Cloud Wars Live with Bob Evans

The Big Themes:Public cloud operating model: Maybe there was more governance requirements, more security. We are seeing now customers becoming more thoughtful.Endless pots of gold: The one big thing on their mind is, “How can I do more with less money.”First-party data, on-premises data: But at the same time having the same self-service model, the speed, the agility, the security, the performance that you need via applications and the access.That technology is a means to an end: It’s really connecting with the people that we do business with. People are the most important – our customers, our employees, and our partners.The Big Quotes:“According to Gartner, about 75% of the people they surveyed revealed that midsize and large enterprises are moving to hybrid and multi-cloud and 81% of public cloud users are using more than two clouds.”“Our Nutanix cloud platform is built for that kind of portability across environments to begin with.”“So we are integrating with AWS, with Azure, with other cloud providers, with managed service cloud providers to deliver that functionality to our customers in a really simplified manner.” Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• The Baby Boomers are retiring: Further accelerating the need to deal with mainframes.• FinTech as an example: Old brick and mortar banks and investment firms have had mainframes for 40 years, but those workhorses can’t handle fast-changing world of digital finance.• You’d better get that project right: We always tell our CIOs, "When you successfully move your mainframe to the cloud, you're going to end up in the CEO's office." Unfortunately, the opposite is also true!The Big Quotes:“I would think there's about 20,000 mainframes left in existence spread over 5,500 customers.”“We call them unicorns—the COBOL, CICS, DB2, deep technical experts—and they will retire before the mainframes are migrated.”“So, we want to pass that comfort level on and share it with our new customers to say, ‘Yeah, there are going to be things that'll be difficult. We'll get there together.’” Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• The great resignation is effecting projects: What are some of the key findings or trends about these transformations? What was different in Q3?• What are the biggest reasons projects fail to deliver results? So many companies in the middle of digital transformation.• What are some of the pain points: That's actually a little bit higher than we've seen in the past.• What should customers be prepared for: Our survey results point the way forward for businesses.The Big Quotes:“So many of these digital transformations are dependent upon a third-party professional services firm.”“This is almost going contrary to this idea of working remotely. But their main complaint was the fact that they were not able to travel anymore, it was actually something that they missed.”“So the fewer integrations that you have and the less spaghetti, the less mess.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• Facebook is evil: It’s a lot like going to work for Philip Morris 30 years ago. We should continue to invest in solving the world’s problems.• Tesla is undervalued: Tesla is a software company. Tesla is an automaker – and in five years we’ll see who’s right.• An interesting and kind of fun way: How can you make these companies more software companies over the next few years?• The faster we can get there: When we’re taking shots at social media – there’s big problems that need to be addressed.The Big Quotes:“And frankly, every time I think, okay we've hit rock bottom. It's like they figured out a way to drill further into the rock and look worse.”“And so we need to be really careful that we don't I think that we don't paint with too broad a brush there.”“Do you work digital or not? It's just like, so are you going to work or you're going to retire?”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• We just launched a new channel: Reflecting this global business phenomenon, it’s called the data revolution—and it’s turning the business world upside-down.• Mining for gold: Gathering as much customer data as possible and then using mining algorithms to gain insights and opportunities.• Aggregated, integrated, and transformed: Data transformation is the term that is used rou describes the modern digital recipe for turning to turn raw data into business data.• What can and should they do differently? Companies are interacting with their customers online and in unprecedented digital ways.The Big Quotes:“Gartner predicts that 75% of all databases will either be created in the cloud or move to the cloud by the end of next year.”“And they're like, how did they know that about me? It's a little unsettling.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• The real story behind the supply chain: There are not enough skilled workers in manufacturing, logistics, distribution, and trucking.• Combination of technology and innovative programs: Like apprenticeships, primary school education programs, and recruiting people from other industries.• Geo-political dynamics: LinkedIn pulling out of China, recent investments by the US government to stimulate American ships manufacturing, and 5G development.• Google is an example of a broader trend: This is a deceptively simple observation and one that holds insights for business leaders.The Big Quotes:“It's clearly starting to have an impact as we get a little closer to the holiday season.”“Boy, we had that all wrong. What were we thinking? We're rethinking our strategy but trust me, they are.”“We might break that into four or five that have proximity to final assembly, proximity to customers, proximity to talent, proximity to energy grids.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• The solution is a production database: So there’s a big period of time when I have two different data sources. And you run the report off that database.• We learned about Chesterton's fence: It didn't grow like a weed – somebody put it there. They spent time and money and energy. I say to CEOs boards and my customers ask yourself, why did we do it that way?• Very worried about shadow IT: The CEO and the CIO will come to tell you one thing: this is bad.• Keep the lemmings from running over the cliff: Traditionally, the board of directors and the business people were talking about the same thing – and so were the vendors. Giving them the benefit of our advice.The Big Quotes:“Oracle got it. IBM got it. Microsoft gets it. Some of the other vendors that were more product focused, kind of looked at their product from the wrong end of the telescope.”“They don't want to buy a vendor's product. They want to buy a process solution.”“Do analytics, look at dashboards. They've already seen it 20 times.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• We're not loyal to each other: I think you've got to breathe almost our hearts back into our organizations.• Competitors are very aggressive: And they're enticing them with new programs at 20% rates. The salaries are getting kicked up just because they're paying more.• Blindingly obvious: When we’re in the four walls, we forget the simple things. It’s really a clear and present demonstration of what your values and beliefs are.• Empowerment is about decision rights: I don't feel like I'm making impact. I'm not trusted to do my job.The Big Quotes:“I'm not an Elon Musk fan boy, I think he has good qualities and bad qualities.”“This is how we're enabling you to have more fun.”“Are we so dumb as to think that people can't sense that?”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• “Scaling Up” – by Verne Harnish: The four Ds: drivers, demands, discipline, and decisions.• Growth doesn’t always equal success: For each organization, defining what success means is really important to defining how you can make a decision and make those executions a reality.• The Acceleration Economy Analyst Network: This is a new venture from Acceleration Economy Media, a group of experts creating content from different points of view.• The Acceleration Economy Conference: This will be happening in Arizona in March, as a face-to-face event.The Big Quote:“I personally love that we're able to take some time and recognize those points of view, recognize what others have been doing.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• Your data pipeline is key: A strong data pipeline with a decent model is better than an awesome model with a weak data pipeline• Sit down with the executives: It's relevant at the executive level as well. Guys at the CEO level like Cloud Wars All-Star Tony Uphoff are pushing the envelope through data.• In data analysis, there’s a war for high quality talent: Figure out how to get better candidates into the top of your funnel and move the right candidates through that funnel faster.The Big Quote:“I think this concept of just digital twins in general is something that you're going to see start to radiate across more and more of complex systems.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• Young kids don’t have any money: After spending a hundred thousand dollars on a four year education I’d like to see the universities at least provide a one day seminar and teach them personal skills.• A lot of brilliant minds: Talented people that are in the middle of their career have no idea how to navigate to the next level.• They have to do their homework: I find it very sad that these young people don’t recognize that they have to present themselves.• The video conference is a challenge: If you're feeling stressed take a breath, have fun, enjoy yourself, try really hard to make it a conversation. It’s not always about your skills or abilities. It’s about the personality contest.The Big Quotes:“Look online. Every company has hundreds of openings and there's so many people that are interviewing.”“You need to also recognize that your hope is that you're going to gain one or two advocates out of the interviewers.”“It's hugely important to recognize that you really want to connect with these people that are on the interview cycle.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• Operating solutions to hotels, casinos, and cruise ships: It’s been a brutal 18 months for hospitality – the industry did a very good job early on of shoring up liquidity.• We did quite well during COVID: The vast majority of the partner technologies that were deployed I'd say in the first 12 months of the pandemic were largely focused around mobility.• These are huge numbers: We're talking IT staffs that numbered in the thousands pre-pandemic. I don't see those IT organizations returning to pre-pandemic numbers.• It was hard to get a hotel room: I think the industry's going to have a gangbuster holiday season.The Big Quotes:• “I can tell you in the immediate timeframe, because of the staffing shortages, there's a heavy reliance on technology as an intermediary to facilitate that guest experience.”• “I hope you stayed at a property that leverages our Oracle hospitality technology.”• “It's a really great win-win product, because the traveler is always getting a better product and the hotel's getting more money.”--This episode is brought to you by Oracle. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• Setting clear project goals and timelines: This will help you measure your progress. Without clear goals and success metrics, it will be difficult to understand if you are on right track.• Make sure you have leadership buy-in: It’s important to get these individuals on board. Leadership support can also ensure you have the right resources.• Select the right consulting partner: They wish they did more research on their consulting partner instead of simply using the first partner that their software vendor recommended.• How to recover: Identify what is happening in real-time and isolate the specific points of failure. Assess the impact on your project and organization.The Big Quotes:“So who knows where the next wave of technology will take us.”“Well, like the age old question, how do you eat an elephant? It's like one bite at a time.”“You want a partner who's not going to bait and switch you and give you wrong the team during the selection process.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• They're looking to modernize everything they do: And whether that's the infrastructure, whether that's how they operate the infrastructure, but it's such a key priority.• I look at this as two layers of that cake: If we go back to the pillars of a modernization, infrastructure, operations, and applications.• And I think there's really three pillars to that: One is certainly modernizing their infrastructure. Two is their operations and how they're interacting with their data. And then three is empowering their modern applications.• If you look at our core storage products: They're designed from day one to be very elastically scalable, non-disruptively so that they can easily be expanded in terms of performance, in terms of capacity.The Big Quotes:“All of a sudden your entire workforce is working from home and there's IT demands that come out of that.”“Maybe there's a hurricane, a data center goes offline. How do I bridge that gap? How do I survive that couple of weeks before I can get back to normal?"“And so I think that's going to continue to increase. And again, that's something that we've invested heavily here at Pure. Because it just fits so well with the core principles of our technology.” Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• You may be hearing about it: The Buy American Act, The Infrastructure Bill, The United States Innovation, and Competition Act.• Based on our Thomas data: We have a few predictions of supply chain disruptions that will impact the consumer economy over the next 12 months.• The woman that created a billion dollar brand called Spanx: She was pretty savvy about design and had at least a functional understanding of some of the engineering requirements.• These key pieces of legislation: Are accelerating the US manufacturing economy and will play significant roles in driving the overall US economy and global security.The Big Quotes:“And all these things arrived for the first time in history, that generation is being hit with product shortages and problems of supply chain, disruption, and ships backed up in harbors.”“If you can, I would wait at least six to 12 months to buy your next car.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• Every industry: Think about how each one of them accelerated or propelled what they would have taken years to get to in a very, very short period of time.• Some businesses have opened, some have closed: But one thing it's really taught us is we're able to touch billions of people in meaningful ways, across a broad spectrum.• Constantly engaging with your customers: And the more you own your customer’s success, the more rewards you will see for your engagement.• That's what you purchased: Today, you purchase a car that's convenient and that meets your sustainability, and is the next generation and it's driven through software.The Big Quotes:“But it's incredible how human beings have been able to cope with this and continue to cope with the scenarios around it in every place around the world.”“And so we have to work every day, really hard to make our customers successful.” Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• IBM support is a differentiator: Upstart cloud vendors are in an IaaS arms race. Legacy enterprise IT clients have been with IBM clients for 50+ years.• Board of duty of care: The board’s overarching mandate is to protect shareholders over the long term. Boards have two main fiduciary duties: Loyalty and care.• Cybersecurity and obsolescence risk: What is the age of IT components vs. current – years matter less than generations.• The right CIO: The CEO gets the CIO they settle for. And CEOs should lobby for QTE—qualified technology expert—on the board.The Big Quotes:“We can't get people. We can't get stuff. We can't get network capabilities added because everybody's out of everything.”“We are now 20 months into a pandemic where we sent the office workers home. Microsoft just the other day said, ‘We're not coming back for a while.’ ““So you can be a higher margin, higher stickiness, higher customer satisfaction in a company and survive for the long run.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• This thing called fog of war: And the fog of war is you don't know everything. And then as soon as the bullets start flying, you actually know less because it's like this aperture shrinks.• Half the Fortune 500 will be replaced by other companies: We have the highest churn rate in the history of the list.• Most of our corporations are run by terrible leaders: They have the technical background, but just look at our firms, look at how tone deaf they are.• It's a fantastic world: It's the standards that you have to live up to. And in the exploration of this conversation, we can get to the heart of why leadership is so difficult.The Big Quotes:“I think we've lost the societal grit to do good leadership to the extent that we need to, because it's so freaking hard.”“When you learn leadership, there's fundamental principles that are at play here, and sometimes they're in conflict.”“Not the placards that the typical HR department puts on the walls, which are meaningless and senseless. A waste of print dollars.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• The Ambassador: Excited about the project and are telling everyone about it. They’ll be the first ones that post their go-live badge on LinkedIn. They’re also rolling-up their sleeves to contribute.• The up-and-comer: Might not have previous experience but see the project as an opportunity to grow in their career and add a successful digital transformation to their resume. Great attitude.• Debbie Downer/Don Downer: “We’ve always done it this way” is their MO. They have a problem for every solution.• I’m only here for the snacks: Quiet and non-participatory in meetings and email. Demotivate the team and get credit where credit is not due.The Big Quotes:“The success of a project is going to boil down to good people management.”“You want to make sure that you're hand picking the team.”“A lot of these problems can be solved through good documentation and a good project blueprint where people have known exactly what they're needing to contribute and buy one.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• It just doesn’t magically happen: It’s not the data you already have, this is one of the hard lessons that lot of folks think.• DataStax fits into that equation: And this is one of the things that I think goes back to what you talked about in terms of agility.• Everybody has S3 compatible APIs: You've got your storage now that is just scale out via very simple APIs. You've got your compute now that's been standardized on top of Kubernetes.• You may have some rock stars: But majority of code written even at these internet companies is written by good developers. And I guarantee you, you've got good developers.The Big Quotes:“And so Cassandra was what enabled a number of retailers, many of the major retailers in operation today built critical parts of their e-commerce stack on top of Cassandra.”“The starting point for most folks is you start talking about saying, ‘Okay, you need to collect and log and interpret all of these streams of data.’”“And so the open data stack is about trying to make data catch up to where Kubernetes is in terms of giving you that agility.” Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• You've got great leaders at the top of the house: In both those companies you really understand innovation.• One of our venture companies: We sold a company to a publicly traded company that when that transaction happened, I got a lot of congratulations.• That ship has sailed: I also think though that speaks to another thing that we expected to happen when you plug into an organization – like in this case of Salesforce or Oracle.• Very fast moving dynamic: So we need to keep in mind not to get locked into an idea that will surely be obsolete in a matter of weeks or months.The Big Quotes:“But that doesn't mean that the $27 billion was a fair price. I think it probably was not unfortunately for the shareholders.”“The game was how many times could you say synergy in a windowless conference room for 30 minutes?”“I think in enterprise tech you're really seeing something of this happening now in Slack.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:• A fascinating cultural shift: The millennial generation’s increasing dissatisfaction with “knowledge work” and the increasing interest in wanting to make things.• The cultural legacies of the US manufacturing industry: This is why so many industries are disrupted by outsiders.• Technology continues to advance dramatically: It’s time to transform and upgrade how technology is positioned, explained, and sold.• Many scheduled office re-openings have been pushed back: We’re seeing some companies announce full remote plans in perpetuity. What will this push-back do to the tentative office re-opening plans?The Big Quotes:“I think I shared with you in New York City that there's over 8,000 small manufacturers that are generating over $7 billion a year in revenue in New York City.”“We hit a really interesting inflection point where the number of millennial managers were in the workforce and at the same size as the Baby Boom managers.”“The US manufacturing industry is close to a $3 trillion industry—there are not of industries of that size walking around.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Accenture ransomware: Accenture’s response – they quickly detected, defended, and repaired. So far, it appears to be only a low-value material leaked.The New Digital Edge: McKinsey article rethinking strategy for the post-pandemic era. “By 2023, most companies will need to build new digital businesses to stay economically viable.”Talking to CFOs: After talking with several CFOs since the last episode, I think it’s time for some changes. Why does IT report to the CFO at so many companies?What should happen: CFO should tell the CEO, ‘no thanks!’ CFOs and the CIOs make a more powerful team – even better as peers. The Big Quotes:“Accenture also said none of our confidential material was leaked.” “And you know that whole 19th century model of the green eyeshades and the rolled-up sleeves at the desk – that world has changed, and we've got to recognize it.” “So go back 50, 60 years, the first people that put technology and the first computers went in the 1950s – that's 70 years ago.” “Walter Wriston, the founder of the organizer of Citibank, said information about money is as valuable as money itself.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:The “T” in Teamwork: Why employees with breadth and depth are imperative for harmonizing organizational goals and culture. We call this the acceleration economy.We are launching a brand-new program: August 19th to be exact, and it's all content driven to what is the future role of the office of the CFO.Tie in the future effects of the office: What’s the difference between data digitization – and why organizations should care.I think develops a richer culture: It also helps for those people who are in those decision-making roles to better understand what you're doing.The Big Quotes:“A lot of organizations are needing to be adaptive and changing on a dime.”“I think more roles are going to be a little less tactical – a little more visionary and strategic.”“Check out our podcasts, The Wrap, that is one of my highlights of the week, and it's a time that we can share what we've heard through the week.This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

As President of SAP S/4HANA, Jan Gilg oversees development of SAP's flagship ERP product, digital supply chain, and industry solutions. In this conversation, Jan discusses how the shift to a digital economy is driving unprecedented changes in how businesses operate, and the new types of software solutions businesses require to thrive in such an environment. In the midst of all that upheaval, SAP itself has changed in significant ways, and Gilg shares his perspectives on the benefits those changes are driving for customers. The Big Themes:Across all 25 industries: Now moving into the cloud we are really following the old modularization strategy on the one hand side – and blurring much, much more.Much better visibility: I probably want to have more visibility into multiple tiers of my supply chain. The Big Quotes:“This will be a steering dimension for every company in every industry.” “And we capture the data from the sensors and feed it again into the context of the vehicles.” “The shift to Office 365 was massive from our perspective.” This episode is brought to by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Like Goldilocks' testing out the three different sized chairs: This one is too big, this one is too small—this one is JUST RIGHT. Mid-size businesses need solutions and partners that are "just right" for them.McKinsey has reported: What mid-size enterprises really need to realize their growth potential is "the ability to access foreign markets, increase operational efficiency and adopt growth-enabling technologies."Big idea: Businesses need to choose software that is flexible, agile, and facilitates collaboration – especially as businesses re-think in-person versus remote workspaces for their people.Perhaps most important of all: The midmarket needs software that's quick and less expensive to implement compared to big on-premise ERP systems. The Big Quotes:“So Goldilocks was sort of a modern software pioneer.” “This year we're upwards of 1,200 project reviews at this point.” “Because I'm thinking if it's too hot and you get a blob of that on your tongue, it's not going to be a good experience.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:You must preserve the core of your business: Leadership is about to make the investments, provide the autonomy, create the innovation culture and align it to your overall strategy.The four freedoms: An organization that allows for innovation, capability to really thrive, grow, and affect the future of your business.What I call the beacon model: You create a capability that is related – but separate from the core of your business.These are courageous innovators: They have to be able to frame and form their own culture. There is a certain amount of operational form of freedom. The Big Quotes:“So the relationship between leadership and courage – and then the ability to be an innovator.” “Jeff Bezos he has a bunch of them, but one of my favorites is he says something to the extent of, ‘You cannot be afraid of being misunderstood.’” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:We went all in with Google Cloud: Most of our peers were actually going in the other direction. They wanted to be multicloud, making acquisitions in adjacent ecosystems.Return to work shouldn’t mean return to normal: If I talk to our software developers, who were already remote before the pandemic.This is the future of our business: We are about to make an investment that will change the trajectory of the company forever, and we have very high expectations. The Big Quotes:“There's no customer that adopts the Google platform stack without taking on some bit of change.” “We serve all the traditional enterprises that are fighting for relevance and survival, and we're serving all the startups that are actively disrupting them.” “We've attracted some of the most talented, and amazing – like Miles – executives in the world to come join us on this journey, and so, I think our customers feel that.” Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Will business travel come back? There is a lot of conjecture about business travel being forever changed by the forced online interaction of the pandemic. Our sense is it already has been but not in the way many people think.Thomas Q2 Sourcing Report is out: And reflects strong demand across a wide range of categories, with significant implications for technology markets. We nailed a few of our Q2 predictions and have several for Q3.Higher Ed and Healthcare: Two massive markets that many people feel have been ripe for technology disruption for years but they remain unchanged. Will this time be different?The increase in demand for PCB boards: It’s not solely coming from the traditional consumer electronics. It's really coming from the auto industry. The Big Quotes:“I think for a lot of your listeners, you're seeing the major cloud vendors are all in on the top two or three focus of vertical cloud.” “I think we're witnessing a whole new era of how products are conceived, how they're designed, how they're built, how they're manufactured, how they're distributed.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Returning to the office: This isn’t really what native digitals want. Apple employees revolted, as did Google’s, prompting one of the largest technology companies in the world to backtrack.The result of this macro trend: If you are 35 years old or younger you will progressively spend time, energy, and money improving and enhancing your digital life, not your physical life.The stuff business: 140 million native digital Americans and Millennials and Gen Z grew up in an era where they watched how their parents pursuit of “stuff” didn't really lead to anything meaningful.A diamond is forever: This campaign eventually evolved into commercials in the late 1970’s where DeBeers quite literally defines how much a man should spend on an engagement ring. The Big Quotes:“So what's going on here when you're native analog, your primary reality is a physical or analog reality.” “This has profound implications for the way we work, but it's a lot more than just that.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Offer customers the best in breed solutions: The pace that we see in the Middle East is a very hungry market for technology and knowledge.The best way to accelerate: We have done a rollout in 20 countries using that template in a very short period of time. I think this is a big change from the past.A very quick return on their investments: So it’s very important to understand the quick wins from these types of projects.A journey with our customers: We believe that if they grow, their business grows, we will grow with them. That’s our culture. The Big Quotes:"What's your business strategy in the next three to five years?" “People want to grow. They want to grow quickly. They want to expand.” “And then I think it's more about focusing on the people.” Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Cloud repatriation: Techies and investors are buzzing about a recent articlethat seems to argue, “start in the cloud, then move back in-house.”BoD and CIO/CISO gap: Most CIOs/CISOs have limited BoD interaction, and most board directors know far too little about technology. They need to talk!Last week I became a NACD ‘Certified Director’: After lots of study and a grueling exam! So BoDs are on my mind more than usual.Pat Fitzgerald about hiring and retaining workers: Shakespeare, “Glendower: I can call the spirits from the vasty deep.” “Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can anyone – but will they come when you call them?” The Big Quotes:“And right now there is not a single restaurant that doesn't have a help wanted sign the size of their window.” “Now it's 2021. Ransomware is in the news. Cybersecurity is in the news. Digital transformation is in the news I contend.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:The creativity that each one of them had: Telling their own story – and a lot of them used real-life stories and data, and so much more.They’re very polarizing: You can’t really put human management together and feel that’s a warm environment – that definitely has a lot of tone to it.More companies are trying to be strategic: In order to be competitive and to meet customer expectations, they’re having this drive to be from the customer’s point of view.There’s lots of ways to engage with us: We’ve been running this event for over 10 years, and it’s a fantastic way to network with the Microsoft ecosystem. The Big Quotes:“So how do you build those skillsets and some of those big questions of how you can become adaptable.” “I think they are going to move up to the top of the list and compete higher.” “As a young leader I guess is to lead with empathy, and lead with human awareness and kindness.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:That’s what Silk helps with: We’re helping customers take those applications, and more importantly the databases underneath them – and successfully deploy them to the public cloud.Performance and cost: We always describe it as two sides of the same coin. You can have all that performance, but it’s going to cost you the world.The platform works as a very clever system: It uses a two-tier architecture that splits performance and capacity into independent dimensions.The crown jewels of the database space: When it comes to moving it and putting it into someone else’s cloud, you really need to be absolutely sure that you’re going to get everything you need. The Big Quotes:“I'm in a very privileged position to be able to talk to lots of CEOs and CTOs of very large companies.” “It's essentially like a t-shirt size methodology, but most real life work clothes don't fit into the easy small, medium, or large categories.” “I just think that everyone needs to keep an eye on what's happening in this database space.” Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:They want a player that’s crushing their quota year-after-year: Everybody’s going after that person. To get a search agency that’s going to make you a priority and only recruit for you is not realistic.They’re experts in their field: They’re sales recruiters, and that’s all they do. They’re engineering recruiters – and that’s all they do.Equity is always going to be a big issue: I think we’ll continue to be a driving force for change in the future.Candidates are just getting multiple offers, multiple calls: They’re getting tired of getting all the recruiting phone calls and interviews. The Big Quotes:“Did that person resonate with me? Do we share common values? You know, are they going to help me get to that next level?” “They’re going to have more resources. They’re going to have more tools. They’re going to have more investment put into making that organization or that team successful because that’s their business.” “They want to be with companies that are going to make their job easier.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Microsoft has said that for every $1 of software they sell, partners make $9: The opportunity for channel partners in this time of cloud growth is huge.It should mirror the customer base: Software vendors should make it easy for customers to know who their partners are.Effective onboarding and training programs: These ensure that partners have the domain expertise to work any given software and ongoing programs.A level playing field: Not cherry-picking partners for customers based upon name brand or because they fund the top sponsorships.The Big Quotes:“This is really a summary of the last three years of research.”“Just because somebody was great one year doesn't mean that they're going to be great the following year.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Taking a victory lap: When you look at those lists, these are technology companies that have figured out how to partner and work within the industry.New Carnegie Mellon masters program: I believe the first masters level joint business degree is to help students prepare to be a product manager.The enemy of my enemy is my friend: But the other part of that is true as well. There’s a lot of moving pieces on the chess board right now.Rockefeller breaking up Standard Oil: After the breakup, he got significantly wealthier. Could the same happen with Amazon and AWS? The Big Quotes:“I think that the other thing that's going to be interesting as I kind of look into the back half of 2021 and 2022 is I do think we're going to start to actually see a lot more innovation around healthcare.” “The vaccine rollout is nothing short of a miracle.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

Oliver Bussmann is a world-renowned expert specializing on the intersection of technology and business with particular expertise in financial services, and is now CEO of Bussmann Advisory AG. Having been both a CIO and a COO, Oliver has held senior positions at UBS, SAP, Allianz, Deutsche Bank and IBM.I had a great chat with Oliver Bussmann, who's a strategic advisor and board member for corporations and software companies, as well as startups in fintech, payments, and blockchain. Having been CIO at not only one of the world's top software companies – SAP –but also at some leading financial institutions – UBS and Allianz – Oliver shares compelling insights on digital transformation, new business models, the impact of technology on strategy, and the ongoing battle for talent.The Big Themes:State-of-the-art technology: How they connect to the ecosystem, so there are two worlds coming together.Bringing data into the cloud: There’s a price tag to that too. It’s not only an efficiency play, by the way, meaning which application you want to test drive.It’s a never-ending story: The next one is already waiting around the corner. You have to adjust how you work together, and the level of collaboration has changed dramatically over the couple of years.My weekly newsletter: In total almost 40,000 subscribers. I have a huge community of a hundred thousand followers on LinkedIn.The Big Quotes:“The most important asset that you have is your people. And how you take your people, your organization on that journey, get them excited, motivated, help them to learn more new skills and capabilities.”“And we are at the beginning of a marathon. It's not a sprint.”This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Why isn’t big data producing big insights? In our last episode we tee’d up the idea that while we have seen extraordinary advances in big data, data analytics and data science, it’s harder to find examples of extraordinary insights of the use of big data.How should business leaders factor human judgement: In his latest book, “Noise,” Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Prize winning economist suggests that the issue is about human judgement and not data.The era of augmented intelligence: We are seeing some remarkable advances in AI and ML learning — and there are wide ranging implications for business, politics, and society.Many companies are rethinking what “return to office” means: As major companies announce return to office, employees have seen the benefits of remote work. The Big Quotes:“We're spending a lot of time watching artificial intelligence takeoff in the industrial marketplaces and manufacturing marketplaces.” “So this is a human element and there is an X factor oftentimes in human interactions that is very difficult to articulate.” “And this is a truly extraordinary time. We are at an inflection point where the enabling technologies and our ability to understand how to use them.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Wake-up call for boards and C-Suites: What do we hear from victims? “We didn’t think we’d be a target.”In our emerging acceleration economy: Firms can’t afford the lost time, the lost revenue/added costs, the hit to reputation a successful attack causes.Firms must do six things well: Robust prevention, quick detection, defense in depth, keeping secrets secret, effective repair/restoration, and not keeping your eggs in one basket.Manage systemic risk, not just cybersecurity: If someone can waltz in and unplug the firewall, are you secure? The Big Quotes:“There's a John Chambers quote that I've used before. There are two kinds of companies: those that have been hacked, and those they don't know that they've been hacked.” “And if you're an executive and you had trouble understanding that, listen again, because nothing I said is very technical.” “If your systems are cruddy and 15 years old and not connected, you might be in a full-time hygiene mode.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Fundamental and important to the model: Data lakes, data hubs, data warehouses, data marketplaces – that’s a lot of data.Snowflake has popularized the concept: Other vendors are latching onto it – you could argue it is kind of revolutionizing that whole model.Google announced Dataplex: A data fabric for integration, and they also announced an analytics hub for data sharing and analytics, and sharing insights into the data stream.A definition of cloud computing: Still holds up to the light of day after 13 years – including databases and data sources across an enterprise. The Big Quotes:“So my working headline here is, ‘What is a data cloud?’ I've been hearing the term ‘data cloud’ a lot recently.” “I think that plumbing is involved, but it's less about plumbing and more about business strategy.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Where these two circles intersect: You could offer a core set of applications, and the ability for you to pick and choose some of these other applications that are available.We set up Lifion to build our Next Gen HCM: We had to build it not for just the up-market U.S. space, but we were also targeting U.S. HQ at MNCs and international companies.The numbers may vary: I’m just going to use that standard rule of thumb we follow is the 80/20 rule. Enterprise software is about 80% of the use cases.How do you operationalize that mission: I think the way we’re coming into the market is we are saying, “We all want to be there, and we truly believe that this is a tool that can help you get there.” The Big Quotes:“Now, the best part of working within the ADP ecosystem, is we can truly leverage some of these third-party applications via our marketplace.”“We probably do not give enough credit to some of the products that have come before us. They have been the ones who have done it for a while.” Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Plotted on a bell curve: Some are amazing, and some are terrible – and some are in the middle.Stability is not the issue: There’s capital behind these companies that give you the same amount of runway you could expect from any of the other kinds of companies.The term unicorn was coined: You needed to raise money at least a billion dollar valuation from one company in your portfolio to make that portfolio be a top performing venture portfolio.Microsoft and Nuance: You have the sales, the partnership, and the marketing muscle that a company like Microsoft can provide. The Big Quotes:“But the more interesting thing to me was that in the first five months of 2021, there were 187 companies that for the first time raised money at over a billion-dollar valuation.” “The thing that's more concerning to me is I think there's a lot of reflection we, as an industry, need to do on the right way to create healthy corporate governance among these companies.” “And I think it's time for CFOs to stop worrying about just doing the logistics.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Abe Lincoln: Give me six hours to chop down a tree, and I will spend the first four hours sharpening the ax.No analysis paralysis: As you prepare to lock down your decision, you must be sure that the core problem you’re trying to solve is clearly outlined in your statement of work.Don’t boil the ocean: Our magic number is around three alternatives that you’re shortlisting before making a final decision.These trusted partners: When you find a partner that can challenge your ideas and make you think outside the box, that’s definitely a sign of somebody that could really be beneficial for your project. The Big Quotes:“Certainly Raven Intel is a great place where you can get peer review information written by other customers.” “Celebrate your success in the end – and then do a look back and see what worked what didn’t.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

Just over a year ago, Howard Boville left his job as CTO at Bank of America to join IBM as senior VP of hybrid cloud. Boville joined Cloud Wars Live to discuss the big changes he’s been driving at IBM Cloud, the booming market for industry clouds that he’s been aggressively championing within IBM, and the colossal market for industry-specific solutions. A recurring theme for Boville throughout our conversation is the opening of Chapter 2 in the cloud story, where large enterprises that have been caught up in purely technology conversations have flipped the topic to the one that will drive real and meaningful transformation: business outcomes. Boville has not only some great insights to share, but he’s also a gifted speaker who employs colorful language and humor to drive home essential points.In this conversation, Boville shares his thoughts on the ongoing power of the IBM-SAP relationship, which is almost 50 years old, and on the essential need for deep industry knowledge.The Big Themes:We’ve done 6,500 projects: We’ve got 38,000 SAP practitioners. But we've actually got now the regulated cloud capabilities that allow customers to move forward with their projects.They will run on different types of silicon: We have x86, we have Power, we have Z, and we also have Quantum, and that will become fully onboarded beyond research institutions onto our cloud at the end of this year.You can start your digital transformation immediately: There are a lot of cases where we’ve taken two, three, four year projects down to two, three, four months. The Big Quotes:“But one other point I would make, which is again very important, is we don't see ourselves as competing head-to-head against the other cloud service providers.” “The case of cybersecurity is that threat factor never stops, so you always need to be thinking through different ways to actually protect through breadth and in depth.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:The citizen developer: Those low-code, no-code tools are giving the power back to their employees, and that’s creating a new environment that’s having a reorganization in that area.Some of the innovations from Microsoft Teams: It was just like a basic tool that I use with Teams. Some of the innovations that they developed so rapidly in the times of COVID to adapt to a new remote workforce.There’s always new things to soak in there: We also have a number of events that take place, and live on demand – one of them is our binge programs.Industry solutions: Trying to compare their challenges with other challenges – and try to see what matches and what’s worth their time and investment. The Big Quotes:“Most of my day job is reading, reviewing, producing content that's relevant in the business tech world, and helping others have a voice in that conversation as well.” “A huge feature about mydacfeed.com is the ability to personalize your feed and get connected with relevant topics and find like-minded voices.” “I think we saw something similar when Microsoft acquired Nuance, which was their second-largest acquisition behind LinkedIn.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:I’ve got 99 problems and tech ain’t one of them: It’s almost never a technology issue. It’s usually a people problem.The technologists out there: Many technologists can be overly focused on technology, which limits their ability to see the bigger business issues. What are you really going to be focused on?This is a journey: We need to embrace one another and lock arms and move forward together in a secular fashion. The Big Quotes:“But the only thing that surprises me by that is that most companies are going to go, oh, that's not me. That's somebody else. That's that other 40%.” “Motivate your workforce to aspire to be different, aspire to be better, and understand that they're a part of that future that is different and better.” “And so we're all going to be on board to do this, and we're not going to do a hundred things.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:Declare dominion over your work: Agency is working for something greater than a paycheck. When you love what you do, you have nothing to “balance.”Who is your Archimedes: “If you give me a lever and a place to stand, I can move the world.”YOLO, “You Only Live Once”: Originally made popular by the Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart. For many, a good job, a nice car, and a steady paycheck are no longer enough.Sometimes you need an auctioneer: Your auctioneer is probably a friend, a mentor, a family member, or former coworker who pushes you to do things you don’t think you can do. The Big Quotes:“So we're now seeing reasonably credible research being done by major organizations saying a huge percentage of people are considering changing jobs.” “And so what the vast majority of people fail to understand about personal freedom and career agency is that you don't need everybody to agree with what you're doing.” “I think we're at a time where it behooves all of us to care about our lives and our work and the intertwining of the two.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:According to the Association for Manufacturing Technology: In order to reshore 25% of the manufactured goods currently imported from China, US manufacturers will need to invest $400-$600 billion in manufacturing technology.Why isn’t “Big Data” yielding “Big Insights"? It might be because as business leaders we are still confusing causation and correlation.The “Streaming Wars”: Have changed the way that we all watch filmed entertainment. What can the rest of us learn from the battles between Netflix, Disney+ and HBO Max?These are incredibly exciting times: I think there’s a tremendous opportunity in the tech markets, and the manufacturing markets – and we are watching what’s happening in other parts of the world. The Big Quotes:“On Wall Street, they use the phrase, ‘Make the trend your friend’—and this is an irrefutable trend.” “I guarantee you, Tim Cook and the team are tracking those data elements.” This episode is brought to you by BMC Software. Visit Cloud Wars for more.

The Big Themes:A wealth of riches that we are so privileged to have: They serve as a kind of innovation pipeline in addition to our R&D teams.The default data was your data: I think the concept of data protection, data privacy, and now terms that people are using around confidential computing are really where the heart of our differentiation lies.IBM has worked in these industries for decades: Because we have worked with financial services, telco, healthcare, etc., IBM has brought together the different pieces of their applications.Could a quantum computer ever crack what I’m doing: Our researchers have invented algorithms that are secure against future quantum computers. The Big Quotes:“When we talk about IBM Cloud Satellite, it is about a consistent distributed cloud.” “So I got to come into our cloud business several years ago and I now serve as our chief technology officer. And I'm also an IBM Fellow.” “And so we're very closely partnering with our research organization on the topics of future programming models and deploying those kinds of capabilities through code engine and other services in our cloud.” Visit Cloud Wars for more.