This episode covers:What digital friction is (1:05)How digital friction negatively impacts the customer experience (3:10)The culprits that cause digital friction and digital insensitivity (5:01)How total experience helps to solve digital friction and digital insensitivity (8:45)The components of total experience (10:13)The three terms important for creating a shared understanding of being a digital business (11:00)The advantages the midsize enterprise can leverage to create frictionless experiences (16:10)New technology is designed to make life and work go more smoothly. But when it’s unclear how to properly use the technology, when it doesn’t fit the workflow, and when no one really understands it, digital friction slows down progress. Host Shawn Murphy and Gartner Vice President Analyst Joseph Provenza explore speed bumps that trip up digital initiatives and discuss what midsize enterprise CIOs do to lead through the friction that impacts employees and customers.

What Midsize Enterprise CIOs Can Do to Minimize Digital Friction

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“When we just look at immediate financial returns, oftentimes we miss the full picture of the value that gets created.” - Rita Sallam, Gartner Distinguished VP Analyst, Data and Analytics By 2025, nearly a third of GenAI projects will be abandoned due largely to unclear business value. To prove GenAI’s transformative value to executives and CFOs, this episode’s guest offers an insider’s perspective. Rita Sallam is a Distinguished VP Analyst for data and analytics and a former CFO. Her experience and expertise provide critical insights for:Projecting the total cost of GenAI via use cases (3:50)Managing costs as the pilot phase moves to implementation (8:24)Calculating your GenAI budget (12:00)Measuring GenAI ROI (Spoiler: It’s not cost reduction) (14:43)Convincing CFOs that GenAI’s value may not appear on the balance sheet (21:25)

How to Calculate the Costs and Prove the Business Value of GenAI

“The moral of the story is: The closer CIOs stick to the CEO, the easier it’s going to be to help guide the rest of the C-suite through technology uncertainty.” (6:26) This year, the vast majority of CEOs are shifting strategies. At the core of these changes lie digitalization and technology, which introduce unprecedented responsibilities — and opportunities — in the CIO-CEO relationship. Listen now as Gartner Senior Principal Analyst Jennifer Carter shares exclusive best practices and insights on: Addressing profit needs via productivity and technology experimentation (3:21)Generative AI and creating digital cohesion (5:53)How introverted CIOs can build strong connections with extroverted CEOs (8:33)Getting critical one-on-one time with busy CEOs (11:59)A top mistake CIOs should avoid with CEOs (21:20)Jennifer Carter is a senior principal analyst in the Executive Leadership of Digital Business (ELDB) practice. She advises executives on how to navigate C-suite dynamics — in particular building effective engagement with CEOs, creating high-performing, collaborative teams, and influencing stakeholders. Jennifer also covers changing culture through the art of culture hacking and taking a people-first approach to enterprise change communications. Furthermore, Jennifer discusses key topics regarding the future of work, such as leadership in remote and hybrid environments and implementing a human-centric work design. Prior to Gartner, Jennifer studied power dynamics within Chinese imperial courts at the University of Florida and spent years in Gartner’s Executive Programs organization. She has a passion for evaluating complex organizational and leadership challenges and uses her diverse background to inspire executives to think outside of the box.

How to Influence CEOs and Drive Strategy

CIOs are largely determining the organization’s future. Their technology investments can drive — or derail — critical business outcomes. However, organizations must first address a range of challenges to ensure ROI: Which AI experimentation risks are worth taking? What use cases should be prioritized? How does the organization create lasting business value? This podcast addresses each of these challenges, as well as the three key actions CIOs need to take when introducing new technology into their organization.  Podcast highlights:Three major technology trends in 2024 (1:43) Four pillars for onboarding new technologies, like AI (6:31)How CIOs can mitigate risks from technology investments (10:38)The challenges of scaling AI and how to balance workforce implications (16:43)Take Three: Three actions CIOs should take when introducing new technologies into the organization (20:48)

Key Actions for Smart Tech Investments and Scaling AI

Episode highlights:Critical differences between AI and generative AI (05:11 - 06:24)Four AI topics CIOs must prioritize when educating teams (06:36 - 08:07) Why AI literacy is starkly different from typical tech-training (08:25 - 11:08)How to tailor AI education for non-technical employees and executives (11:52 - 15:05)How to solve common challenges when rolling out an AI literacy program (16:01 - 20:00)Three steps to launch your AI literacy program (20:30 - 23:17)AI experimentation is rapidly scaling to implementation across the enterprise. For CIOs, developing a comprehensive AI literacy initiative throughout the organization is now a tactical and strategic imperative. Erick Brethenoux is Gartner’s Artificial Intelligence Chief of Research. He specializes in AI techniques, decision intelligence and applied cognitive computing. Erick guides organizations on the strategic, organizational and technology aspects of using AI as a driving force for growth. In particular, his research focuses on the operationalization of AI techniques and practices, AI engineering, and next-generation decision intelligence systems.

Successful AI Requires a Practical Literacy Program

This episode explores:What is franchised digital delivery? (01:45)What challenges does this model pose for CIOs and other CxOs? (07:25)How do you sell a franchise digital delivery model to someone who is not willing to buy it? (10:15)What are the three fundamental aspects of franchised digital delivery? (14:25)What steps should you take to start? (18:45)In this podcast episode, we delve into the evolving landscape of technology leadership and its impact on business dynamics as seen through the lens of franchised digital delivery, which is about technology management as well as business innovation and strategy. We explore the changing expectations that CEOs and other CxOs have for their CIOs, as well as the CIOs’ vision for their own leadership and the direction of their IT teams. Join us as we unravel these complex changes and provide insights into the future of technology leadership.

What Midsize Enterprise CIOs Can Do to Minimize Digital Friction

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