On the 64th episode of Enterprise AI Innovators, host Saam Motamedi (Greylock Partners) talks with Bill Briggs, Chief Technology Officer at Deloitte. Bill argues that most organizations stall because they try to graft new models onto old workflows, and because their data and system foundations were never built for agentic execution. He shares a practical “start at the outcome” framing, why modernization still matters (even in the GenAI era), and how trust, security, and privacy have to be engineered in, not audited after the fact.

Quick Hits from Bill:

On AI-native starting at the top: “I actually start with the CEO and the chair and sit them down and say, if this isn't coming from you and this not this isn't about here in a year, it's about here. And what that means. We should stop the conversation…”

On why agent pilots stall without foundations: “[Leaders hoped GenAI meant] we didn’t have to do… hard work in data foundations… [but enterprises lack] orchestration backbone… microservice enablement… without that, the bounds of what agents can do [are] limited.”

On redesigning outcomes, not steps: “The point is, you want to have folded clean laundry when you need it. Not [a] step by step replacement of the steps you learned as a child to complete that task.”

Recent Book Recommendation: Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara

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Enterprise AI Innovators is a show where top technology executives share specific ways AI changes how work gets done in the enterprise. Find more great insights from technology leaders and enterprise software experts at https://www.enterprisesoftware.blog/

Enterprise AI Innovators is produced by Abnormal Studios.

On the 63rd episode of Enterprise AI Innovators, hosts Evan Reiser (co-founder and CEO, Abnormal AI) and Saam Motamedi (General Partner, Greylock Partners) talk with Lev Gonick, Chief Information Officer at Arizona State University (ASU). ASU treats AI like a product and a platform: build internal capacity, run structured grant cycles to surface real workflows, and ship a “builder” that can support tens of thousands of users. Gonick also lays out why student agency matters, and why universities that wait for vendors risk becoming “nothing but vendor management.”

Quick hits from Lev:

On building an internal AI acceleration team: “We literally took, initially 20 and now it's 40 people dedicated from morning till night working on platform technology, security, compliance, tooling, building tools to support what we knew that needed to grow up to be, again, a low code, no code kind of environment.”

On scaling demand through structured internal grants: “We thought there be, you know, 40 or 50 great ideas, you know, as we speak today. Now we're through through four full rounds of engagements. We have over 600 projects in-flight, right now.”

On fixing the friction-filled student journey with AI: “Focus in on transforming the ways in which students have to navigate incredibly, difficult, friction-filled, journey. Applying for, getting into, having to do financial aid, landing in a dorm room, [solving] some of the back office through again tools that they're using in their consumer life.”

Recent Book Recommendation: Capitalism: A Global History by Sven Beckert

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Like what you hear? Leave us a review and subscribe to the show on Apple, Spotify, or Youtube you listen to podcasts.

Enterprise AI Innovators is a show where top technology executives share how AI is transforming the enterprise. Find more great lessons from tech leaders and enterprise software experts at https://www.enterprisesoftware.blog/.

Enterprise AI Innovators is produced by Abnormal Studios.

On the 62nd episode of Enterprise AI Innovators, hosts Evan Reiser (CEO and co-founder, Abnormal AI) and Saam Motamedi (Greylock Partners) talk with Mike Trkay, CIO at FICO. Mike explains how FICO is moving AI from pilots to production by prioritizing ROI, data foundations, and governance. He argues for sanctioned LLM access to curb leakage, system integration for business-wide answers, and smaller domain models when accuracy, compliance, and trust matter.

Quick hits from Mike:

On the shift from pilots to ROI: “We’re leaving that phase and starting to get to the point of going, okay, but where’s the true return on that investment?”

On the must-do for enterprises: “Everybody who works for you… they’re going to go use one of the LLMs somewhere… and probably share data and proprietary data.”

On why one big model is not enough: “Sometimes you need the PhD. Who’s got who speaks the jargon, understands the context, and it helps deal with some of the hallucinations and bias, and other things that could be influencing.”

Recent Book Recommendation: The Forgotten Founding Father: Noah Webster's Obsession and the Creation of an American Culture by Joshua Kendall

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Like what you hear? Leave us a review and subscribe to the show on Apple, Spotify, or Youtube you listen to podcasts.

Enterprise AI Innovators is a show where top technology executives share how AI is transforming the enterprise. Find more great lessons from tech leaders and enterprise software experts at https://www.enterprisesoftware.blog/

Enterprise AI Innovators is produced by Abnormal Studios.

On the 61st episode of Enterprise AI Innovators, hosts Evan Reiser (CEO and co-founder, Abnormal AI) and Saam Motamedi (Greylock Partners) talk with Allen Fazio, CIO at Houlihan Lokey. Allen lays out how a global mid-cap M&A leader is rethinking investment banking as a professional service powered by AI. By putting a single orchestration layer at the center and starting with “100-level” use cases for analysts and interns, he is building an innovation engine that protects regulatory exposure while transforming how human bankers research, model, and execute deals.

Quick hits from Allen:

On orchestration and data advantage: “We've been looking for almost three years for what I'll call the orchestration layer. What do we put in the middle of the picture?”

On analyst-first AI adoption: “So for us, our focus is going to be on the lookout level, right. Let's start with the analysts, associates, and interns. And let's really focus on their capabilities, where I think some of our peers are. I'm not saying they're wrong, but where they're spending more time than I'm going to spend is on these high-end use cases.”

On culture over tools: “You're building out an innovation culture, not deploying a technology or a toolset.”

Recent Book Recommendation: Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson

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Like what you hear? Leave us a review and subscribe to the show on Apple, Google, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Enterprise AI Innovators is a show where top technology executives share how AI is transforming the enterprise. Find more great lessons from tech leaders and enterprise software experts at https://www.enterprisesoftware.blog/

Enterprise AI Innovators is produced by Abnormal Studios.

On the 60th episode of Enterprise AI Innovators, hosts Evan Reiser (CEO and co-founder, Abnormal AI) and Saam Motamedi (Greylock Partners) speak to Ronald White, the former CIO of Avanade. Ronald brings deep experience leading global enterprise IT at Avanade and shares actionable lessons from orchestrating large‑scale AI adoption across business functions.

Quick hits from Ronald:

On moving beyond surface-level AI: "What are we going to get past these little parlor tricks and actually do something that impacts the enterprise?"

On proving value through AI adoption: "A lawyer using general AI technology will 100 percent of the time beat a lawyer who is not. Period. End of statement."

On early enterprise wins with AI: "You’re changing the game right away... and so if you don’t stay on top of it and iterate and iterate and iterate, you lose."

Recent Book Recommendation: Destiny of the Republic by Candice Millard

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Enterprise AI Innovators is a show where top technology executives share how AI is transforming the enterprise. Discover more great lessons from tech leaders and experts in emerging AI technologies at https://www.enterprisesoftware.blog/

Enterprise AI Innovators is produced by Josh Meer

On the 59th episode of Enterprise AI Innovators, hosts Evan Reiser (CEO and co-founder, Abnormal AI) and Saam Motamedi (Greylock Partners) welcome Sanjay Macwan, Chief Information Officer at Sprinklr. Sanjay explains how Sprinklr is using AI to enhance customer experience at scale by reducing friction, making engagement intuitive, and ensuring every user feels heard. He also shares practical examples of how internal operations are being optimized through AI.

Quick hits from Sanjay:

On transforming billing with AI: "That workflow from sending a bill to collecting the cash can be incredibly complex. I did solve that in my prior work using AI."

On Sprinklr's AI architecture: "Now we have a platform with three rich components: custom models, GenAI, and allowing our customers to integrate their own models."

On AI making customer experience feel more human: "Even if they couldn't solve the things because there are some physical barriers, I got heard. They heard me. They genuinely reacted to me."

Recent Book Recommendation: All in on AI by Thomas Davenport and Nitin Mittal

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Like what you hear? Leave us a review and subscribe to the show on Apple, Google, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Enterprise AI Innovators is a show where top technology executives share how AI is transforming the enterprise. Each episode covers the real-world applications of AI, from improving products and optimizing operations to redefining the customer experience.

Find more great insights from technology leaders and enterprise software experts at https://www.enterprisesoftware.blog/

Enterprise AI Innovators is produced by Josh Meer.

On the 58th episode of Enterprise AI Innovators, hosts Evan Reiser (Abnormal AI) and Saam Motamedi (Greylock Partners) talk with Jaime Montemayor, Chief Digital & Technology Officer at General Mills. They’re reimagining what a food company can be by leveraging AI to reduce waste, tailor marketing, optimize supply chains, and accelerate product innovation. Jaime shares how strategic clarity, cloud-first infrastructure, and clean data enabled these AI transformations, and why being a hands-on, tech-forward CIO is essential to leading through change.

Quick hits from Jaime:

On operational AI scale: "As of today, we have thousands of those machine learning models running day in and day out in the company. And with those models, our teams have the benefit of being able to do predictive analytics to run their business on a day-to-day basis.”

On generative AI adoption: “Up to 30 percent of our workforce is using this new technology consistently. We have some functions like HR... the use rate goes all the way to 65, 75 percent... doing performance assessments or helping people develop specific development plans.”

On ROI and accountability: “In most cases, the value proposition is about driving efficiency, improving time to market, reducing cost, growing the top line. And what I’ve done is that I partner with my CFO... they keep the score for every investment that we make in our organization.”

Recent Book Recommendation: Rewired by Eric Lamarre, Kate Smaje, and Rodney Zemmel

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Like what you hear? Leave us a review and subscribe to the show on Apple, Google, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Enterprise AI Innovators is a show where top technology executives share how AI is transforming the enterprise. Each episode covers the real-world applications of AI, from improving products and optimizing operations to redefining the customer experience.

Find more great insights from technology leaders and enterprise software experts at https://www.enterprisesoftware.blog/

Enterprise AI Innovators is produced by Josh Meer.

On the 57th episode of Enterprise AI Innovators, host Evan Reiser (Abnormal AI) talks with Mark Sherwood, EVP & CIO at Wolters Kluwer. Mark shares how his team is applying AI across internal operations and product development. From automating SOP creation to surfacing risk in contracts and predicting IT incidents, each project starts with a specific business challenge and ends with a measurable impact. Wolters Kluwer now sees over half of its revenue from AI-enabled products, a result of decades of domain expertise paired with rapid experimentation.

Quick hits from Mark:

On AI-generated SOPs: “It used to take two or three weeks to finalize and get it done. Now, it's essentially 15 minutes, worst case, probably two minutes, best case.”

On contract lifecycle automation: “It’s not just a, you know, search and replace or search and find or go find all these things, but helping understand, you know, what is the best way to rephrase this.”

On disaster recovery readiness: “We're basically checking all these systems 24-7 to understand, do we have something brewing out there? I mean, hopefully we don't have a disaster, but we want to be prepared just in case we do.”

Recent Book Recommendation: The Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown

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Like what you hear? Leave us a review and subscribe to the show on Apple, Google, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Enterprise AI Innovators is a show where top technology executives share how AI is transforming the enterprise. Each episode covers the real-world applications of AI, from improving products and optimizing operations to redefining the customer experience.

Find more great insights from technology leaders and enterprise software experts at https://www.enterprisesoftware.blog/

Enterprise AI Innovators is produced by Josh Meer