Hosted by Deidre Paknad, WorkBoard CEO
Cisco Security Business Chief of Staff, Anna Birch, and Deidre discuss the importance of alignment to drive growth in large enterprise. An acquired team brought OKRs in and the Security Business embraced them to unlock faster growth. Anna shares their journey, including the initial leadership alignment breakthrough, and how they’ve operationalized leading for results.
The Cisco Security Business OKR practice helps align teams on common growth objectives in a matrixed org with a deep product portfolio. Since the Security team brought OKRs and WorkBoard into Cisco, it’s continued to spread across other business units — especially those with collaboration and dependencies with Anna’s group.
About Anna Birch
Anna is Chief of Staff for Cisco Security Business Group. She has held this position since it acquired OpenDNS in 2015. At OpenDNS, she was VP of People Operations and Minister of Culture. These roles at the intersection of business outcomes and empowering people and culture to achieve them serve her well as she leads the OKR practice.
About Deidre Paknad
Deidre Paknad has founded and led three tech startups, acquired companies and been acquired, and led a high-growth business as an executive at IBM for several years; this affords her a unique perspective on using both speed and scale to drive growth. In her role as CEO at WorkBoard, she works with senior leadership teams at some of the world’s largest companies to clarify, align, and drive strategic priorities with greater speed and agility. She is a frequent speaker on Outcome Mindset™ and tapping into ambition.
Deidre has over a dozen patents and has twice been inducted into the Smithsonian Institution for innovation. Goldman Sachs named her one of the 100 most intriguing entrepreneurs of 2019. Deidre hosts The OKR Podcast, which focuses on accelerating outcomes and fostering an outcomes culture.