“Imagine if IT had one tool to fix anything,” says the Chief Creatologist at Dell Technologies Joe Batista. “That’s nirvana. That’s not reality, because I have tool fatigue. I need to get to that simplicity. That’s public enemy number one for us. Now, today, with the influx of cash, the level of innovation cycle time and how the industry’s become more fragmented with lots of products, the complexity has increased exponentially. And the velocity around that complexity is even more accelerated. It hasn’t gotten easier, it’s gotten more difficult.”

Joe Batista, Chief Creatologist at Dell Technologies, discusses the challenges companies face with the exponential pace of changes in technology and innovation in an interview with theCube at WTGtransform 2019:

Helping IT Re-Image the Business

Literally, it (Joe’s ‘Creatologist’ job) sits at the nexus of business and technology. My job, simply, is to help IT re-image the business because now every company’s a technology company. So what does that look like? I’m involved in all sorts of really cool problems, opportunities, that customers are facing by re-imaging IT.

I’ve been around for a long time, and, in the old days, we had swim lanes. You thought about certain vendors, they were in swim lanes. Now, today, with the influx of cash, the level of innovation cycle time and how the industry’s become more fragmented with lots of products, the complexity has increased exponentially. And the velocity around that complexity is even more accelerated. It hasn’t gotten easier, it’s gotten more difficult.

You Have To Rethink the Logic

There’s a couple of thoughts (regarding keeping up with the competition as things constantly change). You have got to look at these vectors that impact a trajectory of the thinking. I love the Peter Drucker quote: If you’re using yesterday’s logic, you’re probably going to get in trouble. You have to rethink the logic, and the example I give was the high jumper and how we did high jumping before and after 1968. As in the Fosbury Flop. So the question becomes what are those vectors?

At Dell Technologies, we have a huge portfolio of technology. But how do you think about the parameter about how those things change over a depreciation cycle? During a conference talk I got a lot of post questions afterward and a lot of engagement regarding this, so it seemed to resonate with the field. The thing that they liked the most was the business conversation of IT. They’re like, we don’t do that enough.

Imagine If IT Had One Tool To Fix Anything

Imagine if IT had one tool to fix anything. That’s nirvana. That’s not reality, because I have tool fatigue. I need to get to that simplicity. It’s Glass’s Law. Every 25% increase in function is 100% increase in complexity. That’s public enemy number one for us.

I was absolutely amazed when I did my due diligence (before joining Dell) about all the innovation that happens in this company. Phenomenal. Not only about the hardware but the software. I think, actually, Jeff (Clarke) said it best. I think we have more software engineers now than we have hardware engineers. So the pivots there, we’re pivoting our talent to the software. But it’s the innovation that’s in this company. I think customers are amazed at that innovation.

The supercharger on it is, how does the innovation apply to the business mechanics of the company, and what value do you extract from that? And that’s where the whole language and conversation usually happens with us. I will tell you, though, I’m really excited that Dell Technologies is doubling down on business outcomes. They’re really trying to change the culture in helping customers understand what the technology means.