The term "cloud" has come to represent a fundamental and structural change throughout the entire IT ecosystem -- how IT is built, operated and consumed.
If you're an IT vendor like EMC, just about every aspect of your strategy and approach can be up for discussion and debate as a result
Very few sacred cows in these times ...
One of the more interesting aspects of how EMC is changing our approach in this new world is a complete redesign of one of our core customer feedback events -- the EMC Customer Council. Indeed, in many ways, it's clear evidence of how things are changing for our customers.
And, if you're a follower of this blog, maybe it's something you'd be interested in?
The Back Story
Way back in the days when EMC had a single primary product (Symmetrix), we were very focused on having our various teams stay as close as humanly possible to our customers -- who were they, what did they need, what was working, what wasn't -- and so on.
Sure, there was plenty of ad-hoc interactions between customers and product engineers, but we didn't have a formalized structure for laying out our thinking, getting critical feedback, and making adjustments.
In the early 1990s, the EMC Customer Council was formed to provide this essential structured feedback. It was an intense two day session where we shared what we thought was important, and we learned in real-time what our key customers thought was important.
Feedback was summarized, distributed -- and progress reports were given at the next get-together. The company took this activity very seriously -- executive participation both during, and more importantly after, the event.
Indeed, I can point to literally dozens of critical enhancements in EMC's products and processes that were a direct result of these sessions.
There's nothing like an educated and passionate customer telling you exactly how the world really works. It's some of the best marketing money I've ever seen spent.
The team that ran Customer Council reported to me many years ago. As a a result, I became absolutely fascinated with the intense and productive dialog that could result from the event, and -- more importantly -- how that discussion changed EMC's course and direction.
But times have changed, haven't they? Intense interaction at the product and process level is still extremely valuable – which is why we’ve now moved to an array of product-specific Technical Advisory Panels.
But at the same time, we're all collectively grappling with bigger issues. And the familiar EMC-centric product-and-process discussion -- while still important at a product level -- needed a complete reboot for modern times.
Change In Leadership, Change In Approach
The fun started when Barb Robidoux -- a good friend and a long-time EMC colleague -- assumed leadership for the group that is now responsible for EMC Customer Council. She quickly recognized that -- yes -- the old approach wasn't meeting our customers' newer needs, and we ought to be thinking about something very different.
The interaction was still priceless, but the challenges had certainly expanded. We had some great conversations on what a reboot might look like.
One thing we both agreed on -- the core audience we wanted to target with a rebooted EMC Customer Council was no longer the proverbial storage or technology specialist: that sort of detailed product level dialogue had logically moved to the individual product groups.
At aa corporate level, we both thought we needed to engage with IT leaders on the topics that mattered to them, and not necessarily the ones that mattered to individual product groups. We also believed that -- as in previous sessions -- the interactions between the participants could be the most valuable of all.
The EMC IT Leadership Council
The goal is simple: bring together IT leaders from EMC's customer ranks to debate and discuss the big topics that are on everyone's mind. Use the feedback to tune and improve EMC's approach.
Better yet: encourage participants to share their experiences and perspective with each other.
And, as always, keep the discussion absolutely transparent and brutally honest.
The first topic this team will be tackling should be no surprise: it's IT Transformation & The Journey To Cloud.
The generic format is simple:
(1) Here's what we think is going on, and what it means to the people in the room.
(2) Here's what we think we can do to help and assist.
(3) Tell us what you think about #1 and #2.
The Agenda
We've done some back and forth, and have decided to go with a core-plus-electives approach. There are three core topics that we think just about everyone will be interested in.
The first -- "Creating The Case For Transformation" -- speaks directly to the challenges associated with convincing the business to invest in IT transformation.
Significant and meaningful structural change is almost impossible without some sort of investment in time and resources -- and, very often, we see that IT leaders are often challenged on how best to make the case outside of IT.
We've done some interesting work in this area, and would like to share it for feedback and suggestions. Looking at the list of participants who've already agreed to attend, I'm betting there will be some great stories as well :)
The second -- "Assessing IT and Business Readiness" -- is exactly what it says: figuring out how ready you are to make the change: where are the strengths, where are the gaps, strategies for closing the gaps, and so on.
Again, we've done some work on this topic on behalf of our customers, and we'd like a critical assessment from the team.
The third -- "Organizing For Success" -- speaks directly to the new skills, roles and organizational structures in the new model, and (more importantly) strategies for transitioning from one model to the next. Again, another area where we think we've done some good work on behalf of our customers, but we need to learn more.
From there, we go into electives, depending on the participant's interest: same format, smaller audiences.
If I remember correctly, we've designed it so everyone can attend two or maybe three of their choosing.
- Transitioning IT Finance- New Models for Business Alignment
- Lessons Learned in Security and Risk Management (!)
- From Virtualization To IT-as-a-Service
- Next-Gen Application Development
- Mobile Workforce Strategies
- Big Data Analytics
A little something for everyone :)
The EMC Team
We've got basically three groups of people from EMC who will be participating and engaging at this event.
From the leadership roster, there's Howard Elias, Pat Gelsinger, Sanjay Mirchandani (EMC's CIO), and Tom Roloff (EMC Consulting). We'll also have the key folks from EMC IT leading some of these discussions: Jon Peirce, KK (our cloud architect), Tony Pagliarulo, Andy Lewis and Barb DeLoureiro.
Complementing them will be the cream of the crop from EMC Consulting: Sandy Hamilton, Bradd Lewis, Ted Newman, Bill Schmarzo and Charley Haney.
And, of course, me. I’ll do my best to keep my mouth shut and listen.
Plenty Of Opportunity To Interact
We've set up the agenda so there will be plenty of time to mingle and chat informally. Often, that's where the best discussions happen.
As an example, the first night we've got a "Meet The Experts" event for the first evening -- refreshments and kiosks where you can sit down and chat with various folks around specific topics.
Usually, we do something fun the second evening -- a nice dinner or something along those lines.
Would You Like To Join Us?
As I checked this morning, there were a decent number of spots still open, but I don't expect them to last for long. Understandably, the organizers have a hard limit on the size of the event.
If you're an EMC customer, and this leadership agenda looks like something you can both learn from -- and contribute to -- we'd love to have you. Simply contact your EMC representative to nominate you for participation.
Me? I think this event shows all signs of being absolutely wonderful.
I can't wait to share what comes out of it.
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