Technovation with Peter High (CIO, CTO, CDO, CXO Interviews)
Subscribed: 394Played: 21,485
Subscribe
Description
Twice-weekly conversations with top executives and thought leaders at the intersection of business, technology, and innovation. Each episode of Technovation explores the technology trends that are transforming business, and the leaders driving digital change inside their organizations. Produced by Metis Strategy and hosted by firm President Peter High, Technovation is the premier podcast for IT and technology professionals with the largest collection of interviews with elite CIOs, CTOs, and CDOs.
875 Episodes
Reverse
Innovation in healthcare doesn’t start with AI. It starts with operational stability.
In this episode of Technovation, Peter High speaks with Chad Wasserman, CIO of HCA Healthcare, about leading technology at massive scale while keeping patient care at the center. Wasserman explains why “operational quiet” is the foundation that makes AI, data, and digital transformation possible and how HCA balances innovation with reliability across thousands of sites of care.
Key topics include:
Why stability is a prerequisite for innovation
Treating IT as an extension of the care team
Scaling AI responsibly in clinical and engineering domains
Building data platforms to support generational change
Developing technologists through deep business immersion
What if the real driver of digital disruption isn’t technology, but unit economics?
In this episode of Technovation, Peter High speaks with Dan Gill, Chief Product Officer of Carvana, about how disciplined unit economics power one of the most ambitious e-commerce models in retail. Rather than leading with engineering for its own sake, Carvana focuses relentlessly on eliminating friction, capturing profit pools, and reinvesting those economics back into customer value.
Key highlights from the episode:
Vertical integration and competitive advantage
Deterministic, self-service digital experiences
Proprietary platforms vs. off-the-shelf tools
AI-human collaboration at scale
How can early-stage investors deliver repeatable, outsized returns—without chasing hype?
In this episode of Techoventure, Mark Fernandes, Managing Director at Sierra Ventures, shares the disciplined model behind one of the industry’s most consistent early-stage venture firms. Sierra’s strategy is designed for repeatable 3–5x returns by focusing on founder-market fit, tight portfolio construction, and tech-savvy sectors like AI, cloud, and cybersecurity.
Key insights include:
The four-part rubric Sierra uses to vet early-stage founders
Why fund size discipline is critical to long-term VC performance
How Sierra balances seed and Series A checks with portfolio theory
The power of “AI enablers” in healthcare, legal, and vertical SaaS
The 20-year evolution of Sierra’s CXO Board and its enterprise value
Is AI coming for your job—or just changing how you work?
In this episode, Wall Street Journal technology columnist Christopher Mims shares a grounded, deeply informed perspective on how AI is reshaping productivity, creativity, jobs, and knowledge work. From the pitfalls of overhyping generative AI to the rise of agentic systems and the enduring role of classic AI, Christopher unpacks what leaders need to know now. He also highlights how experts benefit most from AI, what happens when organizations anchor too heavily on AI tools, and why handwritten notes, walking meetings, and skepticism are critical in the AI age.
Key highlights from the episode:
Why experts extract more value from generative AI
How CEOs are freezing junior hiring while boosting senior productivity
Mims’ concept of “work slop” and how to avoid it
Why hallucinations are structural in AI and require human oversight
Tips for AI adoption that preserve creativity and context
How does a 100-year-old manufacturing leader reinvent itself through autonomy and AI?
In this episode, Caterpillar CTO Jaime Mineart shares how her team is transforming industrial work sites using robotics, machine intelligence, and real-time data. From mining to construction, the company is applying decades of engineering expertise to modern digital challenges, partnering with customers to co-develop scalable automation solutions.
Key highlights from the episode:
How autonomy is expanding beyond mining into quarries and construction
What makes Caterpillar’s AI adoption strategy unique—and replicable
Inside the Helios platform and NVIDIA partnership powering data-driven insights
Why the company pledged $100M to upskill the workforce of the future
Lessons from scaling R&D with real-world customer involvement
1048: What if the hiring process wasn’t broken—but reimagined?
Anthony Moisant, Chief Information Officer and Chief Security Officer at Indeed, details how his teams are building trusted systems, tackling AI bias, and leveraging background agents and AI sourcing to solve the “black hole” of hiring. He also reflects on the importance of early-career talent, skill-based hiring, and the balance of self-learning and leadership-led growth.
The conversation covers:
Why trust is foundational to AI innovation at Indeed
How “invite to apply” transforms the candidate experience
The future of work through agentic systems and AI sourcing
Balancing self-driven learning with leadership-created space
1047: What does it take to lead tech—and the enterprise—in 2026?
In this episode of Technovation, we feature a panel from our October 2025 Metis Strategy Summit where Steven Norton speaks with three top executive recruiters: Craig Stephenson (Korn Ferry), Jamey Cummings (JM Search), and Scott Robbin (Heidrick & Struggles). Throughout the conversation, each recruiter gives their perspective on the evolving mandate of the CIO.
The conversation covers:
The convergence of data, security, digital, and operations under the CIO
How talent strategy and succession planning are changing
What makes a technology leader board-ready
The rise (and ambiguity) of the Chief AI Officer
Offshore workforce trends and leadership development
Enterprises aren’t failing at AI. They’re failing at data.
Daniel Docter, Managing Director at Dell Technologies Capital, shares why the biggest barrier to enterprise AI isn’t models or talent—it’s the fractured, unstructured, and context-free data that most companies still struggle to harness.
In this episode of Technovation, Daniel and Peter High explore:
Why data context is critical to enabling enterprise reasoning
How Redis and other startups are fixing the AI performance gap
What Dell Technologies Capital looks for in early-stage enterprise AI
How corporate VC has evolved into a founder-enabling force
Why the next five years will reward enterprises that fix their data layer
Digitization was just the first step. True digital transformation in healthcare is only beginning.
Dr. Michael Pfeffer, Chief Information and Digital Officer at Stanford Health Care, shares how he and his team are moving beyond electronic health records to deliver real-time, AI-powered care. From building ChatEHR, a secure, embedded LLM interface, to developing Stanford’s FIRM framework for responsible AI, Pfeffer provides a behind-the-scenes look at one of the nation’s most advanced digital health systems.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
Why “digitized” isn’t the same as “digital”
How Stanford built the first integrated LLM in clinical workflows
What makes healthcare AI safe, useful, and equitable
Where AI adds real clinical value and where it doesn’t
The vision behind precision health at scale
1045: AI is no longer a side experiment—it’s a core capability. But are your people, partnerships, and governance models ready for it?
In this special Metis Strategy Summit panel episode, three seasoned technology leaders explore what it really takes to build trust, scale talent, and lead responsibly in the age of AI:
Paul Ballew, Chief Data & Analytics Officer, National Football League
Lakshman Nathan, EVP & CIO, Paramount
Mark Sherwood, EVP & CIO, Wolters Kluwer
Moderated by Peter High, the conversation dives into transformation through the lens of distributed governance, workforce readiness, and the human element behind every AI ambition.
Key themes from the panel include:
How the NFL’s “One-to-One” fan engagement model blends personalization and privacy
What happens when $2B in savings depends on department-level AI strategy (Paramount)
Why “value realization” starts with your CFO and ends with trust (Wolters Kluwer)
The limits of centralization—and why distributed innovation may win out
How to balance Copilot rollouts with responsible AI guardrails
What happens when a former startup CEO brings performance management discipline into city government?
In this episode of Technovation, Peter High speaks with San José Mayor Matt Mahan about applying data-driven decision-making, KPIs, and accountability—practices familiar to tech leaders—to the public sector. Drawing from his experience running venture-backed startups, Mahan explains how focus, measurement, and feedback loops are reshaping how City Hall operates.
Key topics include:
Applying startup-style performance management to government
Using dashboards and metrics to improve accountability
Prioritizing outcomes over activity
Leveraging AI to improve city services at scale
Building a workforce ready to use new technology responsibly
How do you build and scale digital innovation inside a 170-year-old company?
Luke Gebb, EVP of Global Innovation at American Express, joins Peter High to share how Amex Digital Labs brings emerging technologies to market through a disciplined stage-gate process.
Gebb outlines how his team incubates and graduates products that become core to Amex’s customer experience—from peer-to-peer payments to blockchain-based travel rewards. He also shares lessons in navigating cross-functional execution, partnering with big tech, and launching products customers actually use.
Key topics include:
Amex’s stage-gate innovation model
Scaling peer-to-peer payments via PayPal/Venmo
Building customer-centric discovery tools with GenAI
Passport: Using NFTs to enhance travel experience
Collaborating across engineering, legal, and compliance
”
Discount your AI ROI because mileage always varies
Learn more
AI can’t fix what the healthcare system fundamentally gets wrong.
In this episode, Liam Donohue, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at 406 Ventures, shares why his firm is betting on value-based care—and why AI risks breaking the system if applied to the wrong incentives.
From launching EdTech’s earliest funds to shaping 406 Ventures’ sector focus in healthcare, cybersecurity, and infrastructure, Liam offers hard-won lessons in disciplined investing, operator-first teams, and systemic transformation.
Key highlights:
Why fee-for-service economics undermine care innovation
How value-based care reshapes both incentives and outcomes
The real reason AI is booming in revenue cycle management
Lessons from WelbeHealth: rethinking elder care and payments
Liam’s take on what makes a founder truly backable
What if AI is repeating the same mistakes society made during the Industrial Revolution?
In this episode of Technovation, Peter is joined by Nobel Prize Laureate in Economics and Ronald A. Kurtz Professor of Entrepreneurship at the MIT Sloan School of Management Simon Johnson. Throughout their conversation, they explore why automation has historically failed to deliver shared prosperity and why artificial intelligence may be following the same path. Drawing on centuries of economic history, Johnson explains how mechanization once displaced workers faster than new jobs were created, fueling inequality and social unrest.
Together, they discuss what today’s AI leaders must learn from history, why institutions matter more than technology alone, and how workforce anxiety is an early warning sign of deeper structural problems.
Key topics include:
Automation vs. job creation
AI’s impact on entry-level and knowledge work
Workforce polarization and regional inequality
Lessons from the Industrial Revolution for today’s leaders
What it takes to align innovation with shared prosperity
Most enterprises aren’t struggling with AI because of technology. They’re struggling because they’re trying to scale pilots instead of platforms.
In this episode of Technovation, Peter High speaks with Atilla Tinic, CIO of Qualcomm, about how the company is moving beyond one-off AI use cases to build an enterprise AI platform designed for scale. Tinic explains why unified and validated data is essential for AI accuracy, how Qualcomm enables developers and business teams through a centralized AI marketplace, and why security must be embedded into AI architecture from day one.
Key topics include:
Why data governance is foundational to AI success
How Qualcomm structures AI as a reusable enterprise platform
The rise of AI agents and autonomous systems
Cybersecurity challenges introduced by AI and how AI helps defend against them
What does it actually take to move AI from experimentation to enterprise-wide impact?
In this episode of Technovation, Peter High speaks with Leigh-Ann Russell, Chief Information Officer and Global Head of Engineering at Bank of New York (BNY), about how one of the world’s most systemically important financial institutions is operationalizing AI at scale. Leigh-Ann shares how BNY trained 99% of its 50,000-person workforce on AI, moved beyond pilots into deep enablement, and empowered employees across technical and non-technical roles to build AI agents that drive real productivity gains.
Key topics discussed include:
Training nearly the entire workforce to become AI-literate
Moving from AI pilots to enterprise-wide enablement
Empowering employees to build and deploy AI agents
Reducing cognitive load while improving speed and resilience
Leading AI adoption through hands-on executive behavior
What if the key to enterprise AI wasn’t a tool, but a mindset?
Mark Bloom, Global CIO at AJ Gallagher, joins Technovation to share how the 70,000-person insurance giant is scaling AI by leading with data quality and cultural alignment—not flashy tools.
In this episode, Bloom details:
How Gallagher eliminated 800+ data silos to centralize insight and enable AI
Why crowdsourcing use cases from employees unlocked adoption at scale
The shift from efficiency gains to revenue-focused AI
How culture helped overcome resistance to data consolidation
His dual perspective as both CIO and board member
What really drives cybersecurity investment and why is “threat” often the last reason?
In this episode, Rakesh Loonkar, co-founder of Transmit Security and general partner at Picture Capital, shares a contrarian take on how cybersecurity product categories emerge and why compliance and platform shifts often matter more than actual threats. Drawing on decades of experience as both operator and investor, Rakesh explains how he evaluates risk timing, founder mindset, and market inflection points.
Key highlights from the episode:
Why most cyber spend starts with compliance, not attacks
How to invest ahead of platform shifts like AI and cloud
A three-part model for understanding cyber spending behavior
The risks of financial-only boards in technical startups
Lessons from building Trusteer, Transmit, and Picture Capital
What if your AI strategy is your business strategy?
In this episode, three top tech leaders share how they’re embedding AI not as a standalone initiative, but as a lever for enterprise transformation.
Mojgan Lefebvre (Travelers), Pawan Verma (Cencora), and Glenn Remoreras (Breakthru Beverage) reveal how they’ve partnered with boards, business units, and frontline teams to scale AI from proof of concept to performance.
Highlights include:
How Travelers reduced onboarding from 2 hours to 2 minutes
Cencora’s framework for board-level AI education
Breakthru’s use of summits to build AI literacy across leadership
The role of generative AI in operational redesign
Balancing experimentation with responsible governance
What does it really take to design for resilience in an AI-first world?
In this panel from the Metis Strategy Summit, Amtrak CDO Judith Apshago, GE Aerospace CIO David Burns, and Zoetis CDTO Keith Sarbaugh explore how resilient infrastructure is becoming the backbone of enterprise trust, uptime, and AI scalability.
Tune in to learn how these leaders are:
Responding to cloud outages and software disruption in real time
Building AI literacy, governance, and use-case portfolios at scale
Extending cyber defense and IT support to vulnerable supply chain partners
Using edge computing and sensors to enable predictive diagnostics
Converging IT and OT teams to enhance infrastructure intelligence
Comments
Download from Google Play
Download from App Store
United States