Meet the Leader

Focus on What Matters Most: 5 Leaders' Effective Strategies

2026年8月3日

 • 20 mins

How do you focus on what matters most in a distracted and noisy world? In this special Meet the Leader episode, leading thinkers and adventurers share practical ways to reclaim your attention and sharpen your focus so you can spend your time on the right priorities. Their strategies and approaches will help you refresh your thinking, make better decisions and prevent distraction from turning into burnout. You’ll learn to: • Rethink the first and last things you do each day can sharpen your attention • To craft a morning “to-feel list” to clarify priorities and make days more meaningful • To better appreciate the present to take control of your attention • To thinking 'like an ancestor' can help you think beyond the short term  Insights from adventurers who sailed the pacific, an expert on human flourishing, a Buddhist Monk and a 3-time cancer survivor explore attention management, focus, deep work, reflection, long-term thinking and what's needed to improve leadership in a distracted world.

How do you focus on what matters most in a distracted and noisy world? In this special Meet the Leader episode, leading thinkers and adventurers share practical ways to reclaim your attention and sharpen your focus so you can spend your time on the right priorities. Their strategies and approaches will help you refresh your thinking, make better decisions and prevent distraction from turning into burnout. You’ll learn to: • Rethink the first and last things you do each day can sharpen your attention • To craft a morning “to-feel list” to clarify priorities and make days more meaningful • To better appreciate the present to take control of your attention • To thinking 'like an ancestor' can help you think beyond the short term  Insights from adventurers who sailed the pacific, an expert on human flourishing, a Buddhist Monk and a 3-time cancer survivor explore attention management, focus, deep work, reflection, long-term thinking and what's needed to improve leadership in a distracted world.

Face Uncertainty and Take Action: Lessons from a Blind Sailor's Pacific Crossing

2026年7月27日

 • 36 mins

How can leaders move forward when pressure and uncertainty is high? Blind adventurer Hiro Iwamoto and his ‘seeing eye Doug” Doug Smith sailed across the Pacific in 55 days, from San Diego to Fukushima. The two share key strategies in taking action despite uncertainty and what’s needed to pick the right partners to make impossible projects a reality. Hiro also shares how he stays calm in moments of extreme adversity, like when whale sank his boat during an earlier attempt leaving him in a life raft for 11 hours amid five-metre waves. Their lessons on crisis leadership, teamwork, overcoming fear and innovation can motivate any leader during difficult moments.

How can leaders move forward when pressure and uncertainty is high? Blind adventurer Hiro Iwamoto and his ‘seeing eye Doug” Doug Smith sailed across the Pacific in 55 days, from San Diego to Fukushima. The two share key strategies in taking action despite uncertainty and what’s needed to pick the right partners to make impossible projects a reality. Hiro also shares how he stays calm in moments of extreme adversity, like when whale sank his boat during an earlier attempt leaving him in a life raft for 11 hours amid five-metre waves. Their lessons on crisis leadership, teamwork, overcoming fear and innovation can motivate any leader during difficult moments.

AI and Jobs Series: What's Next for Entry Level Workers

2026年7月21日

 • 22 mins

Entry level jobs provide a special window into the wider changes we'll see to job design and skill development. In this episode of Meet the Leader, Peter Brown of PwC explains how entry-level roles are transforming and breaks down new research on what employers really want and need from entry-level workers now. He also shares how can these roles can continue to serve as training grounds for career skills like collaboration, critical thinking, and relationship building and why a thoughtful redesign of these roles will be key to future leadership development. Top names from our Chief People Officer community also share the advice new grads need to know in a fast-changing job market. Key takeaways: The most dire headlines about entry-level jobs are not yet backed up by data. Employers are increasingly prioritizing applied experience and skills over degrees alone. New grads should focus on outcomes rather than tasks and look for ways to build human skills on purpose. Peter Brown is PwC’s global workforce leader and a co-author of the World Economic Forum report Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Entry-Level Work. Subscribe for more conversations on leadership, the future of work, and the biggest trends shaping business. This is the third episode in a 3-part series on AI and jobs.

Entry level jobs provide a special window into the wider changes we'll see to job design and skill development. In this episode of Meet the Leader, Peter Brown of PwC explains how entry-level roles are transforming and breaks down new research on what employers really want and need from entry-level workers now. He also shares how can these roles can continue to serve as training grounds for career skills like collaboration, critical thinking, and relationship building and why a thoughtful redesign of these roles will be key to future leadership development. Top names from our Chief People Officer community also share the advice new grads need to know in a fast-changing job market. Key takeaways: The most dire headlines about entry-level jobs are not yet backed up by data. Employers are increasingly prioritizing applied experience and skills over degrees alone. New grads should focus on outcomes rather than tasks and look for ways to build human skills on purpose. Peter Brown is PwC’s global workforce leader and a co-author of the World Economic Forum report Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Entry-Level Work. Subscribe for more conversations on leadership, the future of work, and the biggest trends shaping business. This is the third episode in a 3-part series on AI and jobs.

AI and Jobs Series: Upskilling's 'Messy Middle' and Fixing the Skills Mismatch

2026年7月13日

 • 28 mins

New research shows many labor markets face a skills mismatch, not a talent shortage. And in the 'messy middle' of the AI transformation, that mismatch will be harder for leaders, workers and hiring managers to ignore as they build future-ready teams. To compete, companies will need to focus less on classic degrees and more on skills-based hiring to ensure worker capabilities reflect what rapidly evolving roles require. In this episode, Maria Flynn, CEO of non-profit Jobs for the Future, explains why education and workforce systems built for the past are struggling to keep pace with AI-era job shifts requiring changes in how workers are trained, assessed and tested. Flynn also discusses the importance of designing quality jobs in all sectors and how worker voice and agency matters in both AI training and implementation and how this can reduce turnover, strengthen AI adoption, and close gender gaps. Key takeaways: • What is the skills mismatch - and what hiring managers need to understand to build their teams • How skills-based hiring can expand across hiring, advancement and talent management • Why successful AI adoption needs worker input, better job quality and inclusive workforce design Part two of our three-part AI and Jobs series. Subscribe to Meet the Leader for more conversations on leadership, AI, skills and the future of work.

New research shows many labor markets face a skills mismatch, not a talent shortage. And in the 'messy middle' of the AI transformation, that mismatch will be harder for leaders, workers and hiring managers to ignore as they build future-ready teams. To compete, companies will need to focus less on classic degrees and more on skills-based hiring to ensure worker capabilities reflect what rapidly evolving roles require. In this episode, Maria Flynn, CEO of non-profit Jobs for the Future, explains why education and workforce systems built for the past are struggling to keep pace with AI-era job shifts requiring changes in how workers are trained, assessed and tested. Flynn also discusses the importance of designing quality jobs in all sectors and how worker voice and agency matters in both AI training and implementation and how this can reduce turnover, strengthen AI adoption, and close gender gaps. Key takeaways: • What is the skills mismatch - and what hiring managers need to understand to build their teams • How skills-based hiring can expand across hiring, advancement and talent management • Why successful AI adoption needs worker input, better job quality and inclusive workforce design Part two of our three-part AI and Jobs series. Subscribe to Meet the Leader for more conversations on leadership, AI, skills and the future of work.

AI and Jobs Series: What tasks can humans stop doing? One HR lead weighs in

2026年7月6日

 • 28 mins

As AI grows more powerful and takes on more rote work, what should humans stop doing? Fertility benefits company Progyny took on this question as a company to re-evaluate routines and norms and how AI might help these evolve. Chief Human Resources Officer Cassandra Pratt shares how teams there are using AI to reduce rote work, rethink job design, improve meeting culture and give people more time for the human work machines cannot do, such as building trust and strengthening relationships.

As AI grows more powerful and takes on more rote work, what should humans stop doing? Fertility benefits company Progyny took on this question as a company to re-evaluate routines and norms and how AI might help these evolve. Chief Human Resources Officer Cassandra Pratt shares how teams there are using AI to reduce rote work, rethink job design, improve meeting culture and give people more time for the human work machines cannot do, such as building trust and strengthening relationships.