Don’t Break the Bank: Run IT, Change IT

Episode Notes3 Takeaways:Spend lots of time with customers. That’s the best way to effectively communicate the services on offer and to get an honest barometer check on how well a customer’s needs are being met.Creating a broad, customer-focused definition of success motivates the entire organization to think about how and what needs to be done to ensure customers are satisfied. When it comes to distributed enterprise and distributed workforce, the last thing you want is to go back to the mainframe closed days. Then you completely stop innovation because you're tying application development velocity straight into infrastructure. That’s never been healthy, and it never will be the right approach going forward.Key Quotes: "Customers are not necessarily looking for products and technologies. They're looking for partners themselves who are going to be able to take them into the future.” - Sumit“Software is about creating a vision, a destination, what I call a dream. Until customers see and envision the dream the same way as you do, and our teams fulfill that dream in a structured and methodical way, none of us are successful.”  - Sumit“Matching the solutions and then making [customers] successful is the core DNA and the job of sales, which is misunderstood until you've done it.” - Sumit--LinksSumit Dhawan LinkedInSumit Dhawan Twitter--About the HostsMatthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on LinkedIn and Twitter.Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on LinkedIn.

3 Takeaways:Technology changes are hard, but they're never quite as hard as the people, process and organizational changes that need to happen - the culture changes.The notion of agile portability is critical and getting progressively easier.When going through a digital transformation, it’s really important to talk about it openly as a community - what’s working, what’s not, and to learn from it.Key Quotes: "I think VMware is on a journey. If we're successful, people will think very differently of us. They will not think of us as just a virtualization company. They'll think of us as a multi-cloud modern application...and that’s a great opportunity.” - Kit“From a VMware standpoint, we’re leveraging Kubernetes as a standard framework...and then building integrated functionality on top of that. So the end result for customers is that it's just a seamless experience. And yes, Kubernetes is there under the covers, and you can absolutely interact with it if you want to, but you also don't have to.”  - Kit“That notion of culture change is extraordinarily difficult and will be by far the hardest part about any sort of transformation.” - Kit--LinksKit Colbert LinkedInKit Colbert TwitterKit Colbert Blog--About the HostsMatthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on LinkedIn and Twitter.Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on LinkedIn.

3 Takeaways:Security and especially cybersecurity is a scary reality across financial services. New technologies bring new risks and the bad guys only have to be successful once to make it worth their while.  Listen to Tom and Chris for thought-provoking approaches.People should be seen as an investment, not a cost. To get the most from this investment, focus on getting the best from people by playing to their differences and strengths (or as René Carayol calls them, their Spikes)  rather than trying to transform them to fit into a bell curve. You can find more about René on his website or on LinkedIn or check out his book Spike.AI is with us and will only get more immense and intense. We hope to focus more on this in the future. Until then, Louise Öström has recommended the book 21 Lessons for the 21st Century: Yuval Noah Harari and especially as an audiobook.Key Quotes: “Look for the things you excel at, and focus on those, rather than worrying about the areas where others could be better.” - Matthew"There is a need to invest in people in a way that makes them feel special, valued and not just a resource, a number or a row on a spreadsheet. You cannot change a conservative,stuffy, risk and control-based culture overnight, but it needs to change if financial services wants to regain its crown as the place where technical talent wishes to work.”  - Matthew “There is no question that we are on the march to quantum, although we are a little way off from quantum supremacy, but crypto has to keep up and be steps ahead if we are to stay ahead of the bad guys.” - Matthew----About the HostsMatthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on LinkedIn and Twitter.Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on LinkedIn.

3 Takeaways:For exchanges, geographical sovereignty is a big deal when it comes to cloud data service providers. Because exchanges support many different regulators, they need to think about where the data sits, who operates that platform and who has access to the data - even if it’s encrypted.Security and data protection are important when considering a move to the cloud, but it’s necessary to make the business case. When you look at cloud fit, you need to decide whether you retain what you have, rehost it, replatform it, refactor it or consolidate it with something else.Cost as a driver doesn't always necessarily stand on its own, and you can't get the business case if you're just looking at a lift and shift. So you really need to look at the broader value chain of what cloud gives you. Sometimes that means rearchitecting the platform to be cloud native to ensure that you're getting the benefits of those new and broader services.Key Quotes: “You need to operate in this combined ecosystem of legacy and new world, and make sure that you can bring those platforms together and operate them as one.” - Allison"With new technology adoption, you need to drive cultural change as much as technology change… That's for us where our Center of Excellence has really bridged that gap and understanding - it helps with challenging the status quo, getting people to think outside of their comfort zone." – Allison“You definitely won't get cost advantages if you're doing the same thing in the old way, but in a new world.” - Allison--LinksAllison Krill LinkedIn----About the HostsMatthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on LinkedIn and Twitter.Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on LinkedIn. 

3 Takeaways:Always invest time and effort in eliminating non-value added work and automating where possible. You can't continue to come back and ask for more money without demonstrating that you’re being responsible with the budget already given. Make sure your tech experts feel connected to the customer experience. Ask IT to do ride alongs - listen to someone on the desk. Do empathy interviews and talk to people. The growth mindset of the organization - the willingness to do new things and manage through change with positivity and energy - is paramount to making all of the technology work to its fullest capability. You need to get buy-in to move forward.Key Quotes: "Customer interaction is a really important thing to spend time on. So I definitely encourage people who are in tech to go talk to customers. You immediately know how important you are to the business.” - Jennifer“The theme I hear in most of these customer interactions is every one of them is grappling now with a transformation journey that they knew they had to make but now are having to do it on an even more accelerated timeline. I think all of them had multifaceted plans but now are having to execute on some of them in days and weeks as opposed to quarters of years.” - Jennifer“Teammates should look for ways to eliminate costs on one side so that they can free up money for new innovation and new investment on the other. You can't just continue to radically grow your technology dollars year over year. You've got to start to tidy up the house in order to make room for new things.” - Jennifer--LinksJennifer Manry LinkedInWomen Who Code--About the HostsMatthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on LinkedIn and Twitter.Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on LinkedIn.

3 Takeaways:Be very clear about why you want to go to a cloud model, and make sure you can get out when you want.The keys to success are attitude, belief and people. Hire people with diverse skill sets and actively encourage them to collaborate.If going to a cloud model is about cost savings, don’t put old workloads into something fancy. Don’t put the pigs in the ferrari.Key Quotes: "You can make a hundred PowerPoint slides, but the magic happens on the ground. And the magic happens when people work with people.” - Louise“The best advice I could give any company within the financial industry is to think about why you want to go to the cloud. What is it you want to achieve? Make sure you don't lock yourself in. Don't put all your eggs into one basket.”  - Louise“Everyone in the banking finance industry globally is struggling with the same challenge. It's not just you. You might be right there in the darkness feeling overwhelmed or don't know where to start. They're all in the same situation. Seriously, you're not alone.” - Louise--LinksLouise Öström LinkedInLouise Östrom Twitter--About the HostsMatthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on LinkedIn and Twitter.Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on LinkedIn.

3 Takeaways:When moving an application to the cloud, focus on the velocity of the move and the ability to revert rather than doing a lot of the optimization work on paper beforehand. Move and then optimize.Try to consolidate layers of redundant regulation that may have built up within an application over time. It saves customers time and money.Make sure the IT teams are seen as the heroes of the cloud transformation process because the applications they support typically produce some of the most critical business data for organizations.Key Quotes: "I'm incredibly excited that the industry has turned around to the importance of technology. We see more and more CEOs declaring themselves to be technology companies even though they're in non-technology industries. I think right now is just a fantastic time to be in tech.” - James“I think what's so compelling about where we are now is that we can really make heroes out of enterprise IT because of the cloud.” - James“When there's an excessive focus on trying to simply recreate a data center environment in the cloud - lock, stock, and barrel - that can very quickly impact the economics of moving to cloud in the first place.” - James--LinksJames Forrester LinkedIn--About the HostsMatthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on LinkedIn and Twitter.Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on LinkedIn.

Episode Notes3 Takeaways:Before kicking off an innovation project, make sure the proposed product has a clear business purpose and route to market. There are two kinds of innovation; Incremental Innovation - make things we already have better; and Disruptive Innovation - to change the game with something new or reimagined.The pandemic has increased interest in augmented reality and virtual reality possibilities in the realm of training and on-site quality assurance.Key Quotes: "To us a project is not successful unless it is graduated and adopted into a product, period.” - Chris“We're not trying to innovate around a one-off to make just one customer happy. If we're going to put something in a product, we want to ensure that this is something that a lot of customers really want and care about.” - Chris“I think a lot of times with innovation the mistake that gets made is you just start running without having a clear line of sight to what the destination is and think you'll figure it out along the way. Sometimes you do and you're successful, but a lot of times you don't and you're building something that nobody necessarily wants or needs.” - Chris--LinksChris Wolf LinkedInChris Wolf Twitter--About the HostsMatthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on LinkedIn and Twitter.Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on LinkedIn.

3 Takeaways:Cyber attacks targeting market strategies and nonpublic market information are growing.The healthcare sector has become a more vulnerable target for extortion because of the pandemic.Organizations should proactively hunt out cyber threats before digital transformations or the rollout of new technologies.Key Quotes: “The healthcare sector has been dealing with a secondary infection--their own cyber crime pandemic, and ransomware is to blame.” - Tom“SolarWinds was probably the most widespread systemic act of cyber crime or espionage in the history of the world.” - Tom“Proactive organizations begin with cyber threat hunting--essentially making sure that no one is in the bank vault when they close for the day.” - Tom--LinksTom Kellermann LinkedInTom Kellermann TwitterModern Bank Heists 4.0 ReportCarbon Black Inc.The Howlers--About the HostsMatthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on LinkedIn and Twitter.Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on LinkedIn.

[Thimon de Jong](https://www.linkedin.com/in/thimon/?originalSubdomain=nl) is a keynote speaker and founder of the strategy foresight firm [Whetston](https://www.whetston.com/). Thimon walks us through his predictions for the future of office life, the fate of cash and his idea for a bank app that could be the next big thing. **About Matthew**Matthew O'Neill is a husband, dad, geek and Industry Managing Director, Advanced Technology Group in the Office of the CTO at VMware.You can find Matthew on [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthewoneill/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/MatthewON). **About Brian**Brian Hayes is an audiophile, dad, builder of sheds, maker of mirth, world traveller and EMEA Financial Services Industry Lead at VMware.You can find Brian on [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/brian-hayes-global-transformation-infrastructure-leadership-innovation-cyber-cloud-digital-delivery/).