August 28, 2024

Jeff Abbott: The Future of Everywhere Work

32 minutes

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Jeff Abbott, former CEO of Ivanti, who, alongside his global team, brings insights to shape the future of work. As the leader of a company dedicated to providing innovative IT and security solutions, Jeff brings a wealth of experience and insight to the discussion of the evolving workplace landscape.

Today, Jeff will share key findings from Ivanti's 2024 Everywhere Work Report – a comprehensive study exploring the latest trends, challenges, and opportunities in the distributed work environment.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

If you think about where some of the most successful platforms are, Salesforce.com has brought an amazing platform to sales and marketing, and Workday is an amazing platform for HR. CIO's and CISOs have not had that. Our quest at Avanti is to bring that platform to the global business community at large, and in this transition we're in right now, I believe it's the most important evolution in contemporary business we've seen in the last 25 years. It's going to be the basis for our economic well-being for the next 50 years, if we get this right.

It makes sense for leadership teams to take active steps to dig a little deeper into this divide. With remote work becoming more prevalent, surveying your employees, I believe, is more and more important, this idea of remote leadership and keeping up with the ‘vibe’ of the company in this remote world to understand the experiences and challenges of employees and the executive suite with different mode of work.

Over 90% of leaders we surveyed say that employees have the tools to be productive in a remote or hybrid work environment. But, of those employees, just 57% say they need better tools and better access, and don't have the smoothest experience from a digital culture perspective.

What we're observing is that IT teams aren't fully bought into the value of DEX (digital experience platform). IT teams are less likely than leadership to say that improving the digital employee experience positively affects productivity, retention, and satisfaction. Additionally, those IT professionals don't always get to experience the benefits of the digital employee experience that they actually help power. As a result, they don't buy into it simply because they haven't had a positive experience themselves. Applying the promise of DEX should really start with IT, because they're the ones enabling it.

BEST MOMENTS

‘The biggest challenge is engaging in the Everwork policy and technical adjustments in the safest and most secure way. You can't rush this. You got to get it right. Just can't wing it.’

‘Threats from bad actors or cyber terrorists are as bad as they've ever been. It's getting worse. These days, it's a persistent threat, they don't just come and knock on the door with phishing, it's a campaign, it’s nonstop. Vigilance is so important.’

‘Both the CIO and the CISO have to lock arms and enable IT to understand how they can truly impact productivity with the DEX platform by having transparency and visibility across the landscape of the company.’

‘Ultimately, where we’re headed is no longer operating IT over here, security over here, we see these organisations starting to converge. That's why this platform is so important for the future.’

ABOUT THE GUEST

As former CEO of Ivanti, Jeff Abbott oversaw all aspects of the company’s growth strategy and direction. Before becoming CEO of Ivanti in October 2021, Jeff was Ivanti’s President since January 2020. Jeff has over 25 years of experience working for enterprise software and services companies, including Accenture, Oracle, and Infor. Jeff holds degrees from the University of Tennessee and Georgia State University. He sits on the National Alumni Board at the University of Tennessee and has previously held board positions with the Georgia Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and the Posse Foundation.

ABOUT THE HOST

Sabine VanderLinden is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur and the CEO of Alchemy Crew Ventures. She leads venture-client labs that help Fortune 500 companies adopt and scale cutting-edge technologies from global tech ventures. A builder of accelerators, investor, and co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, Sabine is known for asking the uncomfortable questions—about AI governance, risk, and trust. On Scouting for Growth, she decodes how real growth happens—where capital, collaboration, and courage meet.

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