>>from around the globe. It's >>the Cube with digital coverage of Dev >>Ops Virtual Forum Brought to You by Broadcom. Welcome to Broadcom, Step Ups, Virtual Forum I and Lisa Martin and I'm joined by another Martin very socially. Distance from me all the way. Coming from Birmingham, England, is Glynn Martin, head of Q. A transformation at BT Glenn. It's great to have you on the program. >>Thank you, Lisa. I'm looking forward, Toa. >>As we said before, we went live to Martin's for the price of one in one segment. So this is gonna be an interesting segment, Guesses. What we're gonna do is Glen's gonna give us a really kind of deep inside out view of Dev ops. From an evolution perspective, Soglo's Let's start transformation is at the heart of what you dio. It's obviously been a very transformative year. How have the events of this year affected the transformation that you are so responsible for driving? >>Yeah. Thank you, Leigh. So I mean, yeah, it has been a difficult year Bond, although working for BT, which is ah, global telecommunications company. Relatively resilient, I suppose, as an industry through covert, it obviously still has been affected and has got its challenges on bond. If anything is actually caused us to accelerate of our transformation journey, you know, we had to do some great things during this time around. You know, in the UK for our emergency and health workers give them unlimited data and for vulnerable people to support them and that spent that we've had to deliver changes quickly. Um, but what? We want to be able to do it, deliver those kind of changes quickly, but sustainably for everything that we do, not just because there's an emergency eso we were already on the kind of journey to by John, but ever so ever more important now that we are what we're able to do, those that kind of work, do it more quickly on. But it works because the implications of it not working is could be terrible in terms of, you know, we've been supporting testing centers, new hospitals to treat covert patients, so we need to get it right and therefore the coverage of what we do, the quality of what we do and how quickly we do. It really has taken on a new scowling what was already a very competitive market within the telco industry within the UK. Um, you know, what I would say is that you know, we are under pressure to deliver more value, but we have small cost challenges. We have to obviously deal with the fact that you know, Cove in 19 has hit most industries kind of revenues and profits. So we've got this kind of paradox between having less cost, but they're having to deliver more value quicker on bond, you know, to higher quality. So, yeah, certainly the finances is on our minds. And that's why we need flexible models, cost models that allow us to kind of do growth. But we get that growth by showing that we're delivering value, especially in, you know, these times when there are financial challenges on companies. >>So one of the things that I want to ask you about again looking at, develops from the inside out on the evolution that you've seen you talked about the speed of things really accelerating in this last nine months or so. When we think Dev ops, we think speed. But one of the things I love to get your perspective on we've talked about in a number of the segments that we've done for this event is cultural change. What are some of the things that scene there as as needing to get, as you said, get things right but done so quickly to support essential businesses, essential workers? How have you seen that cultural shift? >>Yeah, I think you know, before, you know, test test team saw themselves of this part of the software delivery cycle. Andi, actually, now, really, our customers were expecting their quality and to deliver for our customers what they want. Quality has to be ingrained throughout the life cycle. Obviously that you know, there's lots of buzzwords like shift left. How do you do? Shift left testing. But for me, that's really instilling quality and given capabilities shared capabilities throughout the life cycle. That Dr you know, Dr Automation drive improvements. I always say that you know, you're only as good as your lowest common denominator on one thing that we're finding on our Dev Ops Journey Waas that we were you know, we would be trying thio do certain things quicker and had automated build automated tests. But if we were taking weeks to create test scripts or we were taking weeks to manly craft data, and even then when we had taken so long to do it that the coverage was quite poor and that led to lots of defects later in the lifecycle or even in in our production environment, we just couldn't afford to do that. And actually, you know, focusing on continuous testing over the last 9 to 12 months has really given us the ability Thio delivered quickly across the the whole life cycle and therefore actually go from doing a kind of semi agile kind of thing where we did you use the stories we did a few of the kind of, you know, as our ceremonies. But we weren't really deploying any quicker into production because, you know, our stakeholders were scared that we didn't have the same control that we had when we had more water for releases. And, you know, when way didn't think ourselves. So we've done a lot of work on every aspect, especially from a testing point of view, every aspect of every activity, rather than just looking at automated test, you know, whether it is actually creating the test in the first place, Whether it's doing security testing earlier in the light and performance testing. Learn the life cycle, etcetera. So, yeah, it Z It's been a riel key thing that for for C T for us to drive, develops, >>talk to me a little bit about your team. What are some of the shifts in terms of expectations that you're experiencing and how your team interacts with the internal folks from pipeline through life cycle? >>Yeah, we've done a lot of work on this, you know, there's a thing. I think people were pretty quiet. Customer experience. Gap. It reminds me of a cart, a Gilbert cartoon where, you know, we start with the requirements here on Do you know, we almost like a Chinese whisper effects and what we deliver eyes completely, completely different. So we think the testing team or the the delivery team, you know, you know, you think they've done a great job. This is what it said in the acceptance criteria, but then our customers the same Well, actually, that's not working. This isn't working, you know, on there's this kind of gap Way had a great launched this year of actual Requirement Society, one of the board common tools Onda that for the first time in in since I remember actually working within B. T, I had customers saying to may, Wow, you know, we want more of this. We want more projects, um, to have a actual requirements design on it because it allowed us to actually work with the business collaboratively. I mean, we talk about collaboration, but how do you actually, you know, do that have something that both the business on technical people can understand? And we've actually been working with the business using at our requirement. Designer Thio, you know, really look about what the requirements are. Tease out requirements to the hadn't even thought off and making sure that we've got high levels of test coverage. And so what we actually deliver at the end of it, not only have you been able Thio generate test more quickly, but we've got much higher test coverage and also can more smartly, you're using the kind of AI within the tour and with some of the other kind of pipeline tools actually deliver to choose the right tests on the bar, still actually doing a risk based testing approach. So that's been a great launched this year, but just the start of many kind of things that we're >>doing. But what I hear in that Glenn is a lot of positives that have come out of a very challenging situation. Uh, talk to me about it and I like that perspective. This is a very challenging time for everybody in the world, but it sounds like from a collaboration, perspective is you're right. We talk about that a lot critical with Dev Ops. But those challenges there you guys were able to overcome those pretty quickly. What other challenges did you face and figure out quickly enough to be able to pit it so fast? >>I mean, you talked about culture. I mean, you know, Bt is like most come countries companies. So, um, is very siloed. You know, we're still trying to work to become closer as a company. So I think there's a lot of challenges around. How do you integrate with other tools? How do you integrate with you know, the various different technologies and bt we have 58 different whitey stacks? That's not systems that stacks all of those stacks of can have, you know, hundreds of systems on we're trying to. We're gonna drive at the moment a simplified program where we're trying Thio, you know, reduce that number 2 14 stacks. And even then they'll be complexity behind the scenes that that we will be challenged. Maurin Mawr As we go forward, how do you actually hired that to our users on as an I T organization? How do we make ourselves Lena so that even when we you know, we've still got some of that legacy and we'll never fully get rid of it on that's the kind of trade off that we have to make. How do we actually deal with that and and hide that for my users a say and and and drive those programs so we can actually accelerate change. So we take, you know, reduce that kind of waste, and that kind of legacy costs out of our business. You know, the other thing is, well, beating. And I'm sure you know telecoms probably no difference to insurance or finance we've got You know, when you take the number of products that we do and then you combine them, the permutations are tens and hundreds of thousands of products. So we as a business to trying to simplify. We are trying Thio do that in a natural way and haven't trying to do agile in the proper way, you know, and really actually work it paste really deliver value. So I think what we're looking Maura, Maura, at the moment is actually, um is more value focus? Before we used to deliver changes, sometimes into production, someone had a great idea or it was a great idea nine months ago or 12 months ago. But actually, then we end up deploying it. And then we look at the the the users, you know, the usage of that product of that application or whatever it is on. It's not being used for six months, so we're getting much we haven't got, you know, because of the last 12 months, we certainly haven't got room for that kind of waste and you know, the for not really understanding the value of changes that we we are doing. So I think that's the most important thing at the moment is really taken that waste out. You know, there's lots of focus on things like flow management. What bits of the our process are actually taking too long, and we've We've started on that journey, but we've got a hell of a long way to go, you know, But that that involves looking every aspect off the kind of software delivery cycle. >>What are some? Because that that going from, what, 58 i t stocks down to 14 or whatever it's going to be go simplifying is sounds magical. Took everybody. It's a big challenge. What are some of the core technology capabilities that you see really as kind of essential for enabling that with this new way that you're working? >>Yeah. I mean, I think we've started on a continuous testing journey, and I think that's just the start. I mean, that's really, as I say, looking at every aspect off, you know, from a Q, a point of view. It's every aspect of what we dio. But it's also looking at, you know, we're starting to branch into more like a AI ops and, you know, really, the full life cycle on. But, you know, that's just a stepping stone onto, you know, I think oughta Nomics is the way forward, right? You know all of this kind of stuff that happens um, you know, monitoring, you know, monitoring systems, what's happening in production had to be feed that back. How do you get to a point where actually we think about a change on then suddenly it's in production safely. Or if it's not going to safety, it's automatically backing out. So, you know, it's a very, very long journey. But if we want Thio, you know, in a world where the pace is ever increasing the demands of the team and you know, with the pressures on at the moment where with we're being asked to do things, you know more efficiently Ondas leaving as possible. We need to be, you know, thinking about every part of the process. And how do we put the kind of stepping stones in players to lead us to a more automated kind of, you know, their future? >>Do you feel that that plant outcomes are starting to align with what's delivered? Given this massive shift that you're experiencing, >>I think it's starting to, and I think you know, Azzawi. Look at more of a value based approach on. Do you know a Zeiss? A princess was a kind of flight management. I think that's that will become ever evermore important. So I think it's starting to people. Certainly realized that, you know, people teams need to work together. You know, the kind of the cousin between business and ICT, especially as we go Teoh Mawr kind of sad space solutions, low cold solutions. You know there's not such a gap anymore. Actually, some of our business partners expects to be much more tech savvy. Eso I think you know, this is what we have to kind of appreciate. What is I ts role? How do we give the capabilities become more for centers of excellence rather than actually doing Mount amount of work And for May and from a testing point of view, you know, amount, amount of testing, actually, how do we automate that? How do we actually generate that instead of created? I think that's the kind of challenge going forward. >>What are some? As we look forward, what are some of the things that you would like to see implemented or deployed in the next say, 6 to 12 months as we hopefully round a corner with this pandemic? >>Yeah, I think you know, certainly for for where we are as a company from a Q A perspective. We are. Yeah, there's certain bits that we do Well, you know, we've started creating continuous delivery. A day evokes pipelines. Um, there's still manual aspects of that. So, you know, certainly for May I I've challenged my team with saying, How do we do an automated journey? So if I, you know, I put a requirement injera or value whoever it is, that's why. Then click a button on bond, you know, with either zero touch of one touch, then put that into production and have confidence that that has been done safely on that it works. And what happens if it doesn't work? So you know, that's that's the next in the next few months, that's what our concentration is about. But it's also about decision making, you know, how do we actually understand those value judgements? And I think there's lots of the things Dev ops, ai ops, kind of always that aspects of business operations. I think it's about having the information in one place to make those kind of decisions. How does it all tied together, as I say, even still with kind of Dev ops, we've still got elements within my company where we've got lots of different organizations doing some doing similar kind of things but the walking of working in silos Still. So I think, having a eye ops Aziz becomes more and more to the fore as we go to the cloud. And that's what we need to. You know, we're still very early on in our cloud journey, you know. So we need to make sure the technologies work with Cloud as well as you kind of legacy systems. But it's about bringing that all together and having a full visible pipeline. Everybody can see and make decisions against >>you said the word confidence, which jumped out at me right away. Because absolutely, you've gotta have be able to have confidence in what your team is delivering and how it's impacting the business and those customers. Last question for you is how would you advise your peers in a similar situation to leverage technology automation, for example, dev ops to be able to gain the confidence that they're making the right decisions for their business? >>Yeah, I mean, I think the the approach that we've taken actually is not started with technology we've actually taken human centered design a za core principle of what we dio within the i t part of BT. So by using humans tend to design. That means we talked to our customers. We understand their pain points, we map out their current processes on. But when we mapped out, those processes also understand their aspirations as well, you know, Where do they want to be in six months? You know, Do they want to be more agile and you know, or do they want Teoh? Is this apart their business that they want thio run better? We have to Then look at why that's not running well and then see what solutions are out there. We've been lucky that, you know, with our partnership with Broadcom within the P l. A. A lot of the tortures and the P l. A have directly answered some of the businesses problems. But I think by having those conversations and actually engaging with the business, um, you know, especially if the business hold the purse strings, which is you know, in some companies, including as they do there is that kind of, you know, almost by understanding their their pain points and then saying This is how we can solve your problem We've tended to be much more successful than trying Thio impose something and say We're here to technology that they don't quite understand doesn't really understand how it could have resonate with their problems. So I think that's the heart of it is really about, you know, getting looking at the data, looking at the processes, looking at where the kind of waste is on. Then actually then looking at the right solutions. And as I say, continuous testing is a massive for us. We've also got a good relationship with capitals looking at visual ai on. Actually, there's a common theme through that, and I mean, AI is becoming more and more prevalent, and I know yeah, sometimes what is A I and people have kind of the semantics of it. Is it true, ai or not? But yes, certainly, you know, AI and machine learning is becoming more and more prevalent in the way that we work, and it's allowing us to be much more effective, the quicker and what we do on being more accurate. You know, whether it's finding defects, running the right tests or, you know, being able to anticipate problems before they're happening in a production environment. >>Welcome. Thank you so much for giving us this sort of insight. Outlook at Dev Ops, sharing the successes that you're having taking those challenges, converting them toe opportunities and forgiving folks who might be in your shoes or maybe slightly behind advice. I'm sure they appreciate it. We appreciate your time. >>It's been an absolute pleasure, Really. Thank you for inviting me of Extremely enjoyed it. So thank you ever so much. >>Excellent. Me too. I've learned a lot for Glynn Martin and Lisa Martin. You're watching the Cube?

>>from around the globe. It's the Cube with digital coverage of Dell Technologies. World Digital experience brought to you by Dell Technologies. Hello, everyone. And welcome back to the cubes coverage of Del Tech World 2020 the virtual del tech world. Of course, the virtual queue with me is Alison Do. She's the CMO and a member of the executive leadership team at Dell Technologies. Hey there, Alison. Good to see you. >>Hi, David. Good to see you too. I'm gonna see you alive, but it's so good to see on the feed. >>Yeah, I miss you, too. You know, it's been it's been tough, but we're getting through it and, you know, it's a least with technology. We're able to meet this way and, you know, for us continue the cube for you to continue del Tech world, reaching out to your to your customers. But, you know, maybe we could start there. It's like I said the other day else into somebody. I feel like everybody I know in the technology industry has also become a covert expert in the last six months. But but, you know, it changed so much. But I'm interested in well, first of all, you're a great communicator. I have met many, many members of your team. They're really motivated group. How did you handle the pandemic? Your communications. Uh, did you increase that? Did you? Did you have to change anything? Or maybe not. Because like I say, you've always been a great communicator with a strong team. What was your first move? >>Eso There's obviously there's many audiences that we serve through communications, but in this instance, the two most important our customers and our team members. So I'll take the customers first. You have likely seen the spoof Real's Going Around the Internet of Here's How Not to Talk to Customers, Right? So you saw early in February and March in April, all of these communications that started with in these troubled times We are here to help you and, you know, we're already in a crisis every single day, all day long. I don't think people needed to be reminded that there was a crisis happening. So you've got this one end where it's over crisis mongering and the other side where it was just ignoring the crisis. And so what we did was we really looked at all of our communications a new So, for example, in our small business space, we were just about I mean days away from launching a campaign that was about celebrating the success of small businesses. It's a beautiful piece of creative. I love it, and we made the very tough decision to put that work on the shelf and not launch it. Why? Because it would have been incredibly tone deaf in a moment where small businesses were going out of business and under incredible struggle to have a campaign that was celebrating their success. It just wouldn't have worked. And what we did very quickly was a new piece of creative that had our own small business advisers, lower production values, them working from home and talking about how they were helping customers. But frankly, even that then has a shelf life, because ultimately you have to get back to your original story. So as we thought about our own communications, my own leadership team and I went through every single piece of creative toe. Look for what's appropriate now what's tone deaf, and that was a very heavy lift and something that we had to continue to do and I'm really proud of the work. We did pivot quickly, then on the employee side. If you'd asked me in January, was Team member Communications the most important thing I was doing? I would have said It's an important thing I'm doing and I care deeply about it, But it's not the most important thing I'm doing. Where there was a period from probably February to June where I would have said it became the most important thing that I was doing because we had 120,000 people pivot over a weekend toe. Working from home, you had all of the demands of home schooling, the chaos that stress whilst also were obviously trying to keep a business running. So this engagement with our employees and connecting the connecting with them through more informal means, like zoom meetings with Michael and his leadership team, where once upon a time we would have had a more high value production became a key piece of what we did. So it sounds so easy, but this increase of the frequency with our own employees, while also being really honest with ourselves about the tone of those communications, so that's what we did and continue to dio >>Well, you've done a good job and you struck a nice balance. I mean, you weren't did see some folks ambulance chasing and it was a real turn off. Or like you said, sometimes tone deaf. And we can all look back over history and see, you know, so many communications disasters like you say, people being tone deaf or ignoring something. It was sloughing it off, and then it really comes back to bite them. Sometimes security breaches air like that. So it seems like Dell has I don't know, there's a methodology. I don't know if you use data or it's just a lot of good good experience. How have you been able to sort of nail it? I guess I would say is it is. >>But there's some secret method that I'm cautiously optimistic. And the superstitious part of me is like, Don't say that, Okay, I'm not gonna would alright eso so that it's it's both it z experience, obviously. And then what? I What I talk a lot about is this intersection of data versus did data and creativity, and you spend a lot of time in marketing circles. Those two things can be sometimes pitched is competing with each other. Oh, it's all about the creativity, or it's all about the data. And I think that's a silly non argument. And it should be both things And this this time like this. This point that I make about ambulance chasing and not re traumatizing people every single day by talking about in these troubled times is actually from a piece of research that we did, if you believe it or not. In 2008 during the middle of the global financial crisis, when we started to research some of our creative, we found that some of the people who have seen our creative were actually less inclined to buy Dell and less positive about Dell. Why? Because we started with those really hackneyed lines of in these troubled times. And then we went on to talk about how we could take out I t costs and were targeted at I T makers, who basically we first played to their fear function and they said, and now we're going to put you out of a job, right? So there's this years of learning around where you get this sweet spot from a messaging perspective to talk about customer outcomes while also talking about what you do is a company, and keeping the institutional knowledge is knowledge of those lessons and building and refining over time. And so that's why I think we've been able to pivot as quickly as we have is because we've been data driven and had a creative voice for a very long time. The other piece that has helped us be fast is that we've spent the last 2.5 3 years working on bringing our own data, our own customer data internally after many, many years of having that with the third party agency. So all the work we had to do to retarget to re pivot based on which verticals were being successful in this time and which were not we were able to now due in a matter of hours, something that would have taken us weeks before. So there's places where it's about the voice of who we are as a brand, and that's a lot of that is creative judgment. And then there's places about institutional knowledge of the data, and then riel getting too real time data analysis where we're on the cusp of doing that. >>Yeah, so I like the way you phrase that it's not just looking at the data and going with some robotic fashion. It reminds me of, you know the book. Michael Lewis, Moneyball, the famous movie, You know, it's like for a while it was it was in baseball, like whoever had the best nerds they thought we were gonna win. But it really is a balance of art and science, and it seems like you're on this journey with your customers together. I mean, how much how much? I mean, I know there's a lot of interaction, but but it seems like you guys are all learning together and evolving together in that regard. >>Absolutely. David, One of the things that has been really interesting to watch is we have had a connected workplace program for 10 years, so we've had flexible work arrangements for a very long time, and one of the things that we have learned from that is a combination of three key factors. The technology, obviously, can you do it? The three culture, and then the process is right. So when you have a the ability to work from home doesn't mean you should work from home 22 out of 24 hours. And that's where culture comes in. And I frankly, that's where this moment of cumulative global stress is so important to realize as a leader and to bring out to the Open and to talk about it. I mean, Michael's talked a lot about this is a marathon. This is not a sprint. We've done a lot of things to support our employees. And so if you think about those three factors and what we've learned, one of the things that we found as we got into the pipe pandemic was on the technology side. Even customers who thought they had business continuity plans in place or thought that they had worked from home infrastructure in place found that they didn't really so there was actually a very quick move to help our customers get the technology that would enable them to keep their businesses running and then on the other two fronts around processes and culture and leadership. We've been ableto have smaller, more intimate conversations with our customers than we would have historically, because frankly, we can bring Michael, Jeff. Other parts of the leadership team me together to have a conversation and one of the benefits of the fact that those of us who've been road warriors for many, many, many years as I know you have a swell suddenly found yourself actually staying in one place. You have time to have that conversation so that we continue to obviously help our customers on the technology front, but also have been able to lean in in a different way on what we've learned over 10 years and what we've learned over this incredibly dramatic eight months, >>you know, and you guys actually have some work from Home Street cred? I think, Del, you're the percentage of folks that were working from home Pre Koven was higher than the norm, significantly higher than normal. Wasn't that long ago that there were a couple of really high profile companies that were mandating come into the office and clear that they were on the wrong side of history? I mean, that surprised me actually on. Do you know what also surprised me? I don't know. I'm just gonna say it is There were two companies run by women, and I would have thought there was more empathy there. Uh, but Dal has always had this culture of Yeah, we were, You know, we could work. We could be productive no matter where. Maybe that's because of the the heritage or your founders. Still still chairman and CEO. I don't know. >>You know those companies and obviously we know who they are. Even at the time, what I thought about them was You don't have a location problem. You have a culture problem and you have a productivity problem and you a trust problem with your employees. And so, yes, I think they are going to be proven to be on the wrong side of history. And I think in those instances they've been on the wrong side of history on many things, sadly, and I hope that will never be us. I don't wanna be mean about that, but but the truth of the matter is one of the other benefits of being more flexible about where and how you work is. It opens up access to different talent pools who may or may not want to live in Austin, Texas, as an example, and that gives you a different way to get a more diverse workforce to get a younger workforce. And I think lots of companies are starting to have that really ization. And, you know, as I said, we've been doing this for 10 years. Even with that context, this is a quantum leap in. Now we're all basically not 100% but mainly all working from home, and we're still learning. So there's an interesting, ongoing lifelong learning that I think is very, very court of the Dell culture. >>I want to ask you about the virtual events you had you had a choice to make. You could have done what many did and said, Okay, we're going to run the event as scheduled, and you would have got a covert Mulligan. I mean, we saw Cem some pretty bad productions, frankly, but that was okay because they had to move fast and they got it done. So in a way, you kind of put more pressure on your yourselves. Andi, I guess you know, we saw this with VM Ware. I guess Was, you know, just recently last >>few >>weeks. Yeah, and so but they kind of raise the bar had great, you know, action with John Legend. So that was really kind of interesting, but, you know, kind of what went into that decision? A Zeiss A. You put more pressure on yourself because now you But you also had compares what? Your thoughts on >>that. So there was a moment in about March where I felt like I was making a multimillion dollar decision every single day. And that was on a personal note, somewhat stressful to kind of wake up and think, What? What? Not just on the events front. But as I said on the creative front, What work that my team has been working on for the last two years? I am I going to destroy today was sort of. I mean, I'm kind of joking, but not entirely how that felt for me personally at the moment. And we had about we made the decision early on to cancel events. We also made the decision quite early on that when we call that, we said we're not going to do any in person events until the end of this calendar year. So I felt good about the definitiveness there. We had about a week where we were still planning to do the virtual world in May and what I did together with my head of communications and head of event is we really sat and looked at the trajectory in the United States, and we thought, this is not gonna be a great moment for the U. S. The week we were supposed to run in May, if you looked at the trajectory of diseases, you would have news be dominated by the fact that we had an increasing spike in number of cases and subsequent deaths. And we just thought that don't just gonna care about our launches. So we had to really, very quickly re pivot that and what I was trying to do was not turn my own organization. So make the decisions start to plan and move on. And at the same time, though, what that then meant is we still have to get product launches out the door. So we did nine virtual launches in nine weeks. That was a big learning learning her for my team. I feel really good about that, and hopefully it helps us. And what I think will be a hybrid future going forward. >>Yeah, so not to generalize, but I've been generalizing about the following. So I've been saying for a while now that a lot >>of the >>marketing people have always wanted to have a greater component of virtual. But, you know, sales guys love the belly. The belly closed the deals, you know? But so where do you land on that? How do you see? You know, the future of events we do, you expect to continue to have ah, strong virtual component. >>I think it's gonna be a hybrid. I think we will never go back to what we did before. I think the same time people do need that human connection. Honestly, I miss seeing the people that I work with face to face. I said at the beginning of this conversation, I would like to be having this discussion with you live and I hate Las Vegas. So I never thought I'd be that interested in, like, let's go to Las Vegas, you know, who knew? But but so I think you'll see a hybrid future going forward. And then we will figure out what those smaller, more direct personal relationship moments are that over the next couple of years you could do more safely and then also frankly give you the opportunity to have those conversations that are more meaningful. So I'm not entirely sure what that looks like. Obviously, we're gonna learn a lot this year with this event, and we're going to continue to build on it. But there's places in the world if you look at what we've done in China for many, many, many years, we have held on over abundance of digital events because of frankly, just the size of the population and the the geographic complexity. And so there are places that even early into this, we could say, Well, we've already done this in China. How do we take that and apply it to the rest of the world? So that's what we're working through now. That's actually really exciting, >>You know, when you look at startups, it's like two things matter the engineering and sales and that's all anything else is a waste of money in their minds when you and and all they talk about is Legion Legion Legion. You don't hear that from a company like Dell because you have so many other channels on ways Thio communicate with your customers and engage with your customers. But of course, legions important demand. Gen. Is important. Do you feel like virtual events can be a Z effective? Maybe it's a longer tail, but can they be as productive as the physical events? >>So one thing that I've always been a little bit cantankerous on within marketing circles is I refuse to talk about it in terms of Brand versus Li Jen, because I think that's a false argument. And the way I've talked about it with my own team is there are things that we do that yield short term business results, maybe even in corridor in half for a year. And there are things that we do that lead to long term business results. First one is demand, and the second one is more traditional brand. But we have to do both. We have to think about our legacy as a known primarily for many, many years as a PC maker. In order for us to be successful in the business businesses that we are in now, we love our PC heritage. I grew up in that business, but we also want to embrace the other parts of their business and educate people about the things that we do that they may not even know, right? So that's a little bit of context in terms of you got to do both. You got to tell your story. You've got to change perceptions and you got to drive demand in quarter. So the interesting things about digital events is we can actually reach more people than we ever could in an in person world. So I think that expands the pie for both the perceptions and long term and short term. And I hope what we are more able to do effectively because of that point that I made about our own internal marketing digital transformation is connect those opportunities to lead and pass them off to sales more effectively. We've done a lot of work on the plumbing on the back end of that for the last couple of years, and I feel really fortunate that we did that because I don't think we'd be able to do what we're doing now. If we hadn't invested there, >>Well, it's interesting. You're right. I mean, Del of course, renowned during the PC era and rode that wave. And then, of course, the AMC acquisition one of the most amazing transformations, if not the most amazing transformation in the history of the computer industry. But when you when you look to the future and of course, we're hearing this week about as a service and you new pricing models, just new mindsets I look at and I wonder if you could comment, I look at Dell's futures, you know, not really a product company. You're becoming a platform. Essentially, for for digital transformation is how I look atyou. Well, how do you see the brand message going forward? >>Absolutely. I think that one of the things that's really interesting about Dell is that we have proven our ability to constantly and consistently reinvent ourselves, and I won't go through the whole thing. But if you look at started as a direct to consumer company, then went into servers then and started to go into small business meeting business a little bit about when private acquired e. M. C. I mean, we are a company who is always moving forward and always thinking about what's next. Oftentimes, people don't even realize the breadth and depth of what we do and who we are now so as even with all of that context in place, the horizon that we're facing into now is, I believe, the most important transformation that we've done, which is, as you see, historical, I t models change and it becomes, yes, about customer choice. We know that many of our customers will continue to want to buy hardware the way they always have. But we also know that we're going to see a very significant change in consumption models. And the way we stay on top of our game going forward is we lean into that huge transformation. And that's what we're announcing this week with Project Apex, which is that commitment to the entire company's transformation around as a service. And that's super exciting for us. >>Well, I was saying Before, you're sort of in lockstep with your customers. Or maybe you could we could. We could close by talking a little bit about Dell's digital transformation and what you guys have going on internally, and maybe some of the cultural impacts that you've seen. >>So you, you you touched on it. It's so easy to make it about just the I t. Work, and in fact, you actually have to make it about the i t. The business process. Change in the culture change. So if you look at what we did with the AMC acquisition and the fact that you know that there's a lot of skepticism about that at the time, they're not gonna be able to absorb that. Keep the business running. And in fact, we have really shown huge strides forward in the business. One of the reasons we've been able to do that is because we've been so thoughtful about all of those things. The technology, the culture and the business process change, and you'll see us continue to do that. As I said in my own organization, just to use the data driven transformation of marketing. Historically, we would have hired a certain type of person who was more of a creative Brett bent. Well, now, increasingly, we're hiring quants who are going to come into a career in marketing, and they never would have seen themselves doing that a couple of years ago. And so my team has to think about okay, these don't look like our historical marketing profile. How do we hire them? How do we do performance evaluations for them. And how do we make sure that we're not putting the parameters of old on a very new type of talent? And so when we talk about diversity, it's not just age, gender, etcetera. It's also of skills. And that's where I think the future of digital transformation is so interesting. There has been so much hype on this topic, and I think now is when we're really starting to see those big leaps forward and peoples in companies. Riel transformation. That's the benefit of this cookie year we got here, Dave. >>Well, I think I do think the culture comes through, especially in conversations like this. I mean, you're obviously a very clear thinker and good communicator, but I think your executive team is in lockstep. It gets down, toe the middle management into the into the field and and, you know, congratulations on how far you've come. And, uh, and and also I'm really impressed that you guys have such a huge ambitions in so many ways. Changing society obviously focused on customers and building great companies. So, Alison, thanks so much for >>thank you, Dave. You virtually I'm very >>great to see it. Hopefully hopefully see Assumes. Hopefully next year we could be together. Until then, virtually you'll >>see virtual, >>huh? Thank you for watching everybody. This is Dave Volonte for the Cube. Keep it right there. Our coverage of Del Tech World 2020. We'll be right back right after this short break.

>> Boston, Massachusetts. It's the queue covering W T G transformed 2019 Accio by Winslow Technology Group. >> Hi, I'm Stew Minutemen And this is the Cubes. Third year at W. T. G. Transform 2019 which is the Window Technologies Group, Their user conference. Longtime compelling customer, of course. Compelling, bought by Del del Body M. C. So it's now the deli emcee user event and to help me kick off a day of content where we're gonna be talking. Toa some of the W T G executive some of their customers and some of their partners is first time guests on the program. Joe Batista, Who's a Creek and easy chief creative, apologised at Del Technologies. Joe Appreciate you making it all the way in from the suburbs to come here to downtown Boston in the shadow of Fenway. >> It was a long haul this morning with no traffic of 5 30 35 minutes in. >> Yeah, a Zeiss safe for the people. Adele. It's about the distant from Boston Towe where we live as it is to go from Austin to Round Rock. So >> there we go, >> you know, similar types of things. So I have to start create apologised. A song. You know, I did a little bit of reading and, you know, having watched Aquino, it's, you know, sparking that creativity. So I love the idea of it. You've had this title for quite a while since before you Riddell just give us a little bit about background of you know what you do, and you know why you're qualified to do it. >> Well, it was quite a fight. It's a fun brand, but literally. It sits at the nexus of business and technology, and my job's simply is to help it re image the business, because now every company's a technology company. So what does that look like? So I get involved Also, it's a really cool problems, opportunities that customers are facing by re imaging it >> well, it's funny that you say re image, because when I did my history, the oldest thing I found some article from the nineties talking about somebody from Polaroid that that title and I was actually talking to some of the young people in the office there, like everybody's using Polaroids. There's these days, it's cool. It's true. They're doing it. So what's old is new again. You know everything come back together. So luckily, you know our industry. I mean, nothing changes, right? You know, it's the same now as it was 10 years ago, 100 years ago. You know, I'll just go into the factory and pumping things out now. >> Still, you know, I've been a referee a long time, and in the old days we had swim lengths, right? You know, you thought about certain vendors. They were in swim lanes. Now, today, with the influx of cash, as I was talking about, and the level of it of even innovation cycle time and how the industry's become more fragmented with lots of products, the complexity index has increased exponentially, and the velocity around that complexity is even more accelerate. So, no, it hasn't gotten easier. It's gotten more difficult. >> Yeah, fascinating. Actually. I just heard a segment on our national public radio station here in Boston talking about that. One of the biggest changes and how people think over the last few decades is we're better at recognizing patterns. Used to be, we could be an expert on something and do our thing, you know. We know the old trope is well, you know. My grandfather, you know, worked at a company for 30 years and did his same thing today. Things are changing constantly. You know, we didn't have, you know, the power of a supercomputer in our pocket, you know, 10 years ago, you know, let alone even older. So, you know, this is a user conference. So you know what air they did do. I mean, if if I understand, if I'm, you know, making a decision today for my business. And oftentimes that decision is something I need to live with for a while. How do I make sure that I'm making the right decisions That's going to keep me, you know, you know, keeping up with the competition and keeping my business moving forward as things constantly change. >> Yeah. So there is no easy answer to that question. There's a couple of thoughts and hasn't said in the presentation. You gotta look at these vectors that impacted trajectory of the thinking. And I love the Peter Drucker coat. Right. If he using yesterday's logic probably gonna get in trouble, you have to rethink the logic. In the example I gave you was the high jumper and how we did high jumping before and after 1960. So? So the question becomes one of those vectors, and I went through some of those vectors to help people think about, Okay, I do. My analysis on technology, that's all good. And, uh, tell technology you got a huge portfolio of technology. But how do you think about the perimeter? About how those things change over depreciation cycle. So is trying to add a little bit more color in there, thought processes. And I got a lot of post questions afterwards and a lot of engagements. So it seemed to resonate with the field. And I'll tell you what. The thing that they like the most was the business conversation off. They're like, you know, we don't do that enough. >> Yeah, right. I mean, you know, when we look at the successful companies today, it is not, You know, we've been talking for years, you know? Does it matter? Is it just a cost center? And it needs to be if it isn't helping the business drive forward and responding to what the business needs, uh, you know, could be replaced. That's where we got. Shadow it. It's It can't be the nowhere the slow needs to be. When the business says we need to go, you know, get on board and drive. I love one of the analogies you used is, you know, in this world of complexity, there's so many things out there, You know, when I've worked with, you know, enterprises and small cos you look at their environments and it's like, Oh my God, it's this Hedorah genius mess, you know? How do we standardize things? How do we make things easier? You had a fun little analogy talking about space. Maybe, maybe. >> Okay, that was good. I always try to use visuals as much as possible. So high, high, high light with challenges. So the challenge was, Oh, actually have it in my pocket. So they pulled this out and basically what it is. If you look at the international space shuttle, that's the only thing that they need to fix anything on Specialist 7/16 inch socket or the millimeter version of it. I can't read. Excited my glasses on to fix anything. So imagine if I had one tool to fix anything that's Nirvana. That's not reality. I have to fatigue. So I need to get to that simplicity. Its glasses law remember, every 25% increase in function shin is 100% increase in complexity. And that's public enemy number one for us. >> All right, so So you hopped on board the Dell family relatively recently, when most people think, Adele, it's well, you know, Delpy sees, you know, talk to my you know, my parents. They're like they know Dell computers. They've used them forever. You're talking most people, you know, Del servant. Like you talked a lot about your presentation software is eating the world. Give give us how you know where Del fits in that software was eating the world picture. >> Well, what I can tell you, though, is I was absolutely amazed when I did my due diligence about all the innovation that happens in this company. Phenomenal not only about the hardware but the soft. And I think actually, Jeff said it best. I think we have more software engineers now that we have heart hardware engineers. So the pivots there, we're pivoting our talent, the software, but it's the innovation that's in this company. And I think I kind of rattled off a couple of statistics by how much we spend the quantity of I p that we have. And I think customers are amazed at that innovation. But the supercharger on is okay. How does the innovation apply to the business mechanics of the company? And what value do you extract from it? And that's where the whole language and conversation usually happens with us. I will tell you, though, I'm really excited that Del Technologies kind of doubling down on business outcomes. They're really trying to change the culture and helping customers understand what the technology >> means. Yeah, one of things that struck me. I've been to this event now for a couple of years, and, you know, there's a lot of product discussion here, you know, when you get down to the channel, it's like, Okay, great. You know, I'm doing a server refresh. I'm looking to things like hyper convert, you know? What am I doing in my network? You know, when you up level things a little bit, You know, when I went to del World, it's like, you know, we hear about the venture, you know, activity that's happening around and things like coyote coming down the pipe. But How does that trickle down to the customers? That talking event here? It's great to talk about innovation, but, you know, I got to run my business. You know what? You know. Where does Del fit in that picture >> for you? Got it? Well, it's a custom you got to do both, right? So this has got to be a shift, because now I have to think differently, right? I know how to do feature analysis and benefit analysis of a point in time product, but what's the periphery of activities that inspecting, impacting that decision? Does that architectures scale? What are the economics around that? So you need to think about all those things. And I think it's just a journey for not only us as a vendor, but also for customers as well. >> Okay, so you're relatively new in today. L I want to ask you You gave a great quote in your presentation from from Jack Welch. Er said if the rate of change outside the company is greater than inside the company, the end is near. >> I would say the post. >> So, you know, explain to us the pace of change inside of del technologies. >> Well, you know, that's That's a That's a big question. I mean, piece of change varies by organization by business unit I really can't comment on your individual business units, but I will say, though there's a definite desire toe. Understand? We're customers interested. He is there. So what's the customer trying to dio? And then how do we satisfy the customer request? It's a matter of fact. I don't know if you know this and it was amazing because that's what the customer the other day, you know, Stevie Awards. Which a customer satisfaction, which we double down on customer satisfaction. We have a customer chief customer officer was Karen, and we just won 15 Stevie Awards, which is about customer satisfaction. So I think there's a slow shift, but there's a real focus on customer Central City. For us, the velocity will get there. But if you put the customer at the center like we do, that's a winning strategy. >> Yeah, well, yeah, we know Karen Kim does quite well, you know, culture and working with customers. You know, quite dio you talked about the portfolio of companies and l We know Del Bhumi quite well. We've done their event in the team were well, and you know, VM wears no slouch in the industry. I've had one of the pleasures of my careers. You know, I started working with him. Where when they were, like, 100 person company. No, watch them grow and pack. El Singer, I think was just named like the number one number two, you know, CEO work for employees by employees from glass doors. So, you know No, no slouch on the the venture family. So congratulations, toe Dale family on all that. >> Thank you very much are exciting. >> Joe Batista. Thank you so much for joining me here at the W T. G. Transformed 2019. Pleasure to catch up with you. Appreciate the opportunity. All right, so we're here with customers, the executives, and digging into all the industry trends. Of course. Check out the cute dot net for where we will be. And, uh, I think it was always for watching the cube