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The expert consultants on staff with Innovation Vista bring C-level Technology leadership experience to their roles and insights for our clients.
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What CXOs should know about Digital Transformation

Digital transformation is a buzzword which has crept into the language of business in recent years, and the definition of the term varies greatly. At Innovation Vista, we define “digital transformation” as the effort to use technology to grow revenue. Digital Transformation - A Broader Vision for IT Digital transformation is driven by a broader view of Information Technology than its traditional goals of increasing efficiency and automation to help businesses save money and boost productivity. Today, technology has advanced in ways that allow businesses to do much more than what was possible in the past. Even in its traditional scope, IT has become a major component of most businesses' success. Most corporate executives (CXOs) are comfortable with it in this shape and size, but when there’s talk of re-envisioning IT, even with the promise of greater impact, CXOs can become understandably nervous. Hesitations on Digital Transformation One of the [...]

By |2020-01-06T00:36:05-06:00December 14th, 2019|Digital Transformation|
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Should IT Leadership enter the Gig Economy?

With the recent growth of the gig economy in all kinds of sectors and roles, it bears asking whether this kind of structure might be a cheaper option for more companies searching for top-level IT leadership.  Answering this question will have some nuances, but it seems clear that going with a "gig CIO" is worth considering, and is likely better than at least one all-too-common mistake in choosing heads of IT. When you hear “gig economy,” likely you imagine transactions with Uber or Upwork—companies that operate under a “pay by the drink” approach.  It's part of a larger trend which also encompasses the Cloud revolution, where you pay per month for the specific amount of compute and storage you've utilized.  In general, participants in our economy are increasingly preferring to pay for only what they use, in many categories of goods and services.   Approximately 57 million people (36% of U.S. [...]

By |2019-11-22T09:48:12-06:00November 22nd, 2019|Transitional Leadership|
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Need an Expert Speaker on Innovation?

Searching for a keynote speaker for your conference or seminar?  Looking for an expert on Innovation or IT strategy to stoke the creative fires of your group? Many of Innovation Vista's expert consultants are also expert public speakers! Sometimes an outside expert can bring just the new perspective that's needed to get your group thinking differently.  Any of our core services or areas or expertise are fair game: Innovation IT Strategy Innovating Beyond Efficiency Artificial Intelligence Digital Transformation Monetizing Your IT Weaponizing Data Information Security Disrupting Your Industry with Tech Transitional IT Leadership How to Succeed as a CIO System Implementation Tech Assessments Contact us today if you're seeking a speaker for your event.  (Also note: We are happy to do pro bono speeches for non-profits and worthy causes...)

By |2020-05-14T15:37:04-06:00November 8th, 2019|News|
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Innovation – The Great Equalizer

For small and midsize companies competing against large competitors, it can often feel like they are set up to fail. The competitors may have stronger purchasing power, economies of scale, and lower cost of capital, making it hard for the smaller companies to gain any sort of an edge. But the innovation of new technologies is giving many companies hope that they can indeed compete with large competitors several times their size. Innovation is the key to balancing the scale of power. Despite their significant advantages in economies of scale, larger companies also have a liability which can become significant in the emerging Digital Age. Because of their size, large companies have many more layers of bureaucracy and formality. Each of those layers in a larger organization is a delay in decision-making and innovation, particularly when the changes being contemplated are significant and impact a company's business model, pricing, supply [...]

By |2019-10-26T13:49:24-06:00October 26th, 2019|Innovation|
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Transformation Needs the Top, Even if it Doesn’t Start There

No matter where the vision for innovation comes from, the board and CEO must support and evangelize transformation for it to succeed. If the board and CEO don't fully grasp why the transformation is needed, or how it should be achieved, it can bring about more harm than good. They would be better of pausing or canceling the project until everyone can get on the same wavelength. The worst whiplash an organization can receive is a "transformation" project being pushed by IT which doesn't have the support of top leadership. Why? Because the rest of the company will take their lead on how to respond—how seriously to take the change—from their top leadership. If they see shoulder shrugs, they may shrug too and won’t be fully committed to getting on board. Just as importantly, the support from top leadership will deeply impact the behavior of those pushing the change—in IT [...]

By |2019-10-13T11:10:20-06:00October 11th, 2019|Digital Transformation, Innovation|
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Step 1 to Swimming in the Digital Pool – Get in the Water

Do you have a vision for the potential of technology to impact your company's future, but lack the details to make specific proposals? Part of leadership is seeing the need for change and taking steps to share and implement this vision with your team. The first step doesn’t have to be perfect or huge—you need not jump into the deep end of the pool right away, but it's critical at least to acknowledge that you need to learn how to swim. No matter how your organization uses data—processing, analyzing, or simply entering it and viewing it on a daily basis—there is a high likelihood that some kind of digital technology can take your efforts to the next level.  Initially, you may not have clarity on how automation, AI, or analytics will play a part, but neither is it a requirement for someone to know all the strokes before deciding they [...]

By |2019-10-05T12:54:16-06:00October 5th, 2019|Digital Transformation, Innovation|
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Not Every Company Needs Our Services – Only Those Which Have Data

A recent McKinsey study found that companies which invested in data quality and analytics increased their profit margin an average of 6%.  For context, the average profit margin across Fortune 500 companies was just 10.7%...!  Who isn't interested in pursuing an increase in their profits of 2/3?  And unlike traditional IT automation, Digital Transformation can not only reduce costs but also potentially increase revenue. Unless your company does not track or utilize data at all, you are missing an opportunity at these kinds of returns if you're not "weaponizing" your data.  GAAP Accounting does not currently allow companies to book their data as an asset on the balance sheet, per se, but it’s safe to say that between two companies with similar financials, the one with the highest quantity & quality of data is truly “worth more” (and will have tangibly better results!) than one with limited, low quality data.  [...]

By |2019-09-29T15:25:34-06:00September 29th, 2019|News|
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Best IT Strategy for a Non-IT Startup? It Depends

Tech company startups are the darlings of the press and of venture capitalists.  It certainly seems that tech companies dominate the list of "Unicorns" and top IPOs from the last few decades.  Their pace of revenue acceleration (though not necessarily usually earnings) are breathtaking - at least for the few who make it "over the hump" to reach critical mass.  But these are far from the only startup businesses where key IT decisions are needed. In non-IT startup companies, the landscape of tech choices is different, although potentially just as impactful on the company's chances of success.  Tech isn't their product, but in many cases it may make up a significant part of their engine (there is a spectrum of IT impact, of course - that's one reason why "It Depends..")  Interestingly, from the myriad books on the topic of startups pumped out of publishing houses these days, very few [...]

By |2019-11-13T08:33:39-06:00September 12th, 2019|Innovation, Transitional Leadership|
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Innovation Vista Announces Acquisition of Tech-Advisors.net

Houston, Texas, USA   For immediate release   Innovation Vista announces the acquisition of Tech-Advisors.net, a tech site originally established in 2011 as an online IT consultancy. Effective today, visitors to tech-advisors.net will be redirected to InnovationVista.com for our combined online materials and consulting offerings. "This acquisition represents a quality addition to our online offerings, and we could not be more excited. The resources acquired will add significant depth to our client-only materials", a spokesperson for the company commented. Innovation Vista, LLC is a technology consultancy providing senior business leaders technology insights and a full suite of strategy consulting services from experienced C-level IT leaders with proven track records.   Please direct inquiries to news@innovationvista.com.

By |2019-11-09T09:03:58-06:00August 28th, 2019|News|
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Early AI Won’t Reach Professionals’ IQ. Build it Anyway

When you teach your children how to read, you don’t hand them a dictionary. You start with one letter, then move on to the next, hoping you know enough words that describe the letter “X” and can create a system from which they will learn on their own. No one expects a toddler to suddenly pick up the morning paper and process the symbols inked onto the page into useable information—but even knowing that, they begin the long, tedious, (painful?) steps to ensure that one day their child, years down the road, can read the morning paper if they so choose. The results are worth the pain in the end. Yet when people hear about the developments of AI in business, many of them assume the process is pointless if the technology has not reached a level of newspaper-reading, so to speak. What would be the point of investing money [...]

By |2019-09-19T04:54:21-06:00August 1st, 2019|Artificial Intelligence, Innovation|
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