How many times have you gone into your local branch to see someone about a mortgage, or a pension, or a current account and no one is available to see you right away? It happens more often that you think. And the bank often doesn’t know how much business it is losing as these initial requests are quite often not tracked or recorded. Of course you can make an appointment but why should you have to wait? Or, you can click on online chat but it might just not be enough for the more complicated questions.
In reality it is really difficult for the bank to match the supply of expertise with fluctuating levels of demand from customers. And it is increasingly expensive for them to provide expertise on a local basis due to increased demand for quality advisors and the growing cost burden of regulation and supervision.
That is why many banks are looking to virtualise their sales forces. How? By using fully immersive video-based capability to project their centralised expertise into local branches, homes and places of work.
Another busy day of Enterprise Connecting comes to a close in scenic Orlando. With Cisco’s announcements and Rowan’s keynote yesterday, my Wednesday was a bit quieter than Tuesday. (Not quiet, mind you — just quieter…)
Collaboration Platforms with Jonathan Rosenberg
My first session this morning was at what felt like a very early 9 a.m. Led by David Finnernan, the panel addressed the topic of Are Mobile-First Collaboration Platforms the Salvation of Mobile UC? Finnernan described the class of apps as tools for people who do their jobs in a different way (than the old way).
Cisco’s VP and CTO of Collaboration Jonathan Rosenberg represented Cisco on the panel. One of his key points was that creating mobile-first platforms is less about specializing apps for mobile devices as it is about creating applications that work anywhere, saying “Mobile-first isn’t smartphone only, it’s work anywhere.” He talked about how, in a regular day, people typically do most of their work on a desktop. The mobile-first aspect is more about the technical development than the actual use.
Jonathan stressed the importance of designing and creating platforms for mobile from the ground up versus modifying desktop applications to work for mobile. Does he feel strongly about this? “If it wasn’t built from the ground up, you probably want to look elsewhere.” (Admittedly, this didn’t go over all that well with everyone else on the panel.) Continue reading “Enterprise Connect, Day 3 Wrap-Up”
TechSpace allows companies of all sizes to rent space in campus environments. So if you’re a small company without a lot of capital for an office or if you’re a large company that has quickly outgrown your building, TechSpace is the company to rent office space from. With all of these different companies setting up shop under one roof, TechSpace needed a network with fast connectivity and ironclad security.
The success of cities and communities at large will increasingly depend on a given city’s ability to engage in new ways of organizing, providing citizen services, security and governance, and establishing the conditions for modern job creation and successful enterprise. In short, this means a shift to a network-based city that can enable leaders to address key issues using intelligent networking capabilities—turning information into actions that create new capabilities, richer experiences, and unprecedented economic opportunity.
That’s right. Without Cisco Spark, we wouldn’t be launching the Spark service now. Of course, we’d launch it, but the key is the timing. Now. I’m talking about Spark’s impact internally on our ability to accelerate all the launch-related activities.
The experience went well beyond the usual “eating our own dog food” exercise (or “drinking our own champagne” if you prefer the prettier visual). We did more than let a few people in distinct groups bang on something before we released it. This was an all-hands-on-deck strategic plan to use the best tool we had to manage a large number of workstreams across a large number of stakeholders. We had teams and people from across product marketing, product management, go-to-market, sales, partner marketing, engineering, and more.
Spark Took Over… Don’t get me wrong. Spark didn’t magically change how we approached the launch projects. What really changed was the efficiency of communications and decision making — what the marketing guy in me is supposed to call “agility.”
In typical Cisco fashion, we defined Tiger Teams for cross-functional project management and scheduled regular meetings for key topics and executive reviews. But that’s where the old way of working ended and Spark took over. Continue reading “Cisco Spark Made Cisco Spark Happen”
Historically, organizations operated using only structured data methodically gathered and maintained within their own data centers. Now they are deluged with data from everywhere —both structured and unstructured – and from any device or sensor and at any time. Now, with the move toward digital business transformation, amazing opportunities exist for businesses to act on information analyzed in real time at the edge of network, create richer user experiences and automate processes in unique new ways. It’s also an unprecedented economic opportunity for Cisco partners who can help them achieve these goals.
Real-Time Insights Equal Real-Time Rewards.
To take advantage of these opportunities, companies are undertaking new IT initiatives that remove complexity, while making their technology environments more agile and secure. In doing so, they are blurring the lines between their own organizations and those with which they do business. New automated solutions are enabling workflows to operate quickly and seamlessly across company boundaries. Using APIs, both simple and complex IT services can be automated by creating, provisioning and updating multiple service components, whether business, application or infrastructure. Real-time collaboration and response is becoming the norm.
Another example in the new value chain of the connected economy is analytics. Analytic solutions are forecast to drive $7.3 trillion of the estimated market growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) to $19 trillion within less than ten years. Cisco Partners are positioned on the front lines of this technology revolution to help enterprises define the new digital battlefield, shape their response and assist them in changing, adapting and transforming their business models.
Cisco’s analysis shows that six industries — manufacturing, financial services, retail, service provider, healthcare, and oil and gas — will account for 71 percent of the total private sector Digital Value at Stake for the next decade (2015-2024). Yet, none of these six realized more than 29% of its potential Digital Value at Stake in 2015.
When you are passionate about something you are not enticed by recognition or awards – you simply put everything you have into an activity or cause because it means something to you and because you want to see it grow and succeed. You know this fire inside of you could very well change the world, and so you give it everything you have. We all have that one thing – and for me, it’s the work I’m doing at Cisco in my local community, and around the world, in promoting girls and women in tech, STEM education, and my focus on diversity & inclusion initiatives.
I’m fortunate that Cisco is so committed to inspiring and cultivating students to pursue STEM education and careers, and building the workforce of tomorrow. Through my work with NGO Greenlight for Girls (g4g), I’ve been leading Cisco’s partnership and collaboration with them and launching their signature “g4gday” events in new countries around the world. From Amman, Jordan, to Krakow, Poland, to Brussels, Belgium, Goa, India and soon Barcelona, Spain – it has been so encouraging to see these events come alive, and for so many young girls to be left inspired by technology.
Greenlight for Girls’ goal is to breakdown the different stereotypes girls have about STEM (such as it being just for boys, or that it’s boring or geeky). We run full day events full of fun, interactive, hands-on workshops delivered by role models in STEM, and show them how fun and exciting it can be! Cisco recently took part in the g4gDay Brussels event where we hosted 240 girls, and our team of amazing volunteers delivered 3 different workshops:
The “Martian” workshop showcases our Cisco Telepresence units and the technology behind it.
The “Cisco: I’m a Router” workshop teaches the girls the concepts of routing & switching in a very fun, interactive manner.
And the LED Arduino kits programming workshop introduces this platform to the girls as well.
What make these events special is the collaboration and partnership with other companies and organizations that helps to inspire the future female talent pipeline. To be able to teach these young girls more about technology, spark their interests in STEM, and hear them say with great excitement, “I want to work for Cisco one day” is totally priceless!
Our Cisco-led g4g Barcelona day is coming up on May 7th – we’re already anticipating this great event as it is promising to be a huge success. To know that in our time with g4g, Cisco has touched the lives of approximately 2,000 girls across the globe, and that those numbers keep growing, leaves me so inspired to continue my work on these efforts.
Having a 4-year old daughter myself, I feel like I am not only doing this for the working women of today, the ladies currently studying Engineering in universities around the world, and the young girls still trying to figure out what they would like to be when they’re older. It is also for my own little girl at home, too. I want to be able to tell her “Anything is Possible” as I want her to know that she can break down any barriers she may face in the future – and aspire to be a woman in tech, hopefully here at Cisco!
It all came full circle for me recently as I was recognized by our SVP for Cisco Services, Joe Cozzolino, as the “Bringing the People Deal to Life” Q3FY2016 Services Excellence Award winner! I wasn’t expecting such an honor – but the very first thing that came to my mind was, “Wow, not only do I get to work for an organization that encourages me to follow my passion, but I get rewarded for it as well – Cisco Rocks!”
It made me know that Cisco not only supported these efforts completely, but what I truly value in life as well in being an advocate for gender diversity.
I pinch myself each time I realize I get to be part of this great project with Cisco, and that I truly “Do what I love, love what I do.”
Read more about the upcoming g4g Barcelona Day event and how it ties in closely with our focus on Innovation, Smart Connected Cities, and IoE: HERE. Follow Aurelia on Twitter at @AureliaTakacs.
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Apparently Monday was just a warm-up. Tuesday started with several announcements before sunrise and just kept going past sundown with the Cisco Reception. The energy level throughout the day? A strong buzzing. And there was a lot to buzz about, starting with the morning press release kicking off the day with announcements tied to Cisco Spark, including:
The $150 million Spark Innovation Fund to encourage and support application and integration development
All of the energy around the announcements brought even more into Rowan Trollope’s keynote session. Rowan definitely has a way of telling the Cisco Collaboration story. He talked about joining Cisco three years ago and realizing there was one thing preventing Cisco from creating delightful user experiences: complexity. And the barrier to creating amazing user experiences still today? The complexity of the industry. He’s a big fan of simplicity.
He called out that two industries – web conferencing and video conferencing – really should be one. There shouldn’t be a distinction between the type of meetings. As he puts it, “people just have meetings.” His example got a good laugh: “Think of it like WebEx and telepresence had a baby – and it was a really beautiful baby.” Continue reading “Enterprise Connect, Day 2 Wrap-Up”
Having a 4-year old daughter myself, I feel like I am not only doing this for the working women of today, the ladies currently studying Engineering in universities around the world, and the young girls still trying to figure out what they would like to be when they’re older. It is also for my own little girl at home, too. I want to be able to tell her “Anything is Possible” as I want her to know that she can break down any barriers she may face in the future – and aspire to be a woman in tech, hopefully here at Cisco!