AIOps to Deliver Better User Experience

0:08 Hello, everyone.

0:09 My name is Sujai Hajela and I'm the Executive Vice President

0:12 and General Manager at Juniper Networks.

0:15 AIOps is a key component of any automated IT infrastructure,

0:20 improving everything from security and analytics to incident response times.

0:25 Today, we will be talking about the challenges

0:28 and opportunities available to enterprises through effective AIOps solutions,

0:33 and very importantly,

0:34 how it can ensure better user experiences.

0:39 Joining me today is Prakash Kota,

0:41 Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer at Autodesk.

0:46 Prakash, welcome and thank you for joining us today.

0:51 Thank you, Sujai, for having me.

0:53 Prakash, as we get started,

0:55 I'm sure our audience would like to hear about Autodesk's objectives,

1:01 and later on in the conversation,

1:03 I really would want to get into this transformation,

1:05 which you've made from on-prem to everything cloud experience first.

1:10 All right, thanks, Sujai, for having me.

1:12 For those who don't know, Autodesk,

1:16 our vision is a better world designed and made for all.

1:20 All we do is we enable innovators with our design and make technology

1:26 so they can imagine the new possible.

1:29 We have been going through a huge transformation as a company

1:32 by moving to a subscription model.

1:35 We used to ship DVDs, now we give access to our software in the cloud.

1:39 It's always fun because I've seen that transformation throughout.

1:42 I've been with the company for a little over years.

1:46 I've seen probably-- fortunate to see all the transformation that we went through.

1:51 Coming to IT division

1:54 and the transformation that we have been going through is very similar,

1:58 I would say, what we have been trying to do with our customers,

2:01 we've been trying to do internally to our employees too.

2:05 One of the biggest core thing was to move to the cloud,

2:08 leverage cloud to its potential

2:10 so that it removes the friction to the users

2:13 and gives them whatever they need on demand

2:18 because it's all about on-demand now.

2:20 That consumer mentality is what is there for any kind of user.

2:24 - Instant gratification. - Instant gratification,

2:27 whether it's employees, customers, partners,

2:30 and that's the whole theme that we took on.

2:33 It all starts with experience.

2:35 Again, going back, if you look at it when we are a software company shipping DVDs,

2:40 it's all about putting product at the center.

2:42 What new features can I deliver?

2:45 Now, in the whole subscription nature,

2:47 it's all about understanding about your customer,

2:50 and what is important and what is valuable for them,

2:53 and trying to see how do we make sure

2:55 whatever is valuable if there is a friction associated to it,

2:58 can we remove that friction?

3:00 The new buzzword for that is digitization.

3:03 It's all about digitizing and removing that friction.

3:06 Same is the whole charter that I embarked on internally to our employees too.

3:11 When employees join Autodesk, I really don't want them to be stressed.

3:16 I need to fill up these hundred different forms to get this access.

3:19 First, let me find out what all tools they use,

3:22 then let me find out where all should I fill different forms,

3:26 and then go through the approval process that nobody rejects ever,

3:29 and then finally get the access.

3:33 My vision and goal was how do we understand our employees

3:36 and give them what they need on day one?

3:39 We call it day zero access, birthright access.

3:42 Of course, we do this all with keeping enterprise security in mind,

3:46 so that's a core of what we do.

3:48 It's not about compromising security,

3:50 it's more about, "Let's not use security as an example,

3:53 to put so many guardrails in the experience."

3:57 It's all experience-driven and that's how our journey with Juniper also started.

4:01 I remember the days.

4:04 Actually, you know what, Prakash,

4:05 it would be good to maybe walk down memory lane.

4:10 I remember when you and I met and you were going through this transformation,

4:15 you took an example which really stuck to me.

4:18 This was about the phone systems.

4:19 If you don't mind, would you like to just share that with the audience,

4:22 and then we can get into the journey with Mist and Juniper.

4:25 Sure. See, desk phones to me was also a legacy.

4:30 At Autodesk, unless it's required for the nature of the job

4:35 like a call center person or something,

4:38 I personally feel like desk phones are really s.

4:42 We don't need somebody needing to have a desk phone to do their job.

4:48 Any change if I used to have certain thing,

4:51 whether I use it or not, if I'm being told that I'm going to be taken that away,

4:55 it's a resistance that comes because it feels like I had it, so it's an entity.

5:01 It's all about how people's mindset and how we need to

5:03 drive that whether you use it or not.

5:06 At some point, I had to shut down the phone systems

5:10 just to see how many people even complain that the phones--

5:13 Like, take this entire floor and switch off the desk phones

5:17 to see what really happens,

5:18 how many people even really raise a ticket or a system.

5:23 Not surprisingly, my team warned me not to do that stuff.

5:28 I did it. I told them to turn it off and nobody complained.

5:32 That was really a testament of how modern the workforce were.

5:38 The tools that they were using, everything enabled whether it's chat,

5:42 whether using EV phones, or cell phones.

5:46 It was more a testament that we don't need to take a step-by-step approach.

5:50 We can make bold decisions and move faster.

5:54 That was one aspect of it and coming to our story and then see,

5:58 now we turned out, now we don't have any assets desk phones.

6:02 Now, I don't know we have to also start thinking of post-COVID.

6:05 Do we even have desks?

6:07 [laughs] Yes.

6:08 Saying desks because I do think we have workspaces, collaboration hubs, lounges,

6:13 that we are creating for people to come and collaborate,

6:16 but gone are those days where you come and sit here nine-to-five

6:20 and focus and do your all work all by yourself.

6:25 I don't think we have all mastered that in the last two years,

6:29 sitting at our homes or whatever it is.

6:31 I think when we come into an office space,

6:33 we really want to collaborate with others.

6:36 We really want to get that bonding happening.

6:39 I remember, Prakash,

6:40 when we met and the phone example just made me your instant fan.

6:45 Actually, that is where we embarked on this discussion about experience.

6:48 I clearly remember we spoke about it and I was really excited when you said,

6:54 "Look, Sujai, I don't have a problem with--"

6:57 because we were a startup at that point in time,

6:59 we were not even Juniper at that point in time,

7:02 and you were taking a big decision.

7:04 This was a global deployment

7:06 and you were on this digital transformation to drive experiences.

7:10 I remember we both resonated when we said the reason

7:14 this was developed was to enrich end-user experience.

7:17 Of course, we went through pilots and your team was just amazing,

7:20 I have to say very supportive.

7:23 Long story short, a global deployment, then we got acquired by

7:27 Juniper as Mist and that became the AI-driven enterprise.

7:30 You'd be excited to know,

7:32 Juniper's starting line is experience first, networking now.

7:38 From there to a really successful partnership where, by the way,

7:42 I also agree that your team was very supportive.

7:46 Change cannot happen by you and I deciding let's change.

7:48 It was a team which was supportive.

7:51 If I fast forward that experience to COVID,

7:55 everything is wrong about this what's happened,

7:57 you know that everything is wrong.

8:00 It actually changed certain things

8:03 because this whole nine-to-five concept went away.

8:07 This desk went away.

8:11 I'm sure our audience would like to understand

8:14 what this has meant for Autodesk

8:17 and what this has meant for your digital transformation journey.

8:20 One is the whole workplace and so-called hybrid workplace

8:26 where you'll need to figure out, and it could vary from role to role,

8:32 geo to geo, teams and whatever works for individual teams.

8:36 That's a philosophy we have.

8:37 We're not dictating you need to come two days a week or three days a week

8:42 and then two days you stay here or we are fully remote.

8:44 We're not taking our stands in either of those places, but we're also--

8:48 We have great offices by the way. We've invested.

8:51 If you guys have not seen our Autodesk offices, we have great offices

8:55 and I'm a person as a preference,

8:58 I want to go back to office place at least two to three days a week.

9:02 I also know that I will be effective asynchronously

9:06 doing things on my own when I'm remote focused to work.

9:12 My preference is always best of both worlds.

9:14 It doesn't need to be should I be fully remote or should I go back to full-time office.

9:20 The key thing is when I am taking the best of both worlds,

9:24 the experience has to be seamless.

9:26 What I experience at home, I shall not feel like,

9:30 "I need to find out this formula if I need to work in a campus."

9:35 Because we go to a coffee shop, we log in and we start working,

9:40 and when I come into a corporate office, it should not feel like,

9:44 "I need to do these four gymnastics before I get connected

9:47 and then I start working or I need to figure out a huge formula."

9:51 That's a lot of stress, especially if you don't come on a daily basis.

9:57 Again, it's all about the experience and the smartness built around it.

10:02 If I'm a user, I'm going to campus, we should be able to recognize that

10:07 I have an access to that building, and that should also control

10:12 if I have access, which floor, which building

10:15 because that will keep us secure and the Wi-Fi should be provisioned accordingly.

10:20 If I have not followed any protocols,

10:23 the Wi-Fi should be turned off or informed to a manager kind of stuff,

10:26 and then if I had to go to a conference room and beyond,

10:29 I expect leveraging your Wi-Fi

10:31 beacons and other things to navigate me to that place

10:34 because I don't come to this workplace every single day.

10:37 The discussions I think we had pre-COVID days, leveraging how--

10:43 We talked every little about Wi-Fi.

10:45 I remember in our conversation, we talked about all other features

10:49 associated from an experience standpoint which I feel are very relevant now

10:54 when I don't need to go into an office space every single day.

10:59 I'm not going to be stressed knowing that I'll be able to connect quickly,

11:03 securely, and collaborate with whomever I need to collaborate.

11:07 That's the key I would say.

11:09 I think, Prakash, I also remember-- You're right.

11:12 The discussions we had pre-COVID, we didn't know this was going to happen,

11:16 but actually, it has served Autodesk and Juniper really well during this time.

11:22 I also remember when we were talking about this.

11:25 You said, "Sujai, I don't want people to be complaining."

11:28 Like the coffee shop, for example,

11:29 they open it instant-on, instant gratification.

11:33 I'm sure the audience would also like to hear

11:35 what has this transformation meant to you in terms of the IT teams.

11:41 You cannot have a plethora of IT Teams running around chasing ghosts

11:45 as we call it for Wi-Fi problems.

11:47 What is your experience been in terms of network operations with the system?

11:52 See, with network operations, again, I'm a big believer.

11:54 I'm a software person.

11:58 I'm not a hardware core, hardware person.

12:01 I'm a believer that leveraging software for everything is the way to go

12:06 because you can scale faster.

12:08 That's the principle. It's nothing against hardware.

12:11 When we roll up new offices or campuses,

12:14 or when we acquire new companies, when we have to roll up things,

12:19 I feel like everything should be in the cloud.

12:22 Your controller is cloud controller.

12:25 I don't need to have an on-premise because I don't have on-premise stuff.

12:28 I don't have data centers to put those on-premise stuff

12:31 and to have site-based network operations.

12:35 It's cloud-based and that network operations person can operate it from anywhere.

12:40 Then visibility.

12:42 If there are issues, and we all know the reality is we don't want to have issues,

12:46 but when we have issues, we do want to know,

12:50 if possible, before the user gets to know that there's something going on,

12:54 so that we can be either fast reactive or proactive.

12:58 I should be able to quickly search what's going on,

13:01 what kind of issues or who is having bad experiences from a Wi-Fi standpoint.

13:08 Previously, it used to be like that person,

13:11 one person who had the knowledge of going back behind

13:16 those complex networks systems to see what's going on.

13:20 We are all waiting for that godly human being to tell us what was wrong.

13:26 For me, that is not what it is because people, again,

13:30 in a software company, people want to self-serve.

13:34 I don't want somebody to tell me what's going on.

13:37 I don't have a network engineer at home to fix my Wi-Fi issues.

13:42 That's, again, my philosophy and thinking is when I don't struggle,

13:47 and I am keeping my home secure and at the same time connected,

13:53 why is it different at a campus?

13:55 Why do we make it over complex?

13:57 Yes, I know the campus has its own restrictions and what we need to do,

14:00 but now there are solutions that can really take it to this level

14:05 and that's the whole philosophy of how I operate.

14:08 Prakash, just as to summarize, today, we spoke about how we met

14:14 and we aligned on experiences and the phone example made me your instant fan.

14:19 After that we had the discussion as to what was important to you.

14:23 It was about enriching the experience and at the same time

14:27 keeping network operations, systems, and costs under control.

14:31 I think that was really good and I know what I really also liked was you said,

14:37 "Well, Autodesk is looking at changing the experience for its customers."

14:40 The way you deliver the service now

14:43 and what is exciting and a key insight is that you said,

14:46 "Hence you need to do the same thought process to your own employees."

14:51 I think the Juniper Autodesk partnership has been really successful.

14:56 Prakash, what's next on you because I know you,

14:59 you continue to think and think and think and challenge technology actually

15:03 to deliver an experience.

15:05 What's next at Autodesk?

15:07 I think the big focus specifically from an employee standpoint

15:12 is also about personalization.

15:15 The next level of experience is nothing,

15:17 but when you come into a company, as I told you,

15:21 we have hundreds of tools that we use.

15:24 For my profile, I probably use to different tools

15:28 which means I don't need to know the other tools which other folks will use.

15:33 How do you understand me better and serve me,

15:38 give a personalized experience to me?

15:40 We've focused first on improving experience overall.

15:44 Now, it's all about personalizing the experience for me

15:47 and then recommending things for me

15:49 so that my day is effective and productive.

15:52 There's a huge focus on personalization

15:55 and we are doing it for every internal employees

15:57 and the same thing we are focusing on for our customers too.

16:00 How do we understand our customers better

16:02 and serve them better and add more value?

16:04 It's all about value.

16:07 That's the next big thing.

16:09 A lot of focus on data.

16:10 Love it. Fundamentally,

16:12 experience was the vision, started with digitization,

16:16 and now you're saying personalize the digitization,

16:18 take it to a hyper-scale.

16:20 Prakash, thank you for your time today.

16:22 It's always exciting and exhilarating when we speak to you.

16:26 The underlay was AIOps, but again as I expect of you,

16:29 you speak about outcomes and it was today about experiences.

16:33 Thank you again for sharing your journey at Autodesk

16:36 as the Chief Information Officer and Senior Vice President.

16:39 Thank you, Sujai, for having me.