← Success Story with Scott D. Clary
Success Story with Scott D. Clary
Lessons - The Silent Tech War You're Already Losing | Keith Krach - Fmr Under Secretary of State & DocuSign CEO
00:14:34
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- [00:00]
A
In this Lessons episode, explore how technology has become a critical battleground in global diplomacy and power. Discover how private sector innovation can strengthen national security and foreign policy. Understand how authoritarian regimes use technology and economic competition for strategic advantage, and uncover why alliances and democratic values are essential to winning the global tech race. As you, you know, you go through your career, you've had multiple successes, taken multiple companies public. The concept of, of tech diplomacy, which is now what you're focused on mostly, how did that, how did your career in private industry, in public industry, in government, how did that inform and, and help you understand that this was something that you wanted to take on at this point in your life? And I want you all to describe what tech diplomacy is because candidly, there's a lot of subjects that I speak about on this podcast and tech diplomacy, I've actually never heard it before. I started researching for our show and we were trying to do the research to figure out what exactly this is and why is it relevant and what does it mean for the average person. So let's understand where this passion for tech diplomacy came from because it's highly relevant now and what is it and why are you working in it?
- [01:16]
B
Sure. So where it really came about was when I was running DocuSign and we were up to about 500 million unique users around the world. We had entered every major country except for China. And I went on a two week listening trip. I usually would do that if we, if we were going in a big country. And I've been going there since 1981. I mean, I'm a lover of Chinese history, culture, the people, of course, the food. But, but this time it was different. I could see that their traditional market competition was amped up into a new form of techno economic aggression under General Secretary Xi. You know, I had a chance to see their dwarf their, their drone swarm technology. I learned about the one belt one road initiative, which is look like a military supply chain. They were telling me to download 10 cent every 30 minutes. I met with five of the top seven Polar Bureau members. And as I was getting back on that plane, I'm like on, you know, the guys with the best technology win the war. These guys don't seem like good guys to me. And I go, I wonder if the guys in Washington know about this. And I really, I didn't know really anybody in Washington or in the administration. So a week later I went out there, I made it my mission to do that. Next thing you know, I'm in a room and explain about China and they go have you ever thought about serving your country, Keith? I go, well, that's a dream I never knew I had. I'd be honor. They go, can you move? I go, I can move anywhere in the world. It's the fastest decision I ever made in my life. So that's when they sent me to the State department to run U.S. economic diplomacy. And my mission there was to develop and operationalize a global economic security strategy that drives economic growth, maximizes national security, and combats economic aggression. And so one of the first things that I did, as always, is I brought in a great team. It was kind of unheard of in the State Department. I brought in 12 folks from Silicon Valley, results oriented execs, entrepreneurs, technologists, and we combined it with the greatest foreign service officers and civil service imaginable, and it ended up to be just a dynamite team. And so tech diplomacy, what that does is that combines Silicon Valley strategies with foreign policy tools based on a thing called the Trust principle, which was a doctrine we created to defeat China's master plan to control 5G communications.
- [04:25]
A
It's incredible what you did, because everything that you just said that you did is something that I speak about in regards to the issue with government, is that they don't move quick enough, they don't have outside thought coming in. So you effectively brought in some of the top talent in Silicon Valley. You applied that to a, to an actual administration and you brought them in and now you're actually solving problems at the speed and, and with the, you know, the, the lens that a Silicon Valley exec would look at a problem versus a career politician. So that's something that can actually make incredible moves. Now when you go down this pathway, you move from private and public and you move from that into government. Talk about the current state of China, of what they have under their control, what they're trying to do. How does that impact us? For example, even if I think about foreign investment into startups in the us, what do we have to be wary of? How do we fight back? Notion is a success story, partner. Now every week I'm juggling podcast prep and newsletter deadlines and agency work. And one thing that used to eat all my time was compiling status updates across all these different projects. So I could see where everything's at. Now with Notion's new custom agents, that's just handled. Now I set up a status update agent that automatically scans my team's progress. It pulls everything together and sends out a report without me even having to touch it. Here's what makes Notion different Notion is an AI powered connected workspace for teams. Notion brings all your notes, your docs, your projects into one space. It just, it's seamless, it's flexible, it's powerful, and it's actually fun to use. And with AI built right into it, you spend less time switching between tools and apps and more time creating great work. And now with custom agents, the busy work that used to take hours runs itself. Most AI still waits for you to prompt it. But custom agents runs on schedules and triggers. So one person just sets it up and it becomes a shared resource for the whole team. Think of them like AI teammates with a specific job. So try custom agents now@notion.com story that's all lowercase letters. Notion.com story to try custom agents today. And when you use our link, you're supporting our show. Belay is a success story partner. Now here's the honest truth that nobody talks about. The busier you get as a leader, as an entrepreneur, as a founder, as an executive in your company, the less you're actually leading. You're managing your inbox, you're chasing down approvals, you're coordinating logistics, you're handling things that have nothing to do with your actual job. And meanwhile, your team is sitting there waiting on you. And I felt this firsthand. You can't mentor people when you're buried in admin work. You can't have this vision for your company when your calendar is in chaos and it's consuming your mornings and sometimes your whole day. You can't develop your team when you're the one doing everything yourself, right? And when you try to keep it all going, you're not just burning out, you're holding your entire organization back with you. Belay, that's B, E L A Y matches you with a US based executive assistant who takes all of that off your plate so you can get back to the work that only you can do. See, real delegation isn't dumping tasks on someone else. It's creating the capacity to actually show up as a leader. Now download Belay's free resource, the Executive's guide to saving 10 plus hours per week at belaysolutions.com Scott that's belay solutions.com Scott Granola is a success story partner. Now here's something I used to do after every single meeting. Sit down for about 15 minutes trying to reconstruct what just happened, who said what, what we actually decided what I'm supposed to follow up on before next week. And when you're running calls all day and you have podcast guests and you have client check ins and you have team syncs that adds up fast. You either spend half the meeting furiously typing and you miss the actual conversation, or you're present in the meeting, but then you're scrambling after Neither is a good option. Granola completely changed that for me. It's an AI powered notepad that works through your device's audio so there's no bots joining your call, no awkward setup, nothing weird. It just runs quietly in the background while you take your rough notes like normal. And when the meeting is over, you get clean, structured notes. What was decided, who owns what, what's next. Now, the first time I saw the output, I genuinely thought this is what my notes should look like. You get to actually be present in your meetings and you still walk away with everything documented. Try Granola for free for three months at granola AI/success. That's granola AI/success. Get your time back against that.
- [08:54]
B
Sure, sure. You know, I, I kind of had a chance to see it my whole life because, you know, what I could see through the years, you know, through my dad's company back, you know, in Ohio, in the Midwest, I could see that China's weapons of mass production had devastated the heart of our economic engine that's, you know, small and medium sized manufacturers. When I was the vice president, General Motors, I could see if you built a plant in China, you weren't just giving them the blueprints, you were giving them the process, engineering, how to build it, and also training the people so they could come back and compete against you. I also, when I was at Ariba, we had our intellectual property stolen from Alibaba. And now what we see, the reality we face as a nation and as a free world is seemingly ceaseless, intense variation of weaponized economic competition. Because our rivals are playing the long game, they're playing for keeps. They're playing a four dimensional game of military, economic, diplomatic and cultural chess. And at the intersection point, and the primary battleground is technology. And worst of all, these authoritarian regimes have no respect whatsoever for rule of law, for property of all kinds, for sovereignty of nations, for human rights, for the environment, for the press. And, you know, and we have to raise our game. And there is nothing static about super power advantage. And the world needs American leadership. So that's what this was all about. And when I had my Senate confirmation hearing, I had a good fortune. The rare fortune of being unanimously confirmed was I got asked by Senator Coombs and he said, keith, what would your strategy be to Combat China's economic aggression. And I said I would harness us three biggest areas of competitive advantage by rallying and unifying our allies and our friends, by leveraging the innovation and the resources of the private sector, and by amplifying the moral high ground of democratic values. And that turned out to be an enduring model. Now that is used in the Biden administration to combat that aggression. And it was that strategy combined with that trust principle that enabled us to defeat that master plan for 5G. We also used it to create a thing called the Blue Dot network, which is an equitable and unifying alternative to what China has called the one belt one road, or as a Malaysian finance minister called the one belt one way toll road to Beijing. This is where China goes all over the world and creates these debt traps with these low income nations, takes advantage, build their infrastructure, puts their, you know, literally devastates the environment. They also really take advantage of the people in that country. They don't leave them with any skills and they leave them strapped for cash. So we also used it in strengthening US Taiwan ties. So I was the highest State Department official to Visit Taiwan in 41 years. I was, I was greeted with 40 fighters and bombers. And we use that trust principle, put together a thing called the Economic Prosperity Partnership and a number of other things, also use that to call out the human rights abuses against the Uyghur Muslims in a western part of China called Xinjiang. And, and on July 4, 2020 on national TV, I, I called it, called out that genocide. I was the first government official to do that. And so that trust principle was really the basis of everything.
- [13:25]
A
And, and why was this? You know, I think it's because you've, you've dealt with and, and observed China for so long and maybe that's the answer. But why were these particular causes so important to you? Because there's a lot of other things that threaten the US in terms of their equ. Economic prowess. And there's other, other countries, obviously China is one of them, Russia as well, and I'm sure there's a few others that probably are trying to compete on various levels. But the things that you deployed in Taiwan in particular, why does that tie back to the impact that, you know, China could have on the US Because I think Taiwan's in a precarious position right now.
- [14:04]
B
By the way, Taiwan is a lynch pit for democracy and a role model of freedom. That's what they are to the free world. Now to General Secretary Xi, what they are is they dispel his myth that The Chinese culture cannot live under a democracy, but it has to live under authoritarian rule. And he wants it gone. And, and by the way, to companies around the world, China, US conflict would be devastating and literally catastrophic for the high tech business because in Taiwan, that's where they manufacture the most sophisticated semiconductors in the world, which is the foundation for all, you know, for all technology. So this is, this is really a big deal. And if you think of China is the biggest threat to freedom and democracy around the world. And you know, it was interesting when I was undersecretary and this was in January 2020, I came back from Washington to my home in San Francisco. I hosted 36 of the top CEOs in Silicon Valley. You'd recognize all their names, all the companies, they may have been here before Safe Environment. I asked them to go around the room and tell their China horror stories. You know, I can't talk about the contents of that meeting, but I could tell you this is that they, it was cathartic, it was enlightening and it was frightening all at once, Scott. And at the end of it I said, you know guys, we say out here that corporate responsibility, social responsibility, it's also national security, it's global economic security too, because not only is China real and urgent threat to our democracy and our freedom, but they're also a real and urgent threat to our businesses. And so if you think of the things, Scott, that we are, those things like respect for rule of law and property and the environment, human rights, these are things that we honor and authoritative regimes like Russia and China do not. And they, as a matter of fact, they use it against them for their strategic advantage. So think about this guy. So let's say you're a Silicon Valley CEO and I'm a Chinese company. So if I could steal your intellectual property, if I don't have to be transparent, if I can use slave labor, if I can use cheap, huge energy, coal fired power plants, if I don't have to be reciprocal with my market, if I either am the law or I don't have to obey the law, I'm going to beat you every time. And so, and they use co option coercion, all, all this stuff, no respect for human life. That's what we call the power principle. So we did is we created this doctrine called the trust principle where we actually use it to our advance advantage. So one jujitsu move, we flipped them on their back. So we actually weaponize the very principles that protect our freedom.
- [17:40]
A
Thanks for tuning in. If you found this valuable. Don't forget to hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode. And if you want to dive deeper into this conversation, check out the links in the description to watch the full episode. See you in the next one.