Vivek Wadhwa on building resilience in the age of big tech

Silicon Valley expert Vivek Wadhwa talks about building resilience in an uncertain world with the help of big tech.

Resilience has become the buzzword world of 2021 as business leaders navigate the post-pandemic world.

Distinguished Harvard fellow and Silicon Valley entrepreneur Vivek Wadhwa believes getting into the big tech CEO mindset will help HR leaders understand the impact of technology as we prepare for further change.

“Exponentials happened, the virus happened and it brought us to our knees. This virus did worldwide damage. Technology is accelerating and you have to understand it,” Wadhwa said.

“We had better understand it because how will we know what’s ethical if we don’t understand what’s right and what’s wrong?”

In this exclusive interview with UNLEASH editor Yessi Bello Perez, Wadhwa discusses the difference between CEOs such as Tesla’s Elon Musk and Microsoft‘s Satya Nadella and explains that, while their experiences of resilience and technology may be the same, their values are what sets them apart.

“The difference between leaders lies in ethics and values,” Wadhwa said. “There are the leaders who abuse it and create a surveillance state within their own business. It’s the role of the HR department to convey what’s ethical and what’s legal. You can hide from this stuff or you will become a victim of it, just like the virus.

“This effects our work lives, our personal lives and our future. This is what we need to understand.”

Watch our latest discussion on building resilience as Wadhwa challenges the hybrid and remote working revolution, and delivers insights into formulas and workflow from inside some of the world’s most successful silicon valley names.

Vivek Wadhwa is a distinguished fellow at Harvard Law School’s Labor and Worklife Program and the co-author of From Incremental to Exponential: How Large Companies Can See the Future and Rethink Innovation. Twitter: @wadhwa