Interviewer: Mariham Magdy
“The difficult challenge faced by conventional organisations anywhere is to stop chasing the next ‘unicorn’ and think about how they might transform themselves back into the unicorn they once were, while pervading such entrepreneurial spirit across the ecosystems they belong to, in and out their inner core.”
Giovanni Di Noto
ABOUT THE INTERVIEWEE
French-born, Euro-grown, Australian-adopted, with a blend of Mediterranean ancestry and Asian lifestyle,
Giovanni Di Noto is a global leader in cloud economics with a cross-disciplinary tertiary background in business, IT and applied sciences and over 3 decades of experience in new technology.
He has been the recipient of prominent industry recognitions including a 2019 Top Euro Start-up Award, a 2018 Business of Tomorrow Award, 2 x Asia-Pacific Innovation Awards, Best e-Commerce Award, Best IT implementation Award, Best International Contact Centre Award, Excellence in Talent Management Award and a broader list of nominations and commendations over the years.
In his CTO capacity at cloudyBoss Pty Ltd, Giovanni directly led and oversaw the engineering team who released SKYE in 2017, the first mainstream commercial enterprise DLT (Distributed Ledger Technology) engine.
Giovanni has been bestowed with Awards for “Best Human Resource Management” and “Excellence in Teaching and Learning” for his educational prowess and innovative approach to the design of new academic qualifications in technology, as well as his many successful industry-scale transformational program implementations.
THE INTERVIEW
1- HR Revolution Middle East: Dear Mr. Giovanni, we are really proud to make this interview with your good-self and very enthusiastic to learn a lot from your unique experience about many things.
First of all, let me ask you how was this culture mix between France, Italy, Australia & finally the Asian lifestyle, able to equip you with a very unique experience and ability to address business necessities in those different markets?
Giovanni Di Noto: To start with, let me thank you for this conversation.
I was incredibly lucky in my early professional years, and even from an earlier age, as a son of immigrants to be thrown into a multi-cultural context underpinned by freedom, tolerance and diversity.
A pivotal milestone occurred for me when I was selected alongside 11 of my peers from around Europe out of 1800 ITC young graduates, and granted a COMETT (European Multi-Cultural Technology Exchange program) scholarship back in the late 1980’s when the web was invented: a case of being part of the right team in the right place at the right time. What I learned from this series of personal and professional multi-cultural shocks has to do with the “power of conversations”, the fact that “trade is a conversation” (cultures derive from traditions which emerge from trade conversations) and subsequently the importance of information flows (which underpin organizational architectures), communication modes and their many nuances (such as visual, audio or kinaesthetic ones) alongside language attributes.
Take Asia for example: it would be all too easy, business-wise to amalgamate all Asian countries into one large uniform market without taking into account the subtle differences between the ancient structured audio Pali language on the one hand which underpins most Indian and South-East Asian languages (the equivalent of Latin or Greek for European languages), and the logographic visual nature of Far-East Asian languages such as Mandarin, Japanese or Korean on the other hand. Such nuances have direct impacts on how conversations articulate and constitute a first layer of business and socio-economic mantras.
These learning gathered at the frontline drove my professional mottos such as g/localisation or distributed organizational ecosystems which embrace and leverage multi-cultural diversity.
2- HR Revolution Middle East: Would you please explain to us what are “Cloud Economics”? I believe in the Middle East we still need to learn more about this terminology.
Giovanni Di Noto: OK let’s break this down into “Cloud” first then “Economics”.
Cloud refers to all the technologies that have been unleashed since the internet and the TCP/IP protocol were conceived by DARPA scientists Vinton Gray and Robert Kahn 50 years ago. 20 years after, in 1989, cloud suddenly took off and was rapidly adopted by the masses when Sir Tim Berners Lee, UK engineer at CERN in Switzerland, introduced hypertext and World Wide Web.
Beyond web content, search and eCommerce, the notion of cloud extended in the 2000’s to mobile apps which run on devices such as smart phones and tablets rather than desktops. Cloud nowadays extends to any other types of connected devices with data processing capabilities, a domain encompassing what is coined as IoT (Internet of Things): think drones, wearables, cameras, sensors and even nanobots that can be injected into living bodies, controlled via onboard Wi-Fi antenna, an exciting, fast emerging bio-computing sector set to revolutionise surgery.
A key aspect of cloud is its open public network nature which distinguishes it from isolated private computer networks such as those in conventional corporate running onsite data centres. Cloud security is often quoted by enterprise and business commentators as a barrier to cloud adoption: in reality, cloud-based enterprise systems are nowadays more secure than private ones; the sticking points in the cloud vs in-house debate are about connectivity and access more than security.
Enough for the “cloud” bit, now into “economics” which we indeed already briefly touched on earlier: trade, commerce, organizational architecture and economic models are influenced by the way knowledge therefore information flows within organisations and ecosystems. And vice-versa, there are for example debates about the “economics” reasons for the emerging and usage intensification of the “writing” technology thousands of years ago, arguably driven by the need for safer and more efficient ways to maintain ledgers, collect taxes or store value records. Any technology able to shift informational paradigms such as the writing technology, or the cloud one has an inevitable impact on the way we trade, both micro and macroeconomics, and society at large. “cloud economics” encapsulates this idea.
An interesting recent development in cloud economics is the “tectonic” shift brought by blockchain and enterprise DLT (distributed ledger technology): while cloud has unleashed “digital abundance” from the early 1990’s onwards, blockchain is materialising “digital scarcity”: this has profound consequences on “cloud economics”, the scale of which is unfolding before our own eyes…
Blockchain is indeed changing the very nature of the “cloud” itself, not just “cloud economics”. Cloud as we know it might disappear or shift to a far more distributed peer-to-peer ecosystem much sooner than we think. This will happen via the accelerating convergences between information technologies such as DLT, AI, quantum computing, AR and a few others. This transition will neutralise along the way the issues of data cartelisation and other cyber threats the cloud has been subjected to over the past 2 decades.
3- HR Revolution Middle East: Mr. Giovanni you actually have outstanding success stories in Organizations’ Automation & Digitalization, would you please share with us one of them? What important advices would you share with organizational leaders to encourage them to consider automation possibilities?
Giovanni Di Noto: From the hundreds of digital transformation, automation projects and programs I have been involved with for the past 30 years in banking, manufacturing, electronics, healthcare, energy, entertainment and other sectors, the one I am particularly fond of is the work done with the Australian eldercare industry over the past decade, a case study I often refer to in conferences and workshops as it crystallises into one narrative all contextual and organizational dimensions that need to be taken into account when planning or executing digital transformation or automation programs.
Eldercare epitomizes the rapid 21st century paradigm shift from “unwell” to “aged” healthcare patient. This industry is at the nexus between all civilization’s most acute challenges, from our global sustainability crisis to millennial cliff, ageing population and urbanization planning failures (arguably the most lethal of all preventable catastrophes causing 10 million casualties each year, ranking second only to “natural death” which represents 80% of all deaths, preventable or not). Eldercare also commands the most leading-edge scientific, engineering and social advancements and underpins the so-called “silver economics”.
We’ve reached spectacular goals in this sector in terms of enhanced well-being (for both care recipients and carers) and higher productivity levels with bold initiatives combining leading-edge technologies with innovative HR management, ground-breaking organizational architectures and new economic modelling.
I’d advise organizational leaders to shift their perspectives on automation: technology for the sake of it is meaningless; technology unleashes its many benefits only when it empowers humans; this is particularly important at a time where talent pools all around the world are proportionally contracting because of our ageing population.
I would also urge organizational leaders to move away from the fast-obsoleting 9-to-5 framework and its underpinning “broken lines” (supply and demand) economic model. Over the past decade, new organizational structures often referred to as distributed ecosystems have taken off, signalling new ways of operating across all industries, new market dynamics driven by cloud economics, tokenomics, circular models, bio-mimetics and others which increase transformational pressures on conventional organisations.
The difficult challenge faced by conventional organisations anywhere is to stop chasing the next “unicorn” and think about how they might transform themselves back into the unicorn they once were, while pervading such entrepreneurial spirit across the ecosystems they belong to, in and out their inner core.
4- HR Revolution Middle East: You were awarded a number of very distinguished awards; two of them were the “Best Human Resource Management” and “Excellence in Teaching and Learning”; from your recognized expertise, what are important keys to use for achieving excellence in HRM, and in the Teaching & Learning field?
Giovanni Di Noto: Take the “Resources” out of Human Resources. Embrace the Human side of the discipline. This is not a mere HR cliché. It’s our competitive edge vs machines, intelligent or not.
Keys to unlock 21st century organizational dynamics are to focus on quintessential human traits such as “Emotional Intelligence” for example, a dimension we also need to train AI’s about, so that they can better serve humans.
Break down office walls, hierarchies and the very boxes of our entitlement-driven organizational charts: in a 21st century context dominated by ecosystems, every single person is a strategic node in a broader nexus of connections, titles are irrelevant, outcomes are all that count, trust and time the only values that matter.
HR should take over IT (and probably move it to the cloud if yet to be done), harness informational flows (be they collections, connections, storage, disclosures, disposal), knowledge dynamics (learning, unlearning, experiencing, applying, leaking) and on-flow agile process fluidity. Extend this informational framework beyond the conventional corporate “legal” walls to all ecosystems your organisation belongs to.
Reconcile organizational ethos with individual diversity and let excellence emerge out of it.
5- HR Revolution Middle East: To what extent do you believe organizations could move easily to automation options & how this can have dramatic impact on their growth levels?
Giovanni Di Noto: I think that, in a demographically constrained context (proportional global workforce contraction), automation is an absolute necessity rather than an option, and organizations which are yet to contemplate such strategies are doing so at their own peril.
For example I witnessed first-hand organizational shutdowns over the past 10 years in the software industry. Many software houses, successful ones indeed, became unable to cope with market demand, unable to source, nor retain the talents they needed and found themselves increasingly exposed to new categories of risks in a new uncharted “money cannot buy anymore” era.
The usual “growth” rhetoric in business which also dominates politics and banking needs to evolve and mature to a next level. New “value representation” systems are challenging conventional ways of measuring organizational performance. In the short-term, productivity coupled with governance and CSR KPIs are much better indicators of an organisation or ecosystem’s ability to survive the challenging period ahead than any old-school “growth” indicators such as investment validations, capital gains, top line sales, bottom line revenues, market shares and similar measures.
Irrespective of the nature of the organization or ecosystem, implementing automation is complex, difficult and risky, yet necessary. The type of transformation programs conventional organisations should envisage need to be carefully crafted, executed and have their own load of risks, some of which potentially fatal. The same goes for new ecosystems and start-ups which face the daunting task of establishing a new order while operating and scaling up within the very old context they aim to disrupt.
In addition to emotional intelligence, an ability to seamlessly deal with paradoxical situations but also anticipate rather than react are some of the crucial organizational skills required during the massive socio-economic transition all of us are going through.
6- HR Revolution Middle East: What advices would you give to HR leaders when managing internationally dispersed teams who are only connected digitally?
Giovanni Di Noto: Shift to an outcome-based measure of performance to enable “built-in trust”: tokenise work if your context enables you to do so or shift to a distributed user-centred performance measurement framework whereby the user is in the driver seat rather than the organisation.
Time is the new space. Be conscious of your team members’ respective time zones. Implement ethical communication protocols, such as: punctuality, clarity on dates and time zones, electronic “do’s and don’ts, to enhance the effectiveness of meetings and mitigate unproductive practices such as inflammatory emails.
Poor connectivity and poor web conferencing tools deter and impact productivity: think about everything you can do to facilitate, provide, support or advise on connectivity with each of your remote team members.
Be flexible and clear with cloud tools: one tool might perform well today and crash tomorrow. Avoid putting all your eggs into 1 basket and allow access to multiple cloud tools for greater flexibility but ensure this is balanced against educational needs and does not overburden operations.
Redefine office space and face-to-face interactions: your next physical office should be any 5-stars resort or other hospitality site in a wonderful location everyone might aspire to visit. This is not always possible of course, with site-centric exceptions such as hospitals for example albeit g/localisation and AI are increasingly challenging too this type of operations.
Permanent CBD offices are giving way to distributed on-demand co-working spaces. This highlights a new HR scope beyond the core organisation extending to its hyperconnected nexus of ecosystems. Corporate or industry conferences and any other location-based experiential events should be systematically leveraged to foster and strengthen the organizational dynamics of dispersed virtual teams and ecosystems.
7- HR Revolution Middle East: “Smarter Organizations” I believe this new terminology has been introduced by “cloudyBoss”, would you please explain it for us, and let us know how organizations can be smarter?
Giovanni Di Noto: cloudyBoss introduced this new terminology for its D.OT (Digital Organizational Transformation) program targeted to large conventional organisations aiming to dematerialise while minimising the risks attached to automation strategies.
Contrary to conventional unicorn-chasing and rat-race corporate start-up practices, D.OT articulates around an innovative and all-encompassing start-up acceleration program which fosters the right culture, reenergises the organizational ethos and broadens it to new levels.
D.OT combines the full power of cloudyBoss NEXT+ eDLT platform which solves common start-up pitfalls (such as missing MVP, tech budget black hole, failure to scale-up) with an organisation-wide unrestricted accelerator program fostering a broad shift to part-time arrangements.
Beyond mitigating the conventional risks associated with the collateral impact of automation (such as damaging layoff programs), D.OT reshapes the organisation to the unicorn it once was, and allows it to transition to a wide-reaching 21st century ecosystem platform better equipped for socio-economic survival.
D.OT holistic approach to organizational transformation is proving a much “smarter” way to achieve many strategic organizational goals at once and do so in a streamlined risk-adverse fashion. To date, D.OT results with large organisations and entire industries have been compelling and confirmed similar findings to the ones in the 2018 Gallup report in terms of workforce engagement impact on organizational KPIs.
8- HR Revolution Middle East: Finally Mr. Giovanni, would you share with us what are your expectations for the coming AI contributions to the Business World?
Giovanni Di Noto: In the short to mid-term, AI will play an essential role in empowering all humans to achieve the necessary and highly challenging productivity enhancements demanded by the difficult global demographic transition known as the “millennial cliff”.
Beyond current trends with RPA (Robotic Process Automation), AI brings to the business world predictive capabilities, insights uncovering and an ability to embrace with ease the inhuman Big Data tsunami unleashed by IoT. The current short-term issues with data biases in AI training datasets clearly indicate why we need to move away from human data collection and shift to automated unbiased Big Data one.
AI therefore changes the definition of information and enables the concept of “smart information” which routes itself to the right user at the right time in the right place, a radically different way to think about information and knowledge which in turn will inevitably change business and economics.
Beyond human empowerment, AI will allow us to become better humans and focus more on emotional intelligence, artistic and scientific pursuits, creativity, new frontier exploration, lifestyle and entertainment. The business world landscape will be radically different and trigger a new entrepreneurship renaissance with a different timespan for goals and objectives, with new arguably multi-generational horizons.
AI will remove the complexities of dealing with an ever-exploding range of sophisticated and pervasive technologies. By acting as an indispensable layer between humans and technologies, AI will counter-intuitively free-up humans from devices, allowing us to become more humane than we’ve ever been.