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Business is an unlikely hero: a force for good working to solve society's most pressing challenges, while boosting bottom line. This is social purpose at work. And it's a dynamic journey. Purpose 360 is a masterclass in unlocking the power of social purpose to ignite business and social impact. Host Carol Cone brings decades of social impact expertise and a 360-degree view of integrating social purpose into an organization into unfiltered conversations that illuminate today's big challenges and bigger ideas.
Carol Cone:
Welcome to Purpose 360 and welcome to our first episode of 2026 and to one of my favorite traditions on the show. Since 2023, we've kicked off January, stepping back from our usual deep dive episodes with a single individual or a single issue, and instead bringing together a powerhouse group of previous guests to help us look ahead. This annual special is all about perspective, and today you're about to hear from four leaders whose vantage points on purpose and business couldn't be more valuable in are turbulent yet exciting times. Joining us is Alan Murray, former CEO of Fortune Media and now president of the newly formed Wall Street Journal Leadership Institute. Alan brings decades of insight at the intersection of business, leadership and global trends from hundreds of interviews with CEOs.
We're also joined by Alexandra Amouyel, president and CEO of Newman's Own Foundation, offering a unique view from a company owned by its own foundation and built on purpose from day one. We also welcome Artis Stevens, president and CEO of Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, whose profound leadership in the not for-profit sector continues to shape what community impact looks like at scale.
And finally, Kevin Martinez, vice president of Corporate Citizenship at ESPN, who brings the perspective of a major brand that reaches millions upon millions and moves culture, and you've guessed it's related to sports. The predictions of these individuals reflect not just their expertise but their lived experience in steering purpose through real world complexity. And together they paint an important picture of where business purpose is heading next so that you can apply their insights to your work the very next day. So let's not wait anymore. Let's begin.
Carol Cone:
One of our predictors, Artis Stevens, who is the president and CEO of Big Brothers Big Sisters is one of my favorite people who's ever been on the pod. He's an old friend. So welcome back, Artis.
Artis Stevens:
Carol, thank you so much, my friend. It's great to be here with you.
Carol Cone:
It's great to be here with you. I'd just like to embarrass you because in the past year, Time Magazine named you one of the top 100 individuals in philanthropy. So congratulations on that.
Artis Stevens:
Yeah. I'm so honored and humbled to be recognized this way. And here's what I always know about those recognitions. I'm certainly in the forefront, but it's a collection of so many people who are part of this mission and who've been part of my career and my journey as well.
Carol Cone:
But you are certainly one of those greats. So now let's get into why we're here, which is the predictions for purpose in 2026. So the first thing I'd just like to reset with our listeners, what is the purpose of Big Brothers Big Sisters of America?
Artis Stevens:
Yeah. So we're actually celebrating 120 years this year, Carol. And born in New York City with the idea as an alternative innovation to the juvenile justice system that was focused on mentoring relationships. When you put a young person, an adult together, you essentially create magic in both of their lives. And that magic goes on to help support their surroundings, the community, the country overall. And that's what we've seen over 120 years. And while we're now the largest youth mentor in the organization today that's creating positive outcomes in young people's lives, but also creating positive outcomes for our community, our economy, and our workforce.
Carol Cone:
That's the great, great progress that you are making. So now let's turn to purpose at a higher level. And so what are you seeing? What would you predict that both the function of purpose as well as the activations, where are they going in 2026?
Artis Stevens:
Yeah. Well, I think it's obvious that in the society that we live in today how important purpose is. So the first place I always start is value alignment. And I think there's a recentering on value alignment, particularly with everything that's happening in our world globally, in our country, the politics, the isolation, the disconnection, and the power of bringing people together, I think is front and at the center of so much work.
And it creates opportunity, Carol, right? It creates opportunity for purpose-driven companies, brands, nonprofits, or organizations to more collectively work together to center how we bring values, how we bring connection, how we bring better advancement to people working together to solve big problems in our country and solve even the problems that are in our communities at a very local level because we have a greater level of intentionality towards how we think about our value alignments, purpose, and creating shared outcomes together.
When you think about the issues that are resonating for the conversations we're having, both with purpose inter companies, with communities, government, education institutions, one is definitely around mental health and wellbeing. It's about stability as well and connectivity and stability. The third one, of course, is around our workforce, right? Workforce development and building the types of skills that young people need today and how are we empowering talent, ensuring that talent that there's a readiness to be able to enter into new workforce and what our economy looks like.
Carol Cone:
That's absolutely spot on. So what opportunities either with you or with others do you see for 2026, as well as barriers? Purpose used to be, that was the word of the year, and now it's AI, AI, AI.
Artis Stevens:
Yeah. Well, I actually want to put AI in both categories because I feel it's a challenge and opportunity. And a lot of it is the way that we are approaching it or how you choose to approach it. What we're choosing to think about is how do we use it ethically, responsibly, equitably, and to make sure it's focused for the right types of outcomes? So for us, it's empowering young people with the skills that they need and getting them trained. Because here's the thing, a lot of people like to say, and I noticed the headlines about AI going to replace people in their jobs. Really what's going to replace people in their jobs is not AI, it's people who understand AI is going to replace people who don't understand AI. So the more that we empower people with the skills, and particularly young people to be able to use it to their advantage, that's an important factor.
The other really important piece here is about the importance of human connection. And I want to go back to that because it's so important that as we think about AI and we think about all these advancements in technology, we're not losing sight on the importance and the power of human connection, because that's really what's going to drive every single thing.
Carol Cone:
I totally agree with that. How about, what advice would you give to young people? Because, boy, I did a mentoring session last night like, "I'm coming out of school and I really want to do social impact work, but, boy, how do I get a job?" So any advice to young people or early stage professionals who want to advance their careers in social impact?
Artis Stevens:
Yeah. I would say number one is exposure is everything. And remember that when you're getting exposure, a lot of times we want exposure to be able to pay us something immediately, right? Exposure doesn't always come with that. The value and the currency is the experience that you're getting.
So sometimes you're going to need to take that step and understand that the financial incentive may not come along immediately with that, but find ways to get exposure through mentorship, through volunteering, through getting exposed, through even the sense of using virtual connections to be able to do that.
The other thing I would say is what's really important in understanding work in this field is that you have to come into this field with a level of empathy, right? And it's having the right disposition of walking into this field and understanding that empathy and understanding other people and where other people stand and getting outside of yourself and outside of your shoes is really important.
And then the third thing that I would say is that understand what the idea of a plan really means, right? One of the things I've learned in terms of mentoring folks and being mentored myself is thinking steps of three, right? So breaking long-term plans down into, you may have a big vision, break it down into incremental steps that can help to get you there.
Carol Cone:
I love that. Really very specific advice. So I always give the last comment to my guest, so how do you want to just leave the future of purpose 2026 from Artist Stevens, from Big Brothers Big Sisters of America?
Artis Stevens:
Yeah. Here's what I'll say. I truly believe that about purpose is that we are better when we are together. When we find and we figure out problems together, when we solve and we think about strategies and solutions together, when we think about how we can share resources and create opportunities for young people and for other communities who are most marginalized, that is when we are at our best and that's when we're at our best as a country as well.
And I think as we think about the purpose field, our expertise in our industry and our ability to create connections, community and convening to bring all sectors together, that is when we are most powerful. And that is what I am very hopeful and I am inspired about as we move into the next year and beyond to continue to do and to help to catalyze the work that we're doing across the country and the world.
Carol Cone:
Fabulous. You always delight. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And have a great 2026.
Artis Stevens:
I appreciate you, my friend. Let's keep going.
Carol Cone:
Joining me is Kevin Martinez. He's vice president of corporate citizenship at ESPN and he's a rockstar in the field. So welcome back to the show, Kevin.
Kevin Martinez:
Oh, you're very kind and thank you.
Carol Cone:
Kevin, let's just start with what is the purpose of ESPN?
Kevin Martinez:
The purpose is to serve the sports fan anytime, anywhere. We have a multipurpose mission statement that is purpose driven. And that serve is the moniker that we use across all functions of our company.
Carol Cone:
Fabulous. I love it. So what's new since we chatted in the spring of 2024?
Kevin Martinez:
Wow. So I think since we chatted, we had on the radar the launch of our biggest initiative today, which is Take Back Sports. We're seeing that kids are dropping out of sports at huge rates and depending on what segments you're in, whether socioeconomic or others, you're affected it differently. So access to security of resourcing for. So one of the things that we've done is we created a program called Take Back Sports. I'm proud to say one of the biggest achievements of that is we are now powered by the Walt Disney Company. So that means Disney Junior, that means Star Wars, Pixar, everything. So that's exciting for us.
Carol Cone:
Lovely. I love it. Okay. So you're practicing purpose at such a high level with such great results and impact. So where do you see purpose, work, activation, strategy going forward in the coming year? A lot of headwinds out there with lots of things. Some call it a VUCA MAX world, but where do you see it going?
Kevin Martinez:
Well, I'm going to kind of take it broadly and then real quickly to us, which is broadly, I just think that we're going to continue to see a constriction of things because purpose is going to be more defined by fewer people. And so to stay relevant, we need to know what those stakeholders are saying, how they're saying it and why they're saying it. We need to know their purpose behind it. We're all sports fans, so we need to know all of that.
So that's the first thing is that as that starts to constrict a little bit, and constriction may be not bad in some cases, right? It means efficiencies. It means more narrow thought. Maybe there's not 12 people in the room all the time, but there's five people that can really make things happen, right? So that can happen. I think that constriction also has an empowering moment, which is it makes us be really, really focused about strategy.
So strategy, strategy, strategy. And I don't mean a list of things that you do. I mean setting down a pipeline of opportunity and vision statement and then putting against it some very structured elements of how you're going to do it and why you're going to do it. And then with what resources you're going to do it, just build your budget for you, and the outcomes, which is I'm doing your impact report for you as well, right?
So that type of structure for CSR and citizenship practitioners, I think is really important. For companies in general, I think that broader piece. For us at the very sports driven level, you're going to see us look at Take Back Sports and move it all the way to something that's really, really important to us. We have the Super Bowl broadcast in 2027.
So ABC, ESPN have not had it in 30 years. And so we are so psyched about that. The things that we're going to do with the whole Walt Disney company, the Disney difference, that's going to be a major driving force. We're going to take the Take Back Sports initiative with us all the way. So we're very, very excited about that.
Carol Cone:
What are the barriers and challenges in the coming year? You want to be focused, I hear that, but what other ... Will AI be a positive or a negative?
Kevin Martinez:
Yeah. It's funny. The answer is yes, yes, yes. Everything. I always tell people that we need to not fall for the criticism of being a master of many. We kind of have to. We have to be the Navy Seals of reputation. We have to go build reputation. We have to work with our marketing teams, our production teams, if you're consumer goods, all that, whatever it is, service organization, you really need to know your business.
And so that element is really critical to our success, is really understanding how that's going to move forward. So I think there's a lot for us to discuss there, more than the time that we have, but I do believe that that's going to be really critical.
Carol Cone:
And so focus. I always say that focus is your friend and you can't do all these little itty bitty things that you should truly pause a bit, reflect.
Kevin Martinez:
Yeah. You're absolutely right, pause, reflect. We have something called discuss, debate, decide, and align, which is Jimmy Pitaro's mantra. And we do that in accordance to everything, I just wrote a report on it today. But it's this narrowing down to make sure we're all on the same page about how we're moving forward and what we're moving forward with and what we're trying to accomplish. But that element, as you said, that strategy is really, really critical to say, "What is it that we're trying to accomplish and how are we trying to do it?" Because once you get everybody on board, then they own it and that's a much easier process.
Carol Cone:
Absolutely. You want to get people aligned and on board. What advice would you give to the younger purpose professionals who either want to get a job with Kevin Martinez at ESPN or they're beginning to rise up on the company, they're still roiling waters out there for purpose professionals? What advice would you give them for the coming year? What should they be doing?
Kevin Martinez:
Wow. I mentor a ton of people and I'm mentored by a ton of people. And I think the one common denominator is find your joy and passion with corporate responsibility. You're not always going to find the right product or the right thing to do or the right execution, but finding the way that you like to drive the business is really, really important, whether it's through finance or whether it's HR. All of those have components of corporate responsibility that you can be an authority in.
Find your authority in that space and be like learn, be the permanent person in HR, employee engagement, processing for retention. Figure that out.
For me, it's always been about driving it with the business. I've never, as you know, I've never been a, quote-unquote, "a perfectionist on purity of CSR." It's like a lot of the times the work we're working on is stuff maybe I'm not as all 100% in, but I know it's right for the business because the outcome I can kind of massage on the back end to help the people that we really need to help, being our employees, our stakeholders, our stockholders, you name it.
Carol Cone:
Love it. Absolutely love it. I always like to give the last word to my guest. Any final thoughts to our listeners?
Kevin Martinez:
Yeah. I think I'm stating the obvious here, we're in changing times and practitioners, like I had to tell my partner the other day, "I can't watch another comedy video series on structure of government." I just can't. Right? We are fully integrated into what's happening in our society and we don't take a side on it, but we have to manage it on how the purpose of our company works.
And so I would say mental health is going to be critical in '26. Really gives your time some oxygen and some breath. Take a step back and say, "You can only control what you can control and what you can't, you shouldn't." Right? To own, there's stuff that is just too complicated.
I believe, my big epiphany for '26 is, that I believe that we, as a country, are going to come together in a way that's going to make us very excited and patriotic with the celebration of our constitution with other things. I think our veterans are going to start to be... We're going to be more proud of those. I think our economy's going to get better. I think all that stuff is going.
I'm a positive optimist, as you can imagine, but I also look for that and drive for that. So that's the other pieces. Set the North Star, drive to it. You're going to get off the path, you're going to fall. People are going to say you're off track, but as long as you can repeat that mantra, keep doing it. It's got to be part of your vision.
Carol Cone:
Love it. That's fantastic. And it's very optimistic and we need some optimism and we need some cohesion and we need to be kind to each other.
Kevin Martinez:
Yes. Kindness. Carol, thank you for bringing it up because I think that is really critical. We're still human beings. Let's pass a little kindness and love across. I know it sounds a little esoteric, but it works.
Carol Cone:
Well, Kevin Martinez, you never, ever, ever disappoint your words of wisdom are expansive. And thank you for being part of Purpose 360's predictions for a purpose for the coming year.
Kevin Martinez:
Thank you. I look forward to it and happy holidays to you and all your listeners. And there's so much work for us to do. Thank you for this opportunity.
Carol Cone:
Our next guest for Purpose 360 Predictions for 2026 is Alex Amouyel, and she is the president and CEO of Newman's Own Foundation. She is such a delight. Welcome back to the show, Alex.
Alex Amouyel:
Thank you, Carol. Thank you so much for having me.
Carol Cone:
It's always a pleasure and love the food. Love the food. Alex, I'd like to start out with what is Newman's own purpose?
Alex Amouyel:
So Newman's Own Foundation's mission is to nourish and transform the lives of children who face adversity. And we have three priority program areas. We support another organization founded by Paul Newman, the SeriousFun Children's Network, which is a network of 30 camps and programs for children with serious illnesses, both in the US and around the world. They just are finishing up their year of serious fun in celebration and honor of what would've been Paul's 100th birthday.
Carol Cone:
I know. So beautiful.
Alex Amouyel:
And then the other two priority program areas are Indigenous Food Justice and nutrition, education and school food. And for anyone who's been following the news, I'm sure you've seen child hunger and nutrition issues have been in the news a lot due to different cuts to different budgets. But I'm happy to say that despite those, our grantee partners are doing really great work and the work that they're doing is more important than ever.
Carol Cone:
It is more important than ever. Where do you see purpose going in 2026?
Alex Amouyel:
Lovely question. Let me take it from an individual perspective and then from a organizational perspective, if you will. I think I love the end of the year, that awkward time, especially between Christmas and New Year. I watch too much Netflix during that time usually, but what I also tend to do is really journal and take stock of how the year has been for me personally across a number of categories, work, family, friendships, health, et cetera, et cetera, and sort of what are my reflections and ratings?
And in doing that, I often revisit my personal mission, vision and value. So just like a non-organization, I have my own personal mission, vision, values. And then I sort of see, has this year gotten me closer or further? Have I deepened things? What have I learned? Am I still doing what is aligned to my purpose with as much of my time and my resources as I can?
Carol Cone:
I love the fact that you're talking about your personal purpose and what gives you energy and what doesn't, that helps to then focus you on, I assume part of it's your work purpose.
Alex Amouyel:
I've certainly seen this year that given at least both in the US, but also due to USIA [inaudible 00:24:13] and other things, the US has had an influence globally. People have sort of been looking around wondering what's hitting next.
I hope that in 2026 there is a little bit more clarity. I think in that sense, 2025 is very reactive, I think for a lot of people or organizations, but that in having to be reactive, people have now really clarified what role do we play? What are we going to indeed double down on versus how are we realigning if we need to realign for various reasons?
I certainly worry that some of these government cuts, and again, I'll speak more for the nutrition and child food insecurity, is really going to be felt next year. And so if there's a lot more retrenchment from say corporate foundations and institutional foundations and high net worth individuals, yeah, we're going to see unfortunately the consequences of that in the United States. So I really hope that this is the moment for people to step up and continue stepping up.
But yes, I do hope that 2026 brings a little bit of everybody is much clearer on their purpose, much clearer on what's needed and isn't afraid to invest the money that's needed for all these incredible nonprofits and programs to continue and to find real solutions to the big issues.
Carol Cone:
Let's pivot a little bit to the sustainability and purpose professionals, young careerists. And what advice would you give them where maybe they're in college now, they're graduating high school, or they're in early stages of their career and they go, "I really want to give back in my job." What advice would you give to them?
Alex Amouyel:
So I think you'll probably remember I wrote a book a couple of years ago called The Answer Is You, a guidebook to living a life full of impact, which talks about things like how to construct your personal mission, vision, and values. Definitely, and this is chapter one, for early stage people, it's really thinking about, before even thinking about what issue area, what job you should apply for, et cetera, et cetera, it's thinking about what your superpowers are, what are your unique skills, experience, lived experience that you can bring to the table because that's sort of what you can learn and hone and craft and also what makes you unique to you?
And then as you think about the different problems of the world, if it's child nutrition, if it's climate change, if it's different issue areas, your purpose will emerge. Sometimes it takes years, I will say that, at the intersection of what makes you unique and your superpowers, if you will, and problems that affect millions and billions of people, but sometimes that takes quite a bit of time.
And I definitely think it can be hard to get a job, be it a nonprofit or foundation or a government institution or things like that, especially at the moment, there definitely have been cuts, but I do also advise in the book of starting with 10% of your time and all your money and really thinking through your volunteering, thinking through student societies of nonprofits that you could be involved in and putting those skills that you already have of service and then doing these things, and sometimes it may not be paid, it may be volunteering. Over time, you'll get to know these issue areas better, you'll learn your skills.
Carol Cone:
Great advice. And I'm glad we got a chance to mention your book again. So I always give the last, as you know, word to my guest. So anything else that you'd like to add regarding the journey of purpose into 2026?
Alex Amouyel:
So I hope you've all had a good rest over the holidays and that you've thought a little bit about what you want to achieve. Think about your personal mission, vision, and values. Think about what brings you energy and what drains you. Write it down. I love journaling and then go hit the ground running. And everything you do, whether that's through volunteering, giving, purchasing, or as part of your job, can inch you closer to doing good in the world. And keep at it and keep increasing that percentage more and more as you can.
Carol Cone:
Super. Thank you so much for your comments. They were terrific.
Alex Amouyel:
Thank you so much. Have a really lovely day.
Carol Cone:
Today we have a guest who's returning to the show, someone that I admire so much, I followed him in everything he writes, his podcasts, his books. Alan Murray, he's the founding President of The Wall Street Journal Leadership Institute and the former CEO of Fortune Media. So, it's been three years, but I'm so glad you're back, so welcome back to the show, Alan.
Alan Murray:
Great to be back with you, Carol. Thanks for having me.
Carol Cone:
Oh, it's my pleasure. How might you describe your CEO leadership title?
Alan Murray:
I think the guiding motivation of The Wall Street Journal Leadership is this sense that everybody's talking about technology, everybody's investing in technology companies or thinking about how AI is going to transform them. And if you stop and think about it or if you listen to CEOs, you pretty quickly come to the conclusion that the challenge they have is not a technology challenge, the technology is doing fine, it's a leadership challenge. It's how do they create organizations that can accept this rapid pace of change that they're seeing in technology? But not only in technology. So, what we are trying to do is figure out how can we help people lead these large human-based organizations in a way that makes them resilient enough and strong enough and creative enough and courageous enough to [inaudible 00:03:07]-
Carol Cone:
Courageous enough.
Alan Murray:
... challenges of the future.
Carol Cone:
That's fantastic. So, what are CEOs saying right now?
Alan Murray:
I have many conversations, some of them off the record, some of them on the record, but we just recently had our CEO Council Summit that kind of encapsulated what I've been hearing all year. And there are two things I would say. One is I thought the obsession of the year would be what's happening in Washington, the policy changes because they've been huge; tax, tariff, complete reversal of regulatory direction, the transactional nature of the new administration, all of those things have created huge new obstacles and opportunities for CEOs. I thought that would be the leading topic of the year. I knew AI was on everyone's mind, but I thought it'd be overshadowed by policy. I was wrong. The AI opportunity and challenge is so huge and so captivated the minds of the CEOs that it continuously rises above everything else.
And that gets to the second thing, which you will appreciate and are very tuned into: while the conversations I've been having start as conversations about technology, you get about 15 minutes into them and you very quickly realize we're not talking about technology, we're talking about people, we're talking about culture, we're talking about leadership. Back to what I said at the outset, we're talking about: how do you create an organization? Most of the CEOs I talk to run really large companies. How do you get a big organization to adapt to change the speed that they have to adapt to right now? The thing they are all struggling with is the culture issue, the people.
Carol Cone:
Here's a tough one. If you had to choose one factor that will most influence the next generation of businesses to really become human organization, humanized organization, a force for good. What would you say?
Alan Murray:
Yeah, I think it's this. I think AI is going to be one step further, because the machines are going to take care of themselves even better than they did before. And what companies have to wrestle with is: how do we differentiate ourselves? We're all going to have great technology. That'll be table stakes. If you don't have great technology, you're dead. If you do have great technology, then you compete, but you're going to be competing a lot against a lot of other people who have great technology. So, I think the differentiator is: how do we get better use of talent, better people? And I believe a lot of companies are thinking that way. It's mastering the people piece of this equation becomes even more important in an age of AI.
Carol Cone:
So, is activating, is discovering an authentic purpose and living it, really bringing it to life in innovation and employee engagement, in customer relations, in community engagement, is that one of the major ways that the culture may evolve?
Alan Murray:
Absolutely. Absolutely. Look, it's not a silver bullet. You can have a great purpose and a lousy culture and a terrible company, but I'm not sure the opposite is true. I'm not sure you can have a great company if you don't have your people aligned around a clear, inspiring, engaging-
Carol Cone:
Inspiring, right. I love that. Alan, in 2026, where do you see purpose evolving for business as well as society?
Alan Murray:
Yeah, I think there already is and there will continue to be much less purpose washing, people trying to beat their breast and tell the world their purpose and much more inward focus within organizations about how you really activate on purpose. You make it real, you make it meaningful to the employees and you make it a core of the organization. And I think probably at the end of the day, it may sound like less focus on purpose, but it's probably a good thing. If you're listening, which is what I do for a living, you're going to hear less. But if you really get inside companies, I think you'll find the best are doubling down.
Carol Cone:
So what are overall opportunities for an organization or a brand doing authentic purpose work in 2026?
Alan Murray:
I think it ties back to AI, but it's not just the adoption of AI. It's understanding that the adoption of AI is table stakes, but the differentiator that will allow you to stand out among your competitors is people work. And so use AI as an opportunity to double down on the people purpose of your business.
Carol Cone:
Wonderful. And then what about challenges?
Alan Murray:
Well, the same as the opportunity. Look, it's hard. This is a very hard message to get across to your people that this technology, which will change the way they work dramatically, that it's in their interest to embrace it and adopt it. The challenge is that you fail. The risk is that you fail and that they therefore become obstacles to your advancement. So I think it's a double-sided issue and getting it right is the key.
Carol Cone:
Okay. And getting it right looks like what?
Alan Murray:
Getting it right is giving people the confidence that you are going to take care of them, treat them fairly, make sure that they are in a better position to have successful, fulfilling lives and careers in return for them helping you master this wave of technology that's rushing. And it's not just technology, this wave of change that's rushing over all of us.
Carol Cone:
Super. And lastly, what advice would you give purpose and/or sustainability professionals in 2026? They're starting out in their, I'm going to say again, their career or their mid-career, but what would you suggest to them because it's not going to be an easy road?
Alan Murray:
It's hard. It's hard. And, look, you have to show some flexibility. If every young person follows their purpose and their purpose doesn't happen to meet the demands of business at the moment, somebody's going to be left out in the cold. So, you have to show some flexibility and you have to understand that you can't expect companies to share all your political beliefs if their customers and their employees don't share all your political beliefs. So, I think there's been a lot of inflexibility among young people that has contributed to the problem. But, look, at the end of the day, if I'm right, and I'm pretty sure I am right, companies need employees who are better people, who understand how to build loyalty among groups of people and get everybody aligned around a mission and get everybody moving forward in the same direction. What you referred to as social skills, that's what they need.
There was a time not too long ago, Carol, when the cover of Business Week said, "Learn how to code. Everybody needs to learn how to code." Well, that advice no longer holds. The LLMs are going to do a pretty good job of basic coding. What everybody needs are people who can motivate, organize, who can ask the right questions, get people moving in a same direction around a common purpose. That's the challenge of the future, and that suggests a different approach for young people.
Carol Cone:
That's great. Unfortunately, we have to end this great conversation, but I always give the last word to my guest. So, what final word would you like to say, Alan Murray?
Alan Murray:
Look, at the end of the day, I can cite all sorts of potential problems and concerns about where we're headed, but it's a very exciting time to be alive. We are going to remake the world over the course of the next couple of decades, and we need everybody to lean in and be a part of that. And try and understand where we're headed, try and understand the tools that are going to get us there, and try and make sure we use them for good purposes, not bad purposes.
Carol Cone:
That's great. Super. And it's been a wonderful conversation, so thank you so much.
Alan Murray:
And Carol, thank you for having me. Thank you for what you do. Keep pushing Purpose because it's important to how we get to the right place.
Carol Cone:
This podcast was brought to you by some amazing people, and I'd love to thank them; Anne Hundertmark and Kristin Kenney at Carol Cone On Purpose, Pete Wright, and Andy Nelson, our crack production team at TruStory FM, and you, our listener. Please rate and rank us because we really want to be as high as possible as one of the top business podcasts available, so that we can continue exploring together the importance and the activation of authentic purpose. Thanks so much for listening.
This transcript was exported on Dec 06, 2025 - view latest version here.
p360_216 Kevin Alex Artis (Completed 12/06/25)
Transcript by Rev.com
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