Established in 1984, Visible Systems Corporation is dedicated to enabling business transformation by allowing organizations to see change and drive their enterprise strategy to execution. 

An instrumental leader, Michael Cesino is the CEO and Co-founder of Visible Systems Corporation. He recognized a gap between Planning vs Executing strategies and knew that Process and Data were the missing factors. 

A proficient in the field of strategy, Michael understood the need of the hour. He knew that everyone liked to make better decisions but to make better decisions they need systems that are designed to properly execute the strategy. After analyzing and running many use cases involving both data and processes, Michael was able to find a solution. He reckons, "By bringing strategy, data, and processes into focus, you are able to better understand the context in which to make decisions." He also refers to this as situational data.

The Journey

Michael is a Senior Strategy Consultant with over more than two decades of profound experience in strategy. He considers himself fortunate to have worked on several business transformation initiatives - defining enterprise strategy including meeting specific business goals and objectives. 

In the early days of his journey, he started working and got involved in defining and modeling business processes, functions, and accountabilities. From that point onwards, his work involved identifying and mapping key enablers for move-ahead, strategic initiatives –utilizing business digitization and transformation techniques.

In his educational forefront, he has pursued an MBA and completed his Computer Science degree from Suffolk University School of Management and Boston University, respectively. His undergraduate degree is in MIS from Northeastern University. Most recently, received a certification in Digital Transformation: Platform Strategies for Success from MIT Sloan Executive Education. 

An Overview of Visible Systems Corporation

The organization's mission is simple. It drives enterprise strategy to execution by bringing people, products, and services together through software. In short, it helps connects line-of-business managers to the right data at the right time. 

Its latest release of the Visible Advantage platform enables organizations to extract insights from highly decentralized and distributed data thereby driving their enterprise strategy to execution. Using Starburstdata's high-performance connectors, its solution can accelerate time-to-insight by embellishing near real-time data into decision-making processes.

The organization's tagline, "Visualize. Align. Transform." emphasizes that it visualizes patterns, aligns strategy, and transforms change into meaningful business outcomes.

Meet the Mastermind of Strategy

When asked, "How do you describe yourself in one word", Michael promptly responded, "A Process-minded Strategic Thinker". Additionally, he shares a piece of insightful thought, “work at what you love to do otherwise you will lack the passion necessary to succeed.” He is a true example of following his passion, setting benchmarks, and being successful in his field of work.

His source of motivation is driven by strategy and experts in the field of strategy. Peter Drucker, once said that "strategy is a commodity, execution is an art."

Abiding by the meaning of the quote and integrating it into his work and performance, Michael is truly an "artist", who understands that "execution is an art."

He states," I am passionate about enterprise strategies but not just how to set the right strategy; also, about when to know it is time to pivot once the strategy is implemented. Therefore, I see the implementation and execution of the strategy as my focus - whether that be entering a new market, launching a new product, or setting a strategy for an acquisition or merger."

Giving a Tough Fight to Complex and Concerning Challenges

As a small business entering the enterprise software space, Visible Systems continue to be in an uphill battle. Many top-level executives of enterprise companies prefer to go with the de facto standard solutions albeit more expensive offerings by larger, more entrenched firms as opposed to a small startup or small business.

Additionally, corporate culture remains the biggest challenge. Often the mantra is why change anything if it isn’t broken? 

Michael believes that at the heart of this is a lack of trust in data, technology, and people’s capabilities. For example, fueled by the advances in self-service platforms, today we see the emergence of business technologists – many of whom are millennials. He doesn’t feel the corporate culture has yet embraced or learned how to leverage this emergence.  

Michael Shares his First-hand Experience and his Perspective on Industry Scenario

One of Visible Systems' first installations was with that of a lithium-battery manufacturer whose strategy was the early identification of defects for first-article inspections. However, because their production process was highly distributed, there was no way to aggregate data without taking weeks to extract, transform, and load the data into a central data warehouse. 

The organization sees this frequently in an industry where data critical to the implementation of a strategy is widely disbursed and potentially changes often. This sort of distribution of decentralized data is typically referred to as a data lake. By supporting open systems standards, interoperability, and connectivity to the business drivers, its solution is designed to address the challenges presented by a data lake. In the case of the lithium-battery manufacturer, it is able to reduce its time-to-market from months to days.

Expanding and Scaling to New Heights in Near Future

To expand Visible System's footprint, it has invested heavily in digital marketing technologies. Additionally, it offers on-demand training and onboard support for its customers. One aspect of the onboarding is the availability of “strategy” templates that are industry specific and enable its customers to incorporate preferred practices for taking a strategy from its inception through its implementation. Its customers are therefore able to save time and see a return on their investment much sooner than expected. 

A Notable Advice for Entrepreneurs in the Ever-Changing and Demanding Market

Michael’s key piece of advice is to stay up-to-date with the current market. It is easy to narrow one’s focus on the problem at hand. However, be cognizant of what is going on along the horizon. 

"Yes, we must act along a vertical plane to execute but we also need to reach across the horizon to see changes coming our way and pivot as needed", concludes Michael.