The Secret - Interview With John Harricharan (Q4)
John Harricharan talked with us about his experience in the field of marketing, his position with IBM and how he is working on innovative solutions for clients.
John Harricharan is a marketing expert at IBM, he joined them after launching his own consulting company for over 15 years. He has been a speaker at the leading conferences around the world such as Marketing Week and World Digital Marketing Conference. John also helps clients accelerate their digital transformation through innovation, collaboration and strategy.
He is currently the Country Marketing Manager for IBM in Singapore and Malaysia. John’s career started with marketing at IMI Medical Systems, then he spent over a decade with IBM as Global marketing manager for the Asia Pacific region. John has also worked as a strategic consultant to SMEs on digital strategy, innovation and growth.
Viet Thanh: Can you share a little about your personal journey that led you to IBM?
John Harricharan: My journey was quite unusual because the first thing I had done was study engineering. I majored in Electrical Engineering. Then I studied in graduate school which led me to an MBA in Marketing from Bond University in Australia. I came to IBM when I was in the process of starting my business.
VH: How did you land a job with IBM?
JH: It all started with two kinds of projects I was working on at that time, I was working as a consultant for Gartner in Melbourne, Australia. Since my business was about to launch, and I had no idea what to do next, then an opportunity presented itself for me to work with IBM as an employee and it took me a year as an internal recruit from the time that I worked for Gartner until I joined them as an employee.
VH: What part of your job do you enjoy the most?
JH: For me, I find my job to be challenging because I am responsible for over 200 clients in eight countries (Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam). A lot of times when my job is challenging and interesting at the same time. When I work with a client who is on a digital transformation journey and they want me to create an innovative solution for them, it’s really hard work but if it goes well it’s very rewarding.
VH: What challenges do you face when you are working with your clients?
JH: It depends on the project. My challenge is that I want to deliver a solution that is going to be successful. Either with my team or with the client. It’s different every time so it’s quite challenging if you are trying to deliver something innovative and original.
VH: What do you consider as innovation in your role here at IBM? Can you talk more about that?
JH: Innovation depends on the industry, but we are not just delivering solutions. We are collaborating with clients, we’re not just creating something from scratch and then feel like saying “hey, cool” and then forget about it. We are trying to create something together with the client that we can do together.
VH: What was your biggest accomplishment in the last year?
JH: The big accomplishment for me was to get a lot of clients from outside Australia and from outside of IBM’s region. The last year has been very tough for us as well because we had to do a lot of research about creativity and how to come up with new ideas and develop them.
VH: So how did you do it? How did you find those new clients?
JH: Normally, my job is country marketing manager, but I am also involved in the global engagement team in marketing. I had to work with the global engagement team to find new clients, but at the same time I also had to do my country marketing work.
VH: So we want to talk about marketing and business in general. Can you share a little about how you see the future of digital marketing?
JH: Digital marketing is delivering good customer experience and that is exactly what everyone wants nowadays. They want a good experience on mobile devices, on websites, etc… And in order to get that customers need to engage with brands more frequently than they did before. This means that they need to spend more time with your brand instead of spending their time just looking at things.
VH: How do you see the future of computing?
JH: I think that we will probably see more computing moving from the desk to the tablet and mobile phones. Computers are now like a desk, but with a screen as well.
VH: What is your take on big data and analytics?
JH: There is a big debate about big data right now. If you look at Google, they have BIG DATA, but they are using it to marketers and content creators to come up with new ideas so they can make money out of things. But there are also companies like IBM, and in my role at IBM when we work with clients, where I work very closely with our engineers. We use big data to help solve client problems. For example, we can help a company find all the unstructured data that are currently unused and we will extract some kind of a value from them. For example, if you are doing analysis, you can find a trend that people use in certain parts of the world, so your products can be adapted to those trends. That is what we do at IBM.
VH: How do you see the future of business?
JH: It’s going to be very different from how it is now because AI (artificial intelligence) is starting to take a lot of jobs from people. So we have to create another type of jobs for people. The only way to do that is to work with AI and make it work better for us. That’s the future for businesses.
VH: Finally, what would you like to share with our readers?
JH: My last point is about working with IBM, because I work very closely with IBM engineers, we are using technology so that our clients can gain more value from it and they can find a new profit source out of things they don’t know how to use right now.
Viet Thanh is the founder of Small Business Gurus and Social Media Club Australia and a director at several listed companies in Australia. He is passionate about connecting small businesses via social media, blogging and public speaking. He holds certifications from Google AdWords, IBM and HubSpot. He speaks English and Vietnamese fluently.
VH: How do you define Digital Transformation?
Hien Tran: Digital transformation is the act of involving digital information technology to re-invent or reframe business models and processes to create value. It’s a digital transformation if an organization uses digital technologies to transform its business into a new shape or form to be more flexible and agile than before.
Conclusion:
1. Digital transformation is a new trend that every organization must adapt to survive and grow.
2. A number of organizations have made mistakes and learned from them, but there are also some who are still lagging behind. Some companies are transforming for the sake of change and not for profit-oriented goals.
3. According to IBM research, by 2018 every global company will digitize 43% of its business value from 10% today (Jamal E Nasir).
4. IBM discovered that over 50% of CEOs believe that digital technology will create new experiences and opportunities in the next three years (James Doran).
5.