Happy holidays to everyone! During this time, I like to look back on the year in AWS Enterprise Strategy Blog posts to see what themes have emerged. This blog addresses the concerns and challenges voiced by executives during the Enterprise Strategy team’s approximately 1,500 annual meetings with AWS customers. Reflecting on these important topics reveals executive thought patterns and how those patterns develop over time, as well as the perspectives different Enterprise Strategists bring to each topic. This blog post summarizes this year’s ideas and guidance topically rather than chronologically. I hope it’s useful.

Artificial Intelligence

You won’t be surprised to read that AI was an important topic this year. Executives looked to Enterprise Strategists for guidance on what opportunities generative AI opens up, what they need to be aware of in implementing it, and what they should do right now. They have been in the midst of a digital transformation—how does the seemingly sudden rise of generative AI change the imperatives of that transformation? As the posts linked below mention, executives must extend their focus beyond generative AI; more “traditional” forms of AI are often closer to what their companies need, and gaining business value from AI requires broader thinking about how data flows through their companies.

·       Lessons from Edison’s Bulb: Using Generative AI to Light the Way for Business Transformation

·       Responsible AI Best Practices: Promoting Responsible and Trustworthy AI Systems

·       What Will Generative AI Mean for Your Business?

·       How Technology Leaders Can Prepare for Generative AI

·       Transformation and AI

·       AI and Collaboration: A Human Angle

Data

Speaking of data—How do companies use data to create business value? Leaders often wonder how they can “monetize their data” now that they increasingly think of data as an asset. The answer doesn’t lie in the data—it lies in an organization’s ability to innovate with the data and put it to uses unique to that organization.

·       What Are Three Things You Need to Do to Foster a Data-Driven Culture?

·       Is Your Data Foundation Solid, Future-Proof, and Value-Added?

·       Creating a Pathway to Innovation by Becoming Data-Driven

·       What’s Top of Mind for Chief Data Officers Going Into 2024?

General Leadership

Leaders lead; doing so is as challenging as ever. 2023 began with a focus on cost management as leaders faced pressure from economic headwinds. During the year, the focus somewhat shifted to the uncertainties introduced by generative AI and the goals of transformation.

·       Managing in Economic Uncertainty: Cost Reductions

·       Cutting Costs by Cutting Waste

·       Becoming a Future-Ready Enterprise

.       Everyone is Busy: Who Has Time to Transform?

·       A Culture of Resilience

.      The Agile Enterprise

·     Measuring Success: A Paradox and a Plan

·     Continuous Engagement and Innovation

·     Should You Prioritize?

·     Tenets: Supercharging Decision-Making

·     CTO: The Evolving Role of the Chief Trade-Off Officer

·     Business Value Is IT’s Primary Measure of Progress

.     From Sustainable IT to IT for Sustainability

Transforming and Migrating

Leading a transformation and moving to the cloud pose interesting challenges. The titles of these blog posts reveal what was top-of-mind for executives this year: multicloud, developer experience, cloud governance, making time to transform, and paying for transformations. These blog posts were about the nuts and bolts of leading the change throughout its implementation.

·     Designing a Cloud Center of Excellence (CCOE)

.    How ITIL Changed IT in Sometimes Painful Ways

·    Codus Interruptus: Stop Wasting Time

.    How to Set Up a Platform That Effectively Supports Your Development Teams

·    Proven Practices for Developing a Multicloud Strategy

·    Increase Business Value from the Cloud with Effective Cloud Governance

·    Navigating the Cloud Migration Bubble: Turning Your Bubble into a Blip

—Mark