Integration is an integral part of enterprise innovation and success, and it’s no longer just something “nice to have.” Charles Feld, the head of CIO leadership-development firm The Feld Group Institute, encourages other CIOs to champion enterprise integration. He wants to create an extended enterprise of customers, suppliers, distributors, and employees. Feld understands the value and importance of integration connecting disparate systems, increasing visibility across an enterprise, and becoming more informed and predictive when it comes to business.
Integration Right on Time
The Feld Group transforms multinational corporations by integrating all of their disparate systems to help better them serve their customers on an individual and intimate basis, even as the business scales. Different organizations reach out to the Feld Group through a contractor to help them achieve success by managing their strategy and implementation. The senior executive vice president, Charles Feld, retired and created The Feld Group Institute to help other companies see the potential in their businesses that could be unlocked with integration.
The airline industry is a prime example of an industry that needs Feld and integration. The overarching problem for airlines, according to Feld, is having an airline run only 80 percent on time. Of course, some matters cannot be controlled (like weather), but companies must reduce issues by managing foreseeable problems. With systems connected and data coming in real time, the enterprise can acknowledge and respond to problems immediately when they arise. Moreover, patterns can be analyzed to predict and prevent issues before they even happen.
CEO ESP
Feld wants all CEOs to have access to the values and power that integration can provide; he wants them to be able to sense problems and respond in advance. He believes in the capacity of creating intimacy with each customer as he terms serving “segments of one.” All systems must be connected to produce comprehensive customer profiles and serve the customers by catering to their personal needs. Feld is not interested in replacing the airline’s systems but connecting them to optimize assets by orchestrating all moving parts from the passengers to bag checkers. In doing so, airlines can improve on the 20 percent delayed flights that affect millions of passengers.
“Going forward, the world will be fundamentally different. Forget about incremental improvements to hardware and software; only integration will get enterprises where they need to go. Even now, after decades in this business, I feel like I’m in the right place, with the right technology, at the right time. TIBCO has that effect.”
– Charles Feld, Head of CIO Leadership-development Firm.
