Microsoft’s Jean-Philippe Courtois On Why Transparency Is Such A ‘Big Deal’

Jean-Philippe Courtois, president of Microsoft International, spoke to HuffPost Live in Davos on Saturday about the steps his company is taking to maintain the public’s trust as data moves further into the Cloud.

Courtois said Microsoft has been focusing on several aspects: improving how they anchor the data; certification and compliance of infrastructure; and transparency, among other things.

“This is a big deal to actually report back to society what we do with data and how we deal with government requests,” Courtois said about being a transparent company.

Below, live updates from the 2015 Davos Annual Meeting:

HPLEmbed.load({ targetId: ‘HPLContent’, app: ‘hplive_player’, width: ‘640px’, height: ‘321px’, streamType: ‘live’, autoPlay: ‘true’, mute: ‘true’, playButtonOverlay: ‘true’, thumbnail: ”, sources: { ‘video/hds’: ‘http://hpsnhds-f.akamaihd.net/z/davos2015_1@105680/manifest.f4m’, ‘video/hls’: ‘http://hpsn-i.akamaihd.net/hls/live/207735/davos2015/master.m3u8’ }, comScore: { c4: ‘us.portal’ }, analytics: { title: ‘WEF Davos’, playerId: ‘WEF Davos’ }, AMAConfig:’http://ma180-r.analytics.edgesuite.net/config/beacon-3224.xml’ }); live blog Oldest Newest Share + Today 6:10 AM ESTJean-Philippe Courtois At The World Economic Forum 2015 (function(){var src_url=”https://spshared.5min.com/Scripts/PlayerSeed.js?playList=518617088&height=351&width=570&sid=577&origin=undefined&videoGroupID=170366&relatedNumOfResults=100&responsive=false&relatedMode=2&relatedBottomHeight=60&companionPos=&hasCompanion=false&autoStart=false&colorPallet=%23FFEB00&videoControlDisplayColor=%23191919&shuffle=0&isAP=1&sponsorship=hpldavos&onVideoDataLoaded=HPTrack.Vid.DL&onTimeUpdate=HPTrack.Vid.TC”;if (typeof(commercial_video) == “object”) {src_url += “&siteSection=”+commercial_video.site_and_category;if (commercial_video.package) {src_url += “&sponsorship=”+commercial_video.package;}}var script = document.createElement(“script”);script.src = src_url;script.async = true;var placeholder = document.querySelector(“.js-fivemin-script”);placeholder.parentElement.replaceChild(script, placeholder);})();Microsoft International President Jean-Philippe Courtois joins HuffPost Live to talk about technology at Davos, NSA reform and some exciting products that are on the horizon.

“I just think if leaders don’t set a tone about why we do what we do and why we do it in a way that’s enriching for all of us, then people just assume all leadership cares about is the bottom line,” Lesser said.

Lesser said he tries to lead by example but he’s “probably on email too much.”

“In our world, having great talent want to come and want to stay is the single biggest driver of success,” Lesser said.

Lesser said empowering millennial workers and making them aware of the impact they’ll have on the world through their work has increased the success of BCG.

“I really think the more we’ve invested to make it a unique work environment… it’s totally a positive,” Lesser said.

Boston Consultant Group president and CEO Rich Lesser and Wendy Woods, global leader of Social Impact for BCG, joined HuffPost Live at Davos on Saturday to share how their company helped the UN respond to the Ebola crisis.

“It’s something that we felt most privileged to be a part of,” Lesser said.

Amy Gutmann at Davos

“The challenge of free speech is when there’s speech you really don’t like,” Gutmann said. “We have to live up to the challenge and stand by free speech when it’s offensive speech, as well as when it’s speech we like.”

“The creative spirit comes alive when you can robustly argue with people and feel protected, and feel safe,” she added.

Gutmann said offensive free speech fosters more discussion, which can be a good thing.

“When the speech is offensive I feel we have a responsibility to respond,” Gutmann said.

“We have three president engagement prizes for students who come up with a project to spend a whole year post-graduation doing something in the community,” Gutmann said, noting the first three students will be awarded this spring.

“The whole point is to show that higher education is both about your success, but it’s your success by creating value in the world,” Gutmann said.

Amy Gutmann said it’s her mission “to get the word out” about financial assistance, because she would have been unable to go to college if she hadn’t gotten a scholarship.

Amy Gutmann, president of the University of Pennsylvania, said we need to make college more accessible in order for people to thrive in the 21st century.

“No person can afford not to have a college degree, so we have to make a college degree affordable,” Gutmann said.

“Always I try to be centered,” Finucane said.

“Being centered is very important and accepting who you are with your flaws… I walk a lot, I read a lot and I let go. I let go of things,” Finucane added.

The Huffington Post