An Innovative Month

There’s a bit of a buzz going on in the developer community at EMC these days. Actually it goes beyond just the developer community. It has to do with the 2nd Annual Innovation Showcase being held in the third week of October. I’ve written about my experience from last year. This year, I’m involved in a variety of ways (which I’m about to describe).

I enjoyed the conference so much last year I decided to join the organizing committee and contribute a few ideas of my own. I’m glad I did. I don’t know why more people don’t get involved.

It’s a nice break from my real job. In fact, it doesn’t even feel like work.

Note to reader: I don’t think anybody in my management chain reads my blog.

I’m In

First of all, every EMC employee was eligible to submit one of more ideas during the month of June and part of July. I submitted a couple of ideas. By mid July, there were nearly 1000 ideas submitted world-wide. Some of the top technologists at EMC had the task of whittling down that list to 30 finalists.  When I got back from vacation, I got some good news. I made the top thirty.  Twice.  Here’s how it happened.

I’ve done a lot of work with our customers at the JFK Library and their digital archiving project. And I witnessed a particular problem that digital curators often experience, and I thought to myself: “If we combine the software assets of some of EMC’s recent acquisition, we could solve that problem”. So I submitted the idea, and somebody liked it. Bingo.

The second idea was actually a result of coming in 3rd place in last year’s contest. The “data lineage” idea was actually built into a proof-of-concept and shown at EMC World in May. I worked with a team in China on this proof-of-concept. The way in which we built it was quite innovative, and it has a distinct Cloud/Saas angle. So I told the guys in China: “Let’s submit it as a follow-on idea”.  Bingo again. Our team is in.  The China R&D team actually did a little more brainstorming on their own and submitted another, variant idea.  Bingo for them.  That original data lineage idea is the gift that keeps on giving.

The Best Part

I think the coolest thing about the way EMC runs the contest is that it provides a chance for world-wide employees to win the travel to attend “in person” in Massachusetts (during prime foliage season no less). One person per team gets to present the idea to EMC executives. So my friends from China get to send two people, and they get to decide if they want to wear a tie when talking to the BIGS.

Organizing The Event

I mentioned that I joined the organizing team, run by Burt Kaliski.  There are three main ideas that I floated, and I was excited that the team liked all of them, and laughed as they ask me to help implement all of them ;>).

Here are some of the things that are different about this year:

• We added an “advisory board”. They are the thousands of people that participate in the EMC ONE social media platform. We basically use the platform as a world-wide brainstorming and planning tool for the Innovation Showcase. We’ve taken ideas on slogans and speakers, proposed the agenda, asked about world-wide inclusion, and posted results. It worked.  Ideas are being proposed that cross business units as well as geographies.
• People are not only bringing ideas, but some are bringing running code.  My business unit (Rich Napolitano) is sponsoring a XAM coding challenge this summer. I’m running it, along with a bunch of my pals from Centera. I approached my HR team and they not only coughed up some cash prizes but they will also fly the winners to the Innovation Showcase. Very generous.
• We’re trying to pull off a “live sunset innovation tour” during the conference. During the morning of October 22nd we’ll try to set up a live feed from China to get an “Innovation Report” from the R&D teams. Ditto for research in other time zones where the sun has gone down: India, Israel, Russia, Ireland, etc.

Of course, we plan for one or more of our innovative customers to speak at the event, along with some of our University partners. We’re planning on having other cool speakers as well.

Opportunist’s Heaven

It’s easy to take a look at opportunities like this and think “I really don’t have the time”.  EMC knows this.  So they appeal to something beyond the pocketbook: the chance to travel to the US, the chance to meet and explain your idea (or your code) to the highest executives in the company, and the chance to hobknob with some of the smartest people and the brightest speakers in the industry.  Of course, if your idea gets selected, you’ll have the opportunity to drive your idea toward product by working with a dedicated research team.  Because there’s also a bottom line: we want to generate new forms of revenue.

So that’s why there’s a buzz this August.

October’s coming. Smart fun. Meet the experts.

Ya gotta play to win……

Steve