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Heavy Strategy

Heavy Strategy

Hosted by Packet Pushers

TechnologyInterviews guests

Episodes

148

Latest episode

Oct 2026

Language

EN

About the show

From technology to workplace culture, from geopolitical trends to economics, Heavy Strategy debates pivotal questions in enterprise IT. Hosts Johna Till Johnson & John Burke bring their technical expertise, analytical acumen, and contrasting viewpoints to discuss complex topics of interest to IT leaders. Frequently irreverent and always thought-provoking, these are the conversations you wish you could have at the leadership table. Tune in and join the think tank, where unanswered questions are better than unquestioned answers.

Listen to episodes

60 recent
October 27, 2026Episode 14839 min

HS148: Expertise, Layoffs, AI, and You

Since the dot-com bubble burst around the turn of the century, the US economy has seen periods of huge layoffs in IT. AI may be driving another such event, whether in slow motion as companies lay off staff thinking they can be replaced by AI, or suddenly in the event of an abrupt bursting of ... Read more »

October 20, 2026Episode 14742 min

HS147: Architecting Infrastructure to Meet Your AI Ambitions (Sponsored)

Many a IT professional is having the AI football tossed to them, “We need to implement in house AI, go do it”. If this is you, what questions should you be asking of yourself and of leadership? Getting traction accommodating vast new workloads with new and different behaviors is a challenge, given the parameters ... Read more »

October 13, 2026Episode 14635 min

HS146: Costly Choices and Forced Dollars – Thanks AI

Sometimes IT is forced to spend money to do nothing. It might be the cost of evaluating the products and services you don’t end up deploying. Or it’s the cost of scrambling to disable new functionality–mostly AI features these days–in existing apps and services, so it can be evaluated and re-enabled selectively, if at all. ... Read more »

October 6, 2026Episode 14545 min

HS145: The Economics and Architecture of AI Factories (Sponsored)

What is an AI Factory, and why would an enterprise want to invest in one? Johna and John are joined by guests Thierry Pienaar of HPE and Kaushik Shirhatti of NVIDIA to discuss what an AI Factory is, the business case for it, and who should consider them. They also cover the value HPE’s expertise ... Read more »

September 29, 2026Episode 14437 min

HS144: Next-Generation Data Centers: The Rules Are Changing, How Should Your Strategy Change?

In-house data centers are a hot topic again! Companies of all sorts are repatriating cloud workloads. Many want to ramp up in-house AI development, training, and production deployment. However much (or little) you know about building a data center, the rules have all changed in the last few years. From political/regulatory concerns to economics to ... Read more »

September 22, 2026Episode 14336 min

HS143: Why We Don’t Believe in Self-Healing AI (Sponsored)

Everyone is talking about autonomous AI for network operations. But in critical infrastructure, is removing the human really the right goal? In this sponsored episode, Johna and John welcome BackBox CEO Rekha Shenoy and VP of Products and Engineering Richard Phillips to discuss the risks of blind autonomy, where AI can go wrong, why human ... Read more »

September 15, 2026Episode 14237 min

HS142: The Blueprint for Automated Network Operations (Sponsored)

In this sponsored episode, Ronny Wolf of BlueCat Networks joins Johna and John to explore the importance of API-first architecture. They also discuss how BlueCat expanded beyond core DDI into intelligent network operations, the key differences between having APIs versus being built API-first, and how guardrails such as rate limiting and human in the loop ... Read more »

September 1, 2026Episode 14141 min

HS141: EA vs AI

What does Enterprise Architecture (EA) mean when AI is everywhere in the stack? Enterprise Architecture is about nailing down relationships and functions while AI pushes back with dynamic processes and probabilistic results. Join Johna and John as they discuss the possibilities for EA: does it prevail, adapt, or die? Episode Links: Watch this episode on ... Read more »

August 18, 2026Episode 14042 min

HS140: AI and Technical Debt – Boon or Bane?

Does AI increase or reduce technical debt? Join Johna Johnson and John Burke as they discuss how to make strategy in environments in which AI fuels untrammeled growth in enterprise complexity–but also points the way to automated optimization (and concomitant technical debt reduction). Episode Links: Watch this episode on YouTube The AI Technical Debt Crisis: ... Read more »

August 4, 2026Episode 13933 min

HS139: When “One Cloud to Rule Them All” is NOT the Answer: Regionalization

IT folks spent a lot of time in the last 20 years creating globe-spanning infrastructures that maximize performance while minimizing the number of data centers or cloud instances they operate. More recently, the steady rise of regionalized data sovereignty requirements has created counter-pressure. AI regulations are now adding to that pressure to ditch a single ... Read more »

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