Year: 2016

February 29, 2016 Leave a Comment
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Use Leap Day to Leap Forward in Your Career

Leaping employees
Cisco employees in New Delhi show us how to leap!

Time is a commodity – something we all say we need more of. Well, 2016 is a lucky Leap Year! 24 hours are built into the calendar to ensure that it stays in line with the Earth’s movement around the Sun. But we can all look at is as 24 extra hours to spend on things we might not normally be able to fit into our schedule.

You could organize your closet, use that gym membership you got in January that you haven’t gotten around to using yet, get some extra sleep OR you could use the extra time to work on improving your career path with some advice from a Cisco recruiter (That’s me!).

Regardless of whether you are currently searching for a new job, just exploring your options or looking to move forward with the in position you already have these few extra steps might give you a leg up over the competition.

 

  1. Get Social! – This is the age of social media and companies are actively using social sites to recruit and review potential new hires. If you haven’t already started your social media repertoire it’s time to get out there! Sign up for Twitter and share some thoughts, start posting some pictures of your adorable pets on Instagram, get that LinkedIn profile up and running. Follow your current company to keep up with new activities and projects, and follow other places you could see yourself at in the future to keep up on what they might be doing as well. I suggest following @Cisco and @WeAreCisco on Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram! A certain recruiter is also on all of those sites if you are looking to make more connections ;).

 

  1. Update Social Profiles You Already Have: If you already have a LinkedIn profile take some time to update it and add anything new you might have accomplished. Most people only update their profiles when they are looking for a new position but keeping your profile up to date can open up opportunities you might not have even been aware of. I can assure you recruiters are out there looking for people just like you, so help us find you by creating an up-to-date and active presence. Have you learned a new language, earned a new certification, done some awesome volunteer work? Let us know about it!

 

  1. Update Your Resume: make sure you always have an up-to-date copy of your resume handy, as you never know who might be looking at you. Keep up with current trends; did you know that objective statements on resumes are becoming outdated? Get rid of that objective statement and use the extra space to tell us more about your experience, skills and accomplishments.

 

  1. Update Old Application Profiles on Company Websites: If you are currently applying for new positions make sure you are updating any old application profiles you might already have with the company. I get so many applications with outdated information simply because people forget to go in and update their years old profiles before they apply for a new position. Recruiters can’t reach you if you have outdated contact information (like that college email you never check anymore) and they won’t always know if you only updated your resume but didn’t update your profile so be sure to update everything when you apply somewhere using an application you already have in their system.

 

  1. Make Connections and Make Sure Your Personality is Showing on your Profiles/Resumes: With this extra day, make some time to make connections and network. You never know who might have the right connections to help you get your new dream job and even if they can’t help you professionally who couldn’t use a few more friends or acquaintances now and then. Connecting with new people is almost never a waste of your time. Speaking of connecting in order to make those connections make sure you aren’t coming off robotic in your profiles, I want to know I am connecting with a real person. Put some personality on your profile and people who have the same interests as you will be more likely to follow you or send you that friend request. Are you a big advocate for animal adoption? Follow your local adoption sites or the Humane Society or ASPCA and repost some of their information or start up a conversation with them. Are you a comic book fan? Follow Marvel, DC, Stan Lee and any other of the numerous comic fan sites to keep up to date on current information and meet other people with the same interests.

 

  1. I have one more piece of advice for you and I promise this one is the most important! Spend some of that extra Leap Day time doing something that makes you happy. Go see a movie (I can personally tell you that the new Star Wars movie is excellent.) Start reading that new book you have been meaning to get to. (Or do both! There are lots of great movies coming out this year based on novels already available, here is a great list of new books to read before the movies come out this year http://www.goodreads.com/list/show/86204.Books_Becoming_Movies_in_2016 . I am personally looking forward to reading The Girl on The Train!). Take your dog for a nice scenic walk, or volunteer at your local animal shelter if you don’t have a pet, the animals there are always happy for some love and attention. The point is make sure you make time to do the things you love because life is short so seize that extra day!

Today might also be a great opportunity to send in that Cisco application you’ve been wanting to. Visit our Careers page for current openings.

 

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Taylor Longtin

Sales Recruiter, Talent Acquisition

Talent Acquisition AMS Sales

February 26, 2016 3 Comments
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Changes, Part 2 – So, What Do We Do With That?

Last week, in part 1 of this 3 part series, we discussed how Digitization* is driving change. We also covered how Changes (cue** David Bowie) are manifesting themselves in the shifting shape of Applications, which are the raison d’etre for the Data Center.

Deconstructing Apps: Scale Containers
As traditional apps are deconstructed into multiple microservices running on containers, these containers represent a significant increase of new addressable endpoints on the network. As this deconstruction of the app progresses across dozens, hundreds or even thousands of traditional apps in a given enterprise, there are scaling challenges associated with this. Yeah, ok, so what do we do with that?

Ghosts and Invisibility Cloaks: Telemetry

Lets think some more about the implications beyond scaling issues. As the traditional application is decomposed into multiple microservices, containers can come up and go away very rapidly. They’re faster than VM’s. Consider an event, such as a microservice starting, stopping or moving, or a security attack on one of those mobile endpoints, for example. If sampling occurs every 5 milliseconds (or packets, or whatever…pick an incremental unit), but an event starts at 2 and stops at 4, what happens?

It is undetectable.ghost-151504_960_720

It’s a ghost.

It does not exist.

How do you troubleshoot or manage a ghost you can’t see or measure?  You cannot.

This type of event – which is very real in terms of the problems it may create – is essentially invisible as far as existing tools are concerned. In this scenario, sampling ain’t gonna cut it. Consequently, we need telemetry information that lets us know what’s occurring continuously, in real time.

Ok, so what do we do with that?

Get On The Bus: Capacity

Remember the phrase “the network is the computer”? Over the years, there have been many arguments as to why that vision is becoming realized, and we now see it taking yet another step. As processes become distributed across containers, some traffic that was once perhaps contained within the OS itself will now be distributed across the network. What was once only in the server is now truly distributed across blades, racks, aisles, data centers, as well as private and public clouds. The network becomes essentially the IPC (inter process communication) bus of the computer.bus(Check here to see what a really fast bus looks like in action.) These concepts layer on top of the increasing endpoint density discussed above, to place additional requirements on the network in terms of speed, performance and capacity.

Oh, and let’s not forget that with all that increased data comes the need to store it and move it, and to do so, increasingly, with distributed storage technology. This means far more data moving between compute nodes over Ethernet/IP (in addition to Fiber Channel). Another thing…all those IoT devices that are popping up like mushrooms, or are reproducing like rabbits, or are multiplying like rabbits on ‘shrooms (?), and they are creating data that needs to be stored somewhere as well. All of this combines to generate significant storage growth, much of which will run over the network, also driving the need for additional bandwidth. (Additionally, once that data is collected and stored, somebody probably wants to do some analysis and glean some useful info from it, so we’ve got yet more activity in the form of Big Data…)

So, what do we do with that?

Supercalifragilisticonvergence: Intelligence

convergence

So, at a high level, we see compute, network and storage meld themselves into more of a singular thing (umm, though no, not a singularity) that can be set up and torn down rapidly through self-service. For that to happen effectively, we need to assure that at a more tactical level, we are mindful of how, as discrete technologies converge upon one another, they impact one another’s requirements, whether we’re talking about hyperconvergence or whatever.

As an example, as more storage moves across the network, it must be low latency, and deterministic if it is to deliver lossless transmission of storage traffic. So there must be a higher level of intelligence in terms of things like buffering algorithms and flow control within the network, if this is to be done in a cost effective manner that works. Again, an appropriate response is: So, what do we do with that?

I’ve called out several trends and challenges associated with them, but haven’t yet provided any answers in terms of how to address them. So, return to this blog next week, for #3 in the series, where I will share with you what we do with that.

* BTW, here is a nice summary and white paper of interesting research – not just conjecture – on digitization.

** Yes, I know this is a technology blog but I did mean ‘cue’ not ‘queue’.

Photo credits: commons.wikimedia.com, en.wikipedia.org, youtube (see bus link)

 

 

 

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Craig Huitema

No Longer with Cisco

4 Comments
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Power Grid Security: Separating Reality from Hype

We’ve all seen the news reports on power grid vulnerabilities and the possibility of an impending terror attack. Recently, Ted Koppel’s book, “Lights Out,” caused a wave of press around the issue. Similar spikes in press occurred in the year after the PG&E Metcalf substation sabotage and around the National Geographic special in October 2013, “American Blackout.” There are both good points and some amount of exaggeration in the reporting on grid vulnerabilities, so I’ll be debunking a couple of power grid security myths.

460x3

Continue reading “Power Grid Security: Separating Reality from Hype”

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Rick Geiger

Executive Director

Utilities and Smart Grid

2 Comments
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Customers Share Their Digital Journeys with #CiscoACI

Cisco Live Berlin

“Wow” Moments take the stage at Cisco Live Berlin

One of the key themes at Cisco Live Berlin last week, as well as across the tech industry, is “disrupt or be disrupted”. One of the most exciting aspects of my role at Cisco is working with customers and hearing how Cisco’s ACI and SDN technology comes to life through their voices and success stories – and how they are disrupting in their industry.

At Cisco Live Berlin last week, I had the great opportunity to meet with customers and hear them share their stories on and off stage about how ACI was disrupting and transforming their business models, IT organizations, and their networks. What’s more, customers are so excited to share their ACI successes and innovations that they took to Twitter to share their “wow” moments with ACI at the #CLEUR Tuesday evening ACI Customer Reception, which was attended by packed room of 260 customers. Some of my favorite tweets were from @ThomasRaabo: #ciscoaciwow missing my fabric…See you soon #aci and @Martin_Lipka: CiscoACIWoW: when our non-network engineers started to design, test and configure hybrid cloud and data centre networks on their own!

The buzz continued Wednesday morning as 8 customers including Shutterfly, Keylane, University of Dresden, Sainsbury’s, Halkbank, Pulsant, NBCUniversal and SAP took the stage with Soni Jiandani, SVP of Insieme Business Unit at Cisco, during her iTalk keynote, “Driving Innovation: A Path to Digitization, Speed, and Visibility Into an Application-Centric World.” Each customer representing a different vertical market shared how Cisco’s SDN solutions were a game changer in their organizations – and breathing in innovation, speed and efficiencies to move at the speed of business.

At the 10,000 ft. viewpoint, here’s what each of these customers are doing to digitize their business; increase value to their customers; and create new revenue streams with their networks and infrastructure powered by Cisco Nexus and ACI innovations.

  • Cisco’s programmable fabric helps Shutterfly customers’ move billions of photos off their phone and into the cloud to share their memories with a simple, scalable and high-performing network.
  • 2 Supermarket retailer in the U.K., Sainsbury’s, is taking their business digital to change the way they interact with customers and offer them new ways to buy groceries and goods backed by a converged infrastructure and ACI.
  • Media titan, NBCUniversal, brings us movies, TV show, news broadcasts and theme parks that are in respect different businesses and require a data center environment that can offer the network as a service with automation and segmentation to move at the speed of business (and keep us consumers entertained!).
  • Halkbank can address “just–in-time” delivery of simple banking applications to its wide range of customers across many channels, including mobile, Web, TV and branch tellers, while reducing the IT complexity associated with creating services to meet customer demands – including upgrading entire data center network fabric in just 10 minutes;.
  • SAP is experiencing exponential growth in its cloud business with many cloud networks across the globe and using Cisco ACI to automate, scale and manage complexity to keep pace with customer growth.
  • Technische Universitat Dresden, can spin up virtualized multi-tenant environments with a “plug and play” like model, reducing complexity and quickly serve internal customers faster and easier.
  • With ACI, Pulsant is becoming an established hybrid cloud leader in the market, connecting the virtual and physical, simplifying operations and serving customer fasters, while also giving their provisioning, network and cloud engineers new career paths.
  • Keylane, a SaaS provider for the insurance industry, can move huge volumes of data faster with more bandwidth and less switches with Nexus 9000, increasing time-to-market over the competition and future-proof the network to move to ACI.

 

On State at CLEUR

Behind the scenes, these customers are dynamically changing their IT organizations and simplifying complex infrastructures – changing people, process and things along their digital journeys. That’s the power of Cisco ACI and SDN solutions.

Got an #CiscoACI “wow” moment to share? Find us on Twitter at @CiscoCustomers and @ciscoDC.

 

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Christina Grenier

No Longer with Cisco

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Cisco Employee Brings Hidden Disabilities to Light

Mayte photos

I’m approaching my 10th anniversary at Cisco – my #Ciscoversary! When I look back at the amazing journey I started as a fresh graduate engineer full of insecurities about joining a world networking leader, I can confidently say this last year has been the one that has made me grow the most both professionally and personally.

It all started during the maternity leave of my second son, when I took the time to read about hidden disabilities, or as I like to think of them, “hidden super powers.”

My passion for people and technology has always been a driver in my career. I am today the proud manager of a great team of 20 engineers in the Technical Assistance Center (TAC) organization in Brussels, but Cisco has also given me the opportunity to be very much involved in Inclusion and Collaboration (I&C) activities. So when I became aware of the world of hidden disabilities, I immediately realized the great opportunity ahead of me to make a difference at Cisco.

Hidden disabilities are disabilities that are not immediately apparent or obvious. Having a disability may not affect your job performance, but it can affect daily living, aspects of your work and personal relationships. Depending on the disability, people may need job accommodations to perform the essential functions of their job.

It is estimated that 20% of people in the U.S. (64 million people) have a medical condition that could be considered a type of hidden disability. In the UK, Government statistics cite figures indicating 1 in 6 (16% or 11 million) of the current overall UK population are disabled. The Australian Bureau of Statistics Survey of Disability, Ageing and Careers reported that 4 million people in Australia or 18.5 per cent of the population have one or more disabilities. These numbers keep increasing year over year as better methods to diagnose become available.

These numbers truly opened my eyes to realize that we all work with and interact on a daily basis with people affected by hidden disabilities.

The challenge in today’s workplace is that if a disability is not observable, many people have difficulty understanding the need for adjustments or identifying concrete actions to be taken.

This is what encouraged me to create an awareness campaign for Cisco, to precisely help overcome that challenge. I use the campaign to share information on the disabilities themselves and removing some stigmas and myths, how they affect the individual and small tips on reasonable accommodations that can be provided to improve work conditions and relations.

Jive Page for Hidden Disabilities

Every month I publish information about one hidden disability, and I open a forum to allow people to share their very own experiences. If you ask me what is the most rewarding part of this work, it is reading the testimonials that are shared every time by our incredible people at Cisco. Amazing stories in first person from people that are true examples of how successful you can be despite being affected by hidden disabilities, truly inspiring stories of parents that have helped their children to overcome their challenges, or people that are embracing the message and applying the recommendations on their daily job with their colleagues and reports. I cannot thank enough all these people for being so generous to share their experiences and make this campaign as relevant and as human as it can be.

It is vital for me every time to highlight all the positive aspects that these hidden disabilities bring to the individuals as well, calling out the strengths associated to some of the conditions, because as I mentioned, these are super powers that deserve to be known, specially when it comes to ensuring that we allow them to be at their best and play on their strengths in the workplace. It is all about making it more inclusive and collaborative!

Color blindness, dyslexia, autism, hearing impairment, dyscalculia, epilepsy and ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) are just some examples of the hidden disabilities I have covered to date… but there are 20 more in the pipeline that I am so much looking forward to cover, and continue contributing to making Cisco an even greater place to work!

I am very fortunate to work for a company like Cisco where you get so much support at all levels from colleagues, managers and executives to invest time and devote efforts in your passion beyond your daily job. And getting recognition for it like in my case was receiving the Q2 Services Excellence award for Bringing the People Deal to Life is yet another demonstration of this support and encouragement to always make a difference at Cisco.

Come apply at Cisco, where you can make a difference too!

 

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Mayte Cubino Gonzalez

Senior Manager

Global CX Centers

February 25, 2016 1 Comment
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Cisco Data and Analytics Solutions to be featured at the 2016 Gartner Business Intelligence & Analytics Summit

The complexity of the Internet of Things (IoT) is challenging enterprises to seek new ways to manage and leverage their data. There is an explosion of data being created everywhere—from traditional data warehouses, the cloud, and even the very edge of the network. To remain competitive in this hyper-distributed business environment, it is essential that businesses build an IoT architecture that removes this complexity, making it easier for them to leverage their data assets for business intelligence.

Cisco’s portfolio of Data and Analytics solutions can help you with this digital transformation. Our solutions provide real-time insight from deep within an organization to the edge of the network to fuel innovation, capture competitive advantage and accelerate growth.

These solutions will be showcased during the Gartner Business Intelligence & Analytics Summit on March 14-16 in Grapevine, Texas. During the event, visit our solution booth and attend the keynote session to learn from our experts on how Cisco data and analytics solutions and services can help you access, manage, and analyze your data, transforming it into key business information.

“Data Agility from the Edge to the Center”

Our keynote session at this event will be held Monday, March 14 from 10:45 to 11:30 a.m. central time. In this session, David Besemer, CTO of Data Virtualization at Cisco, will discuss an IoT data architecture that enables you to tame complexity and leverage your data assets, to thrive in a hyper-distributed world.

David B - Gartner Continue reading “Cisco Data and Analytics Solutions to be featured at the 2016 Gartner Business Intelligence & Analytics Summit”

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Kevin Ott

No Longer with Cisco

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FlexPod with Infrastructure Automation: Business Agility Through Simplicity

Over the last several years Cisco UCS integrated infrastructure has been at the center of combining together technologies from industry leaders into integrated systems that dramatically reduce complexity while improving operational efficiencies and time to deployment. FlexPod is a leader in the integrated infrastructure segment, with greater than 7000 customers in more than 100 countries. These customers have come to trust FlexPod to be the foundation for their virtualized infrastructure, cloud computing, desktop virtualization, and enterprise applications.

The need for speed in the technology industry is not a new concept. However, in this instance we are not referring to processor performance or networking bandwidth but rather the ability to quickly and simply deploy IT infrastructure to meet the needs of the business. Cisco and NetApp, working closely with our channel partners, have introduced FlexPod with Infrastructure Automation. This new FlexPod solution utilizes Cisco UCS Mini, NetApp FAS storage, and automation capabilities that radically simplify and accelerate the ordering, delivery, and installation of IT at remote and branch office locations.

FlexPod_IACisco, NetApp, and Avnet have released a new configuration that is preassembled and fully cabled in a rack, simplifying and reducing the order and delivery process from weeks to days. An easy-to-use management interface initiates the automated configuration process by using prevalidated computing, network, and storage templates. The result is that in roughly five business days a customer can procure a FlexPod solution that is ready to be deployed and within minutes of unpacking, a virtualized infrastructure can be instantiated, poised for application deployment. Continue reading “FlexPod with Infrastructure Automation: Business Agility Through Simplicity”

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Tim Stack

Product Marketing Manager

Data Center and Compute

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This is What it Was All About: Changing the Face of Real Estate with Cisco Digital Ceiling

It’s 1994: I finish my Bachelor Degree in Construction Management and I can’t wait to do things differently in the construction sector–an industry plagued with inefficiency and declining productivity. It’s 1997: I graduate from Delft University with a degree in Real Estate Development and Project Management–with a focus on changing how we design, build and finance real estate. It’s 2002: I graduate again (last time, I promise), this time with a degree from Harvard University on the impact the Internet will have on real estate investment management. Three years later, I join Cisco because I believe they may be in the best position to make much-needed transformation come true. In 2008, we sign a first-of-its-kind collaboration agreement with EllisDon, a Canadian construction company that wants to build intelligent buildings. In 2010, we bring the Internet of Things in buildings to life as we collaborate with Delta Controls and launch the first-ever IP-based and PoE HVAC controller in the world. In 2015, we signed the first agreement with Philips Lighting, one of the companies Cisco is working with as part of the evolution of LED lighting to IP-based and PoE LED technology.

Today it’s 2016: It’s done. This is what it all was about. Brace yourself…we ARE changing the face of real estate.

Ever wondered what it looks like above your ceiling in your workplace? Continue reading “This is What it Was All About: Changing the Face of Real Estate with Cisco Digital Ceiling”

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Rick Huijbregts

Vice President

Smart Connected Communities

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Cisco and Extension Team Up to Tackle Modern Clinical Workflow Challenges

Today’s Guest Blog is from Surjit Ahluwalia* who leads the Global IOE Healthcare Solutions and Services Practice organization within the Advanced Services organization in Cisco.

On January 29th, 2016, Cisco joined forces with Extension Healthcare, a leading healthcare alarm safety and event response company, to create a plan, build and manage service that optimizes the network infrastructure for Extension Engage customers. Our two companies are combining our passion for improving clinical and patient experiences to deliver a Extension Healthcarehigh-performance workflow for every clinician and a powerful collaboration and communication platform for every hospital.

As a global leader in healthcare infrastructure technologies, Cisco has been on a mission to bring the power of “digital” to every healthcare organization.   In a world where they have to enable, differentiate and define their businesses leveraging digital technologies and devices, embracing a digital strategy will help them remain viable in an extremely cost sensitive environment where patient experience patient outcomes are key metrics.

Because the quality of any application and solution is only as good as the network that it’s delivered on, Cisco has developed a Digital Healthcare Architecture (DHA), based on our Medical Grade Network best practices and guidelines, offering availability from anywhere at any time.  The DHA takes into account the unique requirements of healthcare for the following three key pillars:  security, mobility, as well as unified communication and collaboration technologies.

Our newly announced service, Cisco Connected Health Service with Extension Engage, leverages Cisco’s DHA architecture and services expertise to maximize the success of Extension Engage deployments.

As Todd Plesko, CEO of Extension Healthcare, has said,  “No one company can handle all of the technical and environmental aspects of clinicians using smartphones and also deliver the clinical communication and collaboration platform to run on those smartphones. Our relationship with Cisco’s Connected Health services team solves that problem by bringing two great companies together that will bring peace of mind to hospital executives that their environment is ready, their investment is safe, and the project is going to be successful.”

What are other examples of how the healthcare industry can go digital? We invite you to share your thoughts in the comment section!

*Surjit Ahluwalia leads the Global IOE Healthcare Solutions and Services Practice organization within the Advanced Services organization in Cisco.  The focus of the organization include architectures and solutions based services for Connected Health offerings; specifically security, mobility, datacenter and collaboration.  The service offerings cover plan, build and manage spectrum including assessment, implementation and optimization services.

Surjit has been with Cisco for 8 years and has spent 15 years working at Intel in a variety of operations and engineering leadership roles.  Surjit also has CISM (Certified Information Security Manager) and CRISC certifications from ISACA.

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Mike Haymaker

Healthcare Industry Marketing

No Longer with Cisco