Peres Conference Day 1--The Rest of the Day
(Long but worth reading to the end, or at least seeing the last two photos!)
The early afternoon kicked off with a "Master Class" with Professor Dan Ariely. Ariely is currently a professor at Duke University. He is a major modern media personality. His "TED talks" have been watched over 4 million times (closer to 5 million). His lab for psychology study is called the "Center for Advanced Hindsight."
I had never actually heard of the guy -- but he is a real favorite of Addie's fiance, Sahar. So we managed to get a photo of the professor with Addie after his exTREMEly engaging lecture.
To summarize. . . Why do we lie so much? It turns out that we lie (on average) approximately every 10 minutes -- often for a perceived social benefit (including for the person we lie to), but often for somewhat mysterious reasons. People try to balance two forces: to think of ourselves as honest people and to benefit from cheating just a little.
One fascinating example of variations in human behavior: When people were over-refunded in change (as part of an experiment), 50% of them gave the money back. BUT when the person giving them the money back annoyed them first, only 14% gave the money back. Not surprising, perhaps. But Ariely has set up many ingenious ways to study these behaviors and the influences that cause variations in them.
The takeaway -- when we feel that we are in a relationship with someone, we are much much less likely to cheat in our favor. (Lying may be part of the necessary grease in human relationships; but cheating is something else entirely.)
We got closed out of the next plenary session -- everyone together, except that there wasn't ROOM for everyone: "Will Tomorrow Be Better?" All (or at least many) of the sessions were actually videoed and are available in streaming at http://2013.presidentconf.org.il/en/video/video-d2s20/
So I'll have to get around to catching the missed session soon. I am interested to see what Yair Lapid, Israel's recently risen political star, had to say. As well as the others on that panel.
But for US, the next session was a series of "One-on-One" interviews conducted by Israel Channel Two's Udi Segal with an extremely unlikely collection of subjects:
John Chambers, Chaiirman and CEO of Cisco
Robert DeNiro
Welli Dai, Co-Founder of Marvell Technology Group
Boris Collardi, CEO of Julius Baer Banking, Switzerland
Sharon Stone
Not pictured: John Baird, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada.
What did these people all have in common? Nothing. SOME of them had some things in common. Three were major political or economic figures. Two were Hollywood stars.
Chambers (of Cisco) was one of a number of big tech industry honchos who loudly proclaimed how great it is to do business in Israel. Why does Cisco find Israel attractive? We found leadership willing and able to do the work we
asked for. Bring electricity to the Internet: In the future, EVERYTHING will go over the
Internet, including health
care and electricity
I’ve never seen a country as critical of yourself as this
country!
In the world of business, you
NEED to change. Just the nature of the
world we’re in. My competitors from 15 years ago are pretty much all
gone. We get rid of more each year. But
if WE don’t change, we’ll be roadkill!
The next big thing is how you connect all the devices in the
world in ways we’ve never done before.
Build a foundation of fiber and mobile.
We need to build a middle class in Palestine. We’ve been working on it. It has gone from 1% to 6% in a few years. Get to 20% and it will be a very different reality. To create peace in the middle east, to create employment,
(Peres understood 5 years before me that) companies can move faster than
governments.
Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs John Baird: You don’t want to be popular. You want to be respected. We think that unilateral actions are unhelpful. (Palestinians at UN, World Court). Only way to achieve peace is together. “Palestinians will pay a big price if they turn to the
Hague.” It’s not ultimately in their
self-interest. We hope that both parties
will engage with John Kerry.
We need to stop arguing over symbolic minor points.
Baird was asked "Is Netanyahu
serious about peace?" His answer: "Canada will support Israel’s leader, whoever it is. I have been most impressed that no Israeli
leader has expressed desire to rule over the Palestinian people."
Next up was Robert DeNiro. This proved to be a rather embarrassing interview. DeNiro is known for not being favorably disposed toward interviews and this encounter showed why. The interviewer asked such inane questions, that DeNiro had to choose between a) giving answers as silly as the questions, b) staring at the interviewer in disbelief, c) storming from the stage or burying the interviewer in a barrage of sarcastic answers. DeNiro came closest to b). I took so many notes on so many conversations -- but had almost nothing to write about DeNiro -- and it wasn't his fault. He seemed like someone who IS an interesting guy -- but the interviewer was so blissed out to be in the presence of a HOLLYWOOD STAR that he swung and missed. The one thing of some interest that DeNiro shared was that this was his 5th or 6th trip to Israel (Thank you Mr. DeNiro) -- and his first visit to the Old City -- a place that really amazed him.Back to business -- almost -- for a conversation with Welli Dai, Co-Founder of Marvell Technology Group. Ms. Dai arrived in 1979 from Shanghai at age 17. She described semiconductors (which is Marvell's business -- they are the "other guy" compared to Intel) as the pizza dough of high tech
– connecting all the various platforms. Her prediction: Big change for the future: In the past, there were
stand-alone products. In the future,
everything will be made to fit. Make the
object fit our needs.
I saw Ms. Dai at least twice -- maybe 3 times -- over the course of the Conference. There was something a little disturbing about her: She insisted on calling herself a geek, on talking about how she's just a mom. She is one of the most powerful women in corporate America! And I heard her say the thing about semiconductors being the "pizza dough of high tech" at least 3 times -- probably 5 or more. It was clear to me that she has certain shtick that she goes to over and over and over. On the other hand, that can also be called messaging. And it has clearly worked for her, hasn't it?!
Swiss superbanker Boris Collardi was next. His views: The world is doing okay.
It’s bottomed out and will be getting better. Despite uncertainty, all the tools are
present for Israel to be a great success.
He was asked, "Why is Italy such a
mess when it has so many things going for it?" Because of huge inefficiency and a handicapped (or
handicapping) economic system.
We need Europe to move from austerity and invest in
growth.
China and the U.S. don’t need the same policies – just
some successful bridges, but this will be difficult, because of the large
cultural differences.
2008 was a wake-up call to governments and banks. There has been strong movement on the
regulatory side. I love banking – next to maybe movies. But it’s not considered an attractive
profession: College grads rate it 10th out of 10 professions when asked what they would like to do.
"How did you get so
far without college?" A peculiarity
of the Swiss system: You can advance through it based on intelligence. I got into banking because when I wanted to do an
internship as a young person, I couldn’t get into the chocolate, cheese, or
watch businesses, the ones everyone wants and does. I got “stuck” with the
bank internship.
About rich people and their money -- and how this can help solve big problems in the world: One of our easiest conversations with rich people is to
get them to do good.
Finally, last and least was superstar Sharon Stone. I had wondered what she was doing on the Conference Program (and had wondered similarly about DeNiro. He didn't have much to contribute -- but that was at least because the interviewer failed in HIS task).
I thought that the interviewer did a better job (surprisingly given how he failed with DeNiro) of asking reasonable questions, but Ms. Stone blathered about a good deal of the time. The more she talked, the more I wished she'd stop. (I had been hopeful, because her list of accomplishments isn't insignificant. She was an early supporter of AIDS activism and research and has done huge things in that area. She was LA Citizen of the Year, which should mean something. And she has started (and bankrolled?) the Yaalah Youth Organization for peace around the world.)
The world has 7 billion people, but 6 billion
cellphones. We need to be able to have
everyone working together for a better world.
I believe that we can look at peace in a new way, like we
did at AIDS.
What really distressed me was what she did to the English language. There had been a bit of a controversy (I later read) that she had, for years, passed herself off as a member of MENSA -- and it turned out this wasn't true. Now I don't care a whit about MENSA and I don' t necessarily admire people who belong to it or brag about it. But someone who claims to but doesn't? A bad sign. . . She used the following words in her conversation: ethniticity, criseses,
drownded and instinctually. It turns out that instinctually IS a word -- but I don't think it was the one the sentence called for.
Her son was Bar Mitzvah at the kotel the day before the session. She said that she married 2 different Jewish guys – so she is
Jew-ish. Gulp.
The Evening Plenary was The Global Economy's Tomorrow-- an all-star cast of international economic heavyweights (not my area so I really wanted to listen closely).
Hosted by
Stanley Fischer, Governor of the Bank of Israel, Very Major Dude in the Israeli Economy
An opening speech by:
Larry Summers, Past President of Harvard, Director of Business and Government at the Kennedy School, Secretary of the Treasury during the Clinton Administration, Director of the National Economic Council for the Obama Administration.
Responses by:
Ronnie Chan, China, Chairman of Hang Lung Group and the Co-Founder of the Morningside Group
(big Chinese venture capital outfit)
(big Chinese venture capital outfit)
Stephen Schwarzman, Chairman, CEO and Co-Founder of the Blackstone Group
Rodrigo Vergara, Governor of the Central Bank of Chile
To sum it up for you: The world economy (World Economy?) is going to be all right. The US will be strong. Things are going okay in Latin America and will continue to get better. Some of this took a long time to say, but what was MOST interesting was Mr. Chan, who wasn't at all shy about saying that China and Asia are way more important than anybody in the room seemed to realize. He wasn't being critical of the U.S. He said that the U.S. is great and is in great shape economically and a great place to invest, do business, etc. But that there was just a smattering of Asians present at this conference and that, 10 years from now, it should be HALF Asian.
Finally, two notable photos to close out the day's events (Day 1 of the two-day conference)
Could it be? Yes it could? Somethin's comin', I don't know if it's good. But that's the first public sighting for ME of Google Glasses. No that's not my son Ben -- looks like him in this picture. But the guy and his wife?sister? business partner? associate? seemed to have a pair or two. We saw them the next morning too. I dunno about this Google Glasses thing. Looks like more trouble than it's worth. And somehow reminds me of Dick Tracy's special watch. Much more interesting to me, and pleasant and inspiring. . .
The gorgeous bridge over which the Jerusalem Light Rail Train travels near Central Bus Station.
Taken in early evening.
Evocative (so they say) of David's Harp.
That's it for today.
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