Today, on Books Driving Change we talk with Sharath Jeevan, who is the author of Intrinsic: A Manifesto to Reignite Our Inner Drive. Sharath is a social entrepreneur who came out of the business world, consulting world, and helped launch STIR Education -- an organization that helps teachers improve their performance through their better motivation and sharing of insights - in many countries, including India and Indonesia, and some parts of Africa. He now runs Intrinsic Labs. We hope you enjoy this conversation.

Today on Books Driving Change we talk with Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, who has written a powerful new book called It Could Happen Here: Why America Is Tipping from Hate to the Unthinkable—And How We Can Stop It.

The people that work in education and that take the responsibility of leading the education system are mainly optimists. If not, you cannot take the job. In the latest episode of Books Driving Change, Agustín Porres and Matthew Bishop talk about Porres’ new book, Unfinished Business in Education, in which he interviews 31 previous education secretaries from around the globe. Each of them reflects on their time in office -- what they learned, what they achieved, what they failed to do, and what they would advise people going into that role today. They also talk about why the pandemic may be providing the perfect opportunity to enact sweeping education reforms, because of the crisis it has brought on, the innovation it triggered, and the fact that education is now much more visible in many national debates that it has been for many years. Porres has spent the last couple of decades working on education policy and is currently Latam Regional Director of the Varkey Foundation, which works to build the capacity and status of teachers. It is also the sponsor of the Global Teacher Prize. Before joining Varkey, Porres worked in various government roles.

In this episode, we talk with Ron Gonen, who is the founder of Closed Loop Partners, and the author of The Waste-Free World: How the Circular Economy Will Take Less, Make More, and Save the Planet. Ron believes we have a challenge in the American economy -- and a little bit in the U.K. as well some other developed countries -- where the highest status in society goes sometimes to the jobs that don't always create the most social benefit or require the most amount of intellect. The jobs of teacher, fire person, police person, public servants, soldier are the backbone of our society. Unfortunately, the status we’ve assigned to those jobs, and the financial incentive, is low in society. We hope you enjoy this conversation.

Welcome to Made in Africa, our conversation series with African visionaries whose work impacts the public good. We are interested in learning how leaders across the continent got to where they are today. The inflection points along their journeys, their inspirations, how they pushed through moments of self-doubt, and how they came out the other side. In this new episode, Sarika Bansal speaks with Yawa Hanson-Quao. Hansen-Quao is the Executive Director of Emerging Public Leaders, which seeks to build a pan-African network of young leaders in public service. She is also a serving member of the Board of Directors at Ashesi University College, as well as the founder of the Leading Ladies’ Network, which supports female entrepreneurs in Ghana.

Today we talk with Anne-Marie Slaughter, the author of Renewal: From Crisis to Transformation in Our Lives, Work, and Politics. Anne-Marie has been a big figure in Washington and thought leadership for the past 20 years or so. This book is both a story about how America, because America in some ways is also a beacon for the world, needs to go through a process of renewal to get itself out of its current, dysfunctional moment. And also, it's a story of personal renewal as a leader. And the way the two themes weave together makes it a very rich book.

Today we talk with François Bonnici, co-author with Cynthia Rayner, of The Systems Work of Social Change: How to Harness Connection, Context, and Power to Cultivate Deep and Enduring Change. Obviously, this is a book that goes right to the heart of the mission of Books Driving Change, where we're looking at how do we build back better in this moment of crisis that the world is facing. This book is full of great practical insights and wisdom, and some great case studies that many people will not be familiar with, and also, some very big thoughts about the way change happens globally and the way systems change could be brought about going forward.

Today we talk to Peter Coleman of Columbia University, one of the co-founders of the Difficult Conversations Lab, which explores what do we do about toxic conversations. We are at a time of increasing polarization in the world, and a lot of conversations seem to end up being more counterproductive than productive. Peter has written a book called The Way Out: How to Overcome Toxic Polarization, which is something that anyone listening to this podcast will want to know the answer to.

In this episode of Made in Africa, Sarika Bansal talks with Bright Simons, President of mPedigree, a social enterprise working on three continents to secure communities from the harmful effects of counterfeiting. They pioneered a technology that lets one send a text message from a pharmacy where you are buying medicines and learn immediately if it is an authentic medication. mPedigree is bringing this same idea to other sectors, such as agriculture, cosmetics, and the automotive industry In the conversation, they talk about how Simons brings two competing sides of himself together: his activist brain, through which he sees injustices in society, and his entrepreneurial side, which wants to find solutions. He has been finding ways to bring a bit more justice and security to the world since he was in high school when he fought the government on raising school fees.

On this episode of Book Driving Change we talk with Meighan Stone who, with Rachel Vogelstein, has written a book called Awakening: #MeToo and the Global Fight for Women's Rights, which is published by the Council on Foreign Relations here in New York. It's an extraordinary book, not least because it shows in a way that nothing I've read before really has, the extent to which the Me Too movement is a global movement. And actually one, and this is something I'll explore with Meighan, that really finds extraordinary commonalities about the experience of women in society, including in countries that you might have thought were very different in terms of the status of women and the experience of women. And it shows there to be a global women's movement revival going on.

Today we talk to Paul Polman, the co-author with Andrew Winston, of Net Positive: How Courageous Companies Thrive by Giving More Than They Take. It's a terrific book, really drawing heavily on Paul's own experience as CEO of Unilever, where he drove a purpose-driven company and helped it become a benchmark for many other purpose-driven business leaders as they seek to use their business to help build a better world.

"A good example of 24/7 authenticity, which is in bleak short supply these days in America. I have several examples in the book where standing up with integrity and honesty, and particularly with personal accountability, will cost you in the short term, and it may cost you a lot career-wise, [by] making some enemies, etc. But in the long term, I think it's an enormously important leadership trait" -- Paul Shoemaker, podcaster, activist, philanthropist

In episode four of Made in Africa, Driving Change’s conversation series with African visionaries whose work impacts the public good, Chinny Ogunro speaks with Sarika Bansal about her life and career. Ogunro has focused her career on building healthcare systems across Nigeria, Ghana, and other countries. She is a systems thinker, first and foremost, interested in doing the most good for the most people. Through the course of her career, she has helped improve the operations of hundreds of hospitals, which has delivered high-quality, low-cost healthcare to over 40,000 people in West Africa and India.

Today we are talking with Gillian Tett. She's the author of Anthro-Vision, a new way to see business and life. Gillian is currently the chairman of the editorial board in the U.S. for the Financial Times, and founder and editor-in-chief of its Moral Money section, which looks at the evolution of financial markets and the question about how investing in business relates to the health of society and the planet and all the developments going on there.

In this episode we talk to Adam Grant about his new book - Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know. Adam is an organizational psychologist at the Wharton School and the author of a number of bestselling books, including Originals and Give and Take. In this book, he addresses one of the big themes of today, which is that we seem to be in a world where our leaders feel they have to be right about everything. They don't seem to think again. They seem to double down on bad ideas when those ideas don't work. People are becoming more entrenched in their opinions. There seems to be less concern about facts and learning and more sort of just sticking to your guns come what may. And this book is really a challenge to that mindset and, actually drawing on a lot of science, about how do we create an open mind, both as individuals and also in society?

“Loneliness thrives in an ecosystem that its drivers are structural, and political, and economic, as well as to do with choices we make as individuals, and therefore that its solutions need to be comprehensive. That we can solve today’s loneliness crisis, but only if we as government, we as business leaders, and we as individuals, make a decision to do so.” -- Noreena Hertz

In this week's episode we talk with Enric Sala, Explorer in Residence at the National Geographic Society, who has written a terrific new book, The Nature of Nature: Why We Need the Wild. Enric is an extraordinary enthusiast for nature and a practical person who has personally led important work to save large amounts of the ocean through his Pristine Seas initiative, which we discuss in this podcast. For people who are committed to building back a better world, there could be no better practical guide to some of the challenges of nature of which there are many: preserving our climate, preserving our planet in a healthy way, than Enric Sala. We ask why we do need the wild and many of the calls for action that he makes in the book.

So, this book, if you will, is a handbook of sorts for anybody who sees themselves as someone who wants to create change and solve problems, whether at a micro community level, an organization level or, I daresay, at a national and beyond level. – Jacqueline Novogratz, Founder and CEO, Acumen

My motto is: “What we build today will form the Africa of tomorrow.” I actually expanded that to say, “What we build today will form the Africa and the Africans of tomorrow.” And that's looking at how we impact on our kids as well with the resources we have around them. And the built environment is one great place to start. In episode three of Made in Africa, Driving Change’s conversation series with African visionaries whose work impacts the public good, Elizabeth Wangeci Chege speaks with Sarika Bansal about her life and career. Chenge is the CEO and co-founder of WEB Limited, a sustainability design consultancy based in Nairobi, Kenya. Until recently, she was also the chairperson of the Kenya Green Building Society.

In episode two of Driving Change: Made in Africa, Dalberg executive director James Mwangi talks with Sarika Bansal about what it was like to start a business with no name and no brand and build it into one of the most respected international development consultancies. He walks through Dalberg’s journey from its days as a start-up in the US to opening its first office in Arica to becoming a global firm offering sage advice throughout the conversation.