 Live from Houston, Texas, it's The Cube, covering Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. Welcome back to The Cube's coverage of the Grace Hopper Conference here in Houston, Texas. I'm your host, Rebecca Knight. Our guest today is Julie Eberfeld, the Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer of the Commercial Bank at Capital One. Welcome, thank you so much for joining us, Julie. Thank you, Rebecca, glad to be here. So I want to start the conversation by asking about a new product launch that you announced, Capital One, teaching Alexa a new skill. Absolutely. Tell us more. Yeah, it was awesome. We had four of our women on stage announcing a brand new product that we offer on Alexis, so a new skill. We introduced Alexis skills earlier in the year where you could find out information about your credit card. And what we announced here at the conference was that you can ask Alexa, how much did I spend? So a little scary for some of us to be able to say, like, how much did I spend? Especially as we enter the holiday season, where the answer might be, yes, a little scary. But we're really excited because we think it's just the way people want to bank today. They want convenience. They want to be in their kitchen and be able to just ask Alexa something that they've thought about and ask how much did I spend at Starbucks last month or how much did I spend at the grocery last month? Oh, she'll tabulate on monthly and weekly. Oh, this is. Yeah, it's for over 2,000 different merchants that you can get your information on and you can ask for a specific date or you can ask for a date rain. So we're really excited about how it introduces the way we're thinking about banking and trying to bring humanity to banking and just reacting to the way that you want to bank. So bringing humanity to banking, but a real techie would say it's bringing AI, artificial intelligence to banking. Yes, absolutely. Where are we, do you think, as someone who's in this industry, on that continuum in the sense of, are we just at the very beginning of this transformation? Oh, absolutely, I think so. I mean, I think people are want to bank differently than they ever have just because their experience with technology is so different, but this whole data revolution and the whole way to think about machine learning and artificial intelligence, I mean, I think we're absolutely just at the tip of the iceberg in terms of the opportunity that it creates. I mean, you've heard a lot at the conference about that topic and just the ideas that people have about where that can take us is amazing and it's no different in banking. We have all kinds of ideas on the way that we're going to be able to simplify people's lives and give them the information they need through all of these technologies. So you are the Chief Information Officer of the Commercial Bank at Capital One and you run a team that is designing and developing products for other companies. That's right. How is your approach to building that team and what are you thinking about as you're hiring technologists, men and women, how are you thinking about the strategy? You know, I mean, talent in the technology industry is one of our bigger challenges, right? I mean, you see all the data that predicts the number of open jobs that are going to be out there in the next five years and all the gaps that there will be in terms of people to be able to fill them. And so for us, thinking about the engineering talent that we need to be able to build the products that our customers demand is so important to us and we know that that great talent is really hard to come by. And so not only do we want to get the best talent but we want them to come in and have a very inclusive environment. So we think about how do people do their best work? They do their best work when they're happy at work, when they're engaged. And so that whole notion of inclusion is so important. But we also really think that the diversity lens is important as well, that we want different perspectives. We know that we're only going to get the best ideas and the best innovations, which is really what we're aiming for in order to satisfy our customers' needs if we have that diversity of thought. And so we want the diversity, that's why we're here, that's why we're really excited about the work we're doing in diversity. But we also know it doesn't stop with the hiring. That that whole notion of being engaged, feeling included, feeling you can get your voice in the room, that you can make a difference and that you can do your best work is really what we're really focused on just as much as the hiring side of it. Right, so it's hiring the right people. And then as you said, keeping them happy and engaged. Absolutely. How do you do that? What are some of the things that you're doing at Capital One, these strategies that you're implementing to make sure that people are, as you said, bringing their best selves to work? We have a number of different programs. I think what I've been focusing on for the last couple years is particularly related to diversity and inclusion in tech. And in particular, our Women in Technology initiative, which is what got us here initially to Grace Hopper, we started initiative two years ago and it really was a grassroots effort. Just a couple of young women who had heard what was happening in the industry were concerned about what was happening in terms of just the numbers and the drop-off in terms of women actually entering the tech field. But then also what they had heard about from their friends and what they were hearing in the media about cultures that were just really not feeling inclusive for women. And then this whole notion that women drop out of the tech field and over double the rate of men, it's sort of this midpoint of their career. Just at the point they're about to be your future leaders of tomorrow, they start to drop out. And what, why in your opinion? I mean, there's a lot of theories, there's some research about this. I mean, it does happen right about the time you are thinking about having your children, which can put a real damper on your career. But what are some of the other reasons in your mind and in your experience? I mean, there's a lot of research out there and we kind of rely on that research in terms of our understanding. I mean, I raised three children in this industry, it's been a great experience for me. But I think the research shows that that's not really the reason. I mean, that is a small percentage of the reason that women do drop out. But I think the research shows that the other reasons have to do with this feeling of, you know, maybe this isn't the right field for me, I don't really feel included. I, you know, you hear terms like death by 1,000 cuts, like maybe they can't even identify themselves, what really caused them to start to feel like this wasn't the right field for them. But something just doesn't feel right. And then somebody comes along. It's that problem that has no name, the body for them. Yeah, exactly. And then somebody comes along and says, hey, you've been working with my business for a long time. You know, you know all about the technology, but you know a lot about my business as well. Why don't you come join me? And they get that offer and it just feels appetizing. And maybe they don't really know why. And so I think we really want to continue to make this just a really compelling opportunity for women. You know, you have just these skills that you have and these tools that you have in your hands as an engineer is just amazing, right? So how do you do it? How do you keep them? What are you doing? Keep giving them great assignments, giving them visibility. So it's the tech candy. That's right. Good problems to solve. That's right. And making sure that their voices can be heard, talking to everybody about what it might feel like. How does that work out in practice? You're at a meeting and as you said, you are wanting to make sure that women feel their voices can be heard. What sort of strategies do you do as a manager? Do I personally invite people into the conversation, right? I mean, you get to know the people on your team, you get to know where they might be feeling less uncomfortable and invite them into the conversation. I think we just went through some training for all of our people managers that we rolled out on bias training. And what we did this for thousands of people managers because we thought it was really important that we had a common language, that everyone could start to talk about bias because we all have it, but we could do it in a really simple and common language sort of way. And so we introduced this training and now everyone, you hear everyone talking about it. Hey, I think that I'm experiencing some safety bias here. I think we're experiencing some distance bias. We're not letting the person who's on the phone or the workers remotely have as much say as the ones who are local to us. And so it's really awesome to see how people are using that. It starts out a little tongue in cheek of I'm just reciting what I learned in my training, but then it can become a real thing. Absolutely, because we make a lot of decisions every day. Some of them are quick and easy and some of them are really complex decisions and really meaningful decisions. And so we've also taken that bias training into our people management practices because we think that is the moments of truth. When you're doing performance management at the end of the year or you're doing talent assessments that we do throughout the year, those are the moments that bias can creep in. And so we know that, we know everybody has them. So we've tried to introduce, hey, these are the risks of bias that you run into during these different people management practices. And here are some mitigating approaches. I think that's the piece that's often missing from bias training is like, okay, so we all have bias and then we can all just kind of wash our hands of that and say, okay, this training actually says there are ways to mitigate that bias and we try to train people in these moments, here are the ways that you can make sure that you try to mitigate that bias. And so I think these different biases like distance biases are really common one. We have people who are on the phone and we don't invite them in. So many remote workers today. Right, and so all of these things build up to creating a more inclusive environment when people understand the biases that they might have and how they then can mitigate it that applies to all of us, right? Everybody has something different they bring to the table. But some of them do particularly affect women more acutely. And so we also introduced a program that we're really proud of which is our men as allies program. Men as allies. Men as allies. All right. And it really was a completely grassroots effort which is what I really love. It wasn't, let's have a demand from the top that we start this program. It was something that came out of our women in tech initiative. And so one of our women attended a conference with a male partner and one of her peer executives. And they went to the conference where they spoke about just some of the experiences that women have in the workplace and how men react to that in the workplace. So how men feel in dealing with women's issues in the workplace. So give me some examples because I mean, I think I know what you're talking about. I think our viewers can relate, but just what were some of the experiences that they talked about? One of the things that Mike talks about is his realization that women don't necessarily get the same feedback as men. So early in your career, you might have something that needs to be corrected and a man coaching another man. And this, by the way, is also women managers, but they will coach a man very directly. They will tell them exactly what they need to do. Here's this kind of career limiting behaviors that you need to correct. And if you correct this, you're going to be on a better trajectory for your career. Women, on the other hand, get very softened feedback. I think we're socialized to think about women and have more, we're just softer in our approach to women. And so they don't get the same feedback. And then, lo and behold, five, six, seven years into their career, maybe this thing that could have been corrected in their first year or second year hadn't been corrected and maybe is starting to create some challenges for them. And become challenges for them to get that next promotion, that next choice assignment. Absolutely. I think there are other things like, you know, this realization that you make assumptions about what people may or may not want to do in their career. And so I think some of our managers realized that, oh gosh, you know, I had an opportunity and men a move. And I just didn't ask this particular woman if she might be interested because I thought that that just wouldn't fit into her family life. And so instead of making that assumption, you know, you really should ask. Right, because it wouldn't be the same assumption you'd make about a man of, oh, well, he's got three kids in school, he doesn't want to move. You would still ask the man, but you would think differently. That's right. It's really true. And so I think there were different elements. And I think as a woman, I'm guilty of it too. And it's not just a male manager who would make that assumption. That's right. And I think that's one of the important things that we've tried to be really inclusive around the notion that, you know, many of these things are not just men to women. They are all managers, tend to have some of these biases and some of these assumptions and that we can think differently about it by being just more aware that that's what we do. I think also just learning that, you know, women do have a tendency to feel like they have to be 100% qualified for a job. There's a lot of research on that. Exactly. That a woman sees a job ad and says, oh, I can't do the seven things they ask. I can only do five. I'm not qualified. Exactly. A man can do two and he signs up. Exactly. And especially I think in engineering, I think it's even amplified when you're a software engineer and it says you need to have these skills and you're like, well, I don't have some of those skills so I shouldn't apply. Whereas, you know, we all know that we can learn these skills. And so I think what we've tried to say is that for some of our women, if we think that a woman is really a great candidate for a job, don't wait for her to kind of put her name in the hat. Just go and reach out and tap her and say, hey, I think this would be a great job opportunity for you. Even if she says, well, you know, I'm not sure I'm qualified. You have to kind of go that next step. Give her the push, Grace. Julie Elberfeld, thank you so much for joining us. It's been terrific talking to you. Thank you. I'm Rebecca Knight, your host for theCUBE's coverage of the Grace Hopper Conference here in Houston, Texas. We'll be back after this break.