Bask Iyer, senior VP and CIO for VMware, Inc., used to be a customer, but he decided to join the company to be part of an organization that delivers a great product offering superior value. Iyer sat down with Dave Vellante and John Furrier on theCUBE, from the SiliconANGLE Media team, during VMworld 2015 to explain his decision and to provide insight into the CIO mentality.

The IT evolution

When asked the DevOps vs. IT question, Iyer, a seasoned industry vet, said, “I started as an IT guy, and the position evolved. Now you develop things faster, knowing a little bit.” He equated DevOps to surfing. “I tell people all the time to ride out the wave you have. The next wave will come,” he said.

Iyer also said that the industry is still riding the cloud wave, yet he is cautious about jumping into fads. In the past, salesmen have tried to sell him “snake oil.” So when it comes to fads, it is necessary to know about them but maintain a watchful approach.

What’s big?

As a CIO, Iyer feels that enterprise is not taking advantage of the cloud. In his view, companies are putting easy things up on the cloud, things that don’t differentiate like email and web. He said enterprise should be taking advantage of the scale cloud provides to handle the transformational challenges. Additionally, homogeneity is also an issue for enterprise. Iyer is already onboard because internally VMware runs on VMware.

Another up-and-coming topic for Iyer is mobile for the enterprise. He sees this as an underdeveloped area that companies need to tap into to extract the value of mobile existing on the consumer side.

The new face of technology

When it comes to the “new” workforce in technology, Iyer stated, “Armies of people are not creating enormous value. Today it only takes one person to run Linux.” Most companies are looking for quality over quantity.

He pointed to the talent pool he has to choose from and said that management’s style has changed. Today you feel privileged to have good people work for you. Furthermore, talented people want to work for good people. They want challenge and they want to change the world.

The VMware diversion

For Iyer, VMworld 2015 has been eye opening in terms the public’s perception of VMware. He said that people want VMware to be successful, and there is a great deal of good will. However, these expectations place the weight of the world on the company’s shoulders.

When it comes to the Federation/standalone company debate, he tells customers to “write the show.” He tells them, “You are in charge. You tell us what you want us to do.”

Watch the full interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE and theCUBE’s coverage of VMworld 2015.

Photo by SiliconANGLE