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A short note for navigating this section - scroll below for the most recent posts, and then for more, click on the Blog Archive box, where you can view all of my posts, going back to the beginning in March 2005.
Only one public, bylined writeup for October, but there’s plenty else in the works. Nothing else to say on the writing roundup front, but if you follow my blog or newsletter, you’ll know I’ve been doing things with other forms of media as well.
Return to Office Challenges - What Workers Want, No Jitter, Oct. 5
It’s one thing to do a livestream event from the comfort of home at your desk, but it’s something else doing it in a studio with a full production crew. That’s where I was yesterday in New York, doing a Twitter Live event, and while the finished product looks seamless, there was a lot of makeup involved, and all the magic happens behind the camera.
In terms of our topic, the focus was on cybersecurity, and the pressing need for a global, standards-based effort to mitigate the risks we all face with any form of online activity. I led the discussion along with Andy Purdy, CSO for Huawei Technologies USA, and we’re pictured below just before going live with our host, Kimberlee Bradshaw, also with Huawei USA.
The Twitterverse traffic was healthy, and I think everyone was pleased with the result. If you’d like to check out the replay, here’s the link - it runs about 30 minutes.
When was the last time I did a “Next Stop” post? Wow - probably February 2020 for Future of Work Expo - that was the last in-person event for me once Covid hit. My blogging has gone dark for too long as well - sorry about that. It’s more the case that I’ve been too busy to post than having nothing to talk about.
Been tracking several really good events recently, but just haven’t had time to post about them - at least yet. Now, though, I’m in the moment with my first bit of travel in ages.
Tomorrow, I’m flying the NYC for some client work, and details about that will come in different forms - that’s all I can say for now. After that, I’m going coastal to San Diego for the SCTC annual conference. As mentioned, this will be my first live event of any kind during this crazy time, and it’s going to take some getting used to.
Definitely looking forward, though, not just because I’m doing the locknote talk on Thursday at 11:30, but for another SIPtones gig. We’re so looking forward to playing, and if you’re attending, dancing WILL be required.
Otherwise, once the video from our gig has been processed, I’ll have some new clips to add to the My Music section of my website. There’s plenty of clips there now, so if you’ve never seen or heard us, that’s where you should go next. That aside, I’ll share what I can on social during my travels, both on Twitter and Linkedin.
First week of the month is when these usually go out - JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review, and Watch This Space. If you don’t know either, a good starting point would be here for the newsletter, and here for the podcast. There’s no cost to subscribe to either, and for a taste, here’s the link to give our latest podcast a listen. As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts, and sharing is appreciated.
Sure is a big topic, and I shared my views on this and The Great Wait - two forces that are posing challenges to the hybrid work model, along with how the collaboration vendors can provide real value. I’ll have more to say about this in future posts and podcasts, but for now, you can give this a read here on No Jitter.
This was new to me - CXPA - the Customer Experience Professionals Association, and today is their big event, CX Day 2021. For those in the CX space - and that seems to be just about everyone lately - this is a highly focused event celebrating the best in both CX and EX - customer experience and employee experience. It’s a global event, by the way, so there’s content and activity specific for various geographies.
Genesys is one of the sponsors, and they engaged myself and some other thought leaders to share our views on CX and DX. They summarized all that in a blog post that ran a few days ago in support of CX Day 2021, and you can read that here. Following that, you should hop over to CX Day here, and check out what’s on offer.
Last week’s Enterprise Connect event was a great showcase for the state of collaboration and contact center technology, despite being scaled back to all-virtual. The messaging remains the same, and there’s lots to keep up on - and this is still be the best event for doing that in our space.
While the buzz is still on, BCStrategies did its regular event recap podcast, and it’s out now. Lot of perspectives to share, and this episode was moderated by Blair Pleasant - good as always. You won’t find a better collective recap of the event anywhere else, and I hope you give it a listen.
Not a lot to report on the writing front last month, but it sure was busy with virtual events and client work - more about that in my October newsletter, which goes out to subscribers on Tuesday.
In fact, public writing was so light, I have nothing to post here. How often does that ever happen? As a quiet FYI, I also do some ghost writing where I have no byline. I did have a couple of those run last month, but obviously I can’t share that here. :-)
October will be a different story for writing for sure - until then, this might a good time to check out some of our Watch This Space podcasts, and perhaps subscribe to my newsletter.
Fall industry events are well underway now, and a big one from last week was Zoomtopia. Always lots to talk about with their event, as they keep pushing out on many fronts. Maybe too many if you ask me, but that’s the nature of the tech space these days, as there are no barriers with cloud, and Zoom is in a hurry to keep growing.
If that’s of interest, then you’ll want to check out our latest BCStrategies podcast, this time led by Blair Pleasant. Here’s the link, and as always, comments are welcome.
Before you know it, Enterprise Connect 2021 will be here, and I’m back for my 4th annual update on the state of speech tech in the enterprise. This is just one of many things being transformed by AI, and this time around, I’ll be taking a future-forward look at what’s coming. The building blocks are in place for some cool applications, but bigger things are emerging, and collaboration might look very different once the ranks of digital immigrants thin out.
As much as I’d love to be there, I’ve made the difficult decision to not travel, and sure hope next year will be different. That said, my live session is still on the calendar, and while the presentation will be pre-recorded, I’ll be on hand via video for Q&A. That session runs Monday, Sept. 27 at 11am ET. Since this is a hybrid event, there will also be a second time slot for my talk for those only attending the event virtually - Tues. at 2pm. Again, I’ll be on hand live via video for that one, and will handle Q&A in real time.
If you don’t know, one of my hats is that of a BC Expert, where I’ve had a long affiliation with BCStrategies, and I’ll be one of many BC Experts speaking at Enterprise Connect. This link provides a summary for all of our speaking spots at the event, and this link showcases all the video previews each of us has done to promote our talks. It’s a great way to get a flavor for what each of us will be talking about, and mine is embedded below, so just click to view it if you like.
For more detail, here’s the registration page for my session, and if you sign up there for the event, you’ll save $400! Also, here’s an article I wrote recently on No Jitter about what to expect at my talk - hope you’ll check it out, along with all the other great sessions from my colleagues at BCStrategies.
Everyone seems to hit the ground running after Labor Day, and I had plenty of things to push out this week, including my newsletter and podcast. Am a bit behind on getting the word out, and by now, subscribers have the latest JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review, along with our Watch This Space podcast.
Definitely a busy fall ahead, and if you want to keep track of what I’m up to, writing about, speaking about, etc., you might want to subcribe to the newsletter. For the podcast, you can subscribe on the major platforms, or just listen here, where you can access all the recent episodes, including the latest, as per the thumb below. If you want to go back further for either, the archives are here and here on my website (updates are coming to these sections, btw).
Got a bit more into the writing groove last month, and the highlights are summarized here. Bigger picture family issues have limited my availability to work the past three months, but most of that has finally passed, and my output will soon get back to where it usually is.
Speech Tech Update: The New Voice Technologies, No Jitter, Aug. 24
3 Ways UCaaS Supports Hybrid Work from Home, TechTarget, Aug. 23
How to Use UCaaS to Fuel Hybrid Workplace Strategy, TechTarget, Aug. 17
Taking Teams Deployment Further with Voice, UC Today, Aug. 16
Spotlight on Global Supply Chain Management: Lessons Learned from the Semiconductor Chip Shortage, my blog, Aug. 5
The 2021 edition of Enterprise Connect is about a month away, and I’ll be presenting my annual update there on the state of AI and speech technology in the enterprise. Most of the attention for this corner of the tech world is focused on consumers and contact centers, but there are plenty of interesting use cases for enterprises right now, as well as on the horizon.
My latest No Jitter article is a preview for what I’ll talking about during my Enterprise Connect session, which runs at 11am on Monday, September 27. I hope you give it a read, and details are there if you want to register and join me then.
There’s a first time for everything, and in this case, it’s hosting a LinkedIn Live event. I’ll be in conversation with Andy Purdy, CSO for Huawei USA, covering 5G ground related to cybersecurity, data privacy and open source.
We’ll have a lot to talk about, where the focus will be on the technology issues, challenges and opportunities - and I hope you join us. We go live tomorrow - Wednesday, Aug. 18 - at 2pm ET, and all the details are here on my LinkedIn event page, and to watch the replay, sign into LinkedIn and then use this link..
From time to time, the folks at UK-based EM360 engage me to host a podcast and interview one of their sponsors. Aside from podcasts, I also contribute guest posts, and am listed in their Tech Index directory.
This time around, I was in conversation with James Buchanan of Dublin-based Arkphire, talking about the challenges faced by their customers to manage remote workers. The pandemic has given rise to work from home, and now hybrid work, and that brings along plenty of technology challenges for both IT leaders and workers. It’s a really timely topic, and here’s the link if you’d like to give it a listen.
Long-time followers of mine know that every so often I’ll write about topics outside my everyday focus on collaboration, contact center and future of work, and this is one of those times. Given how the semiconductor shortage impacts just about everything we do in our digital lives - both at home and at work - the distance between here and my usual topics of interest isn’t as far as you might think. I’ll leave that for you decide, and otherwise, I’d love to hear your thoughts on a timely subject that is much bigger than tech.
The global shortage of semiconductors that began in 2020 is expected to continue into 2022, and its impact is far greater than most people realize. While closely followed in technology circles and the business press, the underlying causes are not well understood by the general public, and there is a bigger story to consider than a shortage of an electronic components that consumers will likely never see or touch.
Today’s economy is increasingly global, where both production and consumption seamlessly cross borders, and supply chains are highly interdependent. When supply and demand are in reasonable balance, this model works well in terms of consumers having choice, innovation and affordability.
However, when disruptions occur, the fragilities of these interdependencies can become exposed, creating a ripple effect of problems that go beyond commercial interests. The current semiconductor shortage is more than just instructive as to why resilience is so important for global supply chains, but also for how we collectively respond to events that pose real threats to our sustainability as a planet.
This fundamental question lays the foundation for understanding why global supply chain issues are bigger than keeping our economies growing. The importance of semiconductors becomes more evident in the context of digital transformation, a meta-trend that all enterprises are adapting to. Driven by advances in cloud technologies, the products and processes from the analog world are quickly becoming digitized. As such, digital transformation is re-shaping every sector of the economy and every facet of our daily lives.
The end game is for all people, devices and machines to become digitally connected, and the common thread for all of this is the semiconductors which power every electronic device imaginable. As the pace of digital transformation accelerates, so does the demand for electronic devices, and as Figure 1 below shows, semiconductors are used across many sectors of our economy.
Figure 1 – Global Semiconductor Use by Market Sector
Source: 2020 State of the US Semiconductor Industry, Semiconductor Industry Association
Aside from semiconductors being so pervasive in today’s digital world, the complexity of the underlying technology and production process makes this sector arguably more reliant on supply chains than any other in our globalized economy. The manufacturing infrastructure is extremely capital-intensive, R&D investment is never-ending, and the production materials must be sourced from a wide range of countries.
While the US has long-dominated this sector, recent events that gave rise to the semiconductor shortage have made clear that no single company or country can effectively manage the entire supply chain.
No supply chain is perfectly efficient, and when disruptions occur, there is usually just one of them, and the problems can be quickly rectified. Being a pandemic, COVID-19 impacted most global supply chains, and in the case of semiconductors, it was a major trigger event, but not the only one.
While the pandemic can conveniently explain away many 2020 disruptions, it was exacerbated by other forces that also impacted the global supply chains that semiconductors are so heavily reliant upon. The key factors behind the current semiconductor chip shortage are summarized below, and while other elements were in play, it should be evident why this combination represents a perfect storm scenario.
Changing habits and consumption patterns. The pandemic forced an unprecedented shift to home-based working and living that will likely persist for the remainder of 2021. Most households have adapted to this new normal by now, and along the way, we have seen major spikes in demand for PCs, tablets, mobile phones, smart TVs, gaming consoles, other electronic devices, and with that the cloud-based services that make all of these activities possible.
5G roll-out. While it’s too early to tell if or when the highly-touted promise of 5G will be realized, the wireless carriers are all-in, making massive investments in their networks. This is only one half of the equation, of course, and for the associated services and revenues to flow, subscribers need 5G devices. The smartphone space is hyper-competitive, and in the lead-up to 5G, the vendors have been under intense pressure to have their latest models ready now.
Crypto-mining. The Bitcoin space continues to be highly volatile, and while it may be a secondary factor behind the semiconductor shortage, it aligns very well with the digital transformation theme that is central to my analysis here. Digital forms of currency are struggling to displace traditional forms of money, and the effort behind Bitcoin remains significant. Most notable for that effort is the massive amount of both GPU and CPU horsepower required for crypto-mining, adding another layer of hyper-demand during 2021 for semiconductors.
Plummeting demand for vehicles. Compounding all these spikes in demand was this sudden drop, also due to the pandemic. Aside from so many people being forced to work from home, the new social distancing behaviors led to a major shift from in-person activity to online. As consumers, we did far less shopping and travelling, with the net result being reduced demand for buying vehicles. Traditional supply chain forecasting models for this industry could not adapt quickly enough to this unforeseen change, and as the pandemic has eased in recent months, the chip shortage has constrained the ability of auto makers to ramp up production as demand has finally returned.
Geopolitical tensions. Free trade isn’t free, and it’s not hard to understand why sectors like semiconductors are of strategic importance to market leaders like the US and China. Domestic economic policies in these particular countries – Buy American Act (BAA) and Made in China 2025 (MIC 2025) respectively – may serve to protect R&D investments and to some extent domestic employment, but they don’t align well with the supply chain needs that underpin the global semiconductor sector.
Globalization is an entrenched reality for any modern economy, and with the efficiencies that come with digital transformation, trade will largely remain borderless, and supply chain interdependency will only increase.
Given the pervasiveness of semiconductors, the combination of forces outlined herein underscore how fragile supply chains can be, as well as the ripple effects that follow when unexpected gaps develop between supply and demand.
In terms of implications – not just for manufacturers, but also consumers and policymakers – here are two calls to action from the perspective of a technology analyst; not just for semiconductors, but for any sector that depends on global supply chains.
1. Supply chain resilience should be of paramount concern
As we are seeing with semiconductors, there is both controllable and uncontrollable risk – for supply as well as demand – all of which must be considered. Nobody foresaw the pandemic, nor were the repercussions anticipated.
What started as an isolated health outbreak in late 2019 will continue disrupting the semiconductor space into 2022 and likely beyond. Even with uncannily prescient planning, this scenario could not have been entirely avoided, but given the importance of these chips for the global economy, a more coordinated, collaborative approach to supply chain management would have mitigated the fallout.
To be effective, it’s important to note that this approach must go beyond the industry players, who are essentially driven by economic interests. Globalization is not sustainable if defined solely by winners and losers, and business continuity must extend to all, not just the dominant few.
This is where a balance is needed between the innovation of the private sector and principled policy-making of the public sector. To further strengthen – and build trust in – global supply chains, industry-based standards are needed so there’s a common set of rules. Getting alignment across all these vectors can take decades, but as the semiconductor fallout has shown, the stakes are too high for bilateral or even unilateral decision-making to set the course for an entire industry.
2. Globalization is bigger than trade and supply chains
Strong supply chains are vital for international trade to flourish, and the semiconductor sector is a great example, since it is the most complex form of production ever created, and the degree of global interdependence among suppliers is unparalleled. When supply and demand are in harmony, it is easy to take the efficiency of this space for granted.
However, when disruption occurs – and in this case, several forms at once – behaviors change and priorities shift from cooperation to survival. Without strong guardrails to maintain a common focus on supply chain resiliency, the ability of the leading players to formulate an effective global response becomes diminished.
As important as semiconductors are to our digital economy, they are just products of technology. The planet has lived without them for thousands of years, and life will carry on when a successor technology displaces them. Supply chains are critical for this sector, but globalization is more than just creating efficient markets for trade.
The real benefits that help create a better standard of living for everyone come from knowledge sharing and innovation that all players contribute to. In theory, this form of globalization should be easy to do, but as we’ve seen from the chip shortage, the practice is more difficult to achieve. The call to action here is to look beyond the world of semiconductors and consider the global response needed for our survival.
COVID-19 was the first true health pandemic in 100 years, and this requires a different response from an epidemic that is localized to a single country or region. Despite the wonders of modern science to quickly create vaccines, global supply chain issues have proven a major impediment to an otherwise solvable problem.
The challenges presented by climate change are no different, and every corner of the world is being impacted by extreme forms of weather we cannot predict or control. Global knowledge sharing and innovation has never been more important, especially if you hold that view that climate change is human-induced. As these disruptions continue, it should be clear that the only way to develop effective responses is through a collective, global approach.
Best practices that come from making supply chains more resilient can surely be applied to global issues like climate change, world hunger and disease management. There should be little doubt that these problems will only persist, and they pose far greater risks to our global well-being than having to wait a few weeks for the latest gaming console.
August is August, so this month’s newsletter will likely be the lilghtest of the year, but that doesn’t mean I’ve taken the summer off. Am as busy as ever, and there will be lots of new stuff to share next month and beyond, so stay tuned.
JAA’s Communications and Collaboration Review went out yesterday, and for everyone else, here’s an easy way to subscribe if you want to follow what I’m up to. Analyst work in the collaboration and contact center spaces is never dull, and for more on that, you should check out my podcast, Watch This Space.
My partner Chris Fine and I are well into our 4th season, and this time around we weighed in on what could well be the most important M&A deal of 2021 in our space - Zoom’s acquisition of Five9. We talk a lot about future of work as well, and for the August episode, we discuss the current state of hybrid work in the broader context of how everyday life is starting to open up again - sort of.
I don’t usually do this roundup until the new month starts, but that’s the way the calendar falls at the moment. July writing was really light - just one published article with my byline - mainly because I was offline much of the month dealing with family issues, but am slowly getting back on track.
Hybrid Work - Trust Holds the Key to Productivity, No Jitter, July 13
This might turn out to be the biggest M&A deal of 2021 in our space, although there’s plenty of time left this year for bigger deals to come along. Even so, it may well be the most important deal given how ripe the contact center space has become for, well… disruption, consolidation, re-imagining, etc.
There are many angles to consider with Zoom acquiring Five9, and we covered a lot of them during our latest BCStrategies podcast, which is running now on our site. I hope you give it a listen, and if you want to hear more, I discussed the implications further with my co-host, Chris Fine on our latest Watch This Space podcast. That episode launches next Tuesday, along with my August newsletter, and if you’re not a subscriber, you can find it here on my website.
Been offline for the past week or so, but back now, and a few things to catch up on. This is my latest post for No Jitter, so am posting here in case you missed it. There are lots of ways to look at hybrid work, and this one draws from a new research study by Fuze, and with their permission, I’ve added my take on the data. I hope you like it, and as always, sharing and comments are welcome.
J Arnold & Associates is an Independent Technology Research and Analyst, helping businesses understand the strategic value of communications technology as they adapt to the digital transformation of work
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