Brian Sommer and I recorded the first 12 episodes in this series. Since then, we have had several guests - Rob Kugel of Ventana, Josh Greenbaum of EA Consulting, Bonnie Tinder of Raven Intel, Frank Scavo of Avasant, Dennis Howlett of Diginomica, Cindy Jutras of Mint Jutras, Dave Hofferberth of SPI Research, Holger Mueller of Constellation Research, Tamas Hevizi of Automation Anywhere, Bob Ferrari of Supply Chain Matters, Sabrina Horn of Horn Strategy, Sandra Lo of Zoho and Bob Evans of Evans Strategic Communications. See the index here
Kicking off this year in the 25th episode of the series is Paul Coester of Big Blue Ventures. He has played a role in 20 SAP ECC and 12 S/4HANA projects - most of them in the Asia Pacific region. We discuss how 2020 played out for SAP in that region and how 2021 is likely to shape up - around S/4HANA, its cloud properties and its industry applications.
We also discuss how SIs and hyperscalers have evolved over the last couple of years. Finally, we discuss the growth in "fractional IT" - he is a prime example of that with his simultaneous hand in enterprise architecture, quality assurance and other roles on multiple projects.
I have always known Paul to call it as he sees it. He appropriately calls himself a "SAP Whisperer" Nice to get his perspective from "Down Under".
Burning Platform: Diversity Trends in Tech
Brian Sommer and I have recorded 12 episodes in this series - see index here. Last couple of weeks, we have had several guests like Rob Kugel of Ventana, Josh Greenbaum of EA Consulting, Bonnie Tinder of Raven Intel, Frank Scavo of Avasant and Dennis Howlett of Diginomica.
The BLM movement this summer has brought more urgency for HR and procurement groups to diversify employee and supplier bases. Related to this, I did interviews with two prominent African-American tech executives, Tony Prophet, Chief Equality Officer at Salesforce and Charles Phillips, Chairman at Infor. Also a presentation by Barbry McGann of Workday on their new VIBE product which allows companies to better visualize employee diversity from multiple dimensions. The Tech sector should be proud of its efforts.
While the recent intense focus is nice to see, it would be remiss to not point out we have been making steady progress for a long time. I invited Cindy Jutras, President of Mint Jutras to talk about her 45-year career at software vendors and analyst firms, and draw from her experiences on how gender and ethnic-based diversity have evolved in the industry. I add my own experience as an immigrant and someone who has worked in and traveled to 70 countries and seen the US "from the outside in" in the video below.
I particularly liked Cindy pointing out the movie, "Hidden Figures" about a team of female African-American mathematicians who served a critical role in NASA during the early years of the U.S. space program. As she says "we have come so far"
We also touch on age discrimination. Silicon Valley and outsourcers tend to be focused on young recruits, but even corporate IT tends to be ambivalent about older employees. The pandemic has resulted in many older employees who are traumatized or those who finally having spent more time at home with families and have relished the experience. Both categories are opting for early retirements. These accelerated (and unplanned) exits may also bring more of a focus on the age attribute as companies refine their diversity policies.
It is a not a "woke" conversation. It is a realistic discussion about why a system of meritocracy, more enlightened executives and driven individuals work better than forced mandates for diversity.
December 17, 2020 in Burning Platform, Diversity Inclusion, Industry Commentary | Permalink | Comments (0)