CTO Chats with Tipu Vaithee Swaran, Technology & Strategy Leader, Capital One

Could you please introduce yourself and tell us about your current role?

I’m Tipu Usha Vaithee Swaran. I’m currently with Capital One, following the merger with Discover, where I’ve been for nearly three years. Before my three years in the industry, I spent over 15 years in technology and management consulting, with a focus on bridging the gap between business strategy and technology.

I joined Discover as part of the CIO’s strategy office, driving technology strategy and data-driven transformations. I’ve worked on several transformation initiatives, including workforce management and establishing a data analytics capability for the organisation. I’ve also been heavily involved in M&A, leading the programme for a major divestiture and now on the massive integration effort between Capital One and Discover.

The IT landscape evolves rapidly. What challenges are you currently facing?

That’s an interesting question. There is an age-old challenge that still remains one of the biggest: the strategic alignment between business expectations and technology delivery. Most of the times technology and business operate in silos that they struggle to understand each other. Bridging that divide between business and technology functions can be one the most difficult things in an organisation.

In terms of innovation and emerging technology, another challenge I see is that organisations sometimes chase the “new shiny object” a bit too fast. New technologies like AI have great potential, however we need to do the proper due diligence and cost-benefit analysis to see if it truly fits our ecosystem and will meaningfully add value to the enterprise goals.

Finally, the integration of new technologies is a major challenge. How does a new AI application fit within a large legacy ecosystem of thousands of applications? We also have to consider their impact on processes, people, and data to ensure we don’t create new silos and allow for seamless adoption.

How do you think the IT sector will evolve in the next three to five years?

AI is definitely going to be a huge part of the world going forward. The conversation is not about whether AI will replace you, but whether you can learn to work with AI.

In my experience, every time a new technology arrives, the need for technology savvy people actually increases. We live in a complicated, interconnected world, and new technologies create so many additional touchpoints that you need smart people to manage them. However, the great thing about emerging tech like AI is, it helps free up time and effort from mundane, day-to-day work, which gives people the chance to focus on innovation, create new products and drive new business opportunities.

How are IT leaders navigating the changing regulatory environment?

The regulations always lag behind technology, because the evolution of technology happens too fast. This has been true with legacy computer systems, most recently with data, and now with AI, the regulatory gap is only going to exponentially increase. At least in the US market, from a regulatory standpoint, it is very reactive.

We also need to tread a fine line between putting in too many regulations, which can stifle innovation. It’s a balance between managing people’s privacy and security without restricting the convenience and comfort that new technologies can offer.

How do you balance the need for innovation with the demand for stability and security?

That’s a great question and a fundamental part of my philosophy. You need to balance doing new things without breaking what you do well today. An approach I have seen work is to use Centres of Excellence (CoEs) as innovation hubs to drive your blue-ocean thinking.

It is also critical to integrate the CoEs with the day-to-day operations and risk management functions of the organisation. This requires strong strategic planning as well as change management to communicate the benefits and take people on the transformation journey. 

I also believe that it will come down to great leadership across the organisation, who will need to balance the strategic aspirations with what can be realistically achieved.

How do you approach mentoring and developing the next generation of leaders within your IT team?

As a leader, you first need to have a clear vision and be able to communicate the goals and objectives to your team. After that, it’s about providing them with necessary direction and empowering them with responsibility to manage the work.

A lot of aspiring leaders don’t want to be constantly told what to do. You need to give them the right level of direction but also the freedom to drive things forward. This helps them develop their own leadership skills and discover whether they prefer to be people managers or creative individual contributors.

Finally, you have to be transparent with people about feedback and growth opportunities. Having regular conversations with your team about their career goals and helping them map out possible paths to get there is a key part of mentoring.

Reflecting on your experiences, what’s been a memorable insight from knowledge-sharing discussions?

Attending knowledge-sharing discussions is one of my favourite aspects of professional development. The greatest benefit I get from roundtable discussions is gaining an alternate perspective. 

We all live in our own minds and can fall into confirmation bias, where we keep reinforcing the concepts and theories that we already believe. These kinds of discussions open up my mind, and help me realise how to improve things I’m already doing, or take a different approach, or learn new technologies that I didn’t even know existed.

For example, in a recent executive roundtable on AI, discussion with another technology leader opened my mind about how the future AI architecture can move from LLM to SLM to make enterprises better achieve AI maturity in a cost-effective manner.

What’s one question all CTOs should be asking themselves today?

Coming from a strategy & transformation background, I see a lot of digital transformations struggle to achieve their objectives despite an abundance of tools and technology skillset. The key question that CTOs, CIOs and transformation leaders should be asking is “Are the technologies we build meaningfully delivering business value?” 

This would mean, to not chase the hype-cycle but rather chase the value-cycle. I would encourage CTOs to take a data driven approach to evaluate and pilot whether those new technologies are helping drive metrics like enterprise revenue, cost efficiency and meaningful customer experience. This data-driven approach before, during and after transformations will help bridge the business-technology divide and create a sustainable digital organisation.