Technovation with Peter High (CIO, CTO, CDO, CXO Interviews)

Latest Episodes:

Inside General Mills’ AI Playbook: Clean Data, Cloud Speed, and Business Trust Dec 01, 2025

Show notes

What does it really take to scale AI across a global enterprise?

In this episode, Jaime Montemayor, Chief Digital and Technology Officer at General Mills, shares the AI playbook behind the company’s digital transformation from foundational investments in cloud and data governance to business-led innovation across supply chain, e-commerce, and marketing.

With 96% of General Mills’ supply chain data now clean and governed, Jaime’s team is shifting from predictive analytics to agentic architectures that enable scalable, AI-powered automation.

Key insights include:

Why cloud migration came before ERP modernization
How trust and business integration drive AI adoption
Building a connected data foundation to serve every segment
Agentic AI use cases in supply chain and marketing
Org design strategies to “lift and shift” innovation at scale

From Bottleneck to Accelerator: How NiSource’s CIO Repositioned IT as a Growth Engine Nov 27, 2025

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What does it take to transform IT from a bottleneck into a business accelerator?

In this episode, Waco Bankston, Chief Information Officer at NiSource, shares how he’s repositioning the IT organization to support growth, enable speed, and shift decades of technical and cultural inertia. Leading a 6.5-year enterprise transformation effort, Waco discusses the discipline required to modernize legacy systems while instilling a new execution culture.

Key insights from the episode include:

Building a modern tech foundation to support future acquisitions
Restructuring outsourced/insourced IT mix through platform consolidation
Shaping team behavior through leadership-by-experience
Establishing unified governance across AI, cybersecurity, and innovation
Leading with operational safety and customer-back design

How Unum’s CTO Reimagined the Enterprise with a Digital-First Architecture Nov 24, 2025

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What does it take to reimagine a 10,000-employee enterprise for a digital-first future?

In this episode, Unum CTO Gautam Roy breaks down how he transformed the company’s operating model, culture, and technology foundation by reshaping experiences from the customer backward.

Gautam shares how Unum evolved from applications to journeys to value streams; how AI, data, and automation have become levers for acceleration; and how innovation culture and continuous learning drive enterprise adaptability.

Highlights:

Unum’s shift to digital-first architecture and “moments that matter”
How AI, data, and automation remove friction across operations
Building predictive, proactive technology employee experience
Creating safe spaces and recognition models for innovation
Developing a future-focused, cross-functional learning culture

Mission-Driven Startups Win: Mike Hayes on Building Companies That Last Nov 21, 2025

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What if your company’s greatest advantage isn’t the product—but the purpose behind it?

Mike Hayes, Managing Director at Insight Partners and former COO of VMware, believes mission clarity is more than culture—it’s a strategic asset. Drawing on 20 years as a Navy SEAL and senior tech executive, Mike shares why knowing “who you want to be” is a superpower for founders and boards.

In this episode, Mike and Peter High discuss:

How purpose-led companies outperform in high-growth markets
Mike’s “Three Circles” framework for aligning talent to mission
What Insight Partners looks for in founder-VC alignment
How to say no (with clarity) when everything seems urgent
Why values-based leadership scales in unpredictable markets

Why Snowflake’s CIO Rebranded IT for the AI Era Nov 20, 2025

Show notes

What does it take to evolve IT into a forward-looking innovation engine?

Mike Blandina, CIO of Snowflake, shares how he’s reimagined IT as “Enterprise Technology” as a way to describe what ‘IT’ really does: lead a solutions-first mindset at Snowflake designed for the AI era. In this conversation, Mike reflects on his first eight months leading tech at one of the world’s most AI-forward data cloud companies.

Key highlights include:

The philosophy behind the Enterprise Technology rebrand
Building Raven and RevOps—AI agents replacing 250+ dashboards
The Customer Zero model for product influence
Governance and localization strategies for responsible AI
Redefining staff models to include digital agents

Chandra Dhandapani on Balancing Talent Strategy with Data, Flexibility, and ROI Nov 17, 2025

Show notes

What if your hiring strategy were fueled by the largest contingent workforce dataset in the world?

Magnit CEO Chandra Dhandapani joins Technovation to explore how data is reshaping how companies think about talent—from role design to sourcing strategy to real-time labor cost insights. Chandra also shares lessons from her journey from CIO to CEO and offers perspective on why automation—not AI—is the skill trend to watch.

Key topics covered include:

12% YoY surge in automation roles vs. 2% in AI
Data-driven frameworks for balancing contingent and permanent talent
How Magnit uses GenAI internally via its “Maggi” platform
Strategic applications of workforce analytics
Leadership shifts from digital to enterprise-wide responsibility

Designing AI from the Customer Back: Hari Gopalkrishnan on Bank of America’s Approach Nov 13, 2025

Show notes

How can AI be designed from the customer back and not the model forward?

Hari Gopalkrishnan, Chief Technology and Information Officer at Bank of America, joins Peter High to share how one of the world’s largest financial institutions grounds its AI strategy in user behavior. From developing Erica to enabling employees with tools like Ask Merrill, Hari explains why every AI solution must begin with real customer or employee friction.

Key topics include:

The evolution of Erica from NLP to large language models
How to avoid the trap of “shiny object” AI
Bank of America’s 3-tier AI architecture: productivity, personas, and platforms
Why dismantling old workflows is the prerequisite to automation
Training 200,000+ employees in AI through “The Academy”

How Dell Consolidated 800 AI Projects into 4 Scalable Enterprise Platforms Nov 10, 2025

Show notes

What does it take to scale AI from 800 siloed experiments into enterprise-wide impact?

Doug Schmitt, President of Dell Technologies Services and CIO of Dell, joins Peter High to unpack the company’s enterprise AI playbook—a journey from fragmented innovation to four scalable platforms used across software development, customer service, supply chain, and sales.

Highlights from this episode:

How Dell consolidated 800 AI initiatives into 4 core platforms
Why Doug sees AI as both tech and business model disruption
The “customer zero” approach to testing and learning at speed
Agentic AI examples in field service and internal ops
How Dell’s AI factory enables rapid experimentation across 3,000+ customers

Give First, Build Later: Brad Feld’s Strategy for Ecosystem-Driven Innovation Nov 07, 2025

Show notes

What does it take to play the long game in innovation?

Venture capitalist Brad Feld has spent four decades answering that question as a founder, mentor, and early-stage investor in companies like Fitbit, MakerBot, and Techstars. In this episode, Feld unpacks the enduring impact of mentorship, the logic behind his “Give First” philosophy, and how startups and enterprises alike can benefit from ecosystem thinking.

Key insights include:

How a childhood visit to Frito-Lay inspired a tech career
What separates peer mentorship from transactional networking
The origin and strategic power of Techstars’ “Give First” mantra
How Feld invests in category creation (wearables, 3D printing, cloud)
Why innovation requires emotional resilience and long-term relationships

Inside Paychex’s Data Strategy: Monetizing Insight for AI, Clients, and the U.S. Economy Nov 06, 2025

Show notes

What if your company’s data could become a public good and a competitive moat?

Beaumont Vance, SVP of Data and AI at Paychex, shares how his team transforms payroll and HR data into real-time economic insight, powering everything from AI copilots to U.S. government response efforts. With 1 in 11 U.S. workers on the platform and 39 million client interactions annually, Paychex treats data as infrastructure.

In this episode, Beaumont and Peter High discuss:

How Paychex monetizes data responsibly
Why statistical precision trumps survey-based signals
Building AI-ready data from unstructured knowledge
Lessons from growth equity on “data moats”
What AI agents will unlock next

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