Eyes On Impact: Future Belongs to Responsible Innovators | AVI Systems

00:00:02:08 - 00:00:28:27
Brad Sousa
And innovation's messy. We love it. But man, is it ever fraught with problems. Outcomes are never certain. So why would we ever commit to something crazy like that? Well, today on Ice on Impact, we have Atti Riazi joining us. She's the CEO of Hearst Corporation. You heard me. Hearst That multibillion dollar global media and tech giant Hearst. Now you're going to love Audrey.

00:00:28:27 - 00:00:56:10
Brad Sousa
And quite honestly, she's amazing. And prior to joining Hearst, one of the things that R.D. did well, she was the assistant secretary general and chief information technology officer for the United Nations. In addition to being CIO, she started a school because, well, who doesn't? And she's the founder of Chief Information Officer. Without Borders. CIO. Without Borders. Why? Because innovation needs a purpose.

00:00:56:13 - 00:01:18:25
Brad Sousa
That's where the excitement lives and a purpose. That's where tech and people come together. That amazing place that we call Human impact. Now, before we get into our discussion with Atti, I just want to say thanks to Logitech, one of our collaboration and solution partners, and we appreciate you believing with us and Human impact and helping us tell the human impact story through Eyes on Impact.

00:01:18:28 - 00:01:26:10
Brad Sousa
So you ready to get going? Let's get after it.

00:01:26:13 - 00:01:48:27
Brad Sousa
Well, hey, everybody, Brad Sousa here, CTO at AVI Systems, and I'm excited about the conversation we're going to have today. You're going to love our guest and the conversations that we're going to have around the role of the CIO and the human impact where tech and people meet. We've invited today Atti Riazi to join us. Atti is the CIO of Hearst.

00:01:48:28 - 00:02:03:07
Brad Sousa
Many of you know Hearst as a global media force information company. And Atti is going to be joining us in our conversation. Welcome. First of all, to Eyes on Impact. Thank you for giving us for your time today.

00:02:03:09 - 00:02:05:29
Atti Riazi
My pleasure. Thank you so much for inviting me.

00:02:06:01 - 00:02:29:09
Brad Sousa
You bet. I personally want to just say at the beginning here that since I first became aware of you, started reading some of the interviews you've done and conversations that you have. I've been looking forward to our conversation today. I'm excited about having it. How about we help people connect with you a little bit? Let's start with your role at Hearst.

00:02:29:11 - 00:02:33:28
Brad Sousa
You're a CIO there. Maybe talk a little bit about that. Get us started.

00:02:34:01 - 00:02:41:11
Atti Riazi
So thanks again. And everyone. I'm I've actually made my 10th anniversary here at Thursday.

00:02:41:13 - 00:02:42:13
Brad Sousa
Congratulations.

00:02:42:19 - 00:02:49:29
Atti Riazi
So I'm actually too dangerous to talk about it because I don't know enough, but I think I do. After ten.

00:02:49:29 - 00:02:51:17
Brad Sousa
Years.

00:02:51:20 - 00:03:19:08
Atti Riazi
This is an incredible company. It's the first privately owned company that I have the privilege to know. And so I'm learning about the culture and it has an incredible culture. And that was one reason I agreed to come to a first. And on I'm the corporate CIO. We have over 350 brands and companies under Hearst. Yeah. And when I tell people, you know, I work for her, so like, oh, that's media.

00:03:19:09 - 00:03:44:13
Atti Riazi
Like, no, no, it's so much broader than media because Search, which is a rating company, is part of partners. We have gone into health care. We have incredible health care companies. Of course, television and newspapers, magazines. Your favorite magazine, That is very are here. And that was my favorite Magazines and newspapers are here. So I get it for free now.

00:03:44:13 - 00:03:48:22
Atti Riazi
And that and that was like an exciting part. It's like, yes, I.

00:03:48:24 - 00:03:48:29
Brad Sousa
Was.

00:03:49:00 - 00:04:32:15
Atti Riazi
There and read about them and we have aviation and transportation. So I selected my background. I've been in many sectors, such as transportation, aviation, healthcare, media and communications and and others. And when I looked at first I saw God. If you look at the impact of tech on every discipline, all of these areas of major transformation and to be part of that transformation positive in terms of helping the consumers, the viewers organization to grow and adapt, technology is just such an incredible privilege.

00:04:32:16 - 00:04:40:09
Atti Riazi
So I am privileged to be here. I've made my 10th month and I hope that I can continue to contribute.

00:04:40:11 - 00:05:02:26
Brad Sousa
Yeah. So you've had such an interesting journey. I mean, you were at your CIO at Memorial Sloan Kettering, which is a world famous health care provider in New York. I want to say you were assistant secretary general and chief information technology officer at the U.N. You were at Onam before that. I mean, that's a really diverse set of experiences.

00:05:02:27 - 00:05:15:25
Brad Sousa
What what motivated you to make some of the changes that you made and and apply your skills at such a diverse group of organizations?

00:05:15:27 - 00:05:42:25
Atti Riazi
You know, that's a great question because it shook the thought of the chicken exact background experience. I'm I am I am very curious. And I think that's my problem. My weakness as well. I'm just too curious like it is. So when I was a kid and it also leads into I became an engineer, but as a kid I remember that I was four, maybe five.

00:05:42:27 - 00:05:58:28
Atti Riazi
My brother got a watch and I got this cooking. So I was like, What am I going to get? Cooking? Said, Girls get cooking, so I want to watch. So when he recently, like, took his watch and I planted it and I figured that I've got a lot of this and it's going to grow, I'm going to have my own watch.

00:05:59:01 - 00:06:24:21
Atti Riazi
Well, I keep watering this and he was looking for his watch. Couldn't find it after two or three weeks that it was. No, but there's no watch coming out of the ground. So I took it out. I opened it up and I said, Let's see what's inside. I'm curious. So I wanted to maybe build one. So I took it apart, took all the years off and kind of put it together.

00:06:24:23 - 00:06:56:24
Atti Riazi
And I still can't put things together after I take them apart. I have a bad habit of taking things apart. Anyway, I buried it again. But the thing about me is I'm curious about things I don't know, and I love to just go in and as see how technology is impacting that business. I've gone from government, which I was in transportation of in say, of the MTA, New York City Transit Authority long time ago, putting project.

00:06:56:26 - 00:07:22:26
Atti Riazi
Yeah and when I ran manufacturing in the Navy are building trains and busses and trucks and I said that would be fun you know I love trucks on off trains and let me try that. And I think that is just being curious and wanting to learn from that sector I went to on M Which was an incredible rule, a global roll to, and then advertising and media was glued to a major transformation.

00:07:22:26 - 00:07:36:20
Atti Riazi
Oh yeah, yeah. They above the line moving the load, the line moving to the line with digital sweatshop or advertising. Lots of images globally of digital companies.

00:07:36:23 - 00:07:59:17
Atti Riazi
And from there I went to a housing authority, which was back to government, which was a different experience. And I remember I last long as a CIO in the housing authority. I was there maybe three or four months. And and I was asked if I could handle procurement. You know, the the chairman said, you know, you're a CIO, you buy a lot of stuff.

00:07:59:17 - 00:08:18:15
Atti Riazi
And it's like, maybe you can be the CIO and a CPA. And I said, Fine, I will give it a try. I like buying things on. And now within a few months, the general manager of housing, the thought he loved and the chair said, They'll look like you could do CIO CPO How about you be your manager as well?

00:08:18:18 - 00:08:32:14
Atti Riazi
So I moved from being a CIO to run, you know, the housing facility and such site program. So I just I think it's just in my blood being curious and wanting to figure things out.

00:08:32:16 - 00:08:44:26
Brad Sousa
So it's one thing that I think there's a lot of people that are curious and have a strong curiosity, but it's another thing to be both curious and courageous, and it seems to me that you have both.

00:08:44:28 - 00:08:50:00
Atti Riazi
I think that's a euphemism for crazy lot of crazy.

00:08:50:00 - 00:08:51:02
Brad Sousa
And they're.

00:08:51:04 - 00:09:13:22
Atti Riazi
Crazy, you know, what could it be? You know, I, I meant crazy decisions. I was shooting for a flight of a few drinks. You know, I was it was over Christmas ten years ago. There are kids school closed. And the second drink, I said, how hard is it to open up a school? And my husband knew we were in trouble.

00:09:13:25 - 00:09:37:23
Atti Riazi
Three weeks later, we had a school nursery, so eighth grade. So I think it's a bit of craziness along with being curious. But if you are not willing to take the risk, yeah, we have so many blockers and dogmatic views and things that hold us back. And I think if you if you open up, there's not much that you can't do really.

00:09:37:25 - 00:09:55:26
Atti Riazi
We all executives, we all managers, we all leaders. It doesn't matter what sector you're in, as long as you can have a vision and have the strategy and and be able to develop talent and seek the right talent, I think that we can do a lot better.

00:09:55:26 - 00:10:19:25
Brad Sousa
I love that. And it sounds to me that your experiences have taught you that it's okay to do crazy things once in a while, even if even if the outcome isn't what you expected, because at least you at least learn, right? Sometimes you win, sometimes you learn. It's kind of the way I say it. And and I don't know that you ever fail.

00:10:19:25 - 00:10:55:20
Brad Sousa
I think you just learn differently as a result of that. So. So you mentioned I'm going to go down a path here. You mentioned your role, I think you said with MTA, where you're CIO, CTO came general manager. I want to I want to lean into that a little bit. On the role of a CIO, if you don't mind, because I think my experience has been most of my customers are CIOs, and my experience has been that the role of the CIO has really taken a shift in the last, I don't know, five, eight years maybe.

00:10:55:23 - 00:11:30:14
Brad Sousa
And I'm curious if you see a similarity to what I'm seeing, and that is a CIO used to be somebody that was promoted because they had become the uber skill. Maybe they were the best coder or they really knew infrastructure or they knew security or whatever it was. They were the best at the tech. But today I think I think it's shifted and I'm not sure that CIOs are comfortable with it, but they're more business enablers.

00:11:30:17 - 00:11:44:29
Brad Sousa
They have to we have to we have to understand and and own the tech. We have to make that work. But it's less about the tech and it's more about enabling a business. Do you see the same kind of thing happening?

00:11:45:02 - 00:12:30:11
Atti Riazi
Yes. I mean, through my career, I, I have changed and I know. Yeah, well, it's changed. And I and so we were operators, we sell operators because we operate the organization and we've barely to keep the lights on. But, um, you know, tech is, technology has changed and therefore we had to change. I mean the technologies huge impact on human life, on society, on governments, policies, politics, huge impact and and always a good, good CIO is someone between Churchill, Mother Theresa and a couple of guys, the pilot.

00:12:30:14 - 00:12:53:02
Atti Riazi
And you got to know what role you play at what time, but what entity? We are the catalyst. And I think that that we, we, we went through being an operators to the phase. I think we confronted a serious paradox. And the paradox in our role and in our sector was it used to be about hardware, software tools, right?

00:12:53:02 - 00:13:18:03
Atti Riazi
And we managed that, but they don't manage that anymore. We manage experience. That's exactly right. Right on the society, on the government, on on, on the company. And that's what a paradox is. It's not about the tools anymore. Everything's on a cloud and things says we are buying versus build. We are integrators, we are catalyst, we are storytellers.

00:13:18:05 - 00:13:48:15
Atti Riazi
We need to get organizations to fall in love with the vision that they're going to be competitive, that they can grow and they're going to provide this optimal service to their customers because, you know, citizens and take them to the unknown space like right is very scary. Now, we generally and I'm an engineer, I left brain. So, you know, we thinks logically, analytically.

00:13:48:15 - 00:14:00:07
Atti Riazi
I don't think I had one philosophy class during my engineering studies, but we always have to be historians. We have to be biologists. We have to be philosophers.

00:14:00:11 - 00:14:00:26
Brad Sousa
That's right.

00:14:00:26 - 00:14:44:28
Atti Riazi
Because you can't be one dimensional. The impact of tech is is not just efficiency. The impact of tech is huge. Change. Yes and no. It does change your soft human machine connection. Then you bring those two together with rules and regulations around that. You get this unexpected results, unintended consequence. So some good, some bad that you can't predict because the way we think about things, addictions are limited to timeframes of one or two, three years versus ten, 20, 30, 40 years.

00:14:45:01 - 00:15:14:14
Atti Riazi
We don't understand causality holistically. We understand correlation a little bit, not enough, but we don't understand causality. And so we are not wrong. We have great sophistication and tech, but we are not broad thinkers as the impact of this, the impact of this technology in 30 years would be this. And I could give you a ton of examples.

00:15:14:15 - 00:15:54:00
Atti Riazi
My experience at the U.N. as how, you know, as how innovation was helpful and supported, but also the innovation. And they can even talk about that. The Internet, the biggest innovation of the 20th century, had shifted crime, espionage, criminals to the dark web that we could no longer keep up with. So and and we don't think about it when the innovators innovators write it, we we we think about how wonderful this is today versus is this wonderful 20 years from now.

00:15:54:00 - 00:16:12:06
Atti Riazi
What's the implications of this ten years from right. So you know, it my role as a as the CIO of the U.N. every morning I woke up and I thought about. But, you know, we have 150. I mean, you think about human trafficking. They have hundreds, 50 billion people trafficked, most in sort of a dark web.

00:16:12:08 - 00:16:12:23
Brad Sousa
That's right.

00:16:12:25 - 00:16:44:10
Atti Riazi
It's ungoverned. It completely shifted the commerce or weapons trafficking, money laundering, like things that in a physical world we could manage, we could control. They had understood, you know, security around it, but it all shifted and we couldn't, as innovators predict, predicts will happen because we don't understand causality. So go back to your first question. This I to see you today.

00:16:44:13 - 00:17:14:08
Atti Riazi
You have to be a philosopher. You have to be a featured fortune teller. You have to understand impact what you do today on every aspect of society, the climate, not only human life, but climate level and be responsive. All that responsible innovation versus just innovating for the sake of innovation, to say consistency, to say confectioners it that that phase has passed us.

00:17:14:10 - 00:17:36:29
Brad Sousa
So I want to talk about that a little bit. This idea of of the social impact of innovation and having responsible innovation rather than just innovation in general. So what is what does that look like in a practical way when you're working with your team as an example?

00:17:37:02 - 00:18:13:12
Atti Riazi
I think that we are the team at Hearst. We are developing products across many sectors. So you're developing products that I've helped their big issues around health care and pregnancy up data protection, consumer protection. So that's this. It raises many questions that Gen I coming in Yeah and us embracing DNA. I you get a lot of ethical and moral questions around That's right but because that J AI is learning from our prejudices we are not whatever we learn.

00:18:13:12 - 00:18:48:06
Atti Riazi
What about content we see to AI is skewed so we are teaching it. We are, we are. And then we are trusting these very complex algorithms, those decisions which is based on prejudice that we have brought in with our previous knowledge. So so I think that that thinking is critical. If you think about areas that be getting into aviation, transportation, even healthcare with Iot and sensors coming in, but would be lacking in a self-driving vehicles, your tracking, your patients, all of that data, what does that mean?

00:18:48:06 - 00:19:11:29
Atti Riazi
How do you again, potentially how do you protect your patients and your consumers, viewers, how do you how do you how do you know what's true and what's not true? I we are in broadcast and we are in publishing company, publishing company. But there's so much content online that that would be generated automatically through a is it real?

00:19:11:29 - 00:19:42:05
Atti Riazi
It's not real. I've seen in the U.N. that around election time, different countries, you could easily decimate wrong information and skew election in a country. I mean, these have huge impacts, huge political impacts, huge financial impacts. So as you are thinking about innovation, think about that. What you mentioned earlier is connected connected to the human connected society, right?

00:19:42:07 - 00:20:16:02
Atti Riazi
Because innovative people are paying. That's the choice. I mean, I know one was innovative people we disrupt, we change things. We we bring new ideas. Nobody wants messy Innovation is messy. But but without innovation, we are doomed to entropy and stagnation. So you cannot not have innovation. But irresponsible innovation is something that we have to deal with. You know, we are and I use a I use air as an example, because we also excited about.

00:20:16:04 - 00:20:50:03
Atti Riazi
Sure. Excited about DNA. I but, you know, I look at a look at statistics globally and I globally we have 50% youth unemployment globally, especially in developing markets and most of the youth that get jobs are in military or they are in in mining, they're in agriculture, the manufacturing, transportation, a lot of jobs in these areas. Give it So imagine 50% youth unemployment is going to shift, 70% is going to shift to 60%.

00:20:50:05 - 00:21:18:23
Atti Riazi
If you look at us, 20% of jobs are in Midwest trucking with self-driving trucks. Where does truck drivers going to go? How fast are we generating new jobs, retraining them? So, yes, to shift, you start to see this impact on unemployment and you will really have an impact on the climate bill with the drought and less rain and and and movement of people.

00:21:18:25 - 00:21:45:15
Atti Riazi
So you combine those things and which you buy for yourself is a disaster because not you're going to get unemployment, unrest, lack of food, lack of health care, disease, but all of these things start to expand. So it's wonderful to be excited about I but we have to think about its impact on all aspects of life and things to do.

00:21:45:16 - 00:22:20:25
Atti Riazi
How do we mitigate, how do we really trade what is, you know, all the jobs going to get automated and modernized? Then what are the new jobs that we are creating as government, private sector, NGO, civil society? What does that mean? How do we deal with e-waste? I mean, that's just complete response of, well, approach of just building things, creating things, not even thinking about the the impact of waste on on the society, on the climate, on just little examples.

00:22:20:25 - 00:22:25:03
Atti Riazi
These are examples, right? Yeah. So don't think about.

00:22:25:06 - 00:22:52:16
Brad Sousa
So so let me let me ask this question. So part of the challenge for me as a CTO and I lead as I lead my team, which are a team of designers and architects, enterprise architects, designers, engineers, you talked about the left brain first kind of mentality in this in this concept of responsible innovation, the focus is on the is on the consumer.

00:22:52:18 - 00:23:19:24
Brad Sousa
The focus is actually from my perspective, the focus is on how do I improve the life of the person that's consuming whatever this tech is that we're delivering. And that concept, the ability to create that empathy with, with that user that's kind of foreign to most engineers, they want to calculate the result before they start. And and I appreciate I am respectful and honor that.

00:23:19:24 - 00:23:41:21
Brad Sousa
But the reality is, is that if we're going to really have impact in people's lives, it's I don't know that you can calculate what the impact is. You have to somehow create an empathy with that user before you start. First of all, do you agree with what I just shared? And if you do, how do you how do you foster that inside your team?

00:23:41:24 - 00:23:47:15
Atti Riazi
I fully agree with that. I think it is as as I go back, it's about experience.

00:23:47:17 - 00:23:48:13
Brad Sousa
Yeah, exactly.

00:23:48:16 - 00:24:11:25
Atti Riazi
Various of what you're doing innovating and it's only on your today's customer, right? It's on your future business, right. And it's not only on a human, it's on so many broader impact. But when you think about think about ransomware. Yeah, deal with ransomware. The code ransomware was written was written for good purposes.

00:24:11:27 - 00:24:12:22
Brad Sousa
Right?

00:24:12:24 - 00:24:15:22
Atti Riazi
Right. By government. It got away. It got it.

00:24:15:22 - 00:24:16:13
Brad Sousa
Right.

00:24:16:15 - 00:24:19:25
Atti Riazi
Is amoral. Tech doesn't understand good and bad, right?

00:24:19:27 - 00:24:21:02
Brad Sousa
Yeah, that's right.

00:24:21:04 - 00:24:46:28
Atti Riazi
It's and good and bad. Subjective. Anyway, good to you. Write that to me. These are just things that are we really need big philosophers to come and debate over these things. But we are no longer, I think the way we were brought up against rage and using school, it was extremely academic and it was strictly, you know, here is you.

00:24:46:29 - 00:25:02:18
Atti Riazi
Yeah, this physics, this is your math. But we did not learn how to innovate. We did not become rock thinkers around our innovation, because then the building hardware, software, now we are building a new society.

00:25:02:20 - 00:25:03:05
Brad Sousa
Right?

00:25:03:12 - 00:25:29:06
Atti Riazi
Right. And if someone told me what you do would create a new society and you can decide what that society would look like based on what you do. I mean, look, we created new way of life after corporate, but you think about education on the right for longest long we talked about remote care, remote education, how do we educate and provide health care to all this poor people in developing markets?

00:25:29:12 - 00:25:58:04
Atti Riazi
We did not think about it. COVID came overnight. We were innovative enough to figure it out where we could provide remote care and remote education. Right? So creativity is incredible. But but we we just you know, there's there is there's so many issue that prevent us from thinking that brought me. But if we need to we can think broad and I do think that permission.

00:25:58:04 - 00:26:14:14
Brad Sousa
To your team to think that broad when you don't at the beginning you may not even know whether the exercise they're going to do is going to be productive or not or not. Or maybe they're more fearful that it may not be productive. How do you give them permission to do that?

00:26:14:16 - 00:26:40:22
Atti Riazi
I think that you can't use the old fact, again, my team, the permission, especially the creative innovators, the designers have the permission that requests that they're required to sync up. Okay. Right. Even if it's small enough about product that you're developing, which has a small impact, but you've got to think, Well, I think that's what I asked my team to do.

00:26:40:24 - 00:26:44:01
Atti Riazi
It is a learned discipline. It's not easy.

00:26:44:02 - 00:26:44:24
Brad Sousa
That's exactly.

00:26:44:24 - 00:27:09:12
Atti Riazi
Right. Easy because we have black and white and that. Yeah, I get it again. I go back to left brain folks. I think the new entrants into the tech sector are not left, right, right, because traffic is so much broader now. Right. We have data scientist coming in, right, trying to get managers coming in and we have analyst coming in.

00:27:09:12 - 00:27:38:29
Atti Riazi
So we have different type of thinking coming in to make us kind of question push on what we're doing and whether it's right it is definitely not easy. But I'll go to I'll say one thing if you go, Kat, if you look at doctors, right, doctors, they are pretty strong as a group and they hold the principles really tightly and they lobby for it and like.

00:27:38:29 - 00:27:39:26
Atti Riazi
But right.

00:27:39:28 - 00:27:40:19
Brad Sousa
Yeah.

00:27:40:21 - 00:28:04:11
Atti Riazi
Lawyers used to say, us tech folks, we got none right? Wow. But we are changing the world. We are changing this world, but we don't lobby for good policies. We don't push and we don't push the tech sector back and say, listen, we can't change these things every three years because the living environment, I don't change my bicycle every three years.

00:28:04:11 - 00:28:27:04
Atti Riazi
Why should I change my phone, my PC and my server, my switch of the three years and upgrade the software, but US tech. So if we had a community of thinkers and advocates and lobbies, we would begin to influence the big designers, the Silicon Valley, in terms of what we find right for the society. We don't do so good.

00:28:27:04 - 00:28:56:00
Brad Sousa
I, I really appreciate that analogy because I think one of the things that has enabled my team has been there's a there's a super strong bond between them and they know that that not only do I have their back, they know that they have each other's back. And so that fosters courage to be curious and to try new things.

00:28:56:03 - 00:29:22:08
Brad Sousa
I really and I really like that analogy. I think you're right. I'd like to I'd like to dive into this concept. I'd like to hear your opinion about this concept of adapt, not adopt. And here's here's the premise. I'd like to have you comment on. A lot of the work that we do is around collaboration, whether it's Microsoft teams or Cisco or Zoom or whoever it is, where we support all of them.

00:29:22:10 - 00:29:49:00
Brad Sousa
And the work that we do is often very global. And so one of the things I think I've learned is that in the old days, like 2019, we would we would introduce a collaboration technology and then we would create an adoption plan to try and convince the workforce to consume it or to adopt it. And adopting was a secret code for stop doing what you're doing and do something else.

00:29:49:02 - 00:30:18:21
Brad Sousa
But the pandemic has made our end users, our consumers of this tech, very savvy, and they now have their own expectations of what it's supposed, what the experience is supposed to be, to your point. And so they adopt means move people towards tech, adapt means move tech towards people. And I think I hear from our user communities, they are not interested in adopting.

00:30:18:21 - 00:30:25:17
Brad Sousa
They're very interested in adapt. What what do you think about what I just shared?

00:30:25:19 - 00:30:50:13
Atti Riazi
You know, I said we always get Monday Blue Monday Blues because we go home and we have all this tech, right? You come to work and you're like, Oh, you must deal with this tech. And it's so dry and it's so rigid and so, I mean, my kids would never read an email if I want to get my kids to even look at texts, I got to snap them.

00:30:50:15 - 00:31:08:16
Atti Riazi
Yeah, napping. And I'm and in the beginning I was like, What the hell? There's this. And then finally I figure out what it is. And. And it wasn't cool for Mommy to snap the kids, but now if I don't snap and back in 5 minutes, they just like mom and dad and stop me. But yeah, I'm talk to me before.

00:31:08:16 - 00:31:32:05
Atti Riazi
So what I'm saying is the young generation, they know how to communicate and they got the best tools. The thing that that thing of finger tips that come to work 18, 19, 22 years. We hired them, then we give them this all, we'll be rigid systems. So yes, we need to reinvent. We need to rethink. They're not going to take it and they shouldn't.

00:31:32:09 - 00:32:10:21
Atti Riazi
The experience should be good when they come in to work. And our consumers experience should be good around collaboration. So and that area is changing dress You know my shop now, right. It's it's incredible to see the young people the way the cloud did completely outside the part of the society the comes that constant conversation. I think commerce and collaboration they in constant sharing of thoughts and ideas and now they're not a new board she think about it because they don't make decisions without talking to each other.

00:32:10:23 - 00:32:11:26
Brad Sousa
That's right.

00:32:11:28 - 00:32:13:18
Atti Riazi
That's the know culture.

00:32:13:20 - 00:32:49:14
Brad Sousa
Yeah. So in in in in my day right of growing up, the problem that we were trying to solve in the U.S. was scale. And so I was taught in school that independent work was the best way, was the most valued expression of work. And so when you say to me, Hey, I want you to solve a problem, Brad Well, I know what that means is go away, study the problem, bring back my recommendation to the team and and show people that it's the right thing to do based upon a stack of facts that I have.

00:32:49:17 - 00:33:28:24
Brad Sousa
But to a younger demographic who community based work is the most valued form of work. And so when I say solve a problem, they crowdsourced that before the meeting's over and they bring back to the team their best recommendation based upon the number of people who agree with them. And so the dependance on collaboration and and rapid ideation and the ability to exchange information from whatever device at whatever location, whatever time my curiosity is piqued, that's super relevant to how I think the workforce works today.

00:33:28:24 - 00:33:35:20
Brad Sousa
To your point, right? It's a generational thing that I think that has improved the way people work.

00:33:35:22 - 00:33:53:18
Atti Riazi
It has great value. You know, this example about the gumball, the gumball machine, you know, you have these there you go and say how many gumballs alone are in it? And I've done research. And they said, If you ask eight people and you take the numbers, you divide it by eight very close when it comes to what the number is.

00:33:53:18 - 00:34:28:04
Atti Riazi
So it is about it is about collaboration. It's about us as humans becoming a more integrated mind, mind. And and I always say about convergence on human machine, you know, you have the singularity. If we reach singularity, where we are so integrated with technology that that we think together, that's I think that's our new species, right? Yeah. Because if you look at a species not as think it's not a thing, it's a species.

00:34:28:06 - 00:34:57:12
Atti Riazi
And I always use the example of Darwin. And if you think about evolution, evolution of humans, evolution of tech, and then the convergence of two species because of the dependencies and they become one, the cases are one species is smart, is stronger, it finds another one is a virus. We know we're not the stronger and the smarter at this point, but there are times when they come together in singularity and then evolve.

00:34:57:15 - 00:35:22:28
Atti Riazi
Jobs that we did before didn't matter. Going into a room, studying by yourself, finding facts. I can do that online. Do nation table. I can chat online, learning new languages. I can do that online. The stuff we teach kids and colleges and high schools. 90% of them are useless, useless. We continue to teach these things. Why do we teach them?

00:35:22:28 - 00:35:31:00
Atti Riazi
Teach them decision making, problem solving, critical thinking and that's they need is much faster to get.

00:35:31:01 - 00:35:31:13
Brad Sousa
That's right.

00:35:31:19 - 00:35:46:01
Atti Riazi
But right but the measure our kids based on two things memory and processing power those are the two things they measure. Human beings have SATs, things solve a problem. How much do you remember those things we don't need anymore?

00:35:46:03 - 00:35:48:15
Brad Sousa
That's right. That's exactly right.

00:35:48:17 - 00:36:05:27
Atti Riazi
So a lot to think about, about the future of humankind. And and how are we going to evolve and have begun to evolve biotech and how are we going to come together? Solid. Not adoption, not adaptability. I call it convergence.

00:36:05:29 - 00:36:39:08
Brad Sousa
Yeah, I love that. That's really great. So you were talking about what it takes, what colleges, universities should be teaching today, what it takes to really be a impactful contributor in the workforce today. If there was somebody that was aspiring to be a leader in tech, irrespective of title, but just their aspiration is to lead people in a tech, what what encouragement would you give them?

00:36:39:08 - 00:36:48:11
Brad Sousa
What's the one thing that you would tell them, Hey, you know what? This is the thing that I would encourage you to focus on.

00:36:48:13 - 00:36:52:09
Atti Riazi
I would say technology be the least.

00:36:52:11 - 00:36:53:07
Brad Sousa
Well.

00:36:53:10 - 00:37:10:05
Atti Riazi
I yes, This mean you come and you talk to me about philosophy and history and literature and critical thinking. If I know you understand, you have good people think you're socially responsible.

00:37:10:07 - 00:37:10:28
Brad Sousa
Yeah.

00:37:11:00 - 00:37:42:24
Atti Riazi
You can think out of the box and you are resourceful and. And you'll embrace your talent, right? I mean, these are things that make good leaders. You have a vision you can inspire, persuade, not only like, you know, communicate and persuade. These are things that I look for and I add towards things because we always forget as folks, that to be a good leader, you need to you need to master two things.

00:37:42:28 - 00:38:02:09
Atti Riazi
And these two things are power. And and we always kind of look at it negatively, right? Yeah. Oh well it takes in this organization or, you know, but you must understand if you want to impact something, what do you need? You need power.

00:38:02:11 - 00:38:03:00
Brad Sousa
Yeah.

00:38:03:02 - 00:38:19:08
Atti Riazi
And you need to work through the politics. Yeah. To create positive impact. Otherwise, you know so. Right. These are things they need to learn. They need to know, They need to embrace. They need to embrace it for positive change.

00:38:19:10 - 00:38:43:22
Brad Sousa
So there's a passion that's obvious with you. And this is where I think I might want to land a plane with us today. What drives that passion for you? A Well, there's a is it is it you have a sense of obligation? Is it that you just see a clear destination and you're going there and you're just a force of nature.

00:38:43:22 - 00:38:49:03
Brad Sousa
You bring people with you. What what is it that drives that passion for you?

00:38:49:05 - 00:39:22:24
Atti Riazi
I think maybe it's two things. One, I'll give you an example of when I was looking for Ogilvy, I went to this town in China called Why You? And there I saw pregnant women, children dismantling it, equipment full of mercury and seeping into the water, seeping into the land, seeping into their bodies. And as the CIA looked at it and I just cried because I said, that's my stuff that's my fault, I thought I was sending Mike to third world countries to contribute.

00:39:23:01 - 00:39:56:15
Atti Riazi
I am poisoning this. Wow. I started a group called CEOs Without Borders, and its job was advocacy around let on medically take this stuff off it. This is equipment and to give to to have positive to bring positive change versus negative change to develop markets innovation. And I think a second one is I grew up in a country where women were, you know, would become teachers and become kind of nurses.

00:39:56:15 - 00:40:24:10
Atti Riazi
And this great my my mom was nine when my grandmother was nine and she was forced to get married. My mother couldn't go past third grade when all the brothers went to college. So I come from a family of women who were not given the opportunity to explore and to contribute. And I have found so many horrible women in the world, even those that walk ten kilometers to carry water on their back.

00:40:24:10 - 00:40:55:09
Atti Riazi
And they took kids on the side. These are incredible woman without the opportunity, without education, without financial independence, without the rights, not to get married or not to have their children marry at night or have their child become a child soldier, soldier or trafficked. So I'm passionate about that because I've seen it. And I think that we are responsible as innovators to create a better world and to reduce the harm.

00:40:55:09 - 00:41:16:11
Atti Riazi
You know, thou shall do no harm and to understand visible risk versus invisible risk and create a future Quinn Society that is more in harmony. So I think then driven with that and it was our experiences and that kind of pushed me forward.

00:41:16:13 - 00:41:36:18
Brad Sousa
Well, Atti, I, I have thoroughly enjoyed our conversation today. You did not disappoint. I was excited about it and you've been wonderful to talk to. It's been a great conversation. I know that we have run out of time. We just made a podcast together and I'm excited about that. Thank you for giving us your time today.

00:41:36:20 - 00:41:42:05
Atti Riazi
Thank you. Brad. What a pleasure to meet you and thank you so much for having me on this podcast. Thank you.

00:41:42:12 - 00:41:43:24
Brad Sousa
Again, you're a very welcome.