CIO Talk Radio

Guest: Bob Gourley Title: CTO, Crucial Point Llc Former CTO for the Defense Intelligence Agency Guest: Vint Cerf Title: Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist for Google In order to remain globally competitive and develop a workforce of appropriate number and quality, the national leadership has made promises to provide support for the next US technology revolution. However, haven't the budget allocations and endorsements for the required programs and initiatives been disappointing and inadequate? With the new incoming national leadership, can both corporate and ordinary Americans be hopeful about the future of the country and our families?

Guest: Christopher Crowhurst Title: VP Architecture & Business Systems Infrastructure, Thomson Reuters Should you assume that creating an IT PMO will automatically create business value? During an economic downturn anything that impacts IT costs has to be evaluated carefully. Bottom line: you need to be sure the number, complexity, and scale of IT projects will justify the effort and cost of creating a PMO and that the cost of the deliverables, including intangibles, will be justifiable to all stakeholders on up through management. How does an IT leader do this?

Guest: Dr. Albert Esser Title: Vice President of Data Center Infrastructure, DELL Guest: Robert Rosen Title: Chief Information Officer, NIAMS (National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases), NIH Past President SHARE (IBM) Guest: Rohit Ghai Title: Vice President of Engineering, Storage and Availability Management Group, Symantec Corporation Despite the global wide financial meltdown, businesses still need to keep running, and Data Centers are the very soul of most businesses. The need to accommodate continually accumulating data and ongoing computing growth doesn't stop, even during an economic slow down. Obvious strategies to handling things include virtualization or consolidation, but those are also expensive. Are there any other strategies that will streamline our Data Centers while keeping the corporate bean counters off our backs?

Guest: Partha Iyengar Title: VP distinguished analyst and regional research director, India, at Gartner Guest: Arvind Tawde Title: SVP and CIO, Mahindra & Mahindra Limited Indian enterprises ballooned rapidly and Indian IT leaders rushed to manage the growth by leveraging the latest technologies. Now the global economic crisis has abruptly put the breaks on IT initiatives worldwide. Suddenly everything IT has gone from boom to bust everywhere, including in India. How well has Indian IT handled this wild roller coaster ride?

Guest: Howard A. Schmidt Title: President & CEO of the London based Information Security Forum (ISF)Professor of Practice, The Georgia Institute of Technology's GTISCFormer White House Cyber-Security AdvisorDistinguished Fellow, The Poneman InstituteProfessor of Research, Idaho Stat In the interest of achieving scalability, are we moving too quickly to cloud computing? What about data/email security issues? Once Cloud Computing becomes the de facto standard, there will be no turning back. Is our act together?

Guest: John P. Gillispie Title: COO, Iowa's Information Technology Enterprise Office, CIO, State of Iowa, Former President of NASCIO Guest: Richard B. Thompson Title: CIO, Maine State Government Guest: Alicia Kellogg Title: Director of Human Resources, Maine State Government There is a huge opportunity cost, when IT resource needs cannot be met quickly and cost effectively. Some problems include: an IT that is unaware of budget constraints or corporate cultural criteria, or a non-technical HR that can become a bottleneck. How can HR and IT become a true marriage, where both parties work together?

Guest: Don Sharp Title: Vice President and Chief Information Officer, Navistar Guest: Gail Homberg Title: Chief Information Officer, Bally Total Fitness IT that merely maintains the status quo doesn't attract substantial funding. OTH, IT that helps the business innovate and operate more efficiently has the power to profoundly improve business processes, save money, and help the organization leap global competition in a single bound! How does IT become a value driver?

Guest: Steve Phillips Title: Senior Vice President, Chief Information Officer Avnet, Inc. Guest: Dr. Jerry Luftman Title: Executive Director of Graduate Information Systems Programs, and Distinguished Professor at Stevens Institute of Technology, Hoboken New Jersey IT leaders must structure their organization to take full advantage of new and changing technologies. They must ensure that every team member contributes to the success of the business as IT grows and changes around them. Roles must change too, and so should the staffing levels and skills/experience mix. How do we handle this moving target to ensure that people are not the weakest link?

Guest: Kevin Walker Title: SVP and CIO, American Electric Power Guest: Ken G. Fulmer Title: Chief Technology Officer, Sunoco, Inc. While versatility may be the key to a successful IT career path, as a CIO, are you ready to put your job on the line by delegating tasks to team members that may not always be up to it?

Guest: Patricia A. Coffey Title: Executive Board member, SIM Advanced Practices Council member, SIM Vice President, Distribution Marketing and Enterprise Applications, Allstate Insurance Company Guest: Leo Collins Title: VP of Advocacy and Communities of Interest, SIM. CIO, Lion's Gate Entertainment Isn't IT supposed to be strategic? If so, can an IT leader do any special realigning of IT resources to help his/her company not only survive the downturn, but be in a better position strategically once things improve, to ensure a quick return to robust topline growth?

Guest: Casey Coleman Title: Chief Information Officer, U.S. General Services Administration Guest: Christopher R. Barber Title: Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, WesCorp In 2009, IT may be used as a driver and sandbox to deliver innovation and competitive advantage to businesses worldwide. At the same time, worldwide labor arbitrage, looming baby boomer exodus, and other economic imbalances may introduce fear uncertainty and doubt (F.U.D.). How is 2009 expected to turn out for IT?

Guest: Jeffrey P. Chasney Title: EVP, Strategic Planning, and CIO. CKE Restaurants, Inc. Guest: Brian Prentice Title: Research Vice President, Gartner's Emerging Trends and Technologies Group While IT has allowed some industries to cut labor, paradoxically, IT is having problems finding skilled people! Two trends are responsible: the boomer generation of experienced technology workers is approaching retirement and some valuable IT resources are just scarce. So what about a new 20 hour-a-week free agent work force to meet future IT needs? Will this kind of work force be able to handle the job?

Guest: John Von Stein Title: Executive Vice President and Chief Information Officer (CIO) of The Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) Guest: Ben Hope Title: SVP CIO, Fox Networks Group Guest:  John Von Stein Title: Executive Vice President and Chief Information Officer (CIO) of The Options Clearing Corporation (OCC) Guest:  Ben Hope Title: SVP CIO, Fox Networks Group For some not so obvious reasons, the Quality Assurance function in IT is treated as a step child! While there are costs related to implementing quality in terms of appraisal and prevention, are these costs really exceeding that of failure? Implementing a successful IT QA function is in fact, a change management challenge. How well are we doing on this front?

Guest: Phil Edholm Title: Enterprise CTO and VP Network Architecture, Nortel Networks Guest: Zeus Kerravala Title: Senior Vice President, Yankee Group At one time, VoIP was just a way to cut down on phone bills. With the convergence of audio and data streams, VoIP is now a serious communication tool millions of businesses depend on every day. But cheap phone service is only one aspect. What strategic advantages will VoIP offer in the future, as the technologies involved mature further?

Guest: Larry S. Thomas Title: VP and CIO, Landstar, Inc. Guest: Dan Mintz Title: CIO, US Department of Transportation Guest: Frank Modruson Title: CIO, Accenture Guest:  Frank Modruson Title: CIO, Accenture A CIO's job tenure is fraught with deadlines, RIF's, job changes, and other stress, and a tough job can take its toll. Is there a better way to do a much better job? ...perhaps by using positive thinking or changing our thoughts to affect outcomes? Can we change our outer world by getting "into the groove", internally?