The Princess of Wales has made a compelling public appeal to the UK's corporate leaders, urging them to fundamentally rethink their values by prioritising 'time and tenderness' alongside traditional metrics of productivity and profit.
A Rare and Personal Address
In her first speech since her cancer diagnosis at the start of 2024, Kate addressed an audience of 80 business figures at the Future Workforce Summit, hosted by her Royal Foundation Business Taskforce. She was joined by former England football captain, Sir Gareth Southgate, adding a significant voice to her campaign.
The Princess reflected deeply on the formative power of love, stating, 'the love we feel in our earliest years fundamentally shapes who we become and how we thrive as adults'. She challenged the leaders to consider the broader ecosystems they influence, from their own families to their workforces and communities.
The Human Advantage in an AI World
The summit coincided with the release of a new report from The Royal Foundation titled 'The Human Advantage'. This report explores a crucial future trend: as artificial intelligence takes over more technical tasks, the competitive edge for businesses will increasingly rely on human skills that technology cannot replicate.
While a significant 81% of business leaders surveyed acknowledged that human skills will be in greater demand over the next five to ten years, the report found a critical gap. Very few connected the development of these essential skills to the foundational experiences of early childhood.
Kate directly addressed this disconnect, telling the assembly, 'Imagine a world where each of these environments were built on valuing time and tenderness just as much as productivity and success.' She argued that profitability and positive social impact are not mutually exclusive, but should be pursued together.
A Long-Term Vision for the Nation
This event builds upon the work of the Royal Foundation Business Taskforce for Early Childhood, which in the summer of 2024 published a report with recommendations for corporate support. This taskforce, involving chief executives from major firms like Ikea, NatWest Group, and Deloitte, calculated that the nation could benefit from an estimated £45.5bn by investing in the early years.
The recommendations include creating workplace cultures that prioritise childhood and offering parents greater resources and flexibility. This forms a key part of the Princess's long-term Shaping Us campaign, launched in January 2023 and described as her 'life's work', which aims to spotlight the irreplaceable importance of the first five years of a child's life.
During her speech, Kate also took a moment to thank her team at the Centre for Early Childhood 'for holding the fort, particularly over the last couple of years', a personal note that resonated deeply with attendees.
