Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason
Speaker 1: Kelly from Bloomberg Radio. Jason Kelly and I'm Carol Masser.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the weekend edition of Bloomberg Business Week. We
Speaker 1: mostly working from home a little bit of the office,
Speaker 1: but it was full of a lot of stories, Jason,
Speaker 1: that reminded us once again, getting back to normal, it's
Speaker 1: not going to be easy. We saw virus cases popping
Speaker 1: up in New York City, also around the globe, and
Speaker 1: throughout this pandemic, we've been reminded of so many of
Speaker 1: the inequalities in our world, and so how timely that
Speaker 1: this week across the Bloomberg Empire, we're talking about equality.
Speaker 1: The equality issue of Bloomberg Business Week, the Equality Summit
Speaker 1: held virtually of course, because that's the world we're living in.
Speaker 1: We're going to hear some of the key interviews from
Speaker 1: that summit and talk to the editor of the magazine
Speaker 1: and some of the key reporters who contributed to that issue. Plus,
Speaker 1: we've got Vox co founder Matthew Iglesias on his new
Speaker 1: book and if we don't measure this and and look
Speaker 1: at it, If companies don't measure and look at this,
Speaker 1: We're not gonna make progress. We'll hear from Xerox chairman
Speaker 1: and CEO Ursla Burns at TPG co CEO and partner
Speaker 1: John Winkle reed on the importance of more diversity on
Speaker 1: corporate boards. But first, Carol, it's the cover story about
Speaker 1: how it's time for a new approach to cure inequality
Speaker 1: because capitalism just isn't cutting it. Check out what Rebecca Greenfield,
Speaker 1: who leads the diversity and sustainability coverage at Bloomberg, had
Speaker 1: to say along with Bluemberg. Business Week editor Joe Weber.
Speaker 1: Credit to Rebecca, who has done a number of stories
Speaker 1: for us this year, and I think this is their
Speaker 1: second cover um in in this space. And when we
Speaker 1: start of started talking to her about what how we
Speaker 1: wanted to approach the quality issue, I think she really
Speaker 1: came at it almost like a little bit of a
Speaker 1: sequel to her last cover story, and it was the
Speaker 1: idea that the last time, it was the idea that
Speaker 1: businesses just have a dearth of of black or minority CEOs,
Speaker 1: people of color, with a really really provocative uh cover
Speaker 1: that showed just how white the fortune is. And this
Speaker 1: time I think she went even a little bit bigger
Speaker 1: about this and said, look like, actually the force of
Speaker 1: that companies have been relying on here is the market.
Speaker 1: The market is supposed to correct things, and it's clue
Speaker 1: clearly not working. And even more provocative, I think, is
Speaker 1: this idea that within HR departments D and I of
Speaker 1: the Diversity and Initiative crew has actually been part of
Speaker 1: the problem. Almost I could pick it up from there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: thanks so much for having me and I yeah, definitely
Speaker 1: Absos did as a follow up to the last piece.
Speaker 1: But like Joab, the driving force behind diversity and inclusion
Speaker 1: initiative to the last three decades has been this market.
Speaker 1: You have an approach, So this idea that you know,
Speaker 1: discrimination and in equality is bad for business. Um, you
Speaker 1: know you're you're losing out on productive people if you
Speaker 1: discriminate I guess people just because they look like And
Speaker 1: also there's so much research showing that diverse teams are
Speaker 1: just better and more productive. And this has been having
Speaker 1: the deconied apartment and you know, billions of dollars of
Speaker 1: industry to get more people who are women and minorities
Speaker 1: and the high paying jobs. And in the piece, um,
Speaker 1: I get into how that hasn't worked. But also you
Speaker 1: know how the George Floyd protests this summer um have
Speaker 1: led to a bit of a shift in thinking away
Speaker 1: from this kind of dominant theory. And so Becca, what
Speaker 1: are people actually doing about it? I mean part of
Speaker 1: what you know, I know you and your team have
Speaker 1: described as this is obviously moving from the fringes into
Speaker 1: the mainstream, into the main conversation. That's one of the
Speaker 1: pillars of everything we're doing with the Equality Summit. But
Speaker 1: what sort of actual movement are we seeing or is
Speaker 1: the entire point that we're not actually seeing anything. We're
Speaker 1: so actually are seeing some changes. And I think the
Speaker 1: biggest thing is, you know, this is not kind of
Speaker 1: sound like that, it's a mindset shift. So before it
Speaker 1: was kind of like diversity is good. Now it's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: racism is still happening, and so we need to do
Speaker 1: things combat racism. I think we can add that to
Speaker 1: other isms that racism has been the focus um for
Speaker 1: the summer for good reason. So I think that's been
Speaker 1: a big shift, because you do different things once you
Speaker 1: start thinking about it in terms of fixing racism as
Speaker 1: opposed to promoting diversity. And I think the biggest thing
Speaker 1: that I've noticed that's more tangible than a mindset shift
Speaker 1: is things that look very similar to and I would
Speaker 1: describe as quotas um, which is what my first article
Speaker 1: was about, which I remember that that was really great
Speaker 1: because I really thought about that. You know, does this
Speaker 1: is this what we need to do? Yeah? I think companies,
Speaker 1: although they are reluctant to actually call it that because
Speaker 1: they're very scared of the word for various reasons, they
Speaker 1: are saying, like, we are going to aim to have
Speaker 1: a certain number or percentage of black people or Latin
Speaker 1: next people in certain high paying, high power roles, and
Speaker 1: that is different. They had not done anything bad aggressive
Speaker 1: before Five Lives Matter protest, and I think it's things
Speaker 1: like that that might move the needle more or at
Speaker 1: bay at least just trying something different and then and
Speaker 1: that's a big shift in the last couple of months
Speaker 1: compared to the last thirty years. Back in one of
Speaker 1: the most provocative things, I'm gonna steal your thunder a
Speaker 1: little bit um, or at least let you steal your
Speaker 1: own thunder, uh is your opening anecdote from seventeen um
Speaker 1: that is about Apple. Can you share that one because
Speaker 1: it's such a provocative way into the story. Yeah. So
Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen, the woman who is tutting up Apple's
Speaker 1: diversity and inclusion department, she's being at a conference and
Speaker 1: she said in her own marks, she said, there can
Speaker 1: be twelve white blue eyes blonde then in a room,
Speaker 1: and they're going to be diverse, and they're going to
Speaker 1: bring a different life experience and life perspective to the conversation.
Speaker 1: And she apologized for those remarks because you know, people said, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, if that's not really diverse city. But it
Speaker 1: was really that that the mission to get more women
Speaker 1: on minorities up and down the corporate ladder had really
Speaker 1: become diluted, and it really become driven by this idea
Speaker 1: we just made diversity of thotten experiences. And when you
Speaker 1: think like, yeah, it's true, like a certain of you know,
Speaker 1: white blonde, blue eyed man from or clearly is going
Speaker 1: to be different than at white blue blonde man from
Speaker 1: somewhere else, but it does not has nothing to do
Speaker 1: with the original mission of getting more women and minorities
Speaker 1: higher up the corporate Later, and that was Rebecca Greenfield
Speaker 1: overseeing all of our managing diversity coverage and Bloomberg Business
Speaker 1: Week editor Joel Webber. So, Jason, coming up from our
Speaker 1: equalities summit, we continue along this theme and this time
Speaker 1: about the failures of capitalism when it comes to diversity
Speaker 1: inclusion in corporate boardrooms. That's right, my conversation with former
Speaker 1: Zerox chairman and CEO Ursula Byrne. She's got a new
Speaker 1: project all about creating more diversity on boards. It is
Speaker 1: very aligned with John Winkle Reed's work over at TPG.
Speaker 1: Weill have that converse tion coming up next. This is Bloomberg.
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason
Speaker 1: Kelly from Bloomberg Radio. We're going to continue with our
Speaker 1: equality theme this week. Jason. Of course, it's a deep
Speaker 1: diving the issue and our summit absolutely a summit you
Speaker 1: and I were both delighted to be a part of.
Speaker 1: And the conversation that I had, I really liked it.
Speaker 1: I have to say Ursula Burns, she's a force, the
Speaker 1: former Xerox german and CEO. She joined me along with
Speaker 1: TPG co CEO and partner John Winkle Reed. We're talking
Speaker 1: about boards and we started talking about a new initiative
Speaker 1: that Ursula is getting underway. This started pretty simply and
Speaker 1: pretty you know, not a lot of ambition. It was
Speaker 1: the response to a lot of calls that I was
Speaker 1: getting in and my brother's and sisters, my black CEOs
Speaker 1: who were getting calls as well, right after the George
Speaker 1: Floyd incident. And it was calls to say from other
Speaker 1: us to say, we think we are doing things okay,
Speaker 1: but it seems like we maybe missing something. Can you
Speaker 1: help me think through this situation? What's happening in the
Speaker 1: United States, what's happening all over the world? And I
Speaker 1: got probably twenty five calls Darren Walker from the Ford Foundation.
Speaker 1: Can we all got calls from other CEOs and business
Speaker 1: leaders asking for some insight. And one of the things
Speaker 1: that became clear was that they were calling us they
Speaker 1: didn't have the resource at home that they could actually
Speaker 1: reach to clearly on their boards, they didn't have that
Speaker 1: resource they could say, can you give me some insights
Speaker 1: that would be able to help me and and my company,
Speaker 1: our company get through this. After these levels of calls,
Speaker 1: myself and Darren and Gaby Salzburger, a whole bunch of
Speaker 1: were just together thinking and talking and saying, why don't
Speaker 1: we not become these point people of here. You know,
Speaker 1: can you give me a call and get a help.
Speaker 1: Can can we structure something that's that's reasonable, that is
Speaker 1: a resource for companies to use income to if they
Speaker 1: wanted to do something pretty simple, because most of these
Speaker 1: calls were to us as business leaders speaking to ceo s,
Speaker 1: could we actually start at the top and structure something
Speaker 1: that was to get every board in the fortune fortune
Speaker 1: one thousand, fortune three thousand to have at least one
Speaker 1: black director, pretty straightforward and no other No, you know,
Speaker 1: no gun to your head, no threats, No, this is
Speaker 1: all about you doing what is will be helpful for
Speaker 1: you and your company particularly now. Just do it as
Speaker 1: a natural, as a natural initiative, and it turns out
Speaker 1: that it then snowball from there. The more people that
Speaker 1: we talked to, the more we realize that this is
Speaker 1: something that's good. We're not the only group doing this,
Speaker 1: This is not the only initiative, this is not the
Speaker 1: only move happening, but it was something that we could do.
Speaker 1: Um that was black lead three you know, three black people, myself,
Speaker 1: two women, uh, myself, Gabby Darren and some people around
Speaker 1: us as well. We have to NaIO helping us. They
Speaker 1: are they are helping us with numbers and with process
Speaker 1: and actually helping us build up a little bit more
Speaker 1: of a database. We have the black Director's initiative, who's engaged.
Speaker 1: We have the Boulet who's engaged. So there are a
Speaker 1: large number of people who actually are trying to work
Speaker 1: on this. We know, maybe too many initiatives, but enough
Speaker 1: such that we can actually make progress on this one
Speaker 1: simple thing. One black director on every company that has
Speaker 1: a board. Let's start with the three thousand. Then we
Speaker 1: went to to try to finding out find out who
Speaker 1: has what. And it's interesting that the data is horrible.
Speaker 1: It's not well kept. Um, it's not an essential place.
Speaker 1: We couldn't. We couldn't. The way that we've found out
Speaker 1: the data is to literally get the list of directors
Speaker 1: and look at the pictures and make an assessment. Now,
Speaker 1: how do we know if this person is black or not?
Speaker 1: So the second thing is about reporting. Can we get
Speaker 1: self identification the director self identify and get some idea
Speaker 1: of where we are, because if we don't measure this
Speaker 1: and and look at it, if companies don't measure and
Speaker 1: look at this, we're not gonna make progress and then
Speaker 1: the third plank is basically around support. Can we support?
Speaker 1: Can we educate? Can can we be a resource to
Speaker 1: these companies and too these boards and two management teams, etcetera.
Speaker 1: UM to actually make progress on diversity as a total.
Speaker 1: We started with black, but it's not black only. We
Speaker 1: started with black because that's the moment that we're in.
Speaker 1: But we have we have women diversity, we have Latina diversity,
Speaker 1: Latino diversity, the diversity across the board. And so, John,
Speaker 1: I want to turn to you because you and I
Speaker 1: spoke a year or so ago about some initiatives that
Speaker 1: you are undertaking, largely around including women on the boards
Speaker 1: of the companies that you were invested in. You have
Speaker 1: since expanded that. I want to back up a little
Speaker 1: bit to understand and help the audience understand why do
Speaker 1: boards matter so much? Why is there so much focus
Speaker 1: on the board. It seems maybe a little bit obvious
Speaker 1: that I want to put that question to you. Well,
Speaker 1: I think you know that the words UM are really
Speaker 1: critical in a number of different respects in a in
Speaker 1: a private equity context. UM. You know, we bring a
Speaker 1: lot of capabilities and talents to our companies to help navigate,
Speaker 1: help build our businesses UM and our words are an
Speaker 1: integral part of that. UM. You know, the private equity
Speaker 1: approach in governance in private company situations is slightly different,
Speaker 1: but not you know, it's not entirely different than public
Speaker 1: companies UM. But in a private context, you know, we're
Speaker 1: trying to investment companies create value. And one of the
Speaker 1: things that we do in particular a TPG. It's done
Speaker 1: across the private equity industry. But one of the things
Speaker 1: that we are very focused on as a firm and
Speaker 1: proud of is that we are we're very engaged with
Speaker 1: our companies and UM. So I would say if I
Speaker 1: had if I had to boil it down, I would
Speaker 1: say engagement with our companies to help our companies grow,
Speaker 1: help our companies navigate problems UM on one hand, and
Speaker 1: on the other hand, UM, I would say, having an
Speaker 1: investor mindset around the cable UM is often an important
Speaker 1: thing in terms of accountability and driving growth and improving
Speaker 1: our companies UM, and so quality of people that we
Speaker 1: have around our boards is paramount. And so a year
Speaker 1: ago when we got together and talked about this, Jason,
Speaker 1: I think one of the things that we felt really
Speaker 1: important was UM having a group sitting around those tables
Speaker 1: that are adding value, that are UM, that are diverse
Speaker 1: and inclusive UM, and really are focusing on bringing great
Speaker 1: talent to the boards of our companies UM, so that
Speaker 1: we helped drive and navigate the future. And UM. I think,
Speaker 1: as we talked about last year, we had we had
Speaker 1: launched an initiative that UM was focused initially on gender
Speaker 1: diversity where we would bring UH at least one woman
Speaker 1: to the boards of all the companies that we either
Speaker 1: controlled or had great influence on. And that's TPG cocy
Speaker 1: On partner John Winkle Reed, former Xerox chairman and CEO
Speaker 1: Earthla Burns very much on the same page about where
Speaker 1: we go next. Yeah. Absolutely. That entire conversation, by the way,
Speaker 1: can be watched by going to Bloomberg Live dot com well,
Speaker 1: from changes in the boardroom to changes in a workplace
Speaker 1: because of the virus. What Semens have been doing through
Speaker 1: this pandemic is we hear from Siemens USA President and
Speaker 1: CEO Barbara Humpton. She gives us her take. This is Woodburn.
Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason
Speaker 1: Kelly from Bloomberg Radio. This week on our daily show,
Speaker 1: we caught up with the President CEO of Siemens USA.
Speaker 1: She's Barbara Humpton. As you know, this is a company
Speaker 1: that has a wide lens at which to look at
Speaker 1: our world, power generators, high tech, you name it. We
Speaker 1: talked about a lot of things, including COVID nineteen's impact
Speaker 1: on the company. What Semens have been doing through this
Speaker 1: pandemic is serving the serving society as we've been built
Speaker 1: to do. One of the most important things was siemens
Speaker 1: capabilities in healthcare are our colleagues and Semens Health and
Speaker 1: Ears has helped respond with additional testing capability and now
Speaker 1: most importantly with antibody testing so that we can understand
Speaker 1: public health as the virus continues to spread it. But
Speaker 1: it goes beyond healthcare. We're engaged in helping with facilities,
Speaker 1: um ensuring that there's adequate hospital beds available, standing up
Speaker 1: new facilities and record time, helping manufacturers keep supply chain
Speaker 1: flowing so that we have enough ppe to meet our
Speaker 1: needs as we go. Overall, I would tell you Siemens
Speaker 1: is going to end up being an important partner for
Speaker 1: for communities around the globe and here across the US.
Speaker 1: As as we deal potentially with a second wave, and
Speaker 1: our goal is to help America stay open potentially a
Speaker 1: second wave. I got to ask you, though, how likely
Speaker 1: are you expecting that, especially with what we're watching over
Speaker 1: in Europe right now in the UK, Well, we know
Speaker 1: that everyone everywhere is having to pay a lot of
Speaker 1: attention to community health, and we've got tools to do
Speaker 1: that now, right So expanded testing certainly makes a big difference.
Speaker 1: And we've also learned how to keep things open with
Speaker 1: appropriate strategies like physical distancing, etcetera. One of our businesses
Speaker 1: and infrastructure actually has a whole program called come Back
Speaker 1: with Confidence. We're rolling out technology into buildings to help
Speaker 1: the people who are managing those spaces keep their residents safe.
Speaker 1: And I were confident that that's going to be a
Speaker 1: major tool for us as we enter into the fall month. So, Barbara,
Speaker 1: one of the areas that we've been very focused on
Speaker 1: is what's happening in cities, and you alluded to this,
Speaker 1: and I know that you attended I believe the U
Speaker 1: S Conference of Mayors, and I want to understand what
Speaker 1: they're saying to you because the infrastructure that they have
Speaker 1: to maintain is critical, as both the network, but also
Speaker 1: just for individual human beings. What can you tell us
Speaker 1: about what's happening on the ground as you talked to
Speaker 1: these folks who are very much on the front lines. Yeah, Jason,
Speaker 1: we were so interested in what's happening at the city
Speaker 1: level because this pandemic is hyperlocal, right. It affects community
Speaker 1: and and communities have to deal with different circumstances. So
Speaker 1: we wanted to survey mayors, and we asked the Harris
Speaker 1: Pole in concert with the U S Conference of Mayors,
Speaker 1: and we got great feedback from a hundred twenty four
Speaker 1: mayors across three or four states across the United States,
Speaker 1: and it was remarkably consistent feedback. And what mayors are
Speaker 1: saying is they expect to see declines in their budgets.
Speaker 1: We're all concerned about that, understanding the economic impact UM,
Speaker 1: but they're also viewing investments in infrastructure as the most
Speaker 1: the most positive way that they can be working in
Speaker 1: both the short term and the long term to support
Speaker 1: the economies, bring jobs back into their communities, and and
Speaker 1: attend to health UM simultaneously. You know, I feel like
Speaker 1: we've been talking about infrastructure for so long. Barbara, do
Speaker 1: you feel like finally something will ultimately be done, because
Speaker 1: you know, it's like one of those things that actually
Speaker 1: both sides of the ai'll agree that we should be
Speaker 1: putting any into infrastructure, you know, in Washington, and yet
Speaker 1: it doesn't seem to happen. You think it's a little
Speaker 1: bit different. You are actually seen municipalities saying we've got
Speaker 1: to do stuff, We've got to do things, Carroll and
Speaker 1: and so here's what I think we're going to see. First,
Speaker 1: we've seen both campaigns at the presidential level talk about
Speaker 1: infrastructure is being central to their agendas. UM. But but
Speaker 1: more than that, this is going to take far beyond
Speaker 1: I mean, before the pandemic, we were seeing something like
Speaker 1: a two trillion dollar deficit in the kind of UM
Speaker 1: spending an infrastructure that would be required to This is
Speaker 1: data from the American Society of Civil Engineers, so we
Speaker 1: knew we were working, you know, an uphill battle at
Speaker 1: that point. What's going to be necessary at this stage
Speaker 1: of the game is to mobilize capital from every sector.
Speaker 1: So I truly believe that UM seeing not only government action,
Speaker 1: but private sector actions would be engaged in infrastructure improvement.
Speaker 1: So Barbara, in the few minutes that we have now.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to ask you what's this been like
Speaker 1: as a leader. I mean, you have a massive organization
Speaker 1: that you're responsible for, and I wonder you know, now
Speaker 1: six months in, this isn't triage anymore. You know, we're
Speaker 1: having to make real decisions about how our companies are running.
Speaker 1: I wonder how you've handled it and what you've learned. Well,
Speaker 1: great question, Jason, and we just discovered early on, because
Speaker 1: we were so essential to so many segments of the market,
Speaker 1: it was necessary for us to, you know, basically pull
Speaker 1: our boots on and get out there and get working. Um,
Speaker 1: when we initially got started, about two thirds of our
Speaker 1: employees were able to work remotely, but that meant a
Speaker 1: third had to be out on the front line in
Speaker 1: harm's way. And that's Barbara Hopton, President and CEO of
Speaker 1: Siemens USA. Excited to catch up with her because, as
Speaker 1: you pointed out, Carol, they have a window into the
Speaker 1: local governments, the state governments, and really this infrastructure issue
Speaker 1: that we're going to have to tackle to battle this virus.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week coming up, lots of
Speaker 1: problems out there for CEOs to solve and when it
Speaker 1: comes to all that ails the US. While our next guest,
Speaker 1: there's a pretty easy fix, and Jason, it involves the
Speaker 1: number one billion or people. This is Bloomberg. This is
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly from
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Radio. So Carol, straight up, I'm a fanboy of
Speaker 1: our next guest. I've followed his work and he delivered.
Speaker 1: Talking about Matthew Iglesias. He's the co founder of Fox.
Speaker 1: He's got a new book. It's called One Billion Americans,
Speaker 1: The Case for Thinking Bigger, and he is thinking big.
Speaker 1: United States, major world power. We've been probably the most
Speaker 1: prominent country in the world for a hundred years now,
Speaker 1: the world's largest economy, the world's largest domestic market. But
Speaker 1: China is up and coming on us. They're in purchasing
Speaker 1: power parity terms. Their economy is bigger than ours. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of tensions, you know, talking about TikTok, you
Speaker 1: can talk about PRC censorship of American movies. Um, and
Speaker 1: you know, what do we want to do about this?
Speaker 1: And I think one obvious answer would be to go
Speaker 1: after the underlying source of Chinese strength, which is that
Speaker 1: they are such a large country, we could seek to
Speaker 1: grow our own population domestically, and that's both by being
Speaker 1: more open to immigrants we are privileged to be a
Speaker 1: country that tens of millions of people around the world
Speaker 1: want to move to, and also by doing more to
Speaker 1: support Americans who want to have children. We have, on
Speaker 1: average about one point seven children per woman, but the
Speaker 1: average woman says she'd like to have about two point
Speaker 1: six children. Men slightly lower preferences. But also, people don't
Speaker 1: necessarily care what we think um and we don't do
Speaker 1: very much financially to let people have the family life
Speaker 1: that they aspire to. We do no child allowance unlike
Speaker 1: most countries. In most jurisdictions, we don't provide for preschool.
Speaker 1: We don't do much to help kids out during the summertime.
Speaker 1: Right now, during covid in, large squads of the country
Speaker 1: were barely even running public schools. So the idea here
Speaker 1: is focus on those two pillars and support families who
Speaker 1: want to have kids, support immigrants who want to come here,
Speaker 1: grow the population, stay number one forever. Okay, that point
Speaker 1: seven child is my favorite. I'm just gonna say that
Speaker 1: two points Hey, listen, I'm one of seven kids. There
Speaker 1: are nine of us in our family, So we've done
Speaker 1: our part to get towards that one billion number. What's
Speaker 1: interesting is, though, and we talk about this a lot um.
Speaker 1: I mean, Jason, you know, has several kids, and I
Speaker 1: just think it's not easy to have big families anymore.
Speaker 1: You talk about policy changes, I mean, we really have
Speaker 1: to change things dramatically in order to make it possible.
Speaker 1: You know, there's a lot of stuff on the policy
Speaker 1: front that would have to change. I mean, some of
Speaker 1: that is money, some of it is housing policy. Right,
Speaker 1: if you live in coastal areas, it's just it's really
Speaker 1: hard to get a big house. We don't build en
Speaker 1: up here. And some of it, though, is the culture. Right,
Speaker 1: as family sizes have shrunk, expectations have changed, and if
Speaker 1: we go back in the other direction to start having two,
Speaker 1: three kids, maybe four in some cases more commonly, you know,
Speaker 1: then you start to see businesses that more cater to
Speaker 1: kind of family friendly uh models, things like that. So
Speaker 1: you know, we've gotten to a point of thinking of
Speaker 1: children as if they're like pets. Right, It's this kind
Speaker 1: of very expensive consumption luxury that some people want to
Speaker 1: indulge in and other people don't. And I think fundamentally
Speaker 1: that's the wrong way to think about it. Having and
Speaker 1: raising children is an important social function. Not everybody has
Speaker 1: to do it, but the people who do want to
Speaker 1: do it should be really supported by the larger society.
Speaker 1: And so Matthew and we're gonna talk more about this.
Speaker 1: Only got about a minute left in this segment, and
Speaker 1: we're gonna do some news and come back. But I
Speaker 1: guess the thing that I would say just to t
Speaker 1: this up and give you a minute then we'll talk
Speaker 1: about it some more, is it's not going great right now. Like,
Speaker 1: I mean, this is not a country, uh that they're like, hey,
Speaker 1: come on in, like things are going awesome, like be
Speaker 1: a part of this, or like have more kids to
Speaker 1: be a part of it. Not to be too cynical here, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's true, you know, but it's paradoxical. On
Speaker 1: the one hand, this is a country that a lot
Speaker 1: of people still want to move to. Right we are
Speaker 1: investing incredible efforts Trump is at least in trying to
Speaker 1: keep people out. But we're having real problems, real political
Speaker 1: dysfunction that is undermining the strengths of America. And I
Speaker 1: think part of the way to get out of that
Speaker 1: atmosphere of dysfunction is to think about things that unite
Speaker 1: us as a country, right, values that we have in
Speaker 1: common that some of arrivals internationally don't have. And you know,
Speaker 1: what is a project that we can embark upon. What
Speaker 1: we still disagree about? Things we could talk about, you know,
Speaker 1: what's the right way to design financial supports from families?
Speaker 1: But if we can say, as we did during the
Speaker 1: Cold War, as we did during World War Two, that look,
Speaker 1: there's something we all stand for, right that points away
Speaker 1: sort of more functional punting. So Matthew, we're gonna move on.
Speaker 1: But I gotta ask you, so, what is the case
Speaker 1: for a bigger population here in the U. S. Is
Speaker 1: it just a bigger consumer base? Consumption base? What's what's
Speaker 1: the thinking that change that's a game change or for
Speaker 1: the United States? You know, scale matters in international politics.
Speaker 1: It matters a lot, right. You look at a country
Speaker 1: like New Zealand are friends of North Canada. There's are
Speaker 1: nice countries, They've got high living standards, but they don't
Speaker 1: really count for anything on the world stage the way
Speaker 1: the United States does. America's leaders, you know, from George
Speaker 1: Washington to Abraham Lincoln through to the present day have
Speaker 1: traditionally thought that, you know, America should be a beacon
Speaker 1: of freedom in the world and a pastion of liberal
Speaker 1: values throughout the world. And that means we need to grow,
Speaker 1: as we have through the centuries, keep pace with the
Speaker 1: other countries out there, and economic terms, though, I think
Speaker 1: that growing our domestic market is also useful. We benefit
Speaker 1: from being the place right. Entrepreneurs from all over the world.
Speaker 1: They know if you want to found like a great company,
Speaker 1: that this is a place to come, right. And so
Speaker 1: we want to let people come and keep doing that.
Speaker 1: But we also we want to grow. We want to
Speaker 1: maintain that status that you know, New York is not
Speaker 1: just a big city, it's the financial center of the world.
Speaker 1: San Francisco is the technology hub of the world old
Speaker 1: and that's because these big cities anchor a big country. Matthew,
Speaker 1: it's Canada calling and they want to talk to you.
Speaker 1: They've got a bone to pick, all right, So Matthew,
Speaker 1: we're going to use the five or six minutes we
Speaker 1: have left to just ask you what the heck is
Speaker 1: going on in national politics right now. You're seeing all
Speaker 1: the headlines we're seeing, you're trying to break it down.
Speaker 1: You've got a great podcast. Um, how do you make
Speaker 1: sense of it? How do you get your head around
Speaker 1: it and separate the signal from the noise here? You know, look,
Speaker 1: right now we're having a very tough debate about the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court. But the fact is Republican senators they have
Speaker 1: the votes to seat a conservative replacement for Justine Skinsburg,
Speaker 1: they have the votes to block a replacement for Justice Scalia.
Speaker 1: The frustration Democrats are dealing with is that the Senate
Speaker 1: is skewed. You know, Nate Silver, the smart poet Lunch,
Speaker 1: they say there's about a seven point Republican bias in
Speaker 1: the Senate and it lets them get away with stuff
Speaker 1: that frankly, Democrats couldn't pull off. Nevertheless, there's actually a
Speaker 1: pretty good chance that Democrats will win a majority this
Speaker 1: November because Donald Trump is quite unpopular. So the interesting
Speaker 1: thing is, you know, if Democrats do manage to win,
Speaker 1: are they going to do anything not just about the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court, but about the inequities that are sort of
Speaker 1: deeply embedded in our political institutions? Wow? Well, any politician
Speaker 1: to anything about what's deeply embedded in our institutions? Right, Matthew.
Speaker 1: I mean these problems that have come out because of
Speaker 1: the virus or what happened with George Floyd and others. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: you know they're not new, No, they're not new. And
Speaker 1: you know, of course, you know, nobody likes to see
Speaker 1: when when protests turn into riots things like that. At
Speaker 1: the same time, you know, you want to tell people, look,
Speaker 1: work on persuasion, go vote, you know, pursue your remedies
Speaker 1: through through the legal process. And if you have a
Speaker 1: political system that's completely unresponsive to that, right, if people
Speaker 1: who live in cities don't have representation in Congress, if
Speaker 1: members of Congress just don't do anything no matter what
Speaker 1: the public's level of concern is, you know, that's how
Speaker 1: you get into a situation of social disorder. And I
Speaker 1: don't defend everything that's happened on every side there, but
Speaker 1: you you need to show people that progress is being
Speaker 1: made on big national problems, and so far, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's really not happening. So, Matthew, I know we're meant
Speaker 1: to talk about your new book, and we're celebrating it
Speaker 1: as we should, but you know, I do think about
Speaker 1: in many ways, how President your book The Rent is
Speaker 1: too damn high was in terms of what we have
Speaker 1: seen in this pandemic and how so much, as Carol
Speaker 1: alluded to, has been laid bare in terms of the inequalities,
Speaker 1: and so much of that it feels like is manifested
Speaker 1: in people's inability to just pay their bills, and we
Speaker 1: are debating that now seemingly are round this question of
Speaker 1: will there be more fiscal stimulus? Are there any reasonable
Speaker 1: and by reason why I mean things that maybe policymakers
Speaker 1: can agree on remedies on that front at this point,
Speaker 1: given how clear it is that we have an issue here,
Speaker 1: you know, it's really tough. Republicans have been very intransigent
Speaker 1: about aid to state and local governments. Uh the reason
Speaker 1: news that came in about tax revenue was actually pretty good,
Speaker 1: So it suggests maybe the need for aid is not
Speaker 1: quite as big as Democrats have thought it was. So
Speaker 1: if Republicans would say yes to a smaller number there,
Speaker 1: Democrats would get what they want then money to go
Speaker 1: out to people, which you know Democrats have been fighting for.
Speaker 1: But also it seems like it would help Republicans at
Speaker 1: the election to get something done here. So you know,
Speaker 1: I I never want to you never want to count
Speaker 1: on Congress doing anything, But the stars do seem to
Speaker 1: be aligned in the sense that you know, both parties
Speaker 1: will be better off if they can get something done.
Speaker 1: On the other hand, you know, of fighting about justice
Speaker 1: Ginsburg seat, he's going to make Democrats really reluctant to
Speaker 1: a deal now, more so than they wore a week ago. So, Matthew,
Speaker 1: if there's one policy you could just do right now
Speaker 1: that you think would have a really positive impact on
Speaker 1: the US, what would it be? You know, I think
Speaker 1: we should do what Canada, who I was knocking before
Speaker 1: did under under thanks now you like them, start giving
Speaker 1: money to parents of young children. I think it's a
Speaker 1: great response to the emergency of the pandemic. Is a
Speaker 1: really tough time for parents, but it's good policy for
Speaker 1: the long term. And we definitely feel the gravity of
Speaker 1: his words about putting money into the hand of people
Speaker 1: who need a little extra, certainly in today's world. Matthew Iglesias,
Speaker 1: co founder of Box Journalists, author his book One Billion Americans,
Speaker 1: The Case for Thinking Bigger. You gotta check out our
Speaker 1: podcast feed for entire conversation with him. Loved catching up
Speaker 1: with him. Such a cool guys, and that routs up
Speaker 1: the first hour of the weekend edition of Bloomberg Business
Speaker 1: Week from Bloomberg Radio. Stick with us. I'm Jason Kelly.
Speaker 1: So much more to come. I'm Carol Masser, including another
Speaker 1: story from our Equality issue of Virginia Cities, Playbook for
Speaker 1: Urban Renewal, Move Out the Poor, plus back to the
Speaker 1: Equality Summit. Maybe a voice you wouldn't expect to hear
Speaker 1: on Bloomberg Business Week. Carol's interview with actress and activists
Speaker 1: Alyssa Mlano and get ready to restock your pantries. We'll
Speaker 1: hear about that from the CEO of General Mills. This
Speaker 1: is Bloomberg. This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser
Speaker 1: and Jason Kelly from Bloomberg Radio. Hi, I'm Carol Masser
Speaker 1: and I'm Jason Kelly. Plenty of head for you in
Speaker 1: this hour of the weekend edition of Bloomberg Business Week. Jason,
Speaker 1: We're gonna hear from Hinder Groups Dr Nichehall. He takes
Speaker 1: over the top spot at the company in April. We
Speaker 1: get lessons his company has learned during the pandemic, plus
Speaker 1: some lessons from General Mills CEO. That company, of course
Speaker 1: based in Minneapolis, what's going on in that city, as
Speaker 1: well as what maybe in your pantry coming up this fall.
Speaker 1: Plus everybody experiences anxiety differently. For me, I get in
Speaker 1: a crisis mode that is very hard for me to
Speaker 1: break the pattern. Actress Elissa Milano on our mental health struggle,
Speaker 1: something many of us can relate to because of the virus.
Speaker 1: First up, though, back to this week's Equality issue of
Speaker 1: the magazine, we catch up with Bloomberg Business Week editor
Speaker 1: Joe Weber and Bloomberg News Financial Investigations reporter Caleb Melby
Speaker 1: about his story of Virginia Cities Playbook for Urban Renewal
Speaker 1: Move Out the Poor. In Norfolk, Virginia, they've been looking
Speaker 1: at what to do with a series of UH neighborhoods
Speaker 1: near their downtown that are two story public housing developments
Speaker 1: and opportunity zones. Basically gave them the financing edge to
Speaker 1: finally UH implement UM kind of like a raise and
Speaker 1: Replaced program where these three UM predominantly black UH and
Speaker 1: and very poor public housing communities UM will be destroyed
Speaker 1: and replaced with some mixed income, mixed use properties UM.
Speaker 1: Some of them will get to come back. About one
Speaker 1: third in the first phase of the people who live
Speaker 1: there now, but not everyone. It's it's the idea, according
Speaker 1: to the city, is to decentralize poverty. UM. And the
Speaker 1: story was a great opportunity for us to look back
Speaker 1: at the history of programs like opportunity zones to see
Speaker 1: UM how they're used by cities. Timing again, and it
Speaker 1: turns out a lot of times it's it's situations just
Speaker 1: like this one. Yeah, and certainly important to tell as
Speaker 1: we try to understand. Joe, come on in, Joe Webber
Speaker 1: now with us, UM, tell us about why this story
Speaker 1: just really resonated with you. Well, so this is our
Speaker 1: quality issue, and you know, we've basically tried to look
Speaker 1: at especially in America through a lens of not just
Speaker 1: equality but inequality, and this one I think has really
Speaker 1: stuck out to us for a while. And and Caleb
Speaker 1: had raised his hands UM in the Before times if
Speaker 1: you remember those as an area of interest that he
Speaker 1: wanted to pursue and and what was amazing with it
Speaker 1: And why I think a story like this is so
Speaker 1: important is because even from the Before Times, this is
Speaker 1: one of those topics and one of these areas of
Speaker 1: interest that still resonates. And if anything, what we've all
Speaker 1: lived through for the past six months in counting now
Speaker 1: only amplifies some of these disparities. And I think that's
Speaker 1: brought to light in the story. Um Kat, the thing
Speaker 1: I was going to ask you about. You know this,
Speaker 1: Norfolk specifically more opportunity zones than any other city in
Speaker 1: in Virginia, and clearly it's gone. Um you know, maybe
Speaker 1: maybe slightly awry of of how opportunity zones have been conceived,
Speaker 1: but like, who's the who ends up winning here? It's
Speaker 1: an interesting question. Um yeah, So there there is a
Speaker 1: developer the city is partnering with brin short development. They
Speaker 1: specifically specialized in exactly a project like this, um public
Speaker 1: to private slash public conversions. They made a name for
Speaker 1: themselves doing this with Cabrini greenhousing projects in Chicago. So like,
Speaker 1: in a very simple way, obviously it's business for them,
Speaker 1: but the City of Norfolk would tell you that they're
Speaker 1: winning right that that as designed the city does not
Speaker 1: work for them, and they are going to design it
Speaker 1: in a way that is better for them. And the
Speaker 1: really painful thing about any project like this is like
Speaker 1: then you have to ask yourself, well, who is the
Speaker 1: city and are the people who are leaving. Are they
Speaker 1: part of the city? Um? And that's something UM people
Speaker 1: in this community called St. Paul's are grappling with, and
Speaker 1: UM what the politicians UM have been trying to grapple
Speaker 1: with in town as well well and in Caleb. I
Speaker 1: do think about the body of work that you guys
Speaker 1: have have put together here, and you know, we've had
Speaker 1: Opportunity Zone investors on this program and we've seen it
Speaker 1: up close and personal here in New York City. I
Speaker 1: guess I come back to, and this is building on
Speaker 1: Joel's question, is this, you know, kind of people just
Speaker 1: kind of being pardon the pun, opportunistic about a law
Speaker 1: that kind of allows them to sort of make money
Speaker 1: even though it's not in the spirit of the law.
Speaker 1: Or is this bad law? Well, that's a really great question.
Speaker 1: And you're right, there's there's investors here too, like neglected
Speaker 1: to mention those here on Bloomberg Radio. Figure, Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: you're you're exactly right. UM. Look, opportunity zones we're specifically
Speaker 1: designed to have very few basically non existing guard rails
Speaker 1: because other programs, enterprise zones UH and empowerment zones in
Speaker 1: the nineties had a lot of them, and investors and
Speaker 1: local leaders complained that like they couldn't make matches work
Speaker 1: because it was too restrictive. So opportunity zones there were
Speaker 1: specifically incredibly expanded of with with a generous capital gains
Speaker 1: tax bright and no real particular rules about like what
Speaker 1: exactly uh you know you you had to build with
Speaker 1: those investment dollars so long as it was going into
Speaker 1: these communities. So yeah, our reporting has focused a lot
Speaker 1: on um, uh you know, some what maybe outliers, right,
Speaker 1: we don't know because there's no actual public disclosure for
Speaker 1: the program, so we don't. We don't. We actually can't
Speaker 1: measure in any way whether all of the opportunity zone
Speaker 1: money looks like Norfolk um or looks like say New York,
Speaker 1: which reported on before, or if or if there's some
Speaker 1: more like kind of locally minded investing dollars going in
Speaker 1: as well, because there's there's no reports from from the
Speaker 1: Treasury Department one way or the other on that. That
Speaker 1: was Bloomberg Business Week editorial Webber and of course star
Speaker 1: reporter Caleb Melby. He's been looking so closely at opportunity
Speaker 1: zones and the big question, as we just heard, is
Speaker 1: really one of transparency. Carol, that's so true, Jason. All right,
Speaker 1: still to come on Bloomberg Business Week, A view of
Speaker 1: the pandemic from a global conglomerate. This is Bloomberg. This
Speaker 1: is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly
Speaker 1: from Bloomberg Radio. Welcome back to the show, Carol. We
Speaker 1: do continue to hear about how COVID nineteen has really
Speaker 1: changed the way companies do business. That's for sure, Jason.
Speaker 1: And we've got a really great perspective from Dr Anissha.
Speaker 1: He's currently Deputy Managing Director, chief financial officer of the
Speaker 1: Mahinder Group. We caught up from Mumbai. This is a
Speaker 1: company that has certainly a global view of the world.
Speaker 1: We kicked off our discussion though, as you might guess
Speaker 1: talking about COVID nineteen, the impact has been significant on
Speaker 1: us as well as everyone around us. We saw the
Speaker 1: month of April essentially wiped out in terms of revenue
Speaker 1: as a lockdown was declared in India towards the end
Speaker 1: of March, and since then things have come back actually
Speaker 1: very very much better and what we expected. There are
Speaker 1: a number of lessons from this as well, and this
Speaker 1: it might be will position us stronger going forward. So
Speaker 1: while COVID is unfortunate and we do hope that things
Speaker 1: do get better soon, uh, it is also teaching us
Speaker 1: lessons about how not to just survive, but how to thry,
Speaker 1: how to deal with uncertainty, and that will make us stronger. Well,
Speaker 1: that's so interesting that you say that, and I do
Speaker 1: think a lot of CEOs it's interesting. Go back to March.
Speaker 1: I feel like no one wanted to talk to us
Speaker 1: because there was so much uncertainty, nobody had visibility, and
Speaker 1: then we all realized we're all in the same boat together.
Speaker 1: And so you know, people have been talking about what
Speaker 1: they're facing. CEO specifically, I am curious in terms of
Speaker 1: risk mitigation, what have you learned as a result of
Speaker 1: the virus when it comes to risk mitigation at your company.
Speaker 1: What we've learned is we've got to as leaders start
Speaker 1: being able to look around corners and be able to
Speaker 1: look at various scenarios and planned for them. We talked
Speaker 1: about a hooker world many years ago, and that in
Speaker 1: many ways is an understatement. So the world has just
Speaker 1: gotten a lot more volatile and uncertain since then, and
Speaker 1: we have to be able to plan with scenarios, take options,
Speaker 1: take certain bets that we can double down on it
Speaker 1: for certain scenario plays out. Tyler talked about black spots,
Speaker 1: and he's talked about COVID not being a black swan.
Speaker 1: He said, this is something that could have been predicted,
Speaker 1: in fact hadn't been foreseen, so it's not a black
Speaker 1: swan in that sense. But Tyl I've also talked about
Speaker 1: anti fragility and about how people and organizations can thrive
Speaker 1: in a crisis and can grow stronger in a crisis.
Speaker 1: So I think this is something that's teaching us now
Speaker 1: as to how do we do that? And you're right, Carol,
Speaker 1: as we looked at March, I think look really bleak
Speaker 1: and everyone was wondering what's going to happen? Where is liquidity?
Speaker 1: How are we going to survive? And as we look
Speaker 1: at the last few months, I think we have survived.
Speaker 1: I think we have come out stronger. And it's really
Speaker 1: about the scenario planning. We have to change old paradigms.
Speaker 1: Just in time was a paradigm that we had in manufacturing.
Speaker 1: It's now just in case, uh, And there's a whole
Speaker 1: different set of things that come in as a result
Speaker 1: of it. Well, it's interesting too, and I think about
Speaker 1: you know, you're in a hundred different markets. You have
Speaker 1: you know about two d fifty thousand employees or more
Speaker 1: around the world. UM. I do wonder how you keep
Speaker 1: your companies, your businesses, your values, UH and standards at
Speaker 1: the level that you want them to be that you
Speaker 1: need them to be in all of those different markets,
Speaker 1: especially in the face of such stresses as the virus.
Speaker 1: I think that essentially comes from our foundation. Um Our
Speaker 1: founders when they set of the company nine actually had
Speaker 1: published UM Something in the Times of India, the leading
Speaker 1: newspaper in India, and they essentially published the Culture to
Speaker 1: talk about the culture and the values of the company
Speaker 1: that they wanted to instill in the company when they
Speaker 1: set it up. And those values have stayed with us
Speaker 1: for the last seventy five years. So this is about
Speaker 1: how we've been set up, the inherent values and the
Speaker 1: company and that's what our leaders have been by. So
Speaker 1: one thing that we saw through the crisis that was
Speaker 1: very heartening for us is leaders across all our businesses
Speaker 1: UM found different ways to help the community. They came
Speaker 1: up with what are different things that we can do
Speaker 1: and we'll talk about some of them as we go along.
Speaker 1: But that's something that comes to them inherently, not because
Speaker 1: it's something that the society expects so that we have
Speaker 1: to do. That's just who we are. I asked you
Speaker 1: about optimism when we kicked off this discussion, um, and
Speaker 1: and I do wonder an I'm looking at some of
Speaker 1: the numbers in terms of India the virus specifically, I'm
Speaker 1: looking at fifty four million cases of the virus more
Speaker 1: than eighty six thousand deaths. So is they're tough numbers.
Speaker 1: I mean, we had pretty tough numbers too here in
Speaker 1: New York, and it's it's kind of staggering. It makes
Speaker 1: you stop, it makes you rethink things. Um, I asked
Speaker 1: about optimism. Has the optimism, though in general, eroded in
Speaker 1: India or at your company? Uh, the optimism has not eroded.
Speaker 1: I feel that people are looking at how do we
Speaker 1: get fast the next few months. But overall, I would
Speaker 1: say that growth fundamentals in India are very strong. The
Speaker 1: numbers in many ways are not surprising because if you
Speaker 1: look at the population density in India, it's far higher
Speaker 1: than that in the US and higher than most places
Speaker 1: in the world. You look at the city of Homepi
Speaker 1: with twenty to twenty five million people, many of them
Speaker 1: very tightly packed together. These numbers in many ways are
Speaker 1: lower than what one would expect here, and as we
Speaker 1: look at some surveys, we also see some level of
Speaker 1: herd immunity that's starting to come into play just based
Speaker 1: on numbers in Mumbaile. So despite the numbers, the economy
Speaker 1: has opened up reasonably well. Rural India has been a
Speaker 1: very strong bell weather and it's really leading the rest
Speaker 1: of the economy forward. Urban India has suffered notargely because
Speaker 1: of the lockdowns, but we started to see things open
Speaker 1: up there and I would say that things are difficult,
Speaker 1: so I'm not going to downplay that. But at the
Speaker 1: same time, as we look at three to five for
Speaker 1: ten years ahead, there is a lot of optimism at
Speaker 1: my India in terms of India as well as our
Speaker 1: own growth. And what do you feel like comfortable in
Speaker 1: terms of predicting visibility. I mean, that's the other thing
Speaker 1: that we feel like for you know, individuals companies have said,
Speaker 1: we don't have any visibility for the rest of this year.
Speaker 1: We don't even know about visibility for next year. Meantime,
Speaker 1: you've got at least the US Central Bank they're talking
Speaker 1: about they have visibility enough at least at this point
Speaker 1: to say we're going to keep rates really low. What
Speaker 1: kind of visibility do you feel comfortably talking about? Is
Speaker 1: it till the end of the year, is it till
Speaker 1: next year or is it not? Or do you not
Speaker 1: really feel like you have have any It's very different
Speaker 1: across sectors, differences dramatics. Let me give a few examples.
Speaker 1: Our farm equipment business coming out of April with almost
Speaker 1: zero sales, had a euro Way Your growth in May
Speaker 1: of two percent, which we had not expected. We would
Speaker 1: have been very happy with, uh the growth of thirty
Speaker 1: or forty, and we would have said, that's great, we
Speaker 1: are getting back on track. But we had a two
Speaker 1: percent eu Way Your growth. That was Dr Nisha Deputy
Speaker 1: Maaging Directors CF of the the Hinger Group. And you
Speaker 1: can hear that full conversation in depth view of the
Speaker 1: world that's in our podcast feed. You're listening to Blue
Speaker 1: Work this week coming up, another global leader weighs in
Speaker 1: on what's ahead when it comes to the virus, what's
Speaker 1: ahead when it comes to the global economy. Talking about
Speaker 1: the CEO of General Mills. This is Bloomberg. This is
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly from
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Radio. We're back here on Bloomberg Business Week. Carol
Speaker 1: Masser along with Jason Kelly, delighted to bring you some
Speaker 1: of the conversations we had on our daily radio show
Speaker 1: from top leaders who Jason, as we know, continue to
Speaker 1: deal with so much the pandemic and a lot more. Well,
Speaker 1: that is certainly the case for General Mills. We caught
Speaker 1: up with the CEO, Jeff Harmon ing they released earnings
Speaker 1: this week, but we had to start by talking about
Speaker 1: not just what's in your pantry, but what's been going
Speaker 1: on in his backyard of Minneapolis since the summer. As
Speaker 1: a community, it's it's been a tough summer here in
Speaker 1: the Twin Cities, but we're looking to rebound and rebuild,
Speaker 1: and General Mills has certainly been a part of it.
Speaker 1: S f I looking, you know, starting with police reform,
Speaker 1: and CEO is really backing that. Here in the Twin Cities.
Speaker 1: We have a number of Fortune five companies and we're
Speaker 1: all kind of rowing in that direction and at the
Speaker 1: same time trying to rebuild our city. Both physically in
Speaker 1: terms of the neighborhoods that um that needed, but also
Speaker 1: our you know, our education system and how that works
Speaker 1: and opportunities for for people of all colors. And so
Speaker 1: while it has been a tough summer, what I can
Speaker 1: tell you is the people in Minneapolis, all people in Minneapolis,
Speaker 1: are working hard to create a more just and racially
Speaker 1: equal city. And if I think that we can do that,
Speaker 1: and Jeff, you are, listen, one of the individuals who
Speaker 1: has seats at the table right to really help facilitate change.
Speaker 1: And I do wonder do you think something is different
Speaker 1: this time around? Because we have certainly had lots of
Speaker 1: conversations with leaders like yourself, CEOs and heads of other
Speaker 1: institutions where you know, we talked about that. There has
Speaker 1: been so much talk for a long time, but nothing
Speaker 1: has really substantially changed. It's not just well, we woke
Speaker 1: up this year and we're like, oh my god, look
Speaker 1: at all these problems. They've been around for decades. Is
Speaker 1: there something different though this time around? Well, there there
Speaker 1: certainly needs to be something different this time around, and
Speaker 1: I suspect that there is. And it's it's really the
Speaker 1: the involvement of the business community. I think you see
Speaker 1: a differential. It certainly is for General Mills as we
Speaker 1: look to build on our our history of inclusion of
Speaker 1: particularly in terms of education outcomes, in terms of representation
Speaker 1: supporting minority owned businesses. Um, we're building on what we
Speaker 1: have done, and I see other Twin Cities companies doing
Speaker 1: the same, and so I think what's different this time
Speaker 1: around is that the fact that there is racial bias
Speaker 1: and injustice is undeniable, and the business leaders are getting
Speaker 1: involved away that at least I haven't seen in my
Speaker 1: twenty five year career, certainly coming out and saying different
Speaker 1: things than we've heard before. Well, and clearly cities like yours,
Speaker 1: and you know, we spent some time with other CEOs
Speaker 1: in your city, and the president of the University of Minnesota,
Speaker 1: Jung Gable as well. I know that they're marshaling a
Speaker 1: lot of the business community because it is such a
Speaker 1: vital part of Minneapolis and in the Twin Cities. Well,
Speaker 1: let's talk about the business, because it's obviously been a
Speaker 1: very different time for all ceo s. Your package food business,
Speaker 1: I would imagine, is dramatical affected by the pandemic. Tell
Speaker 1: us what you've seen sort of by the numbers and
Speaker 1: where it goes from here. So what we've seen for
Speaker 1: General Mills is that the demand has really searched for
Speaker 1: for our business. Because of our businesses food served at
Speaker 1: home and only of food served away from home, and
Speaker 1: so we have had the challenge of rising to the
Speaker 1: occasion or producing significant amounts more food than we had before.
Speaker 1: Our revenues were up double digits in our fourth quarter
Speaker 1: which ended in May, end up another double digits in
Speaker 1: our first quarter of this fiscal year, which just we
Speaker 1: were just announced today, and so increasing production by that
Speaker 1: much has been a big challenge. But I'm really proud
Speaker 1: because General Mills and the rest of the industry has
Speaker 1: really written to meet the moment and we've done it,
Speaker 1: I think because our company are people feel that not
Speaker 1: only are we serving the world food the food the
Speaker 1: world loves at this point, but really the food that
Speaker 1: it needs. And interestingly, um I just just got you know,
Speaker 1: we just got done talking about our first quarter results.
Speaker 1: Are our number of acts and our plants were down
Speaker 1: in our first quarter and we had a present tee
Speaker 1: ism rate of nine and so even in midst you know,
Speaker 1: all the challenges that the pandemic creates. It's actually brought
Speaker 1: out the best in general mills employees, and they're really
Speaker 1: proud of the work they're doing. So and I do
Speaker 1: wonder about trends like the demand for at home food.
Speaker 1: I know, I think you guys have come out and
Speaker 1: already said that you expected to remain above pre pandemic levels.
Speaker 1: Do you fear though, it will start to die down
Speaker 1: as people start seeing how much food they've already stocked up. Essentially, well,
Speaker 1: we we were pretty confident that food demand, demand for
Speaker 1: food at home is going to remain elevated for an
Speaker 1: extended period of time. Part of it is that the
Speaker 1: reason is that people have mostly eaten through the things
Speaker 1: that they've had in their pantries, so there isn't actually
Speaker 1: there's not actually a substantial amount of pantry loading of
Speaker 1: food at home anymore. In addition to that, you know
Speaker 1: what's driving the increasing a manner. People are not as
Speaker 1: interested in going to restaurants eating indoors right now, and
Speaker 1: we're approaching a season where a lot of people, especially
Speaker 1: in the northern part of US, would generally eat at
Speaker 1: restaurants indoors. Combine that with two other factors, I think
Speaker 1: people don't think about as much as that. Many people
Speaker 1: are not going back to the offices, so they're eating
Speaker 1: especially breakfast and lunch. They're eating at home now instead
Speaker 1: of a way. And then finally, the economy is not
Speaker 1: going to be in great shape even once we have
Speaker 1: this pandemic resolve, and in times of recession, consumers tend
Speaker 1: to go to more at home eating they did in
Speaker 1: the last recession. We think they will hear too, because
Speaker 1: it's a cheaper alternative eating out. I know you didn't
Speaker 1: give any kind of you know, it's hard to give
Speaker 1: kind of far out um forecast at this point, but
Speaker 1: what you just said, do you expect to be a
Speaker 1: tough year economically? And we just have about forty seconds here,
Speaker 1: I think I think Fist one will be a tough
Speaker 1: year economically, and I think for us that's going to
Speaker 1: mean we're going to continue to need to produce a
Speaker 1: lot of food because I think at home demand is
Speaker 1: going to remain strong. And that's General Mills CEO, Jeff
Speaker 1: Harmon Ing joining us from Minneapolis and Jason. Of course,
Speaker 1: what we eat clearly contributes to our physical health, but
Speaker 1: increasingly we are also worried about our mental health actress
Speaker 1: Alissa Milana. She takes up that part of the equation
Speaker 1: from our equality summit. That's next. This is Bloomberg. This
Speaker 1: is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason Kelly
Speaker 1: from Bloomberg Radio. Our next guest is someone who has
Speaker 1: allowed us into her personal life before, and Jason, she
Speaker 1: did so again at this week's Bloomberg Equality Summit. She
Speaker 1: talked about her mental health struggles, something so many of
Speaker 1: us are dealing with today because of the pandemic, and
Speaker 1: how she is speaking out to help others. We talked
Speaker 1: about that along with her having COVID nineteen months ago
Speaker 1: and continuing to have symptoms. This is Allissa Milana. Some
Speaker 1: days I feel back to normal and other days it's
Speaker 1: like I have a recurrence of the acute symptoms. I
Speaker 1: was sick with the acute illness for five weeks in
Speaker 1: in March and April UM and I've just I have
Speaker 1: not felt back to back to normal since then. Uh.
Speaker 1: Some days I feel okay, but really it's just this,
Speaker 1: like is this incredible um exhaustion. It feels like I
Speaker 1: have no motivation to physically move my body, and I
Speaker 1: don't know if that is some sort of mental protection
Speaker 1: or if it's my body trying to regenerate or or
Speaker 1: what is happening. But I have shortness of breath, hard palpitations,
Speaker 1: my hair is still falling out, and I have this
Speaker 1: the worst part. I have this ringing in my ears
Speaker 1: that is driving me bonkers. So um, yeah, it's it
Speaker 1: has not been great. And it's interesting because of all
Speaker 1: my friends have quite a few friends that that we're sick.
Speaker 1: There's maybe one out of twelve that feels completely back
Speaker 1: to normal. The rest are just having these these long
Speaker 1: hauler symptoms and um. So you know, we find great
Speaker 1: comfort in each other knowing that that there are other
Speaker 1: people out there going through the same thing, um um.
Speaker 1: And that makes a really big difference. And I think
Speaker 1: that that makes a big difference in our mental health
Speaker 1: and in general, just to know that there are other people, um,
Speaker 1: you know, that go through similar things that than that
Speaker 1: we do. Well. This is why we're so grateful that
Speaker 1: you're talking with us and talking about your own mental
Speaker 1: illness and talking about anxiety. And I want to take
Speaker 1: a few steps back because from what I understand, just
Speaker 1: doing a little bit of research and watching some different
Speaker 1: things and some interviews you've done. You've dealt with anxiety
Speaker 1: for a long time. Is that fair? Oh? Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: But I don't know that I had labeled it as anxiety.
Speaker 1: But my earliest my earliest recollection and and everybody experiences
Speaker 1: anxiety differently. For me, I get very UM, I get
Speaker 1: in a crisis mode that is very hard for me
Speaker 1: to break the pattern UM. And basically it gets to
Speaker 1: the point that my brain just thinks that's the way
Speaker 1: it's supposed to be functioning in fight flighter freeze UM.
Speaker 1: And I should also say, is when when we when
Speaker 1: we're talking about UM issues that affect brain UM, you know,
Speaker 1: we really prefer to talk about mental health, not mental illness.
Speaker 1: I think once we start calling it mental illness UM,
Speaker 1: that's when the stigma UM comes with that. And and
Speaker 1: also to try to sort of be conscious of of
Speaker 1: the phrases that we use UM as far as like
Speaker 1: I actually just did it and I caught myself, you
Speaker 1: know that the rings in my ears was driving me bonkers.
Speaker 1: Like all of those things, all of those natural UM
Speaker 1: ways of describing things of the past we sort of
Speaker 1: have to break out of, I think in order to
Speaker 1: in order to break the stigma. But my earliest recollection
Speaker 1: of being in crisis mode was UM. I lived in
Speaker 1: South Africa for three months in two thousand and it was,
Speaker 1: you know, only nine years after apartheid was abolished, and
Speaker 1: I volunteered in a township in a children's hospital, and
Speaker 1: I was very strong while I was there. When I
Speaker 1: came home and had to assimilate like that part of
Speaker 1: me UM that volunteered and and dedicated my time to
Speaker 1: helping other people and trying to to assimilate that with
Speaker 1: the person that lived in Beverly Hills and drove a
Speaker 1: BMW UM, I had a very hard time getting back
Speaker 1: and getting acclimated and UM and I went through about
Speaker 1: and at this time I didn't I didn't know, but
Speaker 1: I would say four or five months of complete and
Speaker 1: total panic anxiety UM. And for me, I have generalized
Speaker 1: anxiety disordered that also and I also get paddock attacks.
Speaker 1: So what that basically means is my base level of
Speaker 1: anxiety is almost in a panic attack mode and then
Speaker 1: panic attacked or sort of on top of that. UM.
Speaker 1: So yeah, so I remember, like I went to my
Speaker 1: general practitioner and I wasn't even in therapy, which by
Speaker 1: the way, there was anyone that needed to be in therapy.
Speaker 1: It's it was a child after that that that survived. Right, Um,
Speaker 1: but was there anybody? Was there anybody around you? Was
Speaker 1: there anybody around you saying, you know, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: a lista, this isn't right. You know, you shouldn't feel
Speaker 1: this way chronically, and that would step in. I mean,
Speaker 1: my mom was, well, I have a lot of the
Speaker 1: same characteric characteristics as my mother. She um, she suffers
Speaker 1: from anxiety. She also has dyslexia. UM, I have dyslex
Speaker 1: as well. So she was, Yes, she was encouraging me
Speaker 1: to go. But I went to my general practitioner and
Speaker 1: they put me on a you know, a very generic
Speaker 1: antidepressant which made me, you know, gain fifteen pounds, and
Speaker 1: and that was like a whole other issue. And plus
Speaker 1: I was writing week, I was working on charm and
Speaker 1: so it was very hard to take that sort of
Speaker 1: break and sort of and and self care. I want
Speaker 1: to bring you forward a little bit because from what
Speaker 1: I understand, it really became I guess, very debilitating. After
Speaker 1: the birth of your son, Milo, tell us a little
Speaker 1: bit about what happened. Right you came home and and
Speaker 1: I know there were some complications or some stress just
Speaker 1: before he was delivered. Tell us what happened. So, um,
Speaker 1: So I was in labor for eighteen hours. I pushed
Speaker 1: for three and a half hours, and um, he came
Speaker 1: to us vias um c section. UM. The birth itself
Speaker 1: was in the labor itself was very traumatic. UM. Not
Speaker 1: to get too graphic, but when a woman says she
Speaker 1: pushes for three hours, it is with the help of
Speaker 1: of nurses who are basically trying to manipulate the baby
Speaker 1: while it's still inside of your body to get the
Speaker 1: baby out. So for me, it felt incredibly invasive, um
Speaker 1: and traumatic. And I think that it triggered my sexual
Speaker 1: assault trauma because I was sitting there and I was thinking,
Speaker 1: why is this feel like such a violation? Why is
Speaker 1: this does not and I don't think women talk about this.
Speaker 1: UM and you're not in control, and it's it's right,
Speaker 1: you're not in control. It's it's a very tough situation,
Speaker 1: very heated, and there's lots of people coming in the
Speaker 1: room and plugging things in and like you know, I
Speaker 1: used to my mom used to joke like if they
Speaker 1: had a car in there, they'd be back in that
Speaker 1: end just to like so so that I think is
Speaker 1: what triggered my postpartum anxiety. And then I had UM.
Speaker 1: I felt better, my milk came in, I felt better.
Speaker 1: I had this beautiful, little, delicious baby, and UM. And
Speaker 1: it was it was when he weaned. He weaned himself
Speaker 1: very suddenly without any like going down. My hormones were
Speaker 1: out of control and UM, that's when my anxiety started
Speaker 1: to come back again. Was when my hormone level dripped
Speaker 1: dipped after he weaned, which was at ten months. You
Speaker 1: eventually found yourself in the er room right at you know,
Speaker 1: in the wee hours of the morning. Yes, But before
Speaker 1: that A part of this story that I think is
Speaker 1: almost the most important is I went into my the
Speaker 1: g y n Um when this first started happening, and
Speaker 1: she looked at me and with a straight face, she
Speaker 1: said to me, well, it's a big life change. Go
Speaker 1: for a hike, try to find some self care time.
Speaker 1: And by the way, she said to me, you're thirty
Speaker 1: eight years old, so if you want to have another baby,
Speaker 1: we should probably start thinking about that. And I remember
Speaker 1: so clearly, just being in tears, and I looked at
Speaker 1: her and I said, I'm not sure. I want the
Speaker 1: baby that I have right now, and you're talking to
Speaker 1: me about another baby. So I felt completely like the
Speaker 1: the the health care that I was getting was totally
Speaker 1: not where it should have been. So I would just
Speaker 1: go to the emergency room. I would go to the
Speaker 1: emergency room every time I felt like I couldn't deal well.
Speaker 1: And one of the times that you went, you actually
Speaker 1: had yourself committed right for three days, I did, I
Speaker 1: did I Why did you do that? Why did you
Speaker 1: do that? Why did you know you needed to do that?
Speaker 1: So at the time, I was working on Mistresses, which
Speaker 1: was a show on ABC, and I was still functional
Speaker 1: and I was still able to learn my lines and
Speaker 1: show up for work. And the thing about mental health
Speaker 1: and when you're struggling with mental health, uh issues, is
Speaker 1: you can't see it. And that's actress and activists Alyssa
Speaker 1: Milano a conversation, as I sort of jokingly said earlier
Speaker 1: that you wouldn't necessarily expect to hear on Bloomberg Business Week,
Speaker 1: but a reminder part of our equality Summit of how
Speaker 1: holistically we really need to be looking at all of
Speaker 1: these problems. Great interview Carol master Well, that wraps up
Speaker 1: the weekend edition of Bloomberg Business Week from Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for joining us. I'm Jason Kelly and
Speaker 1: thank you for that. Jason Kelly, I'm Carol Master. Be
Speaker 1: sure to check out our extra podcast Abigail Disney, documentary, filmmaker, philanthropist.
Speaker 1: She's also an activist and proponent for using the wealth gap.
Speaker 1: She is calling on companies to offer respect, dignity and
Speaker 1: a living wage to everyone who works for them. And
Speaker 1: for that type of interview and so much more, catch
Speaker 1: our daily show Monday through Friday. It starts at two
Speaker 1: pm Wall Street Time. You can also watch us on
Speaker 1: YouTube just search Bloomberg Global News and of course, always
Speaker 1: check out our podcast. So many in depth interviews there.
Speaker 1: Check it out wherever you get your podcast, also at
Speaker 1: Bloomberg dot com and the magazine. It is on newsstands
Speaker 1: now the Equality Issue. It is worth a deep read.
Speaker 1: We'll see you right back here next week at the
Speaker 1: same time. Have a great weekend everyone. This is Bloomberg