As the coronavirus continues to wreak havoc across the world, many enterprises have rolled out mandatory work-from-home policies to keep their operations ticking — and that shift to the home office is likely to become the “new normal” not only for many workers but for tech providers as well.

Square in the eye of that storm is VMware Inc., the maker of software to “virtualize” computing and make it available in the cloud. In an exclusive interview this week with Wikibon analyst Dave Vellante, host of SiliconANGLE’s video studio theCUBE, VMware Chief Operating Officer Sanjay Poonen (pictured) said one of the main things for companies to think about is endpoint management: managing their workforce remotely.

“A lot of our customers are adjusting to this new normal,” Poonen said. “As a result, they have to either order devices with a laptop, screens, things of those kinds, to allow a work-from-home environment to be as close to productive as they work environment. So I expect that there will be a surge in the endpoints that people need.”

Indeed, a survey of chief information officers by the data company Enterprise Technology Research published last week shows that many organizations are even planning to increase their spending on work-from-home infrastructure to cope with the crisis. And that spending will involve a lot more than simply buying a pile of new laptops and dishing them out to company employees and letting them get on with it.

Lasting impacts to the way we work

Poonen shed some light on what he views as the likely lasting impacts the coronavirus pandemic could have on the way people work. He noted that he has spent numerous hours connecting with customers through virtual means instead of traveling to meet them face-to-face as did in the past.

“I hope that maybe my travel percentage will drop,” he said. “It’s actually good for the environment, good for my family life. If we can lower that percentage and still get things done through Zoom calls and Workspace One, that would be awesome.”

The COO is also determined to meet certain personal goals he set himself at the beginning of the year, despite the coronavirus. For example, this year one of his main areas of focus is to expand VMware’s security offerings, and he sees no reason why that still can’t be done.

“We have a billion-dollar security business and we’re looking to grow that — NSX, Carbon Black, Workspace ONE and accompanying tools,” he said. “To do that I made it a goal to try and meet more chief information security officers.” He still intends to do so, but most of those meetings will now take place virtually.

“Of course, there will be a product pitch for NSX and Carbon Black and how we’re different from whoever it is, Palo Alto and F5 and Netscaler et cetera,” Poonen said. “We’re differentiated, so I want to certainly earn some of the business. But these are ways in which you adjust to a virtual kind of economy, where I’m not able to physically go and meet them.”

Serving the work-from-home imperative

Poonen thinks the sudden need for millions of employees to work from home will make services for endpoints — by which he means virtual desktops, network security and application acceleration — far more important.

And he thinks VMware is well-positioned to provide those kinds of solutions through its Workspace ONE product, which is a ready-made platform that bundles the company’s Endpoint Security, Carbon Black security offerings and Network Platform NSX tools. “As customers come to us and say, ‘What do you have as a work-at-home for business continuity?’ we’re able to offer them a solution,” he said.

VMware is also taking care to ensure its customers can afford to pay for its products during what is undoubtedly going to be a time of financial hardship for many, according to Poonen. He said the company is being very sensitive with regard to pricing, in part to help ensure customers don’t feel like VMware is trying to take advantage of the situation.

For example, VMware sells a large portion of its products as a software as a service, or on a subscription basis, which Poonen said gives customers much more flexibility over when they can pay. It also offers financing services to customers through partners such as its parent company Dell Technologies Inc. that allow them to pay for its products over time.

Only the strongest will survive

As for the impact of the coronavirus on VMware’s own fortunes, Poonen said he didn’t want to make any predictions at this time, noting that the company hasn’t issued any guidance to investors regarding its quarterly finances.

[Editor’s Note: Subsequent to this interview, VMware withdrew its first-quarter and fiscal 2021 guidance, citing the coronavirus pandemic.]

“We’re working hard do the best we can in all the regions, and to be available for all of our teams,” he said. “We’re reaching out to CISOs, CIOs, CTOs and CEOs to help them. I believe people will spend money, and I think that the strongest companies will survive. Those companies with better balance sheets. But unfortunately, a lot of the weaker companies won’t.”

Poonen had some words of wisdom too, saying he believes this is a time when strong leadership really counts, citing examples such as John Chambers, the former longtime CEO of Cisco Systems Inc., and Winston Churchill, the prime minister of Great Britain during World War II.

“Never waste a good crisis,” he said, quoting Churchill. “As you do that, the strong will become stronger because you figure out the way by which, if you’re going to make changes that were planned for one or two years from now, it might be a good time to make them now.”

He also stressed the importance of communication during these challenging times. He said companies should communicate a vision to their employees, and do that incessantly, over and over again, until those employees can repeat the mantra in their own words in a simple fashion. But they should also take care to listen to those same employees, he said.

“One of the things that we’ve been doing a lot of these days is communicate, communicate, communicate, internally,” he said. “We do calls with our top leaders over Zoom. Calls, intimate calls, and often we’re adjusting to where I’ll say a few words. I’ll speak for about five minutes and then for the next 25 minutes I listen. There’s nobody who should stay silent, because I want to hear what’s going on in that corner of the world.”

Here’s the full interview:

Photo: SiliconANGLE