It is Orange Friday.
[Laughter]
And, you hear laughter in the background.
What is the role of the CIO?
It's a big question, and we hear a lot of
discussion about this question.
Well, today on Episode #271 of CxOTalk, we
are talking with two genuine CIO innovators,
two people I respect a lot.
We're going to explore this topic of how should
we think about innovation, the role of the
CIO in 2018.
This is cutting edge, state of the art stuff.
I'm Michael Krigsman.
I'm an industry analyst and the host of CxOTalk.
I want to say a quick thank you, but a heartfelt
thank you, to Livestream because they have
been supporting us for the last two years,
and they're great.
They supply our video infrastructure.
If you go to Livestream.com/CxOTalk, they'll
even give you a discount on their plans.
Without further -- oh, oh, wait, wait.
I forgot.
There's a tweet chat that's going on right
now using the hashtag #CxOTalk, so please
join in.
You can ask questions, share your comments.
The other thing is, please tell a friend,
like us on Facebook, tell a friend because
that will help us a lot if you would.
Now, without further ado, I want to introduce
Yousuf Khan.
He is CIO number one, Yousuf Khan, who is
the CIO of Pure Storage.
Hey, Yousuf.
How are you?
Hey, Michael.
I'm very good, indeed.
Thank you.
Love the glasses.
Tell us about Pure Storage.
Well, first of all, thank you so much for
having me here.
I'm really honored to be here with Diana.
Pure Storage is a company.
We've been around for coming up to about eight
years now.
We are a leading provider for data platform
for the cloud era.
It's been a very, very exciting ride for me
as the company's first CIO.
I'm really looking forward to being able to
collaborate with other CIOs and see the company
rise in the industry as well.
Yousuf, you run a CIO group that's really
interesting.
Maybe briefly tell us about that.
Yeah, so when I joined, this has been a very
interesting ride for me as probably the third
time I've done a job where I'm the first CIO
for a company and helping to organize hardworking
IT teams.
When I took the role on, a large part of it
was being able to meet with like-minded peers.
One of the things to be able to do that is,
as much as I enjoy going to CIO events from
time-to-time, being able to probably have
a more productive conversation, sometimes
delving into what I term as group therapy
happens when CIOs get together.
I've been organizing CIO gatherings informally
mainly over dinner because everybody needs
to eat, but also because we're able to get
into a mode where we're able to build a little
bit more camaraderie and get together and
talk about the industry.
Okay.
Our second CIO is Diana McKenzie, who is the
CIO of Workday.
Hey, Diana, this is your second time on CxOTalk,
and welcome back.
Thank you, Michael.
I'm happy to be here and Happy New Year to
you and everyone on the call.
Diana, I think everybody knows the Workday
name, but tell us about Workday.
Sure.
Workday is a software company.
We were founded to put people at the center
of cloud-based financial and human resource
software.
We have over 1,900 customers that range from
medium size to Fortune 50 customers with over
26 million workers on contract.
Last year we achieved a 98% customer satisfaction
rate for our software platform.
We also achieved 18th position ranking in
the Fortune 100 best places to work, which
is why it's such a pleasure to be here.
Well, it's a pleasure for me that you're both
here.
Yousuf, maybe I'll direct the first question
to you.
This show is about CIO innovation.
What do we mean by that?
Well, I think where we are right now, the
level of innovation that's been surrounding
our companies and our industries at large.
I think, for CIOs, it is a real opportunity
to question the assumptions, which have been
kind of traditionally help build IT organizations.
I think, really, innovation is centered around
the fact that you're able to not only question
those assumptions, but be able to think much
more broadly about not only what the business
needs are, where you're able to accelerate
and deliver good solutions for businesses
to operate, but how to really aid the effort
for it to really change the customer experience,
to be able to give much deeper insights.
I think that opportunity right now really
exists.
That's what I've sort of typically seen.
I think CIOs really have the opportunity right
now to really think in innovative terms because
we're in an ecosystem that allows us to both
experiment and be thoughtful about what solutions
we want to be able to deliver to our businesses.
Yousuf, I'd build on that.
I think you and I are both fortunate in that
we work for companies where other CIOs are
our customers.
Yeah.
And so, we're put in a position where not
only do we have to think about how we help
our customers and our peers innovate--
Yeah.
--but also requires us to be, within our companies,
right at the heart of the innovation of the
products that we're developing.
Yeah.
I have to compliment you on the group that
you formed.
I was new to the Bay Area when I took this
position at Workday two years ago; again,
the first CIO position Workday had.
I had an opportunity to meet Yousuf at one
of these dinners and just found him to be
an incredible coach, mentor, confidant, and
that the group of leaders that we have the
privilege to get together and meet with on
a monthly basis has developed a real chemistry
because we are all in the Bay Area, and we
are all mostly working for technology companies.
It's been a really great experience, so thank
you for that.
Well, thank you for being such a good--I wouldn't
call it--member, but a friend more than anything
else.
Just to kind of go a little bit more onto
that, I think one thing we've found, and I
don't know whether you would agree or not,
but if you're part of the CIO of a technology
company, it's a good place to be to be able
to work with a number of your business partners
and represent a customer viewpoint.
Fundamentally, you'll find that the CIO is
that end customer.
Right.
And so, I really found the opportunity that
innovation is as much about being able to
aid your business partners about how you view
the product, which is something that I do.
Also, I think you've really excelled by building
out what I consider a WOW team, both figuratively
and literally, from an acronym standpoint,
by demonstrating the use of Workday within
Workday.
That's something, a model example that a number
of our CIOs that I follow inspired me to do.
I have a great job because I don't have any
storage issues, so that is my effort.
[Laughter]
I think that's been a real model example.
I think, if you're a CIO of a technology company,
that really is an opportunity for you to be
able to test the bounds because it's kind
of expected, to a certain extent, and share
those with CIOs.
Yeah.
I have a question.
You mentioned customer experience.
Maybe you can explore that.
What does customer experience have to do with
being a CIO, and how important is that, actually?
I'll pick up on the innovation agenda.
Yeah, go for it.
Then I'll pick up, Michael, on how you started
the talk today, which is that the priority
focus for us in 2018, it may be a little old,
but this notion that every company is becoming
a software company is one that I think continues
to be very powerful.
Yeah.
It doesn't matter if you are the CIO of a
technology company or you're the CIO of any
company that makes any sort of product or
service.
The consumer perspective is changing fairly
dramatically to expect so much more from the
people that provide them their products and
services.
Those products and services are expected to
be more personalized for our consumers.
Yeah.
That, in turn, means that as CIOs within our
business, understanding what that consumer
is expecting from us and from our product--
Yeah.
--becomes a critical area of focus for us.
It was in 2017, but more so in 2018.
Yeah.
We also find another priority being the importance
of talent in our organizations and the war
for talent that's going on out there.
The more we can engage our employees in the
workplace and make them feel like they can
come to work or work from home and accomplish
what they need to accomplish in a very seamless
way, that's an area a CIO can have a major
impact on.
We were talking about some of these earlier
this week.
Yeah.
I think the really important thing to think
about is we're living in an experience economy.
I think that's really because customer experience
and satisfaction is kind of unforgiving to
a large extent, right?
Yeah.
That applies for technology companies like
ourselves.
We pride ourselves on having a very, very
industry leading NPS score.
You yourselves have also done tremendously
well from that space.
That's really because, because there is so
much innovation out there, because these industries
are really being kind of disrupted, and there's
more innovation happening in terms of product
innovation, you've got to be able to sort
of work with companies.
That's where kind of the CIO gets involved
and say, "How do we improve the customer experience
by making it easy to be able to do business
with, either via channel partners or being
able to provide a much better support experience?
How do we make sure that the transaction and
being able to conduct that business becomes
easier because it's kind of the entire customer
journey?"
I think the role of the CIO has really evolved
over time where you have to be much more attuned
to understanding what the customer experience
is from start to finish, even before they
become a customer.
How do we make sure that our messaging is
being delivered and how we're taking digital
insights and data that we're seeing from analytics
from our website and from our social media
streams to be able to put that together to
say, "How should we be designing marketing
campaigns which are working or not?"
I think that's an exciting era in terms of
what we've been seeing today.
The CIO is kind of at the front and center
of that by partnering with the other functions
to be able to help deliver that experience.
Well, and I'm going to build on the fact that
you're my customer.
Sure.
A very happy one.
Thank you.
Yes.
Very happy about that.
Yes.
Back to your recognition of the Workday on
Workday team--
Yes.
--which we call the WOW team.
That team gives us the opportunity within
Workday to work very closely with our leaders
in the company and also with our product team
to make sure that the product we're building
and delivering to our customers, first of
all, works for us.
It gives us an opportunity to go first and
learn, and be very involved in the product
development process in terms of making that
product better.
Then I have the opportunity to spend time
with my colleagues and my customers, such
as Yousuf and a number of others.
We talk about not only how are the products
performing today, but how the products could
be performing.
Yeah.
We can bring that feedback back into the system.
Not only that, but you gave us some really
great feedback about how we can help CIOs
have better conversations with their CHROs
and their CFOs--
Yeah.
--as they think about advancing their strategies
digitally.
I think it's a very nice synergy that we found
in that space.
Yeah.
I've sort of found that if you're the CIO
for a technology company that you are a model
customer and have that opportunity.
That's one of the things that we did when
we were looking to build our data infrastructure
internally to provide kind of analytics and
machine learning, which is what we've been
able to do.
A large part of that is because we were able
to test out our product internally and be
able to work with our engineering product
team to say, "Hey, look.
This is the use case that I hear from like-minded
peers like Diana and otherwise.
This is what they need from, like, an analytic
stack.
This is what we need to be able to design
our product for."
I think that's just aided that effort.
Being able to collaborate from that function
has been phenomenal.
How does a CIO make that leap from focusing
on the internal infrastructure operations
of an organization to being almost a customer
experience coach for other parts of the business?
How do you make that transition?
CIOs have to be thoughtful about how they
make that transition.
It starts with where we've spent some of the
time here.
Understanding the paying customer and understanding
the business you're in because that's table
stakes for a CIO.
The second piece of that, though, is there
are aspects of what the CIO is expected to
deliver that are all about being brilliant
at the basics.
If the CIO isn't delivering on the basics
just as if the CFO wasn't closing the books
and the CHRO wasn't paying employees--
Yeah.
--the CIO is going to have a very hard time
stepping into that space to influence the
company around how to better interact with
customers.
It's a combination of knowing the business,
of delivering on the basics, and developing
very powerful relationships, both internally
and externally, to continue to broaden that
perspective and be in a position to introduce
new ideas that can influence and shape the
direction a company is going.
Yeah.
I think there are two key points.
I think you put out a blog post about it last
year, which you talked about kind of doing
the basics.
A lot of us kind of followed that because
I think it's really important to know that
the foundation of where the company is built
and how it operates in a seamless fashion
is important.
You have to be thoughtful about being sure
that that is functioning in the way that it's
supporting the business's growth.
I think the second piece is knowing the context
of your customer, the business, and the partnerships
that you built.
I think it's a really good vantage point for
the CIO because canned technology is coming
across every single aspect of the business.
You're at this vantage point to really be
able to be thoughtful and helpful.
I think there's a bigger piece about how CIOs
move into this.
They probably need to view more CxOTalk sessions.
I will say that.
[Laughter]
I agree.
Start there.
Start there.
There's a serious point in that we have to
be intellectually curious because there's
a lot of opportunity to get confused.
There's also a lot of opportunity to try and
take on too much, and having rigor and focus
on what you can deliver, but doing the research
around it.
That is by looking at things like CxOTalk
and, of course, working with a number of your
research analyst firms to be able to help
define your strategy.
I think that's a big part of how CIOs are
making decisions right now for them to be
able to build an innovation strategy.
It is a combination of peer conversations.
Mm-hmm.
It's about being able to look at what's happening
in the external world and bring that in.
I think that's really important.
I think we're very lucky because we are in
the Bay Area and we're at the heart of that.
But, at the same time, the parallels are there
across the board.
I agree.
Let me play devil's advocate for a second,
if I might.
Now you're saying that the CIO must really
learn the business and, of course, that's
true.
Let me ask this as a question.
Can the CIO ever gain the level of familiarity,
knowledge of the business that people in those
functional departments possess?
If the CIO doesn't have that level of understanding,
then is there kind of an inevitable slide
back to just focusing on infrastructure and
operations because you don't have that equivalent
knowledge as people in the functional areas?
It's a leading question, but please.
I think they have to have a strong appreciation
for kind of the work that happens in a number
of these, in a number of the functions.
I think that's the critical piece.
You have to have a foundation of being curious
and intellectually curious, number one.
I think the other piece is, in order for you
to deliver a solution to your business partners
in your different functions, whether that's
finance, whether that's HR, operations, sales,
or go to market, it's about understanding
what their needs are, and then translating
those needs into a solution which you can
help accelerate their efforts.
A large part of that really comes from aligning
and understanding.
I think the opportunity of the CIO really
is the fact that they don't have a frame of
reference from that standpoint.
They are not deep into those specific functions,
so they're coming in from a very agnostic
viewpoint to say, "What is the best way I
can help to alleviate this effort?"
Get them away from, "Hey, they need better
decision making.
Well, we need to be able to retool and deliver
better analytics and BI, make that faster,
and do it in real time.
Oh, they need to have deeper integration with
a number of their applications."
I think I'm hearing a lot about how you are
able to help build a better data strategy
for our internal business customers, I would
basically call it.
I think that's why CIOs really need to be
aligned and have probably appreciation without
having to become a subject matter expert.
I agree with you.
I would build on that as well and say, when
you think about the three asset stewards in
the company.
Yeah.
You have the head of HR who is the steward
of human resources.
You have the CFO who is the steward of the
financial assets.
The CIO ultimately is the steward of the information
assets.
Everyone owns those information assets, but
it really is up to the CIO and the CIO team
to be working across the business to make
sure the information is flowing freely.
There's an important piece of those three
working very well together.
Yeah.
It just happens to be where our product is
focused.
Right.
That exists in every CIO space.
I think the other thing, to build on what
Yousuf was saying, is while you can't necessarily
be an expert in all of those different business
areas, there are scarcely a few other functions
in the company that touches every single employee
in the company and every single business process
in the company.
By being right there in the center of the
business process, understanding what's working
and what's not working, where the white spaces
between those processes, the CIOs in the organizations
have a unique position to influence how the
company can operate better.
Yep.
From that perspective, I think it's the CIO's
game to lose if, ultimately, they end up being
responsible only for the infrastructure and
plumbing.
Yeah.
It's really hard to not be successful if those
other aspects of the role are right there
for the taking.
I think it's a very slippery slope.
Yes.
Especially in this day and age where you have
the ability with leading SaaS products like
Workday to be able to provide agility to the
business.
If you lose that opportunity then, yes, you're
really going to go back into deep operational
mode, which again is valued and required but
is not going to be able to aid the company
to be much more innovative.
It's really interesting, the point that you
make, that Diana just made, that the CIO is
one of the few roles in the company that touches
every part of the company.
That does give you this unique kind of outside
in perspective where you're aggregating the
knowledge and the insight of what's going
on.
The question then becomes--building on what
Yousuf just said--how can the CIO take advantage
of this unique vantage point to provide the
highest value possible to the organization?
I was going to say, I think the real opportunity
for the CIO is to be able to translate business
goals; to be able to figure out and really
translate those into innovative solutions
that they can aid the effort.
Right?
I think, with that vantage point in mind,
with having the depth of some of the issues
in a number of those functions, having the
availability of innovation outside the company,
as well as innovative thinking inside the
company.
The CIO is really not just the guardian, but
kind of the steward of being able to bring
all of that together.
That's the real opportunity for the CIO to
be able to make that impact into the business,
at least from my standpoint.
Yeah, I agree.
I wouldn't change a thing he just said.
[Laughter]
Okay.
Well, that's good.
[Laughter]
Then can you kind of put your finger on or
define what is that highest possible value,
the best possible role that the CIO can play
under optimal circumstances?
One thing I would say is, I think if they're
able to connect the data and make it faster
within the company, as a general high-level
perspective, be able to provide, I think there's
one fundamental goal that the CIO can basically
focus on is to be able to really aid the business
to make better decisions.
That really centers on the fact that I really
think that companies are suffering from what
I term as kind of data debt.
There's a lot of data being generated into
these businesses right now and making sense
of it.
But, I think the overarching goal is not only
are you able to figure out where the problems
are, but you're able to aid each of those
functions to be able to make better decisions.
It's about partnering up with them to be able
to say, "How do you make a better decision?
Let me provide you with the right infrastructure.
Let me provide you with the right solutions
and software to do that.
Then let's see what those results are."
I think that's kind of what those functions
are.
I think it centers on the data and how you
can provide that and accelerate that effort
in businesses, from my standpoint.
I agree.
I agree with your points on the data.
I also, and I've often talked to my teams
about this in the past, think the role of
the CIO can be almost analogous to your personal
financial broker, stockbroker, which is, we
often receive questions from our business
partners who will say, "We've got all of this
opportunity, all this demand for technology
spend and technology investment.
We all know we'd like to do more than we can
possibly afford as a company."
Yeah.
The challenge is, how do we make decisions
about where we want to invest our resources?
If we think about that as a CIO, we now take
a step back and look at all of the places
we could possibly make those investments.
We can decide, from a portfolio point of view,
what percentage of our investment do we want
to direct towards driving incremental revenue
and how heavy do we want to weight that in
the overall prioritization?
What percent of the investment is about scale?
Yeah.
Depending on where your company is in its
lifecycle, possibly driving efficiencies and
cost reduction.
Yeah.
What percent of your portfolio was all around
the employee engagement experience or just
maintaining the base of operations?
Yeah.
Oftentimes what I find is the request is,
come in as the CIO and help us make sense
of all of these opportunities we have for
investment, some of which require trying out
innovative new technologies, pushing the digital
strategy of the company.
Others are about making the company run better.
If we can shed some light on how to make those
decisions and help to manage that process,
it requires us to be really good listeners.
Yeah.
And, to make sure we're bringing everybody
together in a transparent way.
I think there's a really important role CIOs
can play there.
All right.
I want to remind everybody that you are watching
CxOTalk.
This is Orange Friday.
Now, why is it Orange Friday?
Because both of our guests, their company
logos are orange, and so, of course, how could
it not be Orange Friday?
I'm speaking on Episode #271 of CxOTalk with
Diana McKenzie, who is the chief information
officer of Workday, and also Yousuf Khan,
who is the chief information officer of Pure
Storage.
Right now there is a tweet chat going on using
the hashtag #CxOTalk.
Please, jump in with your questions.
We have a question from Zachary Jeans.
He says, "As a CIO, how do you create a culture
that avoids politics and infighting but, rather,
builds a positive and innovative culture and
experience?"
How do you create a positive culture rather
than one that is political and has infighting,
which, as we all know, happens in almost every
organization all the time?
How do you fight that and do it well?
It probably boils down to having a culture
of transparency.
I fundamentally believe that that aids the
ability for organizations to function better.
Again, you can't get 100% transparency in
some cases, but I think if you have that as
a foundation in your culture, that definitely
aids the effort for people to get aligned
and, also, for them to be able to know that
they are valued, and they're being listened
to, but also being able to understand where
things are going and taking the mystery out
of things and avoiding politics.
I think the second thing is you've got to
be very, very collaborative.
I pride ourselves on the fact that I think
both of our companies are companies which
are admired for culture.
I know that that's one of the main reasons
I joined Pure Storage because of the culture
of the organization.
It is very collaborative, it is very transparent,
and it's one that you have a deep sense of
ownership that you want to be able to protect.
I think those are sort of fundamentals that
we have in our culture and that, I think,
work really, really well.
I agree.
I think transparency, I think collaboration,
I also think being clear on the mission.
When we can help a team understand that we're
all aligned towards delivering an outcome,
everyone can see themselves in delivering
the outcome, and we can set a team up to understand
how each individual unit plays a role in delivering
that outcome.
In IT we call that end-to-end service delivery.
Yeah.
In reality, if we structure our teams such
that they each understand what they're consuming
from another group and what other groups are
consuming from them, and that's measurable,
then it makes it easy for us to transparently
talk about how we're doing and what we can
do to improve.
I think the reality is politics exist in every
environment because we are human beings.
Because of that, there's never going to be
an opportunity to get away from politics.
What we have to do within IT to be effective
is, we have to be really good at listening,
and we have to be really good at storytelling--
Yeah.
--because we are in the business of change.
Anytime we touch any system, any technology,
again any person in the company, we're sort
of messing with their world.
For us to be able to do that in a way where
we can explain the "why" the change is happening,
that to some extent can help get away from
the negative ramifications, if you will, of
what might be perceived as politics.
Yeah.
Honestly, I think a large part of it is definitely
in the CIO organization.
You've got to be able to really empower your
leadership team to be able to have the conversations.
I think it's not really focused on enough,
but I think it's really, really important
that you're able to build a team that aligns
with the culture and is able to represent
it and drives it further down into the organization.
That really requires a combination of both
training, but also, as you like to say, tone
at the top.
Yeah.
I've heard that.
You mentioned that about the leadership and
the executive team at Workday.
That's something that I think is really important
that, as CIOs, should take that to say, "What
signal are you sending to members in your
organization of the type of leader that you
are and the type of organization that you
want to be able to build?"
It will be about the tone, that tone that
you set at the top.
Absolutely.
Now, one of the things that you just mentioned
was communication.
Maybe talk about that.
The role of storytelling was, I think, the
term one of you just used.
Why - why - why-why-why storytelling?
Why?
Yeah.
[Laughter]
Simon Sinek, getting to why; starting with
why.
It's one of the challenges we battle.
I don't know if every functional leader battles
this.
But, within IT specifically, historically,
the equation would say, "I delivered X."
Right?
"I delivered project X because I wanted to
do whatever outcome, Y."
Yeah.
A big part of that is, let's flip the equation.
Let's say, "In order to deliver outcome Y,
we did project X."
By working with the team to help them flip
the equation and think about the outcome first,
it drives a completely different level of
engagement conversation, listening, collaboration
to ensure that whatever is happening on the
other side, as cool and sexy as it might be
technologically, is going to deliver the outcome
you know our business partners are looking
to see.
Starting with the "why," I think, is an important
aspect of communication.
Look.
I think the other thing is communication skills
are much more heavily focused on in a hiring
environment, definitely over the last couple
of years, and it's something which I look
for when we look to hire.
I think the aspect of storytelling is important
because, as a CIO, as you're delivering solutions,
a large part of it is solving problems.
One of the other aspects of the culture really
is about empathy.
Right?
It's about being able to be empathetic about
kind of people struggles or problems that
people are having within the actual organization
as they grow.
That happens from a process and a technology
standpoint about a collaborative aspect to
it.
Being able to tell the story and being able
to bring people around, I think that's the
important piece.
We just live in a much more collaborative
environment that I would say, improving your
communication skills and being able to have
storytelling at the heart of it gets much
more emotive and allows people to be able
to connect better rather than looking at it
in a very programmatic, systematic viewpoint.
Right?
It's always difficult because you're a CIO,
and you're talking about technology, software,
and solutions.
But, I think it's about the impact, and that's
the real story.
Being able to tell that story gets people
excited because they see things which are
being automated, being able to make better
decisions, improving customer experience.
Relaying that back, I think that's where people
get excited.
I think that's where storytelling and kind
of getting the communication skills right
are really important.
Can I pull on the empathy thread for just
a second here?
Totally.
Totally.
There is also this element where we get to
work with really, really smart people.
Far smarter than me, for sure.
I will take that, yeah, 100%.
[Laughter] It's easy, I think, as technologists
to believe that because we're working with
really, really smart people, all of the things
that we're rolling out, they're just going
to know how to use them [and] what they mean.
Yeah.
It's going to make complete sense to them.
In reality, that isn't always the case because
the really, really smart people have a job
to do, and their focus is on getting their
job done, not necessarily the technology that's
enabling their job.
Yeah.
The other aspect of this empathy and storytelling
piece is to understand that the world our
folks live in and we live in may look a little
different than the world than the world the
people we're trying to help live in.
Yeah.
How do we cross that chasm from that empathy
perspective to understand?
How do we help them understand why we're making
the change and what the impact the change
is going to have on them?
I think you've touched on a major issue, which
is enablement.
Right?
Yeah.
When we've been rolling out solutions in place
or trying to improve the business and provide
business changes, you come in with a lot of
positive energy about being able to solve
problems and get excited about it.
Actually, you need to bring people around,
right?
Yeah.
You need to be able to enable them to not
just say, "Oh, you're putting this in front
of me for me to use," but let's talk about
what the genesis of this is and why we're
doing it.
That requires good communication but also
being able to enable people along a journey
for them to get the best use out of it.
Then closing the feedback loop to be able
to figure out what else can we do better and
make it incremental.
How to make it better.
Right.
Yeah.
I have a question.
What does this have to do with technology?
Information technology, IT, what does this
have to do with technology?
I think it has everything to do with technology
because it's at the heart of it.
I think that the notion -- fundamentally,
look; we can talk about every company becoming
a technology company.
The reality is that every single industry,
in some way, shape, or form, is being impacted
by a tremendous amount of software being built
because the level of innovation and the tooling
available for you to be able to build software
and disrupt these industries is very, very
real.
Fundamentally, what that means is for you
to be able to innovate, and forget about innovation.
If you want to be able to really build your
company and your organization, irrespective
of what sector it is, you've got to build
more software, and you've got to make better
decisions through data.
That's where, irrespective of which function
that is, that's going to come down to an IT
organization which is able to provide that
as a service, if we just boil it down to sort
of core basics.
I like to say that we've got to be able to
make sure that you're providing the solutions,
which is kind of what CIOs really are providing
now.
It's more about business technology and impact
technology, and being able to provide business
insight.
That's just required across the board.
It's table stakes.
Yeah, I will speak that on behalf of the IT
brethren.
[Laughter]
[Laughter]
[Laughter] Let's actually talk about technology
and business for a second.
Does the CIO today need to be, should the
CIO today be a technologist or be a business
person?
Everything that Yousuf just said about, "What
about technology?"
Yeah.
Again, it's table stakes because there's no
reason to have a CIO if, ultimately, we're
not figuring out ways to leverage and harness
all the technology that's there.
Yeah.
To get at the data and to help our business
partners run the business better and make
better-informed business decisions.
On the other hand, we have no way of positioning
how the technology can be used or taken advantage
of if we don't understand the business opportunity
that exists.
Yeah.
It does require us to be focused in both avenues,
equally, in order to be successful in the
role that we're in.
I think there's the healthy balance, right?
Mm-hmm.
Otherwise, it's a very begrudging hire of
an organization to basically bring in who
is going to be focused too much on the operational
side.
Right.
Understanding the business, translating that
into a technology solution, and being able
to have that and build in innovation around
it is probably the way I view it.
Yes.
[Laughter]
Okay.
All right.
No, it makes sense.
We have just under ten minutes left, and I
have a whole bunch of questions.
We're not going to spend an extra couple of
hours doing this, so let me ask you some questions
and then just give your very quick kind of
gut feel reactions, like sort of tweet-sized
almost.
Okay?
Number one, what are the most interesting
technologies that you use today, coming back
to technology?
I definitively believe that the time has come
to really talk about AI, and machine learning
specifically, because I think that the ecosystem
to be able to help build that from infrastructure
software and use cases has matured tremendously.
I do think that CIOs need to be able to look
at where they can provide that impact.
Whilst I think it's been early, it has grown,
and I've seen where it's actually been impactful.
I think that should be definitely a focus.
That's definitely focusing towards a buzzword.
I think the second piece is the second iteration
of figuring out how you're able to provide
better data to your company, simply because
the level of data being ingested by businesses
right now and the data producers has grown
exponentially.
That's one of the things.
That's my core goal is to be able to make
sure that we're able to sort of take this.
I mean if you just think about, we now have
got everything from IoT, drones, sensors,
whether it's from motorbikes, cars, or shoes.
It's is being brought in; telemetry data is
being brought into these businesses.
To be able to make sense of that, you need
to be able to [get] ahead of it.
That's how I look at it.
I look at the fact that we've got to be very
thoughtful and focused on these two core,
big areas.
I think that's plenty just from that standpoint.
What he said around AI and ML, I would add
to that blockchain.
I think the potential blockchain has to disrupt
more than just the financial services industry
is very real.
It may be far out into the future, but when
I think about healthcare and I think about
identity management and what's possible with
a model like that, I'm very excited to see
what can happen with that basic design of
blockchain in other industries.
Then another question for you, and I'm just
looking at the clock.
We have five minutes left.
How do you learn?
Yourselves, each of you personally, how do
you learn about new technologies and what's
coming up with startups?
How do you go about doing that?
One is, I do collaborate with startups and
companies that want to be able to align, which
are building solutions which align with the
problems that I [encounter].
That really happens by connecting with VCs
and investors in the space.
I think the second thing is, yes, there's
a conversation that I have with peer groups
like Diana who I'm able to learn tremendous
amounts from.
I think that's a big piece.
I think the third thing is really being able
to listen and understand what's happening,
signaling from a market perspective in terms
of where people are making investments, but
also in terms of some of the things that are
being focused on in terms of inquiries that
are coming in.
Yes, you use the research available to you,
but I think a large part of it is being able
to triangulate those three kinds of vectors,
at least from my standpoint, that aid my decision
making and build a strategy around.
I would add, watch all previous 270 episodes
of CxOTalk.
[Laughter] Then also, in addition to everything
Yousuf said, listen to what really smart people
I know read.
When they tell me they've read something or
they're following a certain author, I subscribe
to it and do my best to try to keep up with
a lot of reading.
But, it helps to continuously keep my perspective
changing.
Yeah.
It also aids you what not to do.
That's right.
[Laughter]
That's the other thing, right?
[Laughter]
Yeah, a lot of learning.
It's like, wow, there's a lot of learning,
so it's about success and failure.
I've definitely learned from both of those.
Okay.
As we go into the last four minutes or so
of the show, what advice do each of you have
for CIOs who want to become CIOs of absolutely
the first order?
What does that mean to be a CIO of the first
order and, again, how do you get there?
We kind of talked about this, but now what
I'm asking you to do--and I'm chewing up your
time here--if you can distill down the pure
essence of what you know, what does it mean
to be a CIO of the first order and how can
CIOs out there achieve that exalted position?
A great place.
I'll start with two points, and then you can
build on those.
Yeah, absolutely.
I'll go back to, be a student of your business
and be a student of your industry first.
Then building on what Yousuf said earlier,
build your team because it's only when you
have a team capable of taking on the work
that you delegate and empower them to do that
you have the time and the bandwidth to spend
time with your business partners and externally,
bringing the perspective in that you'll need
to shape the direction of the company you
work for.
I think I would boil it down to two things.
Yes, think about what type of leader you want
to be.
That's really important.
I think that's a critical piece.
I think the second piece is, listening is
a skill in itself, but listening to what's
worked and what hasn't worked is probably
going to be able to aid your effort.
Be rigorous in terms of what you want to be
able to get done.
Articulating output is actually a really hard
thing because projects take a long time.
Being able to provide rigorous focus and being
able to articulate that in the form of a vision
is really, really important.
Any final, final thoughts as we end this Episode
271 of CxOTalk?
I have one piece of advice, in all seriousness.
I think there's a tremendous amount of opportunity
as a CIO to get a lot of stuff done, but it's
about being overwhelmed.
I think it's very easy to be overwhelmed.
If you're in a CIO role or trying to go into
a CIO role, I think one of the things I found,
and maybe you agree or disagree, is helping
find the common denominator to be able to
get a decision made around a company is really
important.
I think one of the things I've seen done well
is we have a phenomenal CHRO at Pure [Storage]
named Johanna Jackman.
She was able to bring people around as the
first CHRO at Pure Storage to be able to talk
in a collective fashion about what the problems
were and be able to drive decisions from that
standpoint.
I learned a tremendous amount from her.
My one advice is, find the common denominator
and drive people around it.
Help them make a decision and the solution
for it.
I would say technology is table stakes.
Yep.
But, we are in a people business.
Businesses are run by people, and so focus
on understanding people and knowing what it
takes to influence people and you're going
to be successful.
I wouldn't be afraid to take risks as well.
Yeah.
Take risks.
That's a good one.
Like I said, it's the age of being able to
test and figure out whether things work, build,
and integrate.
I would definitely advise towards that for
sure.
All right.
Okay.
We're over time, but that begs the question
very quickly.
How do you know when to take the risk?
You brought it up.
Well, that's totally fine.
Look, I think that it's about, honestly, just
correlating lots of opinions and being able
to get an assessment.
I think really having instincts about whether
it's aligned, whether it's the right time
to be able to make that.
Timing is everything, and so I think finding
the right opportunity to be able to figure
out that risk is probably the most important
piece.
Yeah.
It's judgment and experience.
Yeah.
Okay.
On that note, I want to thank everybody for
watching Episode 271 of CxOTalk.
We have been speaking with two of the most
innovative CIOs that I know, and what an honor
for them to be together here, for me to have
them together on CxOTalk.
It was an honor for us.
[Laughter] It's an honor for me.
I love that.
Fist, sort of cupped fist bump.
My wife refuses to do fist bumps with me because
she says that I don't know how to do a fist
bump.
I wear a sweater vest.
I can't go any cooler.
[Laughter]
[Laughter]
That's about as cool as I get.
I'm sorry, Michael.
All right.
We've been speaking with Diana McKenzie, who
is the CIO of Workday, and Yousuf Khan, who
is the CIO of Pure Storage.
Everybody, thank you so much for joining us.
Next Friday, we're talking with Adriana Karaboutis,
who is the CIO and Chief Digital Officer of
National Grid.
It's one of the largest energy distribution
companies in the world.
She'll be talking about digital transformation
in the energy business.
Thanks so much, everybody.
Have a great day.
Hey, you've got to have a great day and be
cool.
Be cool.
This is as cool as I get.
