Kris Safarova  01:09

Welcome to the strategy skills podcast. I’m your host, Kris Safarova, and this episode is sponsored by strategy training.com and we have a few gifts for you. Number one is you can access episode one of how to build a consulting practice level one. And you can get it at f, i, r, M, S, consulting.com forward slash build. You can also get the overall approach used in well managed strategy studies at firms consulting.com forward slash overall approach. And you can also get McKinsey and BCG winning resume, which is a resume that offers from both of those firms, and you can get it at firms consulting.com forward slash resume PDF. And today, we have with us an amazing guest, Dr Klaus Kris, who is the only leader to have successfully served as CEO of two Fortune 500 giants on different continents, Alcoa in the US and Siemens in Germany, with nearly 40 year career spanning multiple industries, from established businesses to Czech startups, he has advised us presidents and global leaders across Europe, Asia and the Middle East and generally. Klaus is an incredible person. I was likely to get to know him a little bit before this interview, and I’m really looking forward to this

Klaus Kleinfeld  02:24

discussion. Hi, Kris. Enough, happy to be here. Kris, you

Kris Safarova  02:28

argue that energy management, not time management, is the real driver of performance. Maybe we can start with explaining the turning point when you made that shift for yourself.

Klaus Kleinfeld  02:41

Well, having been born in Germany and raised the race there, basically, discipline is a very important word, you know. So, so I’ve been a big fan of time management, obsessive probably, you know, my metaphor for life, for business life, was, it’s an ultra marathon. At that time, I ran marathons, funny enough, you know. And one day, a colleague of mine, who also was a good friend, you know, storms into my office. I was working here in New York at that time, storms into my office, and he knew how to push my buns. And he says, Klaus, you’ve been all wrong. And I said, with what? And he said, with your metaphor of business being an ultra marathon. I said, Okay, well, then what is it? And he said, it’s a number of different size sprints and, and basically recovery time in between. That’s, that’s, that’s really the the magic for long term performance. Then we had a heated debate and, and he talked about, and it’s all about energy management, that that and a few other things, got me looking into it, and I started to see that he is right and, and that in reality, I mean, it’s the energy that we have and how much we have of it that you can bring to anything in life. You know, anything that you desire, be it business, being a personal life, you know, but that’s the source. And then the question comes, what drives energy, what drains energy, and how do you do that? So I got, got into this, and saw it’s really not that complicated. It’s body, mind and soul, you know. And I split the mind part into emotion and mental. And then it’s about purpose and how you deal with that. And there are lots of tricks. And then I saw also, I love playing tennis, and I I also saw that in the tennis world, the tennis players in the top became older and older and stayed longer and longer, and whereas the exact counter thing happened in the business world, I mean, the people burned out much earlier and and so I thought, Wow, maybe there is something we can learn from the high performance world. And so that got me looking into this high performance world, and a whole new, beautiful world unfolded that helped me tremendously to basically sustainably perform in business. As well as in the rest of my life.

Kris Safarova  05:02

Klaus and what are some critical things you uncovered as you started looking at high performance, top performance energy.

Klaus Kleinfeld  05:09

So it’s all about, I mean, how do you generate and maintain, maintain energy? So Fizz, the physical world is relatively well understood by most people. But even there, I mean, the people understand, yes, you have to work out. You have to keep your body fit. You have to eat, well, drink, hydrate. You know, sleep is something that only in the last years have come onto the radar. The aspect of the aspect of of breathing, is just about to break through for most people. So that’s on the physical side, you know. Then on the on the mental side, which I break down into emotional as well as as well as mental. So on the emotional side, a lot of people are stunned when they tell me, Hey, Klaus, I get so worn out in this meetings, and this person is provoking me, and I get mad, and when I tell them, look, I mean, the emotions are made by you. You You are in control of your emotions, because the emotions are coming inside of you, and nobody puts an emotional thing on you. It’s a response to somebody, but you have the choice. You can respond this way, or you can respond in another way, and and you can learn this. You can learn how to not respond to a provocation, you know, or even how to turn this into a strength, you know, so, so. And then the other, the other thing is, they are the most. I mean, the biggest emotion is love that we that we all have, you know, and it can be positive as well as negative, but people always say, well, but I don’t have that in my control. That’s partially true. But what’s not true? There are things like kindness and gratitude that give you a positive emotion. You have it completely in your control, you know. So I have a habit, and it’s all about habitual, habitualization. Happy to talk about that. How you build that into your into your life, you know? So I can talk about that, that later, probably. But the mentor, the mental side is, what do you focus on? How do you see things? I always tell the story about the old Shoemaker and his two sons, you know, he wants to turn his business over to one of his sons, and he doesn’t know who to turn it over to. He sends them to Africa. One goes to the west coast, the other one to the east coast. The first one sends them a note back, Father, I’ve got very bad news. The market is dead. Everybody runs barefoot. The second son sends a note back and says, Father, amazing. The market is endless. Send me as many shoes as you can get your hand around. Everybody is barefoot, you know. So as silly as that story might sound to some who are listening, but the truth is, I have seen as a characteristic for top notch leaders, more often than not, that they have trained themselves in contradictory thinking, not that they do something then with it. But basically they don’t buy conventional wisdom, and they look at something that comes up from multiple angles and see whether this is this, what commonly is perceived as a threat, not also offers opportunities. So this is a big aspect of how do you deal with certain things and and the fourth one, the spiritual one, we don’t even talk about that at all, I think, in the business world, you know. But this is the question of, Do you have a belief in a higher being? And many of us call it God, and that energy can be very, very strong, very, very, very strong, and particularly in very dark times. I have experienced that myself in very dark times where you feel that you have very little to to believe in, you know, that can be a source that can help you a lot. So, so, so I, for that reason, I also covered it, covered in my book, you know, so, just so that people see the whole picture. And the last thing I would say on the energy side is, then there’s this aspect of purpose, you know? And I’ve always struggled in my life with this question of what is purpose, really? And so I use writing the book, and by sorting it also out once and for all, for myself, it’s one of the concepts that humankind has been dealing with since, basically we existed, because it’s the question of, who am I? Why am I here for? You know? What am I here for? You know? And I think everyone here asked themselves this question multiple times in their life, you know, and sometimes the answer that your head is giving you is probably not very pleasant, right? So, so, so, but this is a struggle that everyone is struggling with, and and the and people don’t know, how do, how do I get to something? Some people think it’s just one thing, but in many cases, it’s not just one. You have different roles, different hats. So there’s typically different purposes that at the same time you’re following. But one thing that purpose does, it gives this diffuse energy a. A condensation. It’s like what laser does to light, also very diffuse. It puts it into laser, concentrates it and boom, it goes through anything, you know, and that’s the same that purpose does with energy. Well, maybe I stop right there. Kris Tina, maybe already too much that you are to know.

Kris Safarova  10:16

I love listening to you. Can you tell us more about the hard time and what specifically made you realize that there’s a higher being there.

Klaus Kleinfeld  10:27

None of us can say that there is a higher being, but the point is more, if you believe in it, if you believe in it, does that actually support you in your keeping with your your life, or does it hinder you? And my experience has been, it rather supports you because you sometimes are stuck in your negative self talk and questions that you ask to the universe, you know. And in this case, I always say it’s like, it’s like a one 800 number that’s on for seven days, 24 hours a day. You know someone, someone to talk to, right? And that when you’re all alone, you know that can help you tremendously, you know. And then people tell me, well, but Klaus, maybe one day. How do you know your question? How do you know this? I don’t, I don’t, but all I can say is, I can ask myself, would I actually be better off if I were to deny it, or am I better off to believe and and you you can make this choice every day, every day when you get up in the morning, you can say, I Don’t believe. You know. Okay, fine, you know. But I have, whenever I thought about I decided for myself, I It helps me tremendous, you know, and supports me and and gives me strength and gives me additional energy to have that belief. And I would recommend also people that don’t, don’t worry, don’t, don’t worry too much about it. You know, we all don’t know exactly, and it’s probably a very helpful way to give you another superpower.

Kris Safarova  12:09

And I’m so sorry you went through difficult times. I know what it feels like, and I’m so glad everything is okay now. You’re such a wonderful person, so you never want anyone to suffer, but they certainly don’t want you to suffer. Thank you. How do you personally recover and recharge? You’re obviously so far, you had such high pressure career, and you continue working incredibly hard. What are your goal to recovery? Methods?

Klaus Kleinfeld  12:36

The best way that I could recommend is habitualize as much as you can, because every time you consciously have to make a decision, it requires a lot of energy, and the likelihood that you you’re tired and you don’t want to, don’t want to go through this, that you drop a certain thing you know is high. So the moment you habitualize this and you make it a routine your well off. So for instance, I mean, I decided long ago that keeping my body decently fit is extremely important. I also in my life, it was typically that in the evening, I had to do something, you know, either a longer meeting or see some see some people have a dinner or something with with folks. So the only time that I could really schedule in my in my calendar for working out was early in the morning. So I’m getting up early in the morning, and I really religiously have between 30 minutes to an hour of workout, right? And I try to stick to a certain routine, also with a workouts during the course of the week. So, so. And my office knows that even when I travel, which I do a lot, that no matter where I arrive, that they need to build this buffer in so that I literally come come from the airport, you know, and go to the gym and then then start working, you know. And I feel miserable if I don’t do that, you know. So that’s, that’s one thing, you know. Then on the emotional side, I have always learned that when, when you caught, the easiest thing to control your emotion is breathing, you know. And and when you just let it’s not complicated, and nobody even notices when you are when somebody is tempting you to a response. Number one, you don’t have to respond. You know, it’s completely in your control. And if you feel that you that you want to, not just to be obsessed with the thoughts that the other person tries to trigger, and you just concentrate on your breath, you know, let the breath come in like a flow, like a wave, through your body, and then go out. And you can do this, and you you will see that the immediate response from your body is calming down, right? So, so those, those are things on the mental side we talked about, the focus. I’ve always tried to look. Into a challenge, also as an opportunity, and also looked into an opportunity as a challenge, you know. So just just to see, is there another side to it, you know? And, and for me, leadership was always not explaining things afterwards, but looking around the corner and seeing things earlier, anticipating things that other people would not be able to anticipate

Kris Safarova  15:22

cost. And you’ve worked across four continents, at least. Actually, you worked across entire world, from Germany to us to the Middle East. What lessons translate University?

Klaus Kleinfeld  15:33

That’s a good question. And a lot of people have asked me, Hey, how could you be effective in these different environments? And I think, yes, there are cultural differences, absolutely, I mean, and you have to somehow be sensitive to this and, and it don’t, don’t jump to conclusions too early. However, there’s one thing, not just one thing, but a major thing in common. We’re all human beings and and the one thing that unites us, we all want to be respected as a person, right? So, so. So I always felt that no matter where, which environment I worked, and, you know, I wanted to show respect for an individual no matter which role they are in and even if I don’t agree, I mean, even if I don’t agree, that doesn’t mean that this is not an individual who I respect. Right. Respect gets expressed in many ways, but one common thing is that you listen to what the individual has to say, you know, if you don’t let the individual talk, and it’s very hard to make the other person feel respected, right? So, and I’m I have to also say I’m a I’m a big lover of people. I always felt that I’m learning something from everybody, no matter how long the interaction is and and I have this knack of what I call random acts of kindness. So for instance, when here in New York, you have a lot of high rises, and when I’m in an elevator, I typically start a conversation with somebody. And just yesterday, actually, I was was in an elevator and started a conversation with an individual about optimization of elevator shafts, because we were both waiting in front of an elevator bank that had four elevators, and nothing was happening, right? So, and funny enough, while when we reached the bottom of it, you know, the individual shook my hand and said the best conversation I had for the whole day. And I thought that was funny, but I also enjoyed it. And it gives you again, it gives you energy, you know, so

Kris Safarova  17:43

definitely, you will learn a lot, and you will make some very good friendships along the way as well. How do you think technologies like AI will change the way executives leaders must manage their energy and focus?

Klaus Kleinfeld  17:58

Well, I think it challenges leaders even more than than what we’ve seen in the past. Number one, it makes them stronger because you have a lot of additional knowledge on your fingertips at the same time the race is on. I mean, whoever can AI ice, AI ice, I think I call it AI ice. Their company fastest probably will, win. And there’s not one day, I literally mean, what? Not one day that goes by where not something else is happening and something is gets accelerated. And the question is always, how can you basically get your team behind it and run? And in this case, it’s not just run, but race. And these these questions that we usually have a little bit more time for it, these days you have less time for it. And the price is high. The price is very high. I think that the the the diversion between the first and the second will become much larger, much, much larger, you know, if, because the speed in which improvement happens is faster, and also so I think that’s a that’s quite a, quite a, quite a substantial risk there, and I think you have to get on it. I’m big fan of AI. AI for society. I comes with a lot of additional challenges. But at least for the next, probably few years in the company, there’s, first of all, there’s no choice. You as a leader, have to adopt it. You have to make sure your team adopts it. Basically drive them, drive them into into adoption. No otherwise you you will be that is

Kris Safarova  19:38

very true. So continuing to speak about AI, because it is advancing, as we’re discussing, much faster than anyone can absorb in terms of being on top of what is happening and how to implement it in the organization. How should executives reframe their role in AI driven environment and gender relevant technology advancing so fast?

Klaus Kleinfeld  19:59

Well, no, oops, I don’t know that. They have to reframe it. I think the framing is the same. I mean, it’s just, as I said before. It’s just that look at to whatever avenues of AI application you can build into your company is and accelerate, accelerate. Ai, ai, sit as much as you can. Think about data being your goal. Data will also be the limiting factor if you don’t get the right data. And also think about, how can you all perform your competition? These things are, in general, the same today than they are. They are in future, the way how to get there will be different.

Kris Safarova  20:44

How do you personally stay up to date as much as possible? Of course, it’s not actually possible, even for people who just focus on on AI as technical people. But what is your approach that people can learn from

Klaus Kleinfeld  20:55

my approaches? I first of all, I mean, I’ve been lucky that already in my very early age, I was fascinated with software, writing software, so it drove me already from late childhood on, and that was long, long time ago, you know, so that I started to write code at a time when nobody was even imagining that you could Have your own computer. So one of the first enormously great improvements was to get my own computer that was amazing, you know, and get my hands around this. So I think it would help to principally understand how do these things work. So how do these large language models work and and what, where can I use them? I surround myself. I try to surround myself with people who are very knowledgeable and who know the field very well, and I regularly stay in touch with them. And in some of the companies where I’m invested, we are moving ahead and implementing it. I use it myself, you know, as much as I can. And also some of it I throw away as useless. That always happens, you know, it’s too early, probably for some of it, you know, but many of those, and you have to revisit them probably half a year later or a month later, just happened to me the other day, you know, where I had thrown an application, literally. I tried it out for two weeks or so, and I thought, This is crap. This makes my life not not easier. It’s too complicated. User interface is a disaster. You know, I’m not gonna use it. And it just happens that one of my friends, I wanted him to show me something, and he showed it to me, and I realized that he’s been using as one part, a software patch, use that, that software, and when I looked at it, it was completely different now, you know, and it had solved a lot of the issues that I didn’t like. And in fact, I told him, Okay, I’ll go for it. I Let’s go this direction, you know? I mean, look, I mean trying it out, but not trying is not an option, not an option. And you have, I mean, as a leader, always you have to, you have to show, also to your team that that you are moving forward. And this is not just another fab I’ve seen many fabs, many, many, many fabs. You know, in management, this isn’t one of those. This is real.

Kris Safarova  23:17

That is very true. Are there any specific tools you feel comfortable sharing that you personally like at this time? Well,

Klaus Kleinfeld  23:26

I mean, I am a strong user of number of AI models and the use cases, I mean, in the companies, is for me itself. It’s, I mean, sometimes when I have complicated, little complicated tasks, you know, I almost don’t google anymore, you know, I typically go right away to one of the models, you know, and and look at that. But then, I mean, in the, in the in the area of market communication, marketing communication, to expedite your speed in which you can respond to what’s happening in the outside world, stay on top of the outside world, and basically connected to your to your customer segments, and get the message out to them as quickly as possible. That’s one, one area that I feel very, very strong about, you know, then and the and then the healthcare area, you know. So, I mean, I’ve invested in companies that have have strong AI capabilities to look at surgery surgical environments, you know, or one that basically uses AI to diagnose the structure of train tracks, you know. So the how, whether there needs to be some maintenance done, you know, or some bigger things happening there, you know. So another one company that I’ve invested in is in the logistics field, you know, basically, logistics is super complicated, and it’s still something where a lot of money is buried, you know. And with the better management of. Data and better AI, you can respond much faster to what’s going on in this world. So I think it’s partially the savior of a lot of retail stores to do that, but there’s very few companies that have the have the capabilities. So those are, those are use cases that I’m seeing. But frankly, I mean, there’s, I have not seen one single field. Well, I have seen a few fields but, but very few fields where I would say that they are protected from Ai. Very few,

Kris Safarova  25:28

definitely, for someone who is not technical and they feel that they really fall behind, they were focusing on their day to day responsibilities, and they were not following what’s happening with AI, they use chatgpt. But beyond that, they don’t really use AI much. Maybe they use perplexity sometimes, but nothing beyond chatbots that are generally used chatbot by most leaders. What would you recommend they do in terms of maybe some publications, they start reading? How could they catch up a little

Klaus Kleinfeld  26:01

bit at least? The simplest thing is sign up to one of the one of the AIS, and then use the AI as your personal teacher. I mean, that’s, I think, one of the strongest and easiest ways, because then it will you, you, you talk in your language to that, and you can ask the question. None of the questions will be seen as dumb, you know, and they will all get answers. And then, I mean, in the future world, this future world, not future the today’s world. The reality is, it’s a lot about the questions you ask, and also, what questions do you ask and so, but in this case, what I would do, sign up for it and then start your own tutorial and say, Hey, explain to me what is principal, AI, you know, blah, blah, blah, this thing will spit something out. Then there are words in there that you might not understand. Say, I don’t understand these words. Can you explain it in simple language? Boom, here it is in simple language, you know. And you can do it at the speed that you want to learn. I mean, that’s one of the things that I find most enjoyable, you know. And I’ve used it quite, quite, quite commonly, particularly in family and family environments, when there’s something where we say, you know, why is that so? Why is a word there? Why? Why is, is there a stem of the why is that so? And somebody says, Oh, I think it’s this. They say, Okay, let’s do a little training session here, you know. And let’s, let’s go to one of the one of the elements, you know? So, yeah, that’s, that’s what I would recommend. I don’t think I would go to a book, a book in this case, you know. I think you can do that later, when you feel a little bit more comfortable, or when you can address more specifically what you want to know. I mean, there’s the field is so big, do you want to know a certain application, or are you interested in the societal impact of AI, you know, and, and, and very, very fundamental points there also, you know,

Kris Safarova  27:54

that is an amazing advice. 100% agree. My approach is, well, for anything that they need to develop knowledge about quickly. And it’s interesting because both you and me, we remember time when there was no internet to know something. There was no easy way to find out I didn’t even had access to a library. I remember so you can ask your parents, but they probably will not know.

Klaus Kleinfeld  28:21

Probably when I was eight or so, I think one of my biggest dreams was to one day own an Encyclopedia Britannica, right? And there were these people coming around, knocking on your door, wanting to sign you up as a lifetime thing. Nobody could afford it at once. You would get one every year, you know. So what I always thought that would be cool if one were to were to own it. And the other dream I had, which was even even bigger at that time, is I love music. I’m very I have a very eclectic taste. I love classical music as much as I love R, B, blues rock and roll and so. And I always thought, what wouldn’t it be great if I had, and I had a relatively big record collection already that I assembled, you know? I thought, wouldn’t it be great if I had that digitally, and would be able to carry it around around with me, you know? And here, here I am, you know, not only do I have that now at my fingertips, you know, but I’m also learning new things through it, you know, because they now basically show me what’s, what’s, what’s new in the field, knowing what I like, and also I would have not even dreamt of that. I thought there’s a record store I have to go to,

Kris Safarova  29:36

yes, so I started my career as a concert pianist talking about classical music. I would not say I was really in love with classical music, but it’s something that I dedicated a lot of my life to. And what is incredible now is that you can even ask about specific composers about their life when they were writing this piece the time we live in. It’s incredible anyone who. Remembers the time before, when there was no Internet, without even talking about AI.

Klaus Kleinfeld  30:05

Well, I just recently discovered a young violinist, and I heard this song because it was suggested to me on Apple and Apple classic, you know, I listened to and I thought, what a beautiful violin. And then I was shocked that she’s playing with the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra. Now it’s a good Symphony Orchestra, although she is, I think Korean, you know, so and, and I thought I made a note, I mean, and I actually recommended, I was in Europe last week, I recommended it to one of my old friends there, and said, You who goes regularly to Bamberg. He lives in this close there, and said you should go and hear hear her out. You know this. I mean, this would never have happened before. You know the barrier, barrier for somebody to come through the ranks was much, much, much higher, definitely.

Kris Safarova  30:57

So continue speaking about AI, because it’s such a critical topic right now. What would you advise to someone who feels overwhelmed because of constant AI updates and they constantly feel that they are behind and not able to catch up, even though they’re trying very hard to be on top of things?

Klaus Kleinfeld  31:14

Yeah, don’t worry. I mean, so I think that you can only do as much as you can do, right? So that’s one thing. But the other thing that I’ve seen also is that people sometimes try to boil the ocean. And instead of saying, Hey, what is it, basically being a little bit more mindful of focusing and saying, what I really want to understand is this, you know, and then drill down on this. Very often, you don’t have to understand everything in the same depth. It’s sufficient to understand a certain thing as a framework, you know, in principle. And then deep, dive deep down. And if you feel that you don’t have a certain thing, when you dive further, you can still go back up again, you know, so, so, but I would recommend don’t boil the ocean, particularly on the eye. If you want to boil the ocean, you will not win. You will not win. But that’s true for most fields, you know. And think about what is really interesting to me. I’d rather go for why I call it legs, you know. So, one deep dive after the other and then you, you have your tabletop, you know, which is your horizontal knowledge. And then you do, do drill downs, you know, drill downs, and say, I really understand this. And it also will give you substance, you know, that’s what I would recommend.

Kris Safarova  32:36

What skills do you think will still matter, let’s say, 10 years from now, and I’m asking this for our listeners who now need to prioritize where they should invest their time in terms of strengthening or learning certain

Klaus Kleinfeld  32:49

skills. Yeah, that thought has been going through my mind a lot, and normally in the in the previous changes that I’ve seen. I’ve seen a lot in my lifetime. Globalization wasn’t even really a word when, when it all started, you know, and the whole aspect of optimization, robotization only started and and I was never concerned about jobs, you know, because I always thought that there’s a good opportunity to upgrade, and then there will be enough jobs, and that’s what, what happened? I’m not sure that that’s going to continue this way. There is a debate with some of my friends. You know, what role will humanoid robots play? You know, now we had the humanoid robot Olympics just recently, and frankly, when you saw some of the images there. I got more hope that robot, the humanoids, is a little bit further away than than some of some of my friends are thinking it is, you know what, thinking of a humanoid with, with the capabilities of of a kind of chat GPT style thing that’s pretty, pretty heavy. It can take, it could take a lot of jobs, but I not sure how close that is. You know, I think jobs that, and I think that also the old idea of jobs that require creativity are safe. I think it was almost a cynical, cynical play that that one day I was sitting here in New York at the office of one of the AI companies that I’m invested in. And outside, this was in downtown, and outside, there was a lot of noise going on. We were looking down, down there, and was the screenwriters who were having their strike protests, you know, who would have thought that the screenwriters were the first ones who publicly protested against the use of AI? And given that that they are obviously in a very creative, creative field, you know. So it may be, I would guess that the best choice is not the choice of certain jobs, you know, but the best choice is probably the choice of getting ahead of the curve, you know, and arming yourself, arming yourself with the eye, rather than trying. Fight it or perform it, right? There may be some areas like, I mean, the the classical jobs of analysts, I think they probably will be very limited. I’m not saying that they will be entirely gone, but you see already this time around, at the how, how much fewer jobs are available, entry jobs and law firms, as well as with consulting firms, you can see the impact already

Kris Safarova  35:25

constant. What I see a lot with clients who work for major organizations, including tech companies, is within their departments. They feel that adoption is too slow, yes, almost non resistant, exactly, and they feel that they need to do something to step up. So let’s say, if we take as an example, a partner at a major consulting firm who is managing a practice, and they feel they are falling behind and not using AI, what would be your advice on some of the things they need to keep in mind in how can they work with the team to start integrating AI into their work in

Klaus Kleinfeld  36:03

a consulting environment. If you don’t use AI, then, I mean, I can’t help you. You shouldn’t be in that industry, frankly, right? So, because it is clear that almost all of the large consulting firms, one of the first things that they did is that they built their own AI agents based on the knowledge that they have accumulated with all the studies, you know. So if you are in an area that hasn’t done that, then I would say, Get your ass up, you know, and do it right, and build, build a couple of agents, you know? I mean, I have a ton of agents that are that I’m using in my daily life, you know, so and they make my life much easier, much, much easier. So build that instantly, instantly, you know, when it comes to how do you make a proposal, you know, probably structure it. Structure it by or by. You don’t even have to structure because it’s actually by itself, you know, but, but make sure that you that you get as much data in there as possible, as quickly as possible, you know. And then you probably should also be careful that it is not used for it’s not not in the public domain. That’s the other problematic thing, obviously,

Kris Safarova  37:17

of course, and if you feel comfortable sharing maybe one or two agents that you use the use case,

Klaus Kleinfeld  37:25

I have agents for specific companies, right? So that I use, and I have a private agent that, basically, I use for some, some of my, my personal matters, you know. And I have one also that scans a certain field in the in the internet that gives me a very good understanding and updates me and has the knowledge of that, you know. And, yeah, so, and I have one agent, one agent that I don’t like, and I think they show that that one agent I’m unhappy with, and that’s an agent that does images for me and drawings, in this case, because the drawings and I’m very unhappy with that agent, you know, I told my system already many times that it’s not improving fast enough. It’s actually terrible to be honest. You know that that is the thing where I feel there’s not, not, not accelerating, but maybe the use case is so specific.

Kris Safarova  38:28

Thank you so much for sharing. Klaus. And are there any specific technology or AI breakthroughs that excite you the most, or something that you anticipate happening in the next few years that you’re looking forward to?

Klaus Kleinfeld  38:42

Well, the thing that excites me, and not necessarily in the most positive way, is this convergence of humanoid robots with AI, right? Because the moment you have humanoid robots that truly can do things that a human can do, you know, with with with with AI capabilities, that’s obviously something very, very powerful, and that’s exciting as well as it’s frightening. Obviously, the whole aspect of usage of AI in information targeting is a challenge. Is a big challenge. The other thing that I feel is is also exciting, not in a positive way, is that it was actually a discussion that my my longtime friend, Henry Kissinger, had started also long, long time ago when he challenged, it was Eric Schmidt at that time, you know, from Google, and said, Well, do your software engineers have ethics training? Right? And. That question as as strange as that question could sound, but I think then he went to the point and said, Well, when they write, when they write code, they do implicit decisions for, for, for what they allow and what they won’t allow and and that that they should at least be aware of this. And I’m not, he said, I’m not capable of telling them what exactly to do, but it would, I would feel more comfortable if I knew that they had some understanding at least of what impact they could have, you know. So bringing it back to the discussion around the invention of the nuclear nuclear bomb, you know, and I agree with him. I agree. I agree. And today, we see more of that than we’d seen then. When he asked that question, what does that mean for societies? Right for I mean, we have the debate currently going on around Tiktok and the algorithms around Tiktok. I think this debate is important, you know, because obviously there’s some magic sauce here which made Tiktok successful. At the same time, there’s some disastrous source that has been feeding people with things that are probably not very healthy for them, mentally as well as physically.

Kris Safarova  41:33

And the related question to this, where do you think AI will surprise us, most likely, in areas, maybe where we are currently not paying enough attention to.

Klaus Kleinfeld  41:44

I mean, I personally think it’s going to change almost it has the power to change almost everything, frankly, right? So it has the power, if done in a positive way. It has the power to accelerate decision making on all levels, including political decisions, including even even national or international cooperation decisions, if you used in a good way, if used in a bad way. I mean, it can bring down the cost of of warfare and the precision of warfare to nations and even nations. I mean, like what we see today in the Ukraine, Russia war. I mean a very different, very different war and and a war that can be fought necessarily, not necessarily having big, big times of weapons, you know? So, yeah, so I think that’s, that’s what goes through my mind on this. And then the question is, what impact does it have on our political systems?

Kris Safarova  42:46

I agree. What blind spot Do you think mostly this, at least what you’re observing have about AI adoption that maybe worry you the most?

Klaus Kleinfeld  42:56

Well, I think the you would see, potentially, the discrepancy will even get broader, and discrepancy in terms of those who understand and own AI and those who don’t understand only partially understand and don’t own it. So the spread, and that’s also, I think, reflected in the wealth. The last thing we saw was the composition package that was put together for Elon Musk, the new one. And I think it was driven by AI, driven by the board to probably wanting to have Elon not split his time and spend more time on his AI stuff, but rather integrate the AI into Tesla, which I think for the shareholder is good, you know. So I’m not arguing necessarily against it, but when you see the numbers there, the numbers are showing you what exactly probably can happen, you know. And and it will stretch society even more than what we are seeing today.

Kris Safarova  44:05

And the last question on AI today, I know I asked a lot of them, I think that your wisdom and knowledge in this area is such a treasure trove for our listeners. What I wanted to ask you is, which industries do you think will be shaped the most, the fastest, by AI, in the next few years, the fastest.

Klaus Kleinfeld  44:26

I mean, we’ve seen already many. I mean, as I said, the screenwriters have been shaped already. You know, done. You know, consulting industry, all the analysts, done. Moving moving further, you know, and getting to more seniority, all of this will be the drive to more seniority, you know, so and legal, the legal profession, you know, boom, you know, moving, moving through the ranks, yeah, I mean, so those, those are some that have moved very fast. The whole search world has completely changed. Changed. I think Google is really running now, trying to run as fast as as chat GPT has been running. So in every software field, in every software field, if you, if you don’t bring AI in your toes, basically, right? So, and I literally, I mean, don’t know, don’t know very few industries where AI is not moving extremely fast, but in terms of in terms of impact on people, probably those service organizations have been because they have been large users of young talent, have have really shown pretty dramatic change already, and it’s only starting. Only starting, and

Kris Safarova  45:41

we already touched on it, but just to maybe expand a little more as a question to wrap up discussion on AI for listeners, who are those young consultants, those young lawyers that have been replaced by AI? What would you recommend they do in terms of skills development right now,

Klaus Kleinfeld  46:01

become knowledgeable on the AI and use it as a tool. Use it as a tool, because the best way is to get as fast to get more productive, you know, because there will still be analysts needed, you know, some some, but much less, like the screenwriters, you know, I think the ratio was from four down to one, you know? So, so, and that’s, I think that’s going to be the step now. So you have to adopt it. Have to get very good at this, and then learn as fast as you can, so that you accumulate experience and move up in the and the next experience rank on the consulting side, you know. So, because then, I mean, you also have some inherent knowledge, you know people, the relationships to individuals. When you’re in an analyst role, you don’t know anybody. Have no client contact, you know. But the moment you have client contact and people appreciate you, you know, the human side comes into it. So I think that makes you more irreplaceable than sitting in a dark room, you know, and grinding through spreadsheets, which an AI can definitely do better than you.

Kris Safarova  47:07

Yes, Klaus, you recently wrote the book. Congratulations. Thank you. What would you like people to take

Klaus Kleinfeld  47:14

away from what I would like people to take away? I mean, when I, when I wrote the book, I wrote it basically out of the motivation to give people a framework on how to lead their life, not just their business life, you know, and and with energy being at the foundation, what I wanted to make sure that people have a pathway to sustainably perform with all the challenges today, you know, and become like like an athlete and exactly know how to how to lead your life with these different types of sprints. How do you recharge? And recharge? Usually doesn’t need that much time you know. You just have to know the tricks of the tricks of the trade. So therefore, my book is structured in two chapters. The first one is called the inner game, and that’s all about energy, energy management. How do you deal with it? How can you have energy so you can put it to to use at whatever you want to and the second part is more like a classical leadership book, and how to how leadership styles, how to build a high performance team. You know. How to deal with the board, if you have a board, you know? So those type of things, how to, how to create a successful strategy, sustainable competitive advantages and these sort of things. That’s in the second part, the outer game. That’s a classic Kris book, but the first part, I think, is the one that motivated me most to write it, because I wanted to make sure after I also saw in the younger generation that that there are not that few people that burn out already in their early 30s. And I think that that is not necessary. That’s really not necessary, you know. And that’s not only not necessary, but I would highly recommend to not do that and rather, rather start to to reflect a little bit more before you even feel that you’re running against the wall and and that’s, I think, where the book can

Kris Safarova  49:03

help, definitely. And for someone who is listening right now and they feel that they’re basically suffering from burnout, what is the fastest way to renew?

Klaus Kleinfeld  49:15

Well, the fastest way is really to lean back and breathe a little bit right, to just lean back, close your eyes, you know. And, I mean, there’s this thing called Box breathing, which is really cool, you know. So every, every special forces use it before the mission, you know, to basically get energy back. So you lean back, you breathe in, you count to four when you breathe in, you hold with a count of four, you breathe out on the count of four, and then you start the whole thing again. Then, then so. And when you do this, you will see that in less than, let’s say, two minutes, you will feel very, very much refreshed. You know. And there are other things, a good friend of mine basically puts in his headphones and listens to a great song, you know, a lovely song that they that brings memories back, closes the eyes, brings the memories back, you know. And I have another friend you know, who just puts the phone to his assistant on in your case, if you don’t have an assistant, give it to your colleague and say, Please pick it up. If somebody calls me, I just go around the block, you know, and walk, walk around in fresh air, you know. Just see that the world also goes on. And that is not all about the problems that you think are ruling the world. You know, in reality, I mean, your problems might be small. And the last thing, the last thing I would like to recommend to people, there’s a chapter on purpose. There’s a long chapter on purpose in there with I go through many permutations of what different philosophers see there. So worthwhile. I enjoyed writing it, so I hope you will enjoy reading it. But there’s one chapter, and what do people say on their on their deathbed? And I think that that’s the one that I felt the most dramatic one, because there are very few studies. There’s one study that that showed us, you know, about the biggest regrets, and nobody actually says, I wish I had spent more time behind my desk or in the office, you know. But what do people say? People say, I wish I had allowed myself to be happier. I wish I had allowed myself to be happier. And they come on the last breath, they come to the realization that happiness is something that is in them, you know. And before they probably didn’t see it that clear. Or the other one, which is equally scary, I wish I had the courage to live a life true to myself, and not listen and not let a life that others wanted me to live, you know. So, so I think there’s just two of those things. Think about this. Today is not, hopefully not, the last day of your life, and there’s still time to change, you know. And my mantra has always been, I love it, I change it, or I leave it. And if I feel that I’ve tried changing it doesn’t work, then you better leave it, you know, until it ruins you. And also, I know that people are always afraid. Do I find a great job, you know? And that’s this other point of fear. And I always say fear stands for false expectation appearing real, you know. So don’t let your life be led by fear. And I’ve seen people being in abusive relationships with their partner, or, even worse, with their boss, you know. And when I said to them, Why aren’t you leaving, they said, Oh, I don’t know. Maybe it’s the same everywhere else. And I know the trade of the trade there, blah, blah, blah, you know. But honestly, you know. I mean, you will become a boy frog soon, and then, then you’re you will end a life in misery. And also think about it, what would you say if this were your last day, you know? And and make a leap of faith. I’ve seen in my lifetime when I made this decision that typically it hasn’t, the fears were not warranted and has turned out much, much better, much, much better, much, much better.

Kris Safarova  53:12

Why do you think so many leaders get stuck in kind of a survival for years? They are successful from the outside, but inside, they actually suffering, and they’re not really progressing as fast as they could have. They’re not contributing as much as they could have.

Klaus Kleinfeld  53:26

Well, sometimes it’s the frustration that they feel that the leaders are not taking up their good ideas, they are not listening. And also, I’ve seen this many times in large organizations, that some of the smartest people become cynical, you know. And actually, I’ve made it one of my, my indicators when I got into a job newly, you know, to see where as a cynic. Because a cynic typically is a smart individual, because otherwise they couldn’t make this, this jokes that everybody laughs about, you know, and the person inside has not given up in the belief in the organization. In fact, it’s the expression of frustration. Why isn’t the organization doing different things so? So What? What? What? That’s I think the best way as a leader is to find, I’ve always tried to find them and have a one on one and learn, learn from why are they? Why? Why are they making this comments? And what could I learn from them? And it’s not been rare that I learned a lot, learned a lot, and in the conversation, I’ve also seen that these people are still open to it. They’ve just been seeing too many things that they didn’t like, and that makes them cynical, you know, so. But I would really suggest, and if you’re really unhappy and look for, can you change it? And if you see you can’t change it, then I would say, pull the plug. Leave it.

Kris Safarova  54:54

Last question for the day, my favorite question, okay, what’s the favorite version? Huh, over your lifetime, what were two, three aha moments, realizations that really changed the way you look at life or the way you look at business?

Klaus Kleinfeld  55:10

Well, I think, yeah, so I think the first two are simple. Actually, the first one was because I unfortunately was challenged with the death of my father when I was very, very young. And my parents were refugees from East Germany, you know, so and we’ve just, was just about to get better, and then he died, you know. And that realization was tough to understand, that life ends. Life ends. You know, life is ending, and you it’s not your choice, you know. So that was the first one. The second one is because my mother sent me a lot to East Germany, to our relatives, because all of our relatives lives there, to spend my vacation there. So I grew up in an environment, and you know what I’m talking about, that was an oppressive environment, and but I had the right passport. So for me, it was vacation, you know, but I knew how to mingle, and nobody would recognize that I was not from there, and I had my friend groups, my friends group there, but it showed me also what courage means and what people what freedom means. It shows me what freedom means and also the importance of freedom, very important concept for me. And the second thing that I saw is how courageous people behave and stand up and stand up for their beliefs, in spite of knowing that they will have negative responses to deal with, you know, but they wanted to show what I what, what they stand for, you know. And the third thing is probably an old saying of my mother, that was, what isn’t get paid for isn’t worth a lot, you know. And that was more a warning to not fall for a lovely language when people say, oh, you know, we love your contribution. It’s so wonderful, you know. But not are not willing to compensate you adequately for your for for the value that you’re you’re giving. And also, I think those are three that have fundamentally influenced me.

Kris Safarova  57:23

Klaus, thank you so much, and I’m so sorry that you had to go through loss of your father. So that is incredibly hard for me. The most important person in my life growing up was my grandmother. I also lost you very early. I know what it feels like to basically lose kind of the light of your life, and I’m so glad that that you are here, around on Earth and doing amazing things for everyone. And this was such an incredible conversation. I had packed day, but this is definitely a highlight of it, and I really appreciate everything you said today, pleasure.

Klaus Kleinfeld  57:56

It’s a long time ago and and I had, as I said, it has shaped my life, and I have no idea whether I would have become the same person that I am with the same independence, you know. I doubt it at times. So again, back to this point of where others see the challenge. And it was a big challenge to be honest, you know, but in the end, it probably shaped me in a way that allowed me to be more successful than other

Kris Safarova  58:24

people. Yes, the darkest moments in our life really shape us into who we become. Exactly, exactly where can our listeners learn more about you? Buy your book, anything you want to

Klaus Kleinfeld  58:36

share we are leading to thrive. Klaus Kleinfeld, you can buy it on Amazon. It comes in multiple versions, paperback, hardcover, as well as an end and digital as Kindle, also on Apple as as well as an audiobook. The audiobook, I’m a big fan of audiobooks, you know, because I do it when I read. I listen to it when I work out, also when I’m in the car, you know, when I have a minute on the plane, you know, so, and it’s read by a wonderful person, rich Miller, lovely voice. I I’m in love with that you’re so, so, so. And then you find me on LinkedIn, you know, under Klaus Kleinfeld, great discussion. Actually, we had a great one the week before last on AI, interestingly enough. And I will do more on AI, because I saw that a lot of people are struggling with some of the things that you you mentioned, and the field is big, so I want to address some of those things going forward, you know. But there you find the these things, and then I have a website called leading to thrive. And there you also find other podcasts, for instance, you know, and other things that I’ve that I’ve published, you know, so please feel free, and you can also reach me directly there, via LinkedIn, as well as through the website, leading to thrive. Thank you so

Kris Safarova  59:51

much for being here. I really

Klaus Kleinfeld  59:53

appreciate it. Pleasure, pleasure. Kris Tina, wonderful to be with you appreciate it, and lovely to get to know you.

Kris Safarova  1:00:00

You. Thank you. 100% the highlight, such a huge highlight. August today was Dr Klaus Kris help, the author of leading to thrive. And this episode is sponsored by strategy training.com you can get the overall approach used in well managed strategy studies at Kris consulting.com forward slash overall approach. You can also get McKinsey and BCG winning resume, which is a resume that offers from both of those firms at from the consulting.com forward slash resume PDF, and you can get access to Episode One of how to build a consulting practice level one at firms consulting.com forward slash bill. Thank you so much for listening, and I’m looking forward to connect with you all next