Cio Talk Network Podcast

Leaders recognize the need for employees to learn new skills to stay relevant and profitable in the future. But the inability to maintain an inventory of current skills, identify required and critical future skills, and proactively fill the gap hinders such efforts. So how are business and IT leaders collaborating to ensure proper investment in this strategic and long-term capability-building effort?

Many small and mid-sized companies rely on a dynamic mix of full, part-time, and contracted employees to run their business across corporate and personal-owned devices. With employees' expectations of an ongoing hybrid work environment and the organization's need to maintain security and compliance protocols, it is critical to implement a solution that balances security and user productivity without adding complexity and cost. How can small and mid-sized organizations simplify their IT to yield a more scalable and secure work environment for all employees, whether in the office, airport, or kitchen table? Guest: Eric Hagopian Title: Chief Information and Data Officer, Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/simplifying-it-for-a-scalable-and-secure-hybrid-work-environment/

Organizations want their security investments to achieve intended results and drive significant positive ROI like any business function. For such clarity, how much security organizations need and how much they should pay must be calculated based on operations and technology costs, risks mitigated, and benefits realized. Also, explicit metrics must drive security effort evaluation, performance, and the required adjustments. So how can we move to such outcome-driven security?

Business typically views security programs as inducing caution, restrictions, and restraints. As a security leader, how do you change perception, create alignment, engage constituents, and demonstrably catalyze innovation to transform such programs into practical digital business enablers? Guest 1: Mustapha Kebbeh Title: Chief Information Security Officer, Brink's Guest 2: Dee Young Title: Chief Information Security Officer, UNC Health Care For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/transforming-security-programs-to-become-digital-business-enablers/  

Spreading the same controls across all business areas hasn’t proven to be effective for security management. Neither has planting people, whether your own or a managed service provider, and passively waiting for the alarm to go off. How can you as a CISO be surgical in your approach to security operations to proactively safeguard the crown jewels? Guest 1: Jerich Beason Title: Chief Information Security Officer, Epiq Guest 2: Leon Ravenna Title: Chief Information Security Officer, KAR Global Guest 3: Jake Margolis Title: Chief Information Security Officer, Metropolitan Water District of Southern California For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/from-peanut-butter-to-surgery-for-better-security/

Circularity, aka circular economy, refers to a closed-loop system where we can keep reusing, repairing, refurbishing, remanufacturing, and recycling resources, minimizing resource consumption and waste. It also can help improve resource productivity since we can keep using products, equipment, and infrastructure longer. Since we are using digital to maximize business and user outcomes, can we extend it to enable a circular economy fully? Guest: Aldo Noseda Title: Vice President, Chief Information Officer, Eastman Chemical Company For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/can-digital-fully-enable-circularity/

Amidst the current chaotic environment, we could be fighting daily fires and embrace stagnation. But, instead, organizations must focus on sustainability, cultivating talent, and operating with purpose while using technology to transform and accelerate growth to create a lasting impact and bring positive change. So, how well are the organizations doing what matters most today? Guest 1: Tressa Springmann Title: Chief Information Officer, LifeBridge Health Guest 2: Reid Stephan Title: Vice President & Chief Information Officer, St. Luke's Health System For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/doing-what-matters-most-during-chaos/

There is a rapid change in customer expectations, business models, and how work gets done. Yet, from planning demand to building operational capability to establishing a robust partner ecosystem support, many businesses still depend on principles enshrined as best practices decades ago. How can we rethink and shift our business planning and delivery efforts to more realistic scenario-driven models that are continually refined based on actual outputs? What is holding organizations back from taking this leap? What can business and IT leaders do collaboratively to enable this shift? Guest 1: Nick Giannakakis Title: Group Chief Information Officer, Motor Oil Guest 2: Jennifer Greenman Title: Chief Information Officer, Cancer Treatment Centers of America For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/shifting-from-a-principle-dependent-to-a-scenario-driven-business/

Supporting the scaling and accelerating digitalization efforts requires rethinking and converging business and IT teams. From cross-training workers for homogenization, integrating workflows, learning and adopting emerging technologies, to navigating through uncertainties together. Where are organizations in this journey? What are the related challenges and remedies that are helping build one cohesive force to deliver Digital? Guest 1: Dennis Hodges Title: Chief Information Officer, Inteva Products, LLC Guest 2: Ronald Blahnik Title: Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, Hibbett For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/bringing-business-and-it-together-to-deliver-digital/

An emerging trend may be missed or shunned as speculation when it emanates weak signals or looks like an anomaly. But, waiting for it to become a conspicuous trend could cost you the race with your proactive competitors. So, how can organizations build heightened sensing capabilities to discern promising trends even if the signals are weak and stay ready to execute timely to gain a significant competitive advantage? Guest 1: Nashira Layade Title: Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, Realogy Guest 2: Borre Ulrichsen Title: Chief Information Officer, Gonzaga University For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/turning-weak-signals-into-strong-competitive-advantage/

With management looking to find ways to optimize operating costs leveraging digitalization while expecting clear and positive ROI from such technology investments, where should an organization invest in IT vs. scale back? What if investing in digital transformation is the only way left to desirable cost optimization? Guest: Robert Ford Title: Chief Information Officer, Northwest University For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/funding-it-when-digital-is-the-default/

What if you could assemble your organization like LEGO® puzzles, where each product or service as a business block could be coupled with a compatible IT block. And do it in a way where you could build, buy, or lease these blocks to achieve a lean and on-demand setup that is scalable and extensible without compromising the quality of business operation and customer experience. What does it take to build such capability? Guest: Daniel Blanchard Title: Chief Technology Officer, IHG Hotels & Resorts For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/assembling-business-and-it-capabilities-like-a-lego-puzzle/

In light of recent global disruption, you are asked to step up, leaving your comfort zone. How well have you adapted to adversity without any judgment or avoidance? With the spotlight on you to deliver, have you stayed empathetic? Did you admit mistakes, took criticism, and did it all in stride, recognizing the risk and emotional exposure? If not, what held you back? Where do you need help? Guest 1: Lungile Mginqi Title: Group Chief Information Officer, Sasol Guest 2: Michael Ruttledge Title: Chief Information Officer, Citizens Bank For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/are-you-a-daring-leader/

The pharma companies are juggling multiple priorities like improving R&D, establishing a presence in global markets, and investing in digital transformation initiatives to move beyond the pill, find new revenue streams, and handle changing customer’s expectations for personalization. Pandemic further complicated the issues with delayed product launches, reduced in-person sales visit potential, supply chain disruption, and delays in drug commercialization. So how are the pharma industry players dealing with this perfect storm? What’s the road to relevant, profitable, and future-ready pharma? Guest: Minori Hara Title: Chief Information Officer and Head of Digital & IT Division, Santen Pharmaceutical For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/road-to-relevant-profitable-and-future-ready-pharma/

A hybrid work environment is here to stay. How did you motivate and engage people and lead a team you can’t see face-to-face all the time? How did you ensure effective communication, collaboration, trust-building, and ensuring accountability? What current leadership approaches and skills you used helped or hurt as you lead your troops in the hybrid work environment? How should we develop future leaders for this new paradigm? Guest 1: Rajeev Ravindran Title: Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, Ryder System Guest 2: John Kolb Title: Vice President for Information Services and Technology & Chief Information Officer, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/building-future-leaders-for-hybrid-work-environment/

Your business needs to be resilient that bounces back from disruptions and adversity. You also want to make sure that you are relevant now since the future is uncertain. Should you focus on automation, go remote, digitalize your offerings, promote self-service, and discard any people, processes, and technology that don’t fit your current agenda? How to build an elastic, people-centric business that’s focused on what’s vital now while getting future-ready? Guest 1: Bhavana Devulapally Title: Senior Vice President & Chief Information Office, Ventas Guest 2: Maurice Ferrell Title: Assistant Dean & CIO, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill- School of Government For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/building-an-elastic-people-centric-business-focused-on-now

Is your organization ensuring data security and privacy sufficiently and practicing race and gender diversity and inclusion effectively? Are your business practices ethical and transparent? Is worker health and safety getting the same focus and investment as product safety and quality? If such social and environmental issues are supported by a business properly, customers are willing to help, and employees are more likely to stay engaged. What is your organization doing to fulfill this increasing demand to become a more environmentally and socially conscious enterprise? How can IT help? Guest 1: Todd Britton Title: Chief Information Officer and Associate Vice President, IT, University of La Verne Guest 2: Helen Norris Title: Chief Information Officer, Chapman University For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/enabling-an-environmentally-and-socially-conscious-enterprise

As an IT leader, you strive to create an environment where people can learn, grow, inspire, and innovate. But to deliver on this promise, how are you building and sustaining a bottom-up culture, where each member of your team has a voice, empowered to make decisions, and motivated to create innovative and practical solutions to solve challenges and exploit business growth opportunities? And, how are you embedding resilience, so it stands the tests of business and life-changing disruptions like the pandemic? Guest 1: Faith Burn Title: Chief Information Officer, Eskom Holdings Guest 2: Michael Hites Title: Chief Information Officer, Southern Methodist University Guest 3: Kevin Gray Title: Chief Information Officer, City of Burbank For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/building-a-disruption-proof-bottom-up-it-culture

Business leaders are looking to lessen the impact of current global disruption while fortifying against future ones. They want to acquire new capabilities quickly through mergers and acquisitions, reimagine customer relationship building, and improve their cybersecurity posture to minimize risk while controlling costs. How well are IT and Security leaders supporting this business reinvention effort? Guest: Ketan Pandit Title: Chief Information Officer, QBE North America For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/supporting-business-reinvention-to-alleviate-global-disruptions

It is one thing to envision an AI concept, develop a prototype, and take it to production. It is another to scale such efforts to build and manage a robust enterprise-grade AI pipeline. How can organizations adopt product engineering, lifecycle management, and governance disciplines to scale AI efforts ensuring performance and reliability? Guest 1: Mark Miller Title: Chief Information Officer, Party City Guest 2: Prasanna Kumar Burri Title: Group Chief Information Officer, Dangote Industries For more details and related content: https://www.ciotalknetwork.com/steps-to-scaling-ai