Author: Phil Le-Brun

Managers don’t solve simple, isolated problems; they manage messes. -Russell L. Ackoff By education and hobbies, I am an electronics engineer. Most problems I face in this domain can be solved through the application of mathematical principles and known solutions. Complex problems can be decomposed into multiple simpler problems and solved in the same way, […]

It is not the strongest species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the most responsive to change. —Charles Darwin From childhood, our amazing brain trains itself to recognise patterns. We use this capability to accelerate decision-making, saving us addressing every problem as if new. To apply patterns we ingest, filter, and interpret data using […]

In our Executive Summit roundtable session at re:Invent 2019, Phil Potloff and I discussed the topic of innovation in large enterprises with executives spanning many industries and public sector organisations. Much has been written about how large companies often lose elements of their original DNA as they grow, including their aptitude to innovate. Given this, […]

Every change will be met with an equal, opposite, unpredictable change of its own. —Inspired by Isaac Newton In “Today’s CIO—Orchestrator in Chief,” we covered how changes can be introduced into organisations, but only eluded to matching different approaches with different audiences. This approach is similar to how marketers segment customers to target different buying […]

After culture, people, and process, the most common topic I hear about is the surprise organisations have in shifting their thinking on financial management once on-prem applications move to the cloud. If done well this is a liberating opportunity to closely align cost with value, to engage the business at large in decisions previously abdicated […]

My detailed project plan won the war. — said no military commander, ever. In the chaos of battle, it is accepted military doctrine that highly centralised decision-making fails. Information cannot be rapidly assimilated from the front line and turned into timely decisions. To address this, a commander’s intent is communicated, guiding each platoon in their […]

If I were given one hour to save the planet, I would spend 59 minutes defining the problem and one minute resolving it.  Albert Einstein I’ve been asked multiple times recently what “digital transformation” means? Given that by 2023 conservative estimates of annual expenditure on digital transformations are north of $2 trillion but with well […]

“A learning organisation is an organisation that is continually expanding its capacity to create its future.” Peter Senge, The Fifth Discipline There is something excitingly headline worthy about big initiatives. There is also something depressingly familiar about their poor success rates. In Continuous Transformation: Stop Stopping Mark Schwartz stated that “…your digital transformation must prepare […]

“Great things are done by a series of small things brought together” Vincent Van Gogh In my previous blog I outlined the role of the CIO in driving organisational change, and the first steps to be taken to build the case for change and a supporting coalition. In this post, I will dive into how […]

“Nothing is more difficult than to introduce a new order. Because the innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions and lukewarm defenders in those who may do well under the new.” – Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince A regular topic with customers is how they can approach transforming their […]