10:19 – Nortel’s Peter Kelly takes the stage to talk about IT, convergence and the millennial workforce. He will be talking about the impact of ‘hyperconnectivity’ on CIOs and the IT/telecoms industry. Nortel believes that in the near future every device that can be connected to a network and wants to be connected will be. Just think about what happens when every mobile is connected, he says, every iPod/iPhone… Nike has produced trainers with a sensor pocket in them. Then there’s the intelligent fridge, the intelligent dustbin… even cars could be ‘online’ soon. Breathless stuff. Is the network as it stands robust enough to cope? Peter thinks not.
10:23 – To add to this challenge is the changing nature of the workforce. The so-called ‘millennials’ act in a different way to the traditional knowledge worker. They are self-sufficient and build short-term teams. They always want to be connected, they tend not to use desk phones, they introduce their own IT. They do not hoard information – they share it. Peter calls them ‘agile innovators’ and are replacing the knowledge workers of the previous generation. Peter thinks companies need to embrace them and their ways of working if they are to succeed in the future.
10:29 – Peter talks about web 2.0 for a while, and then explains the risks and rewards for CIOs of working in these new ways. One message he has is ‘virtualise or die’. Companies that do it first will gain competitive advantage. He advises collaborating with partners so you can focus on what you’re good at, as well as engaging the new breed of employees. That will lead to increased productivity. But there are risks – security, business continuity (Skype being an example here – some companies are using it, but it went down for two days recently). Then there’s fraud, control of brand (for example the problems some companies have had with Wikipedia) and the rapid pace of change companies are facing today. That’s difficult for a CIO to manage.
10:36 – Peter talks about some more future challenges from the industry’s perspective. He reckons that, if only 5 to 10% of mobile phone users got serious about using their mobiles for video today, the mobile networks would collapse. That means 4G will be required, and there are battles being raged there at the moment which need resolving. In the fixed line world, carrier ethernet/PBT is where the focus will be. Unified communications will be the third key component of what he calls ‘next generation technology’. Communications-enabled applications will be a key part of that. And so ends another well-delivered agenda-setting presentation.
Tags: ethernet, nortel, peter kelly
October 17, 2007 at 10:14 am
[...] The Official IP’07 Blog created an interesting post today on CIO Briefings (6): IT, convergence and the millennial workforceHere’s a short outline [...]