IBM Study: Majority of Global C-Suite Executives are Rapidly Accelerating Digital Transformation due to COVID-19 Pandemic, but People and Talent are Key to Future Progress

Leaders surveyed name inadequate skills and employee burnout as biggest barriers to progress, yet study finds significant disconnect in how executives and employees rate businesses in addressing these gaps

ARMONK, N.Y., Sept. 30, 2020 — A new IBM study of global C-suite executives revealed that nearly six in ten responding organizations have accelerated their digital transformations due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Traditional and perceived barriers like technology immaturity and employee opposition to change have fallen away – in fact, 66% of executives surveyed said they have completed initiatives that previously encountered resistance.

Participating businesses are seeing more clearly the critical role people play in driving their ongoing transformation. Leaders surveyed called out organizational complexity, inadequate skills and employee burnout as the biggest hurdles to overcome — both today and in the next two years. The study finds a significant disconnect in how effective leaders and employees believe companies have been in addressing these gaps. 74% of executives surveyed believe they have been helping their employees learn the skills needed to work in a new way, just 38% of employees surveyed agree. 80% of executives surveyed say that they are supporting the physical and emotional health of their workforce, while just 46% of employees surveyed feel that support.

The IBM Institute for Business Value (IBV) study “COVID-19 and the Future of Business,” which includes input from more than 3,800 C-suite executives in 20 countries and 22 industries, shows that executives surveyed are facing a proliferation of initiatives due to the pandemic and having difficulty focusing, but do plan to prioritize internal and operational capabilities such as workforce skills and flexibility – critical areas to address in order to jumpstart progress.

“For many the pandemic has knocked down previous barriers to digital transformation, and leaders are increasingly relying on technology for mission-critical aspects of their enterprise operations,” said Mark Foster, senior vice president, IBM Services. “But looking ahead, leaders need to redouble their focus on their people as well as the workflows and technology infrastructure that enable them – we can’t underestimate the power of empathetic leadership to drive employees’ confidence, effectiveness and well-being amid disruption.”

The study reveals three proactive steps that emerging leaders surveyed are taking to survive and thrive.

Improving operational scalability and flexibility

The ongoing disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic has shown how important it can be for businesses to be built for change. Many executives are facing demand fluctuations, new challenges to support employees working remotely and requirements to cut costs.

In addition, the study reveals that the majority of organizations are making permanent changes to their organizational strategy. For instance, 94% of executives surveyed plan to participate in platform-based business models by 2022, and many reported they will increase participation in ecosystems and partner networks.

Executing these new strategies may require a more scalable and flexible IT infrastructure. Executives are already anticipating this: the survey showed respondents plan a 20 percentage point increase in prioritization of cloud technology in the next two years. What’s more, executives surveyed plan to move more of their business functions to the cloud over the next two years, with customer engagement and marketing being the top two cloudified functions.

Applying AI, automation and other exponential technologies to help make workflows more intelligent

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted critical workflows and processes at the heart of many organizations’ core operations. Technologies like AI, automation and cybersecurity that could help make workflows more intelligent, responsive and secure are increasing in priority across the board for responding global executives. Over the next two years, the report finds:

  • Prioritization of AI technology will increase by 20 percentage points
  • 60% of executives surveyed say they have accelerated process automation, and many will increasingly apply automation across all business functions
  • 76% of executives surveyed plan to prioritize cybersecurity – twice as many as deploy the technology today.

As executives increasingly invest in cloud, AI, automation and other exponential technologies, IBM recommends leaders should keep in mind the users of that technology – their people. These digital tools should enable a positive employee experience by design, and support people’s innovation and productivity.

Leading, engaging and enabling the workforce in new ways

The study showed placing a renewed focus on people may be critical amid the COVID-19 pandemic while many employees are working outside of traditional offices and dealing with heightened personal stress and uncertainty.

Ongoing IBV consumer research has shown that the expectations employees have of their employers have shifted amidst the pandemic – employees now expect that their employers will take an active role in supporting their physical and emotional health as well as the skills they need to work in new ways.

To address this gap, IBM recommends executives place deeper focus on their people, putting employees’ end-to-end well-being first. Empathetic leaders who encourage personal accountability and support employees to work in self-directed squads that apply design thinking, Agile principles and DevOps tools and techniques can be beneficial. Organizations should also think about adopting a holistic, multi-modal model of skills development to help employees develop both the behavioral and technical skills required to work in the new normal and foster a culture of continuous learning.

Bloomberg Television and Intelligence Squared U.S. Announce Lineup for Debut “That’s Debatable” Episode, Premiering on on Friday, October 9 at 7:00 PM

– Debating the Motion “It’s Time to Redistribute the Wealth”: Robert Reich & Yanis Varoufakis vs. Allison Schrager & Larry Summers
– Audiences can join the conversation by submitting their arguments at IBM.com/debatable through September 21

On Friday, October 9 at 7:00 PM ET Bloomberg Television will debut the new limited series “That’s Debatable,” presented in partnership with Intelligence Squared U.S. and sponsored exclusively by IBM, with an episode debating the motion “It’s Time to Redistribute the Wealth.” As nations around the world face a reckoning on racial and social justice and work to combat the economic impacts of the pandemic, should we address growing economic inequality by overhauling our tax system, expanding our social safety nets, and investing more in public initiatives like universal health care, education, and infrastructure? Or would a wealth transfer unduly punish the economic elite, destroy the promise of a meritocracy, and inevitably lead to excessive government intervention in our social and economic lives?

Arguing in favor of the motion “It’s Time to Redistribute the Wealth” are former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich and former Greece finance minister Yanis Varoufakis. Arguing against the motion are former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and Manhattan Institute senior fellow Allison Schrager.

Filmed in front of a live virtual audience, “That’s Debatable” will be conducted in the traditional Oxford-style format with two teams of two subject matter experts debating over four rounds, moderated by veteran Intelligence Squared U.S. moderator John Donvan. The live audience will select a winner via mobile, to be announced at the conclusion of the program.

The show will also be one of the first AI-aided debates, designed to demonstrate how AI can be used to bring a larger, more diverse range of voices and opinions to the public square. From now through September 21, audiences can join in the discussion by submitting a short argument for or against the motion at www.ibm.com/debatable. During the debate, IBM Watson plans to use Key Point Analysis, a new capability in Natural Language Processing (NLP) developed by the same IBM Research team that created Project Debater, which is designed to analyze viewer submitted arguments and provide insight into the global public opinion on each episode’s debate topic.

IBM Joins Forces With Nielsen Global Consumer Business To Expand Data Targeting Offerings For Marketers

AI-Enabled Targeting Solution Combines Weather Intelligence, Location and Point-of-Sale Data to Create Actionable Insights for Marketers

NEW YORK, Sept. 14, 2020 — IBM today announced the launch of Watson Advertising Weather Targeting, a new suite of triggers designed for marketers to help them make the connection between weather and product sales actionable at scale without the use of third-party cookies or identifiers. The offering supports new advertising targeting triggers powered by Nielsen. Facilitated through the Nielsen Connect Partner Network, the largest open ecosystem of solution providers for retailers and manufacturers in the consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry, these new triggers leverage IBM Watson to aggregate and analyze large and complex data sets like weather and product sales to create more effective and efficient targeting opportunities while addressing new privacy standards. As part of their collaboration, IBM and Nielsen (NYSE: NLSN), through its Global Consumer business, will work together to combine the power of weather insights from The Weather Company with Nielsen’s Retail Measurement Services (RMS) data to generate future reports for marketers.

“As we prepare for a future without third-party identifiers, it’s critical that the industry put consumers at the center and rely on advanced technologies like artificial intelligence to help make sense of massive amounts of structured and unstructured data with a privacy-first mandate,” said Bob Lord, SVP, Cognitive Applications, Blockchain and Ecosystems, IBM.

He added, “IBM and Nielsen have long been guided by the trust we build between clients and customers. We open up our technologies to make the ecosystem work for consumers and now more than ever, we must come together to help brands effectively leverage the medium while doing right by their audiences.”

Watson Advertising Weather Targeting leverages enterprise-grade AI to analyze over 500 advertising triggers with up to six variables per trigger across 42,000 zip codes every hour, increasing the amount of actionable insights the company generates for brands. With this collaboration, IBM Watson Advertising will introduce a new suite of triggers and insight reports that will harness Nielsen’s RMS data and weather from IBM’s The Weather Company to provide brands with actionable advertising solutions that do not rely on personally identifiable information, third-party cookies or identifiers.

The solution is designed to help brands:

  • Anticipate and activate digital campaigns based on weather’s influence on consumer behavior and emotion according to zip code.
  • Improve effectiveness by automatically serving meaningful, relevant ads to consumers.
  • Reduce media waste by triggering messages only when and where consumers might appreciate the brand message and find it to be relevant.

The targeting solution will be available across the digital advertising ecosystem, including programmatic, display, social, search, video, email and digital out-of-home.

“IBM has long served as a leader in driving value from advanced technology, and in joining forces, we are further strengthening our Nielsen Connect Partner Network as an ecosystem of tech-forward partners to empower our CPG clients,” said Johan Sjöstrand, Global President, Retail Intelligence, Nielsen. “The combined weight of IBM’s weather intelligence and actionable AI with our expansive read into consumer purchasing habits will provide marketers with a clearer roadmap in the face of ever-changing patterns.”

The Weather Targeting data tool is part of a suite of AI-driven targeting solutions. Most recently, IBM Watson Advertising used the technology to assist with the COVID-19 pandemic by enabling brands to run relevant and locally sensitive digital ads based on fluctuating infection rates. This effort was done in combination with The Weather Channel’s COVID-19 tracker that was distributed across properties to provide Americans with general public health and safety information in the face of the global pandemic.

Groupe Renault Tested A Blockchain Project to Go Further In The Certification of Vehicle Compliance

XCEED is a digital project resulting from Groupe Renault’s collaboration with major players in the automotive industry.
A full-scale trial was carried out with several equipment manufacturers at Renault’s Douai plant.
Boulogne-Billancourt, 10 September 2020 – Groupe Renault has developed the XCEED (eXtended Compliance End-to-End Distributed) blockchain project to certify the compliance of all vehicle components, from design to production.

A tool to meet the growing demand for transparency

Designed and implemented in collaboration with leading automotive industry players, this tool enables greater responsiveness and efficiency at a time of ever-greater regulatory stringency. New market surveillance regulations came into force since September 1st, introducing enhanced regulatory controls for vehicles already on the market. The entire production chain thus has to adjust its structure to repond to the regulatory authorities within shorter timeframes.

Based on “Hyperledger Fabric” blockchain technology and deployed in collaboration with IBM, the XCEED project is designed to track and certify the regulatory compliance of vehicle components and sub-components.

A collaborative project with benefits for the wider automotive industry

Blockchain technology makes it possible for information to be shared and tracked by several actors, underpinning competitiveness and operational excellence in the automotive industry. It speeds up the information-sharing process, with data available in real time, and delivers greater efficiency in a network that is distributed rather than centralised.

With XCEED, blockchain is used to create a trusted network for sharing compliance information between parts manufacturers and vehicle manufacturers. The nature of blockchain technology means each party maintains data control and confidentiality, without compromising its integrity, while simultaneously increasing security and confidentiality. The security and confidentiality features offered by blockchain prompted the automotive industry to come together for this pioneering initiative.

Launched in 2019, XCEED is the result of collaborative work between automotive industry partners (Continental, Faurecia, Plastic Omnium and Saint-Gobain), the fruit of collective intelligence and an adaptive agile methodology that marked an unprecedented multi-company approach to data-sharing and project management.

Testing at Renault’s Douai plant was used to consolidate the value and performance that blockchain technology delivers for the automotive industry, with over one million documents archived and a speed of 500 transactions per second.

The XCEED project we initiated is a powerful illustration of Groupe Renault’s capacity to innovate. We are convinced that blockchain is a vector for transforming the automotive industry,” says Odile Panciatici, Blockchain Vice President, Groupe Renault. “Blockchain technology really comes into its own in a vast ecosystem involving a number of different companies, providing a link between the partners’ various processes, computer systems and databases. There are multiple uses for this type of technology in the automotive industry, where we have exchanges with countless actors from outside the company, such as suppliers, clients and independent distributors.”

Schlumberger, IBM and Red Hat Announce Major Hybrid Cloud Collaboration for the Energy Industry

Historic agreement expands access to DELFI cognitive E&P environment to address customers’ deployment preferences

LONDON, ARMONK, N.Y. and RALEIGH, N.C., Sept. 8, 2020 — Schlumberger, IBM and Red Hat, announced today a collaboration to accelerate digital transformation across the oil and gas industry. The joint initiative will provide global access to Schlumberger’s leading exploration and production (E&P) cloud-based environment and cognitive applications by leveraging IBM’s hybrid cloud technology, built on the Red Hat OpenShift container platform. 

Collaborative development will initially focus on two key areas:

  • Private, hybrid or multi-cloud deployment of the DELFI* cognitive E&P environment enabled by Red Hat OpenShift to significantly expand access for customers.
  • Delivering the first hybrid cloud implementation of the OSDU™ data platform (the open data platform for the industry).

Through the agreement with IBM and Red Hat, Schlumberger has committed to the exclusive use of Red Hat OpenShift. Using the container platform will enable the deployment of applications in the DELFI environment across any infrastructure, from traditional data centers to multiple clouds, including private and public. This new way of hosting will offer the possibility to use multiple cloud providers and will address critical issues for customers, facilitating in-country deployments in compliance with local regulations and data residency requirements.

The DELFI environment incorporates cutting-edge data analytics and artificial intelligence, drawing upon multiple data sources, automating workflows, and facilitating seamless collaboration for domain teams. Many more oil and gas operators, suppliers and partners, from all regions of the world will be enabled to work from the industry’s leading digital environment—built on a standard, open platform—where they can ‘write once and run everywhere’ when creating new applications.

“By expanding market access to the DELFI environment we take a major step forward on the journey to establishing the open and flexible digital environment our industry needs,” comments Olivier Le Peuch, chief executive officer, Schlumberger. “Our collaboration with IBM and Red Hat complements our established digital partnerships to produce an industry-first solution to overcome our customers’ challenges. Together, we are enabling seamless access to a hybrid cloud platform in all countries across the globe for deployment in any basin, for any operator.”

“The logic, purpose, and differentiation of all businesses can now be rendered in code, which is why digital innovation has become the most powerful way to drive transformation and hybrid cloud is the lever that unleashes it,” said Arvind Krishna, chief executive officer, IBM. “Together with Schlumberger, we are empowering a much broader group of participants to play a role in driving that transformation and helping the energy industry solve some of the world’s toughest challenges to emerge stronger.”

“The energy industry is transforming as organizations look for efficient new ways to power their operations, adopt digital technologies to create a competitive advantage, and innovate and integrate workflows to make faster and better decisions,” said Paul Cormier, president and chief executive officer, Red Hat. “A hybrid cloud foundation built on open source offers the flexibility, acceleration and innovation this digital transformation requires. Schlumberger has long been an industry leader and is bold in its vision for digital transformation in the energy industry. We look forward to working closely with Schlumberger to make the DELFI environment available everywhere with Red Hat OpenShift.”

Schlumberger supports many of the world’s most vital oil and gas operations and is on the forefront of digitalization across the energy sector. It has established the DELFI environment as the industry-leading cognitive E&P environment where today energy professionals access open APIs to work together, independent of role, workflow or physical location, and create solutions that significantly improve business operations.

The organizations intend to further their collaboration with the creation of a differentiated data management and operations solution for the OSDU™ data platform, enabling oil and gas operators to build, deploy and transition digital solutions with hybrid-cloud data infrastructures. This will foster wider collaboration and greater efficiency across many professionals in the E&P value chain.

Prior to this announcement, Schlumberger, IBM and Red Hat successfully piloted the new hybrid cloud deployment of the DELFI environment on Red Hat OpenShift, the leading Kubernetes platform, working with Red Hat and IBM Services, the world’s largest team of Red Hat certified consultants. The two organizations focused on demonstrating the flexibility and portability for compute, storage and data intensive exploration and field development applications.

IBM’s collaboration with Schlumberger is part of the company’s new commitment to invest in accelerating adoption of hybrid cloud and open architectures. IBM is targeting essential industries, such as energy, running the crucial processes of the world. These efforts are increasing in importance as organizations navigate the impacts of the pandemic and economic downturn, which is creating an acute need for speed to market, flexibility and nimbleness to encourage innovation.

Bloomberg Media and Intelligence Squared U.S. present a new limited debate series “That’s Debatable” hosted by Award-Winning Journalist and Moderator John Donvan and featuring AI from IBM Watson

The one-hour program will premiere on Bloomberg Television on Friday, October 9 at 7:00 PM
Audiences can join the conversation now by submitting their arguments at IBM.com/debatable on the first debate topic: “It’s Time to Redistribute the Wealth”

NEW YORK September 3, 2020 — Bloomberg Media today announced a new interactive debate series titled “That’s Debatable,” to debut on Bloomberg Television Friday, October 9 at 7:00PM ET. Presented in partnership with Intelligence Squared U.S. and hosted by four-time Emmy Award-winning journalist, broadcaster and Intelligence Squared’s longtime debate moderator John Donvan, the program will feature industry leaders, economists, policy makers and public intellectuals debating some of today’s most pressing issues. “That’s Debatable” is sponsored exclusively by IBM.

Filmed in front of a live virtual audience, “That’s Debatable” will be conducted in the traditional Oxford-style format with two teams of two subject matter experts debating over four rounds. The live audience will select a winner via mobile, to be announced at the conclusion of the program.

The show will also demonstrate how AI can be used to bring a larger, more diverse range of voices and opinions to the public square and can help uncover new perspectives to enhance the debaters’ arguments. The general public is invited to submit a short argument for or against each episode’s position statement. During the debate, IBM Watson plans to use Key Point Analysis, a new capability in Natural Language Processing (NLP) developed by the same IBM Research team that created Project Debater, which is designed to analyze viewer submitted arguments and provide insight into the global public opinion on each episode’s debate topic.

“Bloomberg Media’s global audience regularly turns to Bloomberg Television as a critical source of news and information,” said Al Mayers, Global Head of Bloomberg Television and Radio. “By partnering with Intelligence Squared for ‘That’s Debatable,’ we will provide viewers with thoughtful discourse and insights into some of the most important subjects currently at the forefront of national and global conversation.”

“Globally, we are facing unprecedented and complex challenges,” said Intelligence Squared U.S. CEO Clea Conner. “In this era of seemingly endless soundbites and social media echo chambers, it is harder than ever before to truly engage with the other side of an issue. At this historic moment, we are calling for a return to civilized and substantive debate to help us navigate a rapidly changing world. Together with Bloomberg TV, and our exclusive sponsor IBM, ‘That’s Debatable’ will explore multiple viewpoints of the most important topics of our time — and give a voice to a global audience with Watson’s advanced AI analysis.”

The debut episode’s debate topic is: “It’s Time to Redistribute the Wealth.” As nations around the world face a reckoning on race and social justice and work to combat the economic impacts of the pandemic, “That’s Debatable” will take a hard look at the hotly contested question with leading experts on both sides of the argument.

Audiences can join in the discussion by submitting a short argument for or against the motion: “It’s time to redistribute the wealth” starting today through September 14 at www.ibm.com/debatable. Then tune into “That’s Debatable” on October 9 to see a debate fueled in part by your submission.

“Our ambition for ‘That’s Debatable’ is simple — to showcase one of the many ways AI can be used for good by helping people understand nuanced viewpoints, discover and surface critical insights, and inform high stakes decision making,” said Daniel Hernandez, General Manager, IBM Data and AI. “What we learned from over 30,000 Watson client engagements inspired IBM Research to create cutting-edge innovation in language, automation and building trust, which will be demonstrated in the series and made available in Watson for all businesses to use.”