Over the course of the pandemic, employees and managers have developed their knowledge and skill sets related to virtual work and now look to optimize the benefits of virtual work post-pandemic. This Advisor includes three steps for hybrid success that organizational leaders can consider as they iden­tify what adoption of — and reliance on — flexible, hybrid work may look like in the post-pandemic world.

Technology — artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), in particular — shows enormous promise in tackling the complexity inherent in sustainability problems. However, technology itself can leave its own environmental footprint. This issue of Cutter Business Technology Journal explores the challenge of leveraging technology to move us toward a more sustainable future, while mitigating its own impact.

Security threats and compulsions are increasing. Attacks on critical infrastructure and ransomware attacks are not unusual, and it's only a matter of time until we see insider attacks and attacks on IoT devices. In this Advisor, the author asserts that architecture's time has come to help address the complexity and sprawl in the security landscape.

AI and other advanced, innovative technologies are being applied to precision agriculture to help reduce the environmental impact of such operations. This Advisor explores how one cutting edge company, Iron Ox, is using ML, machine visioning, and autonomous robots to transform the agricultural industry.

The value of a great team has never been questioned. What thriving teams have in common is a single vision, a customer on which they can focus, a coach or leader to help them focus, and the authority to work within guardrails without having to stop to get permission to make decisions.

The demonstration of human resilience may end up being more noteworthy than the disruption experienced through the COVID-19 pandemic. Managers, mentors, coaches, and colleagues who are able to identify moments of low resilience can be of the greatest help to the individual employee and overall workplace morale and productivity.

The hype and reality of artificial intelligence (AI) bombards today’s enterprises on an almost daily basis, but what does it take to actually implement it? Simply put, organizations need to address issues across several critical steps in making AI work to their best advantage, including acquiring AI and machine learning (ML) tools. This Advisor explores six main components of AI and ML tools.

This Advisor explores the main function of the quantum bit (qubit), how qubits enable exponential scaling, and how quantum computing is being utilized in the real world, from hybrid approaches to experimenting with development kits.

There are particular business behaviors that actively poison data or degrade data quality. Although not their intention, it’s the direct consequence of how these activities are performed. This Advisor takes a close look at the concept of self-service and how it contributes to the problem of data poisoning.

The Technology in Business Schools Roundtable (TBSr) is a global organization composed of technology leaders who are responsible for managing IT in business schools across the US and Canada. This Advisor outlines several clear examples of how the TBSr board of directors effectively applied four DEI leadership actions to initiate their own journey.

Resistance to change is the primary reason why so many good ideas fail. Thus, it is critical to have user involvement throughout the scope definition and process redesign. Discover how an effective communication strategy between top management and users makes all the difference during project initiatives.

Dynamic Deep Learning (DDL) provides business value by enabling instant decision making. When analytics on streaming data is incorporated into everyday decision making along with traditional analytics of static data, businesses can discover greater opportunities and identify risks in advance. Discover the business value of DDL in this Advisor.

Keeping data is often presented as a no-brainer, even if you don’t know what to do with the data. But data is complicated and can be unreliable and wrong. This Advisor explores the drivers to save data, the drivers to not do anything with the data after saving it, and the complexities of making data-driven decisions.

According to a Cutter Consortium survey examining IPA adoption in the enterprise, organizations rank retail as the sixth leading industry in which IPA will have its most significant impact. Retailers are applying robotic process automation (RPA) and other process automation tools bolstered with machine learning (ML), predictive analytics, and computer vision to a number of applications and domains. This Advisor explores how these tools help make their supply chains more flexible, revitalize the retail shopping experience, and boost customer satisfaction in both online and in-store scenarios.

As we give in to our “very powerful tendency to anthropomorphize ML and AI, imbuing it with human characteristics,” we set our ML projects up for failure. This Advisor explores the importance of deciding on the question you are trying to answer before you embark on an ML analytics project.

Steve Jobs — tireless tech visionary, innovator extraordinaire, and cofounder of Apple — died on 5 October 2011, when he was just 56. Though 10 years have passed since his untimely death, we’re still very much living in his world. To create our own lasting legacy that is meaningful and benefits the community, what sort of values and practices would we have to embrace? This Advisor shares nine key lessons from Jobs.

Cutter Consortium recently conducted a survey to see how organizations are adopting, or planning to adopt, intelligent process automation (IPA). According to survey respondents, IPA will have the most significant impact on banking and financial services (see Figure 1). In this Advisor, we take a closer look at two areas of IPA application in that industry: customer experience (CX) and compliance and financial crimes prevention.

Why is the diversity needle not moving? What needs to happen to truly make a systemic change this time, versus the many previous attempts? In this Advisor, we debunk three pervasive myths around the challenges of building more diverse workforces.

Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) are driving change on both ends of the business-technology continuum. This Advisor explores why companies should accelerate their piloting of AI/ML, deploying internal teams to assess its potential while giving special attention to the range of methods, tools, and platforms /application domains.

Nearly all software projects are premised on understanding user needs and requirements. In our experience with clients, we typically address this phase by working with prospective users to develop use cases. What are some common use cases? Well, it depends on the company, but we’ve seen use cases primarily fall into four categories for early-stage, toe-in-the-water AI compared to full-scale ML efforts:

Market and consumer intelligence

Sales and marketing

Pricing and optimization

Customer care

Self-direction doesn’t just happen because you adopt Scrum, Kanban, or another Agile variant. Or because you say “Agile” 20 times to your teams. It needs a fertile space to grow. It needs to be watered and fertilized. It needs an honest and open environment. In far too many cases, this is simply not happening. So, what are the elements of self-directed space? This Advisor explores five that come to mind.

It is through this issue of Cutter Business Technology Journal (CBTJ) that we hope to remind CEOs of the challenges that remain unaddressed and out of balance. The authors speak from personal experiences, exten­sive research, and a deep desire to contribute toward changing the DEI narrative. They share proven best practices and procedural changes that must be followed so that this time, the outcomes of CEOs’ commitments will look different, and those impacted will finally be able to have more equitable work and life experiences.

The professional life of architects is tough, often dealing with tasks typically not performed in everyday non-IT life. They always must support a “future state,” a situation not yet in existence that users or stakeholders can’t predict if not stressed with the proper questions. This Advisor explores how architects look “beyond the hill” and impose superstructures and patterns that may appear unnecessary today but are useful when things ultimately change.

Government agencies were investing in automation long before COVID-19. But as the pandemic has dragged on, they are increasingly turning to RPA and IPA platforms whose capabilities are bolstered by artificial intelligence technologies in order to better meet the expectations and demands placed on them by citizens. This Advisor identifies some of the more popular IPA applications in government.

The CPO role is emerging as the business’s product portfolio equivalent of the CTO on the technical side of an organization. The CPO leads the product development team and oversees the product portfolio. This Advisor looks at the CPO role and discusses how and when companies—even smaller ones—can benefit from establishing the CPO position.