The Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo, one of the top gatherings of CIOs and IT executives, is being held virtually this year, October 19 - 22. The 2020 conference theme, Compose the Future, takes a positive position on the long-term strategy IT leaders are now helping to orchestrate after an incredibly disruptive start to the decade.

As Gartner notes, “with extraordinary resilience, CIOs and their enterprises are now shedding outdated practices and assumptions about what is possible and practical. They’re keeping the best and resetting the rest, while capitalizing on unexpected momentum to compose the future.”  

True to that theme, I’m fortunate to host 8x8’s October 22 session at the event. In it, I’ll be interviewing two experienced IT executives who have both witnessed unprecedented disruption in their industries in 2020 and are now laser-focused on composing the future: Brian Himstedt, Senior Director of Technology for the Kansas City Royals, and Gary Kohlheim, Director of IT for Walden University.

I invite you to tune in for this discussion. Not only will Brian and Gary be talking about their technology resets when it comes to communication and collaboration across their organizations, but they’ll also be addressing the importance of and benefits achieved by moving their contact centers to this same operate from anywhere environment. The two will also share their thoughts on what they’re focused on (and what they think fellow IT leaders should be focused on) for 2021 and beyond.

It’s a captivating 20 minutes around creating new and consistently great employee and customer experiences, consolidating tools and devices to maintain corporate identity across a remote workforce, and the power of a platform to capture both IQ and EQ data to transform the business and compose the future. By 2021, Gartner has predicted that CIOs will be as responsible for culture change as Chief Human Resource Officers. As you listen to my interview with these two IT leaders, you’ll realize that prediction couldn’t be more true. 

If you're attending the conference, join me, Brian and Gary on October 22 at 12:30 Eastern Time for the session titled "Happy Employees, Happy Customers: How Cloud Communications Create Both." At any time during the conference, we invite you to come talk with 8x8 and/or visit our booth in the event's Engagement Zone.

Can’t make this year’s Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo but still interested in this topic? Don’t miss me and Kansas City Royals Director of Technology Brian Himstedt in a follow-up webinar on October 29. Learn more here.