Cisco Innovators: Interactive Service Request Viewer (iSRV))

The team behind the Interactive Service Request Viewer (iSRV) - a technology that makes the jobs of Cisco engineers faster and easier - talks about how Cisco's culture of innovation makes it possible to develop and create smart solutions to better meet the needs of customers.

Full Transcript:

I'm Steve Ricossa, I work in the product quality assurance team, and we focus on the customer experience, getting an eye on what the customers are feeling about Cisco products in general.


My name is Ken Patton and I wear a lot of hats at Cisco. I like to refer to myself as a data visualization architect, so my current role is to take data that we already have and render it on screen in ways that make it easy for people to digest and understand.

(Together they helped to create iSRV )

iSRV brings the customer experience, what's happening on the day to day basis out in the field, brings that customer experience directly to the engineers who are creating the next version of the products.


And we're also sort of setting the edge in terms of business intelligence, in terms of understanding data. It's a very powerful thing to take data that we already have and actually put it to use to bring value back to the business, rather than just having it sit around collecting dust in some warehouse someplace.

What excites me, that we're able to make a difference or able to work on something new that was actually very elegant in its simplicity.

(Steve and Ken work within a CULTURE of INNOVATION.)

A culture of innovation is where you have a lot of bright people thinking about new ideas, not just coming to work and turning the crank or getting their daily job done, but thinking about doing other things

(Since 1999, Cisco has recognized outstanding innovation with the prestigious Pioneer Award. Ken, Steve and their iSRV teammates were among the 2011 winners.)
You know it's one thing to be creative and imaginative, but you also have to do that with an eye of what are we really going after here? What are we really trying to solve? And Cisco absolutely embraces that.

Being recognized by Cisco is a great honor, frankly we were a little surprised because you really don't know what you're doing until somebody else says hey, you really made a difference, your really did something that is special to the company, you really blazed new trails here.

We think it's wonderful that Cisco makes the investment to recognize and incentivize innovation, and we were up against some very fierce competition and so you know we're glad in a sense that there's that much competition to go up against, that's a good problem to have. You know we felt good about what we were doing, but to have everybody on up to the CEO feel good about what we were doing is just truly amazing.

(Innovation is Happening at Cisco )