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Showing posts with the label data

Fixing the World and the World's Oceans with Data

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My guest today is Steve Adler, CEO, and Founder of Ocean Data Alliance. Steve has served in many leadership roles over his career including being IBM's Chief Data Scientist. Today, he is focused on using his expertise, his connections, and data to make the world and the world's oceans cleaner, healthier, and more sustainable through the capture, collection, and analysis of data.  This is not easy.  You have audiences that don't believe in science. You have politicians that don't believe in open data or appreciate facts. You have humans that are notoriously bad at understanding risk, especially future risk. You have countries without the leadership or infrastructure to effectively capture and use data.  Even with all of these challenges, Steve Adler is championing global efforts to better understand our world and our world's ocean environments for the purpose of improving our future and that of our children's. *****************************************************

The Next Big Think Podcast: Is Data the New Gold?

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My guest today is Susan Cook, CEO of Zaloni .  In this podcast , we explore the massive growth of data and the impact it will have on all of our lives.  We then take a deep dive into the complications involved in managing and securing these giant quantities of data.   Susan Cook has nearly 30 years of leadership experience in enterprise software sales, strategy, consulting, and with a specialization in Data, Analytics, and Business Intelligence across technology giants like HP and Oracle.  As a data management expert, she believes information can grow in value only if protected and managed well. What does data need in order for it to be preserved well?  Listen to us discuss data as the new gold in this episode of The Next Big Think!  ************************************************************************ Kevin Benedict Partner | Futurist at TCS View my profile on LinkedIn Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence ***Full Disclosure: The

Winning with Speed and Fridays

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"The size of competitors and the longevity of their brands, are less predictive of future success than the importance they give to data, the speed in which they act upon the data, and their operational tempo."   In 2013 the volume of data created, captured, copied and consumed worldwide totaled approximately 9 zetabytes.  This year the total will be 79 zetabytes.  By 2025 there is projected to be 181 zetabytes of data.  Inside these fast growing masses of data are the answers all businesses need to succeed.  The data tells them what their customers want.  It tells them the prices customers are willing to pay.  It tells them when the products are most in demand.  This data, however,  has a shelf life that rapidly diminishes over time just as consumers change their preferences with the changing seasons.  It is up to every business to be able to exploit the data fast enough to be meaningful. In an always-connected world where consumers and their needs are transient, timing is ev

Reality is Required

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If you have spent any time working on IT projects you will have heard the statement, "The solution is only as good as the data." It's true.  If you lack enough good data to generate an accurate output, stop and find it before moving forward.  I remember having so many good ideas for process improvement when I worked in IT.  Almost all of them, however, were shut down with the words, “We don’t have good data for that.” Truth is important.  If your data does not reflect reality – digital solutions won’t work.  Many technology projects fail when they move from the whiteboard to reality because they were designed on a notional view of the world, rather than on the state of things as they actually exist.   Understanding what reality is can often be helped by developing a digital twin.  A digital twin is created by integrating sensors into a thing or series of things for the purpose of capturing enough good data to clearly depict reality.  Sensor-supported digital twins fill in

Covid-19, Demographics, Risk Analysis and Mobile Apps

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Finally, it seems we have accumulated enough data from Covid-19 cases to focus in on how we can properly and strictly protect our vulnerable populations and reopen our economies.  We know that if a person has underlying health problems* they have a far higher risk so need additional protections.  We know that people over 65 years old and people living in long-term care facilities are more at risk.  In fact, the most recent update from Idaho's Covid-19 statistics show 58 of the 60 reported deaths occurring in individuals 60 or older.  If a person does not fit any of these three high risk categories, then their risk of getting seriously ill from Covid-19 is small.  This data seems to suggest that giving different guidance to different segments of our population may have merit.

Digital Transformation Requires a Doctrine

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Knights using Stirrups for Balance In my 30+ years in the high tech industry I have often heard the business maxim, “Develop a business strategy first, and then find the technology to support it.” This teaching I have come to believe is wrong. Let me support my argument by first asking a few questions.  What came first e-commerce or the Internet, mobile commerce or wireless networks, commercial airline travel or the airplane, knights in shiny armour being used as shock troops, or stirrups?  Answer: Stirrups of course!  Innovations and technology have a long history of appearing first, and then doctrines and strategies forming later. What we are learning is if your outdated business doctrines and strategies are dictating the speed of your technology adoptions - you are in big trouble! The world is moving much too fast and organizations must now align the tempo of their business doctrine and strategy evolution with the pace of technology innovations and customer adoptions. &quo

A Digital Leader's Playbook

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Digital Strategies Winners know how to win. When competition, data and/or rules change, so do their game plans.  Recently while watching NFL football, I was intrigued by a discussion between analyst about how the best coaches can change their strategies mid-game based on new and different data.  Some coaches are able to pivot, others can't.   What follows is a list of key strategies, concepts and mindsets that will help your enterprise win:

Being Faster than Real-Time is a Competitive Advantage

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Competing in Future-Time Businesses must continuously transform themselves to compete.  Why?  That is what their customers and competition are doing.  One of those areas of transformation involves competing in time.  Think about the impact of Amazon on shopping and delivery times!  All businesses operate in time, whether human , digital or future .  Businesses today must transform in order to successfully compete in all three of these time states simultaneously. Let’s first discuss the definitions of these times: Human time – time governed by our physical, biological and mental limitations as humans Digital time – time governed by computing and networking speeds Future time – time governed by predictive analytics and algorithms

The Power of Knowing

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Throughout history military leaders have suffered through the “fog of war" - the desperation of not knowing critical information.  Information as basic as where are my people and resources, and where are my opponents' people and resources? The answers to these questions were and are critical for implementing the right strategies and tactics to win. Likewise, the absence of answers to these questions are equally impactful. Leaders spend enormous amounts of time and energy defending against all the possibilities represented by a lack of data. Think about a scenario of being lost in a dark forest at night with an unknown dangerous predator lurking about. Which direction would you face? How would you defend yourself? It is difficult in the best of times, but the absence of data can make it even more excruciating!

Interview with Patrick McCarthy, SVP and GM of SAP Ariba - World's Largest Business Network

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In this episode, we take a deep dive into the world’s largest business network and marketplace. We explore the value of digital transformation, cloud based procurement, standardizing processes around sourcing, supply chains, payments, contract negotiations, compliance and much more. We then discuss the power of networks and how the larger the network the larger the value.  We then get tactical and explore SAP’s strategies for marketing and selling SAP Ariba. I find this subject fascinating and hope you will too! Enjoy! ************************************************************************ Kevin Benedict SVP Solutions Strategy, Regalix Inc. Website Regalix Inc. View my profile on LinkedIn Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict Join the Linkedin Group Digital Intelligence Join the Google+ Community Mobile Enterprise Strategies ***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the comp

Leadership: The Plan for Winning in Digital Transformation

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Last year the World Economic Forum labeled 2017 as the beginning of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. What value do we gain from defining industrial revolutions? I believe it is to define new sets of rules for winning in business. Let’s review the three previous industrial revolutions. Industrial Revolution #1. We move from reliance on animals, human muscles and biomass to the use of fossil fuels and mechanical power. A caveman/businessman wishing for a competitive advantage might be the first to use mechanical power fueled by fossil fuels to build cave-condos faster and cheaper than other Neanderthals. Industrial Revolution #2. Electricity is harnessed and distributed, both wireless and wired communication is developed, the synthesis of ammonia provides new fertilizers and harvests increase, and new forms of power generation are developed. A farmer wishing for competitive advantages could adopt mobile phones to communicate wirelessly with their workers, use lights around the far

Silicon Valley Series: Security, Automation and Managing IT

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In this Silicon Valley Series I have the privilege of interviewing very smart and experienced Silicon Valley veterans on a variety of important business trends, technologies and strategies.  I hope you find this series of short interviews interesting. In this episode, I talk with Cybric CTO and security expert Mike Kail, and Tom Thimot, veteran Silicon Valley CEO, about the challenges of securing data and applications across global enterprises, and hear their best advice and recommendations. ************************************************************************ Kevin Benedict Principal Analyst, Digital Strategist - Center for Digital Intelligence™ Website  C4DIGI.com View my profile on  LinkedIn Follow me on Twitter  @krbenedict Subscribe to Kevin's  YouTube Channel Join the Linkedin Group  Digital Intelligence Join the Google+ Community  Mobile Enterprise Strategies ***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to cla

Silicon Valley Series: Using Data the Google Way with Kevin Benedict & Tom Thimot

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In this Silicon Valley Series I have the privilege of interviewing very smart and experienced Silicon Valley veterans on a variety of important business trends, technologies and strategies.  I hope you find this series of short interviews interesting. In this episode I am joined by my friend and veteran Silicon Valley CEO Tom Thimot.  We dig into the lessons Google has taught all of us on the value of data, and how data can be used as a competitive advantage.  Enjoy! Kevin Benedict's Video Series: Digital Expert Series: Kevin Benedict Interviews Futurist Frank Diana Security as a Service and Managing Enterprise Security, Processes and Policies Cultural Impact on Digital Transformation Customer Analytics, Personalization, Privacy and Context Evolution of Cloud, Analytics, AI and Human Integration ************************************************************************ Kevin Benedict Principal Analyst, Futurist, the Center for Digital Intelligence™ Website C4DIGI

The Center for Digital Intelligence Interview: IoT Platforms with Hitachi's Rob Tiffany

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I had the honor of interviewing and disrupting the vacation of Hitachi's CTO for Industrial IoT, Rob Tiffany today.  In this interview we talk all about IoT platforms, big data analytics, architectures, digital twins and solution stacks for industrial IoT.  I learned a lot and hope you will too. Read more from Kevin Benedict here: Digital Transformation and the New Rules for Start-Ups Digital Transformation and Leadership Development Digital Transformation and Competitive Decision-Making Combinatorial Nature of Digital Technologies and Legos D igital Transformation from 40,000 feet Winning in Chaos - Digital Leaders 13 Recommended Actions for Digital Transformation in Retail Mistakes in Retail Digital Transformation Winning Strategies for the Fourth Industrial Revolution Digital Transformation - Mindset Differences Analyzing Retail Through Digital Lenses Digital Thinking and Beyond! Measuring the Pace of Change in the Fourth Industrial Revolution How Digital Thi

Digital Technologies Must Disappear in 2017

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Almost a year ago, I wrote these words, "T echnology has reached the tipping point for me, it moved from a help to a hindrance."  The plethora of adrenaline and endorphin inducing mobile apps, 24x7 news, notifications, alerts and updates, drip fed my brain and hindered my  "deep work and deep thoughts."  In Cal Newport's new book titled, "Deep Work" he posits that most knowledge workers need concentration and substantial time, dedicated and uninterrupted, to produce their best work. He argues that a lot of technologies and open office layouts today inhibit creativity, "deep work" and "deep thoughts," and are the very things that are most highly valued, and one of the key differentiators between humans and robots. Newport argues that we must understand and optimize the conditions that enable our brains to work best.  To sum up his argument, constant drip feeding technologies serve to prevent deep thoughts and deep work, our m

Digital Hope and Redemption in the Digital Age

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“You have a memory like an elephant,” is truly a compliment.  Researchers document all kinds of remarkable examples of the recall power of elephants, and this is credited with their ability to survive harsh environments as noted in this Scientific American article  http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/elephants-never-forget/ . Our human memory also helps us learn from past experiences and mistakes, avoid recognizable hazards and keep track of our very busy lives.  Our memories for the most part have served us well, but the same might not always be said about digital memory in an always connected, real-time world.  One of the most valuable concepts known to man is hope.  Hope is the belief that things can change and get better.  It is the belief that one can turn the page and start a new life.  It is the motivation that draws many to get out of bed each morning, recover from past mistakes, and go to work.  Bankruptcy laws were designed, in part, to give hope. The Supreme C