Mark's Blog

Episode 109: Innovation and the Importance of Focus

In this post I will continue the discussion on innovation and talk about the importance of team separation and focus for innovation.

In the course of my career, I have led literally hundreds of engineering teams.  I will tell you virtually every team, given the option, would always want to have the new product developed within the same overall team that is currently supporting the existing product development.

The justification rationales are pretty consistent. 

            “We need the key experts for both products”

            “This will keep everyone engaged as they all want to work on the new product”

            “We can share and optimize resources and get the projects done faster”

It is almost humorous, that even when Management 101 says to “Foucs, Focus, Focus,” managers can get caught up trying to create startups with the key ingredient missing – FOCUS!

Yes, I have fallen victim to the idea that lots of part time help on paper looks better than just a few focused resources.

In hindsight, it was universally the wrong choice.

OK, so let’s say your organization has a great new idea. You can think of this as like having the buy-in at the poker tournament. You get a seat at the table but the game hasn’t even started!

I believe that most failure to innovate in bigger companies starts right here. Once you want to develop an idea I would submit that there is no better way than a small focused team.  There is a reason that startups continue to emerge even as large companies spend billions on R&D.

OK, so you came up with the great idea and you have you small focused team to get it done. All good right?

Maybe not. Your next step is to insure that you really have both focus and separation.

There are many things that a small team can leverage in a larger organization such as development tools, labs, etc.  On the other hand, there are likely many corporate processes and procedures that will serve to overwhelm the team. Most large companies will have built up processes that are designed for mature environments. If not addressed, these processes will bring your internal startup to a screeching halt.

I have endless stories here but suffice to say, as a leader, you need to insure that your internal startup is focused and subject to appropriate policies and processes that fit the model.

So, at this point, if you can:

1. Focus on a great idea
2. Create a small focused team
3. Optimize the advantages of a large organization and
4. Eliminate the inappropriate bureaucracy

Then you have half the battle won.

More soon on the other half.

 

 

Episode 108: Information Hoarders – Best practices to avoid information overload

If they ever start a reality show for information hoarders I could in trouble.  It’s probably not good TV though because you can still walk easily through my house and I can still fit all of the cars in the garage. With just a couple of arrays sitting in a closet and some stuff in the cloud, I can store information that would take garage-sized spaces on paper. 

But, even though I can navigate my hallways, it doesn’t mean that my information is of any real use. While digital information hoarding isn’t visible, it still can be disabling to individuals and organizations in terms of both costs and time spent trying to manage it all.

I have spent a great deal of time with CIOs, IT directors and storage experts discussing the best practices of information management. Most companies are continuously taking steps to reduce the cost of and improve leverage from their information. Across all of these organizations, I have found that 6 key best practices currently stand out as the most effective approaches to dealing with information overload. They are:

1. Centralize it
2. Virtualize it
3. Put it all online
4. Tier it
5. Manage it holistically
6. Leverage it

Let’s take them briefly one by one.

Centralize it – So many benefits come from information centralization; better security, lower storage costs, and easier management to name a few. The one big negative has been performance over distance. New technology that allows for edge “caching” with WAN acceleration has become the final game-changer for information centralization. There are no more excuses.

Virtualize it – This is not much controversy here.  Virtualization and thin provisioning saves cost and makes management much easier. Done deal.

Put it all online – I equate tape to a hoarders version of a mini-storage warehouse. Technically, the stuff is still there but there is no realistic way to ever use it or get rid of it. Thanks to latest generation de-dupe technology, there is no reason to continue to keep data offline. With low-cost online backup, information can be searched and recovered easily and also disposed of when needed; the viscous circle of renting more mini-warehouses can come to an end.

Tier it – An oldie but still important is to put the information on an optimized storage platform. One size does not fit all for data. The overall cost savings by picking the right storage type can be significant.

Manage it holistically – This is actually a new emerging area for storage management. Typically functions like RAID, snapshot, local replication, DR, archive, and backup have been approached separately, often by completely different organizations. Looking at each element individually will often create many more copies of data then are actually needed. If you look at the management need holistically, there are ways to have copies of data actually serve multiple needs. Think of it as data de-duplication at the management layer!

Leverage it – We do everything else with data and information (store it, protect it, back it up) with the main reason being that the information can create value to the business. What is surprising is how companies often set too little aside to actually get leverage from the information. Leveraging information, for example, can come from building in better BI/DW capabilities or using ECM and search to better manage unstructured information. No matter what your need, be sure to remember to allocate time and money to technology the actually helps you leverage your information. This is where the money is made.

Mark…

Episode 107: Innovation Part II - Ideation

 

Ideation

I was at the Fortune Brainstorm conference a couple of week’s ago and we had an interesting debate on innovation and how we get innovative ideas. Some folks insisted that listening to customers was the key.

I am not so sure.

I tend to believe the opposite, that ideation which generates true innovation comes from individuals that instinctively think outside the box. While you need to have insight into the pain points, costs, and opportunities of customers, they (the consumer) are unlikely to define the innovation. In fact, they will look for you to solve their existing problems in ways that are best suited (and least disruptive) to them. While this is perfectly reasonable desire for a customer, it is unlikely that disruptive innovation will result.

Don’t get me wrong. For existing and new products, customer input and feedback is critical to maintaining a competitive edge.  The initial concept, however, I believe comes from the right ideation. An easy example is the iPod. People weren’t clamoring for one because, at the time, they didn’t understand what was possible. Once it appeared (and was a hit), then feedback become critical to refine and maintain the offering.

Innovation by nature must be disruptive. Typically, it requires us to do something different.  The question for larger companies then becomes – How do I get the ideas?

As I said, I don’t think you get them directly from customers (but you must understand their costs and pain points). I also don’t think that it is efficient to assume that everyone in the company can innovate. I am surprised at how many corporate programs fund and look to everyone in the organization equally for the next idea. While altruistic it seems to me that, just like every other role in the organization, certain people will have more ability to innovate.

To me, asking the whole company to innovate is about as logical as asking me to try sing on American Idol. First, I am self-aware enough to know that I can’t sing and fortunately, even if I did try, they have a way to weed out people like me before they even get on the show. Why then do companies invest like innovation is not a talent?

Yes, everyone can have a breakthrough idea but I believe, to get sustainable results, companies need to find and cultivate their innovators just like they would with other types of talent.  Just like there are people with great operational talents, there are people that are better at seeing the future.  Most companies have key processes to select and retain top sales, engineering, and operations talent yet they often look at ideation as simply something that everyone can do.  I think this is a failed model.

In the VC/startup world, the concept of the “serial entrepreneur” is well established.  Small teams that have successfully innovated are more likely to be able to do it again. Innovation is not a sure bet but is a clear fact that the right individuals and teams can significantly beat the average.

In large companies, when we find an innovative leader/CEO, I think it is likely that the trend of innovation as a company will continue. This is both due to the talent of the individual and also because the innovator/CEO can get around the other issues (like finding funding) more easily.

So my conclusion is that while companies (especially those in tech) should invest in innovation, focus is needed that includes investment in the right talent to get the best ideas.

More on the other key steps to innovation in future posts…

 

 

 

 

Episode 106: I want it Now!

For those of us who like to follow the next big trends in consumer tech, I think the top three on many people’s lists would be:

         Mobile

         Social

         Local

These trends are now so apparent and present today in existing products that this is more a statement of fact than a prediction of the future.  I read an interesting article the other day that pondered the question if people are actually getting dumber because we have so much information available that we don’t really bother to learn.

I don’t believe people are getting dumber. In fact, I would argue that since people now spend less time memorizing irrelevant factoids, there is more time for real learning and understanding.

I also believe that availability of information has and will continue to change how we do everything from run our errands to running our business. The key is still information but the value can change enormously based on two key factors, namely:

1. Relevance
2. Time

Information relevance is the basis for many core technologies such as search, data warehousing, etc. There is still much more we can do here but the value of relevance is well understood.

A new “information” value proposition focus will be time. Essentially, how quickly can I get a particular piece of information and insight? For factoids like who was in a particular movie or who was the King of England in 1805? - the time is retrieve the information on the Web is mere seconds. For those who must know: Technically the title "King (or Queen) of England" has not existed since 1701.  In 1805, King George III was King of The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

OK. So today you can be at dinner discussing sports trivia and pull out your phone and get a virtually instant answer to your query. I can leave my house with virtually no idea where I am going and simply plug a name into my GPS. Thanks to the web, search, and mobile we now have facts at our fingertips almost instantly.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, however. Many of us in business need to make decisions based on information that can often take days or even weeks to compile. One example, I get so frustrated when I check at home if my flight is on time (they say it is) and then head to the airport to only find out the it has been delayed 4 hours! Clearly the data that the airplane would be late existed when I was still at home; the problem is the lack of real-time delivery capabilities.

I was at a conference this week where someone had come up with a way to know when a customer entered a store. This is potentially a big win for store owner. Today, even with a loyalty card, the customer has already left the store before the business even knows they were there! Clearly, most retail businesses could add much more value having information sooner.

The list is virtually endless, from traffic management to financial management; to web analytics, to TV show ratings, there is more value in having information quickly. The most extreme example of this is equities trading where traders pay huge money for even milliseconds more speed.

So while information can still become more relevant, don’t forget about speed. Real-time insight will give consumers “instant” deals as they walk by a store or “instant” warning of an accident on the road ahead. It will give business the ability to instantly see customer reactions to products and advertising.

Yes, too much information will always overwhelm us but real-time insight is something that will actually help improve business (and personal) efficiency. Its not about MORE, its all about BETTER and FASTER.

 

 

Episode 105: Innovation - A Process Problem?

Why is it so hard for big companies to innovate?

We have all heard the question before. It seems like big technology companies have everything needed to be successful innovators. They have the budget, the resources, most have great talent, and they have the access to customers for both review of ideas and selling access. How could they lose?

With all of this against them, one would think that startups could never survive, or possibly thrive. Yet, the startup community is stronger than ever.  In fact, it is a rarity that any large company will generate consistent successful disruptive innovation. Yes, big tech companies will generate some hits but, outside of Apple (and only since Jobs returned), I don’t see a single big tech company that could claim innovation as an internal competency.

Why?

I believe is it for one simple reason. Most companies assume, incorrectly, that R&D creates innovation when, in fact, there is simply no data that has linked the amount of R&D spend to the level of innovation. Simply put, spending more on R&D does not automatically yield innovation.

Think about it. Research is generally very open-ended and tends to look at improvements at the core of technology. Development, especially at larger companies, is strongly influenced by customer feedback and product enhancement requests.  Both of these elements of R&D are very important to technology businesses but neither in their basic form will yield innovation.

So, what is lacking?

I believe that successful internal innovation within larger companies can be accomplished if the company can enable just 4 things within the organization.

Ideation

Separation

Fortitude

Protection

I will try to blog soon with more detail on these 4 items. You will note that “Investment” is not on my list. I didn’t include it because, within the scheme of most company’s budgets, the amount of funding needed for innovation is very very small.

Successful innovation in companies (and even in Governments) IS NOT, in general, a spending problem; it is not even a technical problem; I believe it is mostly a process problem.

 

Episode 104: Future State

With all of the changes in IT and technology over just the past few years, I really see the excitement building again around the all of the potential for innovation. I got to thinking about how technology will evolve and thought I would share some of those thoughts.

25 years from now – what will technology look like. Here are a few that I believe:

Technology will underpin almost everything but will be more and more hidden from view.

All of our digitally stored information will exist in the cloud. While even a phone will have a terabyte or more of local memory, the cloud will still be the repository.

Blue Ray will be the last removable media disk format. Our next generation of kids will not even understand the idea of "removable media."

Ownership of media, music and movies will be based on metadata and rights management. A person will not have to keep a copy of the data.

All storage will be "solid state" with no more moving parts.

Everything ever created will be "online."

Information security issues WILL NOT be completely solved. We will continue to struggle to protect copyrights and share information with limited individuals.

Content will be highly or hyper personalized. Since, at this point, almost all media will be streamed "individually," most advertising will be streamed as well.

Libraries will disappear and morph into think tanks and centers for ideation and discussion. Books will be in museums.

We will see at least one major breakthrough in science come from the ability to simply look for correlations across extremely large information sets.

We will see businesses actually adopt customer-specific value attributes to retain business. For example, a restaurant you frequent will offer special perks that you enjoy (like a preferred reservation time) and automatically remember how spicy you like your food.

We WILL NOT have solved the battery life issue. Bummer…

We will not carry wallets or keys. All credit and debit cards, memberships, and even our keys and ID (except our drivers license) will be on our mobile device. Our Drivers License won't be there because I don't think the governments will have figured out how to leverage technology (I hope I am wrong but I doubt it).

Our kids and our kids kids will adopt collaboration norms that haven’t been thought of yet.

We will organize our lives by search and metadata and not by folders and hierarchy.

Children (and many adults) will be hooked on the latest virtual worlds where they can sit around a virtual table and talk or play a game or watch a movie together. The video wont be like even the best video conferencing today, it will immerse and superimpose the user into the environment (yes, the V0.1 Hollow Deck for the Trekies out there).

Those are just a few of my thoughts. Overall, I believe that innovation will continue to accelerate.

 

 

Episode 103: Flat IT Revisited

I was right.  Well, mostly right.

It has been 5 years now since I proposed the notion of "Flat IT." I thought it would be interesting to go back and see how things turned out. Below is the original blog entry with my comments below each premise. 

=====

In this installment, I would like to outline some of the key changes that will/would occur in a “Flat IT” environment. Here are the some of the key principles.

Infrastructures become Virtual – Virtualization has been a hot trend for some time now and I believe the technology (virtualization) will exist wherever there is Hardware. Virtualization is important for utilization but also ultimately critical for building a truly dynamic IT environment. Virtualization will simply free IT from any specific coupling to HW.

I think I got that one right: Grade A+

 

All Functions exist as Services (SOA) – You may think there is nothing new here but this is where I see a major new change coming. We have always considered applications services as a part of this construct but I also believe that all interaction with data/information will occur at the SOA layer. Applications and users will receive and store their information by interacting with Information Services. These services will provide the protection, archiving, compliance, security, and other capabilities as a service. A single application will no longer “own” data. Information will exist as an independent element that can be managed independently and used by any authorized application. Combined with delivering resources, this creates what I call a Services Oriented Infrastructure.

While not directly SOA, the concept of Web Services is now ubiquitous in the industry. We see more and more data services becoming available every day and the concept of a blob stor is now considered mainstream: Grade A-

 

Composite Applications are built without code – Within the services framework complete applications are simply connected with workflow (BPM) tools just like working with Visio. Composite applications are built by coupling information, security, application, and other services together in a prescribed way.

There clearly has been progress in the direction. Developers are using new high-level languages and a base of open source and web services to rapidly build feature-rich applications. We are getting there but are still a good ways from "drag and drop:" Grade B

 

IT becomes Information-Centric - In the existing IT environments, I believe we moved from being Server-centric to OS-centric to Application-centric. In the next generation, we become more network-centric but fundamentally (for the first time I might note) start building Information Technology actually around the Information. This is powerful. It means that Information is no longer captive to a single application but can be leveraged across any number of applications.

I would argue that we are well on the way to realization of information-centric IT. The need to leverage "big data" and improve our insight via BI and Analytics is at the forefront of today's IT efforts. More and more our applications exist to serve up information in unique ways: Grade B+

 

Virtual Appliances become the preferred delivery model for Application Services - As all interaction and communications between application services and information services will operate at the SOA layer, many of the complex, driver-centric functions that exist within today’s operating systems will simply no longer be utilized. Base operating environments will exist principally to provide a compute environment for applications. Hence, we will start to see more Applications embed base OS and other base capabilities directly with their offerings. This will simplify integration, test, security, delivery and support. We are seeing major examples of this today – for example with Oracle’s recent embedded Linux announcement.

Yup. The VM (virtual machine) approach is totally mainstream. Developers just pick their foundation elements that a best suited to their app and go from there. Consumers can not longer expect or require that a server-based application run on their chosen OS: Grade A

I would also note that the device and client side has gone through a much more rapid transformation than I expected. Client-side app development is moving almost in the opposite direction where developers must have applications that can run across the variety of platforms (android, iOS, etc).

 

Model-Based Management Provides Orchestration or Resources and Services – To pull all of these capabilities together we need management. Traditional framework-centric management is just not going to cut it, however. Today’s management technologies simply can’t handle the virtual, dynamic, and complex environments that will be constructed. This is where model-based management comes in; it will transform how we think about management. Simply, model-based management will provide the orchestration necessary to deliver highly reliable and scaleable systems across these complex environments.

I would say I missed that one. What I now believe needs to evolve in IT management is less focused on model-based capabilities (although they will still be used) and more focused on policy-driven automation:  Grade C

 

While Flat IT never caught on as a term (I wish I could say I was thinking of calling it Cloud Computing) it seems that things have evolved amazingly close to what I expected. You can be the judge, however, as it's all there in the archives....

Episode 102: Ken Olsen

The passing of Ken Olsen caused me to think about how much pioneers like Ken did for the industry, and how much our industry has changed over time.  As we enter yet another generation of computing (Cloud) I find it interesting that we really can’t associate it with any one individual.  There is no doubt, however, that Ken Olsen was clearly the father of the 2^nd generation of computing (minicomputers). What is even more interesting is how much Cloud Computing employs many technologies that evolved from the mainframe and minicomputer eras.

I joined DEC in 1984 and, for the next three years, had almost a surreal experience working for such a wildly successful company. First and foremost, DEC was all about having the best architecture, technology, and products. People may remember that DEC initially didn’t even pay commission to sales people so they wouldn’t be tempted to exaggerate capabilities.  It was a time of simply amazing resources applied to technology and a time when, even as a junior engineer, Ken considered our time so valuable that we had helicopter service between the DEC facilities and the airport to avoid the traffic (I crack up now thinking about it, as my last trip to Hopkinton involved driving a rented Toyota.)  As you can see, I have really progressed in my career!

I was fortunate (for being at the very bottom of the org chart at that time) to actually spend a good amount of time with Ken.  At the time we had made the decision to build some of the first enterprise RAID products and then some of the first array products designed for non-DEC platforms.  These StorageWorks products ultimately came to completely breakaway and lead the mid-range storage market. Even the brand still exists with HP today (although not the market share!).

As I interacted with Ken, I was amazed both with his passion for technology “goodness” and his passion for what we were building with modular storage.  We had built some of the first hot-pluggable storage array systems out of snap-together components and Ken loved the simplicity and modularity so much that it became a driving force across the company. He later founded a company called Modular Solutions to further these efforts.

 DEC, to me, had an almost internal VC culture under Ken where teams would be allowed, and often encouraged to develop competing products. I often felt like some of the toughest competitors were not IBM or HP but other DEC teams. This internal competition was sometimes fun, always challenging, often brutally competitive and sometimes downright dysfunctional. In the end, it’s hard for me to judge whether it actually helped or hurt.

The fact that DEC no longer exists should not diminish the value that DEC and Ken brought to the industry. In fact, the list of companies that have led the market across generational computing and technology shifts is essentially zero. Many have survived but there are always new winners across each successive generation. As I think back to my (few) programming days I still am amazed by what DEC accomplished.  In my opinion, VMS is still the best OS ever created!  

Hat’s off to Ken – the industry we enjoy today exists, in part, to his efforts.

 

Mark...

Episode 101: Big Data Unplugged

Next to “Cloud” one of the hottest new techie areas is Big Data. Of course, being a data storage company at our roots, the term Big Data to a company like EMC is akin to telling me that I get a Big Rib-eye steak for dinner; yum.

The simple fact is that Big Data could transform business and society in very positive and meaningful ways, but the point of this post is to just provide some basic context as to why Big Data should be on virtually everyone’s short list for investigation.

I start with two simple axioms for Big Data:

                More is better

                Extracting value is the trick

While I think we always can get overloaded with information, the opposite I believe is true with data. More is always better.  Before you think this a naïve statement, consider two caveats. First, I assume we can separate valid and invalid data. Second, I make the assumption that there is a way to analyze the data. These two needs, eliminating invalid data and analysis, will become the key ingredient in delivering new value.

So, what can Big Data do for us? The potential is limitless. For example, it has the ultimate potential to help find cures for diseases and revolutionize personalized medicine. It has the potential to change how we deal with poverty, and related Big Things. Big Data can also change our day-to-day lives. Here is a simple example: imagine that when you setup an appointment for lunch 20 miles away, a program automatically calculates the drive time looking at both the predicted weather and the traffic delays for the time of day and day of the week, and then automatically allocates the time block on your calendar.

Much of Big Data will be about combining and correlating data across multiple datasets. Where business today uses BI software to track customer buying trends by some facets (like store location, time of day, etc), the increasing trend will be to look at more and more datasets as potential indicators and sales predictors.

Another new trend in the "data" world is mining and using unstructured data as a data source. Examples of unstructured data are video, files, and even Facebook and Twitter feeds. The challenge here has been how to extract semantic data out and then index it in a useful way. For example, one use has been to capture "sentiment analysis" datasets around a company or product based on looking for the number of positive and negative words found adjacent to the particular term.

This is just the beginning. I expect that video recording in stores to go far beyond being used just for security and businesses will start to build datasets for everything from how long we have to stand in line to how we walk through the store. I am not even going to engage in the "big brother" implications here. This is just the evolution of cultural norms as we now share our daily lives with hundreds of "facebook friends" and carry a GPS transmitter in our pocket or purse. The clear hope is that this data will be used to improve our experience, efficiency, health and quality of life.

So, the base technology is here today. We have the capacity to store, the technology to extract semantic data, the database capability to structure the data, the indexing and map reduce capability to analyze and create UI's to present the results. This opens the door to a whole new set of innovators and innovations that can leverage all of this technology and solve problems that we could not imagine solving a decade ago. I think of it as not just finding a needle in a haystack but finding matching needles across 10,000 stacks of needles.

Very exciting stuff.

Episode 100: Security and privacy - a battle of extremes

I watch in horror as I look at what people post in open forums on Facebook, and I just want to ask them -"do really understand what you just said will exist on the web forever?"

At the other end of spectrum, my financial advisor was just required to install a new "secure email" system to insure that no one (including me) can read anything she sends. After spending 10 extra minutes to trying to decrypt, decode and download every email, I am pulling my hair out with the inefficiency. Thanks to secure EMAIL - I now think the post office can make a comeback. 

So why is it after all these great years of "good enough" email, we are now relegated to a choice of systems that virtually guarantee what you say will become public record with the alternative being new "secure" systems that are so cumbersome and time consuming that I need to FEDEX important stuff? It's not right!

Technology has been a great boon for the world economy but I feel like inability to provide "transparent security" risks is wiping away much of those gains. The risk I see is that, every time we make it harder to do something to accommodate a security need, I believe we actually increase the risk that individuals will bypass the security to regain the efficiency. At some point security additions could potentially increase security risks.

A great example here has been passwords. We all now have so many passwords that folks are forced to either write everything down, or use one password for everything. While companies create rules to have exotic and ever-changing passwords, do they also supply the users with password management software so they don't just write everything down on a scrap of paper?

On the eve of the RSA conference I thought it would be great to present this challenge. We clearly need reasonable security and privacy but we also want to use our iPads for business without having to lose all of the productivity gains. When I get a bank statement, I want it to come up on the screen, not be a link to the bank's home page where I get to spend 10 minutes logging in and navigating to the right spot. When I buy gas at the same station every week, I don't want to spend extra time typing in my zip code.

The true revolution in security, to me, comes when users can have it with little if any visible impact to the ways we would like to work. I would encourage everyone building or evaluating security capabilities to really make user ease-of-use a top priority. The best security is security that users really adopt. 

 

Mark…