>> Announcer: From theCUBE studios in Palo Alto and Boston. It's theCUBE. Covering IBM Think. Brought to you by IBM. >> Hi everybody, we're back this is Dave Vellante from theCUBE and you're watching our wall-to-wall coverage of IBM's Digital Think 2020 event and we are really pleased to have Guillermo Miranda here. He's the Vice President of Corporate and Social Responsibility. Guillermo thanks for coming on theCUBE. >> Absolutely, good afternoon to you. Good evening, wherever you are. >> So, you know this notion of corporate responsibility, it really has gained steam lately and of course with COVID-19, companies like IBM really have to take the lead on this. The tech industry actually has been one of those industries that has been less hard hit and IBM as a leader along with some other companies are really being looked at to step up. So talk a little bit about social responsibility in the context of the current COVID climate. >> Absolutely. Now thank you for the question. Look, first our responsibility is with the safety of our employees and the continuity of business for our clients. In this frame what we have done is see what is the most adequate areas to respond to the emergency of the pandemic and using what we know in terms of expertise and the talent that we have is why we decided to work first with high performance computing. IBM design and produce the fastest computers in the world. So Summit and a consortium of providers of high performance computing is helping on the discovery of vaccinations and drugs for the pandemic. The second thing that we are doing is related with data and insights. We own The Weather Company which is at 80 million people connected to check the weather every morning, every afternoon. So through The Weather Company, we are providing insights and data about county level information on COVID-19. Another thing that we are doing is we are offering some of our products for free. Watson, it is a chatbot to inform about what is adequate, what is needed in the middle of a pandemic if you are a consumer. We are also helping with our volunteers. IBM volunteers are helping teachers and school districts to rapidly flip into remote learning and get used to the tools of working on a remote environment. And finally we have a micro volunteering opportunity for anybody that has a computer or an android phone. So with the world community grid, you can help with the discovery also of drugs and vaccinations for COVID-19. >> Wow that's great, those are four awesome initiatives. They can't get the vaccine fast enough. Getting good quality information in the hands of people in this era of fake news also very very important. Students missing out on some of the key parts of their learning so remote learning is key. I love this idea of kind of micro crowd sourcing solutions. Really kind of opening that up and hopefully we'll have some big wins there Guillermo. Thank you for that. I want to ask you people talk about blue collar jobs, they talk about white collar jobs, you guys talk about new collar jobs. You and others. What are new collar jobs and why are they important? >> Look, in this data, digital, artificial intelligence driven economy, it's important not to have a digital divide between the haves and the have nots on the foundational skills to be operational in a digital economy. So new collar jobs are precisely the intersection of the skills that you need to operate in this digital driven economy with the basic knowledge to be a user of technology. So think about a cyber security analyst. You don't need a masters degree in industrial engineering to be a cyber security analyst. You just need the basic things about operating an environment on a security control center for instance. Or talk about blockchain or talk about software engineering, full stack developer. There are many roles that you can do in this economy where you don't need to have a full four-year degree in a university to have a decent paying job for the digital economy. These are the new collar jobs and what we are attempting to do with the new collar job definition is to get rid of the paradigm that the university degree is the only passport to a successful career in the marketplace. You can start in different, having the opportunity to have a job in a high tech area. Not necessarily with a PhD in engineering as I said, it's something important for us, for our clients and for the community. >> Yeah, so that's a very interesting concept that a lot of us can relate to. To go back to our university days, many of the courses that we took, we shook our heads and said, "okay, why do I have to take this?" Okay, I get it, well rounded liberal arts experience, that's all good but it's almost like you're implying that the notion of specialization that we've known for years like for instance, in vocations, auto-mechanic, woodworking, etc. Planning that have really critical aspect of the economy. Applying that to the technology business. It's genius and very simple. >> Absolutely. Look, this is the reinvention of vocational education for the 21st century where you continue to need the plumber, you continue to need the hairdresser but also you need people that operate the digital platforms and are comfortable with this environment and they don't need to pass at the beginning through full university. And it's also the concept that we have divided the secondary education, high school from college, university etc., like a Chinese wall. Here is high school, here is college. No! There can be a clear integration because you can start to get ready without finishing high school yet. So there are several paradigms that we have evolved in the previous century that now we need to change and be ready for this 21st century digital driven economy. >> Yeah, very refreshing. Really about time that this thinking came into practice. Talk about P-Tech. How does P-Tech fit into acquiring these skills? And maybe you could give us a sense as to the sort of profile of the folks and there backgrounds and give us a sense as to and add some color to how that's all working. >> Absolutely, so look, the P-Tech model started 10 years ago in a high school in New York City, in Brooklyn. And the whole idea is to go to an under-served area and create a ramp onto success that will help you to first finish high school. Finishing high school is very important and has a lot connotations for your future. And then at the same time, they start getting an associate degree in an area of high growth. The third component is the industry partner. An industry partner that works with the school district and the community college in order to bring the knowledge of what is needed in that community in order to create real job opportunities and we will send you the people and then you will use it. No! We need to work together in order to train the talent for the future. And you just go to the middle age and the guilds were the ones that were preparing the workers. So the industry was preparing the workforce. Why in the 20th century we renounced to that? Having real, relevant skills starting in high school, helping the kids to graduate with a dual diploma. High school, college and practice in real life what it is to be in a workplace environment. So we have more than 220 schools. In this school year, we have more than 150,000 kids in 24 countries already working through the P-Tech model. >> Love it and really scaling that up. So let's say I'm an individual. I'm a young person, I'm from a diverse background, maybe my parents came to this country and I'm a first generation American. Of course, it's not just the United States, it's global but let's say I'm from a background that's less advantaged, how do I take advantage? How hard is it for me to tap in to something like P-Tech and get these skills? >> Well, first one of the characteristics of the model is this is free admission. So there is not a barrier fence. If your school district offers P-Tech, you can apply to P-Tech and get into the P-Tech model education without any barrier without any account. And the second thing that you need to have is curiosity. Because it's not going to be the typical high school where you have math, science, gym, whatever. This is more of an integration of how the look of a career will be in the future and how you have to start understanding that there are drivers into the economy that are fast tracks into well paid jobs. So curiosity on top of being ready to join a P-Tech school in the school district where you live in. >> That's great Guillermo, thank you for sharing that. Now of course corporate responsibility, that's a wide net. This is one of your passions. I'll give you the last word to kind of, where do you see this whole corporate responsibility movement going generally and specifically within IBM? >> I think that this whole pandemic will just accelerate some of the clear trends in the marketplace. Corporate responsibility cannot be an afterthought as before in the '80s or '90s. I will put a foundation. I have a little of profits that are left and then I will distribute grants and that's my whole corporate responsibility approach. Corporate responsibility needs to be within the fabric of how do you do business. It has to be embedded into the values of your company and your value proposition and you have to serve those projects with the same kind of skills and technology, in the case of IBM, that you do for your commercial engagements. And this is what we do in IBM. We help IBMers to be helpful to their communities with the same kind of quality and platforms that we offer to our clients. And we help to solve one of the most complicated problems in society through technology, innovation, time. >> Love it. Guillermo thanks so much, you're doing great work. Really appreciate you coming on theCUBE and sharing with our audience. Congratulations. >> Absolutely. Thank you for very much for having me. >> You're very welcome and thank you for watching everybody. This is Dave Vellante from theCUBE. You're watching our continuous coverage of IBM Think 2020, the digital version. Keep it right there, we'll be right back after this short break. (bright music)