Your AI Is Only as Good as Your Data

Pietro Casella, Managing Director and Chief Architect, EQT Digital & MotherBrain Labs at EQT Group
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Episode Summary

In this episode, Markus Zirn and Pietro Casella, Managing Director and Chief Architect at EQT, emphasize the pivotal role of meticulous data management as the cornerstone for successful automation. Pietro stresses the necessity of treating data as a vital trigger for automation, establishing it as non-negotiable on the journey to success. He advises on the democratization of automation, as a way to break down silos and empower team members for innovation and efficiency. Finally, Pietro shares the importance of challenging traditional practices, urging a reconsideration of these methods in the face of AI's transformative impact.

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    • Data as an enabler of automation: The foundation of successful automation lies in meticulous data management. Treating data as a crucial trigger for automation is not just a choice—it's an essential element for a successful automation journey.

    • Start every project with a question: Initiate projects with a focused question, aligning efforts to gather essential data. This targeted approach cultivates purposeful action, leading to more streamlined and valuable outcomes.

    • Democratize automation within your IT department: Break down IT silos and empower every team member with a holistic view of systems. Providing the right tools and authority encourages innovation and efficiency, uncovering simpler solutions to the same problems.

    • Reconsider traditional practices with AI: Challenge traditional methods, such as relying on business rules engines, by embracing the transformative power of AI. Reflect on established practices and explore more efficient alternatives to stay ahead in the evolving landscape.

  • About Pietro

    About Pietro

    Pietro Casella is a technology leader with a strong track record of delivering complex Digital Transformation across technologies and industries. As a shaper, he drives all aspects of transformation from vision to whiteboard, organization design all the way down to code in production. Pietro led the modernization of financial systems, data stack, and process automation at EQT Group. Prior to that, he led Financial Systems development teams at Spotify. He also worked in consulting at KPMG and Accenture where he led large-scale BPM, ERP, and Performance Management projects mostly in the Financial and Health sectors.

  • Top Quotes

    Top Quotes

    “I was reading the book [The New Automation Mindset] and it reminded me of one of the key principles I use when I choose software, is I tend to prefer software that is opinionated. It's like software that tells you how you should run a process, right?  And there aren't many out there, you know, people tend to try to do this very horizontal kind of, you know, I'm going to use the bad word, like vanilla kind of surface, like vanilla flavor software.”

    "The plasticity, I love that word, is this permission to change. And at Spotify, we said, you know, like, move fast, break things. But effectively, is this giving yourself permission to change your mind, right? And many companies fail like this. They choose a software, they make a very large bet on something, then they realize that thing does not work for that platform. But they just continue to bang the, you know, try to make something work that is not the right fit. So, I think we believe in trying things out and learning.”