Conversations with Mike Milken
by Milken Institute
COVID-19 has changed the way we work and live. In response to the public health emergency, Milken Institute Chairman Michael Milken is engaging a range of industry leaders and medical experts to help us better understand and confront a crisis that has not only altered our current day-to-day but will change the course of how we work, socialize, and fight disease for years to come.
Episodes
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Milken Institute Fireside Chats: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent
How should investors think about economic uncertainty in a changing global landscape? At the 2025 Milken Institute Global Conference, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent joins Michael Milken to discuss the policies shaping America’s economic direction from trade and taxation to deregulation and...
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Milken Institute Fireside Chats: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang
Milken Institute Fireside Chats features candid conversations with global leaders across business, finance, health, philanthropy, and public policy. Recorded live at Milken Institute events around the world, each episode offers insight into the ideas, innovations, and leadership shaping economies...
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Ep. 126: Who We Are Today, with Ancestry’s Deb Liu
“How do we think about building an inclusive product that represents what families look like today, which might be very different than what families looked like 200 years ago. We want voices from all over to help us shape that product.” With 20 years of experience in the technology sector –...
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Ep. 125: Leadership, with BTG Pactual’s André Esteves
“We need to attack extreme poverty. Of course, the pandemic brought additional challenge to that. But, we provided emergency aid for an extensive part of our population, around 60 million people. Of course it's a fiscal challenge, but we did more on a relative basis than all the other countries.”...
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Ep. 124: Accomplishments, with Secretary Elaine Chao
“Asian Americans are now beginning to find our voice. We’re learning that we need to be full participants in our democracy. The rise in violence and hateful rhetoric against the Asian American community during the COVID 19 pandemic has brought this community to a greater realization of the need…
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Ep. 123: Priorities, with Anheuser-Busch’s Michel Doukeris
“In protecting our business, we are not talking about protecting AB’s business, but everybody in the chain that was relying on AB to maintain their business continuity. And that came from the farmers to the people in our breweries, to the wholesalers that we service to the retailers that they...
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Ep. 122: New Dimensions, with HP’s Enrique Lores
“We all have learned the things that a few months ago we thought were not possible were really possible. … As I think about manufacturing, I think about two big changes. First is the creation of more decentralized manufacturing networks, where companies will be able to produce closer … to where...
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Ep. 121: The Novelist and the Neurologist, with John Grisham and Neal Kassell
This Podcast Features: John Grisham Author Neal Kassell Founder and Chairman, Focused Ultrasound Foundation “Once I realized the potential of this non-invasive surgical procedure to save countless lives and improve the healthcare of millions of people, I realized how important this work can be…
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Ep. 120: Foresight, with Julie Sweet
“The crisis happened at a time of exponential change in technology that was already transforming the way we work, how we engage with clients, how we make decisions. … And then you instantly had behavioral change at a scale that we've never seen in the past.” Julie Sweet believes large companies...
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Ep. 119: Revolutionary, with UC Berkeley’s Jennifer Doudna
“Diagnosis goes hand in hand with vaccination, and of course with therapies as well. What CRISPR is doing is providing for rapid turnaround testing at a lower cost and higher throughput than we've had with other technologies. We'll see that happening in various testing labs, certainly around the...
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Ep. 118: Core Values, with Google Cloud’s Thomas Kurian
“The process of digitization – whether that was e-commerce in retail, or online gaming for media, online streaming in the media business, digital platforms for the public sector – was already underway. But it enormously accelerated with the pandemic.” In his two years as CEO of Google Cloud…
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Ep. 117: High Priority, with World Bank Group’s David Malpass
“The bigger part of our response over the next year, and then really over the next five years, is how do you really help countries get bigger private sectors, more jobs, including jobs for women and education for girls.” When David Malpass began his five-year term as president of the World Bank...
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Ep. 116: Encore, with Sherry Lansing
“When we get out of this pandemic, I suspect people are going to want to flock to the movie theaters. But they're also going to say, I still want my content delivered. So, the movie industry is going to face a decision. Do they offer it both ways – on your iPad the same day as the release in the...
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Ep. 115: New Heroes, with NIH’s Francis Collins
“It has been a year of terrible tragedy. … And yet, it's also been a year of heroism: the first responders, the healthcare providers, putting themselves at risk to try to help those who are suffering. But I also think there are heroes that have risen to this challenge in the research community…
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Ep. 114: Collaborating to Beat COVID: A Conversation with Leaders from Health and Bioscience
Sir Andrew Witty President, UnitedHealth Group; CEO, Optum; Co-Leader, COVID-19 Vaccine Development, World Health Organization George Yancopoulos President and Chief Scientific Officer, Regeneron Esther Krofah Executive Director, FasterCures “Are we willing to do for life sciences and global...
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Ep. 113: “To Boldly Go,” with Operation Warp Speed’s Moncef Slaoui
“The efficacy of these vaccines is spectacular. It's 95%, the same whether you are an African-American or Hispanic or over 65 years old. … Remarkably, these two vaccines developed in different companies, two different continents, give incredibly similar results, totally independent, which is also...
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Ep. 112: Speed of Science, with Pfizer’s Albert Bourla and Johnson & Johnson’s Alex Gorsky
Albert Bourla Chairman and CEO, Pfizer Alex Gorsky Chairman and CEO, Johnson & Johnson “I think history has shown us to have major leaps forward almost after every crisis. Whether it's a war, a natural disaster, or frankly a big challenge such as going to the moon, these kinds of inflection…
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Ep. 111: Global Scale, with Leaders from Murdoch Children’s Research Institute
Sarah Murdoch Co-Chair, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI) Kathryn North Director, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI); David Danks Professor of Child Health Research, University of Melbourne Hamish Graham Paediatrician and Senior Research Fellow, Murdoch Children’s Research...
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Ep. 110: Mettle, with Mubadala’s Khaldoon Khalifa Al Mubarak
“The UAE was among the first countries in the world to make sure it implemented and successfully executed a testing policy. We ramped up on capacity, on ICU space, on respirator supplies. And that resulted in one of the lowest mortality rates in the world.” As the Group CEO and Managing Director…
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Ep. 109: Lessons Learned: The Intersection of Cancer Research and COVID Treatments
Himisha Beltran Medical Oncologist, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Felix Feng Radiation Oncologist and Vice Chair for Translational Research, UCSF Department of Radiation Oncology Christopher Haiman Genetic Epidemiologist and Professor of Preventive Medicine, Keck School of Medicine of USC Deborah...
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Ep. 108: No Silos, with Google Health’s David Feinberg and FasterCures’ Esther Krofah
David Feinberg, Vice President, Google Health; Advisory Board Member, FasterCures Esther Krofah, Executive Director, FasterCures “What we've really tried to do is get information out there to the public, to researchers, to public health folks, so they can make better decisions about what's...
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Ep. 107: Dealmaker, with Thoma Bravo’s Orlando Bravo
“There were a lot of hedge fund blogs out there saying software is going to get destroyed. … And guess what happened? Our recurring revenue stream was really nearly untouched in a pandemic. Corporate customers paid their subscription software revenue, but they didn't pay rent. It was more stable...
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Ep. 106: On the Verge: Leaders in Bioscience Discuss the State of Vaccines and Treatments
George Yancopoulos Co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer, Regeneron Joseph Vinetz Professor of Medicine, Yale University; Infectious Disease Physician Tal Zaks Chief Medical Officer, Moderna “We're going to need vaccines to create as widespread herd immunity as we can, but we're also going to...
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Ep. 105: Pioneering, with FOX’s Maria Bartiromo
“It goes back to opportunity and jobs.… Government can only do so much. The private sector needs to step up and ensure that they are creating opportunities for a broad swath of the population who don't have those opportunities.” When Maria Bartiromo became the first journalist to report live from...
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Ep. 104: Driven, with GM’s Mary Barra
“There was this ventilator company that needed help. We realized there was one part on the ventilator that was very similar to the way a transmission is designed and they were having quality issues with it. We brought in transmission engineers and they figured out a way to improve the part and…
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Ep. 103: A Timely Solution, with EJF Capital’s Manny Friedman and Neal Wilson
“You've got to think big to solve problems. … Some of the present bills [have] the potential to solve the major inequality problem in the United States.” (Friedman) “Given the historically low rates, what we're saying is the government can be the catalyst for effecting long-term change.” (Wilson)...
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Ep. 102: Humanitarian, with the Hilton Foundation’s Peter Laugharn
“Every society is more fragile than we realize, and every society can be taken advantage of. So I think it's incumbent on everyone to fight for community, to recognize the humanity of everybody. … It’s what keeps us safe, and it's what gives the future to our kids.” Just out of college in 1982,...
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Ep. 101: Diversified, with Eldridge’s Todd Boehly
“Throughout our organization, we're continuously pushing on how do we continue to add diversity, and I think we're a young enough group where that has always been the way we've approached the world. … Our culture has been that diverse groups make better decisions.” Todd Boehly strives for an...
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Ep. 100: Family, with Target’s Brian Cornell
“We need to have an organization that reflects the millions and millions of guests we serve each and every day. From the bottom up we've made a commitment to diversity and inclusion. Of the 1,900 stores we run in the United States, over half are led by female store directors, over a third are...
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Ep. 99: Lessons, with Maria Contreras-Sweet
“Venture capital is concentrated in … three states: California, Massachusetts, and New York. We know that not all the good ideas come from those three places. And so it's really important that we think hard about how we make sure that all small businesses can access capital.” With a career that...
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Ep. 98: Inclusive Capitalism, with TIAA’s Roger Ferguson
“We have to rebuild with a more inclusive capitalism, and I emphasize both of those words … so that as we go forward with crises – and there will be crises – the impact of those crises will not be so heavily defined by the color of one's skin.” As President and CEO of TIAA, Roger Ferguson manages...
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Ep. 97: Visionary, with iHeart Media’s Bob Pittman
“What we've done during COVID in many ways, we've taken 10 years of technology adoption and crammed it into three months. I'm certain we're getting ready to have a slew of new ideas that you and I haven't thought of, but that we're going to be delighted to support.” Bob Pittman was 15 when he...
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Ep. 96: Transitions, with the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre’s Michael Hofman
“Once you have a whole body PET scan, there's not a lot of value often in doing a physical examination or taking out your stethoscope because the information on that scan tells you everything you need to know. The classic medicine history examination is giving way to a whole new form of medicine...
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Ep. 95: Real Impact, with Jennifer Doudna
“I really want to be building on this technology here at Berkeley and making sure that we are creating a community of scientists that are doing two things: not only extending this extraordinary science and thinking about how to apply genome editing in ways that will have real impact on humanity;...
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Ep. 94: Immigrant Spirit, with ABH’s Anastasia Soare
“I think my immigrant spirit of adapting kicked in and I said, look guys, we need to do something. We cannot sit here and do nothing because the stores are closed. Let's start a plan of attack, let's start going online. … This is what we did within 10 days … and we grew 154% online.” Anastasia...
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Ep. 93: Compassionate Capitalism, with Biocon’s Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw
“I'm very committed to compassionate capitalism, which is what I like to call my business. … My products are there to help patients who need it anywhere in the world. And therefore, I believe that if I can actually produce these products in a way that provides affordable access … I will be very...
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Ep. 92: Skills, with Facebook’s Nicola Mendelsohn CBE
“There's so much more that unites us than separates us. And at the same time, also from a business perspective, the small businesses around the world, well, they're looking for the same thing too. … I've been on the streets of the Soweto with some amazing female entrepreneurs. And they're telling...
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Ep. 91: Transparency, with MCC’s Sean Cairncross
“Government funds alone simply aren't going to get the job done. What's needed is the engagement of the private sector and the private capital flows that come into these markets to make lasting change sustainable.” Created in 2004 with broad bipartisan support, the Millennium Challenge…
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Ep. 90: Well-Being, with the Motsepe Foundation’s Precious Moloi-Motsepe
“Your well-being, your wealth, is very intertwined and dependent on other people's well-being. … That is the philosophy that also drives us because we know that our children's well-being cannot be isolated from the well-being of the other children in South Africa, or other kids on the continent,...
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Ep. 89: Impact, with GPIF’s Hiro Mizuno
“For us to have a sustainable portfolio, we have to have a sustainable capital market. And for us to have a sustainable capital market, we need to have a sustainable society. And for us to have a sustainable society, we need to have a sustainable environment? It's all connected.” When he was...
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Ep. 88: Ownership, with Liberty Media’s Greg Maffei
“We developed a green team and a red team. The red team's job was to play defense, and first think mostly about liquidity and our downside. And the green team was supposed to think about where could we take advantage of this?” With COVID striking at the heart of Liberty Media’s sports portfolio...
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Ep. 87: Time to Reflect, with Larry Gagosian
“Many great artists have dealt with the tragedies and the turmoil of the time they lived in. I think the artist needs some time to reflect; you take it in, you process it, and maybe not consciously even, try to depict some horrible event that is filtered through your other experiences and your...
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Ep. 86: Compassion, with Cesar Purisima
“More people will move to poverty as a result of the pandemic. And the estimate is at least half a billion to a billion people. … I think that might push back a little bit the shift to a greener economy. And this is where I hope that the private sector can step up because this is not just a...
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Ep. 85: Sustainable, with Unilever’s Alan Jope
“The biggest tailwind is going to be the voice of young people demanding that the grownups do not ignore warnings about pandemics, about climate change, about gross inequality. One of the headwinds I'm very concerned about is a retreat to nationalism. We know that trade – global trade – has been...
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Ep. 84: Culture, with Mastercard’s Ajay Banga
“Culture doesn’t just come because you wave a magic wand. It comes through hard work; it comes through sharing; it comes through cross‐fertilization of people and ideas. … The culture we built, we don't want to lose that during this process. Coming out of it, there will be an even bigger...
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Ep. 83: Breaking Through, with Ursula M. Burns
“Let's start talking about this. How are we going to diversify our boards? How are we going to diversify our management teams? How are we going to diversify our entry-level pipeline? How are we going to work in a community to make it better? … In the last three weeks, four weeks, it's been…
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Ep. 82: The Day After, with UC Berkeley’s Carol T. Christ
“Though the pandemic is taking so much of our energy right now in addressing it, there will be a day after. And institutions, organizations of any sort, have to have a very clear sense of what their mission and goals are in that day after.” As the 11th Chancellor of the University of California,...
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Ep. 81: New World, with Guggenheim Partners’ Scott Minerd
“We can use this low interest rate period as an opportunity to finance for the future. Will we invest in things which will enhance the quality of life and enhance economic growth and output? … Because we can't go back to the old world. And I think the new world can be a much better place if we…
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Ep. 80: Reimagining, with Deepak Chopra
“COVID has actually given us a time to rethink and reimagine the world. How do we repair the ecosystem? How do we repair the microbiome, which is reversible? How do we create a more socially just, and economically just world and society?” For Deepak Chopra, healing the world begins with healing...
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Ep. 79: Diplomacy, with Ambassador Kelly Craft
“Obviously, we wish it was earlier if China had been more forthcoming and transparent. But I think the important part is that we cannot allow any pandemic or any economic situation currently to cloud our moral responsibility for issues that are already on the ground.” Whether she’s voting in the...
About this show
COVID-19 has changed the way we work and live. In response to the public health emergency, Milken Institute Chairman Michael Milken is engaging a range of industry leaders and medical experts to help us better understand and confront a crisis that has not only altered our current day-to-day but will change the course of how we work, socialize, and fight disease for years to come.
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