68 episodes

Engaging conversations on business, technology and innovation.

Working Capital Conversations Chris Riback

    • Business
    • 4.5 • 14 Ratings

Engaging conversations on business, technology and innovation.

    Julian Francis: Empathetic Leadership in Action

    Julian Francis: Empathetic Leadership in Action

    Today – a special edition of our sister podcast "Call In," which explores Inclusive Leaderships – when to call in, and when to call out.
    Our guest was Julian Francis, President and CEO of Beacon Building Products – the largest publicly traded distributor of roofing materials and complementary building products in the U.S. and Canada.
    A key component of the way Julian advances business success is through empathetic leadership, connecting a human understanding of each employee to the realities of what it takes to succeed in a competitive business environment.
    We also discuss the specific, tangible ways that Julian brings his leadership philosophy to life: Discover ways to generate actionable opportunities for members of underrepresented groups, how to help employees balance personal and work needs, and learn about their innovative campaign for putting people first.
    You can find the Call In podcast, co-hosted with Dr. Alexandria White, at callinpodcast.com.

    • 30 min
    Mary Kay Orr: How Nazareth Housing Helps Families Unlock Their Potential

    Mary Kay Orr: How Nazareth Housing Helps Families Unlock Their Potential

    For anyone fortunate to come home to a familiar space, we can forget the compounding difficulty of homelessness. A home represents stability, and in the wake of the COVID 19 pandemic, homelessness was made even worse.
    Mary Kay Orr, the Executive Director of Nazareth Housing, wanted to address the problem of homelessness in New York in a meaningful way. Nazareth Housing is a community-based nonprofit serving vulnerable families and individuals in crisis. For almost 40 years Nazareth has helped families to unlock their potential, build pathways out of poverty, and avoid homelessness — helped them realize, as Orr puts it, "a mosaic of what life can be."
    Orr came to the organization after 25 years working in financial services on Wall Street. Her work has illuminated the nuance between serving others and helping them, respecting their fundamental dignity and giving individuals the tools to advance their own lives. She has seen that homelessness has multiple root causes and that any gesture of compassion and volunteering contributes to making a meaningful difference.

    • 39 min
    Rep. Stephanie Murphy: What D.C. and Business Can Learn From Each Other

    Rep. Stephanie Murphy: What D.C. and Business Can Learn From Each Other

    As global and domestic businesses enter a new and potentially-fraught economic environment, the relationship between the U.S. government and American business – always evolving – will face new challenges: Inflation, fair trade vs. free trade, China, protectionism, labor, supply chains, taxes, and of course, the massive humanitarian devastation and economic dislocation from Russia’s attack on Ukraine.So how can – and should – government and business work together to maximize American competitiveness, navigate these shifting dynamics, and manage the tensions underlying global trade today?U.S. Rep. Stephanie Murphy has a point of view. Murphy represents a Central Florida district that covers much of downtown and northern Orlando, and other cities. She serves on the House Ways and Means Committee and Armed Services Committee. She also is a co-chair of the Blue Dog Coalition, an official caucus in the U.S. House of Representatives comprised of 19 self-described “centrist” and “fiscally-responsible Democrats.”We wanted to know from Murphy: How should Washington, DC and the business world interact, and what could they learn from each other?

    • 21 min
    Christopher Leonard: The Lords of Easy Money

    Christopher Leonard: The Lords of Easy Money

    We know the headlines: Inflation is the highest in 40 years, climbing 7 percent last year. Stock prices and corporate debt have been running incredibly high. Unemployment, meanwhile, is incredibly low, while the U.S. economy grew 5.7 percent in 2021, its fastest full-year clip since 1984. The wealth gap, meanwhile, continues to spread.
    To fight these realities – especially inflation – the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank will soon start unwinding their two most significant policies that drove extreme amounts of available money at rates that made that money virtually free to borrow since 2008 and the Great Recession and through the Covid pandemic: They will stop the extraordinary experiment of mass buying of U.S. Treasuries known as Quantitative Easing, and they will raise interest rates at least three – perhaps 4 or more times – this year.
     
    The American easy money party is over, and it’s time to clean up any mess.
    So how did this party get started? Why did it go on so long – long after the first signs of rising inflation arose last year? Who made the decisions and, perhaps more centrally, why is the U.S. central bank, comprised of unelected governors and bank presidents, so opaque? What happened behind closed doors?
    Christopher Leonard has the inside story – and he tells it masterfully. His book The Lords of Easy Money: How the Federal Reserve Broke the American Economy, is a clear telling of Fed policy and the key personalities behind it: people like Jerome Powell, Ben Bernanke, Janet Yellen, and one you may never have heard of, Thomas Hoenig.
    About Leonard: He is a business reporter whose work has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, and Bloomberg Businessweek. He is the New York Times bestselling author of The Meat Racket and Kochland.
     

    • 29 min
    Maja Lapcevic: Mastercard Innovation, from Fintech to AI to Money 3.0

    Maja Lapcevic: Mastercard Innovation, from Fintech to AI to Money 3.0

    Of all human tools and inventions, few are as essential, complicated and stigmatized as money. In particular, financial technologies and concepts have often spurred growth, investment and powerful advancements around the globe.Maja Lapcevic brings a masterful understanding to the fintech space and these concepts. She is Senior Vice President, Mastercard Foundry Innovation Management & Marketing, where she leads Mastercard Lab’s Global Innovation Programs, the Mastercard Foundry Marketing team including Mastercard Experience Centers, and product portfolios for Data & Services as well as various dedicated innovation relationships. On a fundamental level, her work helps strengthen the trust, credibility and reliability that are essential to a thriving financial system, including helping government representatives learn about emerging technologies like crypto-currencies and NFTs, as well as working with startups globally to grow and scale their business.

    • 26 min
    Walter Isaacson: The Science and Business of CRISPR

    Walter Isaacson: The Science and Business of CRISPR

    Throughout nearly the entirety of human history, we have accepted a simple truth: A person’s genetic makeup is beyond one’s choice. Until now.
    In 2020, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna for the development of CRISPR, a method for genome editing. CRISPR may change everything -- and land us in a world previously imaginable only in science fiction.
    CRISPR can be wonderful and incredible. It may eliminate a child’s susceptibility to a genetic condition, such as cleft lip or cystic fibrosis or devastating disease. Imagine that. However, it also makes it possible to choose a child’s height or hair color. With these and other possibilities, the moral and ethical implications are important and immense.
    The race to discover CRISPR was one of the great science tales of the 21st century, a cross-continent battle of discovery and speed. So how did CRISPR arrive? And more importantly, where might it take us?
    Walter Isaacson is one to tell that story -- a professor of history at Tulane, he has been CEO of the Aspen Institute, chair of CNN, and editor of Time. He has written numerous No. 1 best-selling books, including on Leonardo DaVinci, Steve Jobs, Albert Einstein, and Ben Franklin, each one of the great creators of their time, who transformed not only their fields, but also the way humans connect -- offering new ways to think about and engage in meaningful human interaction.
    Isaacson’s latest book is The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race. It’s part mystery, part science, part personal, and completely compelling. Isaacson details the discovery of the CRISPR method and tells the story of the groundbreaking, female scientists who revolutionized the world.

    • 26 min

Customer Reviews

4.5 out of 5
14 Ratings

14 Ratings

Di1999hoot ,

Fabulous Podcast

Chris offers a smart, informative approach and brings in fabulous speakers. I especially enjoyed the session with Dr. Alex White on Inclusive Leadership. All are interesting. I suggest subscribing to his daily Working Capital Review newsletter—my source for the best curation of daily news.

calliekg ,

Excellent Guest

Joe Coughlin is an excellent resource from the insurance sector. He is articulate and smart. He understands how Covid has affected businesses.

Rodus ,

Good podcast

Chris Riback is a very good interviewer and has attracted a stable of interesting guests.

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