Former Commerce Secretary Gutierrez on Leadership, AI, and America’s Role In the World

0:00Hello and welcome to Future Commerce, the podcast at the intersection of culture and commerce. I'm Phillip. I'm Brian. And for most of the last century, commerce was the cabinet seat that nobody fought over. It runs the Weather Service, the Patent Office, the Census, and maybe once every 10 years or so, someone like Milton Friedman comes along and says we should abolish it. But today, the modern Department of Commerce has taken on a brand new role. Commerce sets tariffs on America's closest trading partners. It controls or prevents the export of chips that power the artificial intelligence that both our allies and our adversaries are using.

0:32And as of this year, the U.S. trade representative reports to it. And our next guest held the seat of the U.S. Secretary of Commerce from 2005 to 2009, what he calls the peak of globalization and free trade. And before that, he ran the Kellogg Company, a business that he joined at the age of 21 in Mexico City, selling cereal out of a van. And he went on to become the youngest chief executive in that company's 100-year history. And his memoir, Sheer Will, Learning to Lead Where There Is No Path, is published by St. Martin's Press. Will be available on October 6th. Carlos Gutierrez, welcome to Future Commerce.

1:07Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. A pleasure to be here. Thank you. Glad to have you. Thanks for having me. Really glad to have you. And I know that you're heading to Canada next month on a commission for U.S.-Canada relations. We're in the midst of more tariff conversations with our neighbors to the north. What is that conversation you're going to be walking into? Well, you know, we're going to have, I think, some explaining to do, although there's a sense that this is an administration that has its focus on tariffs and trade equality and things of that nature. So we're going to have to manage through this.

1:46It's not going to be quick. We've had a great relationship with Canada. I lived in Canada for almost two years. I ran the Kellogg business in Canada, and I loved it. Canadians are, they go out of their way to let us know that they're not Americans. They're very proud. They're very proud of their independence. They're very proud of their country. So when President Trump talked about the 51st state, there isn't a bigger insult, a bigger provocation than that. You know, that's the national nightmare, that they be considered or that they be a 51st state. So extremely sensitive. The important thing here is that these are tactics, right?

2:34We have to assume that the president is using tactics to be able to achieve what he wants to achieve in trade policy. The moment we let this filter into a strategic posture where Canada continues to change its posture towards China, continues to diversify its commerce to the point where we're affected. So I think that's the thing. The president's doing what he has to do or what he thinks he has to do. as long as this doesn't come a strategic realignment of interest, then we can get through this. These are tactics and this is one more fight. But it's hard to watch because from the Canadian standpoint, they're wondering why they don't really get it.

3:21But I believe that this too shall pass. Some of these problems like softwood lumber, dairy, they've been around for 30, 40 years. So we've been arguing about this for 30, 40 years. President believes he can change it. I hope this works. But again, let's not let this turn into a new relationship. Those were issues when you were seated, right? That's correct. Yeah. That's correct. Yeah. How have things changed since that when you got confirmed? How's ongoing trade with Canada and also with Mexico sort of shifted? I would imagine when you sat down, it was kind of a different environment, or was it?

4:01Oh, yeah, no, it was. It was. The vision, the whole attitude was, let's build a North American fortress powerhouse so that we can compete with the world. And we were talking about having a free trade area of the Americas. So a free trade area that would go from Canada to Argentina. And there was a lot of enthusiasm about that. Again, the peak of globalization. And frankly, we were winning. Our exports were going 12 percent. We were doing fine. I'm not saying we're not doing fine. We were doing fine. But with the standards, the way we evaluate these relationships have changed We're looking at Mexico, we're thinking about the trade deficit with Mexico That's the wrong standard The strategy is that Mexico provides us with low-cost equipment, machinery So that we can compete with the rest of the world So that's part of the strategy But as soon as we say Mexico has to deliver on the trade deficit, they have to reduce their trade deficit, then that kind of a relationship just goes out the window.

5:14It doesn't exist anymore. And Mexico now becomes just like another trading partner. And that, I think that's a mistake. That's a strategic mistake. Because Mexico as it is, the production powerhouse that it is, is an advantage for us as long as we use it that way. And then, of course, Canada, we've got everything from cars to planes to, you know, we rely on Canada. And the idea that we can survive without them, sure, we can survive without them, but we will be weaker. So I would hope that this gets back on track, especially with Mexico, because right now there's just a lot of uncertainty with Mexico.

5:55and the country's not doing well, the economy's not doing well, and they really, really need a boost of business investment. I'm surprised in reading through the book and how much of the role is centered around trade and foreign trade and how much of the relationship comes down to you sitting in a room having conversations with other counterparts in commerce and foreign ministers. How much of your experience running Kellogg, especially like the Canadian business at Kellogg, informs that level of diplomatic relations and being able to have that conversation, sit in the room and speak on that level?

6:41And what do we get wrong from a government affairs and trade perspective that you believe your business acumen helped you to bring to that government role? Yeah, there are, you know, a lot of things that we did to align business interests with the Department of Commerce with what we do. The Department of Commerce is the representative of business and government, right? So Department of Labor represents labor, education represents the occasion. Commerce represents business. So it's a conglomerate. We have trade, international trade, of course, but we have the Patent and Trademark Office. All of the patents in the country are issued by the Commerce Department.

7:26We have NOAA, which is a bit odd, but that's the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration. Fisheries, everything having to do with oceans. The story is that that used to belong to the Department of Interior. President Nixon got mad at them and he decided to shift it to commerce. So it's at commerce. It's 80 % of commerce, the commerce budget, 80 % of the people, but 15, 20 % of my time. That takes up a lot of what commerce is. The Census Bureau, extremely political because this is when you get down to redistricting and how do people draw districts and who is living what, It's a very political exercise.

8:15Today, because of the way the administration is managed, it's managed like a company. The president is a CEO. He gives directions. He makes decisions. And people are expected to execute. That doesn't take into account the vast bureaucracy that exists in Washington, where really the executives can't make too many decisions because they have to go through Congress. That's the one thing that President Trump has changed. He has rewritten the rule book on that. He is making decisions. His people are executing and not necessarily going through the process. And so far, this is the big change. So far, it has worked.

8:58Some things have been backtracked, but it has worked. And what President Trump has done is kind of redefine the job of the CEO of the executive branch. It's no longer tied to what Congress will allow me to do. You know, the idea that my hands are tied because that's the way the Constitution wants it. All of a sudden, the president is showing that his hands really aren't tied, that a president can make these types of decisions. Now, will that turn into a new executive branch, a new all-powerful executive branch? I doubt it, because the backlash will be strong from the left. But there's no question that the way the executive branch is run today is more like a corporation and less like the government.

9:52Does that make the Commerce Secretary the chief revenue officer today? I think the big thing, as you said, the big change in commerce is that USTR reports to commerce. Yeah. That is massive because USTR has a lot of power on its own. And there are things that commerce does and USTR does. And USTR had a lot of clout in the actual negotiations. So now that USTR reports to commerce, commerce is, yeah, all powerful. I hadn't thought of the chief revenue officer because, you know, you've got the Treasury Department. By the way, the Patent and Trademark Office is the only profitable agency in government because you have to pay for your patents.

10:33But sure, you know, the revenue we brought in, we were growing exports 12, 14 percent, which is a huge thing for a country our size. But, yeah, it's a conglomerate and the Commerce Secretary will be as powerful as the president wants him or her to be. Holiday starts early on Walmart Marketplace. Apply to sell and get your inventory to Walmart Fulfillment Services by September 15th to prepare for millions of holiday shoppers. That's right, build your seasonal assortment with something called customer favorites. That's products that Walmart customers already love and they are actively searching for.

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11:58I'm surprised, you know, they're actually using the innovation that happens at NIST actually within the department now. AI is helping them get ahead of the backlog, historic backlog at USPTO. I think there's a lot of real innovation happening at the department now. I think it's part of one of those things that you just don't hear a lot about. I'm just curious. We talked a lot about how the department's changed from the 2005 era. You had one version of the job, then Gina Raimondo steps in. We're in the Howard Lutnick era. We've talked about the through line. If the job and the job description existed the way that it is today, do you think you still would have taken the job so readily?

12:39Absolutely. I would have loved it because, you know, it's one of the problems that CEOs have in Washington is they think that being at commerce, for example, is you're the CEO of commerce and you do what you want. It really isn't that way. And you need a certain amount of humility and understand that you you're going to learn. You don't know everything. And that's one of the problems with D.C. is that you don't expect the tremendous bureaucracy that will be holding you back No one in government has accountability for everything of any topic For example, climate change Commerce was one of 11 agencies that have responsibility over climate change So who's in charge of climate change?

13:28Nobody really Homeland security There are dozens and dozens of agencies That do law enforcement It is, you know, organizationally It's a real mess And so the executive branch is You know, the execution The executive part of the branch Is held back by all these regulations Established by Congress And I think what Trump is doing is I'm going to run this the way I ran a line job, the way I ran a company. I'm going to make decisions and people execute, and if we run into bureaucracy, well, we'll fix it then. It's going to be interesting future presidents to have to live with that idea that Trump proved that you can do things, that your hands really aren't tied.

14:18It'll be fascinating to watch. Do you feel like there are other things then that the Commerce Department should take responsibility for that they don't have responsibility for now? Well, you mentioned NIST, which I think is an amazing place, several Nobel Prize winners, and that's where GPS was discovered, for example. I've always thought USTR was a great idea because, again, by keeping them separate, it just creates an obstacle. It creates bureaucracy. It creates time constraints. It just, you know, bureaucracy and more hands and more centralization and decision, it doesn't work. And that's why government has these issues.

15:05So yeah, USTR reporting to commerce, I think is pretty enlightened from an organization point of view. I think that's probably where commerce should focus on Trade and having USTR will give it a lot of clout So I agree with that But I had several times I had one senator call me to his office To ask me if I would Since I came from the business world Why don't we just get rid of the Department of Commerce You know about these things, Mr. Secretary and I had the impression that, you know, it was all about posturing. I don't think this senator was really thinking about, we're going to close down the Commerce Department, but it's more about I'm going to announce that I'm trying to close down the Commerce Department so people can see that I'm concerned about expenses and government and taxes and things like that.

16:05I just said, I'm sorry, I didn't come here to close down the department. I'm here to promote exports and thank you very much. And I just left, but it's, it's Washington. Fascinating scene in the book. Yeah. Oh, that's right. I, did you read the book? Yeah. I was very impressed. I mean, you, you're like, uh, you know, you went through, uh, just about every chapter. Thank you. No, thank you. I think it's, uh, it's rare to get this sort of inside look. Um, and, uh, and fascinating story. I think leading with the, the commerce story is really interesting way to approach it for this particular audience.

16:38I do think it's interesting that you move into your entrepreneurial phase later on, but I think it's hard for us to get away from AI right now in the news. You're co-founder of Empath, which is an AI business. Could you tell us a little bit about that and tell us a little bit about your current stance on AI and where you think economically AI is going. I think right now, I think GMV is being propped up by a lot of the infrastructure spending. But what say you? So Empath essentially used AI, used machine learning to infer employee skills in big companies. So if you give us information on the employee the performance review be wonderful, anything they've written, just we can, through our model, we can infer the skills of that employee and the proficiency levels.

17:43So in accounting, in financial analysis, you are a three. That's pretty good. With incredible accuracy, We had like 90, 95 % accuracy. We found that people have about 20, 25 skills. Most people think they have three or four skills. And that's the frustrating part, that there are people sitting in organizations that have skills that are needed, but they don't know they have them. The company doesn't know that person has them. They may not even know they need them. So we're probably a little bit ahead of our time. We sold the business to the University of Phoenix. And I was so glad I was able to keep the business alive.

18:21It was my first startup. But this is the future. At the end of the day, it's what you can do. It's skills. And more and more, we're beginning to see that university degrees don't guarantee results. So I think in that regard, we are a bit ahead of our time. I think AI is wonderful.

18:45I think we're lucky to be around at this time. I know it's scary for a lot of people, and I think every innovation has always been scary. Cars were probably scary. They can go so fast. Why don't we stick around and stay with horses? I think this is the future. We're going to have some issues. But what's happening today, it's interesting. Employment has not been declining as people thought. A lot of CEOs are saying, look, yes, AI is going to help productivity, but it's not so easy to say, let's get rid of five lawyers and replace them with AI. It just doesn't work that way. There are too many instances where you need human judgment, where you need intuition, where you need a gut feel.

19:32And I think companies are beginning to find that out. I worry about the politics. You know, we're competing with China. It's an important competition, important race. They do whatever they want. They do it very well and they do it very quickly. And, you know, now we have this backlash against data centers. People have the right to be concerned, but my concern is that it becomes an ideological issue. It's not data centers. It's big business. It's these billionaires who are making all this money and running away with, you know, and building these data centers that are going to pollute and grow our need for energy.

20:16It's just going to destroy our way of life. I think that is very dangerous. I think that's political. It's ideological. I think it's an anti-business posture. And that's going to be one of our big challenges. to how do we compete in AI when we have maybe half or more than half percent of the population who are saying we don't need this yeah it seems like uh well generally the stock market agrees with you uh anthropic uh looking pretty good um and uh I think the question is right now there's a lot of money and there's a lot of expectation around AI. And is there some danger in how much expectation about what AI can accomplish for us?

21:05Is there a bubble at hand? Yeah, I think there'll be a correction. It's hard to get the balance between supply and demand perfectly right. We're moving so quickly with these data centers. My understanding is we need about two and a half trillion of new revenue to offset the cost of the data centers. That doesn't sound that wild, but it's a lot of new revenue that has to come.

21:35I think that there will be a point where you have to say, we have to slow down because demand is not growing as fast as we thought. And there'll be some correction. We'll have to manage through it. We'll have to balance investments. But long term, this is, you know, until something else comes along, this is the future and this is the most exciting thing that's happened. And we can be afraid of it, but my goodness, there's so much to be grateful for in terms of this time. I hear Elon Musk talk and I think he's too optimistic. but you know he he he can convey what is possible you know gdp growth of 100x well maybe it's not 100x but you may be able to do 7x or 10x um you know there are opportunities here what i tell people in businesses is be a champion you know don't sit around saying oh i i forget about it you're not you're not going to stop it be a champion get into it and be part of what's happening.

22:42I do believe though that leadership is important in the era of AI because AI is not going to be able to motivate people, judgment, decision-making, gut feel, intuition. Those are the things that I believe will become more and more important for executives and for leaders. I think that the question really on a lot of people's minds is this widening income gap, not just in the job loss and sort of the fears around that. I think that we're starting to see data there to your earlier point. But the technology, the Sam Altmans of the world, the Elon Musks of the world stand to benefit in a way that the prior tech founders just didn't.

23:34It's this power law exponential curve that seems to be favoring this K-shaped economy in a way that we've never seen before. I think the question is really like what we've said on this podcast in prior eras is there's living above the algorithm. And I now feel like there's this something emerging where people are instinctively starting to feel really concerned about whether they have a choice to work with or without this technology in their life. So when we are starting to think, Carlos, about how the U.S. maintains its dominance and how it maintains its lead on the world stage, we have to win at AI.

24:21Can export controls work? Can we continue to utilize those? I mean, you say in the book, I think you make a really good point, China got DeepSeek and BYD under sanctions. Um, how, how do we maintain that advantage while still maintaining all of the other things we need, like cybersecurity? Yeah, I think that, um, we have placed too much emphasis on, on sanctions, tariffs, you know, sort of a punishment. And that's been the core of our strategy. I recall, you know, several years ago, our secretary of state would run around the world trying to convince people not to buy Huawei products. Don't buy from China.

25:05Don't get involved in the Belt and Road Initiative. But things move on, and the Belt and Road Initiative continues to grow, and those efforts have not been successful. I think that our strategy needs to be, let's out-innovate China. And this is where ideological philosophy comes in, the private sector. We are leading in AI, there's no question. And why is that? It's because of the private sector. And that is our model That isn't China's model And my concern is that we are changing our model Without thinking through how we are changing it And why we are changing it The Chinese don't have any immigration It's like 0.2, 0.3 % of the population was born outside of China But that's not their model They don't want immigration It's centralized It's a big tribe of 1.4 billion people They all work hard They all work for the big cause Our system is different It's individuals, it's immigration It's immigrants who come with a dream And hungry to prosper And we can't have that change or weaken And I worry about the immigration posture I hope it doesn't get to that point But you look at Silicon Valley's Big 7 How many of those big seven, MAG-7, are being run by immigrants?

26:35So I just think we need to understand what is our model? How do we do things? How do we make – how are we different from China? Let's double down on who we are and let's not be confused. And all this politics around data centers, around AI, I think can get us very confused. I think this is a really interesting point. I think, you know, future commerce, one of the things we like to say is commerce is culture. and that by engaging in commerce, you're actually exchanging identity with each other and sort of taking on the pieces of each other that actually make each other special and making it a part of who you are.

27:17And I think immigration has a lot of that, actually. It's sort of part of taking on identity and the reverse. one of the things you said in your chapter which you titled trade which i thought was really interesting was that in order for regions to move on from communism they needed to embrace commerce which is actually kind of an interesting setup like you normally would sort of say democracy is the antidote to communism but you actually picked commerce and i think this is super interesting in the context of sort of a larger AI race with China. How do we sort of go win hearts and minds and sort of shift how people think about how to engage with the broader world?

28:11It's actually not sort of like shutting down and closing in. It's actually opening up and looking out and engaging with people and trading with them. And so in the context of technology and this AI race, how do you see commerce playing a role in that process? Obviously, we talked a little bit about embargoes and tariffs, but is there a way to take the private sector and incent them or sort of provide opportunity for them to go out and use technology to help facilitate commerce? Yeah, that's a great question. It also comes back to kind of ideological. Our companies, our private sector, they're the best thing we have.

29:00And we do have a foreign commercial service, which does great work. We have foreign commercial services officers in every embassy, and they're there to help U.S. companies. I love that work. I used to call them the the country's sales force. So we do a lot of that, but we're still reluctant. We are reluctant capitalists. We're reluctant to go too far, reluctant to embrace these trillion-dollar companies. We're not as committed as other people may think. Yes, we are capitalists, but we are reluctant. We're sometimes a bit ashamed of it. I hope we can change that. I hope leaders can change that in the future.

29:48I hope the president can change that. The understanding that without business, we would be nothing. And boy, when we flirt with socialism and let's get it, I just think we're really walking down a very dangerous path. If you run operations or fulfillment at a growing brand, you already know this to be true. The customer just does not care where the marketing department ends its journey and the operations team takes over. Because if the order arrives late or maybe tracking is not updating or the unboxing experience does not live up to their expectations, that is a brand level problem. And usually that becomes your problem because that is your job.

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31:56And you're also bringing American ideals and your export of business prowess into those other businesses. It's sort of like a sympathetic. My read is that there's this sympathetic relationship between the improvement of those business units, between what you are bringing to the table. And also you're learning something in exchange as well. Um, that seems like a bit of a microcosm from, for what we're exploring between this idea of commerce and culture. Um, one of those examples is, uh, you beginning in Mexico. I'd love a little what Kellogg assumed about the Mexican consumer, uh, the Mexican worker, how that was wrong and what I write in the book about that.

32:45Yeah. Yeah. In terms of the Mexican consumer and the Mexican market, we found what so many other multinationals have found is that Mexico is a wonderful market. It's just a great market. Consumers are very brand loyal. Margins are good. There's not the level of competition that there is here. So it's a wonderful market. The thing about Mexico is the perception of the people, the workers. I had the experience of of dealing with the workers in Mexico, we understood that we couldn't turn the plant around without having the workers on our side. I think it starts there. These people operate the machinery.

33:30They know what the problem is. So we set out to try to get them on our side. It worked. And what I learned is Mexican workers, if motivated, if they trust their leaders, they can do what any other worker can do. It's just a matter of, I think it's leadership and trusting. And, you know, for so many decades, they have been taught and they have experienced that they shouldn't trust these business leaders. They're just in it for themselves. They're not, they don't care about me. So to try to change that perception and say, we do care about you, you're part of the team. And if we do well, you'll do even better.

34:08And that's what happened. So I was very proud of that. And I have the soft spot for Mexican workers. And I think it's just a, it's an approach. You know, you hang around with your team in the ivory tower, or you get out and talk to the people who are doing the work. I prefer the latter. And it worked for me in spades in Mexico. You take, I think, a similar approach when you go to Australia as well, right? I think, yeah. I'm curious, do your tactics change as you're rising through the ranks of Kellogg? I'm curious your mindset as you're growing through the company, as the company's growing, there's an overarching narrative about the change of the American globalization.

34:56And also as businesses are becoming more data-driven. You seem to be driven a lot by instinct. And I'm curious if your point of view works today in a very performance marketing oriented and very data-driven world. It seems to cut against a lot of the best practices that we're hearing. Sure, sure. There are still a lot of global organizations out there. The big consumer companies, Procter & Gamble, they have a global organization, global brands, and I'm sure they've made adjustments. It's like a dial. You always have to be finding the right balance between being global and being local. And every company is doing that.

35:38And nobody has found the right balance yet. And it's daily management. I found that we were beginning to believe our own theories about a world that was supposed to exist, but wasn't really there. A global consumer, the same ad campaign for every country. Why do we need marketing people in every country if we have ad campaigns that are global and we have global brands? So in that mindset, after a while, these countries are stripped down to a sales force, a PR person, a government affairs. I didn't like that. That doesn't attract the best people. I don't think we are competitive when everything is run out of the center.

36:27You're not as competitive in Mexico or in Germany or in UK or in Australia on the ground. So I try to find that balance. I'm very suspicious when only several people have the P &L responsibility. And I found that in this global organization, three or four people manage the P &L. I wanted 40, 50 people to go to sleep worrying about the P &L, not just me. So that was, look, that was my philosophy, the data-driven aspect. We were spending money on technology that would give us advantageous data about cost, about logistics, about the consumer. But we're a packaged goods company. We're not a software company.

37:15And it's very easy to get caught up in the rhetoric and the buzzwords in a meeting room. Everything sounds logical. So I just found that it had reached its peak. And we needed to go back to something that worked, something that worked on a local level, something that worked on a business level. And it worked for us. Maybe had we been a car company, then the globalization, the global organization has to be, but not for a packaged goods company that does business around the world. So really like understanding each culture, having people in those cultures take the lead and be able to connect with them at the level that they can actually absorb the information that you're in marketing that you're bringing to them and engage with the product on their own terms.

38:10Yeah, you know, there's the balance you bring. I brought the global experience when I went to Asia, for example. But it's obvious they want to do things in Asia the way Asians do it. So it's the balance, right? It's an everyday management. judgment. But the idea that there's one solid answer, and this is the way it has to be, I do worry about, we send a lot of executives and companies today, you see them all over the world. There are executives, there are expats everywhere. And some of those are on their first assignments. They're in China in their first assignment, or in Japan, or in Mexico. And it's tough.

38:50It's not as easy as saying, I'm going to show them locally how we do it at the head office, because that's the way it should be done. And boy, a lot of time, a lot of productivity, a lot of missed motivation, where people just don't feel motivated by someone who doesn't understand their culture. So, boy, cultural experience, cultural literacy, for me, It was so important being able to deal with Japanese on the way they'd like it, Australia, Mexico. And at the end of the day, I think that is what internationalism is about, is adjusting ourselves to the country, not assuming that the country will adjust themselves to us.

39:36An Asian once told me, a person from Taiwan, he said, look, Carlos, globalization is not Americanization. I thought that was an interesting thing to say. Yeah, and it's interesting too because I think you look at some of the larger retailers and their stores in China. Costco in China is one of their most successful stores. And what that means for them and the approach that Costco takes to those stores. And obviously, we've seen McDonald's and others sort of adjust to the markets. But it still represents America though, I think, in many ways. Yes, yes, yes. And it's so powerful. You know, in companies all over the world, there are locals, Mexico, Argentina, wherever, who joined a U.S.

40:30company. They're getting trained. They're getting developed. They're corresponding with the head office. So they're practicing their English. Once in a while, they get sent to another factory so they can learn some things. They're getting developed. They're growing. that's what happens inside a U.S. company, American companies. People know that. They know that that doesn't happen in local domestic companies. Everyone wants to work for a U.S. company because they love the values. They love the development. They love that they are considered an individual with potential and that the company is willing to give you that benefit of the doubt.

41:06And then, of course, the brands. I mean, everything from Colgate, you look at the market shares around the world, food. Yeah. The other thing, too, is that an advantage we have is we're good managers. We're good leaders. We understand how to manage global companies. Not easy. And I look at Chinese firms who have moved into Mexico, into the U.S., and boy, they they have a lot to learn about managing a company in a foreign country. They just you know, they just don't have the experience. They don't have the processes. They don't have the instincts. So that is an advantage that we haven't really leveraged that much, but it's going to become more and more obvious as Chinese companies go overseas.

41:52Well, we have a lot of brands and retailers that listen to this podcast. And so something we like to do at the end of every episode is ask you a question about how you see the future evolving in the next 18, 36 months. And so, you know, 18 months out from now, Carlos, maybe even 36 months out, maybe that's maybe a little too far. But how do you see the world changing? How do you see commerce changing? How do you see global commerce changing in that next period? I think in terms of global commerce, it's going to take some time to get back to where we were. In fact, I think the idea of getting back to where we were is probably not realistic.

42:37Everything has changed and everything is going to change Politics is going to have a huge impact on commerce Today we have an administration that is very pro-business, which I love But there are a lot of billionaires in Washington And the conditions to be able to criticize The oligarchy, as some like to call it, are perfect You know, the table is set for demagogues to come in and take us to the left. And I think that will happen. That will happen little by little, but it will happen in pockets of the country. There's going to be a backlash, and that's unfortunate. But perhaps this is what we need, a backlash to the right, a backlash to the left.

43:22Let's go find some moderate, sensible place to be. But I think the next 18 to 36 months will be rough. There's a lot of moving parts. There are a lot of things, decisions that have been made that we won't see the impact for 5, 10, or 15 years. But I do believe that 36 months from now, we're going to see a lot of change in the political arena, a lot of the extremes. Interesting, in Europe, we're seeing a move to the right. Here, we're seeing these socialists bubble up. So it's these extremes positions. It's unfortunate, but being in the moderate center is just dull and boring. You know, voters want something else.

44:03So it's not going to be an easy ride. It will not. And we'll be here to cover it. Thank you so much, Carlos. Thank you for joining us. And Carlos Gutierrez, his book is called Shear Will. It is a new memoir, Shear Will, Learning to Lead Where There Is No Path. It's available on St. Martin's Press. That's a Macmillan imprint and it's available on October 6th. And you can pre-order this copy right now, wherever you get your books, Amazon, Barnes, Noble, or wherever your fine booksellers are. Thank you so much for joining us, Carlos. Thank you. A real pleasure. Thanks a lot.