The future of work is one of the most discussed topics currently. On today’s program, we delve into the battle and future of hybrid work and AI in the workplace. It was a distinct pleasure to have Jeetu Patel Cisco’s Executive Vice President and General Manager of Security and Collaboration join me for this conversation. We discussed the new iteration of “back to the office”, the technical tools that are coming to open companies welcome a global talent pool, and how to protect employees with regard to security. We also touched on AI in its dual form – the positives and the challenges ahead. Lastly, as a thought leader, what do we tell our young minds to focus on in a world where predicting five years out is becoming increasingly difficult with the rapid pace of change?

Jeetu Patel is Cisco’s Executive Vice President and General Manager of Security and Collaboration. He leverages a diverse set of capabilities to lead the strategy and development for these businesses and also owns P&L responsibility for this multibillion-dollar portfolio. Jeetu combines a bold vision, steeped in product design and development expertise, operational rigor and innate market understanding to create high growth Software as a Service (SaaS) businesses.

A member of the Executive Leadership Team, Jeetu is helping to redefine Cisco's SaaS business and strategy to further accelerate the company's transformation and growth. His mission is to build world class, subscription-based products that solve Cisco customers’ biggest problems. His team is creating and designing meaningfully differentiated products that diverge in the way they’re conceived, built, priced, packaged and sold.

Prior to joining Cisco, Jeetu was the Chief Product Officer (CPO) and Chief Strategy Officer (CSO) at Box, a role he pioneered. He led the company’s product and platform strategy, setting the company’s long-term vision and roadmap for cloud content management in the enterprise. He transformed Box from a single product application to a multi-product platform used by 100K customers representing 69% of the Fortune 500. The discipline, quality standards, performance metrics, and stability Jeetu instilled fueled the platform’s growth – nearly quadrupling revenues to $700M+. Box’s growth scaled to reach over 60M users with over 50% of customers using multiple products. He also created the Box Platform business unit where he led product strategy, marketing and developer relations – driving products from incubation stage to mature offerings.