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ITL Recap: Digital Shifts and Their Effects

Last Friday at our IT Leadership Group Meeting, Chuck Martel, Staff VP, Enterprise Data and Analytics at Anthem, Inc., led an interactive discussion on the topic, Digital Shifts and Their Effects. A huge thank you to Securian for hosting our group!

Chuck kicked off the meeting with a slide of a typewriter and asked, what is the most important key on this typewriter? The shift key. He then went on to explain how the shift key is similar to digital shifts. With the shift key, you can either make a small change; for example, you can change a lower case to an upper case. In addition, you can make a significant change with the shift key and change a number to a symbol. 

On a scale of one to ten, how quickly is your business able to act on new/changed inputs? Chuck asked the large group. Someone shouted one, then two, three, four… and nine. As you can see, each organization is different. Depending on the size of the company and industry, this can vary. Some companies may not be about to take action until next year if funded and some companies can adapt in the next sprint of two. Organizations need to be able to operate at scale and innovate at speed. 

Digital shifts don’t just affect our industry but can affect us personally. We are all wired differently and have certain skills and experiences that make us unique. You cannot be successful in building a team when everyone has the same set of skills and experiences. Since Agile and DevOps are such a hot topic in the IT industry now, we compared them to a golf scramble. The point of a scramble is that each player hits a tee shot on each hole, but everyone plays from the spot of the best shot. Also known as putting the pieces together and working as a team – which is just how Agile, and DevOps should work. 

We all take different paths in our careers and our lives. What makes us unique is our goals, obstacles, education, network, opportunities, and experiences, to name a few. Whether we take the path less traveled or the straight and narrow, we are affected by the digitalization of the world. How do you embrace digital shifts in your everyday? 

If you are interested in learning more about what was discussed, view the slide deck here.