Tag: Events

Billion Dollar Shave Club: Michael Dubin’s Next Chapter Inside Unilever

By

NewCo Shift Forum — Speaker Spotlight


There aren’t many ads that people actively seek out and share with their friends, but Dollar Shave Club’s launch video is certainly one of them.

Starring founder and CEO Michael Dubin, the 2012 viral video has over 23 million views, and it set the tone for the Dollar Shave Club brand in the years to come: simple, funny, and unorthodox. Along with its irreverent marketing, the brands direct-to-consumer subscription model, and simple, inexpensive razors made it an instant hit in the men’s grooming space. Everyone rooted for Dubin and DSC, the scrappy startup going head-to-head against Big Razor.

Read More

Driving The Shift Towards a More Inclusive Country With Maya Rockeymoore

By


Maya Rockeymoore, Ph.D, is a respected policy expert, strategist, and a longtime advocate for social and economic inclusion.

Rockeymoore runs Global Policy Solutions, a social change consulting firm (and certified B Corp) that works with clients across the private, public, and non-profit sectors. Rockeymoore founded the organization in 2005, long before the “mission-driven” business movement truly started gaining momentum.

Read More

From Governor, to Homeland Security Chief, to Leader of 250,000 Students

By

NewCo Shift Forum — Speaker Spotlight


Running a school system with 250,000 students and 10 campuses is a tall order, especially for an outsider to academia. But Janet Napolitano has proven she’s up to the task.

Napolitano, President of the University of California system, is a former lawyer, Attorney General of Arizona, and was a two-time Democratic Governor of Arizona from 2003 to 2009. She also served as the Secretary of Homeland Security under President Obama until 2013, the first woman ever to serve in that office.

Read More

Can Kathleen McLaughlin Make Walmart —The World’s Largest Company — More Sustainable?

By

NewCo Shift Forum — Speaker Spotlight


Kathleen McLaughlin is the Chief Sustainability Officer at Walmart, and also serves as President of the Walmart Foundation. Kathleen joined Walmart in 2013 after spending over 20 years at McKinsey & Company, a global consulting firm.

In 2005, Walmart set three ambitious, and at the time, unprecedented sustainability goals for the decade ahead: be fully supplied by renewable energy, create zero waste, and sell products that “sustain our resources and environment.” The company closely measured these goals, and reported annually openly on its progress. And while cynics might claim the company’s moves were just another PR ploy, Walmart’s commitment had significant impact. When a company with half a trillion dollars in revenues shifts its focus, entire economies of scale shift with it.

Read More

To Rebuild Its Image, Bank of America Focused on Its Mission

By

NewCo Shift Form — Speaker Spotlight


Of the banks that survived the financial crisis, few were as battered as Bank of America. The company found itself at the centre of the largest financial breakdown and economic collapse since the Great Depression — their brand’s reputation plummeted not only for its role as a subprime lender, but also amidst accusations of overcharging customers, mishandling foreclosures, and more. Combine this with the $45 billion of federal aid that the bank received, and it quickly became a target for activists, protesters, and politicians, a symbol for what many thought had gone wrong with Wall Street.

Enter Anne Finucane, who has been with Bank of America since 2005, but led the effort to help rebuild trust in their brand and improve their business practices in a post-recession world. Finucane, vice chairman and member of the executive management team, is responsible for the strategic positioning of the bank, and leads their environmental, social, and governance (ESG) efforts. She also oversees public policy, customer research and analytics, global marketing and communications.

Read More

What Happens When Leaders of BigCos, NewCos, and Government Convene?

By

A preview of the upcoming Shift Forum, where we’ll find out.


I’ve spent the past few weeks obsessing over the program for the first ever Shift Forum, an ambitious new event we’re convening in early February. Over the past twenty years, I’ve hosted scores of high-level executive conferences, but this one is markedly different. Shift Forum isn’t a vertical industry event — it’s not focused on technology, or marketing, or policy. Instead, the program is centered around a core, lateral idea in business — that we’re in an extraordinary period of change in our economy and our society, and that change effects every sector and every company — not just one industry.

Those of us in the technology industry tend to think all change begins and ends with our products and services, but that’s exactly the kind of thinking we need to move beyond. Without a doubt, the advance of AI, the rise of the cloud, the domination of mobile and social, and countless other technological innovations have changed business forever. Thanks to those innovations, society is demanding a new contract with business. And that’s what we’re convening to discuss.

Read More

Steph Curry is Redefining Teamwork, On and Off The Court

By

NewCo Shift Forum — Speaker Spotlight


The Golden State Warriors are a team full of superstars, with some of the best individual talent in the NBA. Much of the Warriors success, though, is due to their relentless focus on putting personal glory aside and working together as a team. Here’s the proof: they have led the NBA in assists the past three years by a significant margin, showing their ability to create opportunities as a team, not just as individual talents. The formula is working — it led the Warriors to a historic 73-win season in 2016, and an NBA championship in 2015.

Steph Curry, as point guard and reigning league MVP, is the chief evangelist of the team-first focus. He’s changing how basketball players are viewed on and off the court, especially given that there’s another side to him that you might not be familiar with: he’s also an avid entrepreneur, investor, and philanthropist, and is actively getting involved in the startup world.

Read More

Saving Capitalism With Robert Reich

By

NewCo Shift Forum — Speaker Spotlight


Robert Reich is the Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley. He served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, and Time magazine named him one of the 10 most effective cabinet secretaries of the 20th century.

A leading political economist, Reich has authored 14 books. His latest book, Saving Capitalism, debunks the notion that we need to choose between the “free market” and “big government”. The free market is a myth, Reich argues, because the rules of our market are set, organized, and maintained by government, and the market cannot be separated from the administrators, agencies, legislators, and judges that define it.

Read More

The Shift Is Here. Now We Must Lead.

By

With capitalism at a crossroads and tech driving unprecedented change, it’s time to harness the power of uncertainty


Those of us in the technology and startup worlds have thrived in uncertainty, we actively seek out its risks and opportunities. The ground has always shifted beneath us — but the tremors are now tectonic. Even before the results of this extraordinary election, we could feel it building. In the past decade, our creations have aggregated power beyond our control — they have swayed elections, they have concentrated wealth, data, and leverage in the hands of the very few, and they have triggered market panics and social revolutions. Soon our technologies will unleash a wave of AI-driven automation, and with it the loss (or is it the creation?) of millions of jobs. The world now demands we take responsibility for the power we’ve acquired, and that we engage with society at a broader scale. Will we answer that call?

As technology companies acquired power, the leadership of our largest legacy companies — companies that came to dominance during the post war economic boom — can no longer ignore the shifts in nearly every aspect of their business: customers are demanding new experiences, employees are demanding their work ladders to a greater purpose than profit, partners are asking for new ways to work together, and competitors are redefining markets once thought stable. How will our largest companies manage the transition to a world reshaped by technology?

Read More

My picks for NewCo Mexico City

By

On October 19 and 20th, we will be staging our second NewCo Festival in Mexico City. Over 60 innovative businesses will be opening their doors and sharing their experience and insights on tackling meaningful problems. Contrary to those who would build border walls, the NewCo movement believes solutions can come from anywhere, and there are great groups of people inside companies all over the planet working to bring these solutions to market. I’m looking forward to getting up close and personal with innovators south of the border. Below is where I’ll be.

Scene from NewCo Mexico City 2015

Wednesday, October 19

9:00 AM: Tu Canton

Read More