Thanks, everyone. So good to have you all here. Over the past 30 years, the digital innovation curve has grown exponentially. With this evolution, we're seeing dramatic applications of technology, from sending citizens to space, to self-driving cars. These moonshot applications show us what the art of the possible really is when it comes to technology. Unfortunately, what we don't frequently see, though, are technology applications that are often simple, yet have the capacity to really make an incredible impact on our lives. During our hour together, we are going to shine a light on the innovations that are changing lives for the better. I'm Reva Bhatia. I'm your moderator for today. I work at Publicis Sapient, a digital business transformation company. Our firm works with hundreds of Fortune 1000 companies, from public sector organizations to private organizations, and are really focused on helping them to modernize in a world that is increasingly digital. We take this responsibility really, really seriously. And we try to keep human stories at the center of what we do. And we're really committed to demonstrating the positive impact that technology can have. I'm joined today by Hana Schenk. Hana is a fellow for public interest technology at New America. Thank you for joining us. I'm also joined by James Kessler. He is the industry lead for the public sector at Publicis Sapient. And finally, I'm joined by Teresa Bereta, our chief marketing officer at Publicis Sapient. So as we kick off our session today, we're going to start with diving into a real example of what digital for good looks like in action. Tackling the housing crisis that came with the pandemic is not what springs to mind for many when it comes to where technology can help. To tee this up, we're going to actually share the story of Kirsten, a single mother who was on the brink of homelessness. On the precipice of a devastating loss, we see how her fate took a turn through technology. To show the story, we are going to actually share a clip from the film that Publicis Sapient produced to shine a light on Kirsten and the many others who face similar challenges as her. Give it a watch.
A mother's job is never done. We give our last even though it is our last. Everything was going stable and the pandemic hit. I couldn't work and I'm down on money. The truth was getting evicted. My dad, he taught me where there's a will, there's a way and I'm going to find it. The grant program has helped more than 18,000 households renters affected by the pandemic. The county, I know they didn't expect the size of the crowds that we had. Thousands of applicants. Kirsten was in a bad situation. There's no way we would have been able to get everything we needed done if it had to be done on hard paperwork. Because we were able to digitize, the system was there. The internet is a beautiful thing.
Alright, thank you. So, obviously an incredibly powerful story. So, with this, Teresa, I'm going to start with a question for you. You know, so much of what I teed up in our introduction about Publicis Sapient's approach to digital business transformation comes from really putting people at the center of what we transform and what we do. Then we saw the story of Kirsten and got a glimpse at what this actually looks like in action for real people. What do you want people to take away from Kirsten's story?
Thank you, Reva. I'm excited to be here. So, first of all, let me just say I agree with you because a lot of this would not be, this film would not be even possible to do if, because of our approach. And you're right. Our approach to transformation is always to look at transformation from the eyes of the person, being a customer, an employee, or like Kirsten, a citizen. So, for us, our approach is always look at transformation from the outside in versus the inside out. And because of that, we're able to do this film. But to answer your question, there's three things for me that I wanted people to take away from this film. One is that technology is a force for good. Technology is not the enemy. It is the enabler. And because today there's so many conversations, so many discourse about the negativity about technology, I wanted to remind all of us that inherently technology is unbiased. There are people that are making the decisions. The second thing I wanted people to take away from it is that digital transformation, which we hear this term a lot, and it is not just about big business helping big business. It is actually in service of people. All transformation is about people because it's done by people, for people, and with people. And when we business society, when we try to create solutions that are in service of people, we are creating a society and a world that is better for all. And the last thing I wanted to remind everybody, I wanted the film to inspire people, but I also wanted to remind everyone that we do live in a digital world, right? That genie is out of the bottle. But the more digital we become, the more human we have to be.
That's great. Thank you, Teresa. And, you know, you said something really powerful, which is digital transformation isn't always about or just about big business helping big business. And, you know, with that sentiment in mind, James, you know, you spent a lot of time partnering with organizations to really get them to see what the art of the possible is when it comes to applying technologies. You know, much like the organization that powered the change that enabled Kirsten to stay home and purchase a home for her kids. So, you know, I'd love to unpack with you how you get clients, organizations in the public sector, private organizations, to really think beyond cost-cutting and, you know, big business helping big business to really get them to see the human benefit of making investments in the technology space.
That's great. Thank you, Reva, for that question. But before I answer, I would just like to say I'm thrilled to be here back in Austin, Texas, and sharing the stage with Teresa and Hannah and you, Reva, women that I dramatically admire and look up to. So it's a thrill to be here today. Thank you. And it has been a long time, and I was reminded of that when I was out at several bars on 6th Street last night listening to bands because it was 27 years ago that I was graduating from graduate school and got offered a job here in Austin at a startup. And so it was a choice between the job in Austin or what was known as just Sapient at that time in Boston. So it was Boston or Austin. And I chose Sapient, and it's been a great 27-year journey since partnering with lots of clients and trying to figure out how we can use digital to enable what is both good for the client but, more importantly, the client's customers. And so we have... Let me put it this way. It's like around this exhibit hall, there are lots and lots of vendors, some amazing people with some amazing products. If you haven't seen the Brain portable audio speaker, wear a helmet because your head might explode when you actually listen to it. So there's a lot of people out there who have solutions, but they can only offer the solution because that's their product. So that's one take. Another take is like if you're a traditional management consultant, you'd start with the problem you're trying to solve because that's how they're trained. That's how I was trained. But at Publicis Sapient, we start with the people, the person, the one, the Kirsten, and how are we going to impact that person's life? How are we going to make it better? How are we going to have that impact? And then we work backwards. What is the problem that we need to solve in order to have that impact? And then work backwards from there. What is the work we need to do to solve that problem to have that impact? So when I work with my teams now, we always start with the one. Start with one person. How are you going to make a difference in that person's life? And then we work backwards from there.
That's great, James. And really brings us full circle back to digital really being a key enabler to be a force for good. When you look at the one, when you focus on the one, it empowers you to make decisions that will make a positive impact on the one. So that's a really, really critical lens to frankly approach problem solving with. And on that note, Hannah, throughout your career, you've worked quite a bit on also harnessing technologies as a force for good. So I'd love for you to give us some examples on how you've used digital transformation and technologies at large to solve complex or life-saving issues.
I think it's really important, especially while we're in this space surrounded by all of these amazing, mind-blowing products to keep in mind that technology is a tool, to your point. It's not good or bad. The question is what you do with it and how you apply it. I noticed in government corner over there that they are on the hunt for a new solution that will solve problem X or problem Y. But waiting for the technology to get there to solve all of your problems is... It could take a long time. And it's not necessarily centering the people in the process. So one example that's a story that I love from government world is in 2015, I was working with the United States Digital Service, not represented in government corner over there, but it's a... It should be. It should be. Yeah, so a startup in the White House that was created to try to bring private sector technologists to work on government problems. So the team that I was on was with the Department of Homeland Security, and this was in 2015. We were changing your seat on your iPhone or even before phones came out on a web browser 20 years ago. And so every time I use that, I feel proud of the company that I work for. So that's an example of where it worked well. I was in Nashville a couple weeks ago. And great for the airline, too. And it's great for the airline. To your point, Teresa, having an impact in the end user and profits are not mutually exclusive because that digital product for the airlines is the number one highest grossing product of the entire airline industry because every dollar that they bring in has virtually no cost associated with it. And it enables and empowers the user to feel like they're in control of their experience and their outcome. On the other end, I was in Nashville a couple weeks ago. I had a rental car and I found a parking spot. Guess how long it took me to pay the $1.75 for that parking spot? Seven minutes. I had to find the right app in order to download. I had to download it. I had to establish an account. I had to put in my credit card. And then I had to enable the two-hour parking session. It took seven minutes and it spawned nine emails in my inbox. That was not a great digital experience for me. So at Google Sapient, we think about the end user, the ultimate person that our solutions are going to benefit, and we work backwards from there, as I said earlier. So my experience getting the aisle seat on the exit row on the plane, great experience, worth every penny. My experience parking in Nashville, not very good. And so I'm sure all of you today had a variety of experiences on traveling here and digital either helped or hindered that experience. And so my hope for all of you is that your future experiences will be just what you need to get you the outcome that you need, and it's a great experience along the way.
Awesome, James. Who would have thought that you might miss the days of putting change into a meter? I was so desperate for quarters, except that it didn't take quarters. Well, few things do these days. So it's interesting, though, because you talk about understanding the problem and coming up with the most efficient solution. Clearly Nashville has a little, the city of Nashville has a little bit of work to do on that front. But I want to go back to Kirsten and the problem she was facing. And not just the problem Kirsten was facing, but frankly our approach to telling Kirsten's story in that way. And so when you think about creating a solution to a problem, Tadeza, I'm curious, what was the problem that you were trying to solve with our approach to telling Kirsten's story in this way?
Yes, so I wanted to humanize digital, but I also wanted to humanize our work and bring meaning to our work, to make it relatable, easy to understand. I think a lot of you here have heard a lot of examples we gave about our work, but most of you probably have no idea what we do. And when we leave here, you probably can't explain what we do. Because, see, we work with a lot of large companies. We are a B2B service technology consulting company. So we work with a lot of industries and governments across many industries, like from McDonald's, I mentioned, to Walmart to Goldman Sachs. And what we do is to help these companies and governments to reimagine their business and services for a world that is increasingly digital. How do you explain that? Now, when you go home to your children, it's not easy, right? And because our work is not tangible. But what I did not want to do with this film was to talk about the work or even show the work, because, frankly, that is the easy part. What I wanted to do is show the impact that the work is having, but not the impact in business, because that's also easier to do, the impact in people, ordinary people, real people like Kristen. And that's the challenging part, just because our work, as I said, is not tangible. And for any company, especially B2B service companies, that's a very hard part to do, because we're not selling products and we don't sell directly to the end user. So what I decided to do in that moment to do that, to solve that problem, was to tell stories. And I decided the better way to do it is to tell a story that talks about one person, just focus on one person's journey, and tell that person's journey. And that's what the filmers do. Now, I do have to admit, one of the things I learned, that telling a story or creating a film that does not mention your work or mention your name, it can be hard to explain to your company and to your boss, especially if it's the CEO. That was really intentional. And not because our name is really hard to pronunciate, but because I wanted to be meaningful. I wanted to be authentic. And that's why we did it. Now, I tell you one thing. In the process of doing this, it's actually been a huge lesson for me. And James talked about start with a person, focus on the person. And I think in the process, actually, of doing this film, I also realized that no matter how big or small the problem or the challenge that we're trying to solve is, it can be solved by just focusing on one person. And I learned that, actually, from the process of doing this documentary.
It's amazing stuff, Teresa. I think it's interesting to think about the angle of the problem you were trying to solve or the angle of the problem you were trying to solve, or how do we talk about this important work in a way that humanizes what we do? And the solve was leaning into a story about an individual, leaning into a story about Kirsten, who we're going to hear more about in a bit. But before we do that, Hannah, you mentioned the work that you did at the U.S. Digital Service Department. One thing that stands out to me is how similar to Teresa, you were able to connect that problem with a solution in a really straightforward way. And so I'm curious if you could give some examples of where you've identified problems and how you really leaned into where the biggest impact would be through digital solutions. And how did you really find those points that would really bring out, frankly, the biggest impact?
I mean, so much of this work, it's interesting. I've worked in technology my entire career, and I'm always like, it's not about the technology. Yes, I'm a technologist. Forget about the technology. It's really about finding what those key pressure points are that are going to move the needle for people's lives and make an impact. And one story that I love to tell takes place in Rockford, Illinois, which is a city on the border between, about halfway between Chicago and the middle of Iowa. And Rockford had a persistent homelessness problem. Their rate of homelessness is about 20% higher than the national average. And the mayor was very, very interested in solving the homelessness problem, and this was part of why he'd become mayor. He was interested in making sure that everybody who lived in Rockford was housed. So they had a system to track homelessness. There's a federally mandated system. They pay $30,000 a year to use this system. But the system was not allowing them to solve homelessness. So what they decided to do was they pulled everybody who was working on the problem. They discovered that it was sort of, it's like the blind man and the elephant, right? So everybody had one hand on one piece of the problem, but nobody was seeing the entire issue. So they started with a meeting, and they got all of the right people, including the mayor, into the meeting. And in the meeting, they made a by-name list of everyone who was experiencing homelessness in Rockford. Veteran homelessness. They started with veterans. So this was, by 2015, using this by-name list, they would, in this meeting, go down the list and say, why is this person experiencing homelessness? What can we do to, you know, how did the situation happen, and what can we do to resolve it? And one of the things that they discovered was bus passes. They discovered that a lot of veterans become homeless because they miss their medical appointments. And they miss their medical appointments because they don't have the bus fare. So the solution to this was to provide free bus passes for veterans. And so they piloted free bus passes for veterans for six months, had a huge impact. It's now policy. And in 2015, they ended veteran homelessness. In 2017, they ended chronic homelessness. And this was purely by creating a list of who was experiencing homelessness, finding what that pressure point was, finding that it was the bus pass, and making that policy. And whenever I tell this story, people are always like, what was the technology they used to create the by-name list? Google Sheets. That was Google Sheets. They were paying $30,000 a year for the federally mandated system, and they solved it with Google Sheets.
Wow. Amazing. Great story. Love that story. You know, sometimes you have to start with the smallest thing. Sometimes we think that, and this is why I said that no matter how big or small the problem is, and sometimes it's the smallest problem and finding that point. And that pressure point reminds me of a conversation I had with an acupuncturist several months ago. I was on my way to an event to actually introduce this film. And my driver picked me up at the airport. He's an acupuncturist, just doing that as a part-time job. And we got into the conversation. He asked me what I was doing. I told him I was going to the event. I was going to launch the film. Iindividual people's hands by snapping your fingers. You need a solution. And if we tried to do it with a traditional sort of, you know, paper-based solution, you'd need processing centers all over the country, trucks going around, bringing pieces of paper everywhere. But we were able to cut through all of that and get money to people who needed it right away. And so digital was the unlock to the policy. And so today, there almost isn't a policy you can implement that doesn't rely on digital to execute that policy. So that's some of my experiences. Hana, I'm sure you have many other stories as well.
Yes. I mean, we have talked about that. So really the first time this happened where a policy just did not exist because the technology didn't work was Obamacare and the Affordable Care Act. That policy, if you couldn't sign up for health care, you didn't have it. And that was a real wake-up call for government. And I think also for people who work in that space, that part of how people design policy in the modern age has to involve delivery. And delivery is always technology. That is the world we live in. Delivery relies upon technology. And there's been sort of a leveling up in government with this realization, and that's how we get solutions like DreamKey, where somebody had the idea of like, oh, actually, this thing that we just, this massive law that we just passed and was like a lot of work to design how it was going to work, it doesn't even start to work if you don't have the unlock, which is always tech.
That's incredible. So, you know, Tereza, I'm curious. When we address the meaningful impact on digital in the way that Hana and James just teed up, in the way that we saw in the behind-the-scenes footage of the film, you know, it's clear that there's an undertold story here. In the introduction, you'd set something so elegantly. You said, you know, digital technology is getting a bad reputation these days. And, you know, elevating these stories of good is such a powerful approach to getting people to really see how digital can and should be harnessed in today's day and age. And so, you know, I'm curious where you see this approach to storytelling taking us.
Yeah. Before I answer the question, to your point, that I also said one of the reasons to do this film was to show that digital is a force for good. But I also said that transformation is about people. And I really, really believe that, because people are making the decisions in things with technology. But transformation requires courage and requires bravery to make those decisions. And often in time, unfortunately, both government and the private sector, people that are in a position to make those decisions and to make the change, they don't have the appetite or the desire to do it. That's why things take so long. That's why we probably saw the menu boards here 20 years ago, and now you actually experience them. And that goes back to about people. And when people don't actually want to disrupt the status quo, they don't have the appetite to disrupt themselves. Like this film for me was disrupting the way I think about marketing. I'm a CMO. And you think about my job is to promote our brand. My job is to put the brand everywhere, like we do a 30-second commercial. You don't see my brand in the film. We haven't seen the entire film. I invite you to see the entire 15-minute documentary. Never done. And you will see that it never talks about us. And again, because of that. So to do that, I had to disrupt the way I think about brand marketing. It's a risk. If this didn't work, I would have probably spent a lot of money. And the reason sometimes we do not, individuals, people, executives, and people in government don't have the appetite to do that. So instead of having transformation, what do we end up in the end is incrementalism, more of the same. I used to have this saying to say that, because we've been thinking about digital, digital transformation for so many years. So why now? Like really, these technologies have existed for over a decade. And I used to have this saying, and I still do, that what many companies have done is random acts of digital. And what I mean by that is goes back to technology. You add technology to solve the problem. More technology. I create a website. I create an app. I create this. But you haven't addressed the problem yet. So that's a different shift. And I think where we are today, it's really important to change the shift. And it's, again, putting people at the center. Because when I think about you as a person, as an individual, I'm going to ask, what can I do to help you? If I think of you as a consumer, which is extracting value, how can I get you to consume more? I actually have come to this realization myself, and that part of that, again, this film has been a lot of eye opening. I have tried actually this with my team. Every meeting I go, I started asking, what can I do to help? And I have to say, the first time I asked a question, there was a lot of silence in the room because it can be a loaded question. If you just leave the room, the question with that, I realize that people aren't ready for it. But now when I start asking the question, people get used to it. They start giving me actually answers to say, let's make the meeting shorter. Instead of an hour, 45 minutes. Let's have five minutes between calls. Let's have more time. Can we have more on one time with people? And the things actually put forward are simple. But it's again, it's reframing your thinking.
That's really powerful, Tereza. And interestingly enough, we've talked about the work, we've talked about the film, and the vision here is that telling the story this way and how you've articulated it, Tereza, is going to get people to see, again, that digital can be used as a force for good. Hana, you said we've seen the negative impacts of technology and the positive impacts of technology. And so important for us to make sure that the positive impacts of technology have their moment and have a spotlight because that is often, Tereza, to your point earlier, the undertold story, right? We don't often talk about the human who's the beneficiary of so much of what's going on. So with that, I have a final question for the panel here today, which is a more general one. How has, as humans, technology impacted you? I'll start with you, Tereza.
Wow. So I have to go back to the beginning. I grew up in Portugal, in a very small village of a thousand people, literally a thousand people. We went to bed, we didn't lock our doors. In my village, people lived off the ground, from what they grew, that's what they ate. And some people still do. People didn't have electricity, many people didn't have water. They definitely didn't have TVs, not even a radio. I didn't grow up with a TV, I didn't even grow up with having a phone. It was very, very analog world. For many of us think it's like living in a cave today. But my parents in the village and small business owners, I worked in my parents' business store, I didn't have a calculator, not a cash register. Everything was done manually. So I'm sharing that story because I was not introduced to technology. I immigrated to the United States at the age of 17 and still the accent. I went to university and when I graduated, my first job was at IBM. That's how I was introduced to technology. The first time I worked, I had my own computer when I was in university, I had to go to the lab. But to me, it really that, and I should experience because I didn't come from that, but it really has changed my life. As a professional, technology has enabled me to grow my career. From the first time I joined IBM, I've been able to work remotely. I've had many global roles and I have had to move. That's because of technology. As a mother, I'm a mother to wonderful teenagers, they're somewhere around here, I've been able to be a mother and be present. I've been able to have dinner with my kids and attend not all their events, but important ones because of technology. And as an immigrant, which I'm very, very proud of, I've been able to keep in touch with my community. My community that I still go there every year, that I still in touch, and I do that through technology. Now my community today, people still don't have phones in their homes, but everybody is a mobile phone and the whole town is now on Wi-Fi. So all of these things have been on because of technology. So for me, Raver, I could not, I mean, growing up in that village, I could not imagine what I would be able to do today.
It's incredible. James?
You'll get the short version. I can tell you the 10-minute version, but technology for me was transformational in my life and it relates to the arc of South by Southwest. So when I was in high school in the late 80s and in college in the early 90s, I played a lot of guitar in a lot of bands, kind of like the ones you see down on 6th Street. We didn't make it big, we were sort of hacks, but gosh, did we have fun. But during that period of time, just like when interactive was introduced at South by Southwest, digital came into the music scene. And so when I started, everything was analog and it was up there as a guitar player. If you want to add an effect, you had to add an additional pedal and then Different sound effects came right out of it. How does that happen? Digital. Because it digitally transformed the signal, processed it, and then came back out analog again. We were so blown away by that that it turned into a field of study for me. So I ended up majoring in digital signal processing in college and I went to graduate school for digital signal processing. And then thankfully, Sapient rescued me and now I get to work with public sector clients and helping Kirsten not experience homeless. Definitely took a turn, but I will say. It definitely took a turn, but I'll be out on 6th Street tonight at the bars and when I'm listening to the bands, I'm not necessarily looking at their instruments, I'm looking at their equipment to see how they're processing their sound.
That's a very interesting measure. And Hannah, we'll wrap with you.
Yeah, so my story is probably different and weirder, which is I'm possibly the world's first digital native, even though I'm 50. But I grew up with a monitor that was connected to the Yale University mainframe in the 70s. I had a parent who was part of founding the field of artificial intelligence. So I've had email since I could write. The only people I could email were my parents and my brother. And so we would just email each other. And I think my experience with technology has always been, this is cool, what could we use it for? And it's just been a consistent, like, you know, I remember when the Internet, suddenly I discovered the Internet, I was like, this is cool, I wonder what we'll do with it. So I think I have, as I said, so technology has just been intertwined in my life forever. And I think I am always looking for, huh, I wonder what we could do with this.
Awesome, love it. Well, that wraps up our session today, guys. Thank you so much for sticking around. Thank you all for joining us. Huge thank you to Teresa, James, and Hannah. And I hope you guys find the rest of your time at South by Southwest enlightening. Appreciate it. Thank you.