Global GDP growth of 3.2% is simply not going to cut it for public company CEOs who need to give shareholders much higher revenue growth, says Oracle CEO Mark Hurd. That’s why CEOs and their leadership teams must lead their companies’ global transformation strategies.
In high-growth environments, GDP gains lift all boats, but those gains aren’t enough today, giving CEOs only one main lever to pull: Take market share from competitors. That means bringing more innovative products and services to market faster than anyone else.
Oracle CEO Mark Hurd talks about the transformative value of cloud computing.
Cloud computing is a strategic linchpin to being more agile than the competition, Hurd writes in a just-published post on LinkedIn. “What makes cloud computing so revolutionary is that it can permeate everything your company does, from back-office processes to how it goes to market,” he writes. “It makes possible the digital transformation companies need to thrive in today’s market.”
Hurd continues: “Cloud computing isn’t an adjunct to what you already do—it’s the support mechanism for regime change your business needs to survive. So, the question isn’t whether you should be using cloud computing—it’s whether your company has the right leadership to make the best strategic use of the cloud, and fast.”
In other words, while CIOs have a huge role to play in helping shape corporate cloud strategies, chief financial officers, chief marketing officers, human resources leaders, and other executives have to understand how cloud can help modernize their business processes and support overarching business change and innovation.
For example, using cloud can help ensure feature enhancements are rolled out simultaneously to remote branch offices and subsidiaries worldwide, helping eliminate the inefficiency of disparate systems at different stages of development across departments. The combination of greater efficiencies and more frequent feature improvements can help CFOs think effectively about the next quarter and the year to come, rather than about last quarter’s results.
Likewise, cloud offers new applications for engaging with and retaining top-flight talent, creating new and meaningful feedback loops with customers, and identifying new market segments your marketing team may not have known existed.
“Challenging your senior leadership team about their cloud strategies demonstrates to shareholders that you are committed to stronger growth, in a shorter time frame, than even they may have expected,” Hurd writes.
Hurd will be keynoting at Oracle OpenWorld 2016.
