Chris Curran

Businesses Banking on Breakthrough Innovation

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Post co-authored by Rob Shelton, PwC’s Global Innovation Strategy Leader Last year if you asked a CEO what he or she is doing to achieve growth, the answer would have been investing in China. This year the answer is innovation. Business executives are banking on bold innovation to meet aggressive growth targets, so they are taking innovation more seriously than ever before. In the spirit of Peter Drucker who said, “innovation is work,” business executives […]

Making Enterprise Apps Mindful

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Guest post by Lindsey Jarrell As a CIO, you’re probably familiar with the term workflow, but what about mindflow? Mindflows are the steps we undergo to sift through information and arrive at a difficult decision. Comparing, evaluating, and summarizing leads us down a twisting, turning journey toward a final outcome. In the past, it’s been difficult to design enterprise apps that can support knowledge workers in this convoluted process. Now, that’s changing. We’ve spent years […]

2 Imperatives for the Digital CIO

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It’s been an exciting few years of football for my alma matter Texas A&M.  With the introduction of a new head coach came a new offensive scheme, known as the Air Raid, which is a type of spread offense noted for using many creative formations with receivers and different players in the backfield, short and long passes and a quick tempo.  Combined with a very quick and athletic quarterback, this is a very difficult offense […]

The Next Phase of Agile Development

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Guest post by Alan Morrison It’s human nature for people to build sturdy structures to shield themselves from the unpredictability of the elements. But, if you are too sheltered for too long, you weaken your ability to continuously confront change. That’s the dilemma facing IT departments. Change is raining down on them, and they are having trouble continuously adapting. A term is gaining momentum in the IT community to describe an ideal state for IT […]

Survey: Information Security Attacks Up 25%

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Guest post by Mark Lobel If you want to protect your information assets in today’s interconnected business environment, you need to know your enemy. What are they after, how do they aim to get it and how are you going to stop them? New hacker strategies, the Bring Your Own Device trend, and Cloud Computing are all combining to expose companies to unprecedented information security risks. Yet, companies are acting as if nothing has changed. […]

Digital Keystone Skills

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One of my clients is faced with retooling its IT workforce as a wave of employees approach retirement. Our conversations about how they should shape their recruitment strategy got me thinking about the post I wrote back in 2009 “IT’s Keystone Skills,” and how I would refresh it for today. The idea behind IT keystone skills was to identify the core skills required regardless of the level of outsourcing an organization undertakes.  The four featured […]

Project Portfolio Management: Why Now?

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Guest post by Sanjay Sharma Over the years as a consultant in the area of Project Portfolio Management (PPM), I’ve noticed that shifts in the economy prompt executives to consider adopting PPM. During a recession, thoughtful leaders understand that PPM is more important than ever to facilitate the gathering of key information needed to reduce costs without forfeiting revenue and value. On the flipside, when the economy is rebounding, savvy leaders turn to PPM to […]

What is a Digital Disruptor?

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In the short time it takes to develop an app, digital disruptors can force well-established companies to change the way they do business. Even worse, they can put them out of business all together. Who are these digital disruptors? How do they think? What drives them? How do they pull off the coups they do? Business and technology executives would be wise to dive inside the minds of digital disruptors to anticipate threats to their […]

Cloud: The Testing Ground for the New CIO

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Guest post by: Mike Pearl In case you missed it, Michael Hickins of the Wall Street Journal recently detailed a lively panel discussion that unfolded during MIT’s CIO Symposium on May 22, 2013. CIOs complained in chorus about cloud computing vendors circumventing the IT department and selling directly to business units. One CIO compared the proliferation of rogue cloud deployments to cockroaches. In the midst of the fiery finger pointing and complaints about redundancy, complexity, […]

Emerging Technology and Disruptive Technology – What’s the Difference?

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Some people question my use of the word “emerging” to categorize technologies such as social, mobile, cloud, analytics, sensors and others.  They argue that these technologies are already here and aren’t emerging anymore.  Some suggest using “disruptive” to describe them instead.  Now is a good time to distinguish between these two labels and make sure that we are using each to help us better understand technology’s impact to our businesses. Emerging means to come into […]

Is Your CIO Your CDO?

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One analyst reports that by 2015 25% of companies will have a Chief Digital Officer (CDO) who resides outside of the IT department and is responsible for driving the digitization of research and development, marketing, customer service and the creation of new products and services. Before you create this new role and contact your favorite executive recruiters, take a step back and ask a few questions: What is the scope of digital transformation for your […]

Winning the Information War with Mobile

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Guest Post by Hemant Ramachandra We’ve all heard the saying that information is power and that’s never been truer. Today’s consumers are now often armed with more information than the sales teams that serve them. As a result, the sales force is often at a disadvantage—needing to scramble to make sure they remain relevant to their customers. Take the car buying experience as an example. One of my most vivid early memories was accompanying my […]