How reinvention can help survive disruptions through innovative technologies

This episode of “Better Innovation,” Global Tax Innovation Leader and host Jeff Saviano interviews Rumi Morales, professional crisis reinventor and innovator.

Podcast transcript: How reinvention can help survive disruptions through innovative technologies

43 mins 40 secs approx | 10 February 2021

Introduction

Jeff Saviano

Hey. Better innovation. It's Jeff. We have jumped right into season four, and our theme of resilience and how to best re-emerge from the pandemic. We did this at the end of season three with our focus on crisis innovation. We're always looking for new innovation angles that we really haven't explored yet on the show. Today, we have Rumi Morales in our virtual studio.
Rumi and I had this great talk about reinvention. She's had such a cool career. She was one of the early specialists in digital currency. She's a blockchain leader. And even more broadly, she's very focused on distributed ledger technologies and she's been an early investor in AI and other innovative tech. Rumi is a venture capitalist and also works with non-profit and helps them with their reinvention journey.
Okay. This is kind of cool. Institutional Investor has named Rumi as one of the most powerful dealmakers in financial technology - for two years in a row. She's invested across three continents and even lived in seven countries. We also learned on the show today that Rumi has been a Hollywood producer and sometimes she even moonlights as a jazz singer.
How cool is that? I can't think of anybody better to talk about reinvention. She's done it all and she's reinvented herself over and over again. Let's face it, we all need some kind of reinvention coming out of this crisis. Take a listen. Rumi has a great story to tell.
Rumi, welcome to the show.

Rumi Morales

Thank you so much. It's so wonderful being here.

Saviano

It is so nice to have you in our virtual studio.
Today, although I have to say, Rumi, it would have been better if we could have done this live. We typically will do all of our better innovation interviews live. So maybe there's a round two someday when the world is in a bit of a different place.

Morales

Let's hope so. But as this also is an innovation podcast, it's great to see us plunging forward in these uncertain times. Being as innovative as we can and having conversations like this. So again, thanks for inviting me here.

Saviano

It is a very good point. Rumi, if we can't be innovative, then who can? Right. All right. We're going to talk about innovation.
This is a Better Innovation podcast. If we can't handle this and you can have great interviews, which we will today. So, thank you. And we are talking today very early in our season four. I can't believe that sometimes this is our fourth season of Better Innovation. The focus for us this season is on resilience and re-emergence. How do we re-emerge strong from this pandemic?
So, to continue with the alliteration, let me add one more outcome - reinvention. I really enjoy diving into all of your experiences Rumi okay, I'd like to focus much of our time today on this idea of reinvention, especially the need to reinvent on the heels of a crisis like this. How does that sound?

Morales

I think that sounds great. Looking forward to it.

Saviano

Okay, let's go all the way back, Rumi. I'll bet that learning to reinvent yourself isn't something that you picked up just in, like, the last job that you had. Can you talk a little bit about your early life experiences and what gave you the tools to reinvent?

Morales

Yes, certainly. It wasn't just picked up in the past few years.
I'm actually trying to think of did it start when I was two years old or when I was four, because when I was two years old, my family moved from Japan to United States. And when I was four, we moved from the United States to India. When I was six, we moved from India back to the U.S. and this kind of carried out through my childhood.
My father was a U.S. Foreign Service officer in the State Department which meant we moved a lot. For me as a child that was being yanked around a number of countries. In addition to those two, actually, we had a second tour in Japan, but it was Osaka. I was born in Tokyo. We also lived in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
This was throughout 18 years of my childhood. I think what was so critical in terms of reinvention there is two things. One is when you're dropped into a new country, obviously no one has a history of you. You don't have past friendships. You don't have relatives that are there and you are forced to define yourself. But then we always came back to America, Japan, America, India, America, Japan, again, America.
So, I'd also have to reinvent myself, returning to the place where I used to be. We always return to Reston, Virginia, a suburb outside of Washington. D.C. So as I was growing up through my elementary and high school years, I graduated from high school with kids I've known since the age of two, but I kept bouncing in and out of their lives.
And as a result, I think I became a professional re-inventor in my childhood and that just carried forth in my career.

Saviano

Oh, how interesting. Did you find, in those early years Rumi that as you were bouncing back from the U.S., you know, with your family, your father's foreign service, that as you went into those new situations that you thought about even as a young age, about how do you want to maybe you weren't thinking about the word reinvention, but perhaps what can be different about this new experience?

Morales

Absolutely. It was always like, who am I now? Who can I be now? And looking at the new opportunities that are there for you, when I moved, for example, to Osaka when I was ten years old, it was in a much different school than I had been before. Before I was in a simple elementary school, the school I went to in Osaka was K through 12.
And you saw yourself in high schoolers. And I thought, Well, I want to be like that. And I, I decided I wanted to hang out with the high school kids and I taught myself how to play the bassoon of all things, a musical instrument that not many people play, but just so that I could be in the high school band because I thought that would be interesting.
But, you know, what's also interesting is when I moved back to America and back when I used to be the elementary school kid, I was a swimmer. I couldn't be a swimmer anymore, but I was now a bassoonist. So, in high school in America, the kids who used to know me as a swimmer now knew me as a bassoon player, of all things.

Saviano

Oh! I love it. So that's the first tip for our better innovation audience. The key to reinvention is in the bassoon. How could we have missed that? This is our I think you were the 62nd interview we've had and it's finally we know the secret. I love it.

Morales

I could, I could spend this whole podcast on the bassoon if you wanted me to, but I'm guessing most of our listeners do not.

Saviano

I was going to ask you if there is an early memory that you could share about how you reinvented yourself. And even if it's at a young age, maybe that's the one, that the one that really stands out in your mind about how you did something very purposely different at that time?

Morales

I think so too.
Even though I could have been a little unintentional when I decided to continue with it. So, to be specific, you know, I left America when I was four. The second time I left America in fifth grade, I came back in ninth. Those were very important years to I've missed, right? I missed puberty. I missed popularity. I missed all the elementary schools converging into junior high.
And then high school so that when I came back in ninth grade in a new high school, friends that I used to have were not friends with each other anymore. Different cliques had emerged. And I didn't know where to put myself. Like I mentioned, I hadn't been swimming for three years, so I couldn't do that anymore. What could I do?
And I just happened to be talking to a fellow student who was sitting next to me. And I mentioned I had, you know, played the bassoon. And he said, “Oh, well, we need a bassoon in our wind ensemble. Will you audition for that?” Okay. And so, I auditioned and I got the position. And then once I was in the Wind Ensemble, the best students came up to me and said, “oh, you play them a soon we need a bassoon in our youth orchestra for Northern Virginia.
Will you audition for that?” And like, oh, sure. And this is actually the power of the bassoon. And maybe to take it a little bit more broadly, the power of finding a niche, the power of finding a specialty that you can own, that can translate into other areas, because not only was I just a bassoonist but it opened it up, a world of possibilities there to be a little play in a youth symphony, that youth symphony, travel to Scotland for one summer.
And that's where that's where it took me It wasn't without pain. The bassoon is not a popular instrument, and I was not the most popular kid. But that is what reinvented me and that was it. And it still gives me grounding, I'm still proud to call myself a bassoonist.

Saviano

What a good story of not just reinvention, but as you said, Rumi, what can come from that?
What experiences and what you can learn from something at such a young age? Let's take that now. Let's fast forward a bit to the early part of your career. In those early days, you worked for a fairly traditional financial organization. I've heard in some other interviews that living through crisis have had a profound impact on the way that you've been thinking about issues and problem solving.
Tell us more about that.

Morales

Absolutely. I mean, there are different types of crises that one can manage through in their work - personal and professional. You know, I've been able to manage through some personal crises in my career, but specifically around the professional ones. I almost felt like I was a born crisis professional if that makes sense.
My very first job right out of college was working for a Southeast Asian investment fund, which was decimated by the Asian financial crisis in the late nineties. We were based in London making investments in Europe, England and the United States, but the cash base was in ringgit, which, as you might recall, was devalued by 40% in two weeks in 1998.
So, it was just impossible to be able to meet those obligations that we had. My boss at the time ran away and I was left as the only Director of his holding company, as his chief of staff, being the one that needed to pay the bills, let go of staff, try to find someone to take over our office lease.
I ended up getting the power of attorney to sell his fancy toys like his Rolls-Royce or his apartment overlooking Hde Park. Anything, anything to be able to pay the bills. And being a Director of the firm, I couldn't pay myself before I was able to get all of this done. I remember when, I don't even know what credit or it was at this point, but someone came to the office that the furniture had already been seized.
So, I was sitting on the ground and for some reason the telephones were working still. I was on the phone and these guys came in and they gave me this judgment or this whatever it was. And they said, I read it. And I said I hadn’t paid for the fire extinguishers. The fire extinguisher rental was overdue. And I thought, well, that is just so funny because I felt all I was doing here was fighting fires.
Right but I said, okay, and I handle that and I clean up everything as best I could. I thought, well, I'm not a UK citizen. I can't stay here anymore. I'll go to New York. I don't know anybody there. You make it there. You can make it anywhere. I was 22 years old at this point and I think having lived through that again as both a personal, massive personal adjustment, but obviously a professional crisis prepared me for whatever it was to come.
And so, then I went to New York and then found my way to the larger financial firm that you mentioned. In between there was the dot com bubble bursting, of course, yet another crisis. And then after that experience, I also found myself with the global financial crisis. So, I'm just a crisis queen really at this point. It's what I'm trying to say.

Saviano

It's an interesting label. You must have picked up so much from that experience. You were so young; you were 22 years old. You certainly didn't go into that experience looking at what can I learn from managing in a crisis? But it's not as though you had a choice. You had to play the cards that you were dealt and you needed to emerge from that.
Do you find that that you think about that experience and maybe even some of the experiences from your childhood when looking at issues that you're facing today and could be working with a start-up or working with some other organizations? Do you go back to those experiences?

Morales

Yes, very much. They very much form my philosophy of doing business and understanding that how important it is to be able to maintain discipline, maintain hope and maintain flexibility, to be able to achieve to, you know, to the next goal, wherever it is that you need to get to.
And I certainly take these lessons as well when it's not just going to the crisis but it's the aftermath.

Saviano

Right.

Morales

What was the adjustment afterwards? What did you learn from it? What are people who did not participate in that crisis with you not seeing that you can help them to see. So, for example, when I did move to New York after I had closed everything in London, it was still, you know, 1998, kind of Go-Go days of the dot com bubble still rising.
No one had any real clue of the pain and the suffering in Southeast Asia and what had happened when the currencies devalued in Thailand and Malaysia and others. And I had just lived through something horrendous and it coming back, it's like, do you not see that? Who knows this, who can understand this, who can help me through it to help others?

Saviano

Right.

Morales

I think that's also really that's been a key thing for me is when I see any crisis today, if there's any start-up that I might be working with today that's having troubles, it's like even if you get through it, then what? How are you going to work it out with others to make it better?

Saviano

I really like that we examined a bit of crisis innovation at the end of our last season, season three and we were, as we saw in the midst of the pandemic and we had on great guests Rumi, focused on not just how do you innovate when you're in a crisis, but we learn so much about what are the signals that may be in place in the world that perhaps some saw or maybe even didn't see that led to the crisis, that it was one important lesson that I took away from the series is that the best way to innovate in a crisis is not when you're in the moment, it's, well, what happened before the crisis to prepare yourself for it.
I'd be so interested to know if you would agree with that. And if you think that that there are some interesting things that you do to help look around the corner and see what may be coming next that could turn into a crisis and really turn your life upside down.

Morales

For me, the early experience that I had in London dealing with the Malaysian Fund has always grounded me with any future experience, which is, yes, you must always look around the corner, but probably what you find around the corner will not be new.
Some part of it you've had to handle before or some part of it somebody else may have handled and you can seek their advice. What I hope, though, I think what helps people get through these crises is knowing that you can handle it, having that internal faith and confidence that you can get through it. So, going back to your very earliest question of, you know, how have I learned to reinvent myself and when did that start?
Certainly. And this is where I gain a lot of strength from my childhood and that upbringing, knowing that no matter where I was yanked around the world, I turned out okay. So whatever crisis that you may hit, if you have your confidence and your wits about you, like I said, also hope and flexibility, you'll be okay. You have to tell yourself that.

Saviano

I think that's really good personal advice. And maybe to pivot a bit to what about the organization itself? And you've also had the benefit of working with some longstanding, maybe a bit traditional non-profit, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Girl Scouts of America. There are, of course, extremely successful organizations. Do they need a reinvention agenda? Does everybody need one?
And what is the fit of reinvention to organizations like the two that I mentioned?

Morales

Every organization should seek reinvention no matter how old they might be. But I also think it's important to be mindful that reinvention does not mean necessarily taking out the bones with which you have built your body for decades. And there are many people who feel like, oh, we need to change everything.
We mess everything up. But you do have to look at the arc of history and think about the success of long-standing organizations and realize a reinvention has always been key. There is also something that speaks to the human experience that wants these institutions as they are. So, if you talk about the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, think about their business model.
A lot of that is predicated on having a bunch of older people sitting side by side with each other in an enclosed space for 2 hours, listening to music played by a bunch of people sitting side by side on the stage. Is that a business model that can last? For classical music enjoyment has been lasting for over 500 years through a variety of pandemics across many countries.
What makes this one different? How are we going to reinvent for this time? Without completely changing the DNA of what made us necessary to begin with?

Saviano

Let's keep going with that a bit. Is there something that those organizations can do because it's you know, it's hard. The more traditional they've been, perhaps they've had long standing processes. What can they do to jumpstart it?
Is it a question of necessity that they don't have a choice? And how do you work with organizations to come to that realization that they need to do something as drastic as what you would call reinvention?

Morales

I think these organizations and not just the two, right, the CSO are the Girl Scouts, but any larger traditional organization. It is necessary for them to understand that they should change as times change.
Though again, without fundamentally altering their DNA. The thing that they can do the best for me, I think, is education, to educate themselves in terms of what those changes are coming. Many people, for example, say, well, there's the writing on the wall. Are you reading it? And if you're reading it, are you acting on it? Is being able to translate the reading on the wall to your own action?
And a lot of that requires the education to understand what is being written, what is written on the wall, what does that say? Many traditional organizations, larger institutions feel this need, I think, to say, well, we know that things will change. We may not be a leader, will be a fast follower. And I always say, well, what? What makes you think you're going to be fast? And especially with the change of the technology innovation that we're seeing today and how much new opportunities can be there as well, trying to get them to many times not kick and scream to the future, but recognize all the opportunities there are if they educate themselves among those possibilities could be.

Saviano

Do you have a story that you could share Rumi, about innovation and reinvention from could be one of the organizations you work with or something that you have observed in the market? Give us an example of the signals that existed to the organization and the world that reinvention was necessary and how that organization dealt with it.

Morales

Reinvention can be a tremendously lucky thing as well for a company to recognize and mean that not necessary be part of anyone's roadmap.
But as long as they have their true north, they have a very strong vision and mission and purpose. I think that many times you're able to take these things that just seem lucky and be able to build them into something greater. You know, a certain company that had excess servers really was able to change that into really providing cloud infrastructure for how many organizations today?
I think as well, though, what's critical there is the ability to execute just because you see something or something falling on your lap. Can you follow through with it? Everyone that has a cell phone today is not the same companies that were dominating the space 10, 15 years ago. Why not? I would think that everyone had access to the same technology.
They were all in the same business. But it was the ability to execute that I think is critical for reinvention to succeed.

Saviano

You've opened the door to technology, and I appreciate I appreciate the example, and I think that's one thing that we share Rumi is this fascination with innovative technology. Your work in particular at Outlier, focuses on identifying and you’re an investor, you cultivate emerging technologies.
What do you think the role is for emerging tech in reinvention?

Morales

I think reinvention is the right word. Many times, emerging technologies actually feel they need to create something entirely new that the world has never seen before, when in reality there are many things that were quite well today but need to be improved upon. We're seeing this today in what they call defi right decentralized finance.
A number of blockchain or cryptocurrency companies are focusing on this area of financial systems where you do not have centralized authorities and you're able to be able to conduct transactions without intermediaries. And this is not brand new. But it's funny to me to look at many defi companies and say, “oh, this is completely different from finance. So, you know, this is completely, you know, a different system.”
But is it? Is it though? Are you helping us reinvent the bones of our current financial architecture in a way that will meet the need of a more digital future? I think that emerging technologies rather than thinking that they all need to be revolutionaries and maybe I'm talking about my own institutional book here because as you know, I'm quite an institutional animal, still is rather than thinking they need to completely do everything again.
Look at what works, use emerging technologies to make it better.

Saviano

I'd like to stick with this idea of decentralized finance, and we do quite a bit with blockchain and distributed systems. I think my own personal belief is that that they will be transformational. Do you think that there is a connection with the emergence from the pandemic, that it could be perhaps an accelerant to these systems being put in place?
Talk a bit about why now as we're talking in early 2021. Do we think that the crisis that we've been dealing with actually could move the world to decentralize systems?

Morales

Absolutely. What the crisis has shown us is the ability of technology to bring us still together, for us to be united and work together without ever having to see each other. I think people see that just as you don't need to go to one physical location, like an office building to be able to work. Why then do you need to do have this central place or that meeting place in order for something to work? And the other what the crisis has also done is to provide real world examples where people see how the current infrastructure is failing us when we are trying to get payments out to individuals sitting in the PPP.
Why in the world where we are sending checks to people that are not at this address or that address or the checks for getting lost and mail and how many days this is take versus say, “hey, if we had a more robust digital infrastructure and payment system, you'd be able to reach people immediately.” In addition, this this notion of a central bank digital currency rapidly came to be a question of when, not if, it became when, not if because of the pandemic.
People understand that this will happen.

Saviano

We can go back to the alliteration. We started our discussion with them and this notion of not just, you know, what we're talking about today around reinvention, but resiliency and taking out a central actor. There were many central actors that failed during the pandemic. They couldn't access their system and they weren't prepared for their workers to be at home.
And you could see the resulting supply chains would fail as a result of that central access. I would agree with you. We think that, again, it's my own my own personal belief that the pandemic will shine a bright light on that, that we're finding in order to be more resilient a resilient society and supply chain is one that you absolutely need to think about.
How do you distribute the governance and those processes? Did I get that about right?

Morales

Right. Absolutely right. Better than I did. I do think it's an incredible area. And I want to also ask a question about Central Bank Digital Currencies. What is it about CBDCs that you're so interested in?
I think at its heart it's just know reinvention or innovating upon financial infrastructure that surely sorely needs it.
I have no idea why it takes so long to pay for something when now you have the technologies that can authenticate and secure any transaction that is out there. So, for me, it just selfishly, I would just be wanting things to be more efficient. Yes, I can speak more broadly about the power of digital currencies writ large, the democratization of finance, people not being subjected to middlemen and exorbitant wire transfer fees and so on and so forth.
But just putting all of that aside, I am a someone who has a little kid. My mom and dad told me my favourite song was Money, Money, Money by Abba. Right. It's been me since I was a kid.

Saviano

And like a premonition.

Morales

I like I know. I like money. That's, like, fun of me. I want it to work faster. I want it to work better. I want it to be more helpful for people. And I think the CBDC is just one solution to bring the power of digital currency to everyone and to make their lives better. Financial inclusion.

Saviano

Financial inclusion. They certainly help on inclusion and certainly helps on the transparency. And we look at how do you look at existing commerce today?
And if you could replace those financial systems with even programable central bank digital currencies that we think are incredibly effective. That also requires a certain amount of connectivity and collaboration across multiple stakeholders. And I also think as we emerge from the pandemic, we're at a time where perhaps there'll be an opportunity for greater integration and collaboration to improve societies as a result of what we've all been through.
Do you think that the multi-stakeholder nature of blockchain is one that we need new governance models in order to develop solutions there?

Morales

I definitely think that it can be a good roadmap for the way that different systems and governance models are suggested in the future. As you know, blockchain is still very, very young. You can argue that a lot of the companies that are focused on decentralized systems are still quite centralized themselves. In terms of the number of developers that they have focused on it, the influencers in the market that are working on it. I think it's hard to say how many distributed ledgers or blockchains out there are truly out in the wild, shared by absolutely everyone and governed by absolutely everyone. But I think what's also important as we look at the capabilities of a blockchain and system today is thinking about as well what systems may not be organized yet, could very well take advantage of a blockchain structure for tomorrow. What do I mean by that? It could be very hard to change our current financial infrastructure for everyone that talks about defi to be honest with you, I'm not that large of a fan, I'm not a fan of removing any central bank anytime soon. But if we think about a future of things of connected devices that not only communicate but will be trading and transacting with each other, that's a world where you could say a blockchain completely makes sense.
Having shared information about everything that's happening on a system makes sense. There is no central bank of things, but these things are going to become economic entities. And this is an area if we look into the future like, well, how can we prepare for that? How can institutions reinvent themselves to meet that? What can we learn to go forward and make sure that that can be successful?

Saviano

It's a good way to put it. I'm a fan of belts and suspenders systems to start. It's hard to imagine just turning off existing fiat currency systems. And in one day you're going to turn on the central bank digital currency. These are complex solutions. What are some of the challenges with in particular getting governments to reinvent themselves with innovative technology?

Morales

I can speak as someone who grew up in the government, right? As I mentioned, my father was in the State Department, so even though I've never been a public official myself, I've also spent a lot of my career focused on policy issues related to capital markets. And even as a venture investor, I often say I would not be a good investor if I didn't spend at least a fifth of my time focusing on regulation and policy.
It is very, very challenging. I think governments can be this has got us on track. Governments can be bureaucracies. Now, governments or bureaucracies can be very, very bureaucratic and hard to get things done. Emerging technologies as well are usually not at the top of the priority list for many governments to achieve, there's a lack of awareness and education about what these things can do, and yet the governments hold so much power in terms of regulation and legislation to make something successful.
So, it's very hard when you're trying to educate at the same time protect the growth of nascent technologies from a government that doesn't prioritize them and yet feels like and yet has so much power over them. Does that make any sense?

Saviano

It does make sense. Do you think that the government’s policies are keeping pace with the accelerated development of innovative tech or perhaps lagging a bit?

Morales

Absolutely not keeping pace, just not. And what makes the situation in the United States even more challenging is, as many people say know, the spaghetti bowl of different regulators that we have is very head spinning where you'll have, for example, recently one arm of the U.S. government and the Treasury having a statement around digital currencies. And you have another part saying another, which is quite, quite different and unless there some type of coordinated and thoughtful approach, certainly in the United States about emerging technologies and where we are, you'll never catch up.
It's funny for me as someone who's been involved in the digital currency and blockchain space since 2014. For me and I consider myself somewhat of an expert now, I call myself a member of the silent generation in the blockchain space I feel that old I look at the new developments coming out today. I'm like, I barely understand this.

Saviano

It's moving very quickly.

Morales

It's moving so fast. And so, if you have a regulator who's now just or a legislator who's just trying to get a hold of this now, it's going to be incredibly hard to catch up.

Saviano

It's not always so easy to categorize policies as either a carrot or a stick. You're talking about the stick of regulation. I do think that there's the corollary to look at the carrots, what are the incentive mechanisms that governments can provide, where the good fortune of having a delegation from Scotland came into our lab at EY. And Minister Ivan McKee from Scotland, a Minister of Innovation, spent some time with us. And I was so inspired by steps that they were taking to create an environment for innovation, not just to look to heavily regulate the stick of regulation, but to create incentive mechanisms and a place for companies to come to attract. How do you attract industry and universities and these diverse ecosystems to solve problems in new ways?
Do you think that's a role of government too Rumi, to incentivize the development of technology like this? Or do you think that they should just stick to regulation?

Morales

I think it's good to encourage people to let them know that they can innovate. It is not just about regulation. But it should not be about also saying that we I'm not sure how much it's fair that governments can be the one to encourage people to use their imaginations, people will use their imaginations regardless, I think. But to know that there is a space for them and that they are welcome there. I remember a couple of years ago going to a rather large fintech conference in London, and there was a welcoming message from Prime Minister David Cameron at the time, the night before, like Prince Charles sent an email saying, Welcome to this country.

Saviano

Oh, my gosh.

Morales

And I thought, Hey, Prince Charles supports FinTech. And I kind of laughed about it, but I thought, hey, you know what? That's really nice. You know, that's nice. Well, let us know, hey, we're welcome here. We can innovate here and we're supported and just feeling that the sense that you are welcome makes a big difference to someone wanting to build your business in your country, in your state or in your city.

Saviano

Is this a burning platform for governments as they emerge from the pandemic? Do you think that if it's not that it should be at the national let's just take the national level.
Certainly, you have subnational governments making great advancements, sometimes even faster. Look at what's happening in the US, sometimes the states laboratories of democracy. The states are faster to innovate, but just to stick with national governments. Do you think that this really should be a burning platform for those governments?

Morales

It can be, but it's in competition with a number of other burning platforms. I don't think anyone disagrees that it's good to innovate and build new businesses. But it's also important to focus on climate change. It's also important to focus on diversity, equity and racial inclusion. It's very important to do any number of things that no one will disagree with.

Saviano

Yeah. It's a hard time.

Morales

Beneficial for society right.

Saviano

There's a lot to do. It's hard to make it a priority. Yeah, there's a lot, especially now that the role of government leaders. These are complicated issues.
Rumi, this has been such a great conversation. Just ask you to as we get closer, unfortunately to the close of our time today, just ask you to think about the members of our audience who may be struggling with some aspects of the pandemic.
Imagine you're a small business owner or you're an industry that was very affected by the crisis. You own a restaurant or you're working in hospitality. What advice do you have about how to get started and think about reinvention? You know, perhaps that, you know, in your heart that you need to do something different, but those first steps can be difficult.
What advice would you have for people in that situation?

Morales

I don't mean to get corny, and I hope this doesn't sound too, too, too corny, but know that you are loved by someone somewhere. I cannot tell you.

Saviano

It's good advice to me.

Morales

Desperate situations I've been in and I just felt like as long as I felt someone cared about me, I was going to be okay. The second one is just having faith in the experiences that have taken you to this point because those experiences will take you ahead. And then the third is, all right, now go out there put yourself out there. No, no toe dipping, plunge right in and out there. And it's okay if you fail, right. It's okay. It's okay if people don't like this new you, you have to put yourself out there.
But beyond that, the things that we've talked about and the bio that you read about me, I was a Hollywood producer at one point. I made some movies. I have been a lounge singer in Hong Kong the day I was laid off from my job at a major investment bank of the Global Financial Crisis. I got a singing gig two days later.

Saviano

Now, wait a minute, now we're, we're, we're 42 minutes into the interview, and I can't wait to talk to our crack research staff after interview today. How did we miss that? Can you run that by us again? You were a Hollywood producer and you are a lounge singer. Okay. Start with the Hollywood production. What did you, what were you into?
What did you produce?

Morales

So, this was when I was working with the Malaysian in London. Like many Malaysians who wanted to finance a Hollywood film, this movie was called 100% and was actually all it was a cast of all Asian Americans in a storyline that had nothing to do with being Asian American. So, I really appreciated that as someone who's half Japanese myself, it kind of performed in the Indie circuit, you know, it did what it did and it was a fun experience.

Saviano

So, it was produced?

Morales

It produced and you and you had it.

Saviano

And was this when you were 21-22?

Morales

Yes, it was, yeah.

Saviano

That's amazing. So, you had that experience in Hollywood.
That's a good reinvention story. How did you figure out how to do that? Did you look to mentors in any books that you found?
I think it's such a good example, Rumi. what did you do when you were faced with that? How did you even know how to get started?

Morales

My boss at the time told me, You know, you're able to give advice sometimes without having been through an experience yourself. So, for example, I don't know if, for example, if you may have counselled someone whose father was shot, your father's probably never been shot, but you probably have some advice to give. Something within you knows what to add.
It was very similar here. No, I never produced a high movie before, but there's something within me that thought, well, I have some value that I can add here to make a situation work to help someone along the way. So that was my approach to it.

Saviano

Okay. Now, I don't know anything about the lounge singing. Can I make a guess at the genre?
I'll bet you were a jazz singer.

Morales

Yes, I was a jazz singer.

Saviano

Really? I got that right. You did? I'm so happy.

Morales

I'll tell you something. In Hong Kong, the Great American Songbook sounds a little funny. I sung in a Cantonese accent. So, with a lot of the jazz music that they like to hear, it was helpful to have someone who could really convey the words.
And I enjoyed that experience. Again, it was something, and I was always moonlighting through my financial career. By the way, but this was one where, again, because I was laid off three days later, I had a gig in a shopping mall in Hong Kong and I was like, it wasn't forever. Right? I'm not a Hong Kong singer today, but this goes to the broader point of reinvention.
Like I felt I was loved by someone somewhere and the confidence to be able to do it, and I just went for it.

Saviano

And you took that first step. And I think it's I have to say, that's not the advice I thought you would get, but I love it. I love how you phrased it. I think you made it really personal.
Everybody needs help from somebody. When you're going through a tough time like that, you need to be able to lean on somebody and know that that you've got somebody in your life. So, I really do appreciate that advice and I appreciate the end of it. I appreciate that, that you need to just take that step.
I think your career Rumi, I look at all of the really interesting things that you have done. It's a story of reinvention of not just yourself, but the organizations that you work with. And now I can't wait to when we're finally we're outside of our homes, we can leave our virtual Better Innovation studio. I can't wait to your next gig.
When's your next lounge singing gig?

Morales

Now you probably just hear me teaching home-schooling my kids for their music class at home. Right. But I will let you know and invite you and your audience for sure.

Saviano

Well, Rumi, at the end of our interviews, we'd like to conclude our beta innovation interviews with some rapid-fire questions, kind of a fun way for us to ask some really fast questions and give your first impression answer.
What do you think? You up for it?

Morales

I'm up for it.

Saviano

Okay. All right. I think you are, too. All right, here we go. First question, what book do you have on your nightstand? That's a softball.

Morales

The Perils of Peace. It's called The Perils of Peace. And this is about what happened to America after Yorktown. So, after the Battle of Yorktown, once you finish that, how do you actually achieve the nation of the United States? It wasn't easy, right from 1783 to 1787, like what happened in that intervening in those intervening years before we had the Constitution. That's a pretty cool book. I'm only halfway through right now. Oh, that is good. It's so interesting. I'm rereading Give and Take by Adam Grant's. You've probably heard of Adam Grant, University of Pennsylvania. Wharton School professor.
And he gave an example of Lincoln in his early years ends the elections that he lost and the failed starts and the difficulties that he had. And I was I was so inspired by another historical figure but how he dealt with adversity. And so, I, I appreciate that, that's awesome. Okay. That's the first one. You're on a roll.
All right. Number 2 tell us about a historical figure that you admire.

Morales

I absolutely admire Mahatma Gandhi. Hands down.

Saviano

You didn't even pause yet. I couldn't get the words out of my mouth. And you why do you say Gandhi?

Morales

There are very few people on this earth who I feel are completely unique and have done something that's never been done before and he is one of them.
And to be able to gain independence for your nation without violence I don't think had been seen before. And just the magnitude and the inspiration of his own inspiration and how it continues to motivate people today is also just a tremendous legacy. So, I'm 100% in for Gandhi.

Saviano

Do you find yourself thinking about Gandhi when you work with the non-profit you mentioned and others?

Morales

All the time.
Yes. That one line be the change you wish to see in the world. I love it. That's my guiding my love it.

Saviano

Okay, here we go. Last question. What do you see as our greatest opportunity to build back stronger when we finally emerge from the pandemic? Listening to each other? I think a lot of the pandemic is obviously causing a lot of problems.
People have mental health issues. Listen to them. Pandemic is creating a lot of opportunities and ideas. Listen to those. We've got a lot of toxicity in our political system right now as we know. We have to listen to each other listen to our neighbours, to our communities. We cannot have happened what happened, you know, on January 6th again.
But I think that requires listening openly to each other, not just to the facts you want to hear, but to the facts shared by your friends and your community.
I think it's great advice. And I was wondering if you may say blockchain, you didn't, you gave a much better and deeper answer to that question. And it's hard to argue with that Rumi. I think we all need to do that society. It has been a difficult even past few weeks.
Well, I want to thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I've really enjoyed our conversation and maybe I'll end it how we began. You'll come back again someday, maybe when we can do it live in a studio,

Morales

If this is an invitation now, the answer is yes. Absolutely.

Saviano

Maybe we'll do it. I have an idea. Maybe right after your lounge singing act. Maybe like when you come off stage, we could interview you when you come off stage. How's that? I think that would be great. Be sure to invite all your friends, make sure they're very supportive and very, very kind with their compliments.
Wonderful. Will do. Rumi, thank you so much. Thank you. It's been a pleasure.

Presenters

Jeffrey Saviano

EY Global Emerging Technology Strategy & Governance Leader

Podcast

Episode 2

Duration

43m 40s

EY refers to the global organization, and may refer to one or more, of the member firms of Ernst & Young Global Limited, each of which is a separate legal entity. Ernst & Young Global Limited, a UK company limited by guarantee, does not provide services to clients.

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How reinvention can help survive disruptions through innovative technologies

Presenters

Jeffrey Saviano