Cannes Lions’ battle of the brands: Starbucks’ stumble, World Cup ads, and more

Every year at Cannes Lions, the advertising world takes stock of itself — what's working, what's not, and what it's pretending not to notice. Autodesk CMO Dara Treseder joins Rapid Response live from the festival to cut through the noise. She breaks down the industry's complicated relationship with AI, weighs in on the hottest and most overrated campaigns of the year including sharp takes on Nike, Adidas, and Starbucks, and explains why the path from CMO to CEO is suddenly the most interesting career move in business. Treseder also gets candid about the brand of Elon Musk post-IPO, what Autodesk's $350 million investment in the next generation of workers actually signals, and what separates a brand collaboration that breaks through from one that just breaks. Visit the Rapid Response website here: https://www.rapidresponseshow.com/ See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Speaker 00

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• 1:42Speaker 01

  When things go wrong, marketing gets blamed. But when it's all going well, nobody's talking to us. It's a real point, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna sit with it for a minute. I often say, marketing is like plumbing. When was the last time, Bob, you went to your house and you were like, ooh, I love my plumbing? You're not thinking about your plumbing on the daily.

• 2:00Bob Safian?

  No, only when the pipes break.

• 2:01Speaker 01

  Only when the pipes break. And you see it all the time now, right? Your reputation matters as a business.

• 2:07Bob Safian?

  Yes.

• 2:07Speaker 01

  Customers will switch like that, from one service to the other, because of the trust in the brand, in the business, and the story that is being told by a powerful marketing engine. That is how you build a house that stands the test of time.

• 2:29Bob Safian?

  That's Dara Treseder, CMO of Autodesk and a recurring guest on Rapid Response. Dara and I sat down together at the Cannes Lions Festival in France to break down the buzziest stories and trends in the advertising and marketing world, from the industry's flip-flop on AI to the growing pipeline from CMO to CEO to the trillionaire brand of Elon Musk. Plus, the hottest and not-so-hot campaigns from the likes of Adidas, Nike, Starbucks, and more. As always, Dara brings her A-game, quotable, funny, and full of future-forward lessons. So, let's get to it. I'm Bob Safian, and this is Rapid Response.

• 3:15Bob Safian?

  I'm Bob Safian, and I'm here with Dara Treseder, the CMO of Autodesk at Cannes Lions. Dara, great, great to be with you.

• 3:22Speaker 01

  Thank you so much. This is our annual thing. I always love spending time with you here.

• 3:26Bob Safian?

  Yeah, it's fun. So, what's the vibe this year? What are you feeling? Are people excited? Are people anxious?

• 3:32Speaker 01

  I think people are really excited, but there's also a lot of anxiety about what's going on. And I think there is, some people are feeling clear, some people are feeling like there's a lot of chaos. So, it's a tale of two cities.

• 3:45Bob Safian?

  And is the chaotic feeling, like, about the world? Is it about AI and the business? Like, where's the chaos landing?

• 3:54Speaker 01

  I would say the chaos is a little bit about the world, but a lot about AI. I feel like the chaos on AI is more rampant than it was last year.

• 4:03Bob Safian?

  I mean, I feel like the mood, I mean, we've had such a crazy 2026, right? Things going on in the Middle East, and the Knicks winning the championship.

• 4:13Speaker 01

  The Knicks winning the championship.

• 4:15Bob Safian?

  Like, the brand of the Knicks, though. The best thing that could happen for New York.

• 4:19Speaker 01

  The best thing, the best thing. I think everybody likes an underdog, right? Everybody wants to see the challenger win. I'm in the Bay Area, West Coast, Best Coast, but even I, even I was rooting for the Knicks, okay? And I was so proud, the whole story, the resilience, the story of the coach, the story of Jalen, I mean, just, there's so much inspiration. And just to see, I, you New Yorkers, you, y'all are wild.

• 4:44Bob Safian?

  Yeah, I was a little worried that things were gonna get a little-

• 4:46Speaker 01

  You get the tech bros run for their money there.

• 4:48Bob Safian?

  I was worried things were gonna get a little too wild at the, at the parade and every, because it was, it was a madhouse.

• 4:53Speaker 01

  It was wild.

• 4:54Bob Safian?

  But joy was what took over.

• 4:55Speaker 01

  Joy, joy, and we needed joy. We needed joy. And I actually think it brought joy more than just to New York. I think it brought joy to America.

• 5:03Bob Safian?

  You were mentioning that you went to the World Cup with your son. And since we're here, I wanted to ask you about the World Cup ads. Is that part of the conversation you're, you're hearing?

• 5:14Speaker 01

  It's part of the conversation. And I have to tell you, you know, I've been hanging out with some CMOs, some are Team Nike, some are Team Adidas.

• 5:22Bob Safian?

  Yes.

• 5:23Speaker 01

  You know, I want to give both brands a lot of credit. Because how do you enter a conversation in a very cultural relevant way? I think Adidas approached it from a nostalgia perspective, and they really nailed it. And they created so much meaning, they focused on the semantics, they leaned into, I think, the lost art of deep storytelling. And it really paid off. And Nike took a different approach, right? They went a little bit more, let's go 360 degrees, a little zany.

• 5:51Bob Safian?

  Yeah.

• 5:52Speaker 01

  And, and, and they, they captured a lot of attention. They drove a lot of conversation. So, you know, both brands did a really great job. And, you know, in the spirit of heated rivalry at the World Cup, people are taking sides.

• 6:05Bob Safian?

  So you, you talk about with ads being like relevant, memorable, and ownable. Now, now, both of those ads are definitely memorable and they're relevant.

• 6:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 6:16Bob Safian?

  Are they ownable? Like, could Adidas have done the Nike ad and Nike have done the Adidas ad?

• 6:21Speaker 01

  I actually think that they are ownable. Adidas did what Adidas does best. This- Detailed storytelling. It's like a hallmark of the brand. And I have had the opportunity to work closely with Adidas. When I was C M R Carbon, we had a big partnership with Adidas. I've seen how they think and they, they understand what their customers love. And they lean into that. And even at Can Lion, we see them winning two Grand Prix in the same day.

• 6:49Bob Safian?

  Yeah.

• 6:50Speaker 01

  Right? See, even that campaign that they did, the Adidas Oasis campaign, it's, it's, it's very similar in terms of style of ownability, which is let us lean into original storytelling. Let's not try to zag because everybody is zagging, but let's zig and let's do our own thing.

• 7:07Bob Safian?

  Mm hmm. And for Nike?

• 7:09Speaker 01

  I think, look, Nike is about marketing at the speed of culture. That is what they do. Even look at the Knicks game, the marketing that Nike did at the Knicks game, where they were able to take user-generated content and they were able to piece together beautiful creative that just really had everybody feeling that New York spirit. And they did it in real time.

• 7:29Bob Safian?

  Yes.

• 7:29Speaker 01

  That is Nike at the speed of culture. I almost think like the brand embodies that. If you have a body, you're an athlete, right? They, they, they take that like elite athlete in terms of how they try to move and the speed at which they try to move. So I think the Nike work was very true to their brand.

• 7:45Bob Safian?

  Yeah, although Adidas got Timothy Chalamet, who's a Knicks fan. So, you know, they both get to play there.

• 7:50Speaker 01

  They both got to play, exactly. And, you know, I love me some Timothy Chalamet. I'm a Dune fan. They had me. Once the ad started, I was like, okay.

• 7:57Bob Safian?

  Okay, you're, you're in.

• 7:58Speaker 01

  Don't ask me what team I am. I like both brands, but you know, if I had to pick, it would be Adidas.

• 8:02Bob Safian?

  So, um, the, you talked, last time we talked a bit about, uh, opining with the spine and how important that is and how effective that is. In this, the environment of change that we're in right now in 2026, is that harder?

• 8:18Speaker 01

  It is risky, but the risk is worth it. The risk is worth it when what you are opining on is core to your business strategy.

• 8:27Bob Safian?

  Mm hmm.

• 8:28Speaker 01

  And you can back it up with your spine. Because there's so much sameness.

• 8:32Bob Safian?

  Mm hmm.

• 8:33Speaker 01

  The unfortunate thing about what is happening is AI is raising the floor. But it is human ingenuity that's going to vault the ceiling.

• 8:42Bob Safian?

  Yeah.

• 8:43Speaker 01

  And there isn't enough emphasis being placed on that human ingenuity and human creativity. But I'm a rigorous optimist, so I think we are in the golden age for marketers and creatives who have excellent taste.

• 8:59Speaker 01

  Are willing to master these tools, know when to use it. But most importantly, have the discernment to know when not to use it. And I think when you have that down, the clarity and the peace comes in the midst of the chaos.

• 9:14Bob Safian?

  Hmm. The conversation last year here was about how AI is going to crush all the creativity or people were worried about that. And this year, it's a little bit more about like, maybe AI isn't, shouldn't be applied to the creativity part of the business or the product. It should be applied to sort of the process a little bit more.

• 9:31Speaker 01

  I think so, you know, when, when you're using AI, it, it is operating in two dimensions. There's the syntax and there's the semantic. When you're using AI in the syntax, like it can really address processes helping. But when you want to focus on meaning and the semantics, that is where you want to make sure that the creative is still in control of the art. AI is here to serve humanity. Humanity is not here to serve AI. And I think the brands that are willing to say that unapologetically.

• 10:02Bob Safian?

  Mm hmm.

• 10:03Speaker 01

  There's trust being built with their customer bases.

• 10:06Bob Safian?

  Is there conversation or how much conversation you're hearing from colleagues and others here about like when you acknowledge that AI has been used in the creation of content of, of an ad?

• 10:18Speaker 01

  Okay, so I was with a bunch of CMOs and CEOs yesterday. And the conversation was you have to acknowledge it. Because if you don't acknowledge it and it gets discovered, your customers feel like you were trying to deceive them.

• 10:32Bob Safian?

  Hmm.

• 10:32Speaker 01

  Everyone will forgive an honest mistake.

• 10:35Bob Safian?

  Mm hmm.

• 10:35Speaker 01

  No one will forgive deliberate deception.

• 10:38Bob Safian?

  Mm hmm.

• 10:38Speaker 01

  And so it's so important that you are transparent about when you're using AI. And by the way, when you have to become transparent, it forces you to put in the right checks and balances.

• 10:48Bob Safian?

  Hmm.

• 10:49Speaker 01

  That allows you to have the guardrails that minimize your chance of making bad choices, like obvious bad choices.

• 10:57Bob Safian?

  You are at an organization where you are marketing AI as a tool for folks, but people are suspicious in a way, maybe even more than they were last year at this time. How does that impact how you think about marketing, what you're delivering?

• 11:14Speaker 01

  One of our core values as a company is to be trusted. And so when we talk about our AI, we want to make sure that our customers understand what it is, what it isn't, how it got composed. We actually have these cards called AI transparency cards. They're like little nutrition cards. You know, when you buy cereal boxes, your label, we have that. So you can actually look and say, oh, what went into this product or tool? What does this AI mean? How will I use it? It gives you that information, these AI transparency cards. And that has been a great way to foster trust with our customers. Now, I'm not saying we're perfect, right? Every company, we're learning and we're growing, but we are so committed to doing everything we can to be trusted.

• 11:54Bob Safian?

  Do you personally use AI differently than you did like a year ago?

• 11:58Speaker 01

  I do. I do use it differently. I would say the biggest thing for me has been understanding that I'm not taking an existing process and just layering AI on top of it. I'm actually taking a step back and saying, what is the outcome I'm trying to accomplish? And then how do I redesign the system to get me to deliver not just efficiency, but effectiveness of that outcome? And then how do I integrate humans and machines to do that to the best of my ability? And that has helped me a tremendous amount. In fact, I believe that we are in the era of system and design thinking. And it's not in conflict with creativity.

• 12:40Speaker 01

  Actually, designing and creating systems gives you more space to be creative. It allows you to lean into creativity in a way that you couldn't without a clear system. And I'll say, you know, to be a thought leader, you gotta have a thought.

• 12:55Speaker 01

  Radical idea. But it's so important for me, I never want to originate my idea through AI. I am not going to become a secondhand thinker. I am a firsthand thinker. And that discipline of saying, I'm going to come up with my point of view and my perspective. Now, I might implement AI as I develop it, as I evolve it, but the original idea and thinking and thought. Is mine.

• 13:19Bob Safian?

  Hmm. There was this sort of fracas in South Korea.

• 13:23Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 13:24Bob Safian?

  For Starbucks, right? They built an ad campaign around a sort of infamous massacre. And it kind of blew back on them and they had to close stores and do a day of training and whatever. And they sort of semi blamed it on AI. Was this like AI leading the the the charge in a way that it shouldn't?

• 13:45Speaker 01

  First of all, I just have to say it was a really unfortunate incident. For us in America, it would be the equivalent of a campaign almost around nine 11 or something like that.

• 13:57Bob Safian?

  Yeah.

• 13:57Speaker 01

  To me, this wasn't so much an AI problem as it was a system problem. There were not the right checks and balances. You have to think through how many people were involved in reviewing and approving this.

• 14:12Bob Safian?

  Right.

• 14:13Speaker 01

  That we got to this place because you can't tell me it was just like an agent all the way through.

• 14:18Bob Safian?

  It's not that we're moving so fast that we're not checking.

• 14:21Speaker 01

  There must have been opportunities. And if we didn't have that, then well, that's a failure of system design. And I think it's a lesson to all of us because we are all going in real time. And sometimes you have to go slow to go fast. There is not a it's not velocity versus governance. It is velocity and governance. And that is the power of how we win in this AI era.

• 14:46Bob Safian?

  Because if we just move without that governance, we may move into some places that are uncomfortable.

• 14:52Speaker 01

  We might go to places we don't need to go. You know, there are journeys we don't need to take.

• 14:56Bob Safian?

  Right. How much conversation are you seeing around AI and search? And sort of how that changes where you find people, where you connect with people?

• 15:09Speaker 01

  I was having a conversation actually with the 21st century brand. They're one of the brand strategy firms and they've come up with a framework that I really love. I think the way they articulated is brilliant, which is priming and proving. So you have to actually prime people to to to love what you are about to offer. You want to prime the audience and that's where you're addressing your total addressable market, your service, your serviceable, addressable market. But then also you need to prove it's not about what you say about you anymore. That. Thirty year old on Reddit who just had their little keyboard warrior moment.

• 15:47Bob Safian?

  Uh huh.

• 15:47Speaker 01

  And you know, wrote a scathing review of your brand. Now, all of a sudden can really shape perception of how you're seen.

• 15:55Bob Safian?

  Well, and that may, the AI may pull that up as much as, yeah.

• 15:58Speaker 01

  Prove it to the L L Ms. So it's a combination of priming people and proving to L L Ms. And the best systems are bringing these two in concert and working together. And everyone is trying to figure out what do we do? How do we do it? How do we do it in B to C? How do we do it in B to B? In fact, one of the C M Os was asking me, she said, do you think this is as relevant for us in B to B? I said, absolutely. B to B is a much more emotional purchase.

• 16:24Bob Safian?

  Mm hmm.

• 16:24Speaker 01

  Emotional investment. You're spending hundreds of thousands, millions of dollars, tens of millions, hundreds of millions. In some places billions of dollars on a technology investment. You want to be sure that that is happening. And I can't tell you the amount of use cases now about purchases that began with the C E O, C I O, C T O, C M O. Doing an L L M search. You know, they're just having coffee on the plane. They pull up Quad. They get a shortlist and all of a sudden that becomes the shortlist that goes to the R F P process.

• 16:57Bob Safian?

  Wow.

• 16:58Speaker 01

  It's amazing. This is now the reality of a B to B buyer's journey.

• 17:03Bob Safian?

  Hmm. The way to influence those decisions, no one's quite sure how to do that yet.

• 17:09Speaker 01

  You know, I think no one's sure, we're figuring it out. But I think what we're learning is the importance of, you know, cultural relevancy and authority. That has never been more important than it is today. You have to be in the conversation. So you have to be culturally relevant for your category, for your space. And you have to be loved and advocated for by third parties.

• 17:35Bob Safian?

  Hmm.

• 17:35Speaker 01

  So comms is storming, right?

• 17:38Bob Safian?

  Cause earned media suddenly becomes more important.

• 17:41Speaker 01

  Era of the earned media, right?

• 17:42Bob Safian?

  Because the L L M is going to discount the owned media in a different way?

• 17:46Speaker 01

  They do, they discount the owned media and they place more emphasis on what others are saying about you. So earned media community has never been more important. Almost every C M O I am talking to now is thinking through their YouTube strategy and their Reddit strategy. With regards to influencers, you see marketers saying, hey, I'm turning my whole, a large part of my budget to creators and influencers because everyone is realizing I gotta have someone with authority validate me.

• 18:16Bob Safian?

  There is a difference in impact between you telling your own story and someone else telling a story about you. So what kind of stories are landing most right now? Unexpected brand collaborations? A $350 million investment in humanity? A SpaceX-sized IPO? We'll talk about all that and more after the break. Stay with us.

• 18:44Speaker 00

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• 20:31Bob Safian?

  Before the break, Autodesk's Dara Treceder talked about this year's Cannes Lions and changes in the world of advertising and marketing. Now, we talk about the brand of Elon Musk post-SpaceX IPO, why Autodesk is investing $350 million in the next generation of workers, and more. Let's dive back in.

• 20:53Bob Safian?

  Here at Cannes, there was a time where all of the activations were ad agencies.

• 20:57Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 20:58Bob Safian?

  Right? And then they became the tech platforms. And you have Meta here, and you have Google here, whatever. But we don't have yet OpenAI and Anthropic sort of owning the beach yet.

• 21:10Speaker 01

  I think it's just a matter of time, because they're starting to activate. There's always a scouting. I think they're in their little scouting time. They're coming in, they're checking out, saying, "What are those people doing there with all that rosé and sunshine?" Right? They're scouting to figure out how they want to show up, but I think it is inevitable. It was interesting to see Databricks. If I had told you a company like Databricks would be at Cannes 10 years ago, you would have been like, "Girl, how much rosé have you had?" And I'd be like, "None, I just drink sparkling water." But you know, you wouldn't have anticipated that. We're seeing that change happen, and I think this is the trend we're going to continue to see.

• 21:44Bob Safian?

  The other trend that seems to continue to grow here in a way that almost surprises me is the creator economy part of it. I sort of thought, like, is it going to peak? Are, you know, are we over the top? Not close, right?

• 21:59Speaker 01

  You can't even blink without seeing a creator. And I think that this speaks to the power of the authority and the third-party community movement, right? You can't design your campaign, your growth plans, your marketing strategy without thinking through what that is.

• 22:16Bob Safian?

  So do you think of creators as earned media, or are they like collaborators?

• 22:21Speaker 01

  I think that they are both. Actually, I think some creators have built such a following that they are a media channel unto themselves. And they're creators who are more in the collaboration space. So it's both, and some actually do both and some land more squarely in one of the two buckets.

• 22:38Bob Safian?

  And calling it just the creator economy isn't really doing service to the variety that's that's available.

• 22:43Speaker 01

  It's absolutely not doing service. And in fact, what I would say is, you know, that collaboration is no longer just a distribution strategy. It should be a design principle from the beginning.

• 22:54Bob Safian?

  I mean, uh, brand collaborations, we see a lot of them around, right? We talked about, um, Adidas has a bunch of different brand collaborations. Um, Absolute Focke did one with Tabasco. I don't know if there are any that particularly, uh, resonate for you or that you're hearing people talk about.

• 23:11Speaker 01

  Well, the Adidas and Oasis, right? Everyone is talking about this because it's been a while. Since you had two Grand Prix's in one day. Oasis have been long time fans of Adidas.

• 23:22Bob Safian?

  It's a collaboration that's sort of, um, each side reinforces the other in the same way they're like.

• 23:28Speaker 01

  And it's mutually beneficial because it was great for Oasis too. It made them cool, right? It made them show up in interesting ways. It provided merch for their, for their, for their fans that was differentiated, unexpected. It allowed them to surprise and delight their community. The best partnerships are mutually beneficial.

• 23:44Bob Safian?

  So I'm curious, like, there's a, there's a collaboration between Swatch and Piaget, right? Which, you know, did well, but it's also sort of a high-end brand with a more mass market brand. Is that a different kind of risk?

• 23:59Speaker 01

  It's a different kind of risk. You have to be confident and understand what your customer is looking for. There are certain high-end customers, like I don't really think Hermes would ever say, here, here's a Birkin. Collaborate because it, it would compromise the integrity of the brand. So I think you have to figure out, hey, what am I trying to accomplish? And, and, and what is, what makes sense? When you're a brand trying to go down market. Sometimes you have to, you know, think about new ways to reach your down market customers. But you do not want to compromise.

• 24:32Bob Safian?

  Right.

• 24:33Speaker 01

  The business from your up market customers. You want to make sure that.

• 24:35Bob Safian?

  And that's a tricky dance.

• 24:36Speaker 01

  It's it's a very tricky dance. It's a it's a fine line and you don't want to cross over.

• 24:41Bob Safian?

  Right, and I guess sometimes the luxury brands, they're just trying to stay relevant.

• 24:44Speaker 01

  They're trying to stay relevant.

• 24:45Bob Safian?

  So they have to sort of reach sometimes to places.

• 24:48Speaker 01

  But usually they'll do it as a limited capsule, right? To find a way to put a boundary around it and keep it in that box, if you will, to preserve the rest of the brand story.

• 24:58Bob Safian?

  Right, to get into culture a little bit more, but to maintain their their status.

• 25:02Speaker 01

  Exactly. Get into culture without losing the fight.

• 25:05Bob Safian?

  Yeah. Are there other campaigns and things that you're hearing people talk about? You're talking about that you're seeing here that, you know?

• 25:14Speaker 01

  I really loved the the Longy coffee campaign. I thought it was beautiful, right? So they took a coffee maker and they redesigned an actual coffee shop. It was bringing the element of appreciation of the coffee shop experience into your home. And that, you know, every coffee drink, my husband drinks a lot of coffee. And the first thing he does when he gets up is goes to his car. He loves that coffee machine, you know, starts to make his coffee. And and to be able to do that in a machine that reminds you of your favorite coffee shop, there's a power to that. Obviously, I'm also going to say there are autodesk customer. So I I I I love that. And it won awards, right?

• 25:59Speaker 01

  And part of what I think grabbed a lot of people's hearts and minds is the power of craft. Making, bringing the outside in in an authentic way. The industry craft that is sometimes a lost art in the age of AI.

• 26:17Bob Safian?

  The role of the CMO is it's changing in some organizations. I mean, there've been some studies I've seen recently that CMOs are are are more relied on on CEOs than they used to be for high level decisions. Where should CMOs sit? In sort of business strategy.

• 26:36Speaker 01

  I think if you're a business that wants to be successful, your CMO should have a real seat at the table and should be empowered to win. Because you are absolutely seeing the best companies are treating their CMOs like strategic partners. They're not seeing them just as the marketers, but they're seeing them as enterprise-wide business leaders. And you are seeing that path from CMO to CEO. It is happening at a much faster clip than it was happening even just five years ago.

• 27:04Bob Safian?

  Yeah.

• 27:04Speaker 01

  And the reason for that is because as CMOs, our remits are so broad. Right? We have to think about everything from the events and experiences and the activation at can, all the way to the go-to-market strategy, the revenue accountability, the pipeline creation, to the technology stack. We are on the forefront of the implementation of AI internally. And so having a CMO have a real seat at the table gives the C-suite, the company, a competitive edge and advantage.

• 27:33Bob Safian?

  I mean, what what has tended to happen sometimes is when things uh things don't go well for a business revenue-wise, the CMO gets blamed. And when things do go well, the business unit takes the credit for it, right? How important is it for CMOs to like have control of their own source of revenue for the business?

• 27:54Speaker 01

  I think it's really important to have that revenue accountability, especially for areas of the business where marketing is in first chair, like digital business, like for example Autodesk. I oversee our digital business. It makes sense that it sits with me because it begins and ends with marketing.

• 28:10Bob Safian?

  So you you are in charge of delivering revenue?

• 28:13Speaker 01

  Yes, I have a line, I have to deliver.

• 28:17Speaker 01

  I'm in charge of delivering revenue for our digital business, our e-commerce business, the Autodesk store. And you know, most of my CMO friends are in a similar situation. Accountability and ownership have to go hand in hand. And businesses are seeing that separating the two do not set the company up for success.

• 28:33Bob Safian?

  Yes.

• 28:33Speaker 01

  So really getting that done is important. And the point you made about when things go wrong, marketing gets blamed. But when it's all going well, nobody's talking to us. It's a real point and I'm gonna I'm gonna sit with it for a minute. You know, we're in can, we have air conditioning, we've got some time. So we're gonna talk about this for a minute. Because I often say marketing is like plumbing. When was the last time, Bob, you went to your house and you were like, "Ooh, I love my plumbing." You're not thinking about your plumbing on the daily.

• 29:00Bob Safian?

  Only when the pipes break.

• 29:01Speaker 01

  Only when the pipes break, but I bet when the pipe breaks, you're thinking about it until it gets fixed, right? You can't, you can't exist in a house.

• 29:10Bob Safian?

  I need that plumber now.

• 29:11Speaker 01

  You need that plumber now. And that is, that is the reality for a lot of marketing. It's often invisible. It's behind the scenes. It's not top of mind. But when one little thing goes wrong, it's the topic of conversation. And so our job, actually, as CMOs, is to market the marketing. We have to make sure that internally and externally, the value of marketing is understood. And you see it all the time now, right? Your reputation matters as a business.

• 29:40Bob Safian?

  Yes.

• 29:41Speaker 01

  Customers will switch like that from one service to the other because of the trust in the brand, in the business, and the story that is being told by a powerful marketing engine.

• 29:52Bob Safian?

  And I, I feel like, you know, the story of a business is its strategy. And the strategy has to be a story. Like, all of those things have to fit together.

• 30:01Speaker 01

  Absolutely. It has to be cohesive. That is how you build a house that stands the test of time.

• 30:07Bob Safian?

  So we, we started by talking about the Knicks as a brand. And when I ask you about a, a, a different brand, um, and, and your take on Elon Musk as a brand. Because to me, a lot of the buying of SpaceX is about him as opposed to being about the business.

• 30:24Speaker 01

  I mean, we definitely have to say it's cult of personality. That is a lot of what they're betting on. Betting on him, his strategy, his vision. That is increasingly becoming the name of the game. Especially in technology, the people behind the products have never been more important than they are today. And so that almost shapes the company's strategy. It shapes the perception of the product. People are willing to put up with a lot when they believe in the personality. You know, they're willing to believe things that almost seem unbelievable to a logical person thinking about fundamentals because they're not betting on reality. They're betting on their perception of potential.

• 31:10Speaker 01

  Based on the personality.

• 31:12Bob Safian?

  But there's, there's more, I, I don't wanna say there's pressure, but there's a model for having your CEO be like a celebrity, like a public celebrity.

• 31:21Speaker 01

  It is, it is, it is definitely the, especially for these large tech brands, right? The CEO personality, the CEO being a celebrity, the CEO being out there, not just the CEO. Senior leaders on the executive team, building their cult following is a core part to driving growth. And you, look, Elon Musk is having a good year, right? He's having a good year. And I think that, you know, regardless of what anyone thinks, the SpaceX IPO was a success. Now, will, what will happen in the long run? We're all gonna wait and see. Let's grab our popcorn and see what happens.

• 31:58Bob Safian?

  We'll see what happens. We'll see what happens. Well, um, as always, Dara, this is great. As we, as we look to the year ahead, are there themes or lessons or guidance that, that you're most focused on right now?

• 32:12Speaker 01

  Yes, you know, I'm really focusing on investing in the people. There's not been enough conversations about how we are investing in the next generation. Let's take a minute and just reflect on what's happening. A lot of students just graduated. I went to a few graduation celebrations. You saw booing happen in certain instances. Because these students are walking into the toughest job market. And at the same time, like you said, trillionaires are being minted.

• 32:41Bob Safian?

  Yeah.

• 32:41Speaker 01

  At Autodesk, we think about this deeply. We actually just committed $350 million to invest in preparing the next generation for jobs in this AI era. Over three years, we're going to be doing the work to provide access to technology, training and credentialing. And I would say that as a company, really think about your people internally and externally. How are you investing to help them win? Because when you do that, you're gonna set yourself up for success in the long run and win that long game, right? You'll be the next.

• 33:15Bob Safian?

  Well, Dara, as always, great to talk with you. Thank you.

• 33:18Speaker 01

  Thank you so much for having me.

• 33:23Bob Safian?

  Conversations with Dara leave me both joyful and reflective. What stuck with me most this time about the lesson she shared was the through line of intentionality. The speed of technology today makes it easier than ever to be reactive, and that lack of intentionality can lead to oversights and a creeping staleness. Sure, it takes extra effort to carve out the time and focus to be intentional, and none of us have enough time, but we can all taste the difference between a meal that's been lovingly prepared and one that's rushed out in ultra-process. So my advice: make the time. Don't automate away the critical moments we need to consider things.

• 34:04Bob Safian?

  As Dara says, "You can't be a thought leader without a thought." I'm Bob Safian. Thanks for listening.

• 34:19Speaker 00

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• 34:59Speaker 00

  Before we get to the rest of our conversation today, I want to spend a moment sharing with you about the Masters of Scale Summit, which returns to San Francisco this October 20th to 22nd. So many of us feel overwhelmed right now. It feels like so much of the world is careening, and we don't have power, we don't have agency. That's the thing about the Masters of Scale Summit. It's really designed to remind us that we do have agency. Agency to lead, agency to design, to build the relationships and the partnerships. That empower us and to make the change that we want to see. We program a stage, we curate an audience, we set a schedule that builds in time for these relationships to be made and to grow so that by the time you leave Summit,

• 35:44Speaker 00

  you are fired out of a cannon, ready to run through walls to do better in the world with the agency that you actually have. I hope to see you there. Visit mastersofscale.com/summit.

• 36:02Bob Safian?

  Hey listeners, Bob here. If you listen to Rapid Response on Masters of Scale, you may be missing half the show because every Friday we release a second Rapid Response exclusively in the Rapid Response feed. The guests and topics are just as compelling and timely, from Ford CEO to NASA's administrator to the lessons from the devil wears Prada. It takes about 10 seconds to find. Just search Rapid Response wherever you listen to podcasts and hit follow to make sure you never miss an episode. I hope to see you there.

• 36:41Bob Safian?

  Rapid Response is a Wait What original. I'm Bob Safian. Our executive producer is Eve Trow. Our senior producer is Alex Morris and our associate producer is Masha Makutonina. Mixing and mastering by Aaron Bastinelli and Brian Pugh. Our theme music is by Ryan Holiday. Our head of podcasts is Lita Malad. For more, visit rapidresponseshow.com.

• 37:16Speaker 03

  Humans will never be more intelligent than AI.

• 37:20Speaker 04

  There's going to be two types of companies. Those are great at AI and those that went out of business because they weren't.

• 37:25Speaker 05

  How do we build a future that is human centered?

• 37:30Speaker 06

  I'm Rana Elkhauyubi and on my podcast, Pioneers of AI, we answer that question and so many more. As an AI scientist, entrepreneur and investor, I know what it takes to build AI that works for everyone. Every week I sit down with the pioneers shaping our future and we take you behind the scenes of the AI that's transforming our lives. Find Pioneers of AI wherever you tune in.