The Impact Programme, a personal development network for IT
executives, takes a group of UK e-commerce and IT directors on a
tour of Silicon Valley in California for a week each year. This
May, the group visited technology companies in and around San Jose.
Ross Bentley spoke to three participants
Phillip Webb
Chief information officer of defence research organisation
Qinetiq
Why did you go?
I visit Silicon Valley and the Boston area on a regular basis. This
time, I was interested to see the retrenchment taking place among
companies as a result of the recession because the likelihood is
that we will experience it in the UK at some point.
What were your impressions of Silicon Valley? Why has it become
a hotbed for technological progression?
The US development
cycle seems to be more sophisticated. They are more successful at
moving a vision to reality. In the UK, there is a tendency for new
technologies to reach a hyped peak and then hit a trough before
they are adopted by the masses.
In the US, the funding model is far more amenable for taking
projects forward. Investors over there are far more patient. In
Europe, investors want a return on investment too quickly.
Is there anything you saw that you would like to incorporate
into your job or business?
Compaq showed us innovative solutions. I was impressed by
breakthroughs it had made to cope with large-volume transactions.
It is now delivering client/server wide area networks that can cope
with workloads associated with mainframes.
In San Francisco, we visited several companies working at the
forefront of knowledge exploitation technologies and the tools to
extract knowledge. But they were still struggling with the issue of
how to integrate structured and unstructured data in an intelligent
manner. The demand for this will grow.
How will this experience help you in your job?
We are
essentially a research and development organisation so a big part
of my job is getting out and finding out about the latest and best
technologies. As chief information officer, I have to translate to
the business how we can exploit these and make opportunities for
ourselves.
Jennifer Allerton
Chief information officer of
financial services company Barclaycard
Why did you go?
I joined Barclaycard in 1999 and wanted to see what ideas were
coming out of Silicon Valley from the view of the credit card
industry.
Is there anything you saw that you would like to incorporate
into your job or business?
In terms of up-and-coming
technologies, I was interested in some developments in voice
recognition. In the US, they are looking at using it to stop fraud
from catalogue and TV shopping. I am looking at its potential to
curb credit card fraud.
Internet security firm Exodus, which does work with the FBI, had
some interesting things to say about "social engineering". That's
not the nuts-and-bolts of Internet security but the things
companies can do to stop breaches of IT security through non-IT
related activities.
Compaq demonstrated what it calls "non-stop computing" - this is
real-time processing of accounts and gets away from the need for
batch processing where a window has to be made available every 24
hours. This is of great interest to financial services
companies.
Banking is far removed from the nine-to-five, Monday to Friday
industry it used to be - the Internet has taken it global. Being
open at all times gives a real competitive advantage.
How will this experience help you in your job?
In the US, people don't waste time planning projects, they get on
with doing it. There is also less of a stigma related to failure.
It is even good to have a "crash and burn" on your CV - it shows
that you are willing to take risks, to think outside the box.
Bringing that entrepreneurial spirit to a company with the
resources that Barclaycard has is very appealing. We are slowly
developing this culture and have brought in American colleagues,
who help to instil fresh ideas.
Neil Wells
Group IT director of construction company
Wates
Why did you go?
The Impact trip to Silicon Valley combines several key elements of
a good fact-finding trip. Going to the "horse's mouth", which is
California, with a team of your peers is very instructive. You get
to see new technologies but you also get a synthesised view through
colleagues and fresh perspectives from senior IT people working in
such diverse industries as financial services and government
agencies.
What were your impressions of Silicon Valley? Why has it become
a hotbed for technological progression?
There are several
reasons why California has developed as the centre of the
technology world. San Francisco is liberal and encourages thinking
out-of-the-box, while the area is a financial centre with good
business links.
There is a genuine community of like-minded people, all sparking
off each other which has created a certain impetus and an ideal
climate for thought leadership. In the UK, I feel we haven't
reached this critical mass.
Is there anything you saw that you would like to incorporate
into your job or business?
I was interested in the way
application service providers are moving forward. At Wates, we
already use this business model for some applications. The building
industry is waking up to this model, which I can see becoming
popular as companies aim to concentrate on their core
businesses.
I also picked up tips about collaborative working using the
Internet. This would be very powerful in the building industry
where there are many disparate functions that come together on a
project. Working collaboratively allows everyone to know at what
stage a project is - it makes the relationship between all the
fragmented parties richer.
We also saw niche players in the knowledge management market.
Knowledge working is easy to explain but difficult to implement.
For many companies, the early game is expensive while the business
imperatives aren't clear enough yet.
How will this experience help you in your job?
It is
important to keep abreast of the up-and-coming technologies as it
helps you to anticipate when you might adopt a new technology. It
helps colour your roadmap for the next couple of years. One is
always under pressure from well-informed users who want to know
where the IT department is heading.