464- We Really Are Innovation Technology w/Jennifer Terrill

GUEST BIO

Jennifer Terrill started as a programmer with a computer science degree and calls her career a jungle gym: fintech, internet banking, retail, where she was CIO of True Religion Brand Jeans, payments, and a cemetery and mortuary company she took from paper to digital. For a little over a year she has been CIO of Sperber Landscape Companies, which has about 3,500 employees and branches from coast to coast, including Hawaii, and she reports directly to the CEO.

Her superpower, she says, is solving problems, and it starts with embedding herself in the business. She explains why technology is secondary for crews out in the field, where a screen that takes 10 clicks is too much, and how IT gets into the conversations it's left out of: ask to sit in on the meeting.

On AI, she describes an experimental phase built on a prompt library and brain files, and she explains why tokenomics needs watching as costs shift from SaaS subscriptions to tokens. She closes with her game plan for the first 90 days in a new organization, which starts with an assessment and a day in the life.

Episode Show Notes

Navigate through key moments in this episode with timestamped highlights, from initial introductions to deep dives into real-world use cases and implementation strategies.

[00:00] A jungle-gym career from programmer to CIO

[04:10] Her superpower, and don't make me think

[07:31] Telling the story, and making it easy for them

[12:49] Herding AI cats, and the Mr. No myth

[15:04] Solving problems, and the conversations you're not in

[21:16] A day in the life and the Innovation Council

[24:19] AI in the experimental phase

[27:38] From SaaS to tokens, and no blank checks

[30:30] Hiring for curiosity, and a softer place to land

[37:02] When the team makes the wrong call

[39:19] The first 90 days

[42:55] Be fearless, and the business acumen gap

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Ask to sit in on business meetings to learn how the business runs. If you're in that room, you can help solve the problem

Design for the way people already work. If a SaaS screen takes 10 clicks for a crew in the field, it's too much

Give the business options, from the cheap and cheerful solution to the Ferrari, and let them pick based on the impact and the money

When you consolidate tools, have the people who use them build the scorecard, then let them pick the winner

As costs shift from SaaS subscriptions to tokens, keep an eye on tokenomics, and put a semantic layer and permission layers in place before people start calling APIs

When you join a new organization, start with an assessment of applications, infrastructure, cybersecurity and vendor data privacy, do a day in the life, then present what needs fixing right away with its cost and three options

464- We Really Are Innovation Technology w/Jennifer Terrill