Northeast Forum

Talk of unprecedented uncertainty, the new normal of ambiguity, and the unknown surround our leadership dialogue, but the hyper chatter around current industry and market conditions consistently misses the fundamental notion of uncertainty: whether it is good or bad depends on what you are trying to do, and how you are set up. Dr. Homkes will kick off our focused set of conversations by encouraging us to do just this: embrace uncertainty, prepare for the future rather than constantly planning for the downside, and build organizational and leadership capabilities around the constant resets uncertainty forces us to make. She will walk us through her proven approach to grow through any market condition and equip us with a powerful toolkit to leading our companies and teams on the journey.

As business leaders and more importantly, transformation makers, your attention is spent on driving the company forward in any market condition. At the end of 2021, we asked our community of IT change-makers, to provide insight into what is weighing heavy on your shoulders as we approached a new year. We learned that at the very top of your list, digital strategy and the technology you implement is crucial. Now, we’re going to dig deeper with a panel of your peers and learn how they are navigating this great unknown. We’ll discuss the topics below (and many more) together in an open discussion. Bring questions and insights to challenge our panelists and keep the conversation interactive.

In this session we’ll tackle:
-Preparation for the future and leading your business through tough and unknown (and ever-changing) market conditions
-Maintaining a strong culture and ways in which each of us are navigating infusing a human approach into our leadership
-Specific technology and strategies that are creating opportunities for innovation and growth

Over the past decade, companies have launched their Digital / Innovation / Online strategies to transform their business to meet the needs of their evolving customers. Despite all we have learnt in this time, one question still sits uncomfortably "Where does this work belong in the business?". Is it an IT project, a Marketing or Customer project, or even a newly formed Digital Team?
This session, with Virgin Active’s Global Chief Marketing and Technology Officer, will dig into this challenge and propose a way forward in the rise of the Chief Marketing and Technology Officer as a bridge to a fully converged future.

Providing competent and capability driven cybersecurity protection to the modern day enterprise has become increasingly difficult, if not impossible by today’s protection standards. Adopting a prominent public cloud posture can be a force multiplier for any security apparatus, if designed and architected properly. Join a discussion of this premise among some of the industries highest profile technology leaders. If the enterprise profile of the future is one composed largely of optimized hybrid environments, organizations need to weigh both value and the potential for risk reduction as they build roadmaps for the future.

The pandemic accelerated Digital Transformation with a focus on cloud adoption for better outcomes and experiences. However, today’s networks are now more distributed than ever - creating an expanded attack surface and levels of complexity that outstrips the capabilities of traditional approaches. Contactless commerce, remote working, telehealth and other facets of digital transformation are rapidly transforming the ways we communicate, conduct commerce, and deliver public services.

Going forward, organizations of all sizes, will need to balance risk management and security with the need to safely open up the enterprise to better serve the connected citizen. How should we think about computing, networking, and security when enterprises own less and less infrastructure, platforms and software? In this session, we’ll discuss practical solutions and hard lessons learned by CISOs & CIOs as they worked through the pandemic and now prepare for a much more accelerated, interconnected and exposed operating environment.