Latest / The DEX Show: A Show for IT Change Makers / Alan Nance Returns – And The XLA Revolution is ON 🚀

Transcript

Alan Nance Returns – And The XLA Revolution is ON 🚀 · The DEX Show: A Show for IT Change Makers

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Welcome Item change Makers to The Deck Show with Tim
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Flower and Tom McGraw.
• 0:07
  Speaker 2: Let's get into it.
• 0:09
  Speaker 3: I change Makers. I'll tell you something about podcasting, right,
• 0:12
  Speaker 3: Sometimes you have a guest you really like and you
• 0:17
  Speaker 3: make a couple of shows with them, and then part
• 0:20
  Speaker 3: of you think, Okay, we've done, we've done, we've done
• 0:21
  Speaker 3: a few this year, we've done a few this this quarter,
• 0:24
  Speaker 3: this half.
• 0:25
  Speaker 4: Of the year.
• 0:25
  Speaker 3: We'll just you know, we'll come back to them soon,
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: and then you forget, You forget that you have that relationship.
• 0:32
  Speaker 3: You forget what a good guess they were, and it
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: takes something to remind you. And listen, it's with great pleasure,
• 0:39
  Speaker 3: but we welcome back to the show for the first
• 0:41
  Speaker 3: time since The Deck Show's first year as a podcast,
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: Alan Nance, How you doing, Alan, Good to see you back, mate,
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: back he's back.
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, No, that's great. It's great to see that you
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: guys are still alive and kicking. And I don't know
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: how many how many episodes you guys have had.
• 0:59
  Speaker 5: We're in our fifth year. I don't know how what
• 1:01
  Speaker 5: are we at two hundred yet?
• 1:02
  Speaker 6: Tom?
• 1:03
  Speaker 5: Definitely in our fifth year.
• 1:05
  Speaker 4: Yeah, No, I don't know, I don't know. We've been
• 1:08
  Speaker 4: we going forever. I cannot believe you. You were like
• 1:12
  Speaker 4: a regular in our first year and then and then.
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: You didn't need me anymore, moved on. It always happened.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: The superstars just outgrow the show.
• 1:21
  Speaker 4: And it's not true. It's not true. It's actually it's
• 1:26
  Speaker 4: actually shout out to Laura Reeve. She was like having
• 1:30
  Speaker 4: Alan has a wonderful idea. That's a great shout.
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: I would tell you Laura has not forgotten. So we
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: do a lot of work with with Laura. Laura is amazing,
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: and I'm glad that she didn't forget us.
• 1:44
  Speaker 4: It's become a bit pointed now we didn't forget about Jollen.
• 1:48
  Speaker 5: You're always top of mine.
• 1:49
  Speaker 4: Who stood? Who up? This week?
• 1:50
  Speaker 6: Alan, we're going to get No, that was all my
• 1:56
  Speaker 6: fault because I was I've been traveling a lot and
• 2:00
  Speaker 6: and I struggle because my laptop.
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: I don't know if you guys have this problem. My
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: laptop changes when I go from one place to another,
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: but Microsoft Outlook doesn't. So you've changed your thing to
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: be in London, but your agenda hasn't moved, or it's
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: moved a little bit, which is what happened.
• 2:23
  Speaker 4: I find that so disorientating. Actually, I've got.
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: To really force myself. And even then, I'm not sure
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: it works all the time, because I've had situations that
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: I have changed it, and I still see when I
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: look at the agenda that clearly something's like at three
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: o'clock in the morning or something. How is that.
• 2:40
  Speaker 4: I'll go?
• 2:41
  Speaker 5: So I travel a ton too, I'm in time. My
• 2:43
  Speaker 5: body doesn't even know what my home time zone is anymore.
• 2:46
  Speaker 5: So the trip I'm on right now, i'll in twenty
• 2:48
  Speaker 5: five airplanes seven weeks, so I'm everywhere. The two things
• 2:52
  Speaker 5: I do is I change the time zone in my
• 2:54
  Speaker 5: operating system, so everything else adjust from there. But you
• 2:56
  Speaker 5: can also set multiple time zones in outlooks, so you
• 2:59
  Speaker 5: kind of have East Coast, West coast Central all in
• 3:01
  Speaker 5: your agenda at the same time, overlapping. So well, maybe
• 3:04
  Speaker 5: we'll chat off line and there.
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I need, I need to get that done. And
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: I did. I mean, I don't travel anywhere near as
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: excessively as I have. But I remember coming into one
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: airport and I'd had to check my baggage, and I
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: went downstairs to pick up my baggage, and I couldn't
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: remember I'd come.
• 3:18
  Speaker 5: From right where I just where did I just come from?
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah? So I had to get my ticket out? Oh yeah,
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: I know you came from Cincinnati.
• 3:26
  Speaker 5: How about hotel rooms? Aland do you ever walk out
• 3:28
  Speaker 5: of your hotel room and forget which way the elevator is?
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I do that a lot. Yeah, And I
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: am forever losing my cards, so I always say, please
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: do give me multiple cards because I am going to
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: lose at least one of them. Okay, so now now
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: I've I've destroyed any credibility an organization.
• 3:48
  Speaker 4: Well, let's really establish for credibility.
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: Actually, well, harken back to something because Tim when I
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: when I when I emailed Allan, he was like.
• 3:56
  Speaker 4: The decks, the decks the dex profit.
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: Totally Yeah, yeah, I think it has some very accurate
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: predictions and there's almost first appearances. So let's let's come
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: back to that in a bit. But how how have
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: you been out and how the last few years served you?
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: Well, I tell you the you know, we've all been
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: predicting this sort of I know, renaissance. It won't even
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: be a renaissance because his first time, this growth in
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: the in the whole experience management movement, and and like you.
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: You know, I've been banging this drum probably for about
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: five or six maybe six years now, And I remember
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: going to one of the first events I went to,
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: but even before going to the next thing event in
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: London was an HDI event, And you're getting up there saying,
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: you know, I think your experience management's really important. Everybody's
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: looking at you, like, but that's not even in itol.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: You know it's not. And you're telling this, and then
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: you know, the next year you go, people say, so,
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: what is this XLA thing that you keep talking about?
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: And is that going to be anything? And and can
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: I can I take my SLA and make it an
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: XLA and things like that, and then but now now
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: I'm surrounded by people that tell me they are XLA
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: experts and they're calling me up and and and well
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: you'll see it in your own exponential growth. It does
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: feel a little bit like redemption, Like I did tell
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: you this was going to happen. It also feels a
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: little weird that people that were fighting with us about
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: this two or three years ago, and our experience management
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: advisors and stuff, and I'm like, Okay, I guess that's
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: good news. So but but Honestly, if you look at
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: the institute we've been we've we've created the XLA Institute
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: just over a year ago and it has been phenomenal, right,
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: and you probably know, or you may not know. Next
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: Thing is one of the global founding members of the
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: of the excellent Institute, and we now have on the
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: mspgs I side, we have enough like Global Assystems Integrators
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: they represent in total about one hundred billion dollars of
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: annual revenue who are now members of the Institute, and
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: we've got another two or three that are lining up
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: to join us. So it really is an exciting time
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: and it is a time that what I love about
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: this time is it's no longer just about is it
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: important or not? But what is the right path, what's
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: the root to value? How do I make the investments
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: that I have with you know, I've bought Next Thing,
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: for instance, and what can I go now? What can
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: I do now with Next Thing? Now that I'm ready
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: to do more? And I don't want to not Next
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: Thing at all, because I we're very grateful for everything
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: Next Thing has ever done. But Next Thing was for
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: a long time still that sort of net work observability
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: and convincing people to go into the experienced portions of
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: its capability. But I think now everybody wants to talk
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: about that. What can I do more than I was originally.
• 7:14
  Speaker 3: Doingying absolutely now out of interest. Did you feel like
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: twenty twenty four was the tipping point year for this
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: redemption arc?
• 7:25
  Speaker 5: No?
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: I still think. I still think we've got a tipping
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: point to go. And the reason I say that is
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: because I remember very much when I launched well, I
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: launched ITIL in the UK in nineteen ninety two. I
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: was the keynote speaker in the barbegan in nineteen ninety two.
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: It took ten years before we did the launch of
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: ITEL in the US, and we launched that in I
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: think ninety seven, ninety eight, something like that, and then
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: in two thousand and two in Boston. I'm an old man,
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: I've got all this history stored away. In two thousand
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: and two it was the tipping point. And why because
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: General Electric, State Farm, Procter and Gamble and HP all
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: got up and said, this is it, this is what
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: we're going to do. I don't think we've had that
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: tipping point quite yet, but what we are seeing certainly
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: on the MSP managed service provider, the global system integrator provider,
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: the deck suppliers. There's the commitment. What I'm excited about
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: is the emergence of the PepsiCo is the emergence of
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: the T mobiles, the emergence of people, the real name
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: brand companies that drive everything else because they have these
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: huge technology budgets. I now see them doing really really
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: serious XLA based experience management programs and they're serious and
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: they understand it's not about just buying next thing, but
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: they're going to need to also look at happy signals
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: and then they need to integrate it with service now.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: So there's an awareness and as a willingness and as
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: an activity now. I do think twenty twenty five will
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: be the tipping point. I think these companies are all
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: going to come in twenty twenty five, and not just
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: like the head of Digital Workplace who I love, I
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: mean that they are our most important audience. But you're
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: now seeing CIO is starting to really pay attention to it.
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: You're seeing security people getting involved. I'm doing a workshop
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: all this month. It is March. In this March and
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: it's for a very large company, but they've got HR
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: in it, they've got security in it, they've got the
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: onboarding people, they've got the digital workplace people, they've got
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: the service test people, and they're all in this program.
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: And so for me, we are really really close to
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: the tipping point now. I think for you, I think
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: for your DEX, I think twenty twenty four was a
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: very important year for the importance of decks on its own,
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: But now moving that up to the corporate value ladder,
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: I think that's going to be my That's just my
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: I thought.
• 10:04
  Speaker 5: So you talked about i TEL there Alan, and there's
• 10:08
  Speaker 5: no coincidence that the XLA concept feels a lot like
• 10:13
  Speaker 5: ITEL Right, So is it a branch, is it a
• 10:17
  Speaker 5: subset of IIL or is experience management completely different from
• 10:21
  Speaker 5: systems management? And they need to stand on their own
• 10:23
  Speaker 5: two feet?
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: Well, I think they need to stand on their own
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: two feet, but I think they are very much intertwined.
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: Because you know, the reason we created the XLA stack,
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: because we didn't believe this was all about sentiment. It
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: wasn't just about things like the psychological safety of teams,
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: or how people felt about their work or their boss,
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: or or whether it was about hybrid working. It was
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: really this stack of information that was that was it
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: was a multidirectional because it is usually bottom up. So
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: but the services layer, the enterprise systems management, enterprise service
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: management layer an important source of data. But I think Tim,
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: what you're going to find is that we're now looking
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: at this further. You know, so recently I was involved
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: in a thinking exercise and you may have seen I've
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: been thinking a lot about Starbucks lately, and I'm very
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: excited about the change of route that Brian nicol As,
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: the new CEO, is taking with Starbucks, basically saying, you know,
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: we have always been the place to be and now
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: we're just a place to buy like everybody else, and
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: we need to get back to creating experiences that bring
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: especially groups of people to us who want to spend
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: time with us, with their friends, who want to maybe
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: do educational work or other work. We need to be
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: back to that place to be, and we were looking
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: at that and if you look at that XLA stack,
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: it's a little different to a digital workplace stack because
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: you start to look at, Okay, if I want to
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: bring groups of people to Starbuck, how am I going
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: to measure my success? And you start thinking about maybe cameras,
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: maybe integrating what do you call it, the loyalty card information.
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: Of course you've always going to have sentiment, but you're
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: going to start to look at other things in exactly
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: the same stack wires that you would do before. So
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: it's a bit of a long answer, but I think
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: enterprise service management is the thing on its own because
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: it's got a lot of things it needs to worry
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: about that we don't worry about, but it has essential
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: data that needs to be linked in smart and hopefully
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: seamless ways that drive the XILA.
• 12:36
  Speaker 5: So drill into the XLA institutent a bit with us.
• 12:40
  Speaker 5: What do you see as its kind of core definition
• 12:43
  Speaker 5: or mission, what's your role? And maybe a bit about
• 12:47
  Speaker 5: what the market is telling you about it. What's the
• 12:49
  Speaker 5: market feedback ben over the last year.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: Well, so a couple of things. So first of all,
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: the XLA Institute is set up as a sort of
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: not for profit organization. Goal is to is the community.
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: It's a little bit like what John Layton has been
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: doing for you guys on a different scale maybe community.
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: So it's getting the community, getting the community, connecting people
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: because we're still we're still in a thought leader phase.
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: So you want to connect your thought leaders, and you
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: want to connect those thought leaders to people who still
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: who kind of not there yet. So we do that.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: But what we're also increasingly seeing, which is why I
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: think the MSPs and gsis are important, is that the
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: customers want they want to be certain that when they're
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: signing up for something it's valid, they're not subject to
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: XLA washing. There's some type of certification process and what
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: an XLA looks like, what does an experience management organization
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: look like? If I'm contracting that from an MSP, what
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: should I be setting in the contract? How should I
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: be measuring whether I'm getting it? So there's a lot
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: of seriousness to strengthening that community. I think that's what
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: we're definitely seeing. And what I'm seeing is surprise. You know,
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: when you've been pushing up a hill for a while,
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: you get pleasantly surprised. Brazil, and Brazil has been unbelievable.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: Brazil is by far the most advanced country in our
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: universe in terms of adapting it. All the four five
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: major companies in Brazil are all running XLA programs, and
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: they're doing it with the various subset of MSPs. Yesterday
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: I got a call. You know, Saudi Arabia wants to
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: bring this to them as part of their twenty thirty program.
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: So you're seeing the pool. Now, you're seeing the pool,
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: and our job is to make sure that the knowledge
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: is being acquired because everybody's I don't know if you
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: have the same thing. Everybody's asking, have you got the
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: case studies, have you've got the evidence? Can you show
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: me these xlas at work? Can you show me how
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: you've taken a dex data from from from next think,
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: what have you done with that? You know, how does
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: that relate back to what we've got in service now
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: right now? Do we link it to medalia or call
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: tricks in some meaningful way? So these are really solid
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: questions about implementation, not just about is it worth doing?
• 15:20
  Speaker 5: And you mentioned that next Think as a founding member
• 15:24
  Speaker 5: of the institute, it's a big deal for us, not
• 15:26
  Speaker 5: only because it helps us further our mission, but it's
• 15:29
  Speaker 5: a real clear sign that senior leaders understand it's more
• 15:33
  Speaker 5: than just technology, that that that that the tech is
• 15:36
  Speaker 5: not going to be the savior. There is no easy button.
• 15:39
  Speaker 5: It's got to be the people in process around it.
• 15:42
  Speaker 5: As well, you have to change how people operate, you
• 15:45
  Speaker 5: have to change how people think and then get the
• 15:47
  Speaker 5: right technology for the problem you're trying to solve. So
• 15:50
  Speaker 5: it's real great for us because it furthers our mission.
• 15:52
  Speaker 5: Why is it important for you to have next think
• 15:55
  Speaker 5: in this role? What do you think about what the
• 15:57
  Speaker 5: partnership means for the future of decks?
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: Well, I think next thing is the is obviously that
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: the is the IF service. Now is the five hundred
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: pounds enterprise service apperciment. Next thing is probably the five
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: hundred pound guerrilla when it comes to decks. So, first
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: of all, you're the market leader. Secondly, you're a very
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: noisy market leader. I mean the amount of events and
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: things even like this podcast and tim your your world
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: wind trip across across the United States, you know, the
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: meet the meet, the Digital leaders, all of these things.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: You know, you're in all corners of pretty much.
• 16:32
  Speaker 4: You mean the master the masters of well I'm not
• 16:36
  Speaker 4: going to give you that.
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: I don't get the names right, but you're putting on
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: so much. So not only are you the market leader,
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: but you're continuing to expand the market, continuing to expect
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: in a good way. Right, So, you've taken on the
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: role of expanding the market. Now. Obviously the other side
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: of that is you're getting more and more companies coming
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: in to say we want to compete with Next Think,
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: so you always have to stay ahead of that. And
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: I think you've done a lot of investment in R
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: and D to keep that leading position. But you've also
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: created almost a market index, and that's great. That's great
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: for us. You know, obviously you'd like to own all
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: the market, but by doing that, you're getting to more people.
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: You're you're giving opportunity to competition as well. But just
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: the shehaer audacity of Next Think is for me super
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: exciting that you're on our side now if you know
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: what I mean, that you're also part of our community
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: and you bring that energy and commitment to our community
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: as well. And what we'd still have to do, because
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: it's early days, is now start to think how do
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: we now create new ecosystems and bring them to the public.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: Because I do believe that the upwards value of decks
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: is not fully your life. So I think there's something
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: that we can do together to make that even more. Yeah,
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: a salesperson would say sticky, but as a buyer, I
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: would say more valuable. So how do I get from
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: an XLA one dot zero to an XLA three dot zero?
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: How does my investment in next thing help me get there?
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: Do you talked about the management of change? I just
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: had an email the other week from an oil and
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: gas company saying, you know, we'd love to do this,
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: but the type of culture we are, we want the
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: we want the management of change program to be clear
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: as as much as a technical roadmap is clear, how
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: are we going to get the people to be comfortable
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: and successful in this move as well? And some of
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: these organizations when I'm talking to recently, they've got like
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: two or three thousand people in their IT organization. So
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: we can't step over that and say, well, you've got
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: to talk about a You're going to be fine. You know,
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: there's a lot.
• 18:58
  Speaker 5: Of work in fact, everybody to change overnight. That's a
• 19:01
  Speaker 5: big ship to turn.
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, of course, and and and and you know this
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: is I think it's a great time because I've always said,
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: what you've learned to this point is going to hold
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: you in good stead for what we're doing next. This
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: is not a change where everything you've ever been good
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: at is no longer relevant that that's not this change.
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: So everybody should feel pretty good about this change. If
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: you're confident in your in your enterprise service management skills,
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: if you're confident confident in your ability to build an
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: observe ability chain, if you're confident in your ability to
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: build a debt ops chain, then you're going to be
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: fine as we go into this new new discussion, and
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: you should be embracing it.
• 19:43
  Speaker 5: Yeah, and back to a little bit of market share.
• 19:45
  Speaker 5: I think Pagro's got a very healthy attitude about the
• 19:48
  Speaker 5: market as a whole. We want our fair share. But
• 19:51
  Speaker 5: if we were to own the whole market, if there's
• 19:53
  Speaker 5: no competition, that's not healthy for anybody. So, uh, you know,
• 19:56
  Speaker 5: I think there's I think there's a healthy competition in
• 19:59
  Speaker 5: the market and and there's plenty of success to go around.
• 20:04
  Speaker 5: Let me, Tom and I kind of have a streak going.
• 20:07
  Speaker 5: And it wouldn't be an episode if we didn't talk
• 20:09
  Speaker 5: about AI. So dex is all about the experience of humans.
• 20:14
  Speaker 4: It wouldn't be a podcast full stop.
• 20:19
  Speaker 5: Yeah, but we do have a streak going. So experience
• 20:24
  Speaker 5: of humans, how is it affected by AI? It really
• 20:28
  Speaker 5: has been a force in shaping digital experiences. Curiously, your
• 20:32
  Speaker 5: thoughts on the influence of AI as the x l
• 20:36
  Speaker 5: A movement kind of evolves moving forward.
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: So I don't think anybody has an AI problem, but
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: people have problems that AI can help us with. So
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: I think let's let's always take that first of all, Right,
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: So what challenge do we have that AI can help
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: us with? Now, there's there's a very obvious challenge that
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: we have in XLAS, and that is, as ex become
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: more complicated, they need more data, and they need and
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: they need to have swift, real time a correlation of
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: that data. And that's something that human beings are not
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: readily equipped to do, and especially if we're talking about scale. Right,
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: So so my my three things when I'm talking about
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: the future of the future of service and experience management
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: is that businesses need to get innovation at scale and
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: technology at speed, and it has to be delivered in
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: a human centric way. Now, I think AI is not
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: just about humans. I think AI. I think the AI
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: is actually also a lot about the the the experience
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: of robots. So I think that's that's an equally valid conversation.
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: But I think where it t or technology has generally
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: been as difficult. It's first of all, speed. Even if
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: you take something like service now and you're in a
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: large organization, you're looking at months and months and months
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: of work. That's one thing, but also innovation at speed.
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's cute to have hackathons, but I don't
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: think anybody's impressed by a hackathon anymore. You know, if
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: you're a large company, you want to see that innovation
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: come to the front line as quickly as possible, especially
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: if it's going to drive revenue and productization. So I
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: think AI can help with the scaling in an important way.
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: You know. Obviously I use AI all the time. It
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: makes me more efficient, and I think, but I don't
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: think it's making companies more efficient yet. I don't think
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: that's that's correct. And I think too many people think
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: they have an AI problem or an AI challenge, and
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: they're going about it the wrong way, just like we
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: did with cloud. Let's let's create a center of excellence
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: for AI, which is great, but then it's a hammer
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: looking for a nail. And I think we need to
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: understand what our problems are, and we've got enough of
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: our problems now and frame them against as I said,
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: can this help us, you know, do technology at speed
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: and do innovation at scale and the human centricity of that.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: And I'll give you one example. I was involved in
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: a brainstorm the other day and somebody had this conversation
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: and Charlie Betts was in it. And if you know
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: Charlie Betts, who's a is a very renowned analyst in
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: Forester and a nerdy, geeky guy. And the premise was this,
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: do we need a CMDB or can we create a
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: CMDB in real time with AI?
• 23:30
  Speaker 5: An unstructured CMDB.
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: An unstructured CMDB if AI is that good? Could we
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: could we rapidly create the CMDB for the situation that
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: we find ourselves here? And then I got, you know,
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: I go away and I have two sleepless nights on that,
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: and then you have this whole conversation with the nerdy
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: people about the speed of physics and the speed of
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: light and can you do that? But I think those
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: are the types of things I think we will be
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: talking about changing completely, changing the paradigm. You don't have
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: to build a CMDB and then use it. You may
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: have to. You may be able to build a baseline
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: CMDB and augment it in real time with AI that
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: would give you the speed that you need as well.
• 24:10
  Speaker 5: Yeah, and you know, it actually augments some things I've
• 24:12
  Speaker 5: heard from Gartner and some of their keynotes at their
• 24:15
  Speaker 5: conferences around the lack of value in spending time structuring
• 24:21
  Speaker 5: the data that AI can look into. For instance, the
• 24:24
  Speaker 5: example they used was your teenager's messy room, and you
• 24:27
  Speaker 5: know where are the socks and where is the homework
• 24:30
  Speaker 5: and where AI can go into that environment and find
• 24:33
  Speaker 5: it all very quickly for you without having to organize anything.
• 24:36
  Speaker 5: So it's a it's a kind of a cool concept
• 24:38
  Speaker 5: applied to the CMDB.
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, And don't forget we've CMDB is a massive investment.
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah for large organizations, love.
• 24:49
  Speaker 4: You AI themes to know.
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: But okay, so we've spoken about experience management at the
• 24:56
  Speaker 3: top of a discussion.
• 24:58
  Speaker 4: Probably we might.
• 24:59
  Speaker 3: Still have listeners too familiar with decks, not familiar with
• 25:02
  Speaker 3: how what experience management exactly means in terms of extending
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: the capability of decks.
• 25:08
  Speaker 4: I'm sure I picked something up from.
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: It so far, So maybe kind of sketch fed out
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: for them Alan and talk about how the XLA Institute
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: can help organizations move from the theory of this to
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: practical measurable outcomes.
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: Well, what we're seeing and we're working on the state
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: of XLA to actually see. So I think when we
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: look at the market, we have two axes of capability
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: of maturity. So we have the capability maturity, which everybody
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: will know, which tends to be like five phases and
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: stuff in it, and that's really how good are you
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: at doing things right? But the one that we're introducing
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: is the maturity of value generation and this is where
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: the XLA comes in. So when we do the first XLAS,
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: they're all bottom up. So the first x as that
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: we build are all the sentiment of things that are
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: as they are. So we look at things as they
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: are and we form an opinion and then we can
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: iteratively improve those things over time. Ultimately, what you want
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: to get to is you want to be you want
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: to have a defined experience, and you're using decks as
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: a quality control as to whether or not that design
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: is working as you intended it to, and you're also
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: using it as a warning sign for when for when
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: that defined experience is expiring, because all experience is perishable
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: simply because of human beings. So and because all experience
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: is perishable, when we're looking at when we're looking at
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: a situation and we see that the institute the situation
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: is not what we expect it to be, and that
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: comes back to ito is it an incident or is
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: it a problem? Now, Decks will tell us if it's
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: an incident, because it will tell us, oh, the reason
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: that we're seeing this is because there was an outage
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: on outlook or on teams or wherever. But if that's
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: not the case, then we may have a problem that
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: people are just tired of this experience that we've defined
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: for them and something has changed which is going to
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: warrant us changing our design. So I think we're going
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: to see as we get more familiar with this and
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: we learn how to build this up, that the emphasis
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: is going to move. The first emphasis is going to
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: move to personas. So we're going to be arming personas
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: of value in an organization. So for instance, if you're
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: in a software environment, it's going to be your developers.
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: If you're in a sales environment, it's going to be
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: a salespeople, and we're going to look at the defined
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: experience for them. Over time, you're going to move out
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: and you're going to integrate it with your customer experience
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: and dare I say your supplier experience. In a world
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: of tariffs and barriers, managing the supplier experience is going
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: to be strategically important for entire countries, and we see that.
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: I'll give you one example of that. I'm in the
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: Netherlands right now. The Netherlands has done one of the
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: best jobs of buying pharmaceuticals, which is great until there's
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: a shortage of pharmaceuticals or a disruption in the supply chain,
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: and the Netherlands is the last country that gets anything.
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: So your experience is understanding experience is going to be
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: super important top down. So I think what we're trying
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: to do is to work with the pioneers on what
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: does those that value look like, that expansion of the value,
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: and ultimately we're going to give people roadmaps of how
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: they start here and end there and how they stopped
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: st of the top and work their way down or
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: how they work out from the middle. I know if
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: that makes sense if I'm explaining it very.
• 28:56
  Speaker 4: Well, very well.
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: As always, since you've a profit of decks and you're
• 29:03
  Speaker 3: back on the show, let's test that prophetic panache. Once again,
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: let's see if it's how it's holding up in twenty
• 29:10
  Speaker 3: twenty five.
• 29:10
  Speaker 4: I don't know, we're not quite early in the year
• 29:12
  Speaker 4: enough to ask for twenty twenty five prediction, but maybe
• 29:15
  Speaker 4: we've got it. Since you are, since the profit has returned.
• 29:19
  Speaker 4: Come on, well what do you go for? So what
• 29:21
  Speaker 4: challenges and trends do you see on the horizon?
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: Well? I think that the I do think that the
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: MSPs and gsis are going to have to turn around
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: their business model, right. I think they've been in this
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: race to the bottom for the longest period of time,
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: and in some ways the tool sets have been a
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: part of the race to the bottom. Can I optimize?
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: Can I reduce costs? Can I reduce tickets? Can I?
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: You know, this whole idea of completely reducing tickets is
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: an obsession, and it's not an obsession because of the customer.
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: It's an obsession because of trying to compete at the
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: lowest possible price and have some acceptable quality against it.
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: I think that people are going to are going to
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: switch that around. I think the most advanced ones are
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: going to turn it around and say we're not doing
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: that anymore. We're now going to we're now going to
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: have a set of defined experiences. They're probably going to
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: be industry specific. We're going to build stacks that enable
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: us to not just provide those, but they're going to
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: be almost like thinking stacks on how we can help
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: the organization on its side to improve the way it
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: creates and delivers experiences to its employees or its customers.
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: And I think it's going to be a huge mindset change.
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: And it's not just a mindset change with the MSPs
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: and managed service providers and the global service integrators. It's
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: going to be a huge mindset change for people in procurement,
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: for people in vendor management who are so programmed to
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: look at optimization that they don't have enough tools to
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: look at value. So there's going to be that growth
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: in value. And I also think that we're going to
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: see a bigger push because of that from the people
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: that do get that, and that's going to be the
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: large consultancies. So right now, the large consultancies, I think
• 31:07
  Speaker 2: have been a little bit on the sideline. They've been
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: they've been dabbling in it, they've been using it themselves.
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: Like you know, Deloitte is one of your one of
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: your customers for instance, as an example. But I think
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: you're going to see them finding ways of actually bringing
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: value to entire organizations that are going to be experience
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: based innovations and experience based value generation and we're all
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: going to be and so instead of us pushing them,
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: we're going to be pulled along at a brisk pace.
• 31:36
  Speaker 2: I think those are two things you're definitely going to see.
• 31:39
  Speaker 4: Awesome, Alan, Who should get in touch with you? And
• 31:43
  Speaker 4: how can they get in touch with you?
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm easily. I'm easy to find. Although LinkedIn did
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: shut me down for a day. Yeah, apparently there was
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: somebody who has got into my system or.
• 31:56
  Speaker 5: Too many controversial statements from you, Allen.
• 31:59
  Speaker 7: That's controversial, no, no, So so you can easily get
• 32:10
  Speaker 7: to me at Alan dot nance at x l A
• 32:13
  Speaker 7: dot Institute.
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: That's the easiest way to get to me. I am
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: on LinkedIn. I always say to please connect and and
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: ask questions right because we're doing a program right now
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: on a research program on the enlightened executive. Because what
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: we do see is this is also a time of
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: executive change. Maybe that's another thing, and I've said this before,
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: but it's happening now. You know, my generation has refused
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: to retire or die and they're still occupying positions. And
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: they got to those positions by being the best people
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: they could in the service economy. And they're not if
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: they're at the end of their career, they're not willing
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: to take risks anymore changes the risks. So I'm going
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: to stick with that. But also there's a lack of
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: understanding of all this stuff that that's being pushed at them.
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: So what we're doing now is, let's find the enlightened leaders,
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: Let's find the enlightened executives, and we're doing a program
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: to identify what their traits are because we also have
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: a whole new generation of leaders who want to do this.
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: And I use this analogy, and if you've heard my analogy,
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: it's an American football analogy. So I apologize Tom that
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: if you look at my generation of leadership, who are
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: still everywhere, if you consider them to be the defensive line,
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: their goal is to protect everything that's been achieved. They're
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: very suspicious of any movement and they want to shut
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: down any movement coming straight at them. But they're also
• 33:41
  Speaker 2: a little bit slow, a little bit inflexible, and they're
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: big and heavy, so when you're looking at them, they're
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: really really scary. But the new generation, they're the running backs.
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: And all the running backs need is one gap, and
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: once they're through that gap, they're on the way to
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: the scoring line. And then we've got the aligned executives,
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: which you are offensive line. So they're not playing to score.
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: They're already at the offensive line, but what they are
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: doing is creating the gaps. They are the they are
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: the very smart said, they're not bulls in a china shop.
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: They are the very smart people who understand how to
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: manipulate and move that defensive line around and create the
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: opening so that running back can go through. And that
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: dynamic I think we're trying to understand with this this research.
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: It may not make sense to you to but I
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: love it.
• 34:33
  Speaker 4: I love it.
• 34:34
  Speaker 5: Tom's got to go out and buy a book on
• 34:35
  Speaker 5: American football. Your side, I'm I'm just glad you didn't
• 34:41
  Speaker 5: use a cricket example.
• 34:45
  Speaker 4: I was applying it to rugby as we went.
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: It'll work, it works a little bit, It works a
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: little bit, but you don't have to line up quite
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: as static as the offensive defensive line.
• 34:56
  Speaker 3: Yes, you've adapted your whole way of thinking for you
• 35:00
  Speaker 3: country elements.
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: And I was inspired because when I was working with BMC,
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: there was our CEO at the time, Bob Beacham said,
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: if you get a great running back, you've suddenly got
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: a running game. And I think when I go to
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: these conferences, I see a lot of people who really
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: want to do this, and they're not in the positions
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: that they can do it yet, but they're looking for
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: that They're looking for that opportunity. And I keep telling them, fine,
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: you only need one enlightened leader to change an entire company.
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: And then I get the question, well, what do they
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: look like? How do I recognize them? And that's what
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: this research is a little bit about.
• 35:37
  Speaker 3: Well, Alan, so lovely to break bread with you again,
• 35:42
  Speaker 3: since we've all spent the intervening years, you know, building
• 35:45
  Speaker 3: and growing and doing so well, and let's not leave
• 35:49
  Speaker 3: it another three four years whatever it is, let's let's
• 35:52
  Speaker 3: have you back on soon. And it's been a pleasure
• 35:54
  Speaker 3: to catch up and take care, how lovely, have a
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: lovely weekend, and you see.
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: It's great chatting with you as always, and I much
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: appreciate not just me personally, but also from what I
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: call the movement, the stuff that you're doing every day
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: and every week, and what Tim's doing traveling around the country. Now,
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: it's massively important that that drum beat continues to resound
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: through every nation. So thank you so much for your
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: work as well.
• 36:23
  Speaker 4: Hey, thanks allmen.
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: To make sure that you never miss an episode, subscribe
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: to the show in Apple Podcasts, Spotify your favorite podcast player,
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: and if you're listening on Apple Podcasts, make sure to
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: leave a rating of the show. Just tap the number
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: of stars you think the podcast deserves. If you'd like
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: to learn more about how next Thing can help me
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: improve your digital employee experience, head over to nextthink dot com.
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much for listening. Until next time.