Big Questions with Cal Fussman

Three young girls leave the United States for the first time and head to Paris on a trip that has been awarded to their mother for extraordinary work. It lands them in a restaurant where they encounter escargot for the first time. Do they devour the snails? Drown them in lemon juice to avoid the taste? Or scramble for the nearest detour?!!! The story is a portal into how the workplace has changed through a report called the Recognition Disconnect. Now, with more than 50 percent of employees surveyed feeling burned out and many fearful of being replaced by artificial intelligence, people desire workplace rewards that are about time with family that actually replenishes. The human connection in this trip shifts the narrative away from the dystopian nightmare of AI taking everybody's jobs. It's told through Xceleration CEO Ben Levenbaum – who commissioned the survey. And seasoned by Frank Congiu, a global thought leader at Randstad – which helped 1.7 million people find jobs last year. In the end, it defines how this podcast has evolved into ways of getting the best out of AI and avoiding the worst. For these reward trips are an innovative way of enabling humans to feel confident and thrive in the age of artificial intelligence.

Cal goes to the heartland to talk with a man who's spent decades teaching kids how to build strength the right way for a conversation on how his training approach overlaps with AI. Turns out, Michael Ockrim uses the same disciplined tactics to build digital muscles that can wrestle down insurance payments. This episode is a real-world look at how anyone (not just tech people) can start putting AI to work in their own life. Michael is a husband, father of four and founder of Mighty Oak Athletic in Westmont, Illinois. Consider this episode solid advice from the heartland.

As the 25th anniversary of 9/11 approaches, Cal replays one of the most powerful conversations in Big Questions' archive: his interview with Michael Wright, a survivor who was buried alive when Tower 2 of the World Trade Center collapsed on him. Michael was a 30-year-old account executive on an ordinary Tuesday morning when the hijacked planes hit. Cal interviewed him for Esquire Magazine just days after the attack and has replayed his taped recollections every year since Big Questions started. This year, Cal introduces curated archival images from that day, synced to Michael's narrative. The visuals can be found on youtube.com/@bigquestionspodcast. This is the story of how Michael survived after being buried alive near a fireman. He crawled to the fireman and stuck to him "like a sticky burr on a bear's ass." The fireman hacked them both out with an axe. When the story was first published, Esquire called it "the fastest 3,863 words you will ever read." It's a story about adaptation under the worst possible pressure, and about the connection between two strangers that made survival possible. Twenty-five years later, all of those involved still have everything to teach us.  

Mike Bechtel doesn't just study the future — he makes a living seeing it before the rest of us. As a historian, futurist, and professor at the University of Notre Dame, he spends his days tracing the throughlines between what's come before and what's coming next in technology and corporate innovation. In this conversation, Cal and Mike go deep. It's the kind of conversation that makes you lean forward, laugh and stop to ponder. But then a tornado warning cut it short. As Mike went off to safety, Cal realized he'd been in on a treasure of a conversation. We can all be grateful that Mike and his family came through the storm okay . . . and that Mike will be back for some more Big Questions.

Lachi is a blind musician who has produced GRAMMY nominated projects. She's also a GRAMMY trustee. And the voice behind Diseducation — a song built on the idea that the world needs a new way of thinking about disabilityHer latest album, Magnificent, features more than 70 human collaborators at a moment when many in the music industry worry about how AI might be coming to replace them. Cal sits down with her to work through the question at the center of this podcast: How do we get the best out of AI without taking on the worst? For Lachi, AI can open vistas that are closed to the disabled. For a musician, it can also take away a livelihood and steal IP. Lachi and Cal talk about accessibility, authorship, the environmental cost of the data centers powering the future, and what happens when we let AI do the thinking our minds were built to do. It's a conversation about what we all need to do to recognize our best path forward.

"If you want to know what life's like when you're not the apex of intelligence, ask a chicken."That's the line that Geoffrey Hinton, the Nobel Prize-winning "Godfather of AI" dropped on Steven Bartlett's podcast. It stopped Cal cold. Along with a lot of other people. One of them was a digital anthropologist and best-selling author named Brian Solis, who's spent decades watching technology unfold. To Solis, Hinton's statement felt in the moment like we had reached The End. But when Cal caught up with Brian a year later, he found that the anthropologist had adapted and made a case for what's possible. It's all in the book he co-wrote with Dave Wright that's titled: Infinite. Cal's conversation with Brian did something he never expected. It made him think about himself, for the first time, as a leader. Stay tuned . . .

Everybody's telling you that AI is coming for your job. Kevin Surace is here to tell you what they're not telling you. Kevin's the father of the artificial assistant. A CNBC Top Innovator of the Decade. He's the holder of more than 90 patents. And now he's the author of The Joy-Success Cycle – a book that is going to make you happy. Kevin has spent decades watching new technology arrive, and he's never once seen it destroy more than it creates. The headlines may chase the 90,000 jobs lost to AI. Kevin's counting the 364,000 jobs that didn't exist three years ago. That's because they didn't have "AI" in the title at the time. Cal makes a case that the coming labor shortage nobody's talking about is a much bigger story than the layoffs everybody is. Kevin has the numbers to prove it. So be joyful. In 30 minutes you're going to see the world in a new way.

A patient kept showing up in the Emergency Room. Most insurance reps would approve or decline each claim and move on. One customer service representative at Devoted Health called to ask the patient why there were so many repeated visits. Didn't take long for the rep to discover the problem. It was created by mold in the patient's home. The deeper problem was the patient had no money to move. The rep didn't just flag it. She got the company to help the patient move to a new and safe place. Eric Ries tells this story in his latest book, Incorruptible, as proof of something AI can't replicate: the instinct to ask the right question and respond to the answer as if the patient were a family member. On this episode, Cal and Eric talk about what happens when a business defines its product as love. And why there are no algorithms that can compete with the human touch when it comes to generating supreme loyalty.

Cal has a suspicion that the little-known K Economy explains more about where the world is headed than most of what you hear on the news. So he reaches out to one of the world's most masterful interpreters of geopolitics and finance to break it down for the Big Questions audience. As founder of Tanto Capital, Ozan Ozkural flies from one city to the next — advising boards, governments, and investors across the globe, meeting kings, presidents, and financial leaders along the way. Cal met Ozan a decade ago through his pal Larry King, and Ozan became a regular at their breakfast table whenever he was in LA. Ozan is that rare guest who can jump from quantum computing to the Medici family in Renaissance Italy to the future of Chinese demographics in the same conversation. In this episode, Ozan decodes the K Economy down to a level of human evolution that leaves even Cal stunned.

We've all heard how AI has been eliminating entry level jobs. Byron V. Garrett has a different story to tell. He's a Time Magazine Visionary Honoree and CEO of Genesys Works, and he runs a draft day. Not for football. Not for basketball. For high school students from the most underserved zip codes in the country, drafted by JP Morgan, Target, Deloitte, and 240 other companies across 9 cities. Seventy five percent of these students start earning more than one of their parents, sometimes both, for internships while they're still in high school. Ninety percent go on to college. Since 2002, more than 14,000 kids have come through this pipeline. This isn't the AI story you've been told. There's no doomsday. No dystopia. Just proof that the right training turns kids who might be overlooked into in-demand hires.

For the first time, you can ask Cal what you want to know about asking better questions. About your next podcast. A business move. A personal situation. Cal will get back to you personally with the help of AI. AI Cal isn't trained on the internet. It's trained on Cal. On five decades of conversations with U.S. presidents, world leaders like Nelson Mandela and Mikhail Gorbachev, Muhammad Ali, Serena Williams, Robert De Niro, Kobe Bryant, and thousands of others who've shaped how he thinks about questions, trust, and listening. The man who made it possible is Rob LoCascio. Rob built the first web chat and turned it into a company worth $3.5 billion. After outside investors squeezed him out, his response was to build something entirely new: UARE.ai. You'll hear Rob's story in this episode and understand why it gripped Cal as he prepares to become a grandfather. UARE.ai is how he plans to pass on what he knows, long after he's gone. You can have access to it now at UARE.ai.

The change in front of all of us right now may be the most radical humans have ever faced. Who do you want guiding you through it? Courtney Harrison would be an intriguing choice. She's a rare breed of HR leader — one who doesn't just advise organizations on change, but who puts people inside the experience of it and shows them they're capable of far more than they believed. She once strapped corporate leaders into Olympic bobsleds hurtling at 90 miles an hour while gravity made their bodies feel four times as heavy. And then there's the match she and her colleague, Alicia Mandel. arranged between a group of high-flying CEOs and the USA Olympic women's volleyball team — with a dramatic twist that made the CEOs see themselves in a new light. This episode is all about stepping through fear and navigating the change we're seeing right now. Courtney is talking straight to you . . . and everyone else.

Every teacher struggling with AI use in the classroom needs to hear this episode. Jamie Metzl has a Ph.D. from Oxford, a law degree from Harvard, and has run 60 marathons. He spent nine years writing his first book. When he sat down to co-write The AI Ten Commandments with GPT-5 he didn't surrender his thinking, creativity or his soul. Jamie doubled down by documenting the process. It's the first major published book to list a human and an AI as co-authors. Steve Wozniak, one of the founders of Apple, summed it up like this: "If you care about the future, read this book." To which I'll add: It not only takes the best from our collective past. It draws a roadmap for students to get the most out of themselves by working with AI instead of hiding behind it. Teachers can use the process to see how and what students have learned. Please pass this podcast and Jamie's book on to every teacher you know. And students, too.

Cal resumes his conversation with Dr. David Bach, the Harvard-trained neuroscientist who is about to give you an opportunity to upgrade your brain. Dr. Bach is the founder of Optios. His company's work is unlocking a door to a new kind of human potential. Cal learns how Optios will help him get in the zone to learn about the science he could never pay attention to when he was in junior high school. His conversations with Dr. Bach are starting to pay off. Cal is now fascinated with how Rory McIlroy will be able to shave strokes off his golf game. And how you'll be able to get better at learning whatever matters most to you by dancing with AI. The simulation Dr. Bach describes in this episode works in the lab. Soon it'll be coming to you. In the meantime, Big Questions has upgraded to allow you to watch visually. If you'd like, check it out on youtube.com/bigquestionspodcast. 

Charles Gaudet has coached thousands of CEOs over the years. Yahoo Finance has called him "The CEO Whisperer." In this episode, Cal asks him to turn what he's learned toward a big question: What can everybody do to protect their jobs in the age of AI? Charles has some answers. The employees who thrive will be the ones who use AI to make themselves more valuable by leveling up their productivity. Here's the best part. To do so, you don't need the right answers. You just need to come up with the right questions.

Graduation stages across America erupted in boos this spring when AI came up. That anxiety isn't just for new grads. It's felt by anyone wondering whether they still have a place in a world being reshaped by technology. This episode of Big Questions: The Future of Work tackles that fear head-on. Cal brings in Jay Samit — former Independent Vice Chairman of Deloitte Digital and bestselling author of Disrupt You, Future Proofing You, and most recently Second Act Advantage — for a conversation that's less about artificial intelligence and more about human intelligence: how to think, adapt, and find your edge no matter where you are in life or career. And that's not all, there's a travel story from our sponsor, Moments, by LuxuryConciergeTravel.com that starts like a Chevy Chase National Lampoon film and ends up with real life smiles. If you're walking across a graduation stage, fearful of a "job-pocalypse" in midlife or wondering what your next chapter looks like in retirement, this episode will give you a lift.

In an age when AI has everyone asking what's next for humans, Cal goes looking for answers. He finds them in some unexpected places. A five-year-old girl who walked through a Transylvanian forest to save her sister's life. A New York publicist who followed a hunch to Charlotte and built something nobody had ever seen before. And a guy with a borrowed bicycle who turned a single crazy idea into a quarter-century movement that has raised $31 million for cancer victims. These aren't tech stories. They're human ones. And the thing that connects them is that irreplaceable gut instinct that no algorithm can replicate. It just might be the most important skill you have right now. Big Questions: The Future of Work with Cal Fussman. Every Tuesday. Powered by Moments.

Cal opens this deeply personal episode of Big Questions with a flood of remarkable medical breakthroughs. 3D-printed windpipes. A pancreatic cancer drug that doubles survival rates. Nanotechnology clearing toxic proteins from the body. And he explains why he's sharing them: to balance the grief of losing his friend Sally, a highly-ranked senior tennis player taken too soon by gallbladder cancer. Out of that grief, Cal finds promise. From a man who rode a bike for 24 straight hours 25 years ago who's gone on to raise $31 million for cancer patients. To a vision of the future where technology doesn't kill jobs — it creates them. This episode is exactly what Cal is promising as his podcast evolves toward the Future of Work. Sunshine. Even through difficult times. It'll be a Central Park for the soul. See you every Tuesday.

A professor at an elite university noticed something alarming: every student's work was flawless . . . and nearly identical. All of it generated by AI. So she did the unthinkable (for the students, anyway). She banned devices and allowed only pen and paper. What happened next surprised everyone, including her students. But going Old School isn't the overall point of this episode. Cal uses this story to give a taste of the evolution of his podcast Big Questions: The Future of Work. In this episode, best-selling author Jamie Metzl describes how he used the work ethic he'd developed over decades to combine with the speed and scope of AI in the writing of his new book: The AI Ten Commandments. Meanwhile CEO coach Charles Gaudet predicts how we are close to a day when people will apply for jobs with AI at their side. Job applicants will soon hear the phrase BYOA. That's: Bring Your Own Agents. In both cases, this runway answers the question of how to get the best out of ourselves and AI together. With Old School values and New Age tools.

Cal stumbles on a Chinese company offering to digitally resurrect the dead for three dollars. His first thought? Larry King would have loved this. In this episode, Cal sits down with Larry King Jr. to explore what it really means to preserve a life. The stories. The voice. The questions. From Larry Sr's relentless chase for immortality. To the Larry King Cardiac Foundation that literally saved hundreds of hearts. To the bobblehead-sized AI facsimile that might one day let your great-great- grandchildren hear your voice. It all adds up to a conversation about legacy, technology, and what we leave behind. Plus! The story of how Larry Zeiger became Larry King in ten minutes flat through a liquor ad and a door that was kicked down.