Today’s interview is with Ben Pring, who is the head of thought leadership at Cognizant, co-founded and leads Cognizant’s Center for the Future of Work, and is a member of Cognizant’s Executive Leadership Team.

Toll collecting isn’t quite what it used to be. Gone are the days where you would throw change into a bucket. Now everything is digital and those who collect tolls face new challenges.

Sustainable business practices are not just a moral imperative but also make excellent business sense. Our recent research highlights ways to monetize emerging tech tools that make business “greener” and more prosperous, says Ben Pring, chief futurist from Cognizant’s Center for the Future of Work.

The pandemic has brought renewed focus on the topic of sustainability. While the COVID-19 lockdowns resulted in a steep dip in greenhouse gas emissions, 2020 was still considered the worst year for climate-related disasters, with record-breaking temperatures around the globe, months of disastrous wildfires that engulfed most of California and Australia, and a record hurricane season in the Caribbean.

The beauty industry, as with most retail businesses, was forced to rethink their pre-COVID-19 approach and reimagine customer engagement in an entirely new context during the pandemic that will set the tone for the shopping experience for years to come.