From inflation to the war in Ukraine and the ongoing effects of COVID-19, a perfect storm of economic, social, and geopolitical disruptions has increased uncertainty for business leaders. Building on research and insights from technology executives across industries, Metis Strategy has identified five actions leaders can take to navigate that uncertainty in the months ahead:
Recent downgrades to economic forecasts suggest an economic decline is on the way (indeed, some argue that it has already begun). In July, the International Monetary Fund released an updated global economic outlook which forecasted growth to slow to 3.2% in 2022, down an additional 0.4% from its April forecast and sitting at just above half of the 6.1% growth from 2021. The IMF cited the war in Ukraine, supply chain disruptions, and tighter monetary policy among the key drivers behind the decline. In the U.S., inflation continues to rise, recently surpassing 9% to reach a 40-year high. Additionally, interest rate hikes to tame inflation are already underway by the U.S. Federal Reserve. With so many economic factors at play, uncertainty will be the only constant for the time being. As such, contingency planning and risk management in decision making will be vital to long-term success.
Multi-scenario planning allows decision makers to identify potential outcomes and the likely predictors of each to ensure that the organization is ready to act quickly no matter what comes to pass. Companies must not place too much emphasis on small data variations, as this course of action will not necessarily yield the best results given the array of factors at play. Rather than try to predict or plan for each incremental interest rate hike, for example, leaders instead should prepare for a combination of possible economic conditions: inflation and a recession, inflation and economic growth, stagflation, and so on.
By pursuing macro-level planning for multiple scenarios, organizations will better be able to see the shifting landscape and make timely adjustments rather than wavering due to “paralysis by analysis.”
New work models demand new infrastructure. That sentiment has never been as profound as it was over the past two and a half years as CIOs facilitated a massive shift to remote work. Today, those CIOs face a mandate to enable productive work in a hybrid environment.
As hybrid work models become the norm, it is time for CIOs to focus once again on their organization’s long-term agenda. Corporations know that the pace of change in technology has never been as quick as it is today, and at the same time will never be this slow again. With over 70% of organizations pursuing a flexible or hybrid work model, companies must invest in infrastructure, training, and culture to provide teams with the tools they need and ensure a strong and collaborative environment across more flexible work models.
That requires giving people the tools and skills they need to navigate the uncertainty that lies ahead. Upskilling and reskilling programs are some of the most prominent ways to do this. A LinkedIn study found that 94% of employees would stay longer at a company that invests in their learning. This has manifested itself in many ways at insurance giant MetLife, which launched a digital academy for employees to develop technically. The company has also worked to foster a culture in which employees feel empowered to achieve their career aspirations, Bill Pappas, MetLife’s Head of Technology and Operations, said in a recent episode of the Technovation podcast. Part of developing a strong hybrid model includes investing in the necessary tools, from collaboration platforms to cloud infrastructure, that enable teams to work productively from wherever they are.
Every organization must define its own version of a sustainable work model, including how to attract and retain employees, and how to nurture the desired culture. As old work operating models are redefined and new ones are implemented, investments in people and infrastructure that enable digital dexterity, paired with an increased focus on cultivating culture, will be key differentiators for organizations’ long-term success.
Supply chain challenges brought on by COVID-19 and the war in Ukraine, among other factors, have exposed the fragility of global trade networks, which have seen relatively little disruption over the past 30 years. The global economy’s reliance on Ukraine and Russia for crucial commodities such as oil, wheat, and neon (used in chip manufacturing) has hurt national economies and small businesses alike. The war also has disrupted both air cargo routes and sea shipments, driving up wait times and prices. Trade restrictions (such as sanctions and tariffs) and weakening trust between countries further compound those challenges. Increasingly, companies are questioning whether global supply chains will be as beneficial as it has been in the past.
Consequently, executives are re-assessing the viability of relationships with suppliers both foreign and domestic. Decision-makers may benefit from diversifying their supplier portfolios, possibly favoring those that are more geographically proximate and located in more politically stable countries to further help prepare and protect against future disruptions. Companies such as Intel and General Motors, for example, are building new manufacturing capabilities within the U.S. to decrease their dependency on suppliers in Asia. However, the decision to regionalize varies widely across organizations and industries, and many economists, academics, and executives are speculating about what the next decade holds. Professor Willy C. Shih of Harvard Business School argues that regional supply chain blocs may be the future of international trade as organizations emphasize safer and more stable routes. Others contend the benefits of a global supply chain (i.e. reduced costs), will regain value and that a “transformational shift from global to regional business” is unlikely. The common factor across both theories (and many others) is that significant instability is likely to endure. That makes building supply chains with sufficient flexibility of paramount importance. Technology offers several avenues to achieve this.
Many organizations are turning to digital tools to boost supply chain resilience and transparency. Companies can leverage artificial intelligence and machine learning to carry out risk analysis of supply chain patterns in real-time. Autonomous planning, for example, allows organizations to increase supply chain efficiency and decrease necessary human involvement. Enterprise resource planning upgrades and advanced track-and-trace solutions also offer more visibility into the movement of goods and can help mitigate risk. Furthermore, emerging technologies such as blockchain, autonomous mobile robots, and 3D printing may offer additional benefits from the warehouse floor to a product’s final destination.
Cybersecurity remains a priority for all members of the executive suite. Last year saw a record number of data compromises, up 68% from 2020 with an average cost of a staggering $4.24 million per breach. Roughly 65% of respondents in Foundry’s 2022 State of The CIO study said current socioeconomic pressures have further boosted the importance of increasing cybersecurity, and cyber has been noted as the CEO’s top priority for IT in 2022.
The increasing volume of digital interactions has led to a dramatic rise in the likelihood of breaches and the cost of protection. Facing a threat landscape that is evolving faster than ever, organizations should act quickly to re-evaluate company polices, assess risk management strategy, and bolster both internal and external security practices. This requires a mindset shift in how security is viewed. Traditionally viewed purely as a cost center, organizations must view cybersecurity as a critical piece of the enterprise risk mitigation strategy. Today, businesses must continuously update their cybersecurity practices to reduce the risk of becoming a target and ensure they can respond quickly if or when they face an attack.
Technology leaders should communicate clearly to C-level peers and boards about how risk is being managed. At the same time, it’s important to continue developing strong cybersecurity hygiene at all levels of the organization and to disincentivize unsafe behaviors. Security policies should be evaluated and updated regularly to ensure that they are keeping up with changing times. Regardless of what specific technologies an organization pursues, it must accompany the mindset shift to cybersecurity ultimately as a risk mitigator and cost saver, rather than just a cost center.
Environment, social, and governance initiatives (ESG) have been on the rise for the past several years. Individuals are becoming increasingly concerned not only with working for a company that is actively pursuing ESG initiatives, but also in purchasing from one. This trend shows no signs of slowing down.
It is critical that organizations clearly communicate actions and results of ESG efforts to the public. Historically, however, ESG goals have not always had clear or easily obtainable data and metrics. Technology is making that job easier. Connected devices, for example, can conduct remote diagnostics of buildings, enabling “smart buildings” and helping to minimize their carbon footprint. CIOs can lead the charge on ESG initiatives by identifying key results that IT can deliver, weaving ESG into an organization’s broader digital strategy, and rallying support across the organization to ensure progress on ESG initiatives is fully realized.
The global business environment is in a period of transition. Leaders must use this time to ensure their organizations can respond in a nimble fashion to unexpected changes and not only survive, but thrive, no matter what the future holds. This requires a holistic look across people, process, technology, ecosystems, and strategy and, in many cases, willingness across the enterprise to transform operating models and ditch traditional ways of working. Technology leaders can be at the forefront of this shift, pairing their expertise in digital with a focus on operational excellence to drive sustainable change across the enterprise.
Our next Digital Symposium is just around the corner. Join us on September 8 as industry leaders and technology executives share their perspectives on fostering innovative cultures, innovating during dynamic times, and creating new digital pathways to reach customers, among other topics.
CIOs and other technology leaders, register here to reserve your spot today. We look forward to seeing you!
(Click here for highlights from our most recent Digital Symposium, and stay tuned to our YouTube channel for videos of our panel discussions.)
12:00 – 12:10 p.m.
Welcome and Introductions
Welcome and introduction to the Metis Strategy team.
Peter High, President, Metis Strategy
12:10 – 12:25 p.m.
Fireside Chat: Gabe Dalporto, Chief Executive Officer, Udacity
Gabe Dalporto, Chief Executive Officer, Udacity
Moderated by Peter High, President, Metis Strategy
12:25 – 12:50 p.m.
Data & Analytics as a Source of Resilience and Growth
Vinod Bidarkoppa; SVP, Walmart; Chief Technology Officer, Sam’s Club
Susan Doniz, Chief Information Officer and SVP of IT & Data Analytics, Boeing
12:50 – 1:05 p.m.
Entrepreneur Spotlight: Orion Hindawi, Co-Founder & CEO, Tanium
Orion Hindawi, Co-Founder & CEO, Tanium
1:05 – 1:20 p.m.
Fireside Chat: Chandra Dhandapani; Chief Executive Officer, Global Workplace Solutions; CBRE
Chandra Dhandapani; Chief Executive Officer, Global Workplace Solutions; CBRE
1:20 – 1:35 p.m.
Fireside Chat: Kevin Stine, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
Kevin Stine, Chief of the Applied Cybersecurity Division, NIST’s Information Technology Laboratory (ITL)
1:35 – 2:00 p.m.
Transforming a Global IT Operating Model
Ash Banerjee, Global Chief Information Officer, Dentons
Anil Bhatt, Global Chief Information Officer, Elevance Health
Moderated by Michael Bertha, Vice President & Central Office Lead, Metis Strategy
2:00 – 2:25 p.m.
Creating Innovative Sustainable Business Models
Frank Cassulo, Chief Digital Officer, Chevron
Bhavani Amirthalingam, Chief Digital Information Officer, Ameren
Moderated by Chris Davis, Partner & West Coast Office Lead, Metis Strategy
2:25 – 2:50 p.m.
Driving Strategic IT Modernization Efforts
Marykay Wells, Chief Information Officer, Pearson
Carman Wenkoff, Chief Information Officer, Dollar General
Moderated by Steven Norton; Co-Head Executive Networks, Research, and Media; Metis Strategy
2:50 – 3:00 p.m.
Closing remarks and adjourn
Click here for highlights from our last Digital Symposium, or view the panel discussions on YouTube. We look forward to seeing you!
Thanks to all who attended the Metis Strategy Digital Symposium. Amid a backdrop of economic and geopolitical uncertainty, technology leaders highlighted the need for increased agility as their organizations implement new ways of working and develop technology-led business models. Collaborating more than ever with peers in the C-suite, CIOs today are using data and digital tools to deliver continuous value to customers and to evolve product and service offerings as customer needs and expectations change.
Below are highlights from the event. Stay tuned to the Metis Strategy YouTube channel and Technovation podcast in the coming weeks for full recordings of individual panel discussions.
Technology becomes key to understanding the customer journey
At our February event, attendees noted that customer centricity has been the biggest driver of impact and performance at their organizations. That trend continues as new technology-led business models create opportunities for organizations to better understand customer journeys and deliver continuous value. Mamatha Chamarthi, Head of Software Business and Product Management P&L at Stellantis, explained how the automotive industry’s shift to software-defined vehicles has given the organization a chance to understand the customer journey from pre-sale to ownership while providing opportunities to deliver on-demand features and continuous updates past the point of a vehicle’s production. By transitioning the business model from a one-time purchase to a services and subscription model, Chamarthi’s team is able to generate a recurring revenue stream and deliver continuous, personalized value to customers.
Ather Williams, EVP and Head of Strategy, Digital, and Innovation at Wells Fargo, is navigating a massive change in the financial services industry as customers increasingly adopt digital and mobile platforms and seek new experiences in how they manage their finances. That has driven a mindset shift internally as leaders place greater emphasis on customer journeys.
In an age where customers have higher expectations about their digital experiences than ever before, organizations must adopt an agile mindset so that they can evolve with their customers and take a customer-focused view of value delivery, said Prakash Kota, CIO at Autodesk. Technology teams increasingly look at problems with a customer lens rather than an engineering lens, thinking about where there are opportunities to remove friction.
Training programs aim to build skills, foster new mindsets
To remain competitive in the product-oriented digital future, companies will require leaders with a still-rare combination of business acumen, technology savvy, and leadership skills. To develop “bilingual experts” who are equally comfortable with business and technology and who reflexively think about how technology can be used to create new capabilities, Vipin Gupta, Chief Innovation and Digital Officer at Toyota Financial Services, established the TFS Digital Academy. The program aims not only to equip participants with needed IT skills, but also to embrace a product mindset and think about the how the company’s financial services capabilities can be continually assembled and improved.
While fostering a digital mindset is essential, so is ensuring teams have the necessary skills to take advantage of new technologies. This remains a challenge. More than 35% of attendees said a lack of needed skills was the biggest challenge to adopting cloud, for example. To address the skills shortage and foster a market for new talent, Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian noted that the company has committed to train 40 million developers with hands-on skills training and certification opportunities.
Leaders take an ecosystem approach to innovation
Gone are the days in which corporate innovation happened in a silo. Today, the ability to innovate is an enterprise-wide imperative, and leaders are eager to explore the ways in which technology can deliver new and surprising value. Technology leaders play the role of strategic influencer in this new innovation ecosystem, identifying new opportunities, engaging colleagues and partners, and aligning innovation activities with the broader corporate strategy.
At Land O’Lakes, Chief Technology Officer Teddy Bekele is creating a “farm-to-fork” innovation ecosystem. By using technology as a backbone to achieve the company’s mission to feed a growing population, Bekele seeks opportunities to “excite the value chain” and develop ideas that can positively impact stakeholders across the business. “If technology isn’t driving value in the business, we’re just a cost center,” Bekele said. At Land O’Lakes, technology is now the center of the business, and product teams are focused on delivering tangible impact.
Innovation has allowed technology leaders to gain more strategic influence in the C-suite as well. At Thermo Fisher, Chief Information Officer Ryan Snyder works closely with the company’s CEO and the Chief Strategy Officer to make sure initiatives his team are passionate about get woven into the company’s strategy. Innovation needs to be “super connected to strategy being set by company leadership,” he said, and the approach to innovation must be aligned with where the company is heading.
Economic and geopolitical upheaval sharpen focus on resilience, risk reduction
Facing economic challenges, geopolitical uncertainty, and ongoing supply chain constraints, companies are turning to technology to drive operational efficiency, reduce risk, and build resilience across the organization. CIOs across industries noted that they are digitizing supply chain operations for greater visibility, leveraging analytics to better understand customers, and re-evaluating global talent footprints.
In a poll, more than half of attendees noted they are exploring new locations for talent both domestically and abroad, and nearly 30% said they were outsourcing more talent to locations where their organizations have an existing presence. Chris Drumgoole, Chief Operating Officer at DXC Technology, said the company is discussing ways to reduce single-country risk and has placed increasing focus on resilience across operations.
“Operationalizing culture” becomes a competitive advantage
As technology leaders take on expanded roles in the C-suite, tangible value delivery and operational excellence take on even greater importance. Jeff Smith, Chief Operating Officer at World Fuel Services, remarked that the only unique attribute about a company is its culture, and that competitive advantage can be gained by learning how to operationalize it. To achieve this, Smith’s team defined 30 cultural practices, the majority of which could be scaled globally. He created measurements for both operations and leadership, conducted leadership maturity assessments, and even created a “Bureaucracy Mass Index” showing the ratio of leaders and managers to “doers.”
Chris Drumgoole of DXC noted the increased adoption of more customer-focused metrics over traditional IT metrics in order to better understand the customer experience. The company sends a Net Promoter Score survey out each month that creates a regular flow of feedback and data. He and Smith both underscored the need for clear-eyed, tangible metrics – that which gets measured gets done – and to embrace opportunities for continuous improvement.
Our next Digital Symposium is just around the corner. Join us on May 19 as industry leaders and technology executives share their perspectives on fostering innovative cultures, scaling transformation initiatives, and navigating geopolitical uncertainty, among other topics.
11:00 – 11:10 a.m.
11:10-11:30 a.m.
Conversation with former President of Mexico Vicente Fox
Pres. Vicente Fox, fmr. President, Mexico
11:30-11:50 a.m.
Building Talent for Digital Operating Models
Mamatha Chamarthi, Head of Software Business and Product Management P&L, Stellantis
Vipin Gupta, Chief Innovation and Digital Officer, Toyota Financial Services
11:50 a.m. – 12:05 p.m.
Entrepreneur Spotlight: Adyen
Pieter van der Does, CEO, Adyen
Kamran Zaki, COO, Adyen
12:05 – 12:20 p.m.
Fireside Chat: Thomas Kurian, Google Cloud
Thomas Kurian, CEO, Google Cloud
12:20 – 12:40 p.m.
The Journey from CIO to COO
Chris Drumgoole, EVP & Chief Operating Officer, DXC Technology
Jeff Smith, EVP & Chief Operating Officer, World Fuel Services
Moderated by Alex Kraus, Vice President & East Coast Lead, Metis Strategy
12:40 – 1:00 p.m.
Technology-led Business Model Innovation
Ather Williams III; EVP, Head of Strategy, Digital, and Innovation; Wells Fargo
Prakash Kota, Chief Information Officer, Autodesk
Moderated by Chris Davis, Vice President & West Coast Office Lead, Metis Strategy
1:00 – 1:20 p.m.
Innovation Ecosystems as a Source of Growth
Ryan Snyder, SVP & Chief Information Officer, Thermo Fisher
Teddy Bekele, SVP & Chief Technology Officer, Land O’Lakes
1:20 – 1:30 p.m.
Thanks to all who joined the February 2022 Metis Strategy Digital Symposium. A special thanks as well to all of our speakers, who shared their perspectives on topics ranging from creating speed and agility in an era of “predictable unpredictability” to developing new operating models, scaling innovation, and using data and technology to enhance the customer and employee experience.
Digital and technology executives are seeing expanded purviews and greater strategic influence inside their organizations as technology becomes increasingly integral to business operations. In addition to traditional IT roles, today’s CIOs are taking on key roles in revenue-generating activities, helping to define the future of work, and leveraging strategic partnerships to find unconventional solutions to today’s challenges.
See below for a few highlights from the event, and check out the Metis Strategy YouTube channel and the Technovation podcast in the coming weeks for full recordings of individual panel discussions. In the meantime, click here to request an invitation for our next virtual event on May 19, 2022.
Customer focus drives greater impact for IT
Today’s technology leaders are more customer-centric than ever before as data and analytics capabilities help organizations better understand the customer journey and transform the customer experience through digital. Indeed, nearly half of attendees noted that customer centricity has been the biggest driver of impact and performance at their organizations.
At MetLife, Bill Pappas is utilizing his combined role as Head of Global Technology and Operations to drive a more holistic approach to managing the customer journey. The ability to collaborate internally across data and analytics, cybersecurity, infrastructure, customer-facing service advisors, and other teams has led to a greater understanding of the processes and decisions that impact customers, which in turn helps MetLife design better products and services for them.
At Inspire Brands, digital technologies have allowed the company to serve customers and employees more effectively across a variety of channels, CIO Raghu Sagi said. Buffalo Wild Wings, for example, went from having almost no off-premise business before the pandemic to having almost all off-premise sales as people stopped going out to eat. In response, Sagi and his team quickly rolled out new features such as curbside delivery and contactless payments, tools they could then scale across their other restaurant brands.
Even security services, often considered a friction point for many users, have become an avenue for delivering value to customers. Transmit Security, for example, is leveraging biometric capabilities and other technologies to help customers access their accounts faster while simultaneously strengthening the overall security of those accounts and reducing system complexity on the back end.
CIOs double down on culture, people development
As organizations continue to navigate a challenging talent market, executives are doubling down on people management efforts to attract, retain, and develop talent. That includes building internal culture, enabling flexible working models, and developing upskilling and reskilling opportunities to create growth opportunities for their teams.
“People are truly everything we do, and as a leader, your role is to be [first] a human resources manager,” Bill Pappas of MetLife said. In addition to articulating its value proposition to attract top talent, the company offers a range of upskilling and talent development initiatives, including a digital academy, that seek to foster the technology, commercial, and leadership skills needed to lead in today’s environment.
Edward Wagoner, Chief Information Officer for Digital at JLL Technologies, noted that data and technology are helping the company design the future of work and bring it to life at the intersection of physical and digital spaces. With some employees returning to office and others continuing to work remotely, Wagoner emphasized that there are still many unknowns, and that organizations across the board will continue to test new hypotheses and draw on lessons learned to improve the employee experience.
Indeed, technology leaders will play a central role in enabling new forms of collaboration and creating spaces that establish a level playing field and sense of belonging for diverse and remote employees. “As digital technology leaders, we’re so entwined in the culture game that we now need to go figure out what are these experiences that provoke people to collaborate differently,” said Vince Campisi, SVP Enterprise Services and Chief Digital Officer at Raytheon Technologies.
Tech leaders become a catalyst for new business partnerships
While CIOs have always kept a finger on the pulse of emerging technologies, they increasingly are forging more strategic partnerships with suppliers, peers, startups, and others to gain new insights and develop new products and services.
To navigate the emerging tech landscape, Novant Health, Chief Information Officer Onyeka Nchege focused on identifying core capabilities and building a strong partner ecosystem that could deliver a positive impact and improve the patient experience. In 2019, Novant Health solidified a partnership with Zipline that, through a fast-tracked operation during the pandemic, led Novant Health to become the first healthcare system to deliver PPE via drone distribution.
Although the real estate industry hasn’t historically been known as a leader in technological innovation, companies like JLL have established new partnerships to expand the company’s thinking and to better address ongoing uncertainties such as the future of work and climate change. Wagoner noted that JLL acquired an AI company to improve data-driven decision making. He also discussed the ways in which JLL is partnering with technology leaders across industries to address topics such as sustainability monitoring and reporting.
A dedication to scaling digital operations and innovation
CIOs, CDOs, and CTOs have an ever-growing role to play in helping organizations adapt quickly to changing markets and consumer demands. Key to that is enabling innovation at scale and applying digital tools to enhance operations.
Innovation is no longer a practice that takes place in a separate building, but rather a capability embedded across the enterprise, said Charu Jain, SVP Merchandising and Innovation at Alaska Airlines. Jain further drove these efforts by developing an innovation committee at the board level. This committee provides formal commitment and accountability to innovation efforts and helps identify opportunities to apply technology to revenue-generating activities and guest and employee experiences. Having teams across the company pursue innovation ideas, paired with strong change management and new ways of working, has helped make innovation a “fabric of how [Alaska Airlines] does business,” she said.
Sanjib Sahoo, Chief Digital Officer at Ingram Micro, highlighted digital innovation as a means of improving performance while constantly reassessing the business model and ensuring that there are no opportunity gaps in the organization. “We perform as we transform,” he said, noting the importance of integrating operational excellence and value creation into all transformation initiatives.
Since the pandemic began, CIOs are owning more innovation and business value creation processes, said Sunny Gupta, CEO & Co-Founder of Apptio. That includes a shift to product-focused operating models, which requires leaders to think not only about technology applications but also new funding models.
Technology plays key role in building supply chain resilience
Supply chain disruptions and natural disasters have caused strain on global operations, underscoring a need to digitize and automate processes and collaborate with peers and partners. Increasingly, technology is the key to building resilient supply chains that allow organizations to pivot quickly amid ongoing disruptions.
At Big Lots Stores, data and decision modeling help build stronger and more resilient digital supply chains, said Gurmeet Singh, CTO and CIO. The ability to process data from each point of the supply chain speeds decision making and allows the organization to pivot quickly when markets change, which ultimately impacts costs, store operations, and the customer experience. Singh has also spent time learning from startups in the supply chain space to understand how new technologies are driving greater visibility and automation.
Gary Desai, CIO at Discount Tire, remarked that resilient supply chains and strong relationships help improve the “speed of trust” with customers and drive better outcomes. Desai works alongside the Chief Customer Officer and Chief Product Officer at his organization and meets with the CEO of their supply chain software provider to discuss ways in which technology can continue to deliver value for the company now and in the future. New ways of working, including a shift toward planned appointments at stores instead of walk-ins, also present new opportunities to apply digital technologies and enhance relationships with local suppliers.
We hope you’ll join us for our next Metis Strategy Digital Symposium on May 19, 2022. You can register for the event here. Stay tuned to our website for more details.
Dean Del Vecchio is the Executive Vice President, Chief Information Officer, and Chief of Operations at Guardian Life, roughly 160-year-old mutual company with roughly $10.5 billion in annual revenue. He leads a team of about 4,500 employees. He is a major driver of innovation across the company, but he and his team hoped to open up innovation to the majority of colleagues rather than make it a purview of a single team at Guardian Life. In fact, he has even facilitated a method to engage outside partners and vendors in the process, as well.
Del Vecchio has defined three categories of innovation:
Core innovation entails finding a better, a faster or a simpler way to perform everyday tasks of the company.
Adjacent innovation requires monitoring other companies, including innovative ideas driven in other industries and translating them back to Guardian Life. “If there is somebody else doing something out there, it does not have to be in our industry, our segment or our market,” said Del Vecchio. “If somebody is doing something interesting and differently than we are today, let’s copy it.”
Transformational innovation fosters the development of truly big and new ideas for the company to pursue. “It is rethinking a market segment, [for example],” said Del Vecchio. “It could be rethinking how we do work entirely. We have been quite innovative in the way we thought about operating in the cloud, for example. We have been operating in the cloud since 2018. We shut down our data center in 2018. We no longer have an owned operating data center.”
To foster the development of all three types of innovation, Del Vecchio has developed innovation challenges for the team. It involves posing a challenge question of the team and leveraging the wisdom of the crowd to develop creative answers to the question. “We have employees vote on [the ideas], and we have them do pairwise comparisons on [them],” noted Del Vecchio. “Then the good ideas that bubble up, we do a Shark Tank experience. We have people put forth their idea, present it to a group of people, we vote, and we challenge [them with] questions. If an idea gets thumbs up, we move it forward to a minimum viable product.”
In recognizing that the best ideas will come when the net is cast widely, Del Vecchio recognized that he had to grow more technical talent, which is especially a challenge these days when the war for talent is raging at a level not previously seen. He introduced a program called Code for Good, which identifies employees in non-traditional technology roles and trains them to become developers. “It is a six-month boot camp [including] programming and learning, and then they are out on the floor,” he said. “We make sure that there is a job for them and that they have an opportunity to participate in that.” He has had multiple cohorts go through this program, and the value derived from these newly minted programmers has been profound.
Del Vecchio is building on this success with the development of an Automation for Good program. This is geared at engaging employees who work on transaction-heavy processes and engaging them to help design automation to take the place of some of the most tedious and time-consuming tasks. “Employees could be adding much more value and dealing with much more complex issues if they had the time, but because they are dealing with all these transactional things,” he noted. “Why not allow them to be able to self-automate and identify those tasks that they wish they did not have to do in the first place, and then create a much more fulfilling job for themselves?”
There is a broader vision to this. Del Vecchio and his team are mapping out the customer experience journey to understand where there are opportunities to digitize, and where to introduce self-service capabilities. He and his team hope to automate to the point of facilitating proactive and predictive capabilities. “We are doing that in ways of a digital agent, for example,” said Del Vecchio. “We have installed, using AI and automation, the digital agent capability so you could chat with a digital agent and get claim status or get eligibility of benefits.”
Del Vecchio and his team have also focused on each aspect of the relationship and the journey, whether it is the initial onboarding piece or further along in their relationship with the company. “Can we help customers with decision tools to help them select the right products?” he asked. “Ultimately, when they are on board and they need services, can we provide them with all of those avenues?” A key is to serve clients as they wish to be served. If they want to interact with a chatbot, they can do so through their mobile device. If they prefer the web, they can do that. If they want a mobile app, Guardian Life provides that capability. “We are not there yet but that is how we are looking at it, and we are looking at it across all medium, as well as all segments of that lifecycle engagement,” said Del Vecchio. He and his team have the processes and the ideas to drive continued innovation through Guardian Life on behalf of its customers.
Peter High is President of Metis Strategy, a business and IT advisory firm. He has written two bestselling books, and his third, Getting to Nimble, was recently released. He also moderates the Technovation podcast series and speaks at conferences around the world. Follow him on Twitter @PeterAHigh.
Ather Williams III is the Senior Executive Vice President and Head of Strategy, Digital Platforms, and Innovation at Wells Fargo, a post he has held since October of 2020. In that role, he leads corporate strategic planning, defines and manages digital platforms and capabilities, and oversees innovation priorities, opportunities and company-wide efforts to drive transformation.
Williams strategy role cuts across the five business lines at Wells Fargo, three of which are focused on consumer and two of which are focused on enterprise customers. “We work across those businesses, across all of our range of capabilities, covering our 69 million customers, and all of our functions to put together a coherent strategy to serve those clients in an innovative way,” noted Williams.
One of the key strategic pillars that that Williams and his team has defined and is helping to drive focuses on technology and innovation and having a digital-first, mobile-first, though not mobile only, mindset. “Digital platforms are a natural place to sit with me because it is a transformation of how we bring together a consistent consumer experience that starts with mobile across our deposits and payments business, our consumer lending business and our wealth management business,” said Williams. “[This intersection] will easily migrate across our other channels, be it an ATM, a branch or a financial advisor’s office.”
Williams considers the innovation part of his mandate to be the “fuel for the future.” The inspiration for that innovation often comes from interactions with customers and the needs they articulate, and the innovation is then driven by the team he has at his disposal within Wells Fargo together with a partner ecosystem he has curated. By way of example, Williams noted customers’ desire to rethink how they move their money around the world or new ways of investing their money. He also noted working with customers on how best to decarbonize. Wells Fargo makes its innovation channel accessible to customers and the broader ecosystem can help bring those ideas to life.
Williams noted that the pandemic has been a remarkable accelerant for mobile adoption. “All the metrics I look at weekly on our digital platforms, how we are performing and interacting with our clients, they are all up double digits year-over-year, and it is continual growth,” he said. “On the consumer side of the house, mobile is our number one channel. Between mobile and online, we have about just shy of two billion interactions with our clients every quarter.”
Williams is quick to add that these growth figures are not the death knell to Wells Fargo’s branches, however. He offers coin and currency transactions and mortgage initiation as two of a variety of examples of interactions that customers are often more comfortable doing in the branches. Williams describes the strategic approach the company is taking as mobile first but not mobile only. “Making that transition from being what a lot of banks traditionally have been which is a physical interaction first, technology supporting it, to being a technology led, physical supporting it,” Williams highlighted. “That flip is what we are driving from a strategy perspective.”
The company has also flipped the traditional script on how innovation happens. It used to be that companies like Wells Fargo built products and technology internally without outside partners to speak of. Counterexamples include payment networks for credit cards, or for clearing payments internationally, but these were exceptions rather than the rule. “Increasingly, banks are becoming ecosystem orchestrators where we build some stuff, but we enable you to experience it through APIs,” offered Williams by way of example. “That change, going from a very inwardly focused culture to an outwardly-focused culture, meaning engaged in the broader ecosystem for our clients, has been a big change.” Williams underscored that this trend happens both on the consumer and on the wholesale side of the business. Now enterprises bank through their ERP system in their treasury workstation. Wells Fargo has developed a means of plugging into that.
When asked how he measures innovation, Williams volunteered velocity of ideas through the company’s pipeline. “We run a funnel process and I measure ideas in and ideas we push into production, but it is also how quickly we can churn them through,” he noted. “Anything in the cryptocurrency area for example, is changing so rapidly that, I just need to make sure that we are getting enough reps or enough at-bats on things to see what might stick.” He also indicated that he is mindful of patents filed by the company. He also mentions that it is no longer useful to simply benchmark Wells Fargo against other banks, as had been the primary measuring stick used. “We look at some companies that are traditionally very innovative, mostly in the tech space but not necessarily banks,” said Williams. “I do look at how quickly they are launching new products, and how they are driving the industry.”
Each of the line of lines of business has a strategy and innovation lead. Their main job is to help each business think about how they are going to meet those changing customer needs and how the company will respond to competitive forces. Additionally, these leaders investigate problems Wells Fargo is trying to solve and then tap back into that innovation stream of what is happening in the market. There is also a team that is focused on innovation strategy. That team is “focused on thinking about what is five or ten years out that we need to keep our eyes on,” Williams said, “It can be a technology thing, or it could be an industry trend thing that we can see is going to impact us.”
The leaders of each of these teams come together with some frequency to share insights and to identify points of collaboration. The innovation team drives research and development, as well as the pilot and deliver, test and learn continuum to scaled ideas. “We get an idea such as cross border money movement over the distributed ledger,” said Williams. “Here is the client, here is the business case, here is the client scenario, how do we make that happen? You pull it into the lab, you can stand up a prototype and get it to run. Then once you get to a certain place, you can commercialize it and you flip it back into the business.”
This well thought out innovation engine is already bearing fruit, and Williams is confident that the best is yet to come.
Carol Juel has been the chief information officer at Synchrony Financial since the company’s creation, after it spun out from General Electric just over seven and a half years ago. She had worked at GE for the decade prior to that. In the early stages of Synchrony Financial’s existence, Juel had the opportunity to think about new beginnings as to how a modern technology organization should function to best support a new, already scaled and growing business.
Like many CIOs, Juel introduced agile methods as a primary process to develop new initiatives within the technology realm. Like many peers of hers across industries, the iterative approach, engaging the intended audience and users in the process from ideation through to completion ensured a better end product, and it reduced the risk that time and money would be invested only to conclude with a collective yawn from customers, for example. Every project has degrees of uncertainty and risk associated with them, especially if they are truly innovative. If you are batting 1.000, you are not innovating, after all. Therefore, when contemplating scenarios where uncertainty reins, greater degrees of cross-functional collaboration are essential, and they can get the collective batting average higher for the technology and digital teams as a result.
Come March of 2020, we all entered perhaps the greatest period of uncertainty as the consequences of the pandemic on our personal and professional lives began to be reconciled. The progress Synchrony Financial IT had made in instituting agile gave Juel an idea. Why not make the executive team (the chief executive officer and his reports) an agile team of sorts? One of the key aspects that Juel thought would facilitate setting a path during unprecedented times was the concept of the daily stand-up meeting. “Agile stand-up meetings, for those who have never been to one, are a very specific meeting,” said Juel.
“Once or twice a day, the team gets together to communicate information. You’re talking about what you need, you’re making decisions and you’re talking about blockers. [By the conclusion of each meeting], everyone is clear about the actions that need to be taken, who is accountable and what’s going to get done by the next agile standup meeting.”
This was the new way of working for the Synchrony executive team, but those executives already had seen the great strides the technology team had made in leveraging the same methods, and this made the case very easy for Juel to implement this among her peers and with her boss, the CEO. “It was a conversation on an afternoon, and by the next morning we had our first executive-level stand up meeting.” Juel served as the scrum master for the team, helping the team streamline the methods used to achieve their goals.
The advantages were legion. Issues were discussed as soon as they were identified, common approaches to rectify those issues were developed almost immediately and with broad buy-in from across the team, the consequences of those decisions were monitored real-time and any course correction could be made quickly. The speed of decision making hastened and the pathway to value shortened just as fast.
“There was so much uncertainty at the outset of the pandemic. What consumer spending was going to look like? How would the job market evolve? Having tools as a leadership team that allowed us to work differently to respond to this unprecedented set of challenges was exciting.” This fostered a broader agile cultural change across the company. As the executives learned more about these methods, they began to deploy them with their own teams. Thus, the speed of all teams began to hasten in ways akin to the change that the technology team had experienced in the early stages of its agile journey. Juel credits these changes as critical factors in allowing Synchrony Financial to launch both Verizon’s and Venmo’s first ever credit card programs. Both happened in record times remotely.
The agile approach led to creative thoughts on how best to enhance the experiences of employees during trying times. As it became clear that normalcy would not return by the time schools let out for the summer, it also became clear how disruptive it would be for many to have kids at home all day without typical summer outlets like camps. This is where the immersion of the executive team in the agile principles shined. The leaders of Technology, Marketing and Human Resources worked together to design the camp. “The goal was to help school age children to have engaging activities that would be inspiring,” Juel said. “Older kids could help design programs for younger kids. Employees served as mentors for all, and different employees took responsibility for developing different modules.” These would include everything from learning how to do a cartwheel to STEM classes.
Not only did this fill a need that was a source of anxiety for employees, but it strengthened the community across Synchrony Financial, as employees helped other employees’ children.
A little more than a year into the pandemic, in April 2021, Brian Doubles was named chief executive officer of the company. As with any leadership change of this magnitude, it provided a reason to rethink Synchrony Financial’s operating model. One of those would bring technology and operations together under Juel’s leadership, as she took on the role of chief technology and operating officer. As technology became more pervasive across the operations, the tie between the two became clearer, and in a period of dramatic change the value to be derived by linking these functions in a new way was profound.
As her influence inside of Synchrony Financial grew, so too did her reputation outside of the company, as well. She would be asked to join the board of Brighthouse Financial in the fourth quarter of 2021, joining a select but growing group of enterprise technology leaders who have been asked to join boards.
By thinking more expansively about her role as a technologist, Juel fostered resilience in the business operations (eventually taking over responsibility for business operations), resilience in the families of employees, and became a board-level tech executive in the process. This is a great example of the great work done in IT finding broader applications and increased value through the creative thought process of a strong leader.
Amala Duggirala has joined USAA as executive vice president and enterprise chief information officer. Founded in 1922 by a group of military officers, USAA is among the leading providers of insurance, banking and investment and retirement solutions to more than 13 million members of the U.S. military. USAA has offices in seven U.S. cities and three overseas locations, with a headquarters in San Antonio, Texas. The company employs more than 37,000 people worldwide.
In her new role, Duggirala will lead a team of 6,000 colleagues, and her purview will include technology, data, security and third-party management. She will be a member of USAA’s executive council, and she will report to the company’s president and chief executive officer Wayne Peacock. USAA was founded in 1922, and Duggirala has been tasked to lead USAA’s technology transformation to strengthen the company for its second century in business.
“Amala is one of the leading strategists in technology, and we are thrilled to leverage her industry expertise and passion for developing people to lead USAA’s technology transformation,” said Peacock. “Her enthusiasm and innovative spirit are the perfect match for USAA as we continue to build innovative products and services for our members and teammates into our second century.”
“I’ve admired USAA for its accomplishments in technology throughout my career, and I look forward to maintaining its reputation as a technology and innovation leader in the financial services industry,” said Duggirala. “It’s my honor to serve the military community as well as our 37,000 employees worldwide.”
Duggirala spent her prior five years at Regions Bank. For the first two years, she was the chief information officer and chief technology officer of the company and for the last nearly three years, she expanded her responsibilities to include over operations as the chief operations and technology officer. In that expanded role, she and her teams had important responsibilities in driving Regions Bank’s fast response in serving communities through the Paycheck Protection Program, a lending program launched by the U.S. Small Business Administration to help entrepreneurs facing unprecedented financial challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Prior to her time at Regions Bank, Duggirala led technology and product transformations in the fin-tech and telecom industries at companies including Kabbage, ACI Worldwide and British Telecommunications.
Duggirala holds a Master of Science from Columbia University in New York with a specialization in Business and Digital Transformation, as well as a Master of Business Administration from the University of Nebraska at Omaha and a certification in Advanced Project Management from Stanford University. She earned her degree in Electronics and Communications Engineering from Osmania University in Hyderabad, India.
As someone who released a book over the past year, I have been keenly aware of the great works of others published in 2021. The many great contributions reflecting rising trends in technology, the acceleration of digital transformation, the sancitity of customer-centricity, and the importance of remaining aware of the relevance of various trends to the evolution of one’s business all were represented across numerous tomes of consequence in the year that has passed. Here are ten that stood out.
AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future, by Kai-Fu Lee
Artificial intelligence is perhaps the most important technology of our time. How will it change the world over the next 20 years? In his latest book, Kai-Fu Lee, author of the bestseller “AI Superpowers” and former head of Google China, provides an immersive vision for how AI will transform aspects of our daily lives.
Amazon Unbound: Jeff Bezos and the Invention of a Global Empire, by Brad Stone
In a follow-up to his 2013 bestseller The Everything Store, Bloomberg News’s Brad Stone offers a perspective on how the company’s innovation and acquisition strategy have propelled it to be the world’s largest e-commerce company.
The Heart of Business: Leadership Principles for the Next Era of Capitalism, by Hubert Joly
As Chairman and CEO of Best Buy from 2012 to 2019, Hubert Joly led the immensely successful transformation of the electronics retailer. In his latest book, The Heart of Business, Hubert gives a look into his philosophy of “human magic” to illustrate how the people of Best Buy created a customer-centric company, and competed successfully against some of the most successful digital native competitors in the process.
Play Nice But Win: A CEO’s Journey from Founder to Leader, by Michael Dell
Successfully navigating a firm through a rapidly changing business landscape requires a good dose of grit and a leader ready to face some setbacks. From dorm-room CEO to leader of a global technology giant, Michael Dell charts the evolution of his eponymous computer company and shares his perspectives on the corporate struggles that defined him as a leader.
The Exponential Age: How Accelerating Technology is Transforming Business, Politics and Society, by Azeem Azhar
We are living through a period of unprecedented technological change, and the pace of change is only accelerating. Azeem Azhar, creator and host of the popular Exponential View newsletter and podcast, explores the widening gap between the pace of change and our ability to adapt, and offers a new framework for understanding the impact of technology on the economy, politics, and the future.
Risk: A User’s Guide, by General Stanley McChrystal and Anna Butrico
General Stanley McChrystal understands risk at his core, having served at the highest ranks of the American military. In recent years as a business consultant, he has advised executives on how best to apply what he has learned on the topic to the business world. He and his co-author, Anna Butrico, define ten dimensions or controls of risk that we can adjust at any given time. The authors provide the mechanics to develop a healthy Risk Immune System to anticipate, identify, analyze and act upon the possibility that things will not go as planned.
Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know, by Adam Grant
To succeed in today’s fast-changing world, we must not only be continuous learners, but also un-learners and re-learners. We must develop this capacity and inclination in ourselves as well as in our teams. In Think Again, Wharton professor and bestselling author Adam Grant gives us tips and tools to question our assumptions, stay curious and develop nimbler and and more flexible mindsets.
The Age of AI: And Our Human Future, by Henry Kissinger, Eric Schmidt, and Daniel Huttenlocher
How will AI transform our society? In this book, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, and MIT Schwarzman College of Computing Dean Daniel Huttenlocher explore how economics, politics, security and even knowledge itself is being re-imagined in the age of AI. They draw upon their diverse experiences as a statesman, a CEO, and an academic to highlight the dramatic changes that AI will usher in, ultimately transforming how we all experience reality.
Futureproof: 9 Rules for Humans in the Age of Automation, by Kevin Roose
With the rising influence of AI and algorithms, some fear that automation will threaten jobs. In Futureproof: 9 Rules for Humans in the Age of Automation, New York Times technology columnist Kevin Roose presents a hopeful future where humans can successfully thrive in the AI age, shares what skills are necessary in a world increasingly influenced by algorithms, and argues that we should focus on being more human rather than becoming more like machines.
The Cloud Revolution: How the Convergence of New Technologies will Unleash the Next Economic Boom and a Roaring 2020s, by Mark P. Mills
There are many pundits who write compellingly about a dystopian future brought on by technology advances run amok, with worries about how companies and the technology they unleash will continue to change our society for the worse. Mark Mills of the Manhattan Institute offers a counter-point to that perspective, positing that we are the cusp of a second “roaring ‘20s” brought on by radical advances in three primary technology domains: microprocessors, materials, and machines. Accelerating and enabling all of this is the Cloud, history’s biggest infrastructure, which is itself based on the building blocks of next-generation microprocessors and artificial intelligence. With a historian’s ability to connect dots across the last century as well futurists pluck to articulate big bets on the future, Mills offers perspectives that are worth contemplating.
