IT Transformation with Watson

by Kevin Jackson & Dez Blanchfield

IBM recently launched an exciting new project in the form of a podcast series produced and hosted Dez Blanchfield, appropriately titled the “Pioneers Of Possible. This new podcast series sets out to connect listeners from around the world with innovators and thought leaders within IBM’s Global Technology Services (GTS) and Global Business Services (GBS) business units worldwide.

Each episode offers a “fireside chat” between Dez Blanchfield the host, one of an exciting lineup of IBM GTS & GBS subject matter experts, all of whom are currently very actively engaged in the challenges associated with leading and delivering the future today. Though its initial three episodes, the show focused on connecting listeners with IBM’s subject matter experts. Getting to know these leaders personally and professionally is an important goal because, in their roles, they drive the trends, disruptions, and transformations we see across many industries today.

In episode one of the series Mickey Iqbal, IBM Fellow -Global Lead for GTS Enterprise IT Transformation Advisorsstates “In today’s world, businesses are faced with the challenge of keeping up with the accelerating rate of change.” Dez Blanchfield likened this to leaders needing to sprint just to keep up. Running in multiple lanes, in multiple races simultaneously. A key message throughout this episode in the series is that in today’s increasingly competitive environment, success lies in an organization’s ability to create new ideas and solve problems and selecting the right partner to help them through the business and technology transformation required to achieve the desired outcomes.

In episode two of the series, Nick Fuller, Senior Manager, Cognitive Service Foundations, IBM Research, talks about how “Technology immersion and actively collecting ideas both help.” His impressive professional pedigree coupled with an incredible array of 63 patents certainly give weight to his comments on such matters. In this episode, the discussion included the broad topic of problem-solving in today’s race to leverage cognitive computing and artificial intelligence. He posits that a multi-step process is required, including:

Thus far in the series, our SME’s have offered listeners tuning in an amazing look into their personal lives, professional career paths, and their roles with IBM. A key theme throughout thus far has been that IBM’s Cognitive Technology Service Platform, known as Watson, brings significant business and technical competitive value to organizations in the exciting array of new business and service capabilities it can enable.

As a transformative company itself, IBM has moved from a systems integrator model to a service integration model that is led by technology. IBM’s focus on using their digital transformation to improve the way IBM delivers services is what led to the Watson service delivery platform. This offering infuses artificial intelligence derived insights from Watson into the IBM service delivery process. In doing this, IBM leverages open source and best of breed technologies to deliver rapid outcomes. This approach also focuses on building and maintaining a service delivery ecosystem.

 

Thank you for tuning in, we have many more great podcast episodes lined up for you.

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