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The Wfhissue A JOURNAL OF COMMUNICATIONS AND CORPORATE RELATIONS ISSUE 20 2020 The WFH Issue CHRIS KEMPCZINSKI: Year One as McDonald’s CEO SIR ALAN PARKER Interviews Adam Grant BRUNSWICK REVIEW REVIEW BRUNSWICK ADRIAN GORE Is Optimistic m ISSUE 20 DAMBISA MOYO on the Global Economy FLETCHER PREVIN: m IBM’s Pandemic Response 2020 AUDRA McDONALD on Broadway NEAL WOLIN on 2009 v 2020 SHELLYE ARCHAMBEAU: Unapologetically Ambitious SIR MARK ROWLEY The Unarmed Cop PHARMA v COVID-19 Brunswick is a strategic advisory firm focused on critical issues. Our purpose is to help the great value-creating organizations of the world play a more successful role in society. We advise on critical issues at the center of business, politics and society, and help our clients—the leaders of large, complex organizations—understand and navigate these interconnected worlds. To download and share Brunswick Review stories go to www.brunswickgroup.com/review You can follow us on Twitter @BrunswickGroup Highlights from this and previous issues are also available on LinkedIn editor in chief Kevin Helliker managing editor Carlton Wilkinson creative director Frank Tagariello senior writer, deputy editor Edward Stephens project manager Caitlin Koons editorial advisor Vanessa Quarrie The Brunswick Review is printed on Revive print production MerchantCantos 100% recycled, made using post-consumer printed by CPI Colour waste fibers and manufactured without the cover illustration Noma Bar use of any secondary bleaching. feedback [email protected] Copyright © Brunswick Group LLP 2020 2 2The Age of Acceleration BY SIR ALAN PARKER here are moments in history when 20everything seems to accelerate. Ten years in one. 0 2020 is such a moment. All over the world, long- term trends have raced forwards and deep issues have surfaced, often pretty brutally. • In the tur- T bulent late 1700s, William Blake said, “What is now proved was once only imagined.” The techno-evan- gelists must feel the same, along with climate change ac- tivists and human rights campaigners, as well as the neo- Keynesian monetary policy folk. • We have learned a lot this year. Business has shown an agility it could not have imagined. None of our crisis workshops modeled this one. Leadership has stood to the fore in its support of staff and other crucial stakeholders. Companies have accomplished things we wouldn’t have thought possible. Leadership has shown it really matters. • Trust in the corporate sector has risen in line with its resilience. In particular the banking and capital markets sector have been, to date, resilient. The markets have been volatile but the financial sector has brunswick review · issue 20 · 2020 3 worked in response to problems not as the cause of them. is now far greater support from the investment commu- All of those changes painfully put into place following nity, even activism. Investors are increasingly looking for the last crash, particularly in banking, have passed a test. leadership to embrace change and get ahead of the curve We can only hope we apply equally well the learnings from rather than go slow into it, at ever-increasing risk. this crisis. Investor ratings on those embracing versus those avoid- “WHAT IS NOW PROVED WAS ONCE ONLY IMAGINED.” It is now widely accepted that the full economic and so- ing necessary change are rarely as divergent as between cial impact has only just begun and behind that the rec- Tesla and the old-line auto industry, but there are under- ognition of impact on the personal lives of people every- lying investor trends that signal the direction. Also worth where. Among our clients, leadership teams in all sectors considering, a failure to fulfill promises to wider stake- have been incredibly focused not just on organizational holders can carry a more immediate risk for leaders than challenges but also on the well-being and mental health of might a financial stumble, given the longer-term judgment their people at every level. In many cases, it has a knock-on of shareholders. effect to their families and local communities. In all the massive upheaval this year technology has The effort to create a more cohesive and caring culture come to our rescue, keeping our businesses running, internally has massively accelerated, even when a record where they can, from home. It turns out you can’t make level of jobs is being lost. The value of addressing these steel from home but you can run a trillion-dollar bank issues openly and honestly has, in our experience, never from your kitchen as one Chairman pointed out to me, been higher, never more widely recognized. As ever, trade- and as another retail CEO said you can run thousands of offs have to be made. It is the nature of life and business. stores and their supply lines from drawing rooms. Tech- But the people issues weigh heavier than ever in decision nology has also kept us entertained and most importantly making not as a result of union pressure or legislation, or connected to friends and loved ones. This is not without even solely good performance and other reasons of busi- its dark side, and I don’t mean just Zoom stress. Our cyber ness. A pandemic lays bare the impulse to serve humanity. prep and breach teams are facing an extraordinary step-up At Brunswick, we are engaged in significantly more work in problems all over the world. in these areas and, no less important, work that is more Dealing with technology disruption has been a top-of- substantive and impactful. the-agenda issue for business leaders for over two decades. This pandemic has surfaced many deep, longer term Now business faces a new kind of non-optional connec- issues. The depth of systemic inequity has been laid bare. tivity. Business now must be connected to major societal The true depth of this shows up very poignantly in the issues in a way it never has before. Employees want em- COVID death statistics. ployers to reflect their values and where possible the gen- Racial inequity and gender inequity have accelerated eral public is voting through consumer choice, and online onto board agendas in previously unimaginable ways and there is no place to escape. The new power to call out busi- we do not see those movements declining. Actually, the ness on big issues is reaching leaders in every aspect of increasingly impressive response of the leaders showing their lives. real leadership will demonstrate what is possible and make Profit and positive social impact are no longer seen as it easier for others to follow. Though the noise of a new binary choices. Having widened the aperture of consider- media world makes analysis difficult, the message is clear, ations, leaders are taking societal factors into account as words are not enough. Action is what matters and that is for decades they have taken on regulatory factors. It is a what will build and protect reputation. core competence and they will be judged by their recog- This is also true in the other mega-trend that we see nition, understanding and response to changing attitudes. accelerating rapidly, climate change. Those voices early Investor sentiment through the crisis has been almost in 2020 who thought this pandemic would put climate universally clear and consistent to our clients—think and on the back burner are long gone. If anything, climate act in ways favorable to the long-term good of the busi- change concerns have been intensified by a powerful mix ness. Investors are looking well beyond financial perfor- of concern about health and the environment. Govern- mance in 2020 or 2021. They have put greater emphasis on ments have so far failed to deliver meaningful change and ESG, not just as a risk metric but as an indicator of sophis- in response to this the recognition of the role of business tication of leadership and an important indicator of the is growing. External pressures are growing too, but the de- direction of travel on these bigger issues. bate is shifting away from business as part of the problem There is a great opportunity for business leaders here. towards business as the chief source of solutions. Creating financial returns for investors is central to any Transitioning business models can be difficult and take businesses purpose and right now that ability is crucial time. Tech disruption has shown us that. One big differ- for investment in R&D and innovation. Longer term, cre- ence in transitioning to a lower carbon world is that there ating value for more than a single set of stakeholders will 4 brunswick review · issue 20 · 2020 IN THE TURBULENT LATE 1700S,WILLIAM BLAKE SAID, “WHAT IS NOW PROVED WAS ONCE ONLY IMAGINED.” TECH-EVANGELISTS, CLIMATE CHANGE ACTIVISTS, NEO-KEYNESIAN MONETARY POLICY FOLKS MUST FEEL THE SAME. deliver not just financial rewards but also customer loyalty, mused on the future of office life. Now we have done lock- stronger internal support and performance, better supply- down for long enough for most of us to yearn for the ca- chain-and-distribution relations and lower regulatory and maraderie, social buzz and productivity of our workplaces, political risks. the joy of seeing our colleagues. Governments everywhere have massively increased their Dealing with our new lives at a day-to-day level has kept involvement in all of our lives. We have seen emergency all of us very busy. Yet most of us have also found prop- laws limiting freedom of movement along with direct er time to reflect deeply on bigger strategic issues. I have company and sector interventions and levels of spending found this to be true on a personal and also corporate level.
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