Podcasts about technology consulting

Field that focuses on advising businesses on how best to use information technology

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Best podcasts about technology consulting

Latest podcast episodes about technology consulting

How Women Inspire: Invest, Lead, Give
How Women Investors are Changing the Venture Investing Landscape with Alissa Livingston and Amy Dawson

How Women Inspire: Invest, Lead, Give

Play Episode Listen Later May 21, 2025 30:07


Ready to shatter the glass ceiling of venture investing? Let's  dive deep into the transformative world of women-led investments. In this episode of How Women Inspire, Amy Dawson and Alissa Livingston unpack the stark reality that women control 52% of wealth yet receive only 2% of venture funding - and why that's about to change. With candid insights, personal stories, and a roadmap for getting started, this conversation is a rallying cry for women to step into their financial potential, challenge traditional investment narratives, and create meaningful economic impact. This week's episode 169 of How Women Inspire Podcast is about how women investors are changing the venture investing landscape! This episode was created in partnership with the Nasdaq Foundation. Together, we are working to educate, inspire, and engage women from diverse backgrounds on venture investing and entrepreneurship. Did you know that only 2% of venture funding goes to women-led companies? Together, we are working to show that women are the new face of venture investing.In this episode of How Women Inspire Podcast, Amy Dawson and Alissa Livingston are sharing the importance of approaching investing as a community and actionable steps you can take right now to overcome your internal roadblocks keeping you from investing. Alissa Livingston is the AVP of Finance Strategies & Initiatives at Saks Global. When she's not using data to analyze new business opportunities, she's taking trapeze lessons or traveling with her two children. Alissa received a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Northwestern University in Chicago, and an MBA from Columbia Business School in the City of New York. She's spent time in Technology Consulting, Investment Banking, and Luxury Retail.Amy Dawson is a product executive with over 20 years of experience in transforming visions into successful commercial ventures. She excels at identifying product-market fit, developing bundled solutions, scaling new product development from concept to profitability, and driving cross-functional execution for sustainable growth. Amy also serves as a board member for How Women Lead. Some of the talking points Amy and Alissa go over in this episode include:The benefits of learning together, the welcoming and collaborative nature of the venture ecosystem.How seeing other women successfully invest can inspire you to confront your investing fears.Using your investing journey to teach the next generation about financial literacy and establishing new norms in investing.The personal satisfaction and impact of supporting women founders who address issues affecting women and society.Thank you for listening! If you enjoyed this episode, take a screenshot of the episode to post in your stories and tag me!  And don't forget to follow, rate, and review the podcast and tell me your key takeaways!Learn more about How Women Inspire at https://www.howwomenlead.com/podcast CONNECT WITH ALISSA LIVINGSTON:LinkedInCONNECT WITH AMY DAWSON:LinkedInCONNECT WITH JULIE CASTRO ABRAMS:LinkedIn - JulieHow Women LeadHow Women InvestHow Women GiveInstagram - HWLLinkedIn - HWLFacebook - HWL

Service Academy Business Mastermind
#321: Building the Future of Technology Consulting with C Infinity Solutions and Chris Coughlan, USNA ‘05

Service Academy Business Mastermind

Play Episode Listen Later May 4, 2025 30:42


Need financing for your next investment property? Visit: https://www.academyfund.com/ Want to join us in San Antonio, TX on June 11th & 12th? Visit: https://www.10xvets.com/events ____ Chris Coughlan is the Founder and CEO of C Infinity Solutions, a digital consultancy helping companies turn big ideas into scalable, AI-powered products. A Naval Academy graduate and former intelligence officer, Chris blends military precision with business innovation to drive real results. After leadership roles at IBM, Wizeline, and Atrium, he launched C Infinity to rethink how businesses build technology — faster, smarter, and with fewer barriers. His team specializes in helping founders and enterprises bring new products to market, modernize operations, and scale with confidence. Known for his hands-on leadership and focus on execution, Chris is helping redefine what technology partnerships can achieve. In this episode of the SABM podcast, Scott chats with Chris about: The Start of C Infinity Solutions: Combining military experience and business strategy to help companies build scalable digital products. How They Stand Out: Speeding up product development by turning ideas into full engineering specs in just four hours. Chris's Path: From Navy leadership to IBM sales and strategy, then founding a digital consultancy focused on growth through technology. Lessons Learned: Bridging the gap between business goals and tech execution, while using AI to streamline and scale. What's Next: Growing C Infinity's client base, launching a SaaS product, and building a portfolio of tech-enabled companies. Timestamps: 00:39 Chris's Journey from Military to Tech 01:23 Overview of C Infinity Solutions 02:28 Exciting Projects and Use Cases 08:01 Team Composition and Skills 11:25 Innovative AI Tools and Methodologies 18:27 Future Goals and Vision 22:56 Connecting with Founders and Veterans Connect with Chris: LinkedIn Email: chris@cinfinitysolutions.com  If you found value in today's episode, don't keep it to yourself—share it with a colleague or friend who could benefit. And if you're a Service Academy graduate ready to elevate your business, we'd love for you to join our community and get started today. Make sure you never miss an episode—subscribe now and help support the show: Apple Podcasts Spotify Leave us a 5-star review! A special thank you to Chris for joining me this week. Until next time! -Scott Mackes, USNA '01  

Learning Through Technology
Exploring Data Interoperability and Privacy in Education Technology: Insights from Susan M. Bearden, CETL and CEO of Bearden Education Technology Consulting

Learning Through Technology

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 23, 2025 37:58


The education sector has witnessed a significant transformation with the integration of technology into classrooms. Education technology, or EdTech, has revolutionized the learning and teaching process, and analysis of student data has become a critical component of the education system. In this episode of the Learning Through Technology podcast, we speak with Susan M. Bearden, CETL and CEO of Bearden Education Technology Consulting. Join Alex, Bob, and Susan as they dive into the fascinating world of data interoperability and student data privacy in education technology. Susan discusses her work at the US Department of Education and explores the benefits and challenges of data interoperability while stressing the importance of privacy protection.

CEO Sales Strategies
AI in Sales: How Business Technology Consulting is Transforming Sales Success [Episode 179]]

CEO Sales Strategies

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 25, 2025 34:25


AI won't fix a broken sales process—it will expose it. If you're not closing more deals with AI, the issue isn't AI—it's how you're using it. Learn how to leverage AI for real sales success.If AI isn't helping you close more deals, you're probably using it wrong. Learn how to fix it and start leveraging AI for sales success.In this episode of the CEO Sales Strategies Podcast, Doug C. Brown sits down with AI and business technology expert Christian O'Meara to discuss the biggest mistakes sales professionals make with AI—and how to fix them. They break down AI-driven sales strategies, automation, and how to use AI as a tool to scale business growth without losing the human touch.In this episode, you'll learn:✅ Why AI alone won't fix a weak sales process—and how to use it effectively✅ The biggest AI mistakes sales teams make that cost them revenue✅ How AI-driven prospecting can get more decision-makers to engage✅ Why AI in sales isn't the future—it's already here

Staying Connected
Can Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) Be What You Want it to Be?

Staying Connected

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 20, 2025 7:40


In this 7-minute episode of Staying Connected, Ben Fox joins Tony Mangino to demystify NaaS and related “as-a-service,” utility-based, network service and pricing models.  They discuss the confusing marketing suppliers use for NaaS, what customers want from a true NaaS proposition, and the reality of translating network infrastructure into utility-based service and pricing models. If you would like to learn more about our experience in this space, please visit our Technology Consulting and Strategy Development webpage. Follow us on LinkedIn: TC2 & LB3

Staying Connected
Wired No More - The Growth of LEO Solutions

Staying Connected

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 10, 2025 8:53


On this episode of Staying Connected we continue our discussion on the evolution of the LEO satellite market and the enterprise use case for these solutions. In this 9-minute podcast, David Lee and Steve Rosen join Tony Mangino to discuss the technical and regulatory factors that make LEOs a viable competitor to traditional terrestrial Internet service and point to increased enterprise adoption.  If you would like to learn more about our experience in this space, please visit our Technology Consulting and Strategy Development webpage. Follow us on LinkedIn: LB3 & TC2

Cesta s EY
Cesta s EY #52 – Jakub Tesař: Jel jsem se do San Francisca naučit, jak se dělají inovace ve velkém světě a přivezl to do Čech

Cesta s EY

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 13, 2025 28:29


„Když se bavím s kamarády ze školy, často se diví, že vydržím tak dlouho v jedné práci. Ale pravdou je, že u nás je to každý týden, měsíc, rok, úplně jiná práce. Díky tomu to není nikdy nuda,“ říká Jakub Tesař, Innovation, Digital a Emerging Tech Lead a Director z týmu Technology Consulting, který v EY nedávno oslavil desáté výročí. Jak se dostal do globálního inovačního týmu v Silicon Valley? Co mu přinesl projekt pro investičního giganta BlackRock? Jakou roli v jeho kariéře hrají blockchain a agilní management? A jak začal budovat tým Inovací v Čechách?

EY FinTech Beyond Borders
#032 - GenAI in Financial Services: Insights from India

EY FinTech Beyond Borders

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 21, 2024 47:11


This episode of EY FinTech Beyond Borders explores the rise of GenAI in India. The episode features Anuj Srivastava, CEO and Co-founder, OnFinance AI; and Akshay Deo, CTO and Co-founder, Maxim AI. Hosted by Chris Schmitz (Partner, EMEIA FinTech Leader, EY) and Rohit Pandharkar (Partner, Technology Consulting, EY). The views of third parties set out in this podcast are not necessarily the views of the global EY organization or its member firms. Moreover, they should be seen in the context of the time they were made'

Association Tech Insider
S2 E10: Spooky Campsite Tech Horror Stories!

Association Tech Insider

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 31, 2024 24:04


It's Halloween, and to celebrate the ASAE Technology Professionals Advisory Council brought together three council members to share their scary IT stories and the lessons learned! Hosted by Justin Burniske, Principal Consultant at Meta-Dao, he talks with Norma Castrejon, Strategic Consultant, Technology Consulting at DelCor Technology Solutions, Michael (Misha) Getter, Vice President, Systems and Technology at Global Cold Chain Alliance and Becky Breeden, Chief Executive Officer at Brightfind. They share stories of email outages, abandoned implementations and insecure data - OH MY! Hopefully you'll be scared into taking some extra precautions in any situations when you tackle future projects - particularly when it comes to identifying the best tools and partners to work with! ⁠Norma Castrejon⁠ Michael (Misha) Getter Becky Breeden Justin Burniske

The Six Five with Patrick Moorhead and Daniel Newman
IBM Consulting: Taking Clients from Scope to Scalability - Six Five Media On the Road

The Six Five with Patrick Moorhead and Daniel Newman

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 29, 2024 13:03


IBM Consulting is leading clients through the journey from defining project scope to achieving scalability. Host Daniel Newman and IBM's Kelly Chambliss, SVP at IBM Consulting, spoke on the topics below on this episode of Six Five Media On the Road.

The Business Ownership Podcast
Leveraging Technology Consulting and Software Development: A Competitive Edge for Small and Medium Businesses - Steve Russell

The Business Ownership Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 26, 2024 36:02


Are you ready to revolutionize your business with digital transformation?In this episode of The Business Ownership Podcast I interviewed Steve Russell. Steve, the visionary CEO of Upstart 13, embarked on a transformative journey that reshaped the outsourcing industry. Dissatisfied with the status quo, he boldly left his prestigious role at McKesson (NYSE: MCK).Before founding Upstart 13, Steve oversaw the Patient Services Business Unit at CoverMyMeds, a healthcare unicorn within the McKesson technology ecosystem. His expertise extended to managing Business Operations and Services Teams at PROS Inc. (NYSE: PRO).Determined to create an outsourcing company unlike any other, Steve scoured for top-tier talent, cultivating a culture and ethos rivalling the most esteemed US companies. His approach centered on empowering individuals, creating a lasting impact, and prioritizing a "People First" mentality. As a Berkeley Executive Leader with over two decades in the software industry, Steve's academic prowess, including a Master's of Science in Information Systems Management from The University of Liverpool and a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Design Engineering.Today, Upstart 13 is a testament to Steve's bold vision and unwavering dedication. Curious how custom software can skyrocket your business growth? Check this out!Show Links:Upstart 13 Website: https://upstart13.com/contact-us/Steve Russel on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/steve--russell/Book a call with Michelle: https://go.appointmentcore.com/book/IcFD4cGJoin our Facebook group for business owners to get help or help other business owners!The Business Ownership Group - Secrets to Scaling: https://www.facebook.com/groups/businessownershipsecretstoscalingLooking to scale your business? Get free gifts here to help you on your way: https://www.awarenessstrategies.com/

Sales Talk for CEOs
Building Your A-Team: Matthew Toth's Proven Strategies for Hiring and Retaining Top Talent

Sales Talk for CEOs

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 30, 2024 37:27


In an era where technology evolves at lightning speed, having the right team in place is no longer a luxury—it's a necessity. CEOs today face the critical task of ensuring their organizations are equipped for sustained growth and success. Matthew Toth, CEO of C3 Technology Advisors, shares valuable insights from his 15-year journey in building a successful technology consulting firm. Here's what he's learned about hiring, training, and retaining top talent.Building a Foundation for SuccessMatthew emphasizes the importance of laying a solid foundation for business success. "Sales is a lagging indicator of just doing the right things," he says. "If you build the right culture, bring on the right people, and have a good strategy, the numbers will follow." He believes that focusing on long-term goals and creating a strong company culture are essential steps toward sustainable growth.Effective Hiring StrategiesWhen Matthew decided to start his own business, he knew he needed to hire the right people to grow. His approach to hiring involved planting seeds early. "I started seeding my network with, 'When this thing works out, I'm going to come for you one day,'" he shares. This proactive strategy allowed him to build a pipeline of potential hires who were already familiar with his vision and values.Matthew's first hire was someone he saw as a perfect fit for his company culture. Despite the initial challenges, he trained this employee by giving him numerous opportunities to engage in real-world sales activities. "I just decided I'm going to go grind this thing out," Matthew recalls. His emphasis on practical experience and on-the-job training helped his first hire become a successful leader within the company.Training and DevelopmentTraining new hires can be challenging, especially without a formal process in place. Matthew's solution was to provide hands-on training through real-world experiences. By involving new employees in client interactions and sales processes, he ensured they gained practical skills and knowledge. "There's no training manual when you hire your first employee," he admits. "But giving them as many at-bats as possible was a great way to learn."Retaining Top TalentRetaining top talent is crucial for long-term success. Matthew believes that treating employees well and investing in their development is key. "I measure my success by year-over-year retention of extraordinary people," he says. By creating a supportive and growth-oriented environment, he has been able to maintain a high level of employee satisfaction and performance.Action Steps for CEOsBuild a Strong Foundation: Focus on creating a positive company culture, hiring the right people, and developing a clear strategy.Proactive Hiring: Continuously build a pipeline of potential hires by networking and keeping in touch with talented individuals.Hands-On Training: Provide new hires with practical experiences and real-world opportunities to develop their skills.Invest in Retention: Treat employees well, invest in their development, and create a supportive work environment to retain top talent.Matthew Toth's journey from a solo entrepreneur to the CEO of a successful technology consulting firm offers valuable lessons for any leader. His experience underscores the importance of building a strong foundation, proactive hiring, hands-on training, and investing in employee retention. To learn more about Matthew's strategies and insights, listen to the full episode below. Whether you're a budding entrepreneur or an established CEO, this episode provides practical advice and inspiration for your business journey.About GuestI'm the father of one amazing girl, husband to a police officer and founder of C3 Technology Advisors. When I'm not growing C3 into everything it possibly can be, I like to golf, work out, read, and spend time with my friends and family.I started C3 Technology Advisors in November of 2008. I'll never quite forget family and friends questioning the wisdom of starting a company just as the economy started to crumble and stalwarts of the banking industry failing left and right. I just had faith that C3 was what I was meant to do. I didn't want to continue to work for corporate America and be subject to the whims of whoever my next director, VP, or company acquirer would be.I started this journey 15+ years ago as a one-man band. Today, I'm lucky to be surrounded by 38 incredible consultants, engineers, marketers, project managers, and more who now service clients on a wide range of technologies. I couldn't be any more blessed. I'm committed to building an enduring company that our employees, clients, and other stakeholders can be proud of.Social Links Check out C3 Technology Advisors' website: https://c3techadvisors.com/Connect with Matthew on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/c3matthewtoth/Check out Alice's website: https://aliceheiman.com/Connect with Alice on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aliceheiman/

The CollabTalk Podcast
MVPbuzzChat Episode 273 with Alicia Keener

The CollabTalk Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 22, 2024 24:43


Episode 273 of the #MVPbuzzChat interview series. Conversation between Microsoft Regional Director and MVP Christian Buckley (@buckleyplanet), and Business Applications MVP, Alicia Keener (/IN/aliciakeener/), a Director of Technology Consulting with RSM US LLP, based in Greenville, South Carolina. You can also find this episode on the CollabTalk blog at https://buckleyplanet.com/2024/07/mvpbuzzchat-273-with-alicia-keener/

Transformation Ground Control
The EU & US Vs. The Tech Industry, Careers in Business & Technology Consulting, Keys to Implementation Success

Transformation Ground Control

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 26, 2024 145:46


The Transformation Ground Control podcast covers a number of topics important to digital and business transformation. This episode covers the following topics and interviews:   The EU & US Vs Tech Industry, Q&A Careers in Business & Technology Consulting (Rob Novick, Blue Pasture Advisors) Keys to Implementation Success (Jeff Nelson, Third Stage Consulting)   We also cover a number of other relevant topics related to digital and business transformation throughout the show.  

Staying Connected
The Search for Innovation in Outsourcing Services

Staying Connected

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 13, 2024 8:02


At the core of most, if not all, outsourcing initiatives is the desire for innovation that will deliver radical change and improvement in the delivery of IT services and support.  The reality is that this outcome becomes aspirational when confronted with the need to simply “keep the lights on”. In this 8-minute podcast, TC2 Managing Director Ben Fox joins Tony Mangino to explore this outsourcing conundrum and how both the customer and the supplier can approach these opportunities to drive successful innovation and truly transformational change in the end user experience. If you would like to learn more about our experience in this space, please visit our Strategic Sourcing and Technology Consulting and Strategy Development webpages. Follow us on LinkedIn:  TC2 & LB3

Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots
525: Tech, Public Service, and Serendipity

Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots

Play Episode Listen Later May 16, 2024 37:24


Victoria Guido hosts Robbie Holmes, the founder and CEO of Holmes Consulting Group. The conversation kicks off with Robbie recounting his initial foray into the tech world at a small web hosting company named A1 Terabit.net, chosen for its alphabetical advantage in the white pages. This job was a stepping stone to a more significant role at Unisys, working for the state of New York's Department of Social Services, where Robbie inadvertently ventured into civic tech and public interest technology. Robbie shares his career progression from supporting welfare systems in New York to becoming a technological liaison between the city and state, leading to a deeper involvement in open-source solutions. His journey through tech spaces includes developing websites, diving into the Drupal community, and eventually establishing his consulting business. Robbie emphasizes the serendipitous nature of his career path, influenced significantly by community involvement and networking rather than a planned trajectory. Additionally, Robbie gives insights on the impact of technology in public services and his stint with the U.S. Digital Service (USDS), where he contributed to significant projects like vets.gov. Robbie promotes the value of community engagement in shaping one's career, stressing how connections and being in the right place at the right time can lead to unexpected opportunities and career pivots. Follow Robbie Holmes on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/robbiethegeek/), X (https://twitter.com/RobbieTheGeek), Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/robbiethegeek), Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/robbiethegeek), or GitHub (https://github.com/robbiethegeek). Check out his website at robbiethegeek (https://about.me/robbiethegeek). Follow thoughtbot on X (https://twitter.com/thoughtbot) or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/150727/). Transcript: VICTORIA: This is the Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots podcast, where we explore the design, development, and business of great products. I'm your host, Victoria Guido. And with me today is Robbie Holmes, Founder and CEO of Holmes Consulting Group. Robbie, thank you for joining me. ROBBIE: I'm so happy to be here. It's great to talk to you, Victoria. VICTORIA: Yes. I have known you for a long time now, but I don't know everything about you. So, I thought I would start with the question: What was your first job that you ever had? ROBBIE: My first technical job, I ended up working for an internet web hosting company called A1 Terabit.net. And note the A1 because it came first in the white pages. It was a really small web hosting company run by a man named [SP] Maxim Avrutsky. I worked there for about six months before I submitted my resume to an online job forum. That's how old I am. And it ended up in the hands of Unisys, where I eventually worked for the state of New York. VICTORIA: Wow [laughs]. So, what a journey that you've been on to get from starting there, and what a marketing ploy back in the day with the white pages. So, tell me a little bit more about how you went from that first job to where you are today with having your own business in consulting. ROBBIE: Yeah, I wasn't even aware that I was jumping into the sort of civic tech space and public interest technology because the job I ended up with was working for New York State in the Department of Social Services. And welfare is federally funded and distributed to states and then states to localities. And New York City and New York State have a weird parasymbiotic relationship because over 50% of the welfare in New York State goes to the five boroughs in New York City. So, so much of my job was supporting the welfare system within the city, which was run by the human resources administration. So, that just led to this cascade of me, like, getting invested in supporting that, and then eventually jumping over to the other side where I worked for the City of New York. And at that point, I ended up becoming sort of a technology project manager and almost a tech liaison between the city and state. And I was out in the welfare centers, helping get the job centers up to a new application called the Paperless Office System, which was a client-server app that was a wrapper around welfare. All of that ended up leading to me finally making it to the network operation center for the City of New York, where I started replacing expensive solutions like HP OpenView with open-source solutions like Nagios and another open-source solution that provided an interface. And it really opened my eyes to the idea of open source. And I had really paid attention to a lot of open-source operating systems. So, I was kind of just a general tech nerd. And eventually, I started building websites, and that led me to the Drupal community in New York City, which was sort of this cascade that led me to communities. And I think that's sort of a through line for my entire career is I don't really think I ever had a plan. I think my entire career has been this sort of a lucky happenstance of being prepared when an opportunity arose and sometimes being in the right place because of my connections and community. VICTORIA: That's interesting about being involved with the people around you and seeing what problems are out there to solve and letting that lead you to where your interests lie. And then, following that, naturally led you to, like, this really long career and these really interesting, big projects and problems that you get to solve. ROBBIE: Yeah. And I think one interesting aspect is like, I feel I spent a lot of time worried about what I was going to do and where I was going to do it. I don't have a bachelor's degree. I don't have an advanced degree. I have a high school diploma and a couple of years in college. Well, 137 credits, not the right 125 or 124 to have a bachelor's degree. I have enough credits for a couple of minors though, definitely Greek art history, I think mathematics, maybe one more. I just never got it together and actually got my degree. But that was so interesting because it was limiting to what jobs I could find. So, I was in the tech space as an IT person and specifically doing networking. So, I was running the network operation center. I helped, like, create a whole process for how we track tickets, and how we created tickets, and how things were moved along. And, in the process, I started building websites for family and friends. And I built a website for our network operation center, so that way we could have photos to go with our diagrams of the network. So that way, when we were troubleshooting remotely, we could actually pull up images and say, "The cable that's in port six goes off to the router. I think that port is dead. Can we move it to the port two to its right, and I'll activate it?" And that made a really interesting solution for something we weren't even aware we had, which was lack of visibility. So many of the people in the fields were newer or were trying to figure it out. And some of us had really deep knowledge of what was going on in those network rooms and hubs. It led me to this solution of like, well, why don't we just start documenting it and making it easier for us to help when they're in the field? That led me to, like, the Drupal community because I started building sites in the Drupal CMS. And I went to, like, my first Drupal meetup in 2007, and there was, like, five of us around the table. That led to eventually me working for Sony Music and all these other things. But the year before I found my way to the Drupal community, I probably sent out, like, 400 resumes for jobs in the tech space, didn't really get any callbacks. And then, I met the community, and I started attending events, and then eventually, I started organizing events. And then, Sony I interviewed and talked to them a couple of times. And then, a friend of mine became the boss. And she contacted me and was like, "Hey, are you in the market?" And I was like, "I don't know. Why? What's up?" And she's like, "I became Doug." And I was like, "What?" And she was like, "I'm now replacing Doug at Sony. I'm running the team." And I was like, "Yeah, I'm happy to talk." And that was the big transition in my career from IT to sort of development and to delivery, right? Like, when it comes right down to it, is I became the manager of interactive media at Sony Music, which was really a job I landed because I was connected to the community, and running events, and getting to know everyone. VICTORIA: Yeah. And I think it's really cool that you had this exposure early on to what you called civic tech, which we'll get into a little bit, and then you went from the community into a commercial technology space and really getting into engineering with Drupal. ROBBIE: Yeah, it was an interesting transition because what they needed at Sony was sort of somebody who could ride the line between systems engineer, database administrator, and Drupal engineer, and also probably pre-DevOps DevOps person. So, I was responsible for all deployments and all tickets that came in. I was sort of both the technical arm of the help desk. When I joined, there was 24 websites on the Drupal platform, and when I left, there was over 200. And we upgraded it from Drupal 5 to Drupal 6 to Drupal 7 while I was there. So, I was heavily involved in all of those updates, and all those upgrades, and all of the deployments of all the new themes, and all the changes to all these sites. So, what was great was they, I believe, if I understand it correctly, they actually created a role for me out of, like, two or three jobs because they needed a me, and they didn't have a role that existed. So, all of a sudden, they made a manager of interactive media role. And I was able to work there for two years, sort of being what I jokingly say, like, a digital janitor. I used to say that I had, like, an eight-bit key ring in a push broom. And I was always mad at your kids for trying to break my stuff. VICTORIA: [laughs] That's so good. A digital service janitor [laughs]? The connection for me between that and where I met you in the U.S. digital service space [laughs] I feel like there's a lot of parallels between that and where your career evolved later on in life. ROBBIE: Yeah. What's amazing is I did all this early work in my career in civic tech and didn't realize it was civic tech at the time. I just realized what I was doing was providing this huge impact and was value. You know, I spent a couple of years in the welfare centers, and I used to say all the time that the two hardest jobs in the welfare center are the person applying for welfare and the person deciding whether or not that person gets welfare. So, being a technologist and trying to help make that as simple as possible or easier and smooth the edges off of that process was really important. And it really taught me how important technology is to delivering service. And I really never thought about it before. And then, when I was working for Phase2 technologies, I was a director of Digital Services. And I read in a blog post, I believe that was written by Mikey Dickerson, who was the original administrator for USDS, and he talked about HealthCare.gov. And he walked in the door, and he said, "How do you know HealthCare.gov is down?" And I think there was some allusion to the fact that we were like, we turn on the television and if they're yelling at us, we know it's down. And Mikey was like, "We know how to monitor things." So, like, if you don't know Mikey Dickerson, he's the person who sort of created the web application hierarchy of needs in Google. He was an SRE. And his pyramid, like Maslow's hierarchy of needs, was all over Google when I was there. I was so impressed with the idea that, like, we aren't talking about how do we solve this problem? We're talking about knowing when there's a problem. And then, if we know there's a problem, we can put some messaging around that. We can say, like, "We're aware," right? Like if the president calls the secretary, the secretary can say, "We know it's down. We're working on it," which is building up political capital. It's a really amazing process that I kept reading this blog post, and I was like, God, that's how I would approach it. And then, I was like, wow, I wonder if I could use my skills to help America, and very shortly submitted an application and was like, well, we'll see what happens. And about six months later, I walked in the door at the VA and was the eighth employee of the Digital Service team at the VA. That was a franchise team of the USDS model. VICTORIA: And can you say a little bit more about what is the U.S. Digital Service and expand upon your early experience there? ROBBIE: Yeah. So, the United States Digital Service was created after HealthCare.gov had its issues. Todd Park had convinced President Obama to reach out to get support from the private industry. And the few of the people who were there, Todd convinced to stick around and start creating a team that could support if there was this kind of issue in the future. I believe the team that was there on the ground was Mikey Dickerson, Erie Meyer, Haley Van Dyck, and Todd. And there was a few other people who came back or were very close at the beginning, including the current administrator of USDS. She has been around a long time and really helped with HealthCare.gov. It's amazing that Mina is back in government. We're very lucky to have her. But what came out of that was what if we were able to stand up a team that was here in case agencies needed support or could vet solutions before these types of problems could exist? So, USDS was what they called the startup inside the White House that was created during the 2014 administration of President Obama. The team started that year, and I joined in May of 2016. So, I would be, like, sort of the beginning of the second team of the VA U.S. Digital Service team. So, USDS supported this idea of tours of duty, where you're a schedule A employee, which meant you were a full-time government employee, but you were term-limited. You could do up to two years of duty and work, and then you could theoretically stick around and do two more years. That was how these roles were envisioned. I think there's lots of reasons why that was the case. But what's nice is it meant that you would come in with fresh eyes and would never become part of the entrenched IT ecosystem. There are people that transition from USDS into government, and I think that's a huge value prop nowadays. It's something that I don't know they were thinking about when the original United States Digital Service was stood up, but it was hugely impactful. Like, I was part of the team at the VA that helped digitize the first form on vets.gov and all the work that was done. When the VA team started, there was a team that was helping with veteran benefits, and they worked on the appeals process for veteran benefits. And I joined. And there was a team that was...eventually, it became dubbed the veteran-facing tools team. And we worked on vets.gov, which was a new front door to expose and let veterans interact with the VA digitally. And over time, all the work that went into the tools and the solutions that were built there, everything was user-researched. And all of that work eventually got brought into VA.gov in what they called a brand merger. So, we took, like, the sixth most trafficked front door of the VA and took all the modern solutioning that that was and brought it into VA.gov, the main front door. So, all of a sudden, there was an identity, a login provided on VA.gov for the first time. So big, impactful work that many people were a part of and is still ongoing today. Surprisingly, so much of this work has now fallen under OCTO, which is the Office of the CTO in the VA. And the CTO is Charles Worthington, who was a USDSer who's the epitome of a person who goes where the work is. Charles was a Presidential Innovation Fellow who helped out in the times of HealthCare.gov and, joined USDS and did anything and everything that was necessary. He interviewed engineers. He was a product person. Charles is one of the most unique technologists and civic tech people I've ever met in my life. But Charles, at the end of the Obama administration and in this transition, realized that the VA was in need of someone to fill the CTO role. So, he came over to become the interim CTO because one of the values of USDS is to go where the work is. And he realized, with the transition, that Marina Nitze, who was the CTO who was transitioning out, there was going to be a need for continuity. So, he came in to provide that continuity and eventually became the full-time CTO and has been there ever since. So, he has helped shape the vision of what the VA is working towards digitally and is now...he was just named the Chief AI Officer for the agency. Charles is a great person. He has successfully, you know, shepherded the work that was being done early by some of us into what is now becoming a sort of enterprise-wide solution, and it's really impressive. VICTORIA: I appreciate you sharing that. And, you know, I think there's a perception about working for public service or for government, state or federal agencies, that they are bureaucratic, difficult to work with, very slow. And I think that the USDS was a great example of trying to really create a massive change. And there's been this ripple effect of how the government acquires products and services to support public needs, right? ROBBIE: Yeah, I would say there's a couple of arms of the government that were sort of modernization approaches, so you have the Presidential Innovation Fellows, which are the equivalent of, like, entrepreneurs and residents in government. And they run out of...I think they're out of the TTS, the Technology Transformation Service over at GSA, which is the General Services Administration. But the PIFs are this really interesting group of people that get a chance to go in and try to dig in and use their entrepreneurial mindset and approach to try to solve problems in government. And a lot of PIFS work in offices. Like, Charles' early team when he first became the CTO included a lot of Presidential Innovation Fellows. It was basically like, "Hey, the VA could use some support," and these people were available and were able to be convinced to come and do this work. And then, you have the Presidential Management Fellows, which I think is a little bit more on the administration side. And then, we have 18F and USDS. The United States Digital Service is a funded agency with an OMB. And we were created as a way to provide the government with support either by detailing people over or dropping in when there was a problem. And then, 18F is an organization that is named because the offices of GSA and TTS (Technology Transformation Service), where it's housed, are on the corner of 18th Street and F in DC. And 18F is sort of like having a technology or a digital agency for hire within the government. So, they are full-time employees of the government, sort of like USDS, except government agencies can procure the support of that 18F team, just like they would procure the support of your company. And it was a really interesting play. They are fully cost-recoupable subcomponent of TTS, which means they have to basically make back all the money that they spend, whereas USDS is different. It's congressionally funded for what it does. But they're all similar sibling organizations that are all trying to change how government works or to bring a more modern idea or parlance into the government. I used to say to people all the time that at USDS, you know, we would set a broken bone say, and then we would come back around and say, like, "Hey, does your arm hurt anymore?" The idea being like, no. Be like, "Cool, cool. Maybe you should go to the gym, and you should eat better." And that would be, like, procurement change. That would be, like, changing for the long term. So, all the work I was doing was building political capital so we could do better work in changing how procurement was done and then changing how the government delivered these things. So, what was awesome was, like, we used to have these fights at USDS about whether or not we were a culture change or we were firefighters. And I think the reality is once we're involved, culture changes happen. The bigger question is, are we going to be there for the long haul, or are we only there for a shorter period of time? And I think there are reasons why USDS teams had both plays. And I think it really is just two different plays for the same outcome. VICTORIA: Yeah, that makes sense. And to pivot a little bit, I think, you know, our audience, we have clients and listeners who are founders of products that are aimed at making these, like, public service needs, or to give some examples, like, maybe they're trying to track Congressional voting patterns or contact information for different state representatives, and they're trying to navigate this space [laughs]. So, maybe you can give some advice for founders interested in selling their products to government agencies. What can they do to make it more appealing and less painful for themselves? ROBBIE: I wouldn't consider myself a procurement expert, but at USDS, the procurement team called themselves the [SP] procurementati. And I was a secret member of the procurementati. I often was the engineer they would call to evaluate statements of work or sometimes be on technology evaluation panels. And it was fun to be a part of that. Things that most companies don't realize is government agencies will put out things like request for information or sources sought in the government space. And this is a way for industry to influence how government tries to solve problems. If you are trying to go after government work and you're only responding to an RFP, you're probably behind in your influence that you could have on the type of work. So, you'll see if a procurement seems to be, like, specifically focused on an approach, or a technology, or a framework, it's probably because some companies have come through and said, "I think this would probably solve your problem," and they gave examples. So, that's one way to be more connected to what's going on is to follow those types of requests. Another is to follow the money. My wife is this amazing woman who helped write The Data Act and get it passed through government. And The Data Act is the Data and Transparency Act. And that led to her heading over to treasury and leading up a team that built USAspending.gov. So, there is a website that tracks every dollar, with some exceptions, of the funding that comes out of Congress every year. And what's great is you can track it down to where it's spent, and how it's spent, and things like that. For education purposes, I think that is a really good thing that business and growth people can focus on is try to see and target where competitors or where solutions that you've looked at have gone in the past. It's just a good set of data for you to take a look at. The other piece is if you're creating a solution that is a delivery or a deliverable, like a SaaS solution, in order for something to be utilized in the government, it probably needs to be FedRAMP-approved, which is a process by which security approvals have been given so that government agencies have the green light to utilize your solution. So, there's tons of documentation out there about FedRAMP and the FedRAMP approval process. But that is one of those things that becomes a very big stopping point for product companies that are trying to work in the government. The easiest way to work your way through that is to read up on it a bunch, but also find an agency that was probably willing to sponsor you getting FedRAMP approval. Most companies start working with a government agency, get an exemption for them to utilize your product, and then you get to shape what that FedRAMP process looks like. You start applying for it, and then you have to have some sort of person who's helping shepherd it for you internally in the government and accepting any issues that come along in the process. So, I guess FedRAMP approval is one that's a little complicated but would be worth looking into if you were planning on delivering a product in government. VICTORIA: Right. And does that apply to state governments as well? ROBBIE: So, lots of state-related and city and locality-related governments will actually adopt federal solutions or federal paradigms. So, I think in the state of California, I think FedRAMP as one of the guiding principles for accepting work into the state of California, so it's not consistent. There's not a one-to-one that every state, or every city, or every locality will pull this in. But if you are already approved to be a federal contractor, or a federal business, or a federal product, it's probably going to be easier to make your way into the local spaces also. VICTORIA: Right. And as you said, there's plenty of resources, and tools, and everything to help you go along that journey if that's the group you're going for [laughs]. Mid-Roll Ad: When starting a new project, we understand that you want to make the right choices in technology, features, and investment but that you don't have all year to do extended research. In just a few weeks, thoughtbot's Discovery Sprints deliver a user-centered product journey, a clickable prototype or Proof of Concept, and key market insights from focused user research. We'll help you to identify the primary user flow, decide which framework should be used to bring it to life, and set a firm estimate on future development efforts. Maximize impact and minimize risk with a validated roadmap for your new product. Get started at: tbot.io/sprint. VICTORIA: So, kind of bringing it back to you, like, you're saying you want those partnerships within the government. You want someone advocating for you or for your product or your service. Drawing that back to what you said earlier about community, like, how do you form a community with this group of people who are in the state, or federal government, or civic tech spaces? ROBBIE: Yeah, I think it's an interesting problem because so much of it feels impenetrable from the outside. Most people don't even know where to start. There are organizations out there that are pretty good community connections, an example I would give is ACT-IAC. It is a public-private partnership where people from within the government, experts in their fields, and people in the private industry who are experts in their fields will be together on community boards and engaging in panels. And so, it's a really nice way to start connecting those dots. I have no direct affiliation with ACT-IAC. But if they'd like to give me my own account, that would be great. But it is one of those organizations I've seen be successful for people trying to find their way into a community that is a little harder to find. I think, also, so much of the community engagement happens at conferences and around...so, like, if you're in the healthcare space, this last month, you've had multiple conferences that I think were really great for people to get to know one another, you know, an example is ViVE. It just happened out in LA, which is a little more on the private sector health space, but still, government agencies were there. I know that the Department of Veterans Affairs had people there and were on panels. And then, HIMSS is another conference that takes place, and that just took place down in Miami. And in Miami, HIMSS happened and a whole bunch of other social community events took place. So, I'm close with a thing called the Digital Services Coalition, which is 47 companies that all try to deliver good government based on the Digital Services Playbook that was created by USDS that lives at playbook.cio.gov and the way that they try to accomplish this work. And that organization, while they were in Miami, hosted a happy hour. So, there's a lot of connections that can be made once you start seeing the players and getting to know who's around. So, it's a little bit about trying to find your way to that first event, and I think that will really open up everything for you. Within a week or two, I was at an International Women's Day event at MetroStar, which is a really great company that I've gotten a chance to spend some time with. And then, I was at an event for the Digital Services Coalition talking about open source in government. So, there's a lot of stuff out there for you to be a part of that isn't super cost-prohibitive and also doesn't take a lot once you start to open the door. You know, once you peek around that corner and you find some people, there's a lot more to be done. VICTORIA: Yeah. And you touched on something at the end there that wants me to bring up some of the advantages you can have being a small business, a minority-owned business, or woman-owned business, or veteran-owned business, so thinking about how you can form those connections, especially if you have one of those socio and economic set-asides that you might want to consider if they're looking to work with the government as well. ROBBIE: Yeah. Those socioeconomic set-asides include small businesses, woman-owned small business. I think it's Native and Alaskan 8(a), which is historically underrepresented and service-disabled veteran-owned. So, there are also sub-communities of associations, like there's the Digital WOSB, the digital Women-Owned Small Business alliance that was founded by Jess Morris from Pluribus Digital, and a bunch of other companies in the Digital Services Coalition. I believe she's the president of the Digital WOSB right now. That is a sub-community of women-owned small businesses that are trying to connect and create a community that they can support one another. And that's just one example of the type of connection you can make through those types of socioeconomic set-asides. But once you have those official socioeconomic set-asides, it will allow you to get specific contracts engagements in the government that are not allowed or available for others. So, the government procurement process will have some amount of these specific socioeconomic set-asides that need to be hit. Like, 8% of all procurements need to go to this and 10% of all procurements need to go to this. So, I think the VA is probably one of the most effective at hitting any of the socioeconomic set-asides, specifically related to service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses. So, if you happen to be a person of color and you found a business and you are female presenting, right? You may have 8(a) woman-owned small business. If you also happen to be a veteran and you're service-disabled, all of those things stack. You don't just get to have one of them. And they can be really effective in helping a business get a leg up and starting out and trying to help even the playing field for those communities. VICTORIA: Yeah. What I really appreciated about my experience working with Pluribus Digital, and you, and people who had had that experience in the U.S. Digital Services, that there is this community and desire to help each other out and that you can have access to people who know how to move your product forward, get you the connections that you need to be competitive, and to go after the work. So, I love encouraging people to consider civic tech options. And maybe even say more about just how impactful some of it can be. And what kind of missions are you solving in these spaces? ROBBIE: Yeah, I often try to remind people, especially those who are heading towards or considering civic tech, there are very few places in this world that you can work on something that can impact millions of people. Sure, I was lucky enough. I have tons of privilege. I worked at a lot of wacky places that have given me the access to do the type of work that I think is impactful, but very little has the kind of impact. Like, when I was interviewed by Marina Nitze as, my last interview when I joined USDS, she sent me an email at the end of it and said like, "Everything was great. I look forward to working with you. And remember, every time you commit code into our GitHub, you'll be helping 8 million veterans." And then, she cc'd Todd Park. And Todd was the CTO of the U.S., and he responded back within a minute. Todd is one of the most busy people. It was amazing to me how fast he responded. But he was like, "Lemme tell you, as somebody who can talk on behalf of our president, our country needs you." And those kinds of things they're hard to comprehend. And then, I joined the Digital Service team at the VA. And one of the first things that I got to support was the 10-10EZ. It's the healthcare application for veterans. And before I got there, it was a hosted PDF that we were trying to replace. And the team had been working for months to try to build a new, modern solution. What it was is it was, like, less than six submissions were happening a day because it only worked in Adobe Acrobat, I think it was 6.5 and below, and Internet Explorer 8.5 and below. And if you think about the people that could submit utilizing that limited set of technologies, it was slowly becoming homeless veterans who were using library computers that had not been upgraded. So, there was a diminishing amount of value that it was providing. And then, on top of it, it was sort of lying to veterans. If the version of the Adobe Acrobat was out of date, or wrong, or too new, it would tell them to upgrade their browser. So, like, it was effectively not providing any value over time. We were able to create a new version of that and that was already well on its way when I joined, but we were able to get it out the door. And it was a React frontend using a Node backend to talk to that SOAP API endpoint. Within the first week, we went from 6 submissions a day to 60 submissions a day. It's a joke, right? We were all 10x developers. We were like, "Look at us. We're killing it." But about three years later, Matt Cutts came to a staff meeting of USDS, and he was the second administrator of the USDS. And he brought the cake that had the actual 10-10EZ form on it, and it said, "500,000." And he had checked with the analytics team, and there were over 500,000 submissions of that form, which means there are 500,000 possible veterans that now may or may not have access to healthcare benefits. Those are big problems. All of that was done by changing out one form. It opened up the world. It opened up to a group of veterans that no one else was able to do. They would have had to go into a veteran's office, and they would have had to fill it out in paper. And some veterans just don't have the ability to do that, or don't have an address, or don't have a...so, there are so many reasons why having a digital form that worked for veterans was so important. But this one form that we digitized and we helped make modern has been submitted so many times and has helped so many veterans and their families. And that's just one example. That's just one form that we helped digitize. But now the team, I mean, I'm back in the VA ecosystem. There's, like, 2,500 people in the general channel in the office of the CTO Slack organization. That's amazing. There's people there that are working all day, every day, trying to solve the same problems that I was trying to solve when I got here. And there's so much work being done to help veterans. But that's just one example, right? Like, at USDS, I know that the digital filing for the free version of your tax form, the IRS e-file Direct, just went live. That was something that USDS had been working on for a very long time behind the scenes. And that's going to impact everybody who submits their taxes. These are the kind of problems that you get to work on or the scope of some of the problems if you work in these types of organizations, and that's really powerful. It's the thing that keeps drawing me back. I'm back supporting the VA again through some contracts in my business. But it's funny, like, I was working for another agency. I was over working at DHS on an asylum project. And a friend of mine kept telling people to tell me, "Man, veterans need you. If only there was another one of you to help us over here, that would be great." And eventually, it led to me being like, well, veterans need me. I'm going to go back to the VA. And that was my second tour at USDS at the Department of Veteran Affairs. And now I'm back there again. So, it's a very impactful place to work. There's tons of value you can provide to veterans. And, to me, it's the kind of work that keeps bringing me back. I didn't realize just how much I was a, like, impact junkie until I joined USDS, and then it really came to a head. I cannot believe how much work I've gotten to be a part of that has affected and supported those who get benefits and services from the federal government. VICTORIA: [inaudible 33:47] impact junkie. That's funny. But yeah, no, thank you for sharing that. That's really interesting. Let me see if you could go back in time to when you first started in this journey; if you could give yourself any advice, what would you say? ROBBIE: Yeah, I think I spent so much time being nervous about not having my degree that I was worried it was going to hinder me forever. And it's pretty amazing the career I've been able to thread together, right? Like, you know, I've hit on a few of them already. But, like, I started with a small web hosting company, and then New York State in the Department of Social Services, then New York City in the Human Resources Administration, Sony Music, Zagat Survey, Google, Johnson & Johnson, IDT telecommunications, Phase2 technologies, where I got to work on an awful lot of problems in lots of awesome places like NBA.com, and Major League Soccer, and Bassmaster. And then, the United States Digital Service where I got to work on things supporting the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Department of Homeland Security over at ADA.gov in DOJ. I helped them out. And I worked over at USDA helping get Farmers.gov off the ground. So, everything on my left leg, tattoo-wise, is something that changed my life from my perspective. And I have a Drupal tattoo on the back of my leg. I have a DrupalCon. So, anytime somebody said "Drupal" anywhere near a USDS person, I would magically appear because they would just be like, "Oh, Robbie has that Drupal tattoo." So, I got to work on a lot of dot govs that eventually landed or were being built in Drupal. So, I got to support a lot of work. And it meant that I got to, like, float around in government and do a lot of things that others didn't get to do. When CISA stood up, which is the office of security inside of DHS, it's one of the newest sub-communities or subcomponents, they built DHS SchoolSafety.gov, which is a cross-MOU'd site. And I got to sit in and help at the beginning of that because of my Drupal background. But it was really fun to be the person who helped them work with the vendors and make sure that they understood what they were trying to accomplish and be a sort of voice of reason in the room. So, I did all of that work, and then after that, I went and worked at Pluribus Digital, where I got a chance to work side by side with you. And then, that led to other things, like, I was able to apply and become the director of Digital Services and software engineering for my local county. So, I worked for Prince William County, where I bought a house during the pandemic. And then, after that contract ended, I had already started my own business. So, that's led to me having multiple individual contracts with companies and so many people. I've gotten to work on so many different things. And I feel very lucky. If I could go back and tell myself one thing, it's just, take a breath. Everything's going to be okay. And focus on the things that matter. Focus on the things that are going to help you. Focus on community. Focus on delivering value. Everything else will work itself out. You know, I joke all the time that I'm really good at providing impact. If you can measure my life in impact and value, I would be a very rich man. If you can measure it in money, I'm doing all right, but I'm never going to be yacht Robbie, you know, but I'm going to do okay. VICTORIA: Oh my god, yacht Robbie. That's great. So, just to recap, everything's going to be okay. You never know where it's going to take you. And don't be limited by the things that you think, you know, make you not enough. Like, there's a lot of things that you can do out there. I really like that advice. ROBBIE: And I think one last piece is, like, community matters, if you are a part of communities and you do it genuinely, how much that will impact your career. I gave a talk from Drupal NYC to the White House and beyond. And I talked through my entire resume and how everything changed when I started doing community engagement. When I went to the Drupal community in New York City and how that led to Sony, and that led to Zagat, which led to me getting acquired by Google, like, these things all cascaded. And then, when I moved to the DMV, I was able to join here and continue supporting communities, which allowed me to bring people into the local civic tech community from the local DC tech community. So, so many of the best USDS engineers, and designers, and product people I was able to help influence to come to government were people I met in the community or the communities I helped support. You know, I was an early revivalist of Alexandria Code and Coffee. It was a community that was started and then wavered. And then, Sean McBeth reached out to the community and said, "Do we want to help and support getting it off the ground again?" And I immediately said, "Yes." And then, that led to my friends at BLACK CODE COLLECTIVE wanting to create a community where they could feel safe and connected and create a community of their own. And then DC Code & Coffee started. And from there, Baltimore Code & Coffee kicked off. And it's just really nice that, like, it doesn't matter where I've been. All these things keep coming back to be a part of community and help support others. And you will be surprised at how much you get back in return. I wouldn't be the person I am today in my community. I wouldn't have my career if it wasn't for the people who started and helped shepherd me when I was starting out. And I feel like I've been trying to do the same for people for a really long time. VICTORIA: I love that. That's what I say, too, when people ask me for advice on careers and how to grow. And my biggest piece is always to go out and meet people. And go to your community, like, look and see what's happening. Like, find people you like hanging out with and learning from. And just that should be the majority of your time probably if you're trying to figure out where to go with your career or even just, like, expand as a person sometimes [laughs]. Robbie, I was going to ask; you mentioned that you had bought a house in Virginia. One of my other warmup questions was going to be, what's your favorite thing to put on the grill? ROBBIE: My house in Virginia definitely gets a lot of use, especially in the spring and the fall. I'm a big fan of team no extreme when it comes to temperature. But during those time periods, my grill is often fired up. My favorite is probably to make skirt steak on the grill. I'm a huge fan of tacos, especially made out of skirt steak. I'm in all day. That's one of my favorites. I also love to smoke. I have a smoker because I'm a caricature-esque suburban dude. I'm going to live into all of the possible things I could have. But I've had a smoker for a long time, and I love making sort of poor man's burnt ends. It's one of my favorite things to make. But you got to have some time. That's the kind of thing that takes, you know, 14 hours or 16 hours, but it's really fun to take advantage of it. A quick thing I love to make is actually smoked salmon. It takes longer to brine it than it usually does to smoke it. But it is one of the nicest things I've made on my smoker, you know, fresh pesto on a piece of salmon is pretty awesome, or everything bagel. Everything with the bagel seasoning is a pretty fun way to smoke some salmon. VICTORIA: Wow, that sounds so good. I'm going to have to stop in next time I'm in Virginia and get some [laughs] and hang out. Do you have any questions for me? ROBBIE: I'm excited to see where you've gone and how you've gotten here. I think this is such a cool job for you. Knowing who you are as a person and seeing you land in a company like this is really exciting. And I think you getting to be a part of this podcast, which we were joking about earlier, is I've been listening to probably since it started. I've been a big fan for a long time. So, it's cool to be here on this podcast. But it's also cool that my friend is a part of this and gets to be a part of this legacy. I'm really excited to see where you go over time. I know my career has been changing, right? I worked in government. Before that, I did all kinds of other stuff. Nowadays I have my own business where I often joke I have sort of, like, three things I offer, which is, like, consigliere services. Wouldn't it be nice to have a Robbie on your executive team without having to pay them an executive salary? You know, another one is like, you know, strategy and mentoring, but these are all things I know you do also, which I think is cool. But I've been working on contracts where I support companies trying to figure out how they modernize, or how their CTO can be more hands-off keyboard, or how their new director of business development can be more of a technical leader and taking on their first direct reports. So, I just enjoy all those aspects, and I just think it's something that I've watched you do in the company where we worked together. And it's always fun to see what you're working on and getting a chance to catch up with you. I feel like you're one of those people that does a really great job of staying connected. Every once in a while, I'll get a random text message like, "Hey, how you doing?" It always makes me smile. I'm like, Victoria is a really good connector, and I feel like I am, but you're even better at it on the being proactive side. That's how this all came about, right? We caught up, and you were like, "Why don't you come on the podcast?" So, that's really exciting. VICTORIA: Well, thank you, Robbie. Yeah, I think that's one of the great things about community is you meet people. You're like, "Oh, you're really cool. And you're doing cool stuff all the time. Like, how can I support you in your journey [laughs]? Like, what's up?" Yeah, for me, it was hard to actually leave DC. I didn't, you know, really think about the impact of leaving behind my tech community, like, that network of people. It was pretty emotional for me, actually, especially when we finally, like, stopped doing the digital version [laughs]. And I, like, kind of gave up managing it from California, which was kind of funny anyways [laughs]. Yeah, so no, I'm grateful that we stayed in touch and that you made time to be here with us today. Is there anything else that you would like to promote? ROBBIE: You know, just to remind you, you've done a great job of transitioning into where you are today, but anybody can do that, right? Like, before I moved to the DC area, I was in New York, and I was helping to organize JavaScript events. And I started looking at the DC area before I moved down here. And I found the DC Tech Community. And I found the Node School DC GitHub organization and reached out to the person who had ownership of it and said I wanted to help and support. I looked at this the other day. I think I moved on May 8th, and then, like, May 11th, when I walked in the door, somebody was like, "Are you new?" And I was like, "Yeah, I just moved here." And they were like, "Oh, from where?" And I was like, "New York." And they were like, "Are you that guy who's been bugging Josh about running Node school events?" I was like, "Yeah." And like, they were planning an unconference at the end of the month. And they were like, "Would you like to run a Node school at that unconference?" Like, 27 days later. So, it was amazing that, like, I immediately, like, fell from the New York Community where I was super connected, but I went out of my way to try to, like, see what the community looked like before I got there. And I was lucky enough to find the right people, and immediately I joked...I think I wrote a blog post that said like, "I found my new friends. By, like, going from one community to another, gave a person who was in his 40s a chance to meet new people very quickly." And it was pretty amazing, and I felt very lucky. But I did spend a little bit of energy and capital to try to figure it out because I knew it was going to be important to me. So, I think you've done a really good job. You've helped launch and relaunch things that were going on in San Diego and becoming a part of this connection to more people. I think you and I have a very similar spirit, which is like, let's find a way to connect with humans, and we do it pretty effectively. VICTORIA: Well, thank you. That really boosts my confidence, Robbie [laughs]. Sometimes, you show up to an event you've never been to before by yourself, and it's like a deer in headlights kind of moment. Like, oh God, what have I done [laughs]? ROBBIE: Oh, and the last thing I need to mention is I also have a podcast. I have my podcast about film. It's called Geek on Film. I used to record it with my friend, Jon. He's a little busy right now. But I used to pitch it as a conversation show about the current films that were going on. Now, it's one lone geek's ramblings about what he just saw. It's a great podcast for me because it gives me an opportunity to think a little more critically about film, which is one of the things that I probably have almost enough credits to get a minor in. But I absolutely love cinema and film in general. And it's given me an opportunity to connect with a lot more people about this subject and also to scratch the itch of me being able to create something around a community and around a thing I really love. VICTORIA: That's super cool. Yeah. You're top of mind because I also like films. I'm like, what's Robbie up to? Like, what's the recommendations, you know [laughs]? Do you have a top film recommendation from the Oscars? Is that too big of a question? ROBBIE: So, the one I will say that didn't get enough spotlight shined on it was Nimona. So, I'm a huge fan of the Spider-Man movies. I think Spider-Man Into the Spider-Verse and Across the Spider-Verse are both masterpieces. But Nimona is an animated film that was picked up by Netflix, and it is amazing. I don't know that I laughed or cried or was more moved by a film last year. And I don't know that it gets enough credit for what it was. But it did get nominated for best-animated film, but I don't know that enough people paid attention to it. Like it may have gotten lost in the algorithm. So, if you get a chance, check out Nimona. It's one of those beautiful, little gems that, if you travel down its story, there's all these twists and turns. It was based on a webcomic that became a graphic novel. One of the production companies picked it up, and it wasn't going to see the light of day. And then, Netflix bought its distribution rights. There's going to be a great documentary someday about, like, Inside Nimona. But I think the movie itself is really charming and moving, and I was really impressed with it. So, that was the one that got me, like, just before the Oscars this year, where I was like, this is the little animated movie that could, in my opinion. It's so charming. VICTORIA: I will definitely have to check that out. Thank you for giving us that recommendation. ROBBIE: Totally. VICTORIA: Final question. I just wanted to see if you had anything to share about being an advisory board member for Gray and for Hutch Studio. Could you tell us a little bit more about that? ROBBIE: Yeah. So, Gray Digital was founded by a friend of mine. We met through United States Digital Service. And his organization...I had been supporting him for a while and just being behind the scenes, talking to him and talking through business-related issues. And it was really nice. He offered to make me an official advisory board member. It was a great acknowledgment, and I really felt moved. There's some great people that are supporting him and have supported him. They've done really great work. Gray is out there delivering digital services in this space. And I think I was really lucky to be a part of it and to support my friend, Randall. Hutch is different. Hutch is an organization that's kind of like if you think about it, it almost is a way to support entrepreneurs of color who are trying to make their way into the digital service delivery space. Being an advisory board member there has been really interesting because it's shaping how Hutch provides services and what their approach is to how to support these companies. But over the last year, I've convinced the person who's running it, Stephanie, with a couple of other people, to open the door up or crack the door so we could talk directly and support the individual companies. So, it's been really great to be a Hutch advisory member to help shape how Hutch is approaching things. But I've also been a part of, like, many interview processes. I've reviewed a lot of, like, [inaudible 48:01] who want to join the organization. And I've also created personal relationships with many of the people who are part of Hutch. And, you know, like, you know me personally, so you know I run a Day of the Dead party. We'll just party at my house every year. I have a huge amount of affection for Mexican culture and, in general, the approach of how to remember people who are a part of your life. So, this is, like, the perfect way for me to bring people together at my house is to say, like, "Hey, my dad was awesome. What about your family? Who are your people?" What's really nice is that has given me an opportunity to host people at my house. And I've had Hutch company owners at my house the last couple of years and the person who runs Hutch. So, it's a really great community that I look at that is trying to shape the next emergent companies that are helping deliver digital services across the government. And it's really fun to be early on in their career and help them grow. Again, it seems silly, but it's the thing I care a lot about. How do I connect with people and provide the most value that I can? And this is a way I can provide that value to companies that may also go off and provide that value. It's a little bit of an amplifier. So, I'm a huge fan of what we've been able to accomplish and being a part of it in any way, shape, or form. VICTORIA: Well, I think that's a really beautiful way to wrap it up. ROBBIE: Really glad to catch up with you and be a part of this amazing podcast. VICTORIA: Yeah, so much fun. Thank you again so much. It was great to be here with you today. You can subscribe to the show and find notes along with a complete transcript for this episode at giantrobots.fm. If you have questions or comments, email us at hosts@giantrobots.fm. You can find me on thoughtbotsocial@vguido. This podcast is brought to you by thoughtbot and produced and edited by Mandy Moore. Thanks for listening. See you next time. AD: Did you know thoughtbot has a referral program? If you introduce us to someone looking for a design or development partner, we will compensate you if they decide to work with us. More info on our website at: tbot.io/referral. Or you can email us at: referrals@thoughtbot.com with any questions.

The Better Boards Podcast Series
Increasing productivity through inclusion

The Better Boards Podcast Series

Play Episode Listen Later May 2, 2024 25:16


Diversity and inclusion are not evenly distributed throughout an organisation, and the view at the board level may not correspond with reality further down. This creates missed opportunities and prevents companies from unlocking the true potential of their talent and their organisations. Often, firms can increase productivity by doing more to be truly inclusive.In this podcast, Dr Sabine Dembkowski, Founder and Managing Director of Better Boards, discusses increasing productivity through inclusion with Belton Flournoy, Managing Director of the Technology Consulting practice at Protiviti. "When I was young, I looked up and didn't see many people like me”Belton is passionate about inclusion for two reasons. First, he feels that when you don't see anyone like yourself, you fear society won't allow you in certain circles. Second, he continues to see people limiting which parts of their identity they show or hide, and this holds people back from expressing their true potential. “We don't just need to focus on diversity initiatives and how they make people feel. We need to link them to the increased productivity”Belton sees an incredible opportunity to translate the existing dialogues about diversity into more meaningful conversations linked to productivity outcomes and business results.“If you haven't driven the true inclusion values through that middle layer, it won't permeate your organisation, and you might think your organisation is much more inclusion-oriented than it really is…”Many boards have done serious work on inclusion, building it into the mission, governance, and operations. Yet when you drop into the middle management layer, there's a sharp drop-off in belief, behaviour, and execution.“The goal is to create research that helps organisations drive inclusion through evidence-based research”Belton sees many organisations dealing with inclusion and diversity by conducting surveys and reporting their interpretation of the survey results. This approach lacks rigour. This is part of why he devotes so much time to research partnerships, to help create strictly measured and robust studies that can drive change with hard evidence about what's happening and what works.“What you need to do is realise your voice is valid from day one”Belton rejects a fixed mindset and focuses on cultivating a growth mindset. Secondly, he cultivates an internal locus of control. Rather than assigning control of his life to others or believing that an externally controlled system is responsible for his life outcomes, he frames situations in terms of what he can control and take action on.The three top takeaways from our conversation for effective boards are:1.      Create a personal board. As a senior leader, it is hard to get good feedback. So, identify three to six people to talk to about your career in a professional context between one and four times a year. This will transform how you get feedback on challenging issues and help you have a priceless sounding board.2.     Realise the voice in your head is just a voice. You don't have to listen to it. You can ignore or challenge it, which is especially useful for overcoming negative internal narratives. 3.     Contribute to the productivity research of the future. Complete the ongoing survey on generational productivity from the London School of Economics and Protiviti. You can complete it here:  https://www.protiviti.com/us-en/survey/lse-generations-survey   

Smart Software with SmartLogic
"Discovery Discoveries" with Alicia Brindisi and Bri LaVorgna

Smart Software with SmartLogic

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 28, 2024 43:26


In Elixir Wizards Office Hours Episode 2, "Discovery Discoveries," SmartLogic's Project Manager Alicia Brindisi and VP of Delivery Bri LaVorgna join Elixir Wizards Sundi Myint and Owen Bickford on an exploratory journey through the discovery phase of the software development lifecycle. This episode highlights how collaboration and communication transform the client-project team dynamic into a customized expedition. The goal of discovery is to reveal clear business goals, understand the end user, pinpoint key project objectives, and meticulously document the path forward in a Product Requirements Document (PRD). The discussion emphasizes the importance of fostering transparency, trust, and open communication. Through a mutual exchange of ideas, we are able to create the most tailored, efficient solutions that meet the client's current goals and their vision for the future. Key topics discussed in this episode: Mastering the art of tailored, collaborative discovery Navigating business landscapes and user experiences with empathy Sculpting project objectives and architectural blueprints Continuously capturing discoveries and refining documentation Striking the perfect balance between flexibility and structured processes Steering clear of scope creep while managing expectations Tapping into collective wisdom for ongoing discovery Building and sustaining a foundation of trust and transparency Links mentioned in this episode: https://smartlogic.io/ Follow SmartLogic on social media: https://twitter.com/smartlogic Contact Bri: bri@smartlogic.io What is a PRD? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Productrequirementsdocument Special Guests: Alicia Brindisi and Bri LaVorgna.

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Command Control Power: Apple Tech Support & Business Talk
559: Talking NSITSP with Jason Harrison of Harrison Technology Consulting

Command Control Power: Apple Tech Support & Business Talk

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 26, 2024 55:43


▶️ New: watch on YouTube! Topics: -This week we welcome Jason Harrison, of Harrison Tech Consulting. -He is also heavily involved with NSITSP (National Society for IT Service Providers). -Jason takes us through the history of his consulting practice, where he handles a variety of operating systems. -We discuss how IT support is not just supporting the endpoint anymore. You have to be a security expert as well. -Jason says this is also where the NSITSP comes in. -The idea of NSITSP is that our industry wasn't represented well. It is a completely member driven organization that aims to establish high standards and ethics and improve the credibility of IT providers. -The other aspect of the organization is that legislation is inevitable, and it would serve all of our best interests to be a part of crafting that legislation. -Sam curiously asks about their code of ethics. -Compare our industry and ethics to that of a locksmith who may have privileged access and has to have their own code of ethics. -Want to get involved? Visit NSITSP and look at the membership and volunteering options. -Switching gears, we get into a conversation about cloud vs private data storage. -Understand the lack of regulation around cloud data storage. -Jason uses Kerio Connect and Kerio Control for private cloud setups. -Just call Jason “Mr. On Premises.” -Some of the questions to ask a client are their tolerance for risk, exposure, and speed needs.

Technology Untangled
Can you make AI sustainable?

Technology Untangled

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 13, 2024 32:04


In this episode we are looking at the challenges AI technology faces when it comes to becoming, and then remaining sustainable.The benefits of AI are unquestionable: from improved medical assistance and increased efficiency in the workplace, to autonomous transportation and next-level gaming experiences. But the more expansive the abilities of AI become, the more data storage that's required. That data storage uses a lot of energy. In fact, it has been predicted that AI servers could be using more energy than a country the size of the Netherlands by 2030. For HPE Chief Technologist, Matt Armstrong-Barnes, the rate at which AI has grown in recent years has had an environmental impact, and he believes that's down to people rushing into training large language models without thinking about longevity, or the need for future change. And that, in turn, has led to data being stored that is no longer needed. The sustainability issue is something that is also a main focus of Arti Garg, Lead Sustainability & Edge Architect in the office of the CTO at Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Like Matt, Arti has kept a keen eye on the exponential growth of AI data storage and the effect that is having on the environment, and agrees that the key to a more sustainable future is in how we train models. However, whilst training models well is important, the tech itself is a key component in more efficient AI. Shar Narasimhan is the director of product marketing for NVIDIA's data center GPU portfolio. He believes that a combination of openly available model optimisations and chipsets, CPUs, GPUs and intelligent data centers optimised for AI is a key piece of the puzzle in avoiding energy wastage, and making AI more sustainable all round.Sources and statistics cited in this episode:Global AI market prediction - https://www.statista.com/statistics/1365145/artificial-intelligence-market-size/#:~:text=Global%20artificial%20intelligence%20market%20size%202021%2D2030&text=According%20to%20Next%20Move%20Strategy,nearly%20two%20trillion%20U.S.%20dollars.AI could use as much energy as a small country report - https://www.cell.com/joule/fulltext/S2542-4351(23)00365-3?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS2542435123003653%3Fshowall%3DtrueIndustry responsible for 14% of earth's emissions - https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/JICES-11-2021-0106/full/htmlNumber of AI startups - https://tracxn.com/d/explore/artificial-intelligence-startups-in-united-states/__8hhT66RA16YeZhW3QByF6cGkAjrM6ertfKJuKbQIiJg/companiesAI model energy use increase - https://openai.com/research/ai-and-computeEuropean Parliament report into AI energy usage - https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2021/662906/IPOL_STU(2021)662906_EN.pdf

What Gives- The Philanthropy Podcast
Power Up Your Business with ATC- Advanced Technology Consulting

What Gives- The Philanthropy Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 20, 2023 48:23


Join us for a compelling episode of "What Gives" as Erin Satzger sits down with Nick Enger and Dave Goodwin, executives from Advanced Technology Solutions (ATC). ATC is not just your ordinary IT consulting firm; it's a powerhouse specializing in Digital Transformation across voice, network, cloud, and cybersecurity.Discover the unique Delta Model that sets ATC apart, simplifying the complex landscape of IT technologies for businesses. Nick and Dave share insights into how ATC is reshaping the digital landscape and empowering businesses to thrive in the ever-evolving tech world.But the conversation doesn't stop there. Nick Enger, also opens up about his personal journey and the creation of The Hoody Memorial Fund in memory of his close friend, Master Sergeant Corey Hood. Uncover the inspiring story of a proud Lakota West graduate turned Army hero and Golden Knight, and how the scholarship is carrying on his legacy.From cutting-edge tech solutions to heartfelt philanthropy, this episode is a unique blend of innovation, tribute, and community impact. Join us in exploring the intersection of technology and humanity with ATC and The Hoody Memorial Fund.Tune in to be inspired and informed about the incredible work happening at the intersection of technology, education, and honoring the legacy of true heroes.

AI, Government, and the Future by Alan Pentz
Shaping the Future of Work in the AI Era with Maya Sherman, an AI Policy Researcher, Ethicist, and Author

AI, Government, and the Future by Alan Pentz

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 22, 2023 27:19


Maya Sherman, an AI Policy Researcher, Ethicist, and Author, joins this episode of AI, Government, and the Future by Alan Pentz to explore the crossroads of responsible AI, the future of work, and digital transformation. They also dive into the role of governments in regulating AI and India's approach to both regulating and expanding the technology.

Learning Through Technology
Exploring Data Interoperability and Privacy in Education Technology: Insights from Susan M. Bearden, CETL and CEO of Bearden Education Technology Consulting

Learning Through Technology

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 22, 2023 37:58


The education sector has witnessed a significant transformation with the integration of technology into classrooms. Education technology, or EdTech, has revolutionized the learning and teaching process, and analysis of student data has become a critical component of the education system. In this episode of the Learning Through Technology podcast, we speak with Susan M. Bearden, CETL and CEO of Bearden Education Technology Consulting. Join Alex, Bob, and Susan as they dive into the fascinating world of data interoperability and student data privacy in education technology. Susan discusses her work at the US Department of Education and explores the benefits and challenges of data interoperability while stressing the importance of privacy protection.

Irish Tech News Audio Articles
Granite Digital to add 10 new jobs as it secures gold partnership with Kentico

Irish Tech News Audio Articles

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 22, 2023 4:21


Granite Digital, the fastest-growing digital agency in Ireland, has announced that it is growing its team in Ireland by 10 people by the end of 2024. It has also been appointed as a Kentico Gold Partner which will provide Granite with an additional 1.2M revenue over the next 12 months. This will enable Granite Digital to reach annual revenues of more than 15 million. The new roles will be in Software Engineering, Data Science (Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning), DevOps and Technology Consulting and are being made available across Granite's offices in Cork, Dublin and Galway. Powering over 35,000 websites across 120 countries, Kentico is an award-winning provider of digital experience platforms that enable businesses to drive better outcomes with fewer resources. This new partnership with Kentico will support Granite Digital's plan to drive customer acquisition and grow its business across Ireland, the US and Europe. Achieving the Gold Partnership, which signifies expertise in Kentico's technology and dedication to customer success, aligns with Granite Digital's strategic growth. Acquiring 14 digital services businesses, including Continuum, Connector, Webtrade, MediaOne, Apps Made Easy, New York-based LCM 247, and most recently Armour, further establishes Granite as Ireland's largest independent digital agency. Granite Digital's acquisition of Continuum, a Kentico Silver Partner prior to the merger, was crucial in fostering and elevating the Kentico relationship. This partnership enhances Granite Digital's ability to cater to its expanding customer base across Ireland, Europe, and the US, meeting the rising demand for immersive digital experiences on e-commerce platforms. As the only Irish headquartered Kentico Gold Partner, Granite Digital customers will benefit from a powerful set of tools, including Microsoft .Net Technologies, digital strategy development, web design, SEO, and content management system (CMS) capabilities powered by Kentico's digital experience platform. Additionally, they will receive timely software updates, technical training, and cutting-edge digital solutions. Kentico provides businesses with a leading digital experience platform (DXP) that integrates CMS and digital marketing tools and capabilities that empower teams to deliver better customer experiences through multiple channels faster. This powerful combination equips businesses to innovate their digital service offerings, resulting in increased productivity and profitability. This versatile platform caters to a wide range of industries, including, IT, computing, marketing and advertising, and financial services. Robert Carpenter, Chief Operations Officer at Granite Digital, said: "We are delighted to announce the expansion of our team in Ireland as well as our elevated partnership with Kentico. Achieving the prestigious Gold Partner status is a testament to our team's exceptional capabilities and unwavering dedication to delivering unparalleled digital solutions. Together with Kentico, we have strong growth targets in Ireland and internationally, particularly in the United States. "As the demand for digital services offerings continues to surge, we are determined to scale more companies through transformative digital solutions, propelling our own company's growth in the process. This invaluable partnership grants us access to the latest software and cutting-edge resources, ensuring our customers always benefit from highly effective digital solutions. Dominik Pintér, CEO of Kentico, said: "With an unwavering focus on customer success, a decade of experience working with Kentico, and a skilled mastery of our DXP, Granite Digital stands as a truly deserving Gold Partner. Its impressive track record of delivering forward-thinking and exceptional digital solutions for some of the largest companies, education institutes and government agencies in Ireland, speaks volumes about their capabilities. See more stories here.

Command Control Power: Apple Tech Support & Business Talk
Best Of CCP - 210: Managed Services - "A Look To The Future" withJason Harrison of Harrison Technology Consulting

Command Control Power: Apple Tech Support & Business Talk

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 14, 2023 69:24


Sam Valencia, Jerry Zigmont and Joe Saponare discuss working with Apple technology and clients. Drawn from their combined experience of over 20 years in the Apple Consultants Network, they discuss technical support issues both with the technology and working with clients.

Staying Connected
Verizon and HCL Strategic Partnership Update

Staying Connected

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 15, 2023 8:04


On this episode of Staying Connected we discuss what we've learned since the August 10th announcement of the strategic partnership between Verizon Business and HCL Tech. In this 8-minute podcast, David Lee, TC2's Technology Director joins Tony Mangino to provide insight on what we now know and what Verizon's rationale and motivations may be in forming this partnership. If you would like to learn more about our experience in this space, please visit our Technology Consulting and Strategy Development, Strategic Sourcing, and Success Stories webpages.

Business Bros
Unlocking Efficiency Through Innovative ERP Solutions with Ben Cole

Business Bros

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 7, 2023 26:01


1213 Get ready for an insightful episode that delves into the world of ERP solutions and their transformative impact on businesses. Join us as we sit down with an expert who's been at the forefront of Public Accounting, Technology Consulting, and ERP implementation. This journey, marked by a passion for automation, integration, and user experience enhancement, led to the establishment of a company in 2021. In today's conversation, we'll explore how ERP solutions, especially Microsoft Dynamics 365, can revolutionize business operations. With a background in FinTech and a keen focus on user-friendly tools, our guest shares experiences and expertise in optimizing efficiency within ERP systems. Through the company, productivity-enhancing tools are introduced that empower businesses to thrive in a streamlined manner. __________ Go to www.BusinessBros.biz to be a guest on the show or to find out more on how we can help you get more customers! #Businesspodcasts #smallbusinesspodcast #businessmarketingtips #businessgrowthtips #strategicthinking #businessmastery #successinbusiness #businesshacks #marketingstrategist #wealthcreators #businessstrategies #businesseducation #businesstools #businesspodcast #businessmodel #growthmarketing #businesshelp #businesssupport #salesfunnel #buildyourbusiness #podcastinglife #successgoals #wealthcreation #marketingcoach #smallbusinesstips #businessmarketing #marketingconsultant #entrepreneurtips #businessstrategy #growyourbusiness Want to create live streams like this? Check out StreamYard: https://streamyard.com/pal/d/6164371927990272 --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/businessbrospod/support

Phoenix Business Radio
A Closer Look at Arizona’s Shifting IT Industry E40

Phoenix Business Radio

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 28, 2023


A Closer Look at Arizona’s Shifting IT Industry E40 Should we build out our internal IT department or work with a managed service provider? Should we onshore or offshore IT support? How can we attract qualified IT talent? The July 2023 episode of the Arizona Technology Council’s AZTechCast podcast featured experts including Alex Cole, CEO […] The post A Closer Look at Arizona’s Shifting IT Industry E40 appeared first on Business RadioX ®.

The Digital Supply Chain podcast
From Paper to Cloud: How Tech is Revolutionising Supply Chains with Jason Hehman

The Digital Supply Chain podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 21, 2023 25:56 Transcription Available


In today's episode of the Digital Supply Chain podcast my guest  is Jason Hehman, who is the vertical lead for Industrial Innovation and IoT at TXI.Jason shared with us some fascinating stories of how digital transformation is reshaping industries. Our discussion began with the story of Dixon, an organization over a hundred years old, which transitioned from individual environmental monitoring systems to a comprehensive cloud-based solution.Then, Jason walked us through a project with Motor City Systems where a mobile messaging app was developed to alleviate the paperwork load for truck drivers, thereby enhancing job satisfaction and reducing turnover rates.One of the key takeaways from our conversation is Jason's approach to change management. He outlines the significance of aligning stakeholders, defining the purpose of innovation, and integrating teams. These insights are invaluable for anyone navigating their digital transformation journey.Jason also highlights how new technologies such as generative AI are influencing how organizations approach their innovation strategies. It's all about being on a journey, not being caught up in the hype of the latest technology.To wrap up, Jason and I exchange some final thoughts on the future of digital innovation. This is an episode filled with practical insights that you won't want to miss. So tune in, listen, learn and let's continue our journey on the digital supply chain together! And don't forget you can catch the video version of this episode at https://youtu.be/c5tUGzlYxDMUntil next time, stay innovative, folks!Rooted in RetailMade for Indie Retailers! Navigate the retail landscape with expert advice & insider tips.Listen on: Apple Podcasts SpotifySupport the showPodcast supportersI'd like to sincerely thank this podcast's generous supporters: Lorcan Sheehan Krishna Kumar Christophe Kottelat Olivier Brusle Robert Conway Alexandra Katopodis Alicia Farag Joël VANDI And remember you too can Support the Podcast - it is really easy and hugely important as it will enable me to continue to create more excellent Digital Supply Chain episodes like this one.CSCMP European Conference Registration pagePodcast Sponsorship Opportunities:If you/your organisation is interested in sponsoring this podcast - I have several options available. Let's talk!FinallyIf you have any comments/suggestions or questions for the podcast - feel free to just send me a direct message on Twitter/LinkedIn. If you liked this show, please don't forget to rate and/or review it. It makes a big difference to help new people discover it. Thanks for listening....

InsTech London Podcast
Daren Rudd: VP Consulting - Head of Insurance Business & Technology Consulting, UK, CGI: Computers, people and the love of dancing (248)

InsTech London Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 4, 2023 21:44


With all the new technology emerging - and insurers thirsty for knowledge - there's a growing need for someone to help figure out how to join it all together. Robin Merttens talks to Daren Rudd, VP Consulting - Head of Insurance Business and Technology Consulting, UK at CGI. You'll hear about Daren's personal experience and how he and his colleagues are helping insurers engage with new and innovative technology, data and analytics. Topics covered include: The most notable developments in how insurers engage with digital from the last decade Why technology is the new Lego Why we are looking in the wrong place to solve the industry's data problem Success stories in implementing IOT for insurers Go digital but allow time to dance  The book recommendation from this week's guest Daren is Digital Darwinism: Survival of the Fittest in the Age of Business Disruption by Tom Goodwin. If you like what you're hearing, please leave us a review on whichever platform you use or contact Matthew Grant on LinkedIn. Sign up to the InsTech newsletter for a fresh view on the world every Wednesday morning. To find out more about InsTech, our membership and offerings visit www.instech.co or contact us hello@instech.co Continuing Professional Development - Learning Objectives InsTech is accredited by The Chartered Insurance Institute (CII). By listening to any InsTech podcast, you can claim up to 0.5 hours towards your CPD scheme. By the end of this podcast, you should be able to meet the following Learning Objectives: List some of the recent technological advancements in the insurance industry Explain how the nature of technology is changing and why our relationships with technology must develop with it Outline a range of examples of successful IOT implementation by insurers If your organisation is a member of InsTech and you would like to receive a quarterly summary of the CPD hours you have earned, visit the Episode 248 page of the InsTech website or email cpd@instech.co to let us know you have listened to this podcast. To help us measure the impact of the learning, we would be grateful if you would take a minute to complete a quick feedback survey.

DriveThruHR - HR Conversations
Designing and Developing Technology Solutions | Episode 2 - "Intro to HR Tech"

DriveThruHR - HR Conversations

Play Episode Listen Later May 20, 2023 43:00


DrivethruHR is pleased to announce the airing of a special 4-episode series - “Introduction to HR Tech for HR Professionals.” In episode 2 - From Concept to Reality: Designing and Developing Technology Solutions - Robin talks with Caleb Fullhart, SVP, Technology Consulting with Cielo about what HR professionals should understand about the process of creating and refining technology solutions, including ideation, prototyping, testing, and iteration. Whether you're building your tech stack, implementing a new solution, or updating your HR technology systems, Caleb provides some items for your consideration.  this series is sponsored by Humareso

DriveThruHR - HR Conversations
The Foundations of an HR Tech Stack | Episode 1 - "Intro to HR Tech"

DriveThruHR - HR Conversations

Play Episode Listen Later May 11, 2023 34:00


DrivethruHR is pleased to announce the airing of a special 4-episode series - “Introduction to HR Tech for HR Professionals.” In episode 1 - Building Blocks: The Foundations of an HR Tech Stack – Robin talks with Caleb Fullhart, SVP, Technology Consulting with Cielo about the basic components and infrastructure necessary to build a successful HR tech stack including considerations for items such as hardware, software, networking, and security. Whether you're building your tech stack, implementing a new solution, or updating your HR technology systems, Caleb provides some items for your consideration.   this series is sponsored by Humareso  

The Dude Therapist
Just 5% More w/ Jason Goldberg

The Dude Therapist

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 27, 2023 49:56


What does an award-winning entrepreneur, a TEDx Speaker, a bacon-atarian (that's avegetarian who still eats bacon), a funky sock lover, a former rapper (who opened forthe Wu-Tang Clan - YES, really!) and a previously 332lb man (who has since lost over130lbs despite his affinity for bacon) have in common?They are all the same guy! Jason “JG” Goldberg is a Global Keynote Speaker on Future-Proof Leadership and is aMental Performance and Leadership Coach for Celebrities, Change Makers, and CEOs. He is also the author of the #1 International Best-Selling book on Self-Leadership entitled “Prison Break”.Jason has been a featured expert on media outlets, including ABC, CBS, and FOX, and teaching personal growth and business for Mindvalley, the world's largest online education platform for transformation, with over 10 million students worldwide.After spending 15 years in Technology Consulting and co-founding multiple start-ups(including one in partnership with NASA and the Space Shuttle program), he nowblends his signature mix of transformational wisdom, captivating storytelling,practical business mentorship, and belly-busting humor to make personal growth less“personal growth-y” and to leave everyone he meets with at least 5% more joy thanwhen he found them!Jason is a highly sought-after keynote speaker at conferences globally and has shared the stage with some of the world's greatest thought leaders in human potential and peak performance, including Jason Silva (Host of Nat Geo's “Brain Games”), Dr. SeanStephenson (The 3 Foot Giant), Don Miguel Ruiz (The Four Agreements), VishenLakhiani (CEO of Mindvalley), Steven Kotler (Stealing Fire), Marisa Peer (the UK'spsychotherapist to the stars) and so many others that he hopes will impress you ifthese other ones don't! ;)His mission is to guide you to LIGHTEN UP so you can LEVEL UP and, to help youdo that; you can get a free copy of Jason's books and listen to his podcast here:http://TheJasonGoldberg.com/Podcasthttp://GetPrisonBreak.com/dudeSupport the show

North Fulton Business Radio
LIVE from SOAHR 2023: Robin Stenzel, Chief People Officer, Sparq, and 2023 Board Chair, SHRM-Atlanta

North Fulton Business Radio

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 3, 2023


LIVE from SOAHR 2023: Robin Stenzel, Chief People Officer, Sparq, and 2023 Board Chair, SHRM-Atlanta (North Fulton Business Radio, Episode 628) Robin Stenzel, Chief People Officer at Sparq and SHRM-Atlanta’s 2023 Board Chair, joined North Fulton Business Radio host John Ray LIVE at the Business RadioX® remote at SOAHR 2023. Robin discussed Sparq, remote work […] The post LIVE from SOAHR 2023: Robin Stenzel, Chief People Officer, Sparq, and 2023 Board Chair, SHRM-Atlanta appeared first on Business RadioX ®.

The Louis and Kyle Show
Kelley W. Powell: Partnering With Private Equity To Grow Your Business

The Louis and Kyle Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 26, 2022 66:22


Kelley W. Powell is CEO and Partner of MacLaurin Group, a company providing technology operating partner services to portfolios of private equity companies. Kelley is an avid mentor, angel investor, and chairwoman for the da Vinci Center for Innovation Angels Advisory Board at VCU. She's also a board member of the Richmond chapter of the Association for Corporate Growth, and in 2020 was appointed by Governor Northam to serve as a member of the Virginia Council on Women.Even if you are just starting out and PE is not in the near future, Kelley's leadership lessons on how to grow a company are worth the read for any entrepreneur!Connect With Kelley:→ Kelley's Website: https://kelleywpowell.com/→ Kelley's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kelleywpowell/→ Kelley's Twitter: https://twitter.com/ke11eyp?lang=en→ Kelley's Book: https://www.amazon.com/Courage-Lose-Sight-Shore-Confidence/dp/1544514697Help The Louis and Kyle Show:If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with a friend or leave a review!→ Leave a review: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-louis-and-kyle-show/id1504333834→ Follow Louis on Twitter: https://twitter.com/LouisShulman→ Follow Kyle on Twitter: https://twitter.com/_kylebishop→ Follow The Show on Twitter: https://twitter.com/LouisKyleShow→ Drop us an email: Louis and Kyle Show [at] gmail → Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/louiskyleshow/→ Follow on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/65567567/→ Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCb6qBiV1HAYcep87nKJmGhA→ Read Louis' Newsletter: https://louisshulman.substack.com/ Special Thanks To Our Sponsor, VASA, The Virtual Assistant Staffing Agency:If you need some extra hands to free up your time, let VASA help you with hiring for administrative, technical, and creative work. That's graphic design, cold-callers, social media managers, sales reps, video editors, admin assistants, and more.Free up your time to focus on your highest impact work, and learn more about VASA at vastaffing.agency or by scheduling a free strategy session here: https://calendly.com/vastaffing/strategy-session-lk-podcast

Interviews: Tech and Business
Business Transformation: Lessons and Practical Advice

Interviews: Tech and Business

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 23, 2022 40:58


#businesstransformation #consulting #digitaltransformation Errol Gardner is Global Vice Chair for Consulting at EY, which has 350,000 people and is one of the largest professional services firms in the world. Errol joins CXOTalk to share his insights about the current state of business and leadership and offer practical advice on leading transformation initiatives at large organizations.Read the full transcript: https://www.cxotalk.com/episode/business-transformation-lessons-practical-adviceCXOTalk newsletter: https://www.cxotalk.com/subscribeGiven Errol's experience working with EY's many global clients, this is an important conversation for anyone interesting in transformation.The conversation includes these topics:-- About EY and the role of Vice Chair for consulting-- What is business transformation?-- What are the goals of business transformation?-- What is the organizational transformation mindset?-- What are common elements of transformation initiatives across large organizations?-- What are the success factors for cultural transformation?-- How can business leaders support change efforts during the transformation process?-- Why do organizations start a digital transformation journey?-- How should organizations start their business transformation process?-- What is the role of IT in digital transformation?-- How can organizations overcome digital transformation challenges?-- Why is cultural transformation so important?-- Why are diversity and diverse teams so important to successful business transformation?-- Advice to business leaders-- Advice to middle managersErrol Gardner leads EY Global Consulting with over 100,000 professionals worldwide. In this role, he advises clients on transforming businesses, enabled by technology and data, with a human-centered approach. He joined EY as a partner in 2009 and has held several leadership positions, including the EY Global Leader for Technology Consulting. Errol has 30 years of professional services experience, and has served clients in oil and gas, power and utilities, and has focused on banking and insurance in recent years. Errol is passionate about diversity, equity and inclusion, and co-chairs EY's Global Social Equity Taskforce (GSET), to raise consciousness on social equity inside and outside of EY. He is a member of the Executive Leadership Council, an organization committed to increasing the number of C-suite Black executives on corporate boards. Errol is an Associated Chartered Accountant (ACA) and holds a BA in Industrial Economics from the University of Nottingham, UK.

HFS PODCASTS
Unfiltered Stories | Enterprise adoption of low code

HFS PODCASTS

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 20, 2022 32:03


In this edition of Unfiltered Stories, Ralph Aboujaoude Diaz, Practice Leader at HFS connects with Ben Rayner, Head of Analytics and Process Optimisation at Citi Enterprise Operations and Technology, Seng Yue Yau, Head of Digital Transformation and TBS IT at Takeda, and Rui Gonçalves, Head of Technology Consulting at KPMG Portugal & Global Low Code and Automation Lead to get their insights & perspectives on how low code does or doesn't fit into their digital journey. Low code is a hot topic in the market right now for software development teams and the potential for citizen development (non-IT developers). HFS with support from KPMG is exploring how European firms are grappling with low code, the opportunities, challenges, and successes. In this session, Ralph will moderate a discussion with Ben, Yau, and Rui about our recent study that involved HFS speaking to 15 technology leaders about their firm's adoption of low code. Ralph, Ben, Yau, and Rui cover a range of topics, including: How does low code fit into your organization's technology or software development practice(s)? What are the drivers for low code adoption? How does low code fit with RPA, or how does it fit into personal (citizen developer task automation) versus business or enterprise-wide solution development? What were the challenges they had with data when it came to low code? What role can a partner play in helping with a company's low code adoption? What advice would they offer a technology or business leader on adopting low code in their organization?

The SYCK Career Podcast,
Ep 21 SYCK Tricks for "Multipotentialites": An Interview with AWS's Harold Pietri

The SYCK Career Podcast,

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 8, 2022 55:18


Determined to receive prestigious job offers from his preferred companies, Harold Pietri was very strategic in the steps he took to get there. Harold finished his undergrad work in Venezuela before moving to the United States to get his MBA. He wasn't done traveling yet though as he applied to his dream company in Spain to stand out and worked hard to end up back in the states. Now, Harold is an Enterprise Account Executive at Amazon Web Services. In this episode, Harold shares his journey and some strategies he used to get multiple job offers (in multiple fields), and some advice to others working towards their dreams.   IN THIS EPISODE: [00:57] Harold shares some of his job background and how he knows Alan [09:57] Interview tips for people who have a wide range of experiences (multipotentialites) [13:15] Harold's story of moving from Venezuela to the United States [27:56] How Harold went about securing other job offers as leverage [33:10] How Harold chose AWS over other job offers [45:40] Advice for students in MBAs to get internships and job offers   KEY TAKEAWAYS: You have to spread your net wide and work hard to land a good job.  It takes preparation, creativity, networking, and effort in the job search. Having multiple diverse experiences can be beneficial for your job, but you have to be creative and know how to market yourself to show you are specialized as well. There is more than one path to get to where you want to be.  It can take some creativity and thinking outside the box to get there. BIO: Harold Pietri is currently an Enterprise Account Executive at Amazon Web Services. He recently graduated with his MBA from The University of Rochester's Simon Business School, where he specialized in Technology Consulting, Strategy & Pricing. He's owned and operated businesses in e-commerce and retail, and worked as Chief Sales Marketing Officer for a digital marketing agency in LATAM. Harold believes in a breadth of experiences and following your curiosity. RESOURCE LINKS SYCK Podcast "Multipotentialite" TED Talk “Great on the Job” book by Jodi Glickman Harold Pietri LinkedIn Simon Business School Website  

The Wireless Way, with Chris Whitaker
Bob Hoke, Telarus Partner that went from financial consulting to technology consulting, hear how the two serve his clients well. Focus on the "outcome", not the "income".

The Wireless Way, with Chris Whitaker

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 6, 2022 29:09


Bob Hoke- https://www.linkedin.com/in/bobbyhoke/Learn more about Disruptive Innovations.- https://www.disruptiveinnovations.net/Great conversation about Bob's early days and how he became the managing partner at Disruptive Innovations. The question is, have you ever stepped foot on Staten Island? He shares how he leverages the total business health into his financial and technology consulting. He shares how AI and ML are having a positive effect on Contact Center solutions. Love his favorite quote:The will to win is not as important as the will to prepare to win- Vince LombardiBob is Managing Partner and co-heads the consultative effort at Disruptive Innovations, an independent digital business and technology consulting firm. He increases his clients' return on working capital through enhancement, optimization and cost reduction of IT, telecommunications, and cloud technologies. Prior to becoming Managing Partner at Disruptive Innovations, Bob was Director of Strategic Partnerships at Resourcive, responsible for creating partnerships in Private Equity to enable transformation of IT across multiple verticals within their portfolios. Bob also spent considerable time there as an Account Leader, spearheading two dozen engagements that enabled his clients to capitalize on much better technologies and realize millions in savings. His work has also expanded into the realm of data analytics, AI and ML. In addition to his experience in technology, Bob has spent 15+ years in financial services including investment banking, trading, and financial/risk advisory. Bob holds a Bachelor of Science Degree (B.S.) from Cornell University, majoring in Applied Economics and Business Management. Bob is also a graduate of the Business Analytics Program at Harvard Business School. He is married and they have two sons. Support the show

Murder, Mystery & Mayhem Laced with Morality
Elgon Williams-marketing guru & fantasy/sci-fi author shares his wisdom & expertise

Murder, Mystery & Mayhem Laced with Morality

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 4, 2022 36:34


Born in Springfield, Ohio, Elgon Williams grew up on a farm near the town of South Charleston and the village of Selma in rural southeastern Clark County, "...about two miles from nowhere and between cornfields." He graduated from Shawnee High School in 1974. In the fall of that year, he began studies at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, receiving a BA in Mass Communication in 1978. Later, in 1981, he received a degree in Marketing Administration from The University of Texas in Austin. After serving as a Chinese Linguist in the USAF, he worked in Retail Management for much of his adult life. He also has experience in Computer Repair, Technology Consulting, Radio & Television Production, Journalism, Advertising, Public Relations, and Sales Management. His publications include FRIED WINDOWS (IN A LIGHT WHITE SAUCE), BECOMING THUPERMAN, HOMER UNDERBY, THUPERHEROES, and NINJA BREAD CASTLES, which blend urban fantasy and science fiction. Upcoming publishing projects include DAMMERWALD, the first installment of The Wolfcat Chronicles, and DEADMEN DON'T WEAR WATCHES. Stay connected with Elgon on Instagram @elgonewolf You can listen to the podcast on Apple Podcast, Spotify, Google Podcast, or visit my website www.drkatherinehayes.com

Consulting Lifestyle
#118 - Technology Consulting: How To Do Data Migration on IT Consulting Projects?

Consulting Lifestyle

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 23, 2022 16:09


Data Migration is one of the core services a technology consulting consultant can offer to its clients. The process of migrating data can be daunting to the uninitiated. There are many reasons why an organization's data needs to be migrated. In this episode, we're dealing with a fictional technology consulting project and we'll talk about the importance of data migration, its influence on the success of a project, and what is like to have a data management career. NOTE: The project context is usually fictive and the case is not necessarily realistic because I am doing it for a simple explanation but is proportionate to real-life data migration cases.Topics covered:What is ETLVFictive Project ContextExtract TransformLoadValidateThe importance of data migration in a project The importance of Data Governance Conclusion on having a data management career---Get in touch with your host Diogène Ntirandekura at:Email: info@consultinglifestyle.fmEmail: info@erphappy.comLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/diogenentirandekuraSupport the show

Human Capital Innovations (HCI) Podcast
S38E26 - Employers Offer More Flexible Benefits But Eye Cost Containment, with Maria M. Trapenasso

Human Capital Innovations (HCI) Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 7, 2022 32:30


In this HCI Podcast episode, Dr. Jonathan H. Westover talks with Maria M. Trapenasso about recent NFP data about how employers are offering more flexible benefits but carefully eying cost containment. See the video here: https://youtu.be/ienxg9NT_No. Maria M. Trapenasso (https://www.linkedin.com/in/maria-m-trapenasso-shrm-scp/) is the VP, National Practice Leader of HR Solutions for NFP. Maria leads the HR consulting practice and offers NFP's clients strategic guidance on HR related functions such as organizational harmonization, leave management and employment practices. Her expertise is in the areas of HR audits and compliance and assists clients in identifying and creating strategic HR policies and procedures. Maria also has extensive expertise in assisting start-ups create a solid HR infrastructure to accommodate rapid growth and expansion. Maria has over 26 years of Human Resources experience working in various industries such as Corporate and Residential Real Estate, Non-Profit, Technology Consulting, Finance and Insurance. In her prior roles, Maria specialized in assessing HR organizations to create strategic alignment with company goals, implementing comprehensive and compliant policies and procedures and developing dynamic training programs to meet developmental goals. Maria holds a Senior Certified Professional designation from the Society of Human Resources Management, and she has been a professional member of SHRM and the National Association of Female Executives since 1998. Having extensive practice in the corporate benefits market, Maria also holds a NY State Insurance license for Health, Life and Accident Insurance. NFP HR Solutions provides clients with access to HR consulting professionals and information systems expertise. We assess and recommend workforce practices, policies and technology so our client's organizations will run more efficiently and effectively. Please consider supporting the podcast on Patreon and leaving a review wherever you listen to your podcasts! Check out BetterHelp.com/HCI to explore plans and options! Go to cardiotabs.com/innovations and use code innovations to get a free Mental Health Pack featuring Cardiotabs Omega-3 Lemon Minis and Curcumin when you sign up for a subscription. Check out Zapier.com/HCI to explore their business automations! Check out the HCI Academy: Courses, Micro-Credentials, and Certificates to Upskill and Reskill for the Future of Work! Check out the LinkedIn Alchemizing Human Capital Newsletter. Check out Dr. Westover's book, The Future Leader. Check out Dr. Westover's book, 'Bluer than Indigo' Leadership. Check out Dr. Westover's book, The Alchemy of Truly Remarkable Leadership. Check out the latest issue of the Human Capital Leadership magazine. Each HCI Podcast episode (Program, ID No. 592296) has been approved for 0.50 HR (General) recertification credit hours toward aPHR™, aPHRi™, PHR®, PHRca®, SPHR®, GPHR®, PHRi™ and SPHRi™ recertification through HR Certification Institute® (HRCI®). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Technology Untangled
World poverty: Is technology the great leveller?

Technology Untangled

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 28, 2022 33:39


Since 1990, the global rates of extreme poverty have gone from around 40% to around 10%, and ending World Poverty entirely by 2030 is one of the UN's Key Sustainable Development Goals, announced in 2015. However, progress is slowing, and 710 million people around the world still live in extreme poverty - currently earning below $1.90 per day. So how can technology help? In this episode, we'll be meeting some of the people and organisations aiming to eradicate poverty through the use of technology.The power of connectivityOne of the most important ways in which rural economies can grow and become more efficient and productive is to get access to communications technology. Isabelle Mauro is the Head of Information, Communications & Technology (ICT) Industries at the World Economic Forum. The WEF is the world body bringing together the public and private sectors, and has been pushing for greater co-operation between the public sector and telecoms providers to work on lifting developing communities out of hunger and poverty. The results speak for themselves: Research suggests a 10% improvement in mobile connectivity can add 1.5% to a country's GDP. The challenge is to provide a financial incentive for companies and Governments to reach out to poorer areas where the business case for connection might not be so obvious.Harnessing complex skills and technology for unconnected communitiesOne of the firms leading the charge to bring rural communities into the digital age is Hewlett Packard Enterprise. Brian Tippens is their Head of sustainability, and has been working closely with WEF and partners around the world to enable remote and disconnected communities to take advantage of HPE's experience in data and connectivity - particularly in encouraging skills sharing and industrial expertise among NGOs and other bodies. At the core of their philanthropic ambitions, however, is to allow and enable local communities to help provide their own solutions to their own problems, encouraging long-term, sustainable and useful programs of change to emerge.Getting educatedOne of the ways in which communities can be enabled to develop their own long-term solutions is through education and upskilling the population to take advantage of the opportunities offered by technology. Leading that charge is the Micro:bit Educational Foundation, which provides expandable, programmable micro-computers to schools around the world, alongside locally-led educational programs and learning resources. Gareth Stockdale is the organisations CEO and tells us that the democratisation of technology through enabling local participation is key to lifting people out of poverty, providing pathways to future skilled careers, and to enabling self-sufficiency among remote or impoverished communities. Whether it's educating children or upskilling adults to make the most of opportunities in their community and work in collaboration with international organisations, there's plenty being done to help end world poverty by 2030. Will it be enough? Time will tell. But the appetite seems to be real for long-lasting change.Key takeaways: Even small improvements to digital connectivity can have a lasting impact on local and national economic growth and resilience. Most people have the potential to get connected, and doing so can drastically improve lives in remote communities. The best way to lift the world out of poverty is through public-private partnerships which enable and upskill communities to create their own solutions and take long-term advantage of new technologies. Western organisations have a responsibility not to parachute in solutions, but to work on the ground with communities to enable them to make best use of the technology on offer, through collaboration and education. Links and resources:The UN Sustainable Development GoalsThe World Economic Forum's Edison AllianceTech Impact 2030 - How HPE is driving positive change through technologyThe micro:bit Educational FoundationThe impact of digital technology usage on economic growth in Africa - from the Elsevier Public Health Emergency CollectionBrian Tippens on LinkedInIsabelle Mauro on LinkedInGareth Stockdale on LinkedIn

She Said Privacy/He Said Security
Implementing a Secure Identity and Access Management Program

She Said Privacy/He Said Security

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 2, 2022 21:51


David Chan is a Managing Director within EY's Technology Consulting practice, where he helps entrepreneurs, companies, and government entities solve their most pressing cybersecurity challenges. David has over 16 years of experience in cybersecurity and identity and access management. He is currently focused on security reviews of Web3 and implementing blockchain at large organizations. In this episode… When it comes to cyberspace, digital identity is expanding. To adopt this form of identity, businesses need to adhere to the privacy regulations surrounding its use. So, how can your business implement user-friendly identity and access management programs that maintain privacy and security?  Blockchain encourages user transparency and identity security. With blockchain, users can authenticate their identity without using passwords, ensuring an effortless and secure experience. And, by integrating decentralized identifiers (DIDs) into your business, you can save money on privacy and security while giving users consent over their information and identity. In today's episode of She Said Privacy/He Said Security, Jodi and Justin Daniels sit down with David Chan, Managing Director of EY's Technology Consulting practice, to talk about integrating identity programs into your business. They cover the three types of identity and access management programs, how businesses can adopt DID while adhering to privacy and security, and the benefits of implementing blockchain into your identity programs.

Better Call Daddy
217. Become A Pirate! Kindness Is Cool. Russ Johns

Better Call Daddy

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 28, 2022 43:51


Why did that happen to me?  How you see a circumstance, happening to you versus for you, is how you learn and persevere!  How are you going to move forward and pick up the pieces?  Today's guest, Russ Johns has done this multiple times!  You can be better at moving forward but can't change the past.  It's so hard and painful when people don't see things the way you do!  Everyone has a certain level of pirate in them, kindness is cool smiles are free!   Better Call Daddy: The Safe Space For Controversy. Be SEEN | Be HEARD | Be TALKED ABOUT EVERYONE HAS A GIFT, A MISSION, and VALUE… Sometimes we need help in creating our message with WORDS, IMAGES, AUDIO & VIDEO YOU can Be SEEN, Be HEARD and TALKED ABOUT… Using Live Streaming Media. Let's face it. It's not always easy. it feels like 10,000 details and technology can be daunting. Technology can be overwhelming if you want to produce Content, Publish MEDIA, and Expand Your Brand. You don't have the time to discover everything you need to know to be recognized as the AUTHORITY YOU ARE Work with me to create an ONLINE IMPACT without the technical overwhelm… SHOW UP | GO LIVE | BUILD AUTHORITY I WILL help YOU if you are Interested In:

AZ Big Podcast with Michael & Amy
Ep. 25 - Dieter Gable talks Technology Consulting

AZ Big Podcast with Michael & Amy

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 14, 2022 15:58


Dieter Gable, CEO at TBConsulting talks cyber-attacks and scams, and the importance of staying educated about cyber security.

The EPAM Continuum Podcast Network
Silo Busting 32: We're Talking Developer Experience with Sandra Loughlin & Pavel Azaletskiy

The EPAM Continuum Podcast Network

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 11, 2021 23:56


Let's talk experience! In business today, we speak endlessly about digital experience, customer experience, employee experience, patient experience, provider experience, and so on. But one of the newest forms of experience to walk on the scene is still somewhat obscure: developer experience. With an increased focus on digital business, it's really important for organizations to think about the professional and personal well-being of the people developing software for them. The latest episode of Silo Busting double-clicks on this highly relevant topic. Listen up, and you'll get the full download from Pavel Azaletskiy, EPAM's Director of Technology Consulting and Head of Engineering Excellence Consulting in North America. He's in conversation with Sandra Loughlin, Managing Principal and Head of Client Learning & Talent Enablement at EPAM. Loughlin says: “Developer experience is about keeping developers happy and successful in their jobs” and that it involves various components: tools, culture, belief in job, and organizational vision. Azaletskiy concurs and notes that developer experience isn't just for companies exclusively focused on tech. “Every company right now is a technology company,” he adds. “Without efficient delivery and good developer experience it's very hard to compete.” This plugged-in conversation examines he cultural aspects of DevX, the interesting idea of citizen development, the essential elements that developers seek in a job, the relevant benchmarks companies should consider, and more. Experience it for yourself! Host: Alison Kotin Engineer: Kyp Pilalas Producer: Ken Gordon

Chatting with Christine: Tech Careers & Badass Women
How to get a Job in Technology Consulting: Application Strategy | CAREER COACHING WITH CHRISTINE

Chatting with Christine: Tech Careers & Badass Women

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 9, 2021 35:20


I worked with Ivan on a job application strategy to enter into technology consulting! Sometimes pivoting in isn't that hard if you think about the important and relevant skills needed and pull it from everywhere, not just your work experience! We also spoke about how to stand out by networking (and some juicy tips using Linkedin), as well as the interview process and how to prepare! I've covered in previous episodes about case interviews and my YouTube channel also has a lot of resources on that! Check out PrepLounge as well! If you sign up today, you can get 15% off your Premium Membership with CHRISTINE15! PrepLounge offers the best platform and community to prepare for the case interview in management consulting You get access to the case library, framework articles, and further resources and interactive tools that will be helpful throughout your case prep You can improve your performance through meetings with other candidates and coaching sessions with top consultants. Sign up for your Premium Membership today and ACE that case interview! https://bit.ly/3nOR7dB DISCLAIMER: Links included in this description might be affiliate links. If you purchase a product or service with the links that I provide I may receive a small commission. There is no additional charge to you! Thank you for supporting me so I can continue to provide you with free content each week! FOLLOW ME: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ChristineWong Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/christine.innovates Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christineywong Facebook: https://www.fb.me/ChristineWongFB Website: https://christineywong.me/ --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/christinewong/support

Chatting with Christine: Tech Careers & Badass Women
Mock Technology Consulting Case Interview: Tech Transformation | CAREER COACHING WITH CHRISTINE

Chatting with Christine: Tech Careers & Badass Women

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 20, 2021 41:03


Follow Along! Did you know case interviews are usually different for technology consulting case interviews? In today's video, we go through a real mock interview with Diego so you can join along and learn as well! Follow Along with the Case: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_YEuYX2_W4_4gWG_LLBWdcejR1BWyPlI9Fq_eUFfEns/edit?usp=sharing If you would like access to more cases, resources, interview and recruitment forums, join the Technology Consulting Community which is currently the home to 2000+ aspiring and current technology consultants from 70+ countries! https://www.facebook.com/groups/techconsulting Would you like to be on the next FREE career coaching session for anything from general career advice, mock interviews, resume and cover letter interviews, and job success advice? We're doing this on the YouTube channel so more people can follow along! Apply here: https://forms.gle/JUWsG1kX1gdDXFt77 Learn more about the program first? Watch this: https://youtu.be/0RVbfjn8dl8 Not your thing? I also do paid private coaching sessions, so DM me on Instagram at christine.innovates! FOLLOW ME: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ChristineWong Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/christine.innovates Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christineywong Facebook: https://www.fb.me/ChristineWongFB Website: https://christineywong.me/ --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/christinewong/support

Chatting with Christine: Tech Careers & Badass Women
Manal Meer | Pivoting into Technology Consulting from a Science Background | WOMEN OF INSPIRATION

Chatting with Christine: Tech Careers & Badass Women

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 29, 2021 38:32


Manal Meer studied biology and psychology in University of Toronto and then an MBA at McMaster University where she discovered consulting during an internship. Recently pivoting into technology consulting at Ernst & Young in Canada as a Strategy & Technology Transformation Consultant, she walks us through her journey, is an MBA worth it, how she pivoted herself, and even how it's like and some tips she has for those starting their jobs in a virtual or remote setting! Watch the YouTube Video interview here: https://youtu.be/70XUxty6guk Follow Manal Meer: Linkedin: www.LinkedIn.com/in/manalmeer Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/manalmeer/ Clubhouse: https://www.joinclubhouse.com/@manalmeer FOLLOW ME: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/ChristineWong Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/christine.innovates Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christineywong Facebook: https://www.fb.me/ChristineWongFB Website: https://christineywong.me/ --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/christinewong/support