Adaptivate: Listen & Learn

Podcast Title: Adaptivate Podcast Episode Title: 5. Innovating In The Long Cycle Welcome to the Adaptive Podcast, a podcast that inspires industry leaders to leverage technology and new ideas to learn how to adapt, grow their businesses, and create better organizations! In each episode, host Jeremy Miller, a marketer with GE Appliances and student of business and innovation, talks with technologists, engineers, and business leaders about how their experiences have shaped their mindsets. In this particular episode, he speaks with former colleague and current Vice President of Software Products at Aclara, Frank Brooks Jr. The conversations begins with a bit of background, as Frank shares about his role at Aclara and his origins in the field. Currently, he owns the company’s ecosystem of software products and concentrates on providing users with the analytics that may be of interest to them. Prior to that, he has worked throughout the energy sector in roles with industries such as power plants, oil and gas. Jeremy asks Frank to share his latest observations in the current market given the recent hack of government infrastructure. According to Jeremy, the first concern is in making sure information can flow from a meter to the utility’s billing system. Aclara protects their data through encryption and using a private network. The other concern is in protecting the personal data of their customers. He says a big reason why companies are prime for hacker attacks is when software systems aren’t regularly updated. They discuss new innovations in the energy space in the last 10 years. Frank shares a common thread he has noticed among people in leadership positions in regards to choosing specific areas which will generate the most impact. It’s rather helpful to think of things in bit-size chunks rather approach the entire issue at hand all at once. This ensures that the project at hand is organic, self sustaining and will persist if it is right. Jeremy then brings up the topic of the future of the industry and whether any major milestones have been met. The problem, Frank says, is that the process tends to become interrupted after data is collected. To overcome this hurdle, real-time solutions must be at hand. Discussing Artificial Intelligence, they bring uo the fact that a company like Netflix couldn’t exist without it, which Frank says will become even more common moving forward. Until the utility industry has no choice but to adapt, the process will be slow. Additionally, companies have to weigh the risk and reward of adopting new software.  As the conversation comes to a close, Frank recommends some resources for someone who is interested in learning more about the field. Finally, he offers his advice for companies looking for their next product to best serve their customers. First, he says, consider the ‘why’s’, then move to figuring out what the actual problem is and how to get to the bottom of it.   Links: Learn more about https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremymichaelmiller/ (Jeremy Miller) and https://www.linkedin.com/in/frank-brooks-jr-95603b4/ (Frank Brooks Jr). 

Antoine Blondeau, Founder & General Manager at Alpha Intelligence Capital discusses how we will continue to collaborate with AI in more and more places in the workplace. Alpha Intelligence Capital: https://aicapital.ai/ Antoine Blondeau LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/antoineblondeau/

Podcast Title: Adaptivate Podcast Episode Title: 3. The Future of Work  Welcome to the Adaptive Podcast, a podcast that inspires industry leaders to leverage technology and new ideas to learn how to adapt, grow their businesses, and create better organizations! Each episode, host Jeremy Miller, a marketer with GE Appliances and student of business and innovation, talks with technologists, engineers, and business leaders about how their experiences have shaped their mindsets. In this particular episode, he speaks with former colleague and current Google Solutions Manager David White about the future of work. The conversation begins with a bit of background, as David shares his own “origin story” as a professional in the tech field. A tech support role, work for several UN organizations and startups, and more finally led him to Google in 2019. Now, as a Google employee in a sales role, he works on shifting focus from particular offerings to finding the best solutions to unique customer problems. Much of his recent attention has been centered on Microsoft and virtual desktop as a portion of infrastructure modernization. Turning to the future of work, David first explains how he sees things changing now. Recent changes, in large part produced by the COVID-19 pandemic, have been a matter of acceleration rather than complete novelty. Specifically focusing on the tech side of things, David works through an example question that he and his colleagues have had to consider - that of how to settle the issue of laptop security so that employees can work from anywhere.  Moving forward, he explains other details of the changing workplace and their implications. Some companies may never bring employees back to an office, and even those that do may never situate them in permanent work stations again. This shift to more remote work has allowed companies to hire the best and the brightest from anywhere, and tends to bring higher employee satisfaction rates. However, it also removes the inherently valuable space for “water cooler” conversations - conversations companies are trying to create space for in new ways.  Not every industry has been impacted by recent workforce changes in the same ways, of course. Returning to the example of extending cloud reliance and securities such that virtual desktop programs aren’t needed, David details how some companies’ rates of change will be affected by their reliance on legacy apps and need for specialized resources. The world of computing is going, in many ways, the same way as the world of phones has gone, but this process is not without its hiccups as different technologies evolve at different rates.   As the conversation moves to a close, David offers thoughts on the social significance of workplace (and tech more broadly) changes, explains how he anticipates more tech integration on the horizon, offers advice to listeners in the business of building living spaces to suit the changing needs of the day, and plugs his future book and insight from kids’ little league. Links: Learn more about https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremymichaelmiller/ (Jeremy Miller) and https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidwhite9/ (David White)

Vince Kadlubek, founder of Meow Wolf, shares his journey and experience creating Meow Wolf an immersive art experience. Recently, Vince launched the Omega Mart experience in Las Vegas and continues to challenge traditional norms on experiential design. Meow Wolf, Origin Story (2018 Documentary): https://meowwolf.com/explore/origin-story Meow Wolf Home Page: https://meowwolf.com/ https://amzn.to/3rvDfFD (From Science to God), Peter Russel

This podcast highlights the story of S'moresUp, a start-up that has developed a family teamwork app that helps keep the household organized. Priya shares how she started S'moresUp and what is has been like to be a single mom and entrepreneur during these uncertain times.

Cooking is both a physical and chemical transformation of our food. In this podcast, Sabrina Hannah shares insights on how these mechanisms work when we cook. Sabrina also shares her perspective on how we can apply the process of cooking to how we organize projects at work.

Jeff Leduc describes his time at Philips and Medtronic taking new product to market and the lessons he learned along the way. Note: The opinions expressed in this episode are our own.

Learn how Matthew Neutra applies lessons learned from psychology and thought leaders like Tony Buzan to apply storytelling to his work. You can also learn about Matthew's grandfather Richard Neutra, mentioned in the podcast here: Richard Joseph Neutra (April 8, 1892 – April 16, 1970) was a Jewish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austrian-American (Austrian-American)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Architect (architect). Living and building for the majority of his career in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_California (Southern California), he came to be considered among the most prominent and important https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_architecture (modernist) architects. https://nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fneutra.org%2F&data=04%7C01%7CJeremy.Miller%40geappliances.com%7C1cabee81efd04eff875308d89fa335ce%7C43c508cbc53340838105775ae1eaf721%7C0%7C0%7C637434870615738253%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=%2FVFDPt4uTwcOrsBJXMEFxZ5yb9Q0FrO6pkJQifZ%2Fll4%3D&reserved=0 (https://neutra.org) https://nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FRichard_Neutra&data=04%7C01%7CJeremy.Miller%40geappliances.com%7C1cabee81efd04eff875308d89fa335ce%7C43c508cbc53340838105775ae1eaf721%7C0%7C0%7C637434870615738253%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=VMENY1uidASiZtoJ6jZtDr3qY0GVSkUtCvdIF2yzvE4%3D&reserved=0 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Neutra)

Matthew Hammon shares his experience as a digital marketing leader, things he has learned along the way and where he sees the industry going. Mr. Hammon also recommends resources like DigitalMarketer.com to help beginners and veterans alike improve their strategies.

Bob Miller's software career spans decades including executive roles at IBM and Data General before becoming a serial entrepreneur in Silicon Valley where he took MIPS, a company that radicalized the chip industry, public. Since leaving MIPS, Mr. Miller has gone on to invest in and found several startups in the enterprise software industry.

Taylor Marr discusses different trends his team is seeing relative to human migration patterns in the U.S. in response to COVID-19 and what the data may actually be showing. You will also learn how Taylor came to become an economist and data scientist in addition to some tools you can leverage to help you with your data journey. Taylor recommends checking out resources like https://ourworldindata.org/technology-adoption (Our World in Data) in addition to reading books like https://amzn.to/398f1ej (Naked Statistics) to get started.

In this Podcast, Paul not only shares his experiences at Firefox and launching the Firefox OS, he also gives us a peak into how the way we share our identity online and in the real world is about to change dramatically.

Eli Aguilera, SVP Merchandising at Total Wines & More, talks about how they launched a new customer initiative for pick-up ordering in order to continue to serve their customers during the COVID pandemic.

Gurmeet Lamba, VP of Engineering at Fetch Robotics, talks about building flexible teams that can adapt to change leveraging agile software development methodologies.

Matt Smith, Sr. Sourcing Manager at GE Appliances, shares how his 8-year career with the Marine Corps gave him the tools and strategies to manage teams through change and disruption.

John Ouseph, Executive Director of Software at GE Appliances, shares his experience working on the smart home program since its inception in 2006 where it started as a demand response project with the U.S. Department of Energy.

Babak Hodjat, VP of Evolutionary Computation at Cognizant, talks about his start in AI developing natural language processing technology that lead to inventions like Siri and what he is working on now in the realm of evolutionary computation.

In this podcast episode, we speak with Jim Dobbie, industry maverick and EVP at Hunt Companies, about how the property management industry is adapting to changes in consumer needs and demands in addition to new technologies his group is investing in to grow their business.