TechPulse Digest (Mainframe): Unpacking 3 Months of Surveys With John Rhodes of CM First
John Rhodes helps Andy Wig interpret three months of results from TechChannel's TechPulse micro-survey program
Click here to listen to the audio-only version.
The following transcript was edited for clarity:
Andy Wig:
Hello everyone. You have tuned into the very first episode of Tech Pulse Digest, Mainframe Edition. I’m Andy Wig, senior editor at TechChannel, and I should just take a moment here to explain to you just what TechPulse Digest is. TechPulse Digest is a quarterly program where we invite a special guest on every quarter to recap the past three months results of TechPulse. And TechPulse is TechChannel’s new micro-survey program where every month we’re covering a different IT topic. For quarter one, we looked at people’s observations on general industry trends, database management, and cybersecurity. So you can find those comprehensive results on techchannel.com. But today, doing the honor of helping us digest quarter one of TechPulse is Rhodes of CM First. So John, before we dive into the survey, why don’t you tell us a little bit about CM First and what you do there?
John Rhodes:
Yeah. So at Team First, we focus on technology to help people with large enterprise applications and Cobalt and RPG running on mainframes and mid-range. Help them understand that. And my role as CTO is around leading the strategy and increasingly how do we incorporate AI into our products.
Wig:
All right. Well, let’s get into the tech pulse results then. We’ll just go chronologically here, starting with January, where we just asked people for their observations on some of the biggest general tech trends in IT right now. And John, did you have any observations from this first month of tech pulse? How did this match what you’re seeing out there?
Rhodes:
Yeah, pretty much in line. I think we’re seeing a lot of adoption of modern IDEs and modern interfaces and things like VS code, especially on the power systems, but also on the Z. So I think that definitely is in line. Surprised AI might be a little higher than that. I think seeing a lot of that, I think that will tend to rise in the future.
Wig:
Let’s see here. Question two talked about biggest threat to the mainframe ecosystem. Skills gap, imminent retirements. I think maybe no surprise there. Seems like that’s been coming up a lot. Yeah.
Rhodes:
Yeah. That comes up all the time. And that’s kind of where we’re focused technology wise, is we’re trying to help lower the barriers of entry for the next generation of engineers that are coming in for the folks that are retiring, really.
Wig:
And then question three about … I think one thing that surprised me was kind of vendor content was the top response for how people stay knowledgeable on industry trends.
Rhodes:
Well, that’s great to see that. Yeah. Yeah. We put a lot of investment into our content and trying to make it useful to people. I’m glad that people are actually reading some of it out there. Yeah. So that’s great news, I guess. Yeah. I was kind of surprised on the podcast and YouTube videos being so low, I personally use those all the time, but I guess everyone learns differently.
Wig:
Right, right. Maybe that’ll be something that kind of picks up as time goes on too. Anything else stick out to you in that first month?
Rhodes:
Well, yeah, I think the last thing about keeping your skills current. Again, surprised about AI being so low. I don’t think that’s necessarily what’s happening with my peers anyway. I think when I need to understand something, a new topic, learn a new skill, I’m on ChatGPT and I’m in deep research mode, so I’m a little surprised there.
Wig:
Yeah. I’m using it a lot too to understand things as I do my job too. So yeah, I was a little surprised there too. So, all right. We will move on to February then. February, we asked about database management. I think one of the big takeaways was kind of where people have their databases. And probably no surprise that a hybrid setup was the most popular result. Anything stick out to you, February TechPulse?
Rhodes:
Yeah, I was a little surprised at how much workload had been moved to the cloud. That’s a pretty high percentage. I personally see among our customers that they’re doing a lot of moving of maybe streaming data and decision support and analytics to the cloud, but not core workload. But that may just be the people I’m talking to. A little surprised too about the status of AI deployment and the database that 15% not considering it at all. That is very surprising. I think if you’re not looking at this at all, then you probably are not in the right field maybe because it’s rapidly becoming more important to everyone.
Wig:
Yeah. Just not even considering it. I mean, considering how everything seems to be about AI these days, it’s kind of surprising to see that. All right. Well, let’s go on to March then where we got into cybersecurity. And what did you see there, John? How does that compare to what you’re seeing out there in terms of the results?
Rhodes:
Yeah, I think not surprising. It’s quantum. I mean, I was just at the SHARE conference a few weeks ago and yeah, definitely quantum computing and AI are the top concerns, the people I talk to there. But I guess the interesting thing on there is AI is here and now, and then there’s AI attacks happening right now. Quantum hopefully is the threat there anyways sometime in the future. So anyway.
Wig:
Yeah. Apparently the message about Y2Q is getting out there.
Rhodes:
Yeah, and it should.
Wig:
What about question five? I think an interesting question was the barriers people are seeing and implementing their desired security controls. Organizational resistance was the most popular answer. So that was … I really had no idea what the answer was going to be to this one. So what did you think about that question?
Rhodes:
Yeah, a bit surprising, I think, but also security, it’s kind of like insurance. It gets deprioritized maybe in some cases for other organizational needs, other investment requirements. But really, I think when someone has an actual attack that triggers something, then you’re going to get the buy-in then. But at that point, the horse has already left the barn, right?
Wig:
Yeah. You got to kind of touch the stove sometimes before you learn your lesson, I suppose, which, learning the hard way. Well, that does it for quarter one of TechPulse. John, any overall lessons you took home from this or any thoughts? Does it make you think anything about what CM First is doing and kind of help you get a better lay of the land? What were your final takeaways?
Rhodes:
Yeah, I think if there’s any one theme you kind of see here, it’s the mainframe and this environment is not going away. I think the real challenge is understanding these incredibly complex environments well enough to evolve them into the future. And yeah, that’s what we’re focused on at CM First, certainly, to help folks there.
Wig:
All right. Well, John, thanks so much for being part of this first edition of TechPulse Digest. It’s great to just kind of … Seeing the results in a vacuum is one thing, but getting the input and perspective of someone who’s on the ground and seeing this stuff every day is really invaluable. So I just really appreciate you being here and offering your input and your interpretation.
Rhodes:
Well, yeah. Thank you, Andy.
Wig:
All right. And if you want to make sure not to miss any of the insights for people like John and the rest of TechChannel’s community of contributing experts, subscribe to TechChannel’s newsletter. It’s called TechBeat. You can do that at techchannel.com/subscribe. Thanks everyone. See you next time.