Charting a Path to Tomorrow’s Success

I originally signed up for a half marathon. The 13.1-mile distance felt manageable, unlike the massive effort I imagined a full marathon would require. There was just review film one problem: I’ve never been good at doing things halfway.

With the idea of the big race nagging at me, I decided to push my training — week by week, my runs getting longer and more frequent. Before I knew it, I felt confident enough to take on the full 26.2 miles—something that only a few months before felt impossible.

What does running a marathon have to do with business? More than you think — especially when you’re in the business of transformation.

I spend a lot of time talking with VMware’s customers. Just about all of them tell me the same thing: Their company’s future success depends on having a resilient, nimble digital foundation. They’re looking for platforms and tools that can thrive amid uncertainty and flex to meet evolving demands.

Now, my team and I know most of these needs can be met by embracing multi-cloud solutions, which have customer choice and flexibility baked into their architecture. But we also know the process of implementing multi-cloud comes with its own complexity. It’s a major commitment, one that requires time, skills, and resources over the long-term. In the face of that marathon, the lure of half-measures can be strong.

In this environment, my team’s job becomes two-fold: creating a vision for the future that is compelling enough to inspire action, while also charting a realistic path to get there that feels manageable. How do we do it? The same way I eventually ran my marathon.