In this episode, Cisco’s Chief Strategy Officer Ammar Maraqa joins host Kaihan Krippendorff to discuss how one of the world’s largest technology companies is evolving its strategy to lead the next wave of AI and digital infrastructure.

From building AI-ready data centers to fostering intrapreneurship through Outshift, Cisco is reimagining how strategy, innovation, and execution come together. Ammar shares lessons from his experience leading Cisco’s strategy organization and shaping its innovation portfolio across build, buy, partner, and incubate pathways.

Topics Covered

• Cisco’s strategy for the AI and digital infrastructure era
• How the Strategy Office connects long-term vision with execution
• Building AI-ready data centers and enabling digital resilience
• The meaning of agentic AI and its impact on enterprise productivity
• How Cisco’s Outshift incubator drives internal innovation
• Cisco’s approach to build, buy, partner, and incubate innovation
• The difference between a “push” and “pull” model in corporate strategy teams
• Why resource allocation is the truest test of strategic clarity

Key Quotes

Resources Mentioned

• Cisco Outshift (https://outshift.cisco.com)
• Cisco’s Digital Resilience framework
• Outthinker Networks (https://outthinker.com)

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In this special in-person conversation recorded at Adobe’s global headquarters, Kaihan continues his discussion with Malte Bernholz, Vice President of Corporate Strategy and Incubator at Adobe.

In Part One, on our sister show Outthinkers, Malte explored the macro trends transforming creativity, technology, and business in the age of AI. Click the link below to watch part 1 if you havent already.  https://youtu.be/pYoIvvb0SGc 

Now, in Part Two, we go deeper—inside Adobe’s strategic engine—to learn how this global innovator designs its own future. 

Malte shares: 

• How Adobe has reorganized around three audience groups—business professionals and consumers, creative professionals, and marketing professionals—to better align innovation with customer needs 
• How his team leads corporate strategy and incubation, balancing “looking around the corner” with accelerating high-priority initiatives 
• How the Adobe Incubator fosters entrepreneurship within the company, empowering small internal teams to build the next generation of product – and the early outcomes of that work, from Firefly Boards to Project Pulsar and beyond

Part one on OUTTHINKERS: https://youtu.be/pYoIvvb0SGc

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In today’s episode, we speak with Oreste Donzella, former Chief Strategy Officer of KLA, a global leader in semiconductor process control and inspection. Oreste brings over three decades of experience in the semiconductor industry — a sector that quietly powers every technological advance we see today. 

You know, every strategist planning for AI's future is charting a course on assumptions about computational power, cost curves, and technological capability. But few are examining the foundation on which all of it rests: semiconductors. Without understanding where chip technology is headed—and the geopolitical forces reshaping its landscape—you're navigating without checking what lies beneath the waterline. Oreste is a veteran strategy officer with decades navigating the complex semiconductor stack, and here we explore the dynamics shaping foundational technologies—from manufacturing processes to geopolitical tensions—so you can better anticipate the forces that will enable or constrain your AI ambitions. 

In this episode we get into: 

• Why AI’s rise is really a story about semiconductors — and how the industry’s “emotional revenge” is unfolding. 
• The hidden complexity of the semiconductor supply chain — and how a few specialized companies shape global innovation. 
• How geopolitics, national strategies, and power consumption are redefining the industry’s future. 
• The movement toward modular, heterogeneous chip design — and what it means for strategy leaders in every sector. 
• Oreste’s model for the three timeless pillars of great strategy execution: Collaboration, Innovation, and Execution. 

Oreste’s perspective reminds us that strategy doesn’t live in isolation — it operates often within vast, interconnected systems. And those able to think at the systems level, able to understand how they are evolving, will be the ones able to understand where value is truly pooling and therefore where to play. 

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What does a banana have to do with data strategy? In this episode of the Chief Strategy Officer Podcast, we sit down with Claudio Finol, Chief Strategy Officer at Fyffes, one of the world’s oldest and most recognized produce companies. Fyffes bananas, pineapples, and melons may be a familiar sight in your grocery store, but behind the scenes the company is navigating some of the most complex strategy challenges of our time—climate change, global supply chains, digitization, and the disruptive power of data.

Claudio shares how Chief Strategy Officers across industries can learn from agriculture—a sector as old as civilization—about using data to push Michael Porter’s productivity frontier, transform traditional business models, and even create new revenue streams. From John Deere’s reinvention into a data-driven platform company to the strategic tension between optimizing your core and monetizing aggregated data, this conversation uncovers lessons every CSO should hear.

Things We Will Cover in This Episode:
- How Fyffes is blending tradition with transformation in the global produce industry. 
- Why data is no longer just supporting products—it is becoming the product. 
- Michael Porter’s productivity frontier and its relevance in the AI era. 
- How companies like John Deere turned data into a competitive advantage and 95th-percentile growth engine. 
- The two strategic paths with data: optimizing the core vs. creating new data products. 
- What CSOs must do today to prepare their organizations for digitization, AI, and data-driven business models. 
 

Why Listen
If you’re a Chief Strategy Officer, innovation leader, or executive thinking about the future of business, Claudio’s insights will challenge you to rethink what business you’re really in. Whether you’re managing physical products, digital platforms, or services, this episode shows how data strategy, AI readiness, and organizational culture can define the competitive frontier in the years ahead. 

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In this episode, we sit down with Rachel Credidio, Chief Innovation Officer at Aster Group, to explore how restorative practices can be a powerful lever for culture change, innovation, and organizational performance. Having held the previous role of Chief Transformation and People Officer, Rachel has been at the forefront of embedding inclusivity, trust, and accountability into the DNA of Aster Group. Her leadership has helped make Aster Group most impactful non-profit groups in the UK as they help tackle the UK’s housing shortage by providing affordable, safe, and inclusive housing options, while offering wraparound services to support vulnerable communities. 

In this episode we cover: 

• Why restorative practices reduce conflict and boost engagement across complex organizations 
• How inclusive culture lays the foundation for innovation and decentralized leadership 
• What it means to shift from managing people to empowering them through fair process and shared accountability 
• Why building a culture of voice and trust is a strategic investment—not a “nice to have” 
• How Rachel restructured policies and embedded principles into systems for long-term impact 

Whether you're navigating transformation, scaling innovation, or building a more inclusive workforce, this episode offers practical tools and inspiration. 

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In this episode, we sit down with Todd Cassler, Chief Growth Officer of Cerity Partners, to explore the growing role of corporate venture capital (CVC) as a strategic tool for driving innovation and growth. With decades of experience in asset and wealth management as a chief strategy and growth officer, Todd is a trusted partner with a front-row seat to how Fortune 500 companies are using CVC not just to diversify financially, but to shape their strategic futures.
 
Things we cover in this episode:
 - Why CVC programs often fail without CEO and board-level buy-in 
 - How to design a governance model that avoids being pulled back into “business as usual” 
 - The hidden benefits of CVC, from M&A pipeline generation to competitive intelligence 
 - What it takes to align siloed innovation efforts with core business objectives 
 - How to measure the strategic—not just financial—value of your venture investments

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In this episode, we’re joined by Sarah Beckman, Chief Strategy Officer of Ulteig.
Ulteig specialized in infrastructure solutions across power, renewables, transportation, and water. Sarah is an experienced structural engineer, shedesigning energy systems spanning the continental U.S., and also spent time in sales before moving into her current role leading corporate strategy. Her deep technical roots give her a unique perspective on solving complex problems and leading transformation in a traditionally slow-moving, high-stakes industry. Today, she’s focused on preparing Ulteig—and the entire sector—for an era defined by AI, electrification, and the race to build faster than ever before.  Sarah brings a powerful systems-thinking lens to transformation in one of the most critical—and traditionally slow-moving—sectors: energy infrastructure. 

Things we’ll cover in this conversation: 

• How to drive innovation inside mission-critical industries where the cost of failure is high 
• Why aligning strategy to purpose and stakeholder value is key to building urgency without panic 
• How Sarah applied engineering skills to transform a sales strategy and sunset a commoditized offering 
• What CSOs can do to prepare for industry-wide disruption—from AI demands to a nuclear energy renaissance 
• The leadership behaviors and organizational systems that actually make strategy stick 

Whether you're preparing to pivot, wrestling with internal resistance, or rethinking how to build a transformation-ready culture—this episode is packed with practical wisdom from the front lines.

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• Learn more about Outthinker's community of chief strategy officers - https://outthinkernetwork.com/
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• Learn more about Outthinker's community of chief strategy officers - https://outthinkernetwork.com/
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• Learn more about Outthinker's community of chief strategy officers - https://outthinkernetwork.com/
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Today, we are tackling a topic that holding back most organizations from adapting to our rapidly changing business environments, a topic rooted in a habit that is so engrained in most companies that we don’t even think about changing it: budgeting.

In this episode, we sit down with Eric Woodard, Head of Strategy at Primerica and former Bain consultant, to unpack the future of agile budgeting. Eric shares why the old model—locking budgets 12 months in advance—is no longer viable in a world shaped by digital disruption, economic volatility, and shifting priorities. He lays out a practical, compelling alternative: treat strategy as a living, breathing guide for capital allocation.

We explore:
- Why companies are being forced—not just encouraged—to rethink budgeting cycles 
- The key difference between "run the business" and "change the business" spend 
- How to structure dynamic, strategy-led funding pools 
- What cycle times and KPIs work in an agile budgeting environment 
- Why people—not systems—are the biggest barrier to change 
 
Whether you're navigating growth, transformation, or efficiency, this episode will give you the tools to align your budget with your boldest strategic ambitions. 

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If you’re a strategy leader stepping into M&A or refining your inorganic growth strategy, there’s one relationship that can either propel you forward or hold you back: your relationship with investment bankers. In this episode, we dive deep into the often opaque world of investment banking with two strategy executives who’ve worked across both sides of the deal table. 
 
Together, our guests bring more than 40 years of combined experience across investment banking, M&A strategy, and corporate development—having led acquisitions and divestitures in both public and private companies, across industries and borders.  

Michael Arlotto is the Global Head of Corporate Development and Ventures at Kenvue, an American consumer health company and the proprietor of many brands you’ve heard of, like Band-Aid, Benadryl, Neutrogena and Tylenol.  

Chris Nuttall is the Executive Vice President of Corporate Development at Bazaarvoice, an American tech company that helps brands collect and leverage UGC, which stands for user-generated content.

Together, the three of us explore:

- How to assess and build the right relationship with an investment banker 
 - What “transformative M&A” really means—and how to pull it off 
 - The soft skills and cultural fit that matter just as much as deal terms 
 - How to avoid M&A regret by starting with strategy and ending with integration 
 - Why successful M&A is less about buying a company—and more about buying into a multiyear business plan 
  
 Whether you’re planning your first acquisition or fine-tuning your approach to external growth, this episode will help you build stronger partnerships, avoid costly missteps, and execute deals that deliver long-term value.

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• Learn more about Outthinker's community of chief strategy officers - https://outthinkernetwork.com/
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Welcome to another episode of The Chief Strategy Officer Podcast! Today, we’re tackling a topic that sits at the heart of every successful organization: purpose. 

For years, the question of what purpose an organization should hold has typically sat outside the auspices of the strategy office. It was the remit of the CEO or board, maybe corporate communications or the HR. But it is increasingly becoming a central strategic lever, especially as the success of strategy depends on activating ecosystem partners, employees, communities … and it is one we need to better understand.  

How can companies define a purpose that isn’t just a slogan but a real driver of strategic decisions? How does purpose impact employee motivation, customer engagement, and long-term competitive advantage? And most importantly, how can CSOs play a role in shaping and embedding purpose in a way that creates measurable business impact? 

To explore these questions, we’re joined by David Zapata, Corporate Head of Strategy at Grupo Bancolombia, and Claudia Ludovisi, former head of strategy at Disney ABC, assistant Dean of Marketing and Strategy at Pepperdine Business School, who has done interest research into the role of purpose in strategy. Together, they share firsthand experiences and research-driven insights on how organizations can make purpose actionable, sustainable, and truly transformative. 

In this episode, we explore: 

• Why purpose isn’t just about branding—it should drive real business decisions. 
• The biggest mistake companies make when defining their purpose. 
• How to measure whether purpose is actually working inside your organization. 
• The evolving role of AI in shaping personalized and scalable purpose-driven strategies. 
• Insights and a step-by-step approach for crafting a purpose that aligns with strategy and capabilities for your organization. 

Whether you’re refining your company’s purpose or just starting to explore its role in strategy, this episode is packed with insights to help you take a more structured and impactful approach.

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