Empowerment With Automation and AI

Carter Busse, CIO at Workato
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Episode Summary

In this episode, Markus Zirn sits down with Carter Busse to discuss the transformative power of automation, AI, and integration in the business landscape. They explore the shift from a traditional mindset to a forward-thinking, growth mindset, essential for harnessing the full potential of automation and AI. Carter underscores the significance of employee happiness and efficient business processes, backed by compelling examples illustrating automation's profound impact on business processes. He also shares insight into the role of AI in automation, and his optimistic vision for the future.

  • Episode Key Takeaways

    Episode Key Takeaways

    • Importance of a growth mindset: Executives need to break free from limitations imposed by a fixed mindset. In this rapidly evolving environment, it’s critical to pivot and change your thinking from task-based to growth and process-based. 

    • Adopt an incremental approach to automation: When you begin adopting automation, start small and control what you can. But embrace a fast-paced, fail-fast approach to show possibilities to other business users.  

    • Automation empowers people: Automation is key to helping people do great things. Empowering users with technology tools fosters innovation and enhances overall employee happiness.

    • The value of the people, process, technology framework (PPT): PPT emphasizes prioritizing people and processes over technology when making decisions. Use this framework to navigate your business journey, ensuring a holistic and user-centric approach to technology implementation.

  • About Carter

    About Carter

    Carter Busse, CIO at Workato, is one of the leading innovators in IT/Business partnerships in automation.. An accomplished IT executive, Carter brings a rich history in technology, including leading IT during three IPOs—Excite@Home, Salesforce.com, and MobileIron. Carter was hired by Marc Benioff personally as employee #70 at Salesforce. Over the years, he has developed a specialty in constructing highly effective, collaborative teams (90+), executing business strategies, and driving revenue growth while reducing operating costs. Carter is a sought-after advisor of IT leaders around the country, a Bay Area Orbie CIO Award winner, and listed on the Forbes CIO Next list of top 50 CIOs in the United States.

  • Top Quotes

    Top Quotes

    “When I think of automation, I think velocity. I think of velocity, of scaling processes, and I also think of making customers and employees happier. We just did a CIO advisory board with our Automate User Conference, and the word people kept using is happy. People are happier with automation, especially if you empower these business technologists in the business or business technologists within IT, a technical IT team. People are happier. They're empowered. They're really empowered to do great things.”

    “Before I had this new mindset, I truly believed that as a leader in IT, having an integration tool to automate business processes, about 10 years ago, was a key foundation for every IT leader. Because really what we're kind of tasked with is connecting dots across the business with technology. And I learned early on that if there's no one connecting dots, processes are very siloed.”