Decoder with Nilay Patel

Code2040 CEO and co-founder Laura Weidman Powers talks with Recode's Kara Swisher about the mistakes employees and managers make when they talk about diversity and inclusion in the workplace. Companies need to make fundamental changes to how they hire and operate to be welcoming destinations for underrepresented minorities, Weidman says. She discusses the inherent flaws in most "unconscious bias" training and what Code2040 has done differently when it partners with tech companies, finding jobs for hundreds of black and latino students over the past five years. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Spark Capital General Partner Bijan Sabet talks with Recode’s Kara Swisher about being a venture capitalist based on the East Coast, and how he became an early investor in companies like Twitter, Tumblr and Cruise. Sabet also discusses why he has become more politically vocal under President Trump, and urges tech CEOs to follow the lead of their employees in speaking out; the answer on all sides, he says, is to let more voices be heard. Sabet also talks about the failure of the personal-drone company he backed, Lily; and the blunt truth about venture capital — even good VCs are wrong most of the time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Nextdoor CEO Nirav Tolia talks with Recode's Kurt Wagner about how he and his team built a social network for neighborhoods, with a focus on trust and privacy that forced the company to grow slower than most tech startups. Tolia was previously the CEO of Epinions, which after a merger became Shopping.com and sold to eBay. After a sports startup called Fanbase fizzled, Tolia was challenged by Benchmark's Bill Gurley to try again, and today Nextdoor is worth more than $1 billion. Having faced adversity and a public image problem of his own, he also shares some leadership advice for Uber CEO Travis Kalanick: Deal with your issues quickly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

"Radical Candor" author and CEO coach Kim Malone Scott talks with Recode's Kara Swisher about how to be a better manager and leader. Based on her personal experiences at Apple, Google and several tech startups, Scott argues that most management failings come from bosses who are too nice rather than too mean, especially when they're talking to someone who looks different than them. She also discusses the current management crisis at Uber, which she attributes to a culture of "unchecked unilateral authority" that would be more at home in a "baboon troupe or totalitarian regime." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tipping Point Community CEO Daniel Lurie talks with Recode's Kara Swisher about his organization's efforts to fight homelessness in San Francisco. He says it's all too easy to "not see" the incredible poverty and inequality in the Bay Area if you commute into Silicon Valley every day, which means people in tech must be educated about the problem if they're going to be part of the solution. Lurie calls on techies of means, the beneficiaries of "this incredible moment in time," to get involved in philanthropy. He argues that civic involvement won't last if it's mandated from the outside, and that companies must see it as a cultural priority, with the energy to help coming from the top of the org chart. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

"Veep" actors Tim Simons and Matt Walsh and showrunner David Mandel talk with Recode's Kara Swisher about the upcoming sixth season of the HBO political satire. Speaking in front of a live audience at South by Southwest, they recount how they found out on set that Donald Trump had won the presidency, and why it's not their job to respond to the new administration directly. Instead, they say, "Veep" will continue mocking the hypocrisy at all levels of politics and on both sides of the aisle, showing what happens to Julia Louis-Dreyfus's character, Selina Meyer, after she loses the presidency and is a private citizen once again. The trio also talks about the addictiveness of Twitter, whether "Veep" would work in virtual reality, and why everyone in D.C. is oblivious when they get parodied. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Crooked Media Founders Jon Favreau, Tommy Vietor and Jon Lovett talk with Recode's Kara Swisher about their hit podcast, "Pod Save America," in a live interview at South by Southwest 2017. Having previously worked as speechwriters and spokespersons for the Obama administration, the trio discusses what Democrats missed during the 2016 election and how the new "opposition party" to Donald Trump can best focus its resistance. They explain how they run their "progressive media company," which cares more about impact than income, and why they're not excited by the prospect of a presidential run from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Code Advisors Partner Quincy Smith talks with Recode's Kara Swisher about the current state of mergers and acquisitions in tech and media. Smith, who previously worked at Netscape and CBS Interactive, says media companies consolidate in tough times, and a massive game of "sharks and minnows" has begun with AT&T's pending $85 billion deal to buy Time Warner. However, in a similar business climate, tech companies focus on their own products, and Smith argues that the rise of artificial intelligence is delaying or obviating the prospect of big new deals among internet and social media companies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Enjoy CEO Ron Johnson talks with Recode's Kara Swisher about his long career in commerce, including 15 years at Target, and his 12 years at Apple, where he created the Apple Store. Johnson's current company Enjoy hand-delivers premium tech products and helps users with set-up to improve customer satisfaction. He argues that big retailers like Walmart need to innovate on the in-store experience and copy Amazon's approach to customer happiness and loyalty. Johnson also talks about working with longtime Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who initially hated the idea of the Genius Bar. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Entrepreneur and archivist Brewster Kahle talks with Recode's Kara Swisher about the 20th anniversary of the Internet Archive and why it's more important than ever to preserve our digital past. Kahle talks about the companies he founded and sold to AOL and Amazon — WAIS and Alexa, respectively — and how the nonprofit Archive has dealt with everything from copyright issues to social networking websites that are walling themselves off from the rest of the web. He also predicts where artificial intelligence goes from here, saying today's corporations and militaries are a sort of "proto-AI." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices