Ep 82 - Beam me up, BT (Josie Smith)

BT Group started its journey to the public cloud years ago, which has put the company in a strong position to take advantage of the strategic capabilities of artificial intelligence (AI). For this episode, I talk with Josie Smith, chief architect, digital, at BT Group, about the company's efforts to reduce its applications from thousands to hundreds, bring AI into the organization, and drive monumental change across its employee base. Listen now to hear:

• How BT Group’s transformation program, Simplify, is poised save the company £3 billion by 2025 [02:53]; 
• The details of its massive effort to slash technical debt and increase agility [05:29];
• How BT Group’s workforce is responding to its digital transformation [08:57]; and
• What the company is doing to unleash AI’s potential [12:24];

Links and Resources

• Learn more about BT Group.
• Check out this Light Reading article, BT eyes 100% shift to public cloud, not “pretend mist” of private, by Iain Morris.
• Another great read is Raconteur’s piece featuring BT Group’s chief digital and innovation officer, Harmeen Mehta, who isn’t afraid to call out industry’s fear as a roadblock to innovation and growth. 
• AI productivity improvements are real. Journalists like to sensationalize job cuts but if you’re worried about your job being affected by AI, I have one piece of advice: learn AI and be the best at it. Companies need leaders and contributors who know how to transform work with AI.
• Josie is such a Star Trek fan that she actually walked down the aisle to the theme song from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Check it out! 
• I like Star Trek, but I’m more of a Star Wars fan. My favorite Yoda quote? “Do, or do not. There is no try.” Watch the famous clip from the Empire Strikes Back. 
• You can find the transcript for this episode here.

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This week’s guest

About Josie Smith

Josie Smith is leading and driving the re-architecture of BT Group’s digital landscape from 2400 applications down to 500, taking BT Group from a telco to a techco, and from monolithic to modular, agile, and flexible. She is guiding a future for BT Group that connects for good and creates an exceptional experience for customers. Josie is a leader who engages with energy, creativity and fun, and a pioneer of outcome-based approaches as a method of truly linking strategy and execution at pace. She is an ambassador for women in tech/engineering and advocates for inspirational learning in the sciences across all ages to increase diversity within the STEM industries. 

Podcast Credits

• Executive Producer and Host: Danielle Royston, TelcoDR
• Senior Producer: Lindsay Grubb, TillCo Media
• Editor/Marketing: Alisa Jenkins, Springboard Marketing
• Editing: Andrew Condell
• Associate Producer: Kriselda Dionisio
• Music: Dyami Wilson

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