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Optimization for Innovation Conference – Call for Participation

I’m working with the Business Ecology Initiative (BEI) on a new Optimization for Innovation Conference series.  The inaugural conference is “Optimization for Innovation: Reset; Joint Business & Technology Actions for the New Normal”:

As the world economy emerges from a painful recession, organizations are confronted with the challenge of retaining bottom-line diligence, while pursuing market sustaining and gaining innovation, in an environment riddled with uncertainty, increased regulation, consumer reluctance and tighter credit. This is the “new normal.” To execute in the “new normal,” organizations are seeking new ideas and techniques to optimize business operations and foster business innovation.

At the inaugural Optimization for Innovation conference, executives, senior-level practitioners, experts and thought leaders will share real-world experiences and pragmatic 90-day action items to harvest savings and trapped value from existing processes, resources and capabilities. The conference will consist of a combination of invited guest speakers, keynotes, case studies, presentations and tutorials.

By attending this conference, direct reports and senior staff of the COO, CFO and CIO will learn:

• How leading organizations are optimizing for innovation
• Business Optimization Techniques and Practices
• Business & Technology Partnership Models
• Business Performance Analysis and Measurement Practices
• Business Risk Identification & Mitigation in a Connected World
• Business-Technology Enablers

The conference is December 6 – 8, 2010, in Santa Clara, CA USA.  December 6 is tutorials.  December 7 & 8 are full conference days. 

This morning, we issued a call for participation.  We are seeking proposals for presentations including (but not limited to) the following topics:

Program Topics

• Optimization for Innovation Success Stories
• Business-Technology Reset: Optimization for Innovation
• Governance Models for the New Normal
• Business Analytics as Optimization Foundation
• New Normal Linchpins: Business-Tech Savvy Professionals
• Business-IT Alignment is a Dead-End
• Business Optimization Techniques

Tutorials Topics

• Instituting a Business Performance Measurement Framework
• Cyber Risk Analysis: Assessment, Policy, & Economics
• Business Process Modeling and Business Instrumentation
• Lean / Six Sigma in the New Normal

Presentations and tutorials proposed should be geared toward an audience comprising direct reports and senior staff of the COO, CFO and CIO. All presentations and tutorials  must include a 90-day action plan for attendees to pursue post-conference.

The submission deadline is August 13, 2010. Please note, submissions that are direct pitches for product or services will not be considered. Submissions should be prepared in English, containing the following information:

• Presenter name, title and affiliation
• Presenter Bio
• Session Title
• 2 - 3 paragraph description of proposed session
• 3 - 5 bullets on what attendees will learn
• Target audience characteristics: role, skill and industry
• 90-day action plan items

Submit abstracts as described above to Program Chair Brenda M. Michelson (me) via e-mail.

[Disclosure: The Business Ecology Initiative is a client of my firm, Elemental Links.]

Business Ecology Initiative (BEI): Business Architecture Day, Sept 22, 2010 in Cambridge, MA

Are you interested in Business Architecture?  Want to hear from leading practitioners and thinkers?  Then check out the Business Architecture Information Day, co-sponsored by the Business Ecology Initiative and OMG’s Business Architecture Working Group.  The day features practitioner and analyst keynotes:

Capitalizing on Business Architecture in the Pharmaceutical Industry by Deb Boykin, Business Process Management, Director, Pfizer, Inc. 

Pfizer Inc. is a research-based global pharmaceutical company applying innovative science to improve world health. It discovers, develops, manufactures and markets prescription medicines for humans and animals. Pfizer markets its pharmaceuticals directly to health care providers and patients; with the majority of sales conducted through wholesalers including McKesson and Cardinal Health. At Pfizer, Business Architecture resides within the Business Process Management (BPM) group and is a critical component in delivering Business Process value. This presentation will first examine the approach used to develop a robust and agile Business Architecture structure and will then discuss how content is leveraged and sustained to ensure business value.

Trends & Emerging Strategies in Business Architecture, by Jeff Scott, Senior Analyst, Forrester Research, Inc.

Business architecture's time has come. While EAs have talked about business architecture for years, not much has really happened. But now a confluence of events is driving renewed interest - and action - in the business architecture space. Forrester sees three significant trends driving this change: a shift towards business led IT initiatives particularly in social technologies, EA disintermediation in technology decisions as IT organizations outsource more of their role, and renewed interest in strategic planning as business models and organizations become more complex. This presentation will explore these trends and the challenges and opportunities they bring. Key takeaways include trends that are challenging the traditional EA model, trends in developing business architecture and challenges every EA will face on the road ahead.

Find the complete agenda here.  Hope to see you there!

 

[Disclosure: The Business Ecology Initiative is a client of my firm, Elemental Links.]

New Business Ecology Initiative Podcast: Aleks Buterman on Decoding Business/IT Unity

This morning, the Business Ecology Initiative released a new podcast of Aleks Buterman (@aleksb6) speaking on Decoding Business and IT Unity.  From my BEI post:

“Utilizing a case study approach, Buterman spoke of classic and newly identified failure patterns associated with enterprise technology investment. Interestingly, Buterman's case studies extend beyond initial delivery, to focus on real-world challenges of product, program and business sustainment brought on by unanticipated customer and business unit demand, organizational change and insufficient architectural investment.

For preventive and corrective measures, Buterman advocates a capability portfolio approach to bring complexity to a manageable level. The capability portfolio approach considers four dimensions: business, technology, organization and risk. Buterman emphasized the need to apply business discipline, particularly risk assessment and management, throughout business-technology lifecycles.

Amplifying Buterman's findings was a special video conference guest appearance from a vice president at a large Fortune 500 Financial Services firm.”

To listen to an audio recording of Aleks’ presentation go here.

 

[Disclosure: The Business Ecology Initiative is a client of my firm, Elemental Links.]

@ Forrester IT Forum: Roland Paanakker, VP Lean Business Solutions, CIO, Nike

Keynote Speech: Taking The Lean Journey At Nike, Roland Paanakker, Vice President of Lean Business Solutions and Chief Information Officer, Nike

Nike’s Lean Business Solutions group embodies the business technology (BT) transformation. Nike’s corporate focus on categories and shared operating models across all brands requires unprecedented change in business processes, information needs, and enabling solutions. These changes require both a strong BT foundation and a focus on building for the future. Roland Paanakker is responsible for IT at Nike, and as his title indicates, he’s also responsible for continuous improvement and innovation at the company. He will discuss his company’s Lean journey, how it transcends IT and business boundaries, and how his group embodies Lean Thinking in its solution delivery.

During his presentation, you’ll also hear how he builds for the future with an emphasis on three tenets of BT:

• Driving process and technology architectures from business strategies.
• Enabling end-to-end information quality in key business processes.
• Creating a simpler next-generation technology infrastructure and ensuring flexible solutions.

After a cool video from the perspective of a football player (think FIFA) on the field, training and on the town, Paanakker checked the audience for Nike product ownership (we failed on the Nike Plus), and is now telling us 8 things about Nike.

8 Things about Nike

1. We love Sports
2. We are Global
3. We are a strong portfolio of Strong Brands
4. We lead with Innovative Product & Services
5. We connect with Consumers
6. We ignite & manage the Marketplace
7. We operate with Excellence
8. We are a Growth Company

Vision for Nike’s Lean Business Solutions organizations: Solutions to Ignite Growth and Deliver Value – Always.  Amplify business connection, accelerate opportunity and enable the benefits.  Paanakker: it’s not about projects, it’s about value.

Amplify business connection: Global Process & Technology Leaders.  Creating environments for collaboration, planning and accountability.  Right-sizing solutions. 

The portfolio of work for the LBS organization: Deciding on the Right Solution for the Business Challenge.  A solution could be as small as consultative dialog, or as large as a systems implementation.  Not all solutions require technology.  Critical to prepare the business for change.  Each solution is gauged for sustainability, factoring in corporate responsibility.  Sustainability is designed in.

Accelerate Opportunity: Portfolio Managing & Strategic Alignment: Planning with an end in mind.  Prioritzation, quantification, measurement, incentives, and monitoring/feedback.

Enable the benefits:  Three practices in use, coordinated throughout Nike: Lean, program management and change management.

5 Pillars to realize vision

1. Be easy to work with
2. Align with Inc. Strategies
3. Game-changing programs
4. Deliver global and local
5. Holistic Portfolio & Funding

Building for the future, Paanakker calls out the importance of a holistic information strategy. Data quality.  Business analytics.  To make people thrive, they are a learning organization.  In the Lean practice, they apply agile solutions and continuous improvement and innovation. 

Nike’s Lean Approach: Start with mutual Trust & Respect.  LBS as a function, ensures balance between solution provisioning and opportunity creation.  Nike’s approach is built from work in manufacturing, the Toyata Way, but has been tailored for use outside of manufacturing business.

Paanakker quickly went through some detail on the Lean practice.  Points that jumped out: (a) it’s not just about removing waste (efficiency), it’s also about quality, time and line of sight to strategic goals and (b) drive business intelligence through quality data.

LBS vision has a tagline: we create opportunities beyond horizons. 

Editorial comment: You might be thinking, wow lots of marketing speak from a CIO.  Yes.  But, that’s important. If you can’t sell your success, you’ll never be able to sell your ideas.

New BEI Podcast: Faisal Hoque on the Power of Business-IT Convergence

Faisal Hoque, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, BTM Corporation, spoke on The Power of Convergence: Why Bringing Business and Technology Together Matters, at the March 2010 Business Ecology Initiative Symposium in Jacksonville FL.   

Hoque set the stage with the startling fact that only 74 of the original 500 firms remain in the S&P index just 40 years later.  The frenetic pace of business has reduced the enterprise life expectancy.  The response has been a call for agility.  Referencing research of the BTM Institute, Hoque stated that agility is achieved through repeatable management processes.

The components of agility are flexible organizational constructs and behaviors, standards for enterprise architecture, including business architecture, a portfolio investment approach that is structured to balance between stability and agility, and a governance model that facilitates horizontal and collaborative decision making processes.

Of the flexible organizational constructs and behaviors, Hoque focused on business-technology convergence.  Unlike business-IT alignment, which is essentially communicating silos, business-technology convergence features intertwined business and technology activities, dedicated to driving superior financial performance.

With the agility and business-technology convergence context set, Hoque walked through the BTM management practice framework, including the 17 capabilities required to achieve convergence. 

In addition to discussing the practices, Hoque shared metrics and trends from the hundreds of organizations who have utilized the BTM measurement tools over the past 7 years.  A critical finding is a correlation of management practice maturity and corporate growth and financial returns – stock price, earnings and margins.

Click here to listen to an audio recording of Hoque’s presentation and view the slides.

 

[Disclosure: The Business Ecology Initiative is a client of my firm, Elemental Links.]