheney, thank you for being here with us at M. P. W. Um Representative Cheney, as you know, election denialism has swept the country at a startling rate. Fivethirtyeight found that 60% of Americans will have an election denier on the ballot this fall. Um you said that the primary reason the system upheld pressures on January six was the people in power made the right decisions when met with Brute force in some cases is democracy on the ballot this fall, is that the primary thing that voters should be looking for on the ballots and how fragile is our democracy right now. Well, thank you very much for having me, thank you for putting on this wonderful summit and you're absolutely right. Uh there's there's no question that democracy is on the ballot. And, you know, the thing that people need to think about and realize is the election deniers um are really feeling everyone else's vote because the election deniers are saying they will only honor the results of elections if they agree with them. And so when you look at what happened 20 you know, there was again and again and again, President trump heard from the leaders uh at the Justice Department and his and his White House counsel's office, his campaign. Um and then from 61 out of 62 court that there was not sufficient fraud to change the outcome of the election just wasn't there. And we saw that in each of these states, um where this battle is really on the front lines now. And so when you have somebody like Cary Lake or Mark Finchem in Arizona, for example, um who continue to say that the, that, you know, donald trump won Arizona. Um what they're saying to the voters in Arizona is I'm going to ignore the facts. I'm going to ignore the law. I'm going to ignore the rulings of the court. I'm going to ignore our election process and I'm going to ignore people's votes. And I'm just simply going to uh certify elections, I agree with. And and that is just so fundamentally dangerous too. The foundations of our of our democratic system that protecting against that has got to be above any partisan concern, I think, you know, it's notable. I mean you are a Republican Republican, you voted with Trump. I think 93% of the time you've never voted Democrat before. But now you're saying you would actually, if you were in Arizona in these places where election deniers on the ballot, that's pretty significant putting um country over party, you are also the vice chairwoman of the January six select committee. Um The next hearing is this week, can you give us any hints of what we can expect? We know there's a trove of documents from the Secret Service that you have obtained, but what what's around the corner? Well, I don't want to get ahead of the committee. I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear uh in terms of previewing this week. But I will say that the the work of the committee over the last year, year and a half now has really demonstrated, even I think, for people who had followed with some specificity, what happened on the sixth, it's really demonstrated the breadth and the depth um of the effort to overturn the election and to stop the peaceful transfer of power. And it was an effort that at every step of the way the former president was deeply involved in personally engaged in oversaw, um and and you know, I think we've become a little bit numb because, you know, we this is something we've all been dealing with for the last year and a half. But you know, when you think about how stunning it would have been to hear those words, you know, at any prior point frankly in the existence of of our nation that that a president was attempting to stop the peaceful transfer of power. That's never happened before and we have to take it seriously. So Representative Cheney, I'm struck by the fact that it just seems over and over again. The burden seems to be on women to call into account the abuses by the powerful men. Um, where are the men here? We know that they know that biden is the president. Where are they? And yet you're here seemingly somewhat by yourself. Um, although apparently there's a lot of men whispering, hey, good job, keep it up, keep talking for us. Um, Cassidy. Huh? Went before your committee and spoke bravely. Um, this is not so different from the Me Too movement of corporate America where so many brave women spoke out about abuses of power. Um, how did you think about that burden falling on you? Given that you're clearly an ambitious person who built this huge career for yourself? Big dreams still ahead of you in politics. I mean, how did you weigh that responsibility with your own personal ambitions? Why do you have to take this hit? It's, you know, I never thought of it that way. And, and it's really surprising to me how many people do think about it that way. Um, you know, to me there's just no choice if you are entrusted with a position of public responsibility, a position of public trust, you're obligated by your oath to defend the constitution. And um on January six, the President of United States sent a violent mob to the capitol to attempt to stop the counting of the electoral votes to attempt to steal the election. And there's just no, no world in which a constitutional republic can sustain itself if we excuse that kind of behavior. So, um, so to me they're just never, never was a decision or a choice because it's clear what our obligations are. And I will say I've, I've been so moved and just um impressed and humbled by the young women who and and women all across the country. Um, you know, who have real courage. I mean, if you look at, um, you mentioned Cassidy Hutchinson, um, unbelievable courage and, and I will never forget what it was like to be sitting on that diet and to look into that hearing room and see Cathy Hutchinson sitting there all alone at that table. And especially, you know, that is the room where Congress, uh, the committee on Women's suffrage met um, you know, over 100 years ago now to debate whether women should have the right to vote. And, and just time and time again, I've seen both women, you know, like shame off for example, uh and ruby Freeman um and and across the board women who were involved who are speaking the truth, but also just women across the country who are saying this, no, you know, this is a line we won't cross and I think, you know, there there are millions and millions of women whose response to it has been, what mine has been, which is just, you know, kind of of course we're not gonna stand for this and and of course we're going to do what we have to do to protect the republic for our kids. So I want to go into a little bit about the state of women in work. Um It's not great right now, Liz I gotta say there is a lot going on. A lot of mothers had to leave the workforce in droves because of covid um childcare still isn't widely available or affordable to help support working mothers and now with the overturning of row um which I know you supported returning to the States. Um Many have lost the decision though to decide when to have Children. Um making choices regarding their own bodies that have helped women advance in the workplace too. So, um what support do you think that women need to have thriving careers here in America, what role should the government play? Well, I think one of the most important things that the government needs to do um now is uh take steps to implement policies that are going to return the kind of economic growth that that we know we need to create jobs for example, I mean right now, women like men uh in too many cases are dealing with Out of control food prices, they're dealing with inflation that's growing at a faster pace than we've seen in 40 years. Um they're dealing with, you know, fundamental pocketbook issues and um policies that lead to more government spending. We we know make that worse. And so I think women need to be given opportunities. Um they need to know that their kids are going to be safe. Um They need to know that that the country is going to be safe. I mean we're talking about domestic issues but I think we also have a very very serious uh set of national security issues right now, including what's going on between Russia and Ukraine and uh some of the threats that we're seeing um you know about the use of nuclear weapons, for example, the threats that Putin is making. So um I think you know what what what I think and what I hear from my friends, especially moms around the country is that they want competence. Um you know, there will always be issues on which we might disagree with each other. Um but but they want to know that their elected officials um are competent and are there right. Um and it comes like the decision in roe um I am pro life. I believe there have to be exceptions and I also believe that um when we're talking about these issues um we need to do it with a great deal of compassion and understanding for um the impact that these kinds of issues this issue in particular um has on women has on families. Um when I hear politicians talking about it in ways that act as though it's just simply a political issue, um I think that that's a real tragedy and and I think on both sides we have to really reflect on um just just how how serious and personal that issue is. So we here at the summit have the most powerful women in business with us today. Um what responsibility to corporate leaders have when it comes to protecting our democracy, to solving the divisiveness in the lack of conversation and healthy debate that's happening in our country right now. How can corporate leaders help A hugely important role in in several ways? Um one you know, we saw in the immediate aftermath of January six that a number of frankly the majority of um, you know companies in corporate America that contribute to um politicians said that they would not contribute to people who had voted against certification. They would not contribute to people who tried to minimize the insurrection and we slowly watched that change and I think that um we all have a responsibility not to let what happened become normal. And I think that corporate America has a huge responsibility to again say, look, I mean, you know, Arizona is a really good example today where um, you know, people are faced with a choice and they could say, well, you know what I like the policies of the republicans from a business perspective, better than the policies of the democrats, perhaps in Arizona today. But people have to recognize that if you sacrifice the sanctity of the election process and if you elect people whose loyalty isn't to the constitution, then we're never again going to be in a place where we can have those policy debates. And so I think like all vote, um corporate America has a real responsibility um, to be clear about um, the kinds of politics that they're going to reward and incentivize and the kinds of leaders that they're gonna reward and incentivize now, I have to ask careers are not a straight path. They may under they go all sorts of ways and I know that you're spending a lot of time with democrats more than you ever anticipated. Um, you're doing things in your career, you never thought you would have to be doing. Um, and this is not a straight line, probably what you thought you were following further in your career, where do you go from here? Um you're an ambitious person, you must have a plan. Um Well look, I, I really look at it as um every single day you have to do the best you can to do the right thing. And right now what I'm doing with respect to the january 6th committee and with respect to doing everything I can um to make sure that we don't elect election deniers um to make sure that that donald trump is never again anywhere near the oval office. Those those are the most important things and I don't know what comes next. Um And you know, I I think that actually what you're seeing in Washington right now is too many people who sort of are saying, okay well what's my political move and how do I achieve that political objective and and doing that instead of what their their responsibility and obligation is um you know with respect to the job that they currently have. Um So I I really am just completely focused uh professionally right now on um on January six, on finishing the next couple of months is Wyoming's representative. Um I also have five kids, so I spend a good a good deal of time juggling. But um no, I just look, I think people are elected and they have to take their job seriously and and I just don't think that there's any more important issue right now than continued functioning of our republic? Representative Cheney thank you so much for your time for all the work you're doing to protect our democracy. Thank you

Gina Ortiz Jones, Under Secretary, U.S. Department of the Air Force
Interviewer: Maria Aspan, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - First. Class. Service.

I'm honored to speak with our next guest. She has a long history of service and working to protect us economic and national security, including during a deployment to Iraq as an Air force intelligence officer. She is the honorable Gina Ortiz jones undersecretary of the U. S. Air Force. In her current role, she is the second highest ranking civilian in that branch of the military among many of her responsibilities. Undersecretary jones oversees the department's more than $200 billion budget and is responsible for the welfare of nearly 700,000 members of the service and their families around the world. She proudly serves as the first woman of color and the first out lesbian to take up the post of undersecretary of any U. S. Military branch. Undersecretary jones joins us now to talk about leadership service, military innovations and the importance of diversity, equity and inclusion in the armed forces. Please join me in welcoming her to the stage. How are you? Good to see you. Good to see you, Madam undersecretary thank you so much for making the time to be here. Thank you. What a pleasure. I'd love to start by diving into Ukraine because we have seen a lot of news in just the past 24 hours including President Zelensky asking the G-7 to provide more air force defenses and what can you tell us about how the US is responding? Well, I think look, the biden Harris administration has been very clear about our commitment to Ukraine helping Ukraine defend itself. Um I think we should uh the lessons learned that really stick out in my mind. So um is one, you can never underestimate a country's willingness to fight for itself and for the ability to determine its own future. Secondly, you should also never underestimate the United States of America and how well our equipment works. Um I think, look, we're never gonna underestimate uh certainly uh a desperate entity that has nuclear power, nuclear nuclear weapons, but I think we'll continue to work with our partners and allies to ensure that Ukraine has what they need to defend themselves for the business audience in the room. As you look at the global landscape, what are the biggest threats and what are you most focused on doing to secure us interests? Sure. Well, you know, the Department of the Air Force, which includes both the Air Force and the Space Force um is focused on ensuring that we are prepared for the high end threat. Um Secretary Austin has called China are pacing challenge. And if you're paying attention, I know a lot of attention is on what's happening right now with Russian Ukraine. But when we think about the law, long term economic and certainly national security challenges and opportunities that we have a lot of that it happens in the indo pacific and so China's actions has increasingly challenged our security, our interests and our values and the Department of the Air Force, the Department of Defense is focused on ensuring that we are prepared for um for a high end fight. Um, and working with our partners and allies to do that. Uh you know, just a couple of days ago, I was engaging with um with with cadets from West Point and uh, you know, 2003 is when I, when I graduated and when I think of in less than 20 years we've gone from Baghdad time to Beijing time and those are two very different worlds, two very different challenges. Um, and we're working very quickly to make sure that we are ensuring our airmen and guardians have what they need to be successful, uh, what has sustained us, what is um, what we have used and what we've needed in the Middle East over the last 20 some odd years is not what we would need um, against, against the pacing challenge. And so we're working very hard to ensure that we have, we have that frankly. We're also just to focus on ensuring that our airmen and guardians can serve to their full potential. Um it's very important that that certainly my commitment to ensuring that that's the case when I served. I served under. Don't ask. Don't tell. And I will never forget, oh, by the way, happy coming out there. Um, yeah, I will never forget the very first thing I had to do at boston University even though I showed up there with a scholarship was to sign a piece of paper saying that I will not engage in homosexual behavior because don't ask, don't tell applied to me, even as a cadet, my opportunity to get an education, my opportunity to serve my opportunity to die for our country if need be all that goes away just because of the time, we didn't have enough leaders with the courage to say anybody ready and willing to serve their country should have the opportunity to do so. So you better believe every day I walk into the, into the pentagon, I pinch myself and make sure that I'm the undersecretary. I wish I would, I, I would have had when I was that young cadet and that young officer, How does that shape the decisions that you make now the questions that you ask, the people who you ask for input? Absolutely. I mean, I think having had that experience of knowing that your leadership team could not have been fully committed to your success because that was the policy, right? You couldn't, you couldn't speak freely. Um, I try to surround myself with folks that have a different perspective. Um, I know I'm a little bit, a little bit, yeah, and certainly have a different gender than most of the folks that I, that I engage with on a daily basis and um, and certainly have different age and so some of the things that are happening, certainly in our, in our country right now, they land differently with me if you will. Um, so I think it's very important that we talk about those things and we understand how those impact readiness and retention right? Because look, if if somebody is focused on, on, uh, if somebody cannot end their day, focus 100% on the mission, then we need to fix that right? I need, I need folks focused on the mission, not on, you know, childcare, not on other things that are distracting that, that we can, you know, frankly invested and make sure that we've got adequate resources for because at the end of the day, if we are leaving talent on the table, if we're leaving Tala on the table, we're leaving lethality on the table. I know you all talk about leaving dollars on the table, but we leave, we don't want to leave the salary on the table and again, we just don't have time or talent to lose given, given the pacing challenge. So that's what we're focused on the high end threat but also ensuring our folks can serve to their full potential. Could I ask you also to talk about how your background, your family growing up as the daughter of a Filipino immigrant, um shaped how you make decisions today and how you think about looking for talent today? Well, I am just um, uh, I'm aware of how lucky I am. Um, and my mom was not shy in reminding my sister and I have that every single day, uh, my mom came to this country in the late seventies. She graduated from the number one you university in the Philippines. But she came here as a domestic helper. That was the opportunity that presented itself and she wanted her shot at the american dream. So she humbled herself and she just reminded my sister and I every single day that we were lucky not smart, we were lucky to have been born in this special country and we'd have to give back. It's why I serve, that's why my sister serves as a military training instructor in the U. S. Navy. I tried to get her into the Air Force y'all but you know whatever big sister wants, she's gonna do the exact opposite. So um but that's why that's why we served and I had kind of a full circle moment just a couple of days ago because the very first place that my mom worked when she came here was at the new Zealand embassy in Washington D. C. And so friday evening um there is a defense reception there and my mom is the plus one to the under Secretary of the Air Force. But again that's a that's a uniquely american story right? Tell you tell me another country where that's possible. You know I'll wait probably waiting a while because that that I think is is truly why I serve and why I want others to similarly see that when they come and they are courageous enough to say they're going to support and defend the constitution but they can do so to their full potential because our example our leadership is too important. I would love to open it up to questions. Does anyone in the audience have a question for the undersecretary? Yes we'll bring a mic over. Thank you for my service. My dad's Air force very cool. Um And could you identify Elizabeth Warren, the founder of Hello Alice and um we support small business owners and we're super excited about the amount of U. S. Veterans and military spouses, starting companies and I was just curious what the Air Force and other branches are doing to help once um you become a veteran uh go into the private sector and specifically start their own business. Yeah, that's a really good question. I think we're looking at ways we can strengthen our relationship with the Department of veteran affairs. Um Certainly we wanna make sure that our folks are have the skills and and can can translate their experiences in the military into things that would make them competitive on the outside. Um And again that's something I'm working working closely with with on on the V. A. Since that's not completely in our in our wheelhouse. Um But you make a good point about the way and also in which we are supporting our spouses and an understanding that that is also critical to retention. Um um And so we are working closely to ensure, you know, when we engage with certain communities that we talk about the importance of access to childcare and we can talk about the importance of spouse licensure reciprocity, right to ensure that again, as folks are moving every couple of years that, that we are supporting them as best we can. There's another question over there. Hi Mr johnny, um, Girl Dakota, thank you for all the work that you're doing your service and your support for, um, you know, teaching girls cybersecurity look forward to working with you. So on the childcare point. Um, I don't know a lot of people know this, but as you know, we're in the middle of a child care crisis, Half our daycare centers are shut down and we can't seem to shift american culture that, you know, childcare is a personal problem that you have to solve is not an economic issue, but the best model for childcare is happening in the military right now. So what, what's going right there and how do we translate that to the rest of civil society? I think we are, we are trying to, well, when we know it's important. Um, you know, when, when we survey folks, um, and in particular women, when they decide to leave. Um, we'll ask, you know, why why you decide to leave And, and, and oftentimes access to childcare is, is a reason and it's certainly a reason when you have dual military couples, right? And you ultimately have to kind of make a decision, um, in the interest of the family. Um, and, and so we are look, so that is, that doesn't have to be the case. I think we are to your point similarly challenged with access to a sufficient number of workers. We have the facilities. It's really about finding the number of workers to ensure that we can keep our R. C. B. C. S, our Child Development Center staff. So we're looking to be Creative Secretary Austin just signed out a memo. It's taking care of people memo, one of the things on there specifically around childcare. So those that are now providing direct care their first, if they have their own Children that they like to provide, bring to the, to the CBC, they would have their, the fee for the first child waves. Um, and then after that there's an additional discount, but we are doing everything we can to ensure that our CBC are staffed again because we know it's an issue of that effects recruiting and certainly retention as well. Another issue that disproportionately affects women. He tell us a bit about what you're doing to address the long standing problem of military sexual assault. Sure. Um, this is, well, we are looking, we're working very hard to expeditiously expeditiously implement the recommendations from the Independent Review Commission on Sexual assault in the military. Um, this was a top priority. It took place as soon as Secretary often came uh came into the seat in in january of last year. Um some of the things that we have taken on in the Department of the Air Force one, I direct the co location of our support services. Um there's and it's the intent of this is to really ensure that we are making it as easy as possible for victims to know where to go when they when they have um when they need these resources. Right? And so co locating these things as a couple of things. One it minimizes the re traumatization, right? I don't want somebody having to tell their story four or five times if they don't need to, secondly, this also allow for better data collection, right? Somebody comes in, you've got a more holistic understanding of what just happened um you know, because maybe it wasn't just sexual assault, maybe there was grooming, maybe there was stalking, maybe there were some online harassment as well. So a more fulsome understanding of what happened, We'll ensure that we better support the survivor as well as um ensure that we can inform our prevention efforts. And then we also wanted to ensure that our support providers have are are frankly are realizing as much energy as possible by co locating those things. Um so data collection minimizing traumatization, better support services is what this is about. So I directed that on one august we have a co location at the Echolocation pilot and seven locations after our lessons learned that were looked to uh how we might expand that across the Department of the Air Force. We're also investing heavily in our prevention work force. Um We know this is an important ensuring making sure we've got the right climate in our in our work environments. Um so that we prevent as much of this as as possible because yes, look, our number one commercial is always our people. And um if folks are, you know, talking about their experiences in the light, um that that shows that we somehow do not value their service or their sacrifices and that certainly is going to affect our ability to recruit and retain. Um let me when I let me take one more point, if I if I may on that not direct sexual assault, sexual harassment. But I think when I when I talk about our commitment to ensuring folks concerned for their full potential, I must spend maybe similar to all 90% of my day asking three questions, which is why why not? And where is the data? Um Shortly after I got in the seat, Secretary and I got in the seat, we there was a readout of a disparity review. And this was a really holistic look, I commend the folks that that started this before the secretary and I got there. But this looked at um disparities by race, gender and ethnicity. Um and promotion rates and who was selected for certain schools, who was selected for certain assignments. And I thought it was really when they were briefing me, I thought it was really interesting because they were briefing it first by gender and then secondly by race and ethnicity and as a woman of color, I did not see myself and the numbers themselves were not great to be frank. Um but I knew if they looked at the intersection of those three things, it would illuminate some things that that are not coming out from from the current data. So I had them go back look at the data at the intersection of those three things race, gender, ethnicity. And it revealed where we have some more acute challenges, right? So as to where the previous report was showing that um women on the whole were doing well. When you look at the intersection of those three things, you actually saw that the progress of white women was masking the lack of progress of women of color. It showed that we had some real challenges. For example, um are at least promoted uh demographic or asian men. Um And so having that data though allows us to be um to be clear right about where we have some unique challenges, how we might scope some efforts to ensure again that we are one we recognize the problem and they can adequately address those things in a in a holistic manner. Um because this is fundamentally about trust and fundamentally about leadership and and certainly affects all the other, um, challenges and opportunities before us. Thank you so much. Where is the data? I think it's a great note to go out on. So please join me in thanking the undersecretary.

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Nike Athlete, Olympic medalist and 10-time World Champion; Founder, Pocket Rocket Foundation 
A’ja Wilson, Nike Athlete, WNBA Player; Olympic gold medalist; MVP of the 2022 WNBA Champs, Las Vegas Aces 
Moderator: Beth Kowitt, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Living To Play

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Nike Athlete; Founder, Pocket Rocket Foundation 
A’ja Wilson, Nike Athlete, WNBA Player; MVP of the 2022 WNBA Champs, Las Vegas Aces 

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Nike Athlete, Olympic medalist; Founder, Pocket Rocket Foundation 
A’ja Wilson, Nike Athlete, WNBA Player; Olympic gold medalist; MVP of the 2022 WNBA Champs, Las Vegas Aces 
Moderator: Beth Kowitt, FORTUNE

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Nike Athlete, Olympic medalist; Founder, Pocket Rocket Foundation 
A’ja Wilson, Nike Athlete, WNBA Player; Olympic gold medalist; MVP of the 2022 WNBA Champs, Las Vegas Aces 

So I've noticed a lot of you all taking advantage of the beautiful Laguna Niguel weather working out during the summit. It's not surprising that we have so many athletes among us uh sports have so much value beyond keeping all of us active and entertained. Many ceo has participated in sports as they built their way to big careers. There are a lot of transfer liberal attributes, being a team player, a leader, a goal oriented person. And in just a moment we're gonna meet two women who have strong insights into all of this and are here to share. Shelly ann fraser Pryce is an olympic track and field gold medalist and 10 time world champion and she happens to be one of the fastest women on one of the fastest people on earth. And Asia Wilson is a W. N. B. A player with the las Vegas aces M. V. P. Of the 2022 W. N. B. A. Champs and olympic gold medalist and they're both Nike athletes to their joining us to talk about the impact of sports also playing field, how sports can help us learn and uncover revelations about ourselves and maybe we'll get some tips on best ways to up our personal and professional games. But first take a look at this. Okay I just want to start by taking a quick poll of the room who here played sports in college. Okay so this does not surprise me um you know and I want to ask you to experts, why do you think that is? Why you know, why did the women so many women put their their hands up? What role do sports play in leadership and maybe a shell and you can start there um for me, I think um sports was really the vehicle for me to move from the environment that I was in back home to kind of have an education and come out of my circumstances and it definitely empowered me to kind of create a platform for the girls in my community to understand that sports helped to create, like, you know, give you like a sense of belonging to like a collective group and if you're able to do that, then you know who you are as an individual and being able to be in an environment where other girls share similar, you know, traits to who I am as a person and I want to become, it kind of helped me to transition from that and become an advocate in my community. Yeah, I mean, it's the same for me, I think sports did something for me, It helped build relationships. I think it opened up a door for me that I've never probably would have ever experienced if I didn't play sports, it allowed me to be that friend that allowed me to share, like it was just one of those things where I've met so many people and connected with so many people around the world and I think that's how sports helped me and it gave me no choice but to kind of be that leader. It put me out there and was like, all right, it's you and 10 other girls figure it out and that's hard in the locker room because some people coming in sassy and it's like, it made me some people, it's not their day, the boyfriend and text them back and it's like, all right, but we have to we have to win ladies, like we gotta bring it in. So I think that's kind of what helped me in leadership and finding myself and understanding that I have a voice and like I was saying like building that platform for the next and also you're finding yourself. I think that's the biggest thing I found myself through sports. So I wanna, I wanna stand that for a second because you two are at very different stages of your career. You know, Asia U. 26 you've talked before about how you are still developing as both a person and a player. How is that how you doing that in the spotlight like this? I have no idea. Honestly, it's the way my life goes. You know, like you I think the biggest thing is understanding that it's never too late to win from within. I think that is so key. Like, you find yourself, you know those long nights when you're thinking and it's just like what's going on, where am I in my life and it's okay to be at that standpoint and I think for me that's my biggest thing was the bubble. When the pandemic hit it allowed me to have no choice but to get in tune with myself. And I think that's the biggest thing and I honestly would say I didn't find out who I was until I was 24 25 years old. So I think we get so caught up in having Be that phenomenal woman is figuring it out right on the spot when it doesn't necessarily have to be that way. So I'm still figuring it out. I'm loving it, it's my life, but it's definitely, it's been a journey. I want to expect that in a couple minutes, but you know, for usually and you are 36, sorry 26, sorry out of here in 2017, you had your son Zion, but since giving birth you have run the nine fastest times of your career. Um First of all, how? Uh Yes, yeah, I have a daughter, I'm not running out of time. How are you? How do you do it? Like how has this changed you? Um you know, having my son has definitely changed me a lot. I remember the first time when I found out I was pregnant, I was like in a slum, I just finished, It's the truth. I was like, this is not about to be it, I was gonna be 30 I was going to be turning 30 to december of that year and I remember being a female in sports you always hear, Oh, it's not the right time to have a child. You have to wait until you retire or when you get to 30 they almost, you know, want to tell you it's time to wrap it up, you know, it's over. And I remember have, you know, being there and being in the moment, I was just nervous like, what's gonna happen and having my son was the best thing that has ever happened to me because it made me tough and I think it made me more, you know, a stronger athlete and a woman and I was able to balance and juggle being a mom and a nasty because I knew I had more to give and I wanted to unleash that paul and I knew the only way I had to do that was that I had to believe that it's possible. So the moment I accepted what was happening, like, yes, I'm gonna be a mom and it's okay, I'm gonna come back. That was it. There was no change in my mind. There was, I understood it was going to be difficult, I knew it was gonna require more of me. I had to evolve as a woman as an athlete and know that I belong in that space and age was not gonna stop me, you know, uh the opinions of others, we're not gonna deter me from the goals that I have because I knew I had more to give and being able to accomplish the things that I have after having my son is remarkable and I hope it adds Voice to the other women who are thinking that their dreams are somehow dead because oh, I'm turning 30, I'm gonna have a baby. But I'm hoping that they too will find inspiration in knowing that new beginnings is always a good thing. It's an opportunity to evolve. It's an opportunity to grow, it's an opportunity to be more than you thought would be possible. So, I mean, I think it's also worth acknowledging your career has been a decade and a half long, and you are very long and you are at peak performance. Yeah, there are some lessons here in longevity, How have you done that? You know, honestly, it requires work. And I think this year out of all the years that have been competing, I finally found the confidence to be who I am, you know, and I think for a lot of us age is something that we all have to go through. We'll have to, we have think that's just the reality and I think for a lot of us, we are afraid of going through that process that we limit who we are as, as a woman, you know, and it's somehow It somehow takes away from us where we think, Okay, because we're turning 30, we need to just tone things down with were stop dream where to stop thinking that things are possible. But I think at, you know at this stage of my career I feel young, I feel fit. I think I deserve the moment, the moment is mine to see if it's a new beginning. I'm equipped, I'm ready, I'm hungry and I want yeah. Yeah. I love that. You want it, I want it, you want it, I love it, I love it. Um I want, you know, I want to go back to something you alluded to which is kind of finding yourself when you were in the bubble, which is the W. N. B. A bubble for those who don't know. Um you've both spoken and written very openly about battling depression after an M. V. P. Season. What made you decide to be so open about that. Um I think it's just key to show people that I'm human. I think they get so caught up in the accolades, they get so caught up in seeing us in uniform that they're like oh my God you're a machine, There's nothing wrong with you. Like you have the perfect life, you get paid to sweat, You get like you get all these good things and it's like but I still hurt, I still feel feelings, I still go through things and I think it was just so key for for me, especially in that moment and it helped me to be vulnerable and to show that side and say, hey, it's not easy every day for me. I'm glad that I can make it look easy, but it's not easy. Like no one sees the hard work, the long nights, the stressful nights of where you just want to pull your hair out. No one sees that, and it's like, but those moments are real and you have to live those moments and take them in. And I think I was just, it was a moment for me to be like, okay, this is me, this is who I am, and I'm loving who I'm becoming, because I can show the world that it's different paths of life. We're all on this different journey, but we're gonna all get to the top in our own speed at our own race. So, at the end of the day, you just gotta be real and be true with yourself. And that was a key moment for me. Thank you. I want to see if the audience has any questions for you here, we have one in the front, you can wait for the mic intelligence making its way. Well, hi, I'm Lorraine Harrington catalysts and I know an issue for women in sports is pay equity, and especially been with W N. B A. Can you talk a little bit about the challenges and opportunities in that? Yes. Oh gosh, we could be here all day. We uh no, but it's just something that is, it's always a crazy, not even a crazy, it's a sensitive topic because it's like you do so much. You work so hard and it's just like, what can we do to make it just my thing is make it fair. That's all I'm asking is fair. If we put in the equal amount of work, we're doing the equal minded things cool. But I'm just saying make it fair to us as a league and it's really, really hard because of economical reasons and things like that. But it's, it's tough. But at the same time, I think for me, I'm understanding that change doesn't happen overnight and we have to continue to use our platform to voice these things. I think it's so key that we don't be, we're not, we don't have those seats at the tables to say, hey, these women need to get paid more because they work their tails off and they deserve it. I think that's the thing. I think we get so caught up in society of being like, well the woman is always a step below, but it's like why I'm, I'm just as equally as qualified as anyone else. And it's a topic where it's just like, well, what can we do? Everyone's asking, what can we do, what can we do? Just respect and understanding that we need seats in their bodies in those, we need bodies in those seats. We need people to see us. I'm a firm believer and see if you can see her, you can be her and it's really, really hard to be seen if they're constantly sweeping under the rug. And that's so key. It's just like just being seen. I think that's the biggest thing is just putting stuff out there. So many people coming to me and they're like, why can't we find your Jersey and airport? Why can't you? And it's, it's those little things that we have to go back into these companies and saying, just put us out there, put us out there and see what happens and I guarantee you will not disappoint you. And I think that's just very, very key when it comes to just that pay equity situations, just like, let us be seen, Let us be hurt were more were deeper than just athletes were foundation owners were business women, we're mothers, we're sisters. Like, put us out there. And yeah, that's about all I can say that before. I got do we have another question in the audience right over there and if you could wait for the mic and tell us who you are. Hi, I'm Rose with Verizon. First of all, you ladies are fabulous. We are a little jealous that you talked about aging. We're like, okay, but let me ask you this. So how do you think about what your next is because you won't be athletes forever. But you have these incredible skills and discipline and intelligence and we're gonna get you out there, How do you think about your next um so, you know, for me, um it's all about impact, you know, and I'm from the Caribbean, I'm from Jamaica and it's a small country where there are so many girls are people in my community that are on the privilege and I want to be able to be the change for them and through my pocket Rocket Foundation that I started a couple of years ago because of a woman, I should say that your nickname? Yes, yeah, There's a woman I met when I was 15 years old in New York at the Penn Relays and for some crazy reason, not knowing who I was or who I was gonna become, she invested in my life and that changed the course of my life forever. So being able to have that foundation in Kingston where we offer student athletes the opportunity to create change and to have a balance of having their sport and their classroom education and being able to peer both together and create an avenue to escape the current circumstances is where it's at. You know, that's the impact I want in my community to, to have girls in Jamaica feel like out of all the girls in the world we belong, we're not just Caribbean women were not just Jamaican women, but we can have an impact in the world and being able to have that Foundation where we have 55 student athletes that have passed through the foundation, giving them the opportunity to not think about where their meal is coming from, where their uniform is coming from, where the books are coming from, but just focus on the classroom, focused on your sport, being able to create for yourself an opportunity to excel because for me, I never had that opportunity when I was younger, when I was like 10, 11, 12 until I met Gene, you know, and that changed the course of history because otherwise I would have continued a cycle that was in my community, I would probably be home, probably have a couple of kids just running around, but you know, I'm glad that she saw something more and being able to have that initiative in my community, it's where it's at for me and creating more space for women like me in my community. How about you? I think the biggest thing for me is just planting seeds for the next generation, like I'm still young but um I think the biggest thing is understanding that it doesn't stop here, like like surely understand just seeing that potential, we all have those type of people in our lives, that's all potential us before we could see ourselves. And for me that's what's next is how can I plant seeds for the next generation to be like, I want to be the next asia, I want to be the next like what can I do in my community to help them understand that you can shatter any glass ceiling that is in front of you, You can reach any goal. I was a young girl, I don't wanna play basketball, hated sweating, hated sweating. Oh my God, it's disgusting. But here I am sweating for a living. Like it's just one of those things like I just want to put that out there to the young girls like you don't have to have it all at once. Like just continue to plant seeds and what you want in your journey. Like that's my next, that's my why to keep grinding and keep just shattering anything that's in front of me. I love that, shattering everything that's in front of Asia. Thank you so much for being with you.

Iman Abuzeid, Co-founder and CEO, Incredible Health 
Kirsten Green, Founder and Managing Partner, Forerunner Ventures
Moderator: Mandela Schumacher-Hodge Dixon, All Raise

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Breaking Barriers And Raising Capital

Iman Abuzeid, Co-founder and CEO, Incredible Health 
Kirsten Green, Founder, Forerunner Ventures
Moderator: Mandela Schumacher-Hodge Dixon, All Raise

Breaking Barriers And Raising Capital

our next session is about something also near and dear to my heart, something we can all probably agree on the world needs more female founders. Uh, there is some good news on that front. A recent study found that in 2021, of new businesses were started by women. We love that. But female founders and especially female founders of color still face daunting and discriminatory challenges. We are about to hear from three women in the know about breaking barriers and overcoming hurdles when building a business from the ground up. Iman abou Zeid is co founder and Ceo of incredible health. She is also the first black woman founder to lead a company to unicorn status. Kirsten Green is an award winning VC and the founder and managing partner at forerunner Ventures and they're joining us today for a conversation with Mandela schumacher, Hodge Dixon. The Ceo of all raise an M. P. W. Summit guest co chair. Please join me in welcoming them to the stage. Hello. Alrighty. Welcome Welcome. Hello everyone. Alright. Hello everyone. You didn't know the energy arrived. All right, so I'm super excited to be joined by two powerhouse individuals who I've admired from afar and now get to admire up close. So to set context, I'll never forget the first time I sat in on a pitch meeting between an investor and a founder. It felt like I was having a front row seat to the future and it felt like I was having insider access to this very special relationship between a venture capitalist and the founder and the partnership that it takes to create these mythical tech unicorns that many of us in the room use we work at, we sit on the boards of, and so now I am joined by two leaders in the industry and and we have iman and Kirsten. So starting with you, iman, congratulations on the big news. If you haven't heard iman's company, incredible health raised 80 million in series B funding and is valued at 1.65 billion. She is the fourth black woman in history to ever lead her company to unicorn status. So iman, what does this smile? So mean to you personally, I mean personally I'm, I'm proud of the accomplishment. We've also just gotten started right. So the company is only five years old, so we still got a long way to go. You know, we're pursuing this vision of helping healthcare professionals live better lives and the mission of helping them find and do their best work. And you know, we're aiming to be this category defining market leading company. Now. On a personal note, of course, I'm proud of the accomplishments and impressed by what the team has achieved too. But I hope this is not, this is one of the last times, it's actually like a headline like that, like we need, we need to be on the 100 or 200 or 700, you know, women or black women starting a unicorn company. So I hope it's not as big a deal over time too. So Kirsten, I also want to tell you congratulations because it's the 10 year anniversary of forerunner ventures existence in Silicon Valley, the venture ecosystem this past july, you passed that Mile Stone, you are one of the most successful and celebrated women in venture capital today. You have invested in top brands like Glossier Away ritual, the farmer's dog chime fair and many, many more. And earlier this year you announced the close of another one billion in funding, making forerunner ventures a um north now of $2 billion. No, so I want to ask you the same question question I asked him on is how does this feel for you personally, what does this mean for you? Um the last 10 years has been a really incredible journey. And um, I think when I started forerunner, um and I was an outsider to Silicon Valley and the tech industry, I came in with tons of ambition and enthusiasm and naivety. Um and my goal really was to try to learn how to be a great partner to founders, try to build a team around, you know, that could work together and to over time earn the right to invest in a company that we thought was worthy and making an impact at whatever stage and we sort of had to start somewhere on that journey. So when we, when I launched the firm in 2012, we had a $40 million dollar fund. So it's been a series of building blocks and 10 years felt like a big milestone because it's been a decade and I was able to look around and feel so grateful for the incredible team that I get to work with and for um, all of the founders that we've backed. Um, but, and, and the billion dollars felt like a milestone in that, um, in that it sort of was that moment of like, okay, we have enough capital now that we can start early with the company, you can follow through, we can invest in a little bit later stage as well as the early stage, but really it was just like a mark on the journey and I still feel, you know, really excited and ambitious about the next decade. Oh, exciting. Okay, awesome. Well, thank you both so much and if you aren't impressed yet, I want to ground you in some stats of the environment they're working in. So 93% of all venture capital dollars are managed by white men, 82% of all capital deployed to startup founders last year went to all male teams project Diane reported that less than 1%, even less than .3% of all venture capital went to black women founders. So this is the environment they're Navigating. So my question to both of you and I'll start with you, Eamon is as you've navigated these environments, what has kept you motivated to continue to break through barriers and forge your own path to success. I mean, I mean, first and foremost is the the level of assertiveness and determination. You need to just get through all of that is a lot. Um, now the truth is I didn't do it by myself. Okay, so first and foremost I align myself with investors and venture capitalists who frankly, I wasn't their first female Ceo, I wasn't their first minority Ceo. And so the great thing about, you know, the Internet, it's like their portfolio companies are all available, right? You can see who has a track record of investing in women and minorities or not. And you know, when your craft, when I crafted my list of, okay, which investors am I gonna go for? Yes. For me, in my case it mattered that they were in the bay area. I needed marketplace investors and tech investors and so on. But I did eliminate from the list of those that have never invested in a woman. So it's almost like you, you can self select. Um, secondly, I really, uh, fundraising in and of itself is a, is a skill and honestly operating a company. This is a whole set of skills and just really worked on honing my craft. And there were two couple ways I did that first is just surrounded myself with uh, C E O. S that were ahead of me. You know, they were in the next they're in this next stage. Uh and and those were individuals who really, you know, gave me an enormous amount of advice. You know, we're all in the same WhatsApp group or whatever it is, we do our meet ups and our lunches and dinners and so on, where you can really um be extremely, you know, empathetic and open with each other. Uh, and then finally I just really uh made sure to focus on like process honestly when it came to, especially when it comes to the fundraising. Um, you know, it's not just uh it's not enough to just select the right investors to pursue, but like the way you come up with the content of your pitch, the way you come up with the um, the way you run the process, there's a lot of nuance there that has to get learned over time. Um, Yeah. And ultimately, like the last thing I'll just mention is, you know, the statistics. Yes, it's dismal. It's terrible. There's all this bias in the system. But honestly, if you're a ceo it might be the same. Even if you're an investor running a fund. Like you can't actually think about that stuff too much. It's very distracting honestly. And so you just have to really just focus on your your mission and your vision what you're trying to achieve because the biggest thing I can do for this industry is just win, frankly and the same person, right? Like as long as more and more of us are successful, that's, that's a big thing that's going to transform this industry and change some of the statistics Well said, Well said, and how many years have you been running incredible health, five years, five years and then you're 10 years into forerunners journey. So what has kept you motivated to keep going, keep growing, You said you're just getting started? Well, one, I feel really fortunate that I found a job that I love as much personally, that I feel like I get a lot of energy and satisfaction out of the opportunity to be learning all the time and meeting new people and being inspired by seeing their passion, what they're putting forward. Um, but in keeping a little bit with the broader theme in this conversation and thinking about those stats and feeling like I came into this industry, like I mentioned as an outsider, I will admit, I was thinking more about what I wanted to accomplish and the kinds of companies I wanted to invest in and where I thought the opportunity was over time. I've come to really appreciate venture capital, very ecosystem driven business. I've come to really understand that, but appreciate where I am, You know, find support and um and how we collaborate together and to really think about um you know, there are there, it is, it is frustrating to think about only 2% of the money going to women or only, you know, six or 7% of the money being in the hands of women, but I think that like there's a lot of ways to have impact beyond just those stats. Um and so yes, we think about diversity in our portfolio and making sure that we're um you know, being open minded about everything we're investing in. I think when we're in the boardroom, I'm thinking about how do we have an impact on the conversation about the leadership team about the priorities for the company, around sort of career development around a diversified executive team to really think about getting kind of more parity in the leadership roles and having that be part of the role of advancing the whole industry. Um and it's a collective of all of those things working together, that I think gives us the best chance to see more progress. Awesome, awesome. And I know because of the conversations I've been having around the wonderful breakfast bars and the coffee stations, people are very interested and potentially becoming a venture capitalists, there's a lot of growing interest. So, Kirsten, what is your advice to those who are not yet in the room, not yet playing the game, who want to um Okay, so let's see. So i it's been 10 years, I think when I started, I felt like there was a it was even a more closed ecosystem, there were fewer people that had started funds or firms. Um I definitely think that's changed over the last 10 years, we've sort of had a booming economy, a really, you know, a hyper paced startup ecosystem. A lot more founders have been drawn to the ecosystem, A lot more investors have been drawn to the ecosystem, and honestly, while the numbers aren't high enough, it's been encouraging to see the amount of women coming into the market and um, and coming with their whole passion and their whole heart and their ambitions to do that too. I think at some point, you know, now we're in a different part of the economic cycle. Um the conversations are much different around all of our tables and with our founders and trying to set priorities in many ways, it's, it's a lot better, it's more constructive. Um and I think is, you know, a lot of the conversation is more about really sound business building and thinking about building for the future, but back to the venture ecosystem, I think there's also some natural kind of flushing out as people understand like the fullness of the job, it's not just chasing deals around, it's really about helping being um, constructive around the table and bringing, you know, some experience or some expertise to bear to try to make the company better. Um, but I also think with all of the, the way the venture capital ecosystem has grown, there's so many more types of investors and so many more pockets of money if you want to think about making a statement in this space? I think it's important to have some focus, like your mom was saying about her company, so in your business, like think about what do I want to be known for? What kind of, you know, what kinds of companies do I want to back? What sort of theme or thesis do I wa you have, what sort of expertise do I want to bring to the table and try to lean into that? Um it's also obviously helpful to to really have a marquee company and a founder to pair closely with and and sort of be able to be on that journey together. Awesome. Thank you. And I know you already iman shared some of the tactics that you've enlisted to get to the place you are at and you've been kind enough to even support founders in my network, so on your path to greatness, you're still stopping and helping people even being here right now. So for, for people who are reading the blog post listening to the podcast, all the ways to raise capital, like what have they not heard that you want to share with them right now that they need to hear. Uh okay, what are they not heard? I'm trying to think of things that haven't been mentioned before. Um ah uh for first is just like, let's just talk about the topic of content, like what you're actually saying. Um the number one piece of advice I give to almost every ceo, particularly a female ceo is, can you please be more ambitious? Okay, so the, I'll give you an example from our company. So I could, I could go in there and say incredible health is a career marketplace for health care workers. Or I could go in there and say incredible health is a career marketplace for health care workers. And we're aiming to be the category defining market leading company in healthcare labor, like which of those is going to have the investor lean in more. Right? So, and, and I think every part of the pitch is supposed to be like a mic drop like that, right? Like that. The way you talk about product, the way you talk about your go to market strategy, the way, like, the way that you paint the picture for the future, just really have to be very, very ambitious because guess what your, what your male counterparts are like going, going in their crazy ambitious too, and you need to really match that level of ambition. Also understand the, the incentives and the numbers that are motivating the venture capitalists to, I mean, they need high returns, really, really high returns. So pitching big tends to help, um, the second piece of advice all offer on the, on the fundraising pieces, just like, do your background references are very, very important. And there really is only one group of backdoor references that matters and that is the other portfolio Ceo. That's it. And so, um, no other investors, not. You know, other people they might have worked with in the past. It's what is going on with the portfolio Ceo, particularly Ceos whose companies have crashed and burned. Oh, and that is the mic drop. We want to put a round of applause together for these two pioneers. Thank you so much for your time.

Cynt Marshall, Chief Executive Officer, Dallas Mavericks
Interviewer: Maria Aspan, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Being Cynt: Leading From The Heart

Being Cynt: Leading From The Heart

turning around toxic workplace culture is no easy task doing it at an organization with a reputation of being a real life animal house that's next level. The Dallas Mavericks were in a heap of trouble facing scathing allegations of sexual harassment and workplace misconduct. Mavs owner Mark Cuban tapped her next leader for help ST martial. She's been called a trail blazer, a dynamic force. And as a woman of many firsts that includes becoming the first black woman to hold the position of Ceo in the history of the NBA. And she's just authored her first book. Her memoir titled, You've been chosen thriving through the unexpected. Perfectly fitting for a conversation. Sin joins fortunes, Maria aspen to talk about transformation, facing challenges and building success through transparency, trust and values based leadership. Please welcome saint and Maria to stage, I'm not playing. I cannot compete with a shoe game. You know, there's a story there. I do. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so good to be here. So good to be back. Y'all having a good time. Me, I'm having a ball. Well, let's start with the shoes because I read your book on the plane, you've been chosen. Um, made me laugh, made me gas, made me cry. And you tell a story in there about how at one point at a T and T. When offered a promotion, you were told not to wear red shoes. Yes. What? That's what I said. Well, yes, when I first, when I got my officer promotion, um, it was a big promotion. So I was all excited about it. And so as I'm accepting the promotion, my boss said okay so let me give you some advice. Uh I need you to stop uh you know saying words like blessed, so say lucky I need you to change your hair. She left them at on my desk uh that she wanted me to start wearing white, changed my hair. I mean she just had a laundry list of things. Uh she wanted me to cut my hair, my husband is in the background saying just I have a barber, don't worry about it like this is good. And I said uh and I thought about 19 years prior, my first week in the company when my boss Um and it's well intentioned so don't get me wrong, she was well intentioned uh told me to take off my red shoes and get rid of my braids. I was 21 years old and I did it because you know I was getting what I thought was good advice and she wanted me to be appropriate for the culture. She said it was too ethnic. I went home, I stayed up all night with my sister and my mom and we took the braids out and I came back to work looking like she told me to look. So here it is 19 years later I'm getting the same kind of advice and I turned down the officer promotion. I said uh at some point I got to do me, you don't get, you don't coaching is one thing. But to fundamentally change who I am. And so I already had a great job. I turned it down and then a few minutes later the chairman of the company called and he said sent because she told me to change my name because nobody knows what scent is. I had to be Cindy and I said no, I'm sent and he said sent and he started all over and told me it was okay to be me. I could wear what I wanted to wear. Just keep producing. And so now it's my statement. Usually when I go out, I have some red or pink well and the color is also a statement. Yes, it is because it is breast cancer awareness month. And so we have all been impacted by it. I have a sister, uh sister in law who is a four time breast cancer survivor and still fighting it. And so I just wanted to wear pink just in honor of breast cancer. As you know, I'm a colon cancer survivor. And just wanted to send a message to all of us women. Let's take care of our health. I think we all need to have PMS physical, mental and spiritual health. There's another story in your book that made me so angry when you were diagnosed with colon cancer. Well no, I'm sorry when you had your scan that turned up cancerous and the doctor wanted to delay the surgery to remove the tumor and you had to really sit in his office and advocate for him to schedule surgery. Just how did you find the wherewithal to just advocate for yourself for the thing that he later admitted to you would have cost you your life. I just had to I didn't have a choice after I got that colonoscopy. And it was my fault that I delayed the colonoscopy. So I literally meet people now and they tell me their age I'm like, have you had a colonoscopy and everything? What is wrong with this woman? So I delayed it. And so literally my last day of 50 I had a colonoscopy and on my 51st birthday, I got a call from my gastroenterologist and get to a surgeon. When I got to the surgeon surgeon, he looked at the scan and he said, I've seen tumors like this before. You're okay. Don't delay your holiday plans. We can put this off a couple of months. And something just told me we couldn't. And so I wouldn't leave his office. And so for an hour and a half, I just kept saying, no, it's friday. And I'm having surgery on monday. And so he finally looked at my husband and he said, is she going to leave? My husband said she's not going to leave. So the doctor gave me two of his library and all that I came back, I said it's a beautiful library when his surgery. And so somehow after an hour and a half, he found a hospital, which was right up the street from my house, uh to do the surgery. And uh even after the surgery, he said, don't worry about the pathology report. Um, I'm sure it's not cancer. And and he was just, he was going by his professional opinion. I mean just based on, you know, his 22 five years of what he, you know what he saw in tumors. But I just felt like I needed to advocate for myself and not let it go. I looked at that. Um, I looked at the results and it just looked ugly and I said I wanted out, I wanted out. And so I'm glad I got it out. When he called me the day before New Year's Eve. He said, I hope you're sitting down. I have some news, It's bad and it's significant. And I was actually on the phone working over the holidays with one of my lobbyist trying to lay out our legislative agenda in north Carolina. And he said you have stage three colon cancer one left note away from Stage four. And it was the first time in my life. And actually the only time that it was just an out of body experience because you know, I'm this hard working woman probably had ignored all the signs and I did have signs. Somebody asked me a long time ago, did you ever have symptoms? And I said no, I don't think so. And then when I really thought about it, I did have signs and I was just working hard and take care of my business and raising my kids. And I just worked right through the signs. And so when he told me that, he said, you must hate me and I told him, I said actually I don't, you, you you've actually gone up and not in my book because for someone who was positive about me not having cancer, I mean, you knew you were convinced I didn't have it. But you still did your job. You biopsied everything you needed to biopsy. So You're okay. Let's let's let's do what we need to do. And so we did chemo and it was a pretty bad prognosis. And that was 11 years ago. I'm still here. That's why I'm so fired up all the time. I am living my best life. So I wanna maybe go back four years now. You get tired from A. T. And T. After almost 36 years, they're accomplishing so much breaking so many barriers. And uh Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks calls you asks you to come be the Ceo first black female ceo in the N. B. A. Except that, oh yes, the Mavericks have been in the news for having a terrible toxic culture of sexual harassment, domestic violence and he's asking you to come and fix it. What made you say? Yes. Well, first of all, when Mark Cuban called me, Okay, don't judge me. I didn't know Mark Cuban. Okay. I mean I didn't know him. And so I have started my own consulting company. I was on the phone with one of my clients and my phone kept going off my, my other cell phone and I have four kids. And so I and two of them are in college. I actually thought it was one of my kids uh texted me for money. And so I had, you know, because I'm a busy woman. So I'm like, don't try to call me, just text me what you need when you square it up later. So I gave my husband the phone and I said, one of the kids need money, take care of it. And he came back and said, uh, this dude doesn't need any money. And I said, what? He said, he said, Mark Cuban is trying to reach you. I said, who is that? I didn't know Mark Cuban. Right? So he's trying to tell me shark tank. I've never seen shark tank. So he tried to tell me all this. And he said just hang up the phone and call the man back. And so when I talked to Mark, he told me about a Sports illustrated article that just came out and all about sexual harassment. He wanted to see me at two o'clock and I said and my husband at this point is already looking at the maps colors. He's getting dressed. He's like, we're going to see this guy. And so I told him, I said he wanted to see me at two o'clock. I said I can't come and see you. I have a mammogram at two o'clock. He said, well you're going to meet you out there. No, I don't need you to come to the mammogram. Uh I said I'll try to get to you by 4:00. So by the time I got when I got back my husband was all dressed in matching colors and all that. And so we got to mark and by the time I got that Maria, I had decided I wasn't going to do it. I said I am not, I'm sorry my glasses are fogging up. I said I am not going to work in this culture. What woman in her right mind wants to work here. I said I already have a brand. I spent 36 years building this brand. I kind of don't want to be associated with this. I'm not going to do it. My husband's like just talk to him. Okay, so we walk in. I spent an hour with mark and on my way for 55 minutes and on my way out of and he was very he was very honest about what was going on, everything that was happening. It was horrific. And so on my way out of his office to women stopped me and they said, are you the person who mark who mark human said is gonna come and save us? And I said no I can't come and save you. And they said no we need you. And they started telling me their stories. And the more these women talked to me, the more I thought about a blog that I had posted that morning called Impact and it was about what impact was I going to have next in my life? And then one of them said the magic words, she said we think you could really come and impact the situation. And then I thought about the work that I did at a T and T. That landed us unfortunate great 100 best places to work list for the first time in the history of our company. I thought about that work that I had done a year prior and I thought okay maybe I am uniquely qualified to come and help out. Said I'd go home and pray about it. The next day I came in all of these people for three hours had me in the conference room telling me their stories. And I thought you know what, I gotta do this for the sisterhood. Now the brotherhood will benefit. But I gotta do this for the sisterhood. These women deserve a great place to work. And so that's why I said yes because I wanted to give them a great place to work And how did you do that? four years later, four years later, what I did, I came in and I laid out a vision that said, we would set the global standard in the NBA for diversity, equity and inclusion. I laid out a set of values that spill crafts, character, respect, authenticity, fairness, teamwork and safety, both physical and emotional safety. We put together, I laid out a 100 day plan that had four major parts model zero tolerance. So put that whole infrastructure in place around compliance and all of that, a mavs women's agenda and expressed agenda to educate empower and elevate women. When I got to the mavs, we had 10 white men running the Dallas Mavericks. So my first meeting, there were 10 white men and then they brought in two women who were not in leadership to try to take me out. So I would think I would think they were at the table, but I knew better. And so so I want to express agenda to, to lift women uh, and then all of our cultural transformation, deny stuff and then just basic operational effectiveness, Just market based compensation address gender pay equity and all of that. Within 90 days of laying out this vision the values the 100 day plan, I diversified my leadership team. Within 90 days we went from 10 white men running the Dallas Mavericks to 50% women and 50% people of color. And that's throughout the entire organization. So we focused a lot on bringing women to the table. Our workplace promises every voice matters and everybody belongs. And I told them this promise and these values would operate in the halls, not just on the walls. And so we laid out our plan we executed on it and we were bold about it. We were very intentional. I call it all in leadership being intentional, uh inclusive, insightful and inspirational. And so that's what we did. And at my age and my brand, I wasn't afraid of it. I said we are going to put these sisters in charge and we're going to handle our business. And for the last two years we have won the NBA's inclusion leadership award. We've handled our business. Congratulations. Thank you. Unfortunately. We still see some similar issues popping up at other organizations, including in the N. B. A. How do we get to a point where that doesn't happen anymore? Well, I think human behavior is what it is, but I think we have to really practice zero tolerance. There's some things we can't stop from happening, but we can definitely respond to it and send some very powerful messages. Um, I know what the mavs, we have values based employment. Uh, you can't work here if you don't comport with our values. I think we also need to have more women at the table. Uh, there's a lot more women at the table and I think we have to be very intentional about who we hire and what kind of behavior we will tolerate because some of this stuff is not new. Some of these people have done this in the past. And so we have to be very intentional about who we hire, but especially about how we respond to it since they can't cover it up. No. Um, the title of this book is you've been chosen and sent. I have to say. We all feel very fortunate to be chosen by you today. Thank you. Thank you. Oh.

Marne Levine, Chief Business Officer, Meta 
Interviewer: Alyson Shontell, Editor-in-Chief, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Going All-In On The Metaverse

perhaps at some point down the road we'll all be sharing a meal and having these conversations in the metaverse. Um but are you ready for it? Life in the in the immersive virtual world of the metaverse? Our next guest is one of the many people working to make the next generation of the internet a reality and that's despite facing some internal and external headwinds. Marni Levine is chief business officer at meta. Please welcome barney for a conversation with fortune editor Editor in chief Allison Chantelle. All right, good afternoon Marnie. Good afternoon everyone. I hope you're nice and full and ready for discussion. Um Marnie, you had a huge morning this morning. A lot of announcements that metal were made a lot that impact the business community and and maybe the future of work. Could you just give us the key updates? I'd be delighted. Thank you for asking. Yes for those of you who don't know, we just had our big conference this morning, it's called connect. And what we focused on there is about the future of the metaverse and we announced our new um VR device that's our most advanced one called Quest Pro. And uh what quest Pro does is will actually be able to, because of its advanced computing power will be able to help people collaborate better, be more productive at work. So I'm super super excited about what we announced there as part of that. We also announced a variety of partnerships. One was with Microsoft so that you can have access to all of your favorite productivity tools like can you imagine doing work without outlook or word? Um adobe which has, you know, these incredible creator tools um and then also I know you just heard from julie Sweet, we're working with julie Sweet who has been using this technology to train people at accenture and they're very, very well positioned to be able to help other companies who understand the power of this technology, which will change work. And I just wanted to say one other thing about it, because as you can hear, I'm pretty excited about it, which is that if you're sitting in this room and you're kind of wondering like is the metaverse for me, I really would encourage you to try it because it is going to be a game changer and it's particularly going to be a game changer for women, I think um because it levels up the technology and it also levels the playing field and what I mean by that is that it levels it up because the tools are so much better during Covid, we figured out ways to manage and to collaborate and to be productive. We definitely did that. But what this does is it makes you feel like wherever you are in the world you're in the same room together and you can make eye contact, you can get up at the white board and you can brainstorm like you would in an actual meeting room, you can lean back and whisper to the person and have that sidebar conversation like you would in an actual meeting and so you feel like you're in the same room together, the tools we have today, they're good, they get the job done, but this really is going to be a game changer. And the reason why I'm saying level that it will level the playing field is because we know based on lots of studies from McKenzie and others, that women have given, the choice will take a, you know, a more flexible job or a remote option that now eggs and so what this allows is for again, wherever you are in the world, if your home or your someplace else for people to be able to come together and have the same experience, so that will change that and I really believe, thank you for letting me go on about this. Okay, I really believe, I really believe because I know this is top of mind for people that with the right policies and the right social norms, combined with the right kinds of technologies like this, it can be a game changer for work and productivity, so it's a promising founding future, but the future is very hard to build and it's very hard to time. Um this is going to cost meta billions. The company is reorienting a lot of its teams around this efforts um there's skepticism that can work that it will be the future um that this will be what the future looks like even from within meta itself. So the VP of metaverse official Shah has recently admitted there's still no products. It yet, that's natural, it's a new product, that's fine, but the engineers who are building this aren't even quite using this enough um and Matthew Ball, who is a metaverse expert um was quoted as saying, you know, look, there's a risk that almost everything Mark has outlined here about the meta versus rights except that the timing could be farther out than he planned. So how do you weigh that? What if the timing is wrong? I mean, google X has made all these huge Moonshot bets, flying cars, autonomous vehicles are still not here yet, so much money is important, there's a lot at stake. How do you weigh that? Well, let me first explain why we're in this um since I joined the company 12 years ago, and even before that, what this company has been focused on has been about all about connection and community and what the metaverse is, it's a more immersive internet and when you have a more immersive internet, that means that it's inherently social and therefore connection and community is at the center of that, and the way that this will, the way that this will work is it will change many of the things that we do with our friends and family, it'll change the way we entertain, you can do that today, You can go to a concert in the metaverse with the chain smokers and it is fantastic. It can change the way you train doctors and pilots. We have a partnership with L. A. Children's hospital and their training doctors and um and administrators on tough procedures so they can do that not on a person, but like through a simulation in the metaverse and that means something big. It changes the way that we learn just friday night. I was dropping my youngest son off at tennis. Yes, that's what I do on friday night, it's very fun and his tennis coach pulled me aside and asked me whether my son was going to be signing up for this um app that helps you improve your ground strokes and also warm up before matches. Now that was a youth case that I had never thought about, but that is actually in our lives now, that's signing them up for it and that will be in our lives now. So the question is what are the use cases in the future and how will that develop and evolve and it's going to evolve over time, What I've seen so far is really exciting and frankly pretty mind blowing to me. Um and I think the future is going to be bright too, so we are always focused on the next big thing and we are all in and building for this, but we do recognize that it will take time to do it and we're not going to do it alone, we're gonna do in partnership with others, you know, I think another important question to ask is is this a future that's healthy and helpful for everybody? I think we can all agree that future work can definitely be improved. But um I was reading Kashmir Hill did a great review in the new york times of experiencing this metaverse through horizon, which is um your meta versus in the metaverse that meta um and you know, she was saying, you know, there's something here, but I'm legless, my avatar's legless, I'm floating around sometimes. I'm getting kind of accosted. I'm meeting people that have been plug and play for 12 hours a day laying in their bed. Um that is that the future that we want. I'm a little bit scared when I hear that. And um a U. S. Senator recently returned from Silicon Valley and said, you know, I spoke to a lot of people there, but I'm concerned that not enough leaders are seriously asking does innovation actually increased citizens happiness? And so is that a consideration that you're taking into account the company as you're building the future that we all might be using? Well let me talk about it from my personal experience and let me also talk about it from my work experience in my personal experience, what I see with my kids is that I have a 14 year old and a 17 year old is that they'll put on the quest headset, they'll do something like in supernatural or you know, beat favor or something, they'll do that for little while, then they go outside, they play some basketball, they come back in and they do their homework and that's kind of how it works now with my own, with my own kids. Sometimes it's hard to regulate technology and so it's an ongoing conversation that we have. Can anybody relate to that in this room? Yeah, I'm sure you can. Um but we think about that also all the time at work and the experience that we want people to have is that it's intentional and that it's positive and so some of the ways that we're going about helping others think about that is, for example, we launched a family center which gives you visibility transparency around how much time you're using, you know, the quest headset, it also gives you visibility into as parents and also kids into who your kids are connected with, who your teens are connected with. It gives visibility into um it provides visibility around control so that you can, you know, set budgets or limits or you know, mute notifications. That's the kind of world that we want is one where it's intentional and it's positive and so that technology is playing, you know, a fun and good role in people's lives. So the metaverse is going to be, you know, years in the future, you're still building Um there's a lot going on, but there's so much more to talk about meta. So I do wanna continue just in general, it seems to be wartime at meta, this is a company that has experienced pretty much nothing but growth growth, growth, growth growth for 18 years and then all of a sudden that growth is slowing the stock price is down about 60%. Um Since last year there are new threats like Tiktok is uh seems to be the company, everybody's talking about Silicon Valley is taking time and attention away from the traditional tech platforms. The core business needs to shift in advertising which you oversee a lot of because of privacy is now paramount in advertising. That's a shift to um how how do you lead during war time? You joined during growth time have been there through a heck of a ride, but now the winds of change have come in. How are you, how are you navigating that? Well, you just outlined a lot of stuff that's going on, which is, which is true, It's a challenging macroeconomic environment. They're out there for all businesses um including ours there, the digital advertising industry has most definitely been changing for the reasons that you mentioned, Apple made a bunch of changes on their platform and it changed the way businesses big and small are able to find new customers. Um and um and then as you said that there's also competition out there. I mean the advertising industry is one that is always been competitive, it is always changing and it's actually one of the things that I really love about it because it means that what we need to do is that we need to earn every dollar every minute that is spent on the platform And we need to make sure that we have the best solutions available for businesses. So I'm doing what we've always done which is working on making sure that we're working with the 200 million businesses that are on our platform, businesses that are big, but the vast majority of them are small businesses who have very few resources at the disposal, who are looking for profitability and growth, strong return on investment and doing that and making sure that they understand how to use the tools and solutions that we have on our platform in order to be able to grow. But what about your team? Like it's hard to lead a team when they're saying we're hiring, they're hiring freeze is coming, this is gonna be a really hard year were um you know, this is a difficult time of the company and it's such a great question. And over the last few years in Covid uncertainty, I've been able to hone these skills as a leader of the company and you know, one of the things that I learned, I think especially during Covid was that was the importance of communication and really bringing people along on the journey, Things were changing quickly during, during Covid, people felt disconnected during Covid and so really trying to communicate with them regularly through um some of the different tools whether it was video or having Q. And A. In their lives or different ways of connecting and bringing people together and the same is true here now I think that the people at meta, one thing that they understand is that they generally have this mindset which is that there's sort of an acceptance that things are gonna change and evolve. Like if you're, if you're not, if you don't, if you're not comfortable with that it's probably not the right place for you. They are also used to anticipating what kinds of changes are coming along and then adapting to those things and so with my teams, I try to help them along in that journey and understand where we are and where we're going and how best that they can play a role in making that transformation. Um Marnie, one question I wanted to ask too is there's been so much restructuring at the company. I mean Cheryl left, she built the business from nothing to what it was. Um she brought you into the company I believe and and was mentor even in politics before you went to Silicon Valley and joined meta. Um what is the restructuring meant for you? How have you thought about your career, what changes have come for you at meta? Well there have been changes and um Cheryl was an unbelievable leader at the company. I mean there's no question about it, she had just an incredible impact on the company and the culture on the business and I would argue not just on meta but on companies, organizations and institutions around the world. She is incredible. She also is incredibly thoughtful and intentional about making sure that she leaves organizations in a better place than what the way she found them. And she in particular something that I learned from her was the way in which she really focused on finding and developing really great leaders at the company and making sure that we had deep, deep bench at the company and so I sort of look around, you heard from Susan lee are incoming CFO, yesterday I look at other women who, you know, Cheryl has really helped develop, like bringing in gen new set, who's our general counsel or Lori Goler, who is our Chief people Officer or Maxine Williams, who's our Chief diversity officer Nicola Mendelssohn, who's on my team who runs the global business group. There are so many great leaders and also women women make up 30% of our executive team who are in place and who are focused and who are incredibly talented and capable and it's up to us now to really lead going forward. We're excited to see what you do at meta. Um a lot to be done and a lot of work to do, but godspeed, thank you.

Michelle Gass, Chief Executive Officer, Kohl’s
Julie Sweet, Chair and CEO, Accenture  
Moderator: Alan Murray, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Driving Fundamental Change

and so we're going to continue the conversation now with two leaders who exemplify purposeful leadership. Michelle Gass is Chief Executive of coals, she oversees more than 1100 stores e commerce operations and more than 1000 associates and julie Sweet is chair and chief executive of accenture. She was number two on this year's M. P. W list, so she still has something to strive for. Um and I'd also like to mention as they come out, please Michelle and and julie join me. That center was one of the founding knowledge partners for fortune connect. So we've enjoyed our support and partnership from them. Thank you both for being here and julie thank you for your support for connect. Well it's a great program so I will give a great plug for it because it's really helped us connect our next time leaders to great people in content. So we've really enjoyed being able to be one of the early partners know and you've you've helped us form it and Michelle, thank you for joining for this conversation. So, so the topic has changed, which is uh I mean I've been a journalist looking at business for more than four decades. I've never seen anything quite like what you all are dealing with now. I mean you have this huge technology revolution julie that you're right at the center of pretty much a complete rethinking of the purpose of the corporation, you have the energy transformation going on, which is huge. Uh and now thanks to the pandemic. We're all rethinking how we work at the office. So so many different levels of change going on at the same time and julie, if I can start with you, how do you advise companies on how to deal with this so much coming at them at once? Well, alan I think you you have you caught it well there is so much and so, you know, it's important as leadership teams to be able to both zoom out and zoom in uh in the sense of both what you're going to drive today, but how you think about the future. And so we are really talking to ceos today around five key forces of change, the first being the total enterprise reinvention through technology. I'm fond of saying that every strategy leads to technology and I think you're gonna hear a little bit more about that from Michelle and uh and that's different though than what we've seen over the last several years when you talk about digitization, because it's actually an approach that says, I know that I have to systematically reinvent everything that we do every part of the is everywhere we went, we engage and and that has profound implications for how you invest and how you think about the future. The second is talent and I'm sure we're gonna get into that and it's about how you access talent create talent and really unlock the potential of the talent. The third is sustainability broadly, of course it includes the energy transformation, but it's also about, you know re skilling your people, it's about diversity, that's what you do in the communities and how that all translates also to your bottom line. The fourth is the metaverse continuum. And I will say lots of debate around this, but there isn't a company or industry that doesn't need to be thinking about what is it going to be like to go through virtual in and out of the virtual and physical world and how will that profoundly change everything from what we buy, how we buy it to how we work. And then finally the ongoing technology revolution, which is both what we're investing in today. But you know, we we already have paid work in space and so you know, being able to think ahead and really understand those trends and how they might affect you is also an important part of what Ceos and their leadership teams have to do today. And I want to come back in a minute to how you do that, but let's dive a little deeper because certainly the retail sector has felt this In spades. I mean we saw the incredible acceleration of everything digital during the pandemic, but then also continuing trends. How's it affected cold? Oh my gosh! I mean when I think about the last time, I was actually at this conference 2019 to where we are today, like retail is a completely different industry. Um so many changes from, you know what living through the pandemic supply chain challenges the spikes in demand, that pull back and demand labor etcetera. But I say, you know when you take a step back, probably the thing we can all relate to is just the change in how people shop and what was already a trend going into the pandemic on online clearly dramatically shifted so that everybody um is comfortable. But I think more than that it raised the bar and the customer really is in charge. So you know, they want these, they want convenience, they want Discovery, they want inspiration, all of that and depending on what needs state, you know, depends on do they want an in and out experience or do they want Discovery? So for people like us, it's how do we deliver that online? It can be quick in and out or in the store where you do things like buy online pick up in store. Now. We're even doing that, not at the service desk, but you know, you can do it on your own with, but it is definitely not what we thought five years ago, the end of brick and mortar. Absolutely not. I am a huge believer in stores and you know, I think we've all felt this as well. Got back to some normalcy, you know, there's a social part of shopping, shopping should be fun and entertaining. Sometimes it's more mission driven and coles is great for that when you get your socks and your underwear and what have you. Very big businesses for us, but at the same time more and more, we're seeing customers who want unique brands and we're doing a lot of transformation on our portfolio, including our recent launch with support. I mean the other, yeah, the support deal we should talk about. But the other thing that's uh, must be so difficult right now is because in part because of these outside forces, consumer tastes changed so fast. I mean one day everybody's buying yoga pants and the next day they're on to something else. You can't really predict it based on past trends. No, and I think that's where data comes in. Um, so we have a lot more information today. Um, that's driven by data versus what did you sell last year? But I also think it's important as a retailer to not just react in the here and now, but look at long term trends. So for us, you know, we have this strategy to really win in the casual and active lifestyle. People, another shift coming out of the pandemic is, you know, maybe they're dressing up a little bit more, but their expectations about being comfortable is here to stay. So, um, they are still working to work. No, I mean look at look at what you're wearing on your feet, you get the sneakers, you're looking cool. I mean, so I think on the days where there's a formula, a formula for how you want to dress. But I think comfort is universal and that's right in cold sweet spot. But you have to constantly be adapting and evolving your, you know how you're showing up to make sure it's relevant. So julie, you advise companies in multiple industries on how to deal with that. What's the top level advice you got? Everybody in this room is dealing with this in one way or another. I think there's no question about that, what's the top you give them on how to manage it? Well first I just want to reinforce that, I'm not giving up my yoga pants. I was like no, I'm not giving them up. It is very very very good. You know, I would go to data as being the universal and you just heard that from Michelle and and you know this is the area where I think everyone intuitively understands the data is important and I have not yet found a company that has actually solved the problems of data and that's in part because up until really the pandemic, lots of things around data were point solutions, you are solving a specific problem because it was really expensive too To solve the big data problem. And what we've been going through over the last 2.5 years is actually a fundamental shift in business where we're re platform ng to the cloud and just to give you some sense of it a decade ago, our cloud business is a billion dollars today. It's $26 billion $12 billion dollar business. So it is just massively changed. And the reason that's so important when you think about what companies have to do with data is that is it is the fundamental foundation to be able to use data in real time. What you're starting to now go to and you are already leading, there is data at the edge in the store, in the hands of those who are serving customers in the hands of the customers. There's a fundamental different way that you have to both build your technology but understand how people want to shop and then how do you deliver that and how do you deliver that at the right time. And so as you think about, you know, the fundamental changes whether it's the long term business trades the five key forces of change, Making sure you understand what is your path to true. Being able to capture your own data and other data to use it as a competitive advantage is probably one of the highest priorities today for companies, people have questions anybody want in here. I want to make sure that if you do have questions, as I said, I know all of you are dealing with this happy, happy to take them. Let me ask you while while people are getting their hands moving into the air, uh recession seems to be on everyone's lips, we're headed for one. How does that affect with so many demands on the business to invest for change? How do you do that when resources start to get squeezed? Yeah, so sure I'll start that. I mean, I think the coals, you know, we've already started feeling it. Um you know, we operate in the more discretionary categories as opposed to food and gas and where a lot of buzz Are being constrained and so as we see this unfolding, we are quickly adapting to make sure that okay, parts of our product portfolio that stand for value, we're amplifying. I'm so excited. We just talked about consumer data. I mean we serve 65 million customers across the country. We have over 30 million. Our loyalty program, it is like for someone passionate about data, it's it's a treasure trust and we're able to tailor and actually do different offers for julie and Allen based on what's going to get them motivated to come and shop. So that that especially in this environment is extremely powerful to make sure that you're giving offers to people who need it versus not. But there has to be a temptation julie when you start looking at those numbers and the resources start to shrink of saying, let's hold off on that, let's hold off on this, I would say yes and what more companies today that what we're seeing is they're using this as a catalyst for change. So the harder things oftentimes, the harder things are around really structurally changing your cost structurally changing the way you're working. And if we go back to the need to do Total Enterprise Reinvention, one of the barriers is that it was easier to do things around the edge to talk about innovation as a separate group to do something that's very clear at the consumer actually fundamentally run finance differently, go from finance all the way to the customer to change the supply chain so you can act on the data. It fundamentally changes lots of people's jobs. You know, manufacturing is a great place, great companies right now who are leading or digitizing manufacturing. One of the first things they dealt with is that plants have are like kingdoms, They the person who runs the plant, they got to decide. So suddenly having someone come in and say, techno is going to change and you're not going to have a choice. It's a huge change. Using a time like this, right where you want to be investing to win, where you've got cost pressures more ceos that I'm talking about. I'm not talking about cutting back. They're talking about now is the time. I could not agree more with that. And I have heard you say a number of times that the gap between the leaders and the laggers is widening. It sounds like at a time like this, there's the potential for it to get even wider. It is, although the shift, I think that's happened over the pandemic and and I think that's what Michelle is gonna talk to is you have more companies who are saying we want to leapfrog and who and, and and and that is driving. We certainly driving our business. We had 100 clients last year who did $100 million of bookings or more on a quarter with us as compared to 72 the year before. In the face of all that uncertainty. Why? Because that's a proxy. It's yes, of course, it's good about our results, but it's a proxy for the ambition and level of change that is happening even as those same companies are seeing the interesting Michelle. You have an extra fun pressure which is activists in your stock. I mean, you had one group that you dealt with now, you have a new groups calling for you and your chairman both to resign. You, you the the pace of transformation is so fast and then when you have this added issue on the side, how do you deal with it? Well, first and foremost, you gotta stay focused on the business and your team. Um, I engage with all of our shareholders. I engage with the activists always open to ideas that can drive long term shareholder value. Um, I feel very confident our strategy. I just building on what you said. I mean, we're navigating the here and now the pressures that we are feeling, especially in our customer segment. At the same time, we're spending hundreds of millions of dollars to roll out before because that is our future. And so, you know, we're in it to drive shareholder value for everyone and you know, that don't be distracted totally. One last thing I have to do before we let people go to law lunch, uh, julie, I happen to know today is your birthday. It's a big one. It's a big one. And so I think before you get your lunch, you should all sing. Happy birthday to julie. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, Dear julie. Happy birthday to you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Vanessa Pappas, Chief Operating Officer, TikTok 
Interviewer: Emma Hinchliffe, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Community Building’s Latest Sensation

Community Building’s Latest Sensation

being in this community and as a co chair of this summit is such an honor. Um we really love and appreciate our community of most powerful women and the hundreds of you that make it special. So thank you for being here now. I am trying to wrap my head around what it is like being on a team that oversees a community of millions and potentially billions of people because I can tell you on behalf of everyone at fortune, Just overseeing a community of hundreds is a fair amount of work, but overseeing this much larger community is the job of Vanessa Pappas, chief operating officer of Tiktok. The social media app has more than 3.5 billion downloads, more than one billion active users a month and is poised to reach close to two billion active users a month. By the end of the year, the community has become, the company has become a digital powerhouse and a global cultural force, but at a time of such incredible growth and influence, it's also navigating geopolitical challenges and government scrutiny. Please join me in welcoming Vanessa for a conversation with Fortune, senior writer and M. P. W. Summit co chair and the Hench list. Thank you. Right. Hi Vanessa, thank you for buying. Hi everybody. So before you were at Tiktok, you worked in tech for several years, including at Youtube when you took your first job at Tiktok, did you have any idea it would thrust you into the spotlight in this way. No idea. I think, you know, certainly I always believed in the product and the amazing communities that have really uh found to foster on Tiktok, but I think the success that we've had is just been unparalleled and certainly in the short time frame that we've had that success. So it was a surprise, to say the least. So you've repeatedly said that this is a top of mind for many people and dominating the headlines, you repeatedly said that Tiktok has not and would not send data to the Chinese government. What gives you the confidence to make that claim both in the past and looking ahead to the future, you know, what assurances do you personally have? That, that won't happen. Yeah. So really, for us, it's all about the responsibility of the platform to ensure the safety and security of our users here in the U. S. And around the world and that's something that we're heavily investing in. And the way we do it is, you know, in a number of ways. So one where we store our data, how we put the right access controls around that data and then the transparency of all those actions and so everything that we've been doing knowing that we are highly scrutinized platform, that we have a lot of attention on our efforts and our practices were really looking to ensure that we're putting the best foot forward and we do that through those efforts and transparency. So, you know, in terms of assurances, we have our checks and balances in terms of storing that data locally, ensuring that we have the right access controls around it, but really bringing in the visibility to that and, you know, for many ways to talk sexually leading the industry and those transparency efforts. So recently we announced the oracle is actually going to be vetting and validating all of our systems, which is an industry first. You know, if Tiktok under some circumstances were ever banned in the U. S. Could the company survive as a business? Look, I think for Tiktok, you know, it is amazing app that really has um just found uh, such amazing communities around the world and the relevancy that Tiktok has, has become in people's daily lives is just unparalleled again. And so whether you're in the US or you know, in other parts of the world, whether that's in africa to europe, you know, it's just phenomenal to see how each culture is really adapted Tiktok as a form of creative expression and finding their sense of community and voice. So yes, look, I don't think that scenario is gonna play out, but really it is a phenomenon that we're seeing around the world. You have a lot of imitators including metal which attempted to overhaul instagram to more closely resemble Tiktok and then walk that back. Why did their attempts fail? I think the community always speaks for what is going to really resonate and work for them and, you know, the great news for consumers today is there's so much like there's a plethora of choice in the plethora of platforms and so your ability to express yourselves today and find an audience really is um just, you know, there's a multiplicity of ways that you can do that and Tiktok obviously being one and one that we think is very creative and joyful and you know, we call Tiktok the last sunny spot on the internet and so, you know, we're really upholding that community and that's what you're looking for. You coming to Tiktok. There are other platforms that will have similar features, but for us it always comes back to the community. Yeah. You know, what is it about Tiktok that makes the product so popular and so addictive. So I think the popularity of Tiktok and for those in the room have who have experienced it, I mean show of hands by the end of the day, we want to see all because it really is, I think a platform for everyone, right, we really pride ourselves in the diversity of voices that are on Tiktok and that really has grown and changed over the years um since our inception. And so when we think about what's special about Tiktok, it really is a couple of things. One just the, the barrier for entry in terms of creation is really lowered like anybody can get on and create a video. Um, similarly, the ability to get discovered is also radically fast. So you can consume a lot of content in a short period of time and videos get discovered very easily and can go viral largely because of the short format that it is. So I think across those two things, what we've seen is essentially a redefining of entertainment. You know, we think of Tiktok as an entertainment platform powered by the communities and, and that really has shifted the onus in terms of what the platform is, how we define entertainment, how we define creators and it really does enable like this diversity of voices that we haven't otherwise seen. Yeah, I'm gonna go to you guys for questions in a moment. So start thinking um, what do you see on your for you page and what's your favorite Tiktok trends? I see, I mean I see so many things and I think the thing that's magical about Tiktok is that it really is this kind of surprising experience where you can go in with one set of interests and then you'll discover this whole other world that you were just like didn't know about. Um, obviously we've seen successes with things like book talk where you're seeing books and the, the reading community really gravitate to certain literature and then that those books are like being propelled to the new york times bestseller list. So our hashtag book talk has over 80 billion views, which is just phenomenal to think about the power of the communities getting behind things like, you know, literature today. Um, my personal feed is really a mix of old things. So obviously I'm a pet lover, I'm a mom right now, my kids back to school. So one of my favorite creators is Gabby Amorosa who does all these like lunch box hacks and things like that. So it really is, you know, anything and everything. But uh, there's just the, I think the diversity of the content really is what makes it so special. Yeah. You know, the platform platform is powerful in a lot of ways, you know, like facebook talk has the power to influence how people view the world at scale. You know, we saw an example of this recently with the johnny Depp, Amber heard trial where content that was really anti Amber heard really proliferated on the platform and influence how people, especially young tiktok users viewed that trial and this cultural consequences. Um, you know, how are you thinking about that problem? How are you addressing the issue? And does your approach to content moderation differ from competitors? Like yeah, I would say, you know, we take all these issues really seriously. And one of the things that they created early on was something called r content advisory council. And so what we do in that scenario is we bring in a number of experts, They sit on our council, we meet on a quarterly basis and also more regularly when certain incidences arise. Um, that needs greater attention and and that's really an opportunity for us to hear about experts who are on the cutting edge of their field? Thinking about things like cyber billing, minor safety, you know, hate and harassment, any of the issues that can have happen at a response like at a platform of scale and so with things like that trial, we're certainly looking at it from the trust and safety perspective to ensure that we are safeguarding our community as being healthy and vibrant and inclusive space for all. And we're looking at ensuring that we're enforcing our community guidelines that really enable that healthy ecosystem to exist. So that was obviously one where our trust and safety teams were doing sweeps of the content, making sure that we're upholding um, and removing any content that was deemed inappropriate for the platform, I would say, you know, when you compare us to other platforms, I think we take a higher bar in many ways um in terms of the types of content that we would deem violative um certainly if you look at things like misinformation and other challenges that, you know, now we're coming into an election cycle. So it's top of mind, those are certain areas for us that we really do take a fairly strict approach. Do you have any questions Okay, keep thinking um, you know, I think most companies, most brands are at this point, aware of the power of Tiktok, but how do you see large brands and advertisers using the platform well and where do you think there may be missing out on the potential. So you know, where we're seeing brands do well is where they're engaging with the community. And you know, if you think of about Tiktok and the differences to some of the other platforms, it really is more of an authentic experience. And so you know, one of our first kind of campaigns to advertisers was talking about, you know, don't make ads make Tik Toks and I think that really resonates because it really gets to the heart of how can you show up as a brand and talk to the community because it really is a conversation, I think one of the most interactive platforms out there, it really does um just lean into that experience of having this dialogue and and that's why you see like the viral trends really take a foothold because it is this like chain effect of the conversation and these cultural moments that really resonate with people. And so you know, whether that's like, you know, recently we saw Taco Bell work with Doja Cat around like uh discontinued item that they had on Pizza Mexican pizza. And so they did this whole thing and she did a song about like wanting to bring this pizza back and you know, Taco Bell leaned in and then like there was a whole kind of community uprising around like this pizza. So uh, this is crazy and then, you know, but any, any time where we see brands really lean in and be a part of that conversation, that's where we see the magic happen. Um, and certainly, you know, Tiktok has been known as being a shelf clearer in that way. You know, we've seen trends like the feta pasta trend or you know, and feathers like flying off the shelves and ocean spray with the Nathan Apodaca video, like, you know, you can't go into a store and find ocean spray. So, um, beauty products, you know, I think Rihanna with Fenty is really lent into the product, leaned into the product as well and just like really engaging the community. So I think a lot of it is just like how do you show up with an authentic voice and find ways that you can connect with your community and I think that's where the magic happens. Social media managers love to make tick talks about all the trends legal won't let them participate in. And so that's certainly not something you're seeing on instagram ads? Yeah. Um, are there any misconceptions about Tiktok, anything that you, you know object to that you hear in the news or other where I think, you know, where you were talking before about, you know, what is what makes Tiktok so unique and so special and just seeing the genesis of the platform, you know, I've been, I've been with Tiktok since the early days of late 2018 and 2019 and it really was seen more as a gen Z platform at that time. And I think just seeing kind of the growth and like the diversity of the content, a lot of the misperceptions that we're getting is oh, it's still a gen Z app or it's still like lip sync content. But talking before about like trends like book talk where or you know, there really is an audience for the content that you're going to put up as well as the things that you're interested in. I can guarantee you'll find something interesting and entertaining on Tiktok no matter your age, demographic background and so on. So I think that's the kind of misperception that we often face. Yeah. Do we have a question? I thought I saw a hand. Oh yes, right here. Um, sorry, a microphone should be headed your way. Hi from Charles Schwab um, to your mother. And one of the things that I think about is just the, you know, all the data about how much kids are spending time online. I'm curious like how do you manage that with your family? How do you think about how much time they should be spending on Tiktok and all the other places they might be online, screens are hard, especially coming out of a pandemic. I thought it was a mom who is not going to allow my kids to be on screens and you know, granted minor young, so they're four and six. Um but the way that we think about it from the platform perspective and and the sense of responsibility is we look to put the right set of controls um that you as a parent can access for your team. Um So we actually created something called family pairing a couple of years ago, which enables you to pair your device to your team's device and have a set of controls to understand what they're watching and and all of that. And and I think you know, again, that was like industry leading at the time. Um but all of those kind of areas of like how much time people are spending on app is certainly something to be cognizant of. We actually, you know, speaking to the power of our community, we actually engage our community to have them create essentially P. S. A. S. Uh for the platform. So if you were ever scrolling through Tiktok and you've been on it for a little while, you will come across the video that says, hey, why don't you take a break. Um so and we do it in the voice of our creative because we find that's more of an authentic and effective way to communicate to our communities. So we look at it really holistically. Again, I mentioned the content advisory council before where we have experts on youth who help give guidance in terms of some of the tools or features that we should be thinking about, but certainly from like a policy perspective as well. Well, thank you so much, Vanessa. Thank you for being with us. Thank you.

Lynn Martin, President, NYSE Group 
Interviewer: Ruth Umoh, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Powering The Exchange

at the start of 2022 she was tapped to head up one of the most iconic and influential business institutions in the world. The new york stock exchange where more than two billion shares are traded each day. Lynn martin became the 16th president of the N. Y. S. C. In early january, becoming only the second woman in the exchanges 230 year history to do so. She has led the exchange through a volatile time since taking the reins, fears of recession, inflation and rising interest rates and a bear market. But perhaps that's par for the course. When leading the world's largest stock exchange, Lynne joins us today to talk about her core belief how they could apply more broadly in business and what it will take to succeed in the job and more. Please welcome Lynn for a conversation with my colleague and M. P. W. Co chair ruth. You mo All right, Lynn martin in the flesh. Thank you so much for joining us. Of course, of course Emma alluded to in the introduction to this segment. You sure picked an opportune time, head of the new york stock exchange, rampant market volatility, A looming recession by some estimates and inflation record high inflation. How are you navigating all of those opposing forces while still remaining agile while still, you know, future proof in the business. Talk to us. Yeah. So it's my belief that you know, when there's times of disruption, there's times of volatility. There are a couple of core things you can do as a leader. # one, you've got to communicate and the way I apply that to business is our job as an exchange during this time is to ensure that our markets remain open, that our markets remain efficient, that our customers have the best experience possible to manage risk. Uh It's also in my mind and time to think differently um and build for the future and think about not just the exchange of today but the exchange of three years from now, five years from now and what do I want that to look like? What do we want that to look like? So I think it's the new york stock exchange. It's very important given the volatility of the market, given the uncertainty in the mar That we remain very visible uh to allay whatever fears both investors as well as issuers may have. And more importantly than ever it's our job to advocate in this time of immense change for those companies that have chosen to be members of our community. There's 2400 listed companies that we have. Yes, let's talk about some of those fears you took over the reins of the exchange following consecutive record years for new listings. It's seen at the top of the year that we see a continuation of that. That obviously hasn't happened. Is everyone still on hold break this down for us. What's going on the I. P. O. Market. Yeah the I. P. O. Market that first of all the public market currency has never been stronger. The amount of conversations we have with companies in our pipeline continues. Apace Companies still want to go public but they don't want to go public when you don't know if the Dow is going to be up or down 12, points on any one given day. So that's kind of what you're seeing at the moment. You see a bunch of companies that have been private are stacked up there waiting for the time when the market starts to calm down from a volatility perspective. And one of the metric I look at is not just you know the overall market barometers of what the dow is with the S. And P. 500. But also look at the vix a lot. The vix is the measure of equity market volatility. That's the key metric until you see that get below 20 for a sustained period of time. The floodgates I don't think are gonna open on. Those companies have been talking to us for a while who even working with for a while. Um Come to market, are you seeing that apprehension across industries I would assume. Okay there's more apprehension among the tech sector. Energy. Perhaps not so much. Yeah. We have had some IPO's this year. We actually just had our largest I. P. O. In the U. S. Equity markets about a month and a half ago with core bridge which was a spin off of A. I. G. Um went to market, they raised $1.7 billion dollars in this market. The price at the low end of the range. They they're a good core business. There's still demand for that stock and that stock has traded traded well. But we've also seen other sectors come to market, we've seen clean energy, that's been one sector where you have seen some activity. Um You also see businesses like cyber start to think about maybe I should dip my toe mainly because if you think about your own businesses as you plan for 2023 what are areas that you are going to be thinking about? You're gonna be thinking about protecting yourself from cyber risk. I know that's an area that I'm incredibly focused on, but you're also looking at those E. S. G. Metrics and supporting businesses that are promoting the brown to green transition, particularly with our energy markets and energy security continues to be something that you know, we continue to be focused on. I'll soon pivot to discuss USG before I do that. As you said, companies are much more prudent about when they come to market. What do you what do you think it will take for us to see that reversal to what we saw last year? The resurgence of listings. So if I go back, so I'm a statistician by trade. I took a totally non linear path to get here. I was a program, I got a degree in computer science. Um And then because you know, I was a girl living in Manhattan, I decided for good measure to go get a Masters in statistics. So I'm kind of looking at two tails here. Um back to my statistical route. 2021 was one tale where you had the best I. P. O. Year ever. Um and this year you're you have the slowest in terms of proceeds raised in at least a decade. I think probably when the market starts to stabilize, you start to see the mean or the median come back. You're not gonna see a 2021 but you're certainly not going to see a 2022 Lynn when someone googles your name, which I did. What comes up immediately is Lynn martin computer scientist, as you said, you're a statistician, which I think is honestly an apt description. You're obsessed with data encoded in your self proclaimed technique here where it's not mine. What sparked that interest and how are you using that tech background? That data savvy in your current role as the ceo. Yeah, it's I self proclaimed myself as a tech nerd and a data nerd at the same time. So all super interesting ways to flatter oneself as a female. I you know, when I think about when I was in college, back in the late nights when I graduated, I was a computer scientist. I went to go work for IBM. Um as my first job out of college because that's kind of what you did as a computer scientist you went to work for, you know, a big tech firm. Um, I would have never imagined that financial markets would have undergone the revolution that they have. And I wouldn't have also never anticipated that we all would have gone undergone the personal evolution that we had. I think about when I grow Graduate in the late 90s, you know, the.com boom was there. Um, and I didn't have a cell phone, I didn't have an email address. So there are basic things not too long ago that we can all remember that. Yeah, that was the way our lives were. But today we're all attracted to that Darn phone. We're all obsessed with our email. We're all so connected. I think that's a wonderful thing. But I break that down to a really personal example because I think that's the way every business operates now. I don't know of any business in the world that is not using technology in some way, shape or form across industry, be, you know, the consumer facing businesses that leverage online shopping customer analytics for all of your businesses, Those of you who run your businesses, you rely on customer analytics to know your customers better. Um, and every business that I know is really a tech business now. So I think it's hard to delineate what the tech business versus what's what's not a texas? Absolutely. Well, you know, piggybacking off of that, How is the electronic trade and revolution changed financial markets? So I like to say that electron trading has been the great democratize er of financial markets. You think back to, like when I was graduating school there was a bunch of people, most of them were men standing around a pit screaming buys and sells, right? Um and I remember asking my mom, how do you work at the stock exchange? How do you become a stockbroker? And a lot of it was passed on through through lineage was either someone you knew or was your dad or your cousin or brother or whatever the case may be, electronic trading gave a voice to anyone, it's a matching engine does not matter. That does not care what you look like, who you are, how big you are, who you know, it's going to democratize your order input versus someone else's order input. So when I actually joined the exchange industry, it was because not because of my financial background because they needed someone, anyone who could talk to a programmer about how to code to this thing called an A. P. I. As markets were moving more and more electronic. So I think technology has been great, it's a big democratize er for giving us a voice giving women a voice giving people of color, voice giving anyone a voice and that voices on equal footing to everyone else in society. Let's talk Yes. G And circle back to that topic that has become increasingly contentious under your leadership in new york stock exchange has launched an advisory council on sustainability to share best practices. You're also looking more closely at board diversity concurrently. We have seen backlash against E. S. G. Do you think that that backlash will lead companies to pull back from social environmental commit? It means or conversely, do you think the train is already out of the station? We're moving full speed ahead. It's ridiculous at this point. Yeah, so 2400 public companies is what we have in our community. If I look at our own community, 100% have at least one female board director, uh 95% of two or more, 90% have 20% female directors. So on the governance side it feels like we have made good progress and even listening to you all introduce yourself this morning, it was I run this really large business and I'm on these 15 boards, which is amazing. I mean, I think it probably if you did that or when you did that, you know, 5, 10 years ago, it looked a lot different. So I think we've made a lot of progress on the government side from the conversations I've had with our community of Ceo this year, they're trying to do the right thing on environmental, but identifying and measuring and disclosing scope three, something like scope three is really hard and it's not because they don't want to if they have to have tools to do it. So our thesis is our job at the new york stock exchange is to provide our issuers with tools because they want to do the right thing in environmental, social and governance. They just don't 100% know how to get there. So we've got the sustainability council which gets a variety of chief sustainability officers together, helps identify best practices. They were the ones who commented on our the climate disclosure rule that the sec uh came out with earlier this year. We've got the Board Diversity Council which helps improve the diversity of boards, which we've had probably about 30 different placements since we launched a couple of years ago. Uh and you know, we have a variety of other services but ultimately what's going to continue to push the needle forward on E. S. G. Metrics is the investors. And I was just reading a report last night, 40% of dollars invested in the market today is going against TsG funds last year was 33 percent. So that's something that C. E. O. S are paying attention to because there is an E. S. G. Investing lens that increasingly is being applied to public markets very well said well covering these tectonic shifts in business has certainly kept us journalists on our team. I can only imagine what it's like for you running an iconic institution, Lynn martin. Thank you for taking the time. Thank you for having me.

Alexis McGill Johnson, President and CEO, Planned Parenthood Federation of America

Most Powerful Women 2022 - A Business FAQ On Reproductive Rights

A Business FAQ On Reproductive Rights

now to an issue that's been top of mind for many women across America and around the world over the past several months and already the subject of a lot of conversation here reproductive rights and june's landmark Supreme Court decision overturning roe v wade. In just a moment, we're going to hear from Alexis. McGill johnson, president and Ceo of planned parenthood Federation of America in May at R. M. P. W. Dinner in new york, Alexis gave crucial advice to our community and that was before the Supreme Court's ruling was official. Now that it is and that we've had a few months to see the immediate fallout of the ruling. We've asked Alexis to update our community about what she's focused on, what's changed in her view and what advice she would give to business leaders who want to support reproductive rights for their employees, their customers and their wider communities. Please join me in welcoming Alexis McGill johnson to the stage. Thank you. Thank you so much for having you. Hello. It is somewhat ironic. I have to confess To be here at Fortune's most powerful women. When three months ago the Supreme Court took away our constitutional protection to control and govern our own bodies. Our right to make decisions about whether or not we wanted to start or complete our families, a right to address the impact of sexual violence and a right to privacy a right that one in four women has uh exercise in a lifetime before age 45 and the majority of whom are already mothers In less than three months. We have seen 17 states have abortion bans and restrictions in place, which affect one in three women. And I have to tell you, I've traveled across the country. These bands are working exactly as they were intended. They're sowing chaos. There are providers and patients as these bands get lifted and reinstated, appointments are scheduled and rescheduled. And so just the chaos inside of managing health centers have been um traumatic. There's a tremendous amount of confusion and fear providers don't know what what will make them non compliant after the effect. Um, patients don't know who they can share information with because of some of the, you know, quote aiding and abetting laws. Pharmacists don't know what prescriptions they can fill. And there's so much fear right now, we're talking about criminal penalties. We're talking about 99 years in jail. We're talking about $100,000 fines and loss of licensure. So the reality of what is happening on the ground and so many of these states um is quite insane. We have patients who are traveling upwards of 400 miles one way to a state where they can get access to medication, abortion, taking the first pill legally in state And then driving 400 miles back while they're um pregnancy is terminated. That is what we are grappling with right now. And we've seen lawmakers double down on the extreme right. It's not just about abortion access. We are seeing them vote for bands with no exceptions for rape incest to help his mother. We're seeing bands introduced around traveling across state lines. We are seeing uh limiting access to birth control, including I. U. D. S. And of course that means implications for other things like Plan B. And I. V. S. And we've also heard that if um, there becomes an anti reproductive health majority in our Congress, we're looking to see the introduction of a national abortion ban. Okay, so that means not just the states that the 25 states that we expect to totally ban abortion in the coming weeks coming year, but actually, uh, 50 states, so we will no longer be protected in north new york and California. So my immediate focus has been over the last few months on doing exactly what planned parenthood does every day, right? We get up and we provide care to people and we get people to care. We have been focusing on um, the third states right? Making sure that the upwards of like 40% increase that we're seeing, um patients are getting access to the care they need. We're converting to telehealth. We are Patients and supporters about why they can't get the access to care that they need. Um, we are suing uh, all 17 states currently and we will be doing more um, that litigation has proved to be crucial in terms of establishing our rights, reestablishing our rights and we're doubling down on health equity in particular. We received a significant gift from Mackenzie Scott Earlier this year and we're using all $50 million 7% to 24%. So that's the work that we are doing. The question though, is what are you all doing? So we are here in the conference title, Alright, is about realizing our own power, right? We are among fortune's most powerful women. So our call to action is to stand firmly in the power that we have. We may have lost the power to control our own bodies right now. But we know that the fight for this movement and our freedoms is not lost. I know there's so many of you are in rooms where you are not in the majority, right? That's one of the reasons why we like to be here together because you all are in rooms where you are holding literally the uh, the power of, of of so many in that space. So I want us to be more confident in our power and talk about what that looks like. The majority of people across this country support access to sexual and reproductive freedom, including abortion. You should feel confident in your power knowing that the majority of people believe your employees, your consumers and your investors now is not the time to stay neutral. We cannot have bystanders. It's time to get off the fence and make sure that we are using our power to grow power. So there are a few obvious things to do. Many of you are already doing them. And then there's some hard things to do. The obvious things to do. Our look and act on data and live your values. So many of you have been talking about gender equity for decades, right. That has been part of what you have brought in your leadership throughout. But we can't talk about gender equity without talking about accessing health care. We know that our very ability to stand in this room for many of us has depended on our access to sexual and reproductive health care. Access to birth control is responsible for one third of our wage gains. Access to abortion has allowed us to transition to higher paying jobs. And when women lose the whole economy loses abortion restrictions that were enacted last year led to 9% earning loss in the in the private sector and estimated to be $105 billion dollars annually. You have to take care of your workforce. We have to make sure that your benefits are top notch the travel policies have been great, but we have to make sure that the benefits are as expansive as possible. When we lose access to abortion. We have to double down on birth control and IVF and adoption and on sexual reproductive health care, we have to offer relocation. Make sure that your employees that need to travel. Um, can, can also be free talk to your employees. We are hearing that employees want to hear from their senior leaders. They want to hear, they feel nervous about sharing information about how they feel about these bands. And so as senior women in your organizations, if you don't talk about it, they don't have the permission and the courage that we're hearing them. Um, as well. And when you talk about abortion, you're actually normalizing. Um, the fact that abortion is in fact healthcare now, quickly on the heart thing, The hard thing that we have to do as a collective is to put our money where our mouth is. Corporate influence comes in all kinds of forms. And there are many ways in which corporations are actually complicit in perpetuating the loss of our freedoms. So how about this? Let's start doing business with states that aligned with our values and let's not do business in places that don't align with our values. We've seen banks support climate efforts by not lending to coal. We've seen companies support LGBT rights by not holding conferences. We've seen eli lilly go on record saying they will no longer expand their workforce in indiana, but it's really important that um, that another company that I've been working with has not only done all of these things, they have stopped building offices and studios and band states and they've also stopped giving political contributions to lawmakers who support bans on sexual reproductive health care. And they are lobbying members of Congress to do the same things. These are hard things. These are uncomfortable things. But the reality is if we don't do them where corporations sit in this moment, is going to leave the footprint for what the future of abortion access will look like moving forward. So I really want to encourage us to have a much bolder, much more brave notion of how we collectively can fight back. Let's make sure that if we are going to realize our power, we are going to realize it in ways that help us secure our freedom. Thank you.

Asahi Pompey, Global Head of Corporate Engagement, Goldman Sachs 
Announcing the winners of the 2022 Goldman Sachs & Fortune Global Women Leaders Award:
Hend Osama, Project Manager, Almentor
Dalareich Polot, Founder and CEO, Ginto Fine Chocolates; Co-founder, Dalareich Chocolate House

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Honoring Global Women Leaders

Asahi Pompey, Global Head of Corporate Engagement, Goldman Sachs 
Announcing:
Hend Osama, Project Manager, Almentor
Dalareich Polot, CEO, Ginto Fine Chocolates

Asahi Pompey, Global Head of Corporate Engagement, Goldman Sachs 
Announcing winners:
Hend Osama, Project Manager, Almentor
Dalareich Polot, Founder and CEO, Ginto Fine Chocolates

Hello everyone. Good afternoon and welcome back. We hope you enjoyed your concurrent sessions. We thank you all for participating. We're excited to kick off this portion of the program by honoring women from around the world to embrace advocacy, empowerment mentoring in the act of giving back to their communities via the Goldman Sachs Fortune Global Women Leaders Award. Every year 25,000 to $50,000 each is presented to two women. One of the women has participated in the Fortune US State Department mentoring partnership and the other in the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women Initiative. The winners have proposed projects that utilize lessons from the mentoring programs and will help improve their societies back at home, join me to announce this year's recipient is Asahi pompeii partner in global Head of corporate engagement and the president of the Goldman Sachs Foundation. Please join me in welcoming to the stage. Hi, Hello, Welcome Asahi, thank you so much for joining us. Great to see you again. I think the last time I saw you was years ago. Uh but yeah, we're delighted to have you here speaking at the M. P. W. Summit, let's jump right into things. Businesses can truly be a force for good for good, I think as evidenced by Goldman's various women focused initiatives. We have one million black woman. We We have 10,000 small businesses. We have 10,000 women. The list goes on talking about the banks ethos when it comes to impact investment in this theory around inclusive growth. Yeah, well, it's fantastic to be with you ruth and I want to start off by really recognizing that all of the women here, you each work at corporations that are doing incredible work in terms of inclusive growth. And one of the reasons I love coming to fortune every year I get to learn and also exchange ideas. So in terms of our own ethos to take you behind the scenes, in terms of how we think about it, there's sort of three things that really guide us. One of them. Number one, is this whole notion of co creation, right? Nothing for you without you, right Or those closest to the problem are often closest to the solution, but nobody ever bothers to ask them. We bake this thing that's supposed to have. And so when we launched our initiative, one million black women over a year ago, we did something a little bit unusual. We said we're gonna launch this initiative, the largest initiative ever in this country, specifically focused on black women, $10 billion dollars of investment capital, covered with 100 million in philanthropic capital with guess what listening tours. We're gonna go around the country or on zoom and we're gonna listen to black women and girls in terms of where the needs are, How Goldman Sachs could be helpful. Now, ruth, if you'd asked me how many listening tours with you guys gonna do and who would show up if you build it, would they come? I would have said, I'm not really sure, but we're going out there, we're gonna co create, you know, your question around the ethos And as I sit here today, we've done over 60 listening tours and over 20,000 women and girls have tuned in to say, I have an idea, I have a thought, I want to be part of this, I want to be part of this movement and we've responded in kind when I was able to give a grant to a woman that I met literally in the chat room of one of our list tours. I thought, okay, we're doing something special here. So I think one of the key things to take you behind the scenes is this notion of co creating. I think the second thing I would underscore is really taken sort of a data driven metrics related um approach. So we launched a report, Women onyx are former partner Kathy Matsui published that over 20 years ago when we launched a million black women, we launched a report called Black women ah Mix. If you know a woman, if you've seen a woman, you should read Women onyx and Black Women onyx right there just sort of seminal pieces around really being steeped in the data in terms of figuring out where your initiative is going. And then the last one I say is taking a long term view. We all know that difficult problems cannot be solved in a one year grand cycle, right? It's, This is not the case, it took generations to create those problems and it's going to take generations of investment to do it. And if corporations are really serious, we've got to launch and stay the course with it. So 10,000 women, you're gonna meet one of our graduates is a 15 year old program, right? There's a lot of pressure to say it's been 15 years. Should we like do something new? We're like, has the problem of women empowerment been solved yet? If not, I think we need to stick to it. Uh you mean you bring up so many great points and that was very comprehensive response. Let me ask you this business creation has been shown to spur wealth creation certainly for women founders, but also the communities that they represent, the communities that they serve. How then do we create more opportunities for women founders to thrive? You know, I think it really goes back to sort of, you know, women leadership in general. If I look out on this room, I see so many hundreds of phenomenally successful women. And if I were to ask each of you, like what opportunity led you to be in this room today? Almost all of us, you included ruth would be able to trace it back to what I like to call sort of an origin story and opportunity, right. Some breakthrough catalytic opportunity, which is usually this it's usually a marriage of someone who took a risk on you and you taking a bet on yourself, it's usually a combination of shattering that sort of potential performance access, right? We know that men are generally measured on their potential and women are measured on their performance. What have you done for me lately? And if you haven't done that exact thing that I'm not really gonna count it? And so as we think about creating more origin story opportunities, it's really about figuring out how to scale those moments and really figuring out how to create for more people to become homing beacons if you will of how can I create an origin story opportunity for more women and more women founders. So what was your catalytic breakthrough movement? What's your origin stories? Well, I am probably the most unlikely Goldman Sachs partner. Um if anyone said you know she is going to become the most senior black person at Goldman, fact nobody would have seen it in the cart. I'm an immigrant from Guyana. Um my family of seven yes, came to this country and when I was 10 years old and we moved into my aunt Eglantine, one bedroom apartment and it was the cheapest apartment in the housing projects because it was next to the incinerator and went to public schools and for me it was really a series of people whose dreams for me were far greater than my dreams were for myself. And over time my own dreams and my own ambitions grew, but it's essentially from their belief in the earliest days. And so as I think about our global women leaders who you'll meet in a few minutes. It's about how can create we create those kinds of opportunities, whether you're from Egypt or the Philippines as the women that you're gonna meet shortly. Absolutely. To your point, this is Goldman's 15th year sponsoring the powerful women Summit. Thank you for your long running partnership. It's also the 15th anniversary of 10,000 women. What progress have you seen over the last decade and a half? And conversely, what are some of the challenges that we're still experiencing? Look, if there's anything I've known for its keeping it real? I am no Pollyanna. We have not seen enough progress period. The pandemic has set us back significantly. So if we continue at the current rate, it will take 100 and 32 years in order to close the gender gap. Who has that much time? I certainly don't. My sons don't, I don't have daughters, but our daughters don't. Our sons don't. We all don't. And so as I think about the last 15 years, I'm I'm upset, I'm not satisfied. Right. And we need to change that trajectory. And greater investment is where it's at. We've got to make greater investment. You say, you're not satisfied with that trajectory, which is totally understandable what progress though not as rapid as you would have hoped for. Have you seen in the interim. So I'm Seeing greater investment in women in developing countries. We work with women in over 200 countries around the world through our 10,000 women program. I'm seeing their grit. I'm seeing their ideas. I'm seeing their determination through the World Bank. We've been able to see increased funding to women entrepreneurs in developing countries. So those are the places in which I'm seeing around the world. If you will not just taking a us centric approach significant progress And we'll soon again meet some of the leaders here today. Uh more recently you launched a one million black woman, which, as the name suggests, uh, sits at the crux of race and gender. Why the focus on this demographic in particular, what unique challenges are you looking to tackle? Yes. So there's a 90% wealth gap as we all know between a black woman in this country and a white male and what that means. Because I like to get it, you know, into the numbers. An average white male in this country has a net worth of around $90,000. A black woman, it's about $8,000. You take all of our assets together. It's about $8,000. But think about the life that unfolds in the family where mom net worth is $8,000, right? For that girl, for the boy that's growing up. And I like to think about imagine changing that, right. What kind of world would be we'd be creating if we're able to sort of change that trajectory. That's the investment thesis around a million black women. And ruth people have often asked me like, what's the one area you're investing in to change the trajectory of the lives of black women? And I say there's not one thing, right, mic drop. There are so many things that we need to address. So one million black women has six different pillars access to capital, education, healthcare, closing the digital divide as we've seen over the course of the pandemic where so many Children weren't able to get an access to education. And so it's a 10, 10 year long initiative to the point of making a long term investment. Absolutely. Well, Asahi, as you know, access to capital is particularly crucial to women founders who often face disproportionate financial headwinds when building companies, so thank you for the great work that you're doing. It's gonna take a collaborative and very intentional effort to move the needle and to move it significantly. Uh This then brings us to the next portion of our segments as we mentioned a few minutes ago, where often awards tonight, the award goes to women who give back to their communities and have proposed projects to continue their work. It's now time to meet this year's recipients, the 2022 golden sacks fortune. Global women leaders Award winners are hend Osama who works steward women's socio economic empowerment in Egypt through a number of NGO initiatives and as a project manager at the online Arabic language education platform. L. A. Mentor. The second winner is Della reach, its dollar rich pola founder and Ceo of shinto fine chocolate and co founder of Doll a rich chocolate house both in the Philippines. Ladies congratulations. Please join us on. Here's a little bit more about our winners and welcome ladies hend Obama works on creating access to educational, vocational and economic opportunities for women and Children and poverty stricken and marginalized areas around Cairo. She was part of the Fortune US State Department mentoring partnership and she plans to put her award money toward advancing her work. We'll find out more from her in just a moment. Dollar rich Poland makes artisanal bean to bar chocolate using cocoa beans from her island and supporting local farmers. She trains women in her community to farm cocoa, give them technical assistance and buys their products. Her goal is to help empower and give livelihood opportunities to more women in the community. She is an alumna of the Goldman Sachs 10,000 women business training program. Ladies welcome to M. P. W. Summit, thank you for having us. Alright and let's start with you. I mean since graduating this program, what have you been up to? What do you, what have you advancing the work that you've already been doing. Actually the program has helped me a lot like for an introvert like me it's like to be in such an event like this because of the program to be able to handle it. So yeah, it helped me a lot with the networking and the training I'm getting at the same time. It has helped me on to progress when it comes community work to her to innovate when it comes to instead of just the forward instead of direct aid. To be to think of more sustainable to have the SGS in mind just to have more strategic than just giving it forward directly. So this is what I've been working on since the graduates of like um during the member of Ministry of Social solidarity. Like we're assessing programs that target 3.6 million people. So this has been going for the past three years old and I'm sure very busy years. Uh dollar Rich. Well you had me at chocolate. What strategies have you implemented since graduating the program? And what are your primary areas of focus on your business? Okay. Um Yeah. Hi, I'm dollar Rich chocolate maker of course, in the Philippines. Um I was a graduate of 1000 women in 2011. Actually that really changed my life. I was the youngest cohort in that batch. But for me I only didn't learn about business but also about life. So all the strategies that I got from the learnings that I got. I also teach it to my mom, which is really started the business and we were able to college because of that small chocolate business where my mom started. And me, I'm just innovating, innovating the chocolate are working with women and the project actually that I was working, I'll be working after this is after um the devastation of the super typhoon in the Philippines last december. It was so heartbreaking to see the communities that was totally devastated, they lose their houses. And that is actually the project that I'm doing the recovery of the livelihood, the women farmers in the Philippines, specifically in my island. We have the Chocolate Hills and if you happen to be visiting the, it's the island. But yeah, it's a lot of strategies. Um so for example, like teaching the women about entrepreneurship marketing, that's what I've learned with Goldman Sachs and I'm giving back it's my community and hopefully one day in the whole Philippines. Well, congratulations against the both of you ladies, truly inspiring stories and I'm sure I speak for all of us when I say we're excited to follow along on your entrepreneurial journey. Asahi is always a pleasure. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks everyone. Thank you

Lisa Su, Chair and CEO, AMD
Interviewer: Alan Murray, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - What’s Next For The Semiconductor Industry

What’s Next For The Semiconductor Industry

In the past 24 months or so. There's been both a shortage and a glut and plenty of international trade tensions just last week, in fact, the Biden administration imposed new restrictions on exporting us made chips to China and all of these global issues aside, the business of making computer chips is inherently complex and challenging. But tumultuous times in the space are nothing new to our next corporate leader. A. M. D. Chair and chief executive lisa Sue has been there, done that more than a few times. She brought a. m. d. back from the brink of bankruptcy when she took the top job in 2014 and did so by examining the company's core competencies and taking deaths. And today she ranks number 21 on this year's most powerful women list lisa joins fortune. Ceo Allen Murray today to talk about being a a fierce force in tech and what it takes to navigate challenging times. We welcome them both to the stage Lisa, thank you so much for being with us. Thank you. So you are in the eye of a hurricane. I mean you look at your stock price, there was a chip shortage last year. Your stock price soared up over 50%. Now we have a computer slowdown and the stock price has plummeted your product. Computer chips has become a geopolitical weapon. We're spending $50 billion of taxpayers money to subsidize subsidize construction. And then just last week we imposed export controls on chinese exports, which I think account for about a quarter of your business? So having said all of that, how do you keep your cool, I mean what is your secret to keeping your composure in the midst of this whirlwind of activity? Well I have to first start by saying does everybody have their semiconductors? Do you have everything you want now? Well you know, it's it's been an amazing right? I have to say. I think the the most important thing that you know I keep in front of me is the fact that um we work in an industry where it really changes people's lives, it really makes everything better. It really allows you to do things you can't do and that's you know the role of semiconductors and yes, it's a little bit ups and downs. I think the pandemic um really, you know kind of highlighted how important semiconductors are and everything that we do And um you know as an industry we've worked hard to make sure that we have enough and now we may have a few too many. But overall I think um you know, it's it's just a wonderful ride. But but looking to the future, I mean last year your your stock price was what $155 now, it's a $55 which is right. What what what's your sense of where this market is going over the next five years. But my sense is probably neither is right, but we can say that, you know over the long term, um everybody needs more technology I think no matter what you're doing, whether it's for your business or whether it's for um you know in your personal life or whether it's to solve the next, you know, big health care crisis um or it's to solve climate change, you need need more technology and that's what we do. So from that standpoint, I feel wonderful about the long term and you know, in the in the medium term, there's always things that we have to navigate and I think that's part of life as a Ceo these days are a little it's a little bit different because you wake up on any given day and you wonder, ok, what am I going to do today? But that's all right. Well let's let's talk geopolitics, which I suspect is a topic that is not taught at M. I. T. Engineering school. Um but you're in the middle of it uh and the latest news is the president's decision last week to put export controls on chips sent to china, that's a big part of your business. What do you think about that? Well, you know, I think the thing about the the semiconductor supply chain or even the technology supply chain is is actually a very very global business. I mean we send, you know, we designed parts here, we send them um you know, they're manufactured somewhere in ASia, they go through many different steps. So it is a very complex and distributed supply chain. So sure, export controls does add a bit of volatility to it, you know, I think the key in, you know, this is, it's it's very important to keep in mind what we're trying to do and, you know, certainly for the very, very most advanced things that we do, you know, there are national security interests and we totally get that. Um, it's also important to understand that, you know, china is a big market and we believe that it will continue to be a big market going forward, and so it just needs to be navigated that will export controls affect your business uh for the, in the short term, probably not a lot, you know, in the medium term, I think we have to see um, you know, sort of how things play out. But my view of the world is you can always adjust one strategy. Um, once, you know, we have, you know, sort of the overall box in play. Yeah. Do you think it was a mistake for the president to do what he did? Did you argue against it? I would not say that, I absolutely would not say that. I would say that there are national security interests and the national security interests are very much front and center and we're also working very closely with the administration through the industry associations, I think, you know, Gina Raimondo is fantastic. I mean, she truly does have, you know, both, you know, sort of, you know, both angles of what needs to be considered in mind. So I want to come back to that in a second. What percentage of your chip these days are made in Taiwan? The majority are made in Taiwan. So we saw it that they get to know you this morning, this room is filled with women who sit on boards of many of the largest companies in the world, many of which have china businesses, my senses, every board with a significant business in china has war gamed in the last year. What happens if china takes action against Taiwan? How do you think about that? You're from Taiwan, you were born there. How do you think about the risk that she Jinping decides to do something in Taiwan comparable to what Vladimir Putin did in the Ukraine? Well, I think the overall, you know, conversation I think is right in every boardroom, it's not just about china and Taiwan, it's also about, you know what we've all experienced, which is disruptions in supply chains that really weren't expected right over the last few years. So, you know, as we war gamed this, it's about all having multiple sources, having diversity. I think that's one of the reasons that, you know, the chips and Science act is such a good thing for the United States because it, you know, kind of reinvigorates manufacturing the United States and research and development in the United States, you're in favor of that, I'm absolutely in favor of it, I think it's a great it's a great step towards this notion of ensuring that we have, you know, good geographic diversity and A. M. D. Will take advantage of that. You're looking to diversify your supply chain. Absolutely, absolutely. But I don't know if that quite answered the question of how you're preparing for the possibility of something happening in Taiwan, I mean I think you have to plan for plan A B. C. And D. Like any strategic maneuver and I would say plan A B C. D. Includes understanding, you know, where there are multiple sources for and it's not just the United States, right? That I think that's the key thing is it's a very global supply chain the whole world. Can you tell us a little bit about growing up in Taiwan? I mean what got you to where you are today? What were the characteristics of your upbringing that enabled you to be the extraordinary ceo that you are? Well, I was actually born in Taiwan, but I came to the United States when I was two. So I don't know how much I grew up in Taiwan or I grew up in new york. Um but you know, my parents were you know very much around as typical asian parents are very much around math and science and ensuring that educ was, you know, first and foremost in um you know how we grew up, how my brother and I grew up and so it's, you know, for me it's about, you know, building tech, so I know sometimes that sounds boring, but it is actually kind of fun to be able to walk down to the store and say, hey, that's my product, you know, I worked on that, so that's that's what's always been interesting for me, and can you, I want to open it up to uh questions, so please, if you have one raise your hand now and we'll get the microphone uh to you quickly. Um but you came to a. M. D. With a clear sense of of needing to make some changes. Can you talk about how you how you've done that? Well, you know, the the key in our business is really, it's it's about what happens over the next 5 to 10 years actually, when I think about technology, you know, I started in this industry 30 years ago and everybody said like this is the end, like, you know, a few more years and we're done, we're never gonna do anything better. And the truth is, people are extraordinarily smart, there's always something more that you can do, and uh so it's it's very much been around, you know, making significant technology bets and saying, hey, we can change the world um if we make these decisions over the next uh next five years, so it's communication, a lot of it is communication, a lot of it is strategy and a lot of it is um you know, getting um extraordinarily talented people to work together. Yeah. Question just right here please and introduce yourself please. We can't quite see through. Uh my name is christophe ceo of ludo. Um my question is about scaling I think when you took over A. M. D. It was about five or $6 billion market cap and now it's about $100 billion market cap. And it's just one of the most extraordinary stories honestly in business period. And I'm just it's a tremendous challenge to be all of those different companies along the way from five billion to 100 billion. So I'm just curious how'd you do it? Yeah. So you know, it's like running a different company every two years, that's how it feels. We started, you know, it was like 8000 people, we now have 25,000 people. We've done the largest semiconductor acquisition um in history um a few years ago, I think what's been really helpful is I like to think of it as how do we run the, you know, the smallest big company there is. And and so there is a tremendous thing about saying, hey look, you know what, we're actually not that big. We actually have um a you know, we have, you know, sort of lots of things in front of us and that's what we're always thinking about, like what is in front of us, what is the next five years bring and um and that's really helped us grow as much as we have and by the way that incredible performance earned you a spot not only on the M. P. W. List at fortune but on the world's greatest leaders list. So congratulations on that other questions or question back back there. Yes Bridget Thanks Lisa, thank you for joining. I'm Bridget faucet from city and I'm just curious if you could comment on the manufacturing of semiconductors and the intense water that's needed. And as you think about Taiwan challenges just in the last 24 months China of course the diversification piece is important but how do you think that as it relates to water as well? Yeah. Yeah. I think it's your your point is a very good one. Which is it's it's also about natural resources and semiconductors. So it takes you know if you think about how long it takes, it actually takes us six months to build you know chips and the natural resources that are required. You know, Taiwan is an island that has you know very very very um you know great manufacturing capability but it's it's actually running out of some of these natural resources and as a result you know the diversification is important and us is one thing but there's also many other um you know whether you're talking about some of the things that are going on in europe or you know, across, you know, other countries in Asia, I think that helps bring the entire ecosystem together. Question over here. Hi kim Store in, I actually used to run global brand for you, lisa. And so I'm kind of curious back then, which was a few years ago, part of the culture at A. M. D. Was this focus on being the underdog and and that really lit the fire under us to to be better to think differently. And you know, really led the transformation that you drove. So I'm kind of curious now that I mean I guess is that underdog mentality, what's that culture shift been and and how have you seen that transform the overall organization now versus the beginning of the transformation? Yeah, it's great to see you kim so thank you for that. You know, it is true, it is about cultural transformation. We did spend a lot of time thinking that hey we are the underdog and you know, frankly being the underdog can be very helpful at times because you don't have that many resources, but you have incredible heart and going forward. And I think today it's much more about um we're a leader and we have to kind of chart our path over the next five years, but it's a different path than everybody else um in the in the industry. But I think the most important thing is that we do it our way and so, you know, we just went through because we, you know, we just acquired a very large company, Xilinx last year. We started, you know, a whole new cultural transformation for the next five years of a. M. D. And we're under A. R. R. Brand moniker is together, we advance with the idea that we advance not just by ourselves but with our partners and with the entire ecosystem. So absolutely, there's there's a lot of transformation there as well. And are you having fun in the process? I'm having a blast in the process. That's great. Well thank you so much for being with us on the N. P. W. Thank you. Thank you.

Thasunda Brown Duckett, President and CEO, TIAA
Interviewer: Maria Aspan, FORTUNE

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Challenge Accepted: Year One

being a business leader at this moment may be tougher than ever and with lingering challenges from the pandemic from inflation, a volatile stock market and fears of recession, but it's also a time of opportunity, a time for change. Our next guest to Shonda Brown Duck, it is excited about being in a leadership position right now despite the headwinds. And as you probably know to Shonda is the president and Ceo of T. I. A. And the big supporter of girls who code, she's one of the two black female Ceos currently leading Fortune 500 companies after taking the helm at T. I. A. Just last year. She is also number 11 on this year's most powerful women list to Shonda joins the M. P. W. Summit co chair and Fortune Senior writer Maria aspen to talk about her first year as chief executive and what lies ahead, Please welcome them to the stage. I love it to Shonda, thank you so much for joining us again. We are so fortunate to have you back on our stage a year after you started and joined us last year. Um Now that you've been Ceo of T. I A. For for a little more than a year, how do you feel about it? Looking back at your first year in the job? What stands out? Yeah, well it's so great to be here and I love the title of our session challenge accepted Um when I think about the last 18 months, you know I like to say I'm jealous of me And I'm jealous of me because I get to surround myself with incredible people, um I'm jealous of me because over the last 18 months um I get to get really clear on who we are and what we're here to do. You know, we exist to secure retirement for millions of Americans and when you think about the problem that still has to be solved that 40% of Americans will run out of money in retirement, especially when you think about the economy, which I know will get to um I'm jealous of me because I get to be at the table. Um I get to make impact uh and when I think about the headwinds, I feel like challenges accepted because if not me then who and the opportunity to drive this company forward on a transformational agenda. The opportunity to make positive impact. Just a line with who I am and I would say the most important thing um is I get to earn the right to leave this organization, which means you have to win hearts and minds every single day and doing that, coming in navigating a pandemic, navigating covid mental health etcetera. You have to get creative on how are you going to win hearts and minds and how are you going to make sure that you are building a culture that's built to last through the highs and the lows, I'd love to dig into the economy since there is so much going on and so much again has changed since a year ago. Bear market rising inflation, rising interest rates. How worried are you? And that we're headed into a recession. Yeah I mean when you think about it, clearly the Fed has been very clear, you know inflation is at 8.3%. Uh said once it get it down to 2%. Um so a recession is looking likely. You know the question is how long how hard um I don't know but I think the most important thing for me is to think about who we serve um to think about everyday americans who are trying to figure out, you know they're the rising costs. Uh Everyone is looking at their statement and it's not looking that great and you think about your parents that maybe thinking about retiring or you're thinking about your parents that are in retirement. Um Or you think about the young people who may have never seen a market this volatile and so what I want to stay focused on is what we can control and what we can control is reaching out and talking to who we serve. What we can control is making sure that everyone has a plan and that we don't time the market that we stay diversified. Um And what we can control especially when it about who we are at T. I. A. Is to make sure that everyone has access to guaranteed income. So that there is one aspect on your portfolio that is not in the red, which is what we've been doing for over 100 years? And so the market will be volatile? That will continue to be volatile. But I think we have to make sure that we're doing all, we're doing all that we can and continue to lead from the front and stay connected with who we serve every day. You've talked in the past about how you kind of hold your father in your mind as who you make products for and how you make decisions as you're navigating this economy. What are you doing to make sure that the Otis browns of the world have access to long term retirement? Yeah. I talk a lot about Rosie and Otis Brown just the names are just awesome, right? Rosie and Otis? Um and you know, I talked about it because my mother is a retired educator. Um and my dad worked in a warehouse uh and drove trucks, did not go to college. And I talk about him so much because while he was working for a company for decades, he did not take advantage of his 41K. That was for him. He only had his pension and to be able to tell your father that you had access to something that you didn't take advantage of. We failed. And so when I think about a market like we're dealing with, I think about, are we talking to everyone? We're all at our jobs every single day. Are you talking to the person that providing security at your company? Are you talking to your executive assistant? Are you talking to your ops people? And are you saying you know what are you invested in our four oh one K. Or 43 B. Plan? Are you maxed out? You know are you staying invested? Are we talking to the young people? And so you can hear the passion because I know what's at stake when we don't and when you think about what's at stake and sometimes people say when you think about retirement, that's like way down the line. Um but the decision that we make in our 20's decide what that way down the line will look like. And when we think about the ability to close the income inequality gap, how can we close it when 40% of people are running out of money in retirement? The number is even more staggering. When you look at people of color, which means the daughter or the son is trying to take care of mom and dad that may not live together. So two households, you're also trying to take care of your young ones and give them a great life and you're trying to live make it make sense. So I think that we have an opportunity to say, how do we make sure that we are preparing our young people to think about their tomorrow so that we're not transferring debt, but we're transferring wealth which means we can all do our part. And so I can't help but think about my mom and dad because I can't help and think about the sacrifices that they made along the way and to not take advantage of something that was for him simply because the flyer the conversation did not connect to a man in the warehouse, did not connect to someone who's working hard every day to put food on the table and to do their very best when their best is insufficient. So I think we can do better. We should do better. And I do think that we can all think about an Otis in a rosy brown as we think about retiring inequality and as we think about this market volatility to make sure that people know the resources and the access that they have for them and that they're actually taking advantage of it. You've talked a lot and alluded to just the racial and gender wealth gaps. How can those of us in this room work to close those gaps at a time when women are still recovering from the economic impact of the pandemic and the racial and the economy is again, No, absolutely. I mean we know that we have to retire inequality right ladies like we have to do it period. I think for us. I call it, you know what can we do? We know that women retire with 30% less than men. Uh We know that we have a savings gap. We know that we have an income gap. We have a guarantee gap. But what can we do? Well, here's just a few simple things. You know one we can make sure that we're looking at our policies at work and making sure that we're addressing any equity inadequacies and that we're always running the numbers and we're always running the reports and then being okay making the changes when you see a discrepancy, we can make sure that our benefits are working and not just to say we have great benefits but are people taking advantage of them? What is the goal of the benefits? Are people on track? Do we not just say that we have financial education? We have a great 401k. Plan? The real question is, what are the outcomes that these benefits are yielding for our people? And how do we just aggregate the data to say our women taking advantage of it at the same pace as men? Are blacks and Latinos taking advantage at the same place as white americans. Are we really asking the harder questions and then are we willing to do the work? And so I do think that there's more that we can do and then also policy, you know, what can we do as a matter of policy to say? How do we make sure that when we think about women that are still the primary caregiver, that the benefits are working for them, that when they had to exit the workforce during Covid and maybe could not contribute to their four oh one K. Plan or 43 B. Plan, they lost compounding interest for two years. How do we make sure that they can catch up? And so I think the question for all of us is to just make sure that we're being intentional and that we're not just checking the box. We're saying is the box working for everyone. And so I do think we have to remain optimistic. I do think we have to ask the hard questions, but I do think that we can do more work. We can retire inequality, but it's gonna take us to operate with a different level of urgency. And I would also think we have to realize it can't just be the sisterhood. We have to bring the men to the table. When you look at 40 for women are running a Fortune 500, you can say, yeah, there's progress. Um factually, but 44, that's like 9%. We're not going to close the inequality gap. We're not going to close the gender gap. If we don't make sure that we bring our allies are advocates to the table and to make sure that we believe it's a problem that we all must solve. Not just the group. Um that may not be at the table at the level that we want. So it's not just women's problem to solve the women gap. Um, it's not just minorities to solve the minority gap. We need all of us to join the table. Um, and I think that if we can get our allies and our advocates uh, to the table at a much accelerated pace, we can make accelerated progress On a personal level. You are of course one of two black women running a Fortune 500 company. I mean we heard last night from Roz Brewer Walgreens about how that sometimes makes her feel. How do you think about it these days? Yeah. I mean I'm on the shoulders of Giants. Um, you know, and I've said this before and I'll say it again, I recognized that it was the cooks and the janitors and the secretaries that introduced my gender and my melanin to corporate America. You know, I understand that talent is created equally. Opportunity is not and I understand that it's not sufficient. That it's just me and ross, not sufficient. Um and so for me, my my hope and my goal is to make sure that whenever I am in a room that I look to see who's in the room, but most importantly who's not. And I'm asking the question, I understand that in my role too much is given much is required. And though it shouldn't be my burden, but carrying a burden is not new to me to women to the culture. Um, And so for me and I know similarly to Roz we're operating with a sense of urgency. You know my hope is that people can see me and say you know what I can create a new chapter on what a Ceo can look like, how a Ceo can move and operate. And maybe that if people can see me that there's another young girl that can say I can be her today. I also think that we have to make sure that it's not just the young girls that can see themselves. We have to make sure that we're having the conversation at the board level. We have to make sure that as Ceo that we're looking at succession pipeline. Not just to say we have X percent of women but where are the women? And are they on a path to be in the C suite? And if not what is getting in the way, what is getting in the way and then how do we do our part? And so for me there's a lot more work to be done. But to black women cannot do it alone. We need the sisterhood, we need men, we need all of us. And clearly we have to all agree That 40 for women does not represent the talent of women that can lead companies clearly to black women does not represent the full talent of women that can run a Fortune 500. So I do think that there's more work that we can do. Um but I'm up for the challenge and challenge is accepted and the assignment is clear. A year from now. What do you want to be talking about on this stage? Progress period a year from now? I want to talk about how we made progress in closing this retirement gap a year from now. I want to talk about the momentum at T. A. And hopefully so many other companies and what we're doing with intentionality to make sure that people can retire with dignity. A year from now. I hope it's not just 44 women running a Fortune 500 a year from now. I hope you all will come up to me and say I did one do better. I did one do better. I decided to do better. I decided to engage with an ally to be an advocate for someone. I decided to look in my office and say who's that brown girl or that black girl where there may not be another brown girl that she can see, but I'm going to stand in the gap. What is our do better? And so a year from now. The market may still be volatile. A year from now. There could still be a lot of headwinds but a year from now we can still decide to make progress all the same and that's what I hope to see a year from now. Thank you. Thank you

Esther Perel, Psychotherapist; Author and Host, Where Should We Begin
Interviewer: Reshma Saujani, Founder, Girls Who Code; Founder and CEO, The Marshall Plan for Moms; Author, Pay Up

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Working Toward A More Empathetic Workplace

Esther Perel, Psychotherapist; Author and Host, Where Should We Begin
Interviewer: Reshma Saujani, Founder, Girls Who Code

Working Toward A More Empathetic Workplace

Our next guest is one of the foremost experts in modern relationships. She's counseled couples and families on relationships and written books on erotic intelligence and infidelity. She's a podcaster, public speaker and master class teacher. I could listen to her voice forever. We are thrilled to have her with us today to talk about building relationships because doing so in our professional lives perhaps is perhaps most important, more important than ever. As the world of work continues to evolve. As she said, we cultivate our relationship resume at home and that influences how we interact at work. She's psychotherapist, bestselling author and host of Where should we begin Sarah parole And she's teaming up for a conversation today with M. P. W. Summit co chair johnny who is also the founder of girls who code founder and ceo of the marshall plan for moms and author of the book. Pay up. Please welcome stare and Reshma to the state. Hello everyone. Uh it's an honor to be here with my friend fair. Um they called it a wonderful introduction of her. But you are a world renowned relationship expert. You've got over 40 million views on ted uh Most importantly though, she was my couples therapist and saved my marriage which I got a little I do so I might need a little tune up but that's another conversation I have an opening on um but I want to start because last night we were sitting together for dinner and you were saying wow! Like I've never been invited to a conference like this with so many incredible women in business and so why is that? And why empathy? So what I was telling you is that it's been about five or six years that I am going from one business corporate conference to another. But probably 10 years ago, I would never have been invited Why? Because relational intelligence or relationship skills were basically considered feminine skills and feminine skills. You can idealize them in principle and disregard them in reality and basically it's considered soft and it doesn't meet the bottom line and therefore it has that quality that was just alluded to before about nice. I think what has profoundly changed is not my work. What has changed is the meaning of work. Work used to be primarily a production economy. It then became a service economy and it is today an identity economy and work as an identity economy means that we bring to work a host of needs that are relational and existential. We want purpose meaning community, belonging, Identity work meets relational needs like it never has before. Mass not just for a few of the privileged and that is what is profoundly shifting Now, what is the problem of empathy is that it's not a problem we of course want to lead with the heart and all of that. But if you reduce relational skills of relational intelligence to empathy, you you you take out the whole systemic aspect of understanding relational systems. Power is intrinsic to relational systems. So is the way that we communicate The way we share information. The way we collaborate or compete. The way we ask for help or try to experience only self reliance. Those elements are part of relation intelligence. If it's just empathy, I'm afraid that we're gonna just think we're changing something and we're gonna end up keeping women exactly in the position that they've always been in my trap. I think that the best way to explain this is by playing a game. So Esther and I are gonna play her game. Her game is called. Where should we begin? All of you should get this. I feel like a couple of you told me that you have two or three of these already. Um and I think let's start and but I want to tell me why are we playing this game? Why are we playing the game? So everybody in this room has an official CV. It's what you've been talking about before, the boards, you're sitting on the history of your careers, etcetera. But everyone in this room also has an unofficial resume which is your relationship history, which are the messages that you received about how you are in the world, whether you have had focus that emphasizes autonomy and self reliance or whether you grew up with a focus that emphasizes loyalty and interdependence. When we listened to ross yesterday, she told us a little bit about her official resume CV. But she told us and she gripped us with her relational stories about her dad, about her siblings, about going to college, about the community of Spelman. That unofficial resume is our story and stories is what binds us to people. That's what is the connection, that's the bridge. And so I thought I'm going to create a game that's gonna help us tell stories so that people actually know who they are working with and not just what do you do? Yeah, I'll never forget that image of Roz three years old. She said peeking in the window right while the other siblings were waiting for them to come to school. And I think that it was interesting in hearing her speak. I don't think we would have heard a female ceo feel comfortable or vulnerable enough to share that about themselves a couple of years ago. But that is what I think all of us in that room, especially when that image just fell in love with her like at that moment. And you identified because I think a lot of us probably in this room are latchkey kids. Right? Or as you say, are you interdependent or are you write self reliance, self reliance? I think a lot of us really resonated with that. Um okay, so we're gonna play a game and the other piece was why a game because play, I've loved you for a continue to take risks so that you don't, the goal is not to make people be vulnerable, but what you explained with roses that she grabbed us, but by reconciling what always traditionally and certainly under patriarchy seem like irreconcilable dimensions. You can either be powerful or connected, but you can't be both. This is the challenge for women in leadership or I would say this is the challenge for everybody in the today's leadership. Yeah. Um so these questions are very vulnerable. Not sure why I basically volunteered for this, but I did, especially given that you're my therapist. Um This is many years, so we are clear not much has changed. Um So I'm gonna give you no, no, no, Alright, I'm gonna read them and you um you know what we're gonna do very quickly raise your hand. I'm so proud. I'm proud. I stood up for myself. When? Yeah, okay, if I could whisper something in the ear of my younger self, I would say anybody know you don't have to answer them, Do you like the question? Oh, you're oh you're voting for me? It would be nice to me. Yes, yes. Which one you want to hear my answer? Okay. Start at the beginning very quick. I am proud. I stood up for myself. When if I could whisper something in the ear of my younger self, they all like him. I spend too much time worrying about. Okay in my family. My role is my latest crush is lately I've been getting better at, okay, I've spent too much time tell me you worry. Um Well, so the question is I spent so much time worrying I spent, I have a two year old and a seven year old and I spent too much time worrying about whether I have the right to do something for myself, you know, I again felt so guilty that I came here for three days, How many of you resonate with that torn about? Um trying to figure out whether I should take the red eye back and cut it short, right? Because God forbid I get eight hours of sleep and maybe get into run or you know, do something for myself. So I think that I spent too much time worrying about and this is what roz I worry more about one than the other. Um I worry more about the older one because I feel like he's like a little walking Gandhi um and Ross said this yesterday when we were sorry, it was actually the conversation, I can't say um but we're talking about how I do think that I'm going to feel like when they're older, that they're going to resent me for the my ambition and the fact and even my seven year old will say to me, mommy, you care more about those girls than you care about me. And so that that sense of guilt is already kind of seated in me and so I'm always watching to make sure that I'm not messing him up, right? And I think that one of the ways you bridge this is by telling the stories of what you experience when you leave, how hard it is when you go rather than I'll be right back and kind of false reassurances. It does involve, you know, it's hard for me when I go. How do you think about me when I'm gone? This is how I think about you when I'm gone and I look at pics, right, right. You create a way to maintain a threat and a connective tissue in the absence. Everybody understands that notion and when it is shared because what is what do you worry about on the other side? You worry that you miss the other person more than they miss you. So the way you equalize it is by actually creating a shared experience of it. I love the cards because it actually gives the if you can play it from eight years on and it gives you a legitimate way of asking the questions that are usually challenging of telling the stories Melinda was talking before about you bring your whole self to work. Of course we all bring our whole selves to work. We often do it unconsciously. We bring our intel relationship history, how we've learned to relate to people how much we trust them, how much we feel that we can rely on them, how much we can ask for help, how we lead, all of that history does not stay at the door when we walk in. This notion that we've had all along that we have to keep our life outside only let people and with all kinds of leaking do all kinds of things that we then did not understand where it came from. So we've always brought our whole selves to work. I don't think that is a new story. Yeah. I think what's also we were talking about last night was powerful. I'd love for you to share is the sense of that. So for so many of us, I think we were raised with working, you know, working mothers. My mother certainly worked all the time. Um, they were refugees. And so she had to work all the time. And so, but that but but so much I think who we are today is because we actually were allowed to have that independence and that resiliency. But ironically we're raising our kids exactly the opposite. Right. And I find that part of my relationship resume, right? So, so fascinating. Because I intuitively know like you said you when you were raising your kids, you intentionally would push them away. But I think so my parents are also refugees. I grew up above the store. Um, but I think that what's very interesting is that we have developed a new science these days called the science of grit. And it's how why why do we need grid only because we have created mush. It's like one thing response to the other, you know, and there is something about people who have had to work hard for something and struggle that they hope that the people who come after them won't have to struggle in the same way that if I can give you something is that I can diminish the hardship for you. And then they, but at the same time as they do that, they keep saying you have no idea how hard I work for this and things come so easily to you and you are entitled and you think you are old. So you find yourself in this constant conflict with what you want to change, but also with the resentment that the other people don't understand what it actually took and that they take it for granted. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. We're playing another card or am I off the hook. Okay. What was the other one that people wanted? Um, um, okay. I'm, I'm proud when I stood up for myself when, so I daughter of refugees, grew up as the only brown girl and um, a very white working class neighborhood. And so I, my house was regularly ppd and spray painted. Go back to your own country. And when I was in seventh grade, this girl called me a name and challenged me to a fight and little me said, all right, I'll meet you and I got beat up with a baseball bat. And um, I realized at that point that I was not and I never could be white, that I had to stop hiding from my identity. And that is what that moment was. The day that I became an activist. A year later I launched, you know, had my organized my 1st march. I've been marching ever since, but I was the proudest I've been is when I stood up for myself at that moment, that was the moment that my whole life changed. So imagine you played that card with your seven year old. Mm Because how old were you when this happened? I was probably 11, 12. Okay. So maybe like a little bit older. I think that one of the things that we miss is the sharing of exactly those stories at work when we do team meetings as well as at home. And because they give a whole different sense of you. You are working with the amount of assumptions we make about people that we can spend years with and we project onto them a whole bunch of things and we don't really understand that maybe they became a little bit like this or like that. I'm not even gonna name the qualities because there's a whole history that mandated that and they still think that this is really crucial as a survival strategy. And when you tell the stories, it's, you can tell them in playing a card game or you can tell him in fun facts. It doesn't matter. But what you get is the story, the unofficial resume that comes to work and that determines the person that you are and that you are working with relational intelligence at this point is very much a part of the bottom line. The thing is that because it's much more difficult to measure, its not like processes or production, it is much more amorphous. And so we think of it as an extra or something that is needed in times of crisis. But in times of crisis, you need to solve something quickly and you are contracted because there is a tension and you cannot think creatively. So you have urgency. But you don't have creativity in times that are not crisis. You have creativity and you have less urgency, but you have much more latitude to create lasting change. Is the problem of relationship awareness is that people only think about it when the ship hits the fun said with my accent. So we have three minutes only and I want to I want to get to some closing. I want to wrap this up a little bit and and so as you're talking, I think this is a room full of the most powerful women in the world, literally. And when they hear you, one of the things that I hear is you know, how do you reconcile this vulnerability, authenticity, sharing your most personal secrets to allow people to learn about you with reconciling how we see power. Power is supposed to be a little bit of swag right? You don't actually show that much about yourself because you're supposed to show strength. Power is not an individual attribute. Power is systemic. Power is part of any relational system. The moment you depend on somebody, they have power. Every little one knows that. But equally, you understand that power doesn't always come from the top down. Everyone who's ever seen a two year old understands that, you know, this idea of looking at power from this very linear thing. You know, only vertical and it's from the top going down, Power is necessary. It's not a negative word. It and we cannot always use power with abuse right attached to it because then we delude the whole concept where agency is power power to its power, its power from its power. You know, power over is a different story. So, I really want us to round that thing then, you know, I think one of the ways that I can illustrate how you reconnect when people deal with conflict in the workplace, for example, we are continuously driven to think that it is about what it is that we are fighting about. We are very much focused on the content. The issues, the vast majority of things we fight about are not about the issues, they are basically about three major categories and these are relational dimensions. We fight about power and control who has priority, who matters most. Who gets to decide. That is relational. We fight about trust and we said about care and closeness. I can I trust you who has my back, Who can I rely on? And we fight about respect and recognition. Where is the validation? Who recognizes me and who sees what I am about. These three dimensions are relational dimensions that are part of every argument that you have in your homes with your partners, friends, family members and that you have at work. But we are almost sapiens and we keep thinking that is the subject the issue that we are fighting about when in fact generally you can summarize it into one of these three pieces. This is relational intelligence within a larger framework that is systemic, that is power influence. And that has relational intelligence. Wonderful! This is why I am still married. So thank you so much. This was such a powerful conversation. I really encourage every single person in this room um to um Sarah's one of the most is the most profound person who has ever whoever kind of teaches on this idea of relationships and power and work. And I think it all blends together. And there's so many of your teachings in your master class and your ted talk in your books and you are one of the most wisest women I know. So I'm in such gratitude for everything that you put out there in the world because you have helped me become the person I am today. So thank you. Thank you so much.

Melinda French Gates, Co-chair, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; Founder, Pivotal Ventures 
Interviewer: Michal Lev-Ram, FORTUNE


Most Powerful Women 2022 - Disrupting Inequality

Melinda French Gates, Co-chair, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; Founder, Pivotal Ventures 
Interviewer: Michal Lev-Ram, FORTUNE




Most Powerful Women 2022 - Disrupting Inequality



our first guest wants to take that power up a notch. She believes that we need to take a more holistic approach to empower more women at all levels of society and of all backgrounds. It's part of her mission to make the world a better, more equitable place. Please welcome back to the N. P. W. Stage, Melinda french Gates, co chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and founder of pivotal ventures for a conversation with my colleague. Okay welcome Melinda. Thank you. Um I know you're look everybody's taking your photo already. I love it. Good morning. So I know you're obviously you're out and about again you're traveling around. Um and I know you finally got to go to africa again after a long time of not being on the continent. Um you went to Rwanda and Senegal tell us a little bit about just what you saw and what your impressions are of where things progress for women, where things regressed globally abroad um and then we'll get to the U. S. Okay? So yes the reason I hadn't been out traveling obviously was because of covid and the pandemic. And finally this summer um I got to go out traveling again on the continent which I always learned because you talked to so many people, men and women and for me at least that experiential learning is how I learned and You know it's interesting. I mean you have to look globally at where are we as women and we are further behind than when I was at this conference. I think back in 2014 we are three generations away from gender equality in the world, that's my granddaughter granddaughters and to me that's just not acceptable. And so but when you go places like Senegal and Rwanda, you actually see I see the hope. So. I sat with a group of women who were creating businesses. They were part of an investment club and it was so interesting to hear them talk about they have these amazing businesses But how hard it was to get venture capital. 30% of businesses in Senegal are owned by women and yet 3% of venture capital moves to them. And I thought that's just like what I hear when I talk to women in Silicon Valley, less than 2% of venture capital goes to women led businesses from Silicon Valley. You go to Rwanda which I think I've been to at least a half a dozen times now. Maybe more. So interesting to see what's happened because president Kagame after the genocide put in a quota that said 30% of our parliament will be women today, 60% of parliament are women. And they will tell you and the men will tell you that it has changed society. The way they view women. The head of the Kigali Bank, the most powerful black bank, the largest bank in Rwanda is headed by a woman. And so I see changes happening but we're not getting them quickly enough and we're not getting them globally quickly enough around the world. So let's let's pivot to the U. S. And I think obviously everybody is very familiar with the Gates Foundation. You also you found it and um and share pivotal ventures which is really focused on the U. S. And advancing women and people of color here. Um, last time you were here in 2014, you were talking to us about family planning summit in London, you'd raised billions of dollars for contraceptives for distribution in the developing world and fast forward to today and where we're sitting here um this summer we saw the constitutional right to abortion being struck down by the Supreme Court. There's fear that contraceptives are in in risk in certain states. Um and that there's going to be more restrictions there. So given everything that you know globally that you've seen about the correlation of reproductive rights to sort of the broader advancement of women. Um what do you see ahead here? What are we, what are we in for? So I think we let me just talk to stand back from and talk at large. We have so long as the development community which I've been part of for over 20 years through the Gates foundation. We've so long for long talked about empowering women and I think we just need to stop and say no, no, no. We have to make sure women have their full power in society. What do I mean by that? I mean that in their homes and communities and at the very top levels of society that women can control resources, make decisions and shape policies and perspectives. I am convinced that roe v wade would not have been rolled back. You know, a law for women's health on the books for almost 50 years. I was in Rwanda frankly when that got announced and people in Rwanda were just shocked like how can the U. S. Role something like that back? Had the Supreme Court been put there by women? I don't think that decision would have would have happened. And so, you know, we keep talking in Congress about, oh isn't it great, we get another one or 2% of our congressional leaders are women, Well it's Good, but until we get to 50% being women, we don't have a single woman in the Senate who's black, not a single woman. And yet I look out in society and there are a lot of amazing black women, so we can't accept that anymore. We have to make sure women get into seats of power and take their power. And so that is what I'm committing my life to do both through the Foundation globally and pivotal ventures in the United States. So, you know, I love this concept, not just putting women on the agenda, but women making the agenda. Is that politics political or or does it just across the board. How do you just explain that to us? What does that mean? So I grew up in a household where my mom always said to me and my sister as a young girl, set your own agenda or somebody else will. And um I see it as in politics because that's where our public policy gets made. I think women need to be equal across the top. I think in media because that's who tells our stories and shapes our perspective. Look at the difference since Shonda Rhimes has been writing for television or Ava Duvernay with the movie she's making, I think finance because finance, money is power and so you need to have women at the top of financial institutions. I notice Shonda is going to speak later and I think you need to have women at the top and computer science because I look at what's happening. You know, my background is computer science and economics, but I look at the bias being baked into artificial intelligence and I think, oh my gosh, this is just like the US constitution, look what happened. Women and minorities weren't represented there and we're still fighting now to have true equality. You can't have the tech sector which is so prevalent in our lives run by essentially a small group of white men. So midterms are coming up, what is what is your approach and what are the initiatives that you're involved in and pivotal of course when it comes to specifically the political side, Well, I'm everything I do and this is true, both at pivotal ventures and at the Foundation, we invest in partners. And so I'm investing in a number of partners who and I am also putting directly money into candidates elections. But I'm in partners who are looking at how do we get the harassment down in the system? How do we help women and people are L G B T Q fight the harassment in the system? That's a big reason women don't run for office. And how do we make sure their political campaigns are funded at the same level as a man because it is expensive to run for office. It's hard to run for office. So the partners, I'm working through those, that is our big agenda on the political front, I want to ask you also, you know, you you're such an optimist and yet you've seen and talked to so many people who are in such hard positions and you see this, you know, rollback of rights in in this country. What is it that gives you that sense of optimism and hope as you do your work. Um and have you always been an optimist? I think I've probably always been an optimist. I believe in human beings, we are the ones that change the world and I believe in human ingenuity. And so I think when we talk about the real things going on society, unpaid labor, you know, we expect women to care for Children de facto right. And usually for the elderly, that's over 50 million caregivers in our country. And yet we don't create the right policies so they can have affordable quality child care so they can care for the Children and have a job. What I see though is more people talking out about it. We got this close to a paid family medical leave law in our country at the federal level. Those partners aren't going away, I'm not going away. We're gonna keep fighting that. It was one white man that didn't get that passed. Um So I've just seen a Kadre now of women and like minded men saying this shouldn't be, society is going to be better off. The last thing I'll say just about this specifically is, you know, again, so often the women's issue is the nice to do issue the side issue, the backburner issue. I hear this essentially from prime ministers and presidents when I go places like the U. N. Or I meet with them. But you know, let's talk economics, we care economics. If women had the same lifetime earnings of men around the world, we'd add 100 and $70 trillion to the global GDP. So it also just makes economic sense. And so I think it takes all of us to talk about all the factors and then push them forward. And I see women like in this room who are in positions of power are changing things inside of their companies. And I see men like minded men saying, look I know great female scientists, let's make sure that we keep the resume pool open till we get more female scientists on the list, not just white male scientists before we hire. I just I see society changing and we just need to keep pushing because it is humans and human ingenuity that changes society. So I know I mentioned all of the hardships that you've seen across the world and that that you've dedicated yourself to. Um, you had your own set of personal challenges over the last few years. And and definitely since we we saw you here, um, I shared with you earlier that when I got divorced nobody other than my friends and family care, it wasn't, you know, I'm not a public person, like I cannot imagine going through that um more or less in in in the spotlight. And I'm curious how has it changed you if at all um as a leader as you go around and you talk to women across the world, has it changed your perspective? I think what it has taught me is something I had always longed to do, which is to be my most authentic self in every place I show up. And it's funny we have, you know, society is changing. We have said society up essentially in the U. S. So that men, you know kind of went off to work and the women stayed home and cared for the Children. That is completely flipped now right? Most um couples who are partnered, 52% have dual incomes. And so when I think about what we used to say, even to men in the workforce, you kinda you went into the workforce and you talked about work, you didn't talk about your personal life, there has to be boundaries around that. Of course, I know people go into work and you want you bring your whole self to work. You know, you do want to talk a bit about your kids and what's important to you and what's important in society. So I just feel unleashed to do that all the more now and to use both places, both the foundation to forward the agenda I believe in and that we believe in as a foundation and the agenda that I care about in the United States through globally through the Foundation and through pivotal ventures really working on the inequities that happen in this country. Um I know that your your co chairing, by the way, if I ask for a show of hands, I'm not gonna do this, but I'm sure there are other women here who have been divorced, but I don't think that we get other any hands up. If I ask, do you co chair a billion multi billion dollar foundation with your ex husband. So how is that going? Maybe I'm wrong, I don't know, I do realize I'm charting unchartered waters, um but I will say that we are both deeply committed to that institution, look my values are baked into that institution and so what I know is that I have to show up as my best self every single day, um I was saying backstage just briefly, I saw Esther Perel, who I know is going to speak on this stage, I just finished her master class about relationships and one of the things she talks about is power, right? So I both, I'm gonna have, I both have a relationship with my former husband at work and hopefully eventually I'll have a relationship, you know personally with somebody outside of work, but we have to think about power inside of a relationship and how do you share that and share that collaboratively, and so I spend a little more time thinking about that today. But the other thing I will say at the Foundation is we have an amazing board, now we have incredible governance and so I also know it's possible. Yeah, and that actually brings me to my next question. Um Bill Gates made some headlines just recently at a philanthropy conference talking about how the foundation is not going to live beyond the next 25 years, or what you know. I realized this was this was baked into sort of your original intention, it sounds like, but what is that all about? Like explain to us how this works and what your, what it says about your approach to philanthropy that this was not meant to be, you know, your your name, put on something to live for all eternity, you want to have Impact in your lifetime, right? So first of all, just to be clear, the governance documents of the foundation, which I'm a signatory co signature on, I'm a co chair say that it will last till 20 years after the death of the last of us. Got it. So that is the current stated plan. Um but the intention is that the resources that have been amassed from Microsoft that have ended up for whatever reason in both of our hands, that those resources will return to society. And both he and I have thought for a long time we can't predict the problems 100 years from now, we couldn't have predict some of the things that happened in the last five years. So we want to solve today's problems and what we know is that they're enormous and they're even bigger frankly post pandemic because of both the health shocks. But really the economic scarring one for instance, there is, you know, there are many more people this year that will go hungry than last year because of the fuel and fertilizer and food crisis coming out of the Ukraine war, 100 and 50 million more women will go hungry than men. So what I, my job as a coach er, is to say, okay, thus what do we do about it? So we don't just work on hunger at large, but we make sure that food and nutritious food gets into women's hands because guess what? Women not only feed themselves, but they decide who eats in the family and what they eat. Okay? And thank you for clarifying, I assume he wasn't, you know, prophesying a future demise, right? Like that's not something that an ai No, no, I was thinking something and said it before. We have made a decision. All right, do we have a question for Melinda in the audience? A least we'll bring a microphone over to you and if you could introduce yourself. Hi Elise Johnson, Ceo, vital voices. Thank you Melinda for using your platform and your full force and I'm so thrilled to have your most authentic power on these issues. But as you know, it's all about money. Women can't get to power without the money. And we know that only 2% of development charitable giving goes to women and women's organizations. You obviously have, you are not in that category. You have done far more. But how do we get the rest of, you know, whether it's corporate foundations, private foundations to do the same to follow suit and to realize this is the issue of our lifetime. I think we all have to use our voices. I think we have to keep pushing. I think you form grassroots organizations like moms rising saying this is what's right. Uh, Reshma here, she has mom's marshall plan. I think you get inside of corporations, corporations starting to say this is what's right for our employees, not just in the U. S. But globally. And I think it's also by demonstrating so part of the reason I'm using my capital and being so vociferous about it and you're seeing some other women do that who have means in their hands. Like were were unbelievably privileged to have these these means in our hands. You see them living their values in society. And I think by doing that, then you see others follow, but it's gonna take all of us. This is, you know, we're pushing against barriers that are baked into society writ large and um, we have to name and speak our truth if we're going to change that. Um, I wanna end here by throwing out some numbers. Um, since the Gates Foundation started more than two decades ago, you provided more than $60 billion 50 billion. And last year you committed an additional 50 billion collectively. Um, and you've also committed one billion of your money to pivotal. These are astounding numbers. The level of impact that these numbers have is just incredible. And I just want to hear from you. I mean, you touched on this already, but what else can women in the room do today, whether it's in this country or they're looking you know, more globally? How do they have impact? Okay, so let me just add one thing to what you said about the amount of money that is not just the resources from Microsoft, that is also warren Buffett's collectively, I'm not correct you, I'm just saying it's really important for us to recognize that because he believes in women having their full power and he has for a long time. So what I would say to all of you collectively is wherever you sit inside a corporation. If your policy maker, if you're a mom who works empower people around you use your resources, use your voice, vote for the right people who you think should be at the top, get others to vote, bring young women along with you, Any of us that have platforms, we need to open them to other leaders, global leaders, female leaders, young women coming up behind us, this is not a one generation and it's going to solve this problem, it's gonna take all of us to move forward in the world. Thank you so much, Melinda. Thank you

Most Powerful Women Summit 2022

Most Powerful Women 2022 - Securing The Future Of Women’s Leadership

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