S9E8: Tekedra Mawakana Wants to Build the ‘World’s Most Trusted Driver’

29:03In addition to that, it's really, really important to be clear that when we are talking about the Waymo driver, we are only talking about technology that means you don't need a driver's license. You don't need to be behind the wheel. Back in 2012, Waymo had what you would think of as kind of an autopilot product where people, it would take you from ramp to ramp. And we asked employees, they were the only ones who had access to these cars. And we asked employees, pay attention. You know, this is an experiment. Pay attention. Make sure that you're alert. You will have to take over. And what we saw is that people trust the technology beyond its capability.

29:46And so people were like putting on their makeup and shaving and turning around and plugging in things and doing the things they didn't get a chance to do that morning at home, right? That's the whole purpose of giving people this free sort of time back. And so that's when we decided back in 2012, beginning of 2013, that we were only interested in fully autonomous. And so we don't want to be in the situation where we're inviting people to unplug from the driving task and then expecting them to take over at a really, really urgent moment. And the way we think about this is for years and years and years, all of these companies, car companies, everyone, seatbelts, airbags, we've all been patching around the problem.

30:32Because cars are getting safer, but humans are more distracted than ever. So we want at the center of our strategy is humans don't have to worry about the driving task. Humans don't have to have a driver's license. Humans are not sitting behind the wheel. Go be human. Like jam out to your music. Talk to your people. Text who you have to text. Shave if that's the thing you do on your way to work. Like whatever. And they were like men shaving. It wasn't like people shaving. They're like, it was just like a guy shaving. You know, like if those are the things you didn't get the chance to finish doing this morning, then by all means do it.

31:09Just don't also be responsible for driving safely. I mentioned Tesla, but of course you have other competitors as well. Uber, Zoox, to name a few. Why will Waymo win? Is it because of this bet on the Waymo driver technology or is it something else? So I'll answer that question in two ways. I think first and foremost, the reason that we have the lead that we have is because we've had a lot of discipline about safety. And I think that kind of humility and patience that this isn't about how fast you can go. This isn't about how many flags you can plant before everyone else. This is really about building a product that I would put my son in, that I would trust other people to put their kids in.

31:56that proves out its worth and societal benefit. And so I think that kind of rigor and discipline, I'm really proud of because what it does is it says to everyone in the space, this is worth doing. And I think that's the point we are at right now. Like a lot of people are getting involved in scaling and increasing their investment. And I don't mean in Waymo, I mean in these competitive spaces. And so one, I feel like we've done it and that's great. But on the question of long-term, why will we be most successful? I think that's because riders are going to choose. Consumers are going to decide who do they want to ride, who have they grown to trust, and we won't get to decide that.

32:40We're just going to work every single day to not rely on the trust from yesterday, but earn the trust today, earn the trust tomorrow, re-recognize it takes a long time to earn it, not a long time to lose it, And we are committed to the work needed to keep earning trust.

32:59We'll be back with more of Takidra Mawakana after this.

33:22you navigate a rapidly changing world. Just as you would exercise, just as you would worry about your diet, you ought to worry about the place where you work. The trust ultimately has to be with the government, but the government then on its part has to create accountability for all people. These things have real consequences for the welfare of countries and the people that live in them. Join me, Kevin Kuhl, for If Then, a podcast from Stanford GSB, where we explore the forces transforming business and society today. Find If Then on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

34:06I want to talk about the broader implications of this technology. Autonomous vehicles will displace many driving roles. You've said before that new roles will also emerge, but the Uber driver who loses their job today may not be the same person who becomes a fleet technician in the future. How do you think about your responsibility as a leader in navigating that transition? Yeah, it's something we've been spending a lot of time thinking about. We are actually finding through some of our fleet operating partners, so we don't, you know, in some cities, our fleet is run by partners and those partners are hiring people And they've actually been able to take logistics specialists and drivers and move them into depot managers, fleet operators, you know, people who are dispatched to manage the job on an ad hoc basis.

35:02Because when you're talking about people who've been working in gigs, they don't necessarily have eight hours available, but they have time available to be helpful. And so we are actually watching some of our partners be able to do that. We're in the early days, so I don't want to say that that's what we're focused on the most as a company. As a company, there are three things we know to be true. Jobs are going to go away, jobs are going to change, and jobs are going to be here tomorrow that were not here yesterday. The last one we're already seeing, the first one we've already seen evidence in markets where jobs, where we've been there in Phoenix and San Francisco, where the entire pie has grown.

35:44So like the demand for people being driven in San Francisco grew 14%, I'm sorry, 7%, and the wages grew 14 % our first year in San Francisco for cab drivers, limo drivers. And so there is this, as people start to focus on whether or not driving is the safest way to get from point A to point B, as tourists start to flock to cities to have the chance to check out this technology, there are surpluses. And that surplus is actually benefiting traditional jobs. How do I think about our responsibility in it? We have to be in this conversation. This isn't only about Waymo. no, this is about how is autonomy going to shift the world of jobs in the future?

36:33And so this is a conversation that we had it yesterday at our company-wide meeting. We're going to continue to have it. There are studies that are happening right now that are premature for me to talk about, but we're funding those studies. There are job retraining programs. This is an organization called TechForce. We're taking traditional mechanic roles and turning them in to autonomous mechanics. We think that's important. We have a partnership with Bronx Community College where we want to teach the next generation of trade specialists how to work in the autonomous space. So, you know, it's going to be like a building block answer to your question.

37:10But I think we have to, like, just kind of say all the things we're doing. And then hopefully over the next, like, year, there will be these reports that we can put out of, like, that organize all of the data. It's just to, the scale isn't there yet to really talk about it. And we haven't seen the job displacement impact yet. And so that's also really important. There's also another question about access. If Waymo's meaningfully improved safety on the roads, it starts to feel like something everyone should have access to. How do you ensure Waymo's technology isn't just limited to big cities or people who can afford it?

37:48Yeah, that was something we really thought about early, early days. So when we launched in San Francisco and Los Angeles, we sought out, because, you know, in those days we were launching, we didn't go direct to public. We went sort of through early riders. And so we sought out a host of diverse transportation need use cases. And as a result, we ended up with a diverse socioeconomic, racial, location, early riders. And we took that feedback. And one of the things we learned in that was people would really find it useful if Waymo and transit operators had a closer tie. And so in Los Angeles, when we launched, we actually provided a credit for people who were coming from public transit into a Waymo or vice versa to be able to save on their Waymo rides.

38:39And so again, like we are interested because this is about discovery and learning and we have to make sure this technology improves on what exists, isn't just replicating what exists. There's no reason for us to be here if that's all we're doing. And so we feel like one of the ways we earn trust is by listening to communities. How have you been left out of the transportation network? How might we improve that? Not by replacing transit and all of this. No, no, by partnering with them to make sure that we're meeting the needs, that we're getting further out from the center city. Some people are like, it's just so congested.

39:18I'll always be late to work. I work at the hospital. I work overnight. Fine. Let's do a partnership where we do pickups outside of the city and drop offs outside of the city. And then people take public transit to the hospitals in the city center. So these are the conversations that we're having. We don't have all the answers. we receive those answers from the communities in which we operate. In your view, what is the single biggest obstacle to widespread autonomous driving in the United States? In the U.S.? I think, you know, always the question is, is the technology ready? And so if you're talking about cities that have heaps and heaps and mounds of snow, some significant part of many months of the year, I don't think that, you know, certainly for the Waymo driver, you know, we're at the early part of deploying in cities with that kind of snow.

40:14I think that that's one. Second is the regulatory framework. If the driver can work, then has the municipality actually figured out how they want to regulate the technology? And I think that's in a lot of cities where we technologically could launch and aren't, it's because the regulators aren't ready. And in other cities, it's because, you know, there's a weather pattern of some sort that we need to continue to work on. Before we get to hear from our student audience, I have one more question for you. Okay. You have a teenage son who recently got his driver's license? I do, yes. That's not the question.

40:56I was like, that's the easy last one. I'll take it. If Waymo accomplishes its mission, what will the world look like in 10, 20, 30 years? Will teenagers still be learning how to drive? You know, if it's my son, the answer is yes, because he really wanted to. I mean, he knows Waymo. He loves Waymo. And I think it's really exciting to think about driving when you want to as being when you drive. You know, you drive when you want to. You drive when you're on your way to a happy family vacation. And there's luggage hanging off of every part of the vehicle. But I think on a 10 to 20 year horizon, people have decided if they want to keep driving or if they want to buy cars that drive them.

41:40Because the Waymo driver, as I mentioned, will have this opportunity to be in cars. And for people who never want to drive, I still hope that people will take ride share or ride hailing. like Waymo, because it still won't make a lot of sense for city centers to be congested with cars that just sit in garages all day. You know, this technology gives you the chance to be dropped off and for that vehicle to make its way back and to come back and get you. And so my hope is that we'll see cities with more green spaces, more convening spots, which will hopefully make them feel more like cities and communities and less like, you know, concrete jungles.

42:21And that means transportation planners will take millions, tens of millions of dollars and redeploy them into other really important services for people, which, you know, sort of lifts the tide of everyone in those cities. And so I just hope there's a reimagination. And I can only hope because this isn't my side of the line, right? Like this is for cities to really start to, you know, invoke their own imagination about that future. And we're partnering with them on it. And we think it could be really exciting. Absolutely. Well, definitely given us all something to think about and we'll stay tuned, I suppose, and see what happens.

42:59Okay. And with that, we'll turn to questions from the audience. Awesome. Hi, Takidra. Hi. I'm Blake. I'm a second year business student. And I got to say, as a car nerd, this was the best view from the top I've been to. So thanks for being here. Thank you. I wanted to ask you about the technology that underpins the Waymo driver. Yeah. So it feels like Waymo has made an implicit bet that LiDAR is necessary to sort of use autonomous driving safely. And Tesla's made a bet that you can achieve that safety with cameras. And I'm curious, given that with the 6th Gen Waymo driver, you cut the number of cameras in half, like 29 to 13.

43:33But you only went from 5 LiDAR to 4. how we should expect to see Waymo's tech suite evolve over time and what it means for maybe the future where we could use this on a passenger vehicle. Yeah. Thank you. What a great question. And I love that. For us, we think that we are the only purse company that's been able to achieve this over the last five years. It was October of 2020 that we removed the human from our fleets. and we strongly believe that where technology was at that time, the only way to have gotten there in 2020 is with LiDAR and to have done so with the safety results that we care about.

44:17So really the question as I think about it is like, do we have to stay on that path in the future? Maybe not, but now our world model has all of that data in it. And so it's, do we fundamentally believe that there's no reason to short circuit the type of data that's in your model that's going to inform this technology as it drives on the roads? Yeah, there's no reason to short circuit that. And so we feel strongly that that was the right bet, exactly what you said. When you see these changes, it isn't because we're making these kinds of, we are trying to make sure we're costing down the product and that the capability is staying the same.

45:02When we think about the future with personally owned cars, this will be integrated into the vehicle, totally different than what you're seeing now. You know, people are like, I don't want to own one of those. Other people are like, I want a Waymo right now. People will have all kinds of preferences and we have to think about that future. But these are laser focused safety. That sounded like a pun. It wasn't. It's like a dorky AV plan, sorry. But, you know, just to be clear, we use LiDAR camera and radar. Sounds like you already know this. So it isn't just a bet on LiDAR. It's a bet on a multimodal, multi-sensor system.

45:37And I see and I hear and I smell and I taste and I touch. And we just don't think there's any reason to eliminate those in these early days. Thanks for your question. Hi, Takedra. Hi, and thank you for speaking with us today. Waymo's safety data is compelling, and especially in densities, but also as someone from the South, I know trust is often cultural and emotional. And my family also thinks I'm a little crazy when I wear a rainbow. So beyond the numbers and the stats, what do you think has to happen for Waymo to earn trust from communities that are a bit more skeptical of tech companies and autonomous driving?

46:22Yeah, I really like that question because I think one of the things I am always reminded of, I have this experience often where I meet people who would never get in and they're like, oh, now I'll get in. Like, I just assumed that I wouldn't see anyone who looks anything like you or me or from my background or whatever it is. And therefore, I now feel more trusting of it. And so I think one of the things we have to do as a company is continue to make sure we are hiring people that feel to the communities in which we operate, like people who understand the skepticism, the negativity, the exclusion that has happened.

47:07And for us, sometimes it's like people have been excluded in industries that aren't even our industry. But because we are coming up with this technology to offer options, they're like, how do I know it isn't just going to be like this other thing? So we have to also have a very broad aperture and say, how have people been left out of mobility? How have people been left out of early waves of new technology? You know, how have people been sort of trained to believe that this is like the really great question? This is for a select few. It's not for me. And so we have to be very deliberate in each of our launches.

47:44And so this is an example of that, you know, we have very specific conversations. If someone thinks, oh, that's not for me because I'm vision impaired, because I have to way find my way to the car. I have to way find my way into a business. Obviously, the benefit of being with a ride-hailing, ride-sharing driver is they can help me. So then we had to build all of those tools into our toolkit, coming out of a building, making sure that there's a honk feature so you can honk and hear your way to the vehicle. So it's like listening, learning, showing that we're humble, making sure that we're taking the feedback when we get it, and then improving.

48:26And I think that's like, it's literally the only way to do it is to do it. Like there isn't in the whole team knows this. Everything we're doing is difficult because it requires being deliberate every single day. And this is one of the areas that we take great ownership in. Thank you. Thank you, Blake and Gabby, for those questions. Okay, Takidra. Yeah. We like to wrap up our view from the top interviews with rapid fire questions. Okay. Are you ready? I am. Okay. I think. What was the first car you drove, and did you have a name for it? Oh. The first car I drove was a rabbit. Does anyone even know what those were?

49:08Okay, thank you. So it was a VW, for those of you who are looking at me like, what the heck is a rabbit? And it did not have a name. Okay. But it was a stick shift. I'm very proud. Okay. You should be. My dad, that was a requirement. Like, my daughter's got to know how to drive a stick shift. Waymo has a partnership with Stanford Athletics. So I have to ask, what's your favorite sport to watch? Basketball. Okay. Okay. Classic. Yeah. If Waymo could take you anywhere, where would you want to go on your Waymo road trip? Oh, gosh. Okay. So I can't go over water. So, I mean, I think it would be really fun for the Waymo to take me to Collins, Mississippi, where I was born.

49:54That would be really fun. I mean, everyone would conclude I'm crazy, but that would be really fun. What's something you love doing that might surprise people? Rollerskating. Okay. Where do you roller skate? Well, I did roller skate at a roller rink in San Jose until it closed. It closed like a year ago, and I was very sad. But I like indoor, old school roller skating. So now I roller skate on the East Coast when I'm back there because there are still a lot of roller rinks open. But I love, I'm like that person. I love roller skating. Some of you are like, okay, I was with her until she said roller skating.

50:37Who's more nervous when your son is driving, you or him?

50:44Well, he is probably made nervous by me. But the truth is, and so he just invites me from riding with him. But I think he's not, yeah, he's not nervous. And so that both gives me confidence and makes me nervous. The fearlessness of a teenager. Yes. He's not nervous. Although, yeah, I won't say it. Never mind. Okay. And I have one final question for you. It is definitely not a rapid fire question. Oh, okay. One day, when you look back on your life and career, what impact do you hope you've had on the world? So I love that the last question was about my son because, of course, you know, impact on the world.

51:30I think about him first and foremost. And I think about it in this way. Like, I just want driving to not be the risk that it is today. I don't want him leaving the house to be as scary as it is. I don't want the number of people whose, you know, mothers, fathers, loved ones just don't make it home. It is such a stressful, you know, reality if you allow yourself to think about it. And so what we mostly do is we say they're going to be fine. I want that to just be true. And I want that to be part of what we were able to offer people is if it's true, it's great. If it's not true and someone's just shouldn't drive, they're angry, they're distracted, they're drunk, they're tired, then there's this option available to them.

52:30And when I was growing up and when so many of us were growing up, that just wasn't an option. And so when I think about the impact, I would love for it to be that there's always a safe way home. There's always a safe way to get from point A to point B, and we don't lose as many lives as a result. That's a beautiful want for the world. Thank you so much for being here today, Takidra. Thank you.

52:57Amira, you asked Takidra about her first Waymo ride. I want to ask you about your first rideshare experience. My first rideshare experience, I don't know if I remember the exact first moment, but it definitely was sometime in college. I feel like all the ride share companies were giving out free discount coupon codes all over and I did not have a car. I was living in Boston at the time. And so, yeah, I don't remember it sticking out to me as much as my first Waymo experience did because to me, it kind of felt like a more convenient taxi, like something I already knew where the first time I took a Waymo, it was here in San Francisco after moving here for school, the first five minutes I'm like on edge, feeling nervous.

53:41And then after that, you're kind of just, you feel relaxed and you're like, I've actually never felt safer in a car before. So it's just quickly, it's crazy how quickly your mindset can change. Yeah, ironically enough, a driverless car feels safer than a car with a driver in some cases. Absolutely, absolutely. But with that comes a lot of questions. You know, some people feel like getting into a car driven by a stranger might not be so safe. Other people feel like getting into a car driven by a computer is dangerous. How do you think about this question of safety? And what do you think of Takidra's perspective?

54:14The claims that Waymo is making is that it's so much safer than getting into a car that's driven by a person. And for me, if that's true, which I think it is, that should be the future. That's how I think about it. And I like that when she talked about safety and I asked her that question, like, what does safe enough really mean? in this industry because getting into a car every day is like one of the most dangerous choices that we make every day. It is. Yeah. It's really it's not safe. And I liked her response that safe enough is is not good enough. And that that hope also that we all will have a safer option one day to get home and to get wherever we're going.

54:56So I like how she approached this. And safety is so much on the forefront of how Waymo is thinking about the future of autonomous vehicles. I thought her frame of cars are getting safer, but humans are more distracted than ever. I thought that was really interesting. Yeah, it's true. And honestly, you know, hate to out myself, but I feel like when I drive these days, I'm very distracted. You know, your phone's buzzing. There's a million push notifications. People are texting you. You're trying to do the GPS and your Spotify. And so if a computer can do that for you and make sure that you actually are actually safe, I don't know.

55:36All the better? All the better, I think. You asked a very important question about business models operating a fleet versus selling cars to consumers. Takedra said Waymo wants to create the world's safest driver before building out other business lines. What do you think about that choice? I thought it was interesting how she framed it as the Waymo driver, not necessarily tied to the Waymo vehicle as we think about it today. So it's really kind of like this software layer that they're building, which can be applied to other use cases as well. So to me, that choice makes sense and sounds like it will get to a place where it's not just kind of this Waymo robo-taxi model, but also a model where you could own your own car.

56:21It's definitely like a choice and stake in the ground that they're taking and excited to see how that goes for them in the future. So Takidra's career trajectory began in intellectual property and she also did some notable work in the privacy space. What did you observe about the relationship between this background, especially in policy, and her leadership style? I talked about how lawyers are trained to hedge risk. Yeah. It feels like you have to be very measured and really think through all pieces of the equation in that line of work. And at Waymo, it's a company where people are getting in there, their lives are on the line.

56:58And so you want that kind of person with that kind of background running a company like that, where they're really thinking through the risks, the safety component. And so that's how I would that's how kind of I see that translation and that tie. And so much relation to current regulation and how that space is evolving. Yeah, absolutely. It's definitely a job where there's so many pieces to the puzzle that you have to bring together in order to make the impact that they aspire to make. And along those lines, Takedra said, quote, know your craft, knowing your craft, there's no substitute for it.

57:34Yeah, it really struck me when she was speaking about her decision to join Waymo and how that process all unfolded. And at the end of the day, for her, it was about taking a bet on herself, a bet that she had the skills to build something from the ground up. And to me, that's a different way to frame it, right? Because sometimes people talk about taking a bet on a company or believing in the company. And she had that as well. But also knowing, like, I have the skills to do this and I'm going to bet on myself in this instance, I think is also really important. Something that I was thinking about when the interview was over.

58:11Amira, would you take a risk on being a builder like Takedra did? Why or why not? I think more and more I'm thinking that one day I will. And that's really different from where I came in when I came into the GSB. I didn't really see myself as a builder. I saw myself as somebody who was really great at kind of accelerating something that was kind of already built. But more and more I am seeing myself as somebody who could do that. And so I think for the right company and the right opportunity, I would take that risk to build. From self-driving cars to? Who knows, but probably something in the creative media entertainment storytelling space.

58:51Fantastic. Well, Amira, thank you so much. Thank you, Michael.

59:01You've been listening to View from the Top, the podcast, a production of Stanford Graduate School of Business. This interview was conducted by me, Amira Weeks, of the MBA class of 2026. Michael McDowell is our managing producer, and Veronica Simonetti edited and mixed this episode. Special thanks to Liz Walker. View from the Top is the Dean's premier speaker series. It was started in 1978 and is supported in part by the F. Kirk Brennan Speaker Series Fund. During interviews led by students, leaders from around the world share insights on effective leadership, core values, and lessons learned along the way.

59:36You can find more episodes of View From The Top on our website, gsb.stanford.edu slash business-podcasts. Don't forget to rate and subscribe and follow us on social media at Stanford GSB. And see you next time on View From The Top.