Chuck's Blog

Cloud Meets Big Data In Healthcare: The Importance of ACOs

Many people I meet who work at the intersection of healthcare and technology can get frustrated.

On one hand, the current healthcare delivery system in the US, with many obvious and visible opportunities for improvement.

On the other hand, the tantalizing power of newer technologies: cloud, big data, mobility, etc.

Historically, many people like me have looked at the situation, and tried to figure out why supply and demand weren't getting properly connected.  

The technology is there -- why isn't being consumed?

In a nutshell, my opinion is that the industry wasn't organized for success.  There were inherent structural barriers that inhibited the widespread adoption of the newer technologies and approaches.

But, with the recent rise of ACOs (accountable care organizations) and their brethren, a few of us are extremely optimistic that the next few years will be very different than the past.

An Update From My Friends At VCE

If you're a long-time reader of this blog, you know I can't hide my enthusiasm for what VCE is doing with Vblocks.  

By making converged infrastructure easier to consume, they've helped many IT organizations accelerate their transition to cloud and IT-as-a-service models. 

But -- as is always true with any new concept that upsets traditional orthodoxy -- it hasn't come without a fair amount of controversy: some thoughtful and intellectual, and occasionally a bit of unprofessional mudslinging and innuendo. 

I had a chance to catch up with one of my good friends and long-time EMC colleagues who is now at VCE: Todd Pavone, responsible for engineering and marketing at the company. 

We had a great opportunity to share perspectives on what's really going on at VCE -- and what might lie ahead. 

What's Your Personal Innovation Index?

I think most of us would like to be perceived as bright and innovative.  

Saying that -- and doing that -- can be two different things.

While we might occasionally have an innovative moment, how do we get into the habit of personal innovative behaviors that routinely inspire and influence others?

One helpful technique might be to measure your innovative behavior -- and see how you're doing.

Since different people have started to ask me about this, I thought I'd put some thoughts into a post for your consideration.

And, like most things in life, I'm sure it's not the last word on the subject ...

Learning To Get Comfortable With Sensorship

No, that's not a typo.  

That's a twist of a clever phrase that our own Thom Lytle used to describe our increasing participation in sensor networks of all kinds.

In a world of big data analytics, what we think, what we do, how we behave -- are incredibly valuable inputs.  There's a powerfully strong incentive to capture our digital exhaust as we move through life.  

In so many of these models, there's no practical way anyone can opt out.  We're increasingly being sensored whether we approve or not.

Not to be overly negative, but there's scant chance of our legal systems ever hoping to catch up to where technology has so quickly brought us.

So I believe the topic of "sensorship" -- our willing and increasingly unwilling participation in data gathering exercises -- is going to be an important one.

What Happens When You Point A Cloud At A Business Challenge -- Part II

About three months ago, I wrote a post describing how we were using cloud capabilities to address very specific business challenges internally here at EMC.

Matt Coviello had just stood up the latest version of his vLab, and started to introduce it to our global presales community.

Now, it's three months later, and much has changed.  Most importantly, Matt's team has started to expose these capabilities to selected portions of EMC's Velocity partner community, as Chad shared here.

I thought it might be time to spend some time with Matt, and see how his world had changed in three short months.  

Tales From The Trenches: Changing Your Business Model With Big Data Analytics

The premise -- at a high level -- is easy to understand: the new-found power of predictive analytics has the potential to change the way you do business.

But the devil (as always) is in the details.

Clearly there's a transformation at hand.  

The starting point: a familiar world of historical reporting on events in the past.  The goal state: the ability to better predict (and capitalize on) likely future outcomes.

And getting from Point A to Point B is rarely as seamless and pleasant as you read about :)

To that end, I'm actively studying transformational stories about how organizations are learning to change the way they do business around big data analytics.  

And, as it turns out, EMC Corporation is an excellent example of just such an organization.

Good Help Is Here For Your IT Transformation

Any time we're faced with a daunting and unusual challenge, we usually go looking for good professional help: doctors, lawyers, architects, tax professionals, financial advisers, etc.  

We may prefer to do things ourselves, but we realize that getting good, experienced help can make all the difference between a successful outcome, and one that isn't.

The same is true when IT leaders start seriously thinking about IT transformation.  Getting to cloud and its associated IT-as-a-service model can be a daunting transformational journey, and not for the faint-of-heart.

At one level, it's a re-invention of IT's business and operational model to look more like a competitive service provider, and less like a traditional IT shop.

Given my technical background, I have historically been rather skeptical of professional and consulting services, but I've discarded that obsolete view over the last several years.  IT transformation is hard, daunting work -- and getting good help from people who have done it before is not to be discounted.

Such is the case with EMC Global Service's announcement today of a greatly expanded and integrated portfolio of IT transformation services -- a set of offerings that pass my personal test as truly beneficial to many of our customers.

Even if you think you're not in the market for consulting services, it's worth understanding what these people do, how they do it -- and why it's important.

New Tools For The New Information Value Chain

Today, the Greenplum team is not only announcing an improved set of Chorus capabilities, but the important acquisition of Pivotal Labs.

So, what's going on here -- and why are many of us so excited?

Yes, there are cool new capabilities from Greenplum that help accelerate the impact of data science, and yes there's a very cool group of agile app developers and tools from Pivotal Labs. 

But how do these themes tie together, and how to they complement other pieces of the puzzle that we're assembling on the behalf of our customers?

My Perfect Privacy Disclosure

We're at an interesting turning point in so many digital business models: there's a compelling incentive for companies to know as much about you as humanly possible.

On the other hand, we as individuals are increasingly disturbed by how much these same organizations know about us, and it's only going to more disconcerting in the future.

In between is the quaint notion of a privacy disclosure: a veritable fig leaf that attempts to cover the naked truth of what's really going on.

Almost always rendered in small fonts and obtuse legalese, these are quickly displayed in a perfunctory fashion, never to be seen again.  

In the spirit of openness and transparency, I'd like to share my personal thoughts as to what an ideal a privacy disclosure ought to do -- and that's tell it like it really is.

Big Data: From Meme To Marketplace

Industry memes come and go, but industry markets are tangible things: they can be measured, segmented, analyzed and hotly debated by the participants.

Subjectively speaking, widespread usage of the term "big data" started in earnest at the beginning of 2011.  One short year later, it appears made the important transition from meme to marketplace.

Analysts are weighing in.  Interesting subsegments are emerging.  Ecosystem vines are actively growing, thriving and intertwining.  Various customer audiences are raising their hands and expressing strong interest in one set of topics or another.  

All very encouraging from where I sit.

I thought I'd use this post just to bring you up to date on the current state of our industry "big data garden" and how it's growing ...