IT Visionaries

Companies are making the exact same mistake with AI that they made with cloud.

FICO's CIO Mike Trkay breaks down why 95% of companies are failing at AI alignment, why "automating a bad process faster" is the #1 trap, and why regulated industries are already abandoning LLMs in favor of focused language models.

 

Key takeaways:

• Only 5% of AI pilots make it to production — and MIT's research backs it up

• The lift-and-shift parallel: cloud costs went up for the same reason AI ROI is missing

• Why the LLM-to-focused-language-model shift mirrors cloud-native vs lift-and-shift

• What "AI native" actually means (and why chatbots aren't it)

 

Chapters

00:00 The 5% Alignment Problem

01:09 Only 7% Even Measure If Their AI Works

02:15 "You're Just Doing a Bad Process Faster"

06:29 LLM Repatriation and the Rise of Focused Language Models

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This episode of IT Visionaries is brought to you by Meter - the company building better networks. Businesses today are frustrated with outdated providers, rigid pricing, and fragmented tools. Meter changes that with a single integrated solution that covers everything wired, wireless, and even cellular networking. They design the hardware, write the firmware, build the software, and manage it all so your team doesn't have to.
That means you get fast, secure, and scalable connectivity without the complexity of juggling multiple providers. Thanks to meter for sponsoring. Go to meter.com/itv to book a demo.

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IT Visionaries is made by the team at Mission.org. Learn more about our media studio and network of podcasts at mission.org.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Network automation has been "coming soon" for over a decade. So what's actually different this time?

John Capobianco, Head of AI & Developer Relations at Itential, built NetClaw — a CCIE-level AI agent that manages network infrastructure through Slack and WhatsApp. It hit 300 GitHub stars in two weeks. It can analyze packet captures, configure routers, run compliance tests, and generate documentation — all through natural language.

John spent 15 years as a network engineer before becoming one of the leading voices in network automation. He's published multiple books, created dozens of open-source projects, and just launched the VibeOps community where 600+ network engineers share AI code without judgment.

Key takeaways:

• Why natural language is the breakthrough that makes network automation finally work (hint: nobody has to learn Python anymore)

• The 5 use cases beyond config management that deliver value on day one — all read-only, all low-risk

• How to go from human-in-the-loop to fully agentic network operations without triggering panic

• Why "shadow AI" is the new shadow IT — and what leadership needs to do about it

• The contrarian case that writing configs by hand is now a solved problem

 

Guest: John Capobianco — Head of AI & Developer Relations, Itential

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/john-capobianco-644a1515

X/Twitter: @John_Capobianco

NetClaw: github.com/automateyournetwork/netclaw

VibeOps Forum: Reach John on LinkedIn or X for invite

 

Chapters

0:00 Why AI Is Different for Network Automation

2:32 Natural Language: The Interface That Changes Everything

3:51 "The Network Should Be Like a Telephone" — Why Engineers Resist Change

6:08 The No-Win Life of a Network Engineer

8:08 OpenClaw: More GitHub Stars Than Linux

10:15 What NetClaw Actually Does (90 Skills, 43 MCPs)

11:37 The RFC Documentation Problem AI Can Solve

13:03 Day One Agent Rules: Start Read-Only

13:58 When Was the Last Time We Hired a Junior?

15:54 How NetClaw Hit 300 Stars in Two Weeks

19:54 Deterministic vs Non-Deterministic: Getting Engineers Over the Hump

23:36 War Stories: Fat Fingers, MTU Issues, and the DNS Nightmare

28:32 Documentation: The AI Use Case Nobody Can Argue With

32:34 Beyond Config Management: 5 AI Use Cases That Matter Now

36:00 The IDS/IPS Analogy: Why AI Agents Succeed Where Signatures Failed

40:02 AI Hallucination Is Overstated — Misalignment Is the Real Problem

41:53 Model Convergence: Why the Stuff Around the Model Matters More

46:00 Shadow AI Is the New Shadow IT

47:59 What Happens When AI Understands Your Business Context

53:59 The Optimistic Case for AI and Humanity

56:05 VibeOps: Building a Safe Space for AI-Curious Engineers

1:00:36 Is Vibe Coding Just Coding Now?

1:01:54 "Don't Write the Configs Anymore"

1:02:43 Closing & Where to Find John

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This episode of IT Visionaries is brought to you by Meter - the company building better networks. Businesses today are frustrated with outdated providers, rigid pricing, and fragmented tools. Meter changes that with a single integrated solution that covers everything wired, wireless, and even cellular networking. They design the hardware, write the firmware, build the software, and manage it all so your team doesn't have to.
That means you get fast, secure, and scalable connectivity without the complexity of juggling multiple providers. Thanks to meter for sponsoring. Go to meter.com/itv to book a demo.

---
IT Visionaries is made by the team at Mission.org. Learn more about our media studio and network of podcasts at mission.org.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Your basic search is missing a massive section of the internet.

In this IT Visionaries Spotlight, Chris Brandt talks with Sudheesh Nair, Co-Founder and CEO of TinyFish, about the hidden layer of the internet - the data, pricing, and real-world context that never shows up in search results.

The future isn’t better search. It’s AI that can operate the web for you - executing multi-step tasks, navigating complexity, and returning answers that actually reflect your situation.

 

Chapters:

0:00 The Internet You Never See

1:55 From Search to “Operating the Web”

4:30 The Real Value - From Pricing to Taste

 

--
This episode of IT Visionaries is brought to you by Meter - the company building better networks. Businesses today are frustrated with outdated providers, rigid pricing, and fragmented tools. Meter changes that with a single integrated solution that covers everything wired, wireless, and even cellular networking. They design the hardware, write the firmware, build the software, and manage it all so your team doesn't have to.
That means you get fast, secure, and scalable connectivity without the complexity of juggling multiple providers. Thanks to meter for sponsoring. Go to meter.com/itv to book a demo.

---
IT Visionaries is made by the team at Mission.org. Learn more about our media studio and network of podcasts at mission.org.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Think AI is about automating what you already do? That's the same mistake companies made moving to cloud, and FICO's Mike Trkay says you're about to waste millions proving it.

Mike is Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Chief Customer Officer (CCO) at FICO, an analytics software company that processes billions of decisions per day and powers 80% of fraud detection.

In this episode, Mike explains why 95% of AI projects never reach production, why companies are already repatriating workloads from large language models, and what really separates automation from transformation.

 

Chapters:

0:00 Introduction

1:23: Why FICO's CIO Is Also the Chief Customer Officer

4:52 The Office Space Problem: Why CIOs Are Really Translators  

6:02 "Conduit in Chief" — The CIO's Real Job  

6:45 How CIOs Accidentally Become Cost Centers

7:40 What FICO Actually Does (It's Not Just Credit Scores)

12:59 How Missile Guidance Tech Became Fraud Detection

17:59 When LLMs Can't Meet 150-Millisecond Latency

21:32 Why AI Strategy Is Harder Than It Looks

24:50 The Cloud Parallel: 5% Alignment and Why AI Projects Stall

27:08 "You're Just Doing a Bad Process Faster"

31:44 LLM Repatriation Is Already Happening

37:40 A FICO Score for AI Decisions

43:10 Global Regulation and Staying Ahead of Compliance

45:22 The Australian Banking Example: Focused Language Models in Practice

52:08 From Cost Center to Innovation Driver

54:40 What's Next: Agentic Architecture and Focused Sequence Models

57:49 "What's the Opportunity Today?" — The CIO Mindset Shift

--
This episode of IT Visionaries is brought to you by Meter - the company building better networks. Businesses today are frustrated with outdated providers, rigid pricing, and fragmented tools. Meter changes that with a single integrated solution that covers everything wired, wireless, and even cellular networking. They design the hardware, write the firmware, build the software, and manage it all so your team doesn't have to.
That means you get fast, secure, and scalable connectivity without the complexity of juggling multiple providers. Thanks to meter for sponsoring. Go to meter.com/itv to book a demo.

---
IT Visionaries is made by the team at Mission.org. Learn more about our media studio and network of podcasts at mission.org.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

AI is forcing enterprises to rethink everything from hardware to governance, and most organizations are attacking it in silos.

Mano Bhattacharyya (CTO, Nutanix) breaks down why AI isn't just an application layer problem, but an end-to-end transformation that spans compute (GPUs, ARM, DPUs), data management (unclean enterprise data, knowledge graphs), security (agent gateways, MCP server risks), and economics (token costs vs. usage explosion). He explains why CIOs need cross-functional AI committees, not isolated strategies, and why use case driven AI beats exploratory projects that burn budgets in months.

The solution is to form AI committees where CIO, CTO, and CDO work together, not in silos. Focus on use case driven AI by learning from peers, rather than exploratory AI that becomes a budget trap. Start with small prototypes with dedicated use cases, not a free-for-all where every team tries something.

 

Chapters:

0:00 AI as an End-to-End Infrastructure Challenge

2:16 Networking, Storage, and Bare Metal VM Performance

4:43 Agent Security, Gateways, and Enterprise Governance

6:33 Use Case Driven AI and Learning from Peers

--
This episode of IT Visionaries is brought to you by Meter - the company building better networks. Businesses today are frustrated with outdated providers, rigid pricing, and fragmented tools. Meter changes that with a single integrated solution that covers everything wired, wireless, and even cellular networking. They design the hardware, write the firmware, build the software, and manage it all so your team doesn't have to.
That means you get fast, secure, and scalable connectivity without the complexity of juggling multiple providers. Thanks to meter for sponsoring. Go to meter.com/itv to book a demo.

---
IT Visionaries is made by the team at Mission.org. Learn more about our media studio and network of podcasts at mission.org.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.